Finding Jemima

Birthday girl

MATTY

I sent Tom in to watch Jem while I got ready, I was determined to make sure the party went ahead despite yesterday's incident.  After I took a quick shower and threw on some clothes I went downstairs and the boys were all busy with party preparations, obviously feeling the same way I did.  We had kept it low key, just family, a few decorations, junk food, some inflatables in the pool, we had set up some instruments and some karaoke in the garden hoping to persuade Jem to play for us as we still hadn't seen or heard her perform and we were all dying to know if she was as good as Tammy had been telling us every time she rang, but I wasn't holding out much hope, as it was a subject we had not made any progress on and I doubted she would be in the mood after last night anyway. I looked around to find Jem, Max saw me looking and gestured towards the sofa where Jem was sitting with Tom her head rested on his chest and his arm wrapped around her.  I walked over to them, smiling at the sweet sight before me, my fragile little sister being hugged by my best friend who over the years had become more like a little brother to me.

"I gave her some pills for her head and then She fell asleep, I thought I would just leave her be" Tom whispered.  Jem stirred and sat up. "Sorry I didn't mean to wake you sleepyhead". Tom stroked her hair as he spoke gently to her.

"Jem I know today's not the best day to talk about it, but Felix?" I cautiously asked.

"It's over, he was sleeping around with other girls, said it was my fault because I left. He said I was too much hard work anyway. He's probably right I'm just too broken."

"no your not! It's his loss Em, if he can't see how great you are, then he can sod off" Tom interjected.

"I am truly sorry about yesterday, I guess I just needed to be wanted by anyone.  I always screw things up don't I.  You guys would be better off without me here, I'm just holding you back" she sounded so deflated as she apologised yet again for what happened.

"Don't talk like that Jem, I know it's not been easy but your my little Jem, you have to know my life is so much better with you in it."

"Same here" a chorus of four boys added.

A tear rolled down her cheek and I wiped it away "come on, no tears today birthday girl"

"Why does everyone leave me Matty?" She squeaked out quietly fiddling with her fingers.

Before I could think of an answer there was a knock on the door, max answered it and the parents and George all piled in.  Tom had already phoned Sandra to update her on last night.  She immediately made a beeline for Jem, whilst everyone else went straight out into the garden.

"Hey there honey." She sat on the small table opposite Jem and Tom on the sofa "How you doing today, the boys looking after you ok.?" She gave Tom a mum look that said that he'd better had.

"Yeah they have, I don't know what I ever did without these idiots" Jem joked trying to lighten the mood, or avoiding any more questions, I couldn't quite tell.  Her phone rang on the side and she looked at it seeing it was Tammy calling.

"I'm just going to take this, it's Tammy, is that ok Matty?" she said exiting to return to her room as I nodded at her. Tom had already told me he had noticed before she came down this morning that she had a ton of messages and missed calls from Tammy, Peter and Felix. Tom followed Jem out of the room and lingered at the bottom of the stairs making sure she was ok without me even having to ask him to.

The rest of the boys dispersed and they were bossing everyone around giving them jobs to do to finish off party preparations.  I flopped onto the sofa and put my hands to my head letting out a frustrated groan. Sandra sat next to me and put her hand on my knee.  As she did we could hear Jem's muffled sobs coming from upstairs as she spoke to Tammy on the phone.