"So, I'm sorry, what? The Supplier sent you a box of cockroaches?"
And Clara thought her Christmas day had been shit.
There she was as, a 20 year old woman on the cusp of atheism, still being dragged along by her mother to the local church whilst everybody else on their street sat tearing open presents. Stuffing edacious faces with chocolate and plasticky tasting turkey. She had always envied everyone else, slobbing about in their pyjamas until 4PM in the afternoon, the unabashed laziness of it all. Clara and her older brother, Charlie, did their best to put up with it for their mum, smiling and simpering whilst they prayed, pretending to get teary-eyed over the greatness of God during the hymns. All the while concealing their laughter at the salacious gestures and indecorous murmurs of the other, that was. The saving grace was the presents, that despite her reluctance to fully participate in what her priest called a "flagrant celebration of sin and consumerism", their mum never forgot to buy for them. One thing that Clara's tolerance couldn't withstand, however, was her mother's reaction to the news of Lilly's stillbirth. After getting a call from Alice around midday to let her know, Clara had gone downstairs and collapsed onto the sofa, pulling a blanket around her; she felt imbued with a sudden sense of coldness, the news she'd just heard the only possible source, like somebody had opened a window without telling her.
"What's wrong?" Her mum had asked, in the middle of cleaning up the wrapping paper that Clara and her brother had unintentionally dispersed all over the living room floor.
"Lilly lost her little girl." Clara replied bluntly, watching the TV over her mum's shoulder; they were reporting a breaking news story about a terrorist attack in Lebanon, images of people being pulled out of some official looking building on stretchers, blood smeared across their faces like war paint.
"Well, I'm sure God has a purpose for her. He doesn't take children for no reason." Her mum replied, her voice almost mellifluous. "Tell your friend Lilly that."
"A purpose?" Clara spluttered. "What about them?" She snarled, waving a hand at the TV screen. "Does it not matter if we want to keep them down here? He seems like a bit of a selfish bastard to me. Fuck that all loving-thing."
"He didn't do that Clara. People did that." Her mum responded serenely.
"And he couldn't stop them? It's a load of bullshit. It's all a load of bullshit." Clara muttered in reply, ripping the crucifix necklace that her mum had bought her from her neck and chucking it onto the floor, before marching out of the house. For the rest of the evening, she sat on the swings at the local park smoking, watching the TVs through other family's living room windows. She watched the families' faces too; their smiles infused with a happiness that was as foreign to Clara as some forgotten bygone language, filling her with that same amalgamation of befuddlement and desolation. What would Clara prefer? The disgust that came with receiving a boxful of filthy insects from an anonymous blackmailer, or her own loneliness? Was that it what it came down to, now? Grim, she thought to herself as Gemma described how her mum had managed to quash the insect insurrection with her trusty Dyson. They had all gone to meet Alice, who had stayed at St.Edmunds over the Christmas holidays, in the university cafe and were just awaiting Lilly's arrival. If she showed up, that was. Clara wouldn't.
"I mean, I did say we could all go to hers if that would be easier but-" Alice was fretting under her breath, glancing down at her almost empty purse and moving away from the fruit salads to instead grab a bottled water, sliding it across the counter top to the woman behind the till.
"Alice, Lilly's said she's coming." Gemma interjected, grabbing a handful of bread rolls and dumping them next to Alice's water along with a £2 coin. "I don't think you having a breakdown over her being a few minutes late is going to help her once she actually gets here. Calm down. But yeah, Clara, actual bloody cockroaches."
YOU ARE READING
Trust No Bitch: Part 3
Mystery / ThrillerYou think you know the story: 4 women, a dead friend, and an anonymous texter. But think again. It's about to get a whole lot messier, as 4 British university students are about to find out. Full of sex, drugs, and deceit, you've come to the wrong...
