Trust No Bitch: Part 3

Gemma Akintola: Thursday, 25th December, 2015

"It's Chriiiiiiiiiistmaaaaas!"

Every. Bloody. Year.

"Zack! Turn it off, you wanker!" Gemma Akintola heard her brother, Ryan, bellow as she shoved her head into her pillow with a groan. Her other brother, Zack, was the one bounding up and down the hallway, yelling Christmas songs and chortling to himself. She'd never known an 11 year old with such a partiality for the warbles of Noddy Holder.

"Gemma!" Zack called, sticking his head around Gemma's bedroom door and peering at her. "Gemma! Are you getting up? It's Christmas!"

"Really?" Gemma murmured back. "I'd never have guessed." She pushed her pillow aside and sat up against her headboard, massaging her temples. "What's the time, Zack?"

"6 AM!" Zack replied proudly, Gemma groaning again; she'd had a grand total of 3 hours sleep. By the time they'd got Lilly to the hospital, it had been 8ish. An hour or so of waiting to be given an update on how Lilly was doing, only to eventually be told this wouldn't be allowed since they weren't immediate family, took them to 10. Add another couple of hours for the drive back and it was 12:30AM. 2 and a half hours later, that whole time spent holding back a panic attack over what she'd witnessed, Lilly shrieking in pain, blood everywhere, Gemma had finally fallen asleep. And now?

Her family expected her to fulfil the usual Christmas commitments that came with having 3 younger brothers, and then attend her evening shift at TGI Fridays straight after dinner. She supposed her other brother, Sonny, wouldn't be that bothered about Christmas this year, what with him being arrested for stealing a ring that he hadn't even touched less than 3 weeks before.

You're to blame, Gemma reminded herself, getting out of bed and pulling her dressing gown off the back of her bedroom door, wrapping it around her and padding out into the hallway. If you just gave that video of you screaming at Josh to the police, the Supplier would never have framed Sonny.

"Morning, Gem." Her dad said with a yawn, closing his and Gemma's mum's bedroom door behind him. "I'll see you downstairs in a minute. Your mum's already down there. I'm just popping to the John."

"The John?" Gemma scoffed, raising her eyebrows. "Dad, nobody in the last decade of human existence has called the toilet the John."

"Merry Christmas to you to, my sweet daughter. Good to have you home." Her dad responded with a chuckle as Gemma sloped down the stairs and into the lounge where her mum was sat on the sofa with a cup of tea, Zack sat cross-legged at her feet. Her 14 year old brother, Ryan, was sprawled across the other sofa with a pillow resting on top of his face. Sonny was perched in the armchair with his head in his hands; it was him that Gemma went to, balancing herself on the arm and resting her hand on his shoulder.

"Merry Christmas everyone." She mumbled, grinning blearily at them all, Sonny raising his head with a subdued smile. "What are you all hoping for?" She asked, though she knew everyone's answers. Her middle brother, Ryan, was a fledgling photographer and had asked for a new camera. He was going through his "artsy" stage, rarely seen out in public without a beanie hat pulled down low over his forehead, his skateboard tucked under his arm and a packet of cigarettes in his back pocket. Only Gemma knew they were just ornamental; if Ryan actually smoked them, he may as well castrate himself right then and there. Her parents' cordial demeanours were really quite misleading. As a duo, they were practically authoritarian when it came to their children following the house rules, which included no smoking before 18 (though this was the official line, Gemma was quite sure her mother would still be livid to see her puffing away on a fag at gone 20 years old), no drinking before 16 and no drugs, ever, under any circumstances. They were rules Gemma could see positively itching to be broken by her youngest brother, Zack, easily the most refractory of the Akintola siblings. A bit of a "troublemaker", said his school reports, their parents claimed that he was well-meaning, just a little "easily-excited", the typical "my kid's not that bad really" defence. It was true though; Gemma knew he didn't have a bad bone in his body. A tempestuous, inattentive bone?