Our Kiddo

It's not worth it

TW

There was a knock at the door. Leah went and answered it. A man a couple of years younger than she was stood before her.

"Hello?" she said, cheerfully with a questioning tone mixed in.

"Is Evie in?" he asked. Leah raised an eyebrow, wondering who he was and how he knew Evie.

"Yeah. She's upstairs. I'll call her down."

Leah moved to the bottom of the stairs.

"Evie? EVIE!" she shouted.

"Yeah. I'm coming," she heard a voice groan before footsteps could be heard. She appeared at the top of the stairs before freezing when she saw who it was. Her eyes widened in panic.

She turned round and ran back the way she came. A door slam indicating that she very much didn't want to see who it was.

"Sorry. I guess she doesn't want to see you," Leah told the man before moving to shut the door. She was now extremely intrigued.

"Please give her this," he said, handing over a piece of paper with a phone number on. Leah took it and then closed the door.

"Evie? Kiddo are you okay?" Leah asked as she knocked gently on the youngster's bedroom door.

"Go away," was the sniffled response that came back.

"Baby I just want to know that you're alright."

There was no reply so Leah opened the door and found the girl, curled up and crying.

"What's up?" she asked, full of concern, as she sat on the bed and allowed her to crawl onto her lap.

"That's, that's my brother," she stammered in response. Leah didn't know how to reply so she just let her lie crying and waited to hear more.

"How does he know where I live? What does he want?" Evie asked, her eyes full of panic.

"I'm sure it's all completely innocent," Leah tried to reassure her, not fully believing it herself.

"But, but I haven't seen him in years. Why now? We didn't end on good terms. We were never on good terms."

"What do you mean you were never on good terms?"

Leah knew that she'd never got on with her brother but Evie didn't like to give away details. Maybe now was the time to find out the root of the problem.

"Well he was mean to me all the time," Evie replied. Leah nodded, knowing that already.

"Like he hurt me a lot. He seemed to copy my parents and he hit me. He was horrid. Properly horrid. He said things you shouldn't say."

"He's gone now. I told him to go."

They stayed on her bed. Evie cried and Leah comforted. It was bad but Leah hoped that it would soon be put in the past. It was only a small interaction.

***

Since the unexpected turning up of her big brother, Evie had been in bad mood. She was angry throughout training and despite everyone's best efforts, she was shut off and didn't make them all laugh like usual.

She'd also been grumpy at home as well. There were no hilarious evening chats where they just laughed and laughed and Leah was missing it. She hated seeing Evie like that. It wasn't right. It wasn't like her at all.

They were playing against Reading and even in the changing room, Evie was pissed off. She had an angry expression on her face.

"You ok kiddo?" Katie asked.