Acquiesce

True Faith

August 1987

Trix locked the door behind her and froze as she saw Liam Gallagher swaggering down his front path the way he always did. She gave him a polite wave that he neither acknowledged or returned. She couldn't even see his eyes behind his dark sunglasses. He popped the collar on his Polo top up, lit a cigarette and set off down the street.

Liam was almost 16 and she had just turned 17. She still remembered his birthday. They'd shared a party once when they'd been...close. When the Gallaghers had moved in 5 years ago her and Liam had gotten close. Close in age and close in how they saw the world. They'd ride their bikes, play out the back, and kick deflated footballs across the football park until Peggy, escorted home from her work by his older brother Noel, shouted them in close to midnight. Endless, wonderful summers spent eating soleros from the van in 5 seconds flat to avoid sticky fingers. She missed those days more than ever.

Liam was wild and untamed and his wildness was infectious. It was like being bathed in the warmth of the sun in his presence. Liam's smile only dimpled at one side. She remembered that. She hadn't seen him smile in a long time actually.

They hadn't gone to school together. Liam went to the Catholic school. But they walked home together and she hung out with his friends at the weekends. It had never been romantic with Liam which she was grateful for. Liam didn't really treat his birds as well as his friends sometimes. He was a bit thoughtless that way but never out of badness.  Liam threatened any of his friends that even dared to look Trix's way for fear of their friendship becoming complicated by silly romances with his friends that would inevitably fail. It was just pure and innocent friendship. Liam had been the best friend she'd ever had. Until last year when all that changed.

They weren't kids anymore. Liam kept getting intro trouble. Her dad had firmly labelled him and, by proxy, the whole family as the "wrong sort". He'd previously gotten along well with Peggy, and although through different circumstances, he understood the pressures of raising kids alone.  It was a small estate and everyone knew everyone else's business. Everyone knew about Liam and his little gang. They left smashed bus stops, broken beer bottles and stolen wrappers in their wake. Her dad had finally had enough. And then he began grumbling about "What chance did they have of "being normal" with a father that did things like that to them? And that older one's no better. Not even got a job. Quiet, strange boy that one." It made her angry. He didn't understand. He never would. Like everyone else on this estate.

She sighed sadly. She knew Peggy's heart was roasted with her boys antics. Noel...was another story. But he was no longer under her roof at least. She'd heard he was currently unemployed living in a bedsit wasting the hours smoking weed. She knew where he lived, Peggy had given her the address, and she'd encouraged Liam to visit him but he refused. Their relationship had often been volatile and marred with petty jealousies sge couldn't understand. Trix often ended up in the middle of the argument or the brawl breaking it up as a designated peace keeper should. She didn't understand the animosity between them. But then she hadn't been raised in the chaotic and violent Gallagher home. And she was grateful for that.

She felt her face flush as she remembered the rarest of smiles she'd witnessed from Noel when she'd been honoured enough to make, the far more serious, Gallagher brother laugh. The most uncontrollable of laughs wracked his whole body. His heavy, distinctive brows would conceal the beautiful blue of his eyes as they crinkled. Although her feelings for Liam had never been romantic, the same couldn't be said for Noel. He was so different from Liam. The opposite in fact.

Where Liam was wild and loud and warm. Noel was carefully controlled, quiet, there was a distinctly detached coldness about his person. A coldness that had been engineered to protect him. She knew that much.  He didn't trust easily and it took a long time to get him to open up to her. In the 5 years she'd known him she felt she'd barely scratched the surface. He was older than her by 4 years and was also infinitely cooler. He listened to music she'd never heard of before. It wasn't stuff she taped off the charts. And he could really play guitar, not that he'd let anyone hear. But he'd left his window open on hot, summer evenings and the sweet plucking of the strings made their way into her bedroom window some nights. She missed that too.