You Know He's A Keeper When He Quotes Bruno Mars

Chapter 12

Dedicated to @joashi because the book of that account Breaking Apathy is unbelievable! I'd seriously recommend reading it NOW!!

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I couldn't surpress that feeling. It was haunting me since the second Logan had stood so close to me on the pitch. The intensity of his stare still shook me raw. The tickle of his breath against my cheek as he spoke still lingered. And then the heavy feeling I'd felt when he wasn't at the front door anymore still punched me in the gut.

And yet I didn't want to feel any other way.

It was last night. I didn't sleep at all. Especially not with Effy's fixed silence, when she wouldn't even look at me whenever I talked. Breakfast that morning was horrible. She'd put the Cornflakes and milk back as soon as she was finished with them, pretending I wasn't about to use them. She held a magazine up in front of her face as if I wasn't there to make conversation with. She didn't even nod in response whenever I asked a question, pretending I just wasn't there at all.

I didn't know what I should have been thinking about. I could still taste Darren's breath, I could still see Logan's eyes, but my heart was being squeezed and weighed down by Effy's tight grip. Metaophorically, of course.

I hated fighting with her. Anyone, really. I never liked when anyone wasn't happy. I'd go out of my way to avoid tension and confrontation, even witnessing it on anyone's behalf. It was the assertive voice, the voices that could make you feel so small. The voices that you couldn't talk back to. I didn't like being voiceless. I didn't like feeling small.

But what about if I'd never really had a voice to begin with?

"Ron, which dress?" Libby asked, pulling me back to her little bedroom in the caravan. I was sitting on her miniscule paper-thin bed while she twirled in front of me, holding up a bright pink dress with a bow on the front in one hand, a blue frilly one in the other.

I smiled at her. Libby looked just like Effy, but she was at the age just before blonde hair starts to fade. It was more white and wild. Her skin was milk-bottle white and her eyes were the widest eyes in the world.

"The pink one, definitely," I told her and she jumped up and down, throwing the blue dress on the floor.

"I thought that too!" she squealed. She turned around so she was looking in the little mirror attached to the wall, smiling at her own reflection. I smirked. She'd always been Effy's sister. "Oh, Ronnie, I'm so nervous!"

I got up and walked up behind her, running my fingers through her hair as I examined her through the mirror. She was so small that she only came up to my waist. Granted, I was five foot eight and a half, and Effy's whole family was quite petite.

"You'll be great," I said softly.

It was the CoolKidsComp show that day. Apparently, they held it every Friday in the entertainment centre. Any child under twelve who took part had to perform some sort of dance from the audience, the MC would pick someone out who stood out, and then they'd go on the stage with an older family member and do a talent. And Bob's your uncle.

"Bob is my uncle," Libby had told me innocently when I'd tried to calm her down about getting up on stage if she were picked. I rolled my eyes and scruffed her hair.

"It's a saying."

"Don't mess my hair!" she exclaimed, leaning in to the mirror and patting it down.

I looked at my watch. "Come on, Lib. Time to get changed and go. Your mom and dad are already there waiting to see you." Libby bit her lip and looked down. At first, I'd mistaken it for nerves.