Do You Know Indigo?

Chapter Eighteen

Beth embraced me tightly in greeting. It was another Monday morning, another rainy day. I felt Beth tremble as she began to cry. It was so unlike her.

"Come on Beth, we're not helping anyone by just standing here and blubbering." Carefully I pushed her to arms length so I could look her firmly in the eyes. "You know that Sophia would scoff at us crying like this. No news is good news OK?" She sniffed and nodded. Enough was enough.

"I never thought I'd see the day where you would tell me to pull myself together. Urgh." She wiped her eyes. "Do you have a tissue, and come to think of it a mirror on you?" I shoved her jovially and pushed her towards the bus stop.

The bus was empty when we got on. I wondered where Mobile Man had gotten to.

"How do you think Jude and Mandy are?" Beth squinted at me, a bauble between her teeth.

"According to Mandy, Jude wasn't too bad after a good cry and a box of Alpen." Beth released the bauble and tied it in her hair. "When Mandy phoned last night she sounded choked up so we'll just have to see I guess," Beth replied, smoothing her ponytail. I glanced down at my cast and traced Kieran's name.

Trouble had been an understatement Indigo Boy.

"Chris, how are you doing?" I started not having realised Jude and Mandy had joined us. Mandy had taken the seat opposite and placed her hand on my knee.

"I'm OK, what about you?" She tightened her grip on my knee a little. Her eyes searched the air for answers.

"It's not been the most restful or cheerful of weekends, with my father covering it in the paper it was all that was getting talked about at home." She sniffed. "You know, it's at times like this I wish I was like Jude. She's only cried once." Prompted, I glanced at Jude.  She was shifty, avoiding eye contact with me.

"How much did you eat this weekend?" I enquired.

"Enough," she mumbled quietly.

Just before I attempted suicide, Jude was having problems of her own. Her family was in a mess what with her brother being in trouble with the law and her parents amidst a long divorce battle. Too caught up in self absorbed dispair I'd failed to notice Jude had stopped eating."

After she collapsed in a gym class she was in hospital for a month or so, a puppet to the tubes that fed her. The fact I joined her a week later didn't help anyone. We were both so young, so helpless and broken. But where Jude had had her reasons, I had nothing to say for myself.

"How much is enough?" I knew how much I despised being interrogated so this was cruel. Jude massaged the back of her neck gingerly.

"I had a box of Alpen bars and a couple of oranges. I wasn't hungry." she admitted.

"Is that all?" Beth questioned.

"You know its how I deal with emotion, it's not my fault!" she protested. 

"So come one then, tell me what you had for breakfast this morning!" Beth demanded. I didn't personally see the need to pester her further. The important thing was to get her to eat something.

"An oatcake." Beth pursed her lips.

"Here, eat this. Heaven knows you need it more than I do." Jude abstained. "That means you eat it now!" Beth chucked a chocolate bar from her bag at Jude, keeping solemn. Bashfully Jude ripped the wrapper open and stuffed a chunk into her mouth.

"Honestly if I wasn't able to eat twenty four seven I think I'd die," Beth huffed, patting her stomach adoringly. I rolled my eyes.

"So what would you die from, starvation or the massive temper tantrum you'd throw?" Mandy asked curiously, a small smirk creeping across her face. Beth pouted. Everyone else laughed but then awkwardly surveyed the bus floor.