Defy the Stars (6 page)

I closed my eyes. That was exactly it. I could feel the heat from Flynn’s face, so close to mine. He was waiting for me to give him the tiniest signal. He was a magnet, pulling me towards
him. There was no way to resist it. I tilted my face up.

The kiss shuddered right through me. My legs buckled. I leaned back against the tree. I opened my eyes. He was right there, his eyes shining.

‘River.’ His voice cracked and he pulled me into a hug.

I wrapped my arms around him, feeling his strong, muscular back through his jacket. We stood in silence, just holding each other.

A minute must have passed. I became aware of my phone, which had slipped as Flynn hugged me, pressing against my ribs. I suddenly remembered the text I’d received outside the shed. It was
probably just Grace or Emmi looking for me, but I should check.

I disentangled myself. Flynn said nothing, but he was staring hungrily at me. I reached for my mobile where it nestled alongside the money Mum had given me for my share of the taxi home.

‘Who’s texting you at this hour?’ Flynn said, an edge to his voice.

‘Back off, Dad,’ I said. ‘Go and have a beer and a fag with one of your girlfriends.’

‘They’re
Cody’s
friends, those girls we came with,’ Flynn said. ‘Airheads. Nothing to do with me.’

‘Whatever.’ I peered down at the screen. It was a text from Leo. I frowned. What was he messaging me about in the middle of the night? I opened the text:
Gemma just gone to
hospital. Sounds really bad but I don’t know more than that. Yr dad with her. Told him I wd let you know.

I stared down at the screen. Gemma was in hospital? That must mean the baby was coming. It was due now. It was the right time. So why was Leo texting that things were ‘really
bad’.

‘Something’s wrong at home.’ I showed Flynn the message.

A frown creased his forehead, then he looked up at me. ‘What do you want to do?’

I tried to think. My instinct was to call Leo but he had already said he didn’t have more information than was in the text. I could ring Dad but he was presumably busy with Gemma, which
was why he hadn’t called me himself. My stomach churned over. Gemma had lost a baby a year ago – an early miscarriage that I knew had upset her. This would be a million times worse. I
couldn’t bear to think of her and Dad not having this baby.

A sob rose in my chest. ‘I want to go to the hospital,’ I said.

‘Okay.’ Flynn nodded. ‘Okay, then you’re going.’

‘What do you mean?’

Flynn took my hand and led me out of the trees. For a few moments I was too surprised to say anything, but as we crossed the grass I uncurled my fingers from his. ‘What do you mean?’
I repeated, backing away. I checked the time on my phone again. ‘It’s one-thirty in the morning. How can I get back to Norton? It’s a ninety-minute drive away and there
won’t be any tubes or trains running this late.’

‘Well find a way,’ Flynn said, his mouth setting in that determined line I knew so well.

He was striding fast across the grass. I was almost running in my bare feet to keep up. ‘I could get a taxi back to Mum’s,’ I said. ‘Do you think she’d drive me to
Norton tonight?’

Flynn shot me a glance. ‘Your mum will say there’s nothing you can do until morning.’

He was right.

‘Then it’s hopeless,’ I said.

‘No,’ Flynn said. ‘Come on.’

I followed him through the house. I couldn’t see Cody though three of the girls he and Flynn had come with were still dancing. I caught sight of Emmi across the room but there was no sign
of Grace and James. Flynn was already at the front door.

‘Do you have a coat or anything?’

I shook my head, stopping only to slip on my shoes. I followed Flynn outside. The house was on a wide, residential street. Traffic zoomed past at the top of the road. Flynn turned towards
it.

‘Where are we going?’ I said.

‘To get you a taxi.’

‘A black cab? Even a minicab will cost hundreds from here. I’ve only got my share of—’

‘I’m paying,’ Flynn said.

‘I can’t let you—’

He turned and pulled me towards him. He lowered his face and kissed me – a hotter, swifter kiss than before. Then he started walking again, his arm around my shoulders, pulling me with
him. ‘It’s just money, Riv,’ he said. ‘You want to be there. I want to make it happen.’

I hesitated. Two black cabs passed at the top of the road. Both had their lights on. Flynn sped up. ‘Come on.’

We rushed to the top of the road. Another taxi was coming. Flynn held out his arm, flagging it down. As the cab pulled over, Flynn pulled his wallet out of his pocket. He shoved the whole thing
in my hands. ‘Take what you need,’ he said.

‘What?’

The cab stopped. Flynn leaned in at the window, giving the driver directions to the commune. The driver baulked at first, but Flynn was insistent. At last he turned to me and opened the
door.

‘Get in,’ he said.

‘Flynn, I
can’t
take your money.’ Flynn’s eye bored into me. ‘I don’t want it,’ he said. ‘I was going to tell you but then . . . the way
you acted before . . . I didn’t think you’d want to hear it, but I’m quirting work. I’m going back to college.’

I stared at him, the night air cool on my skin.

Flynn bent closer to me. ‘Everything you said was true, River,’ he said softly.
‘Everything.
Nobody knows me like you.’ He held open the door again. ‘Get
in.’

Still clutching his wallet I clambered into the taxi. I turned to Flynn, but before I could speak he slammed the door shut and the taxi sped off.

After all the noise of the party and the rush to leave it, I was alone.

I sat in stunned silence for a few moments, Flynn’s wallet in my hand, trying to get my head around everything that had just happened.

The taxi driver was playing dance music up front. He whistled in time with the beat as he zoomed through some traffic lights. I peered out of the window. Flynn was still standing, watching me
drive away.

We turned a corner and Flynn disappeared. I fastened my seat belt and opened the wallet. Inside was an Oyster card, two credit cards and two ordinary bank cards, plus a few receipts and a
half-used folder of matches with the logo ‘Blue Parrot’ stamped on the front.

I pulled back the soft leather divider. Whoa, there had to be nearly five hundred pounds in here. What was Flynn doing carrying around so much money?

I counted out all the notes, then checked the two remaining small pockets. One contained a condom. The other a tiny photograph that had clearly been cut from a bigger picture. I peered at it,
trying to make out the face on the photo in the passing street lamps.

It was a picture of me, though I didn’t remember it being taken. I was smiling in the photo, the light behind me, glowing around my hair.

I sat back and let out a long, slow, shaky breath.

The memory of our kiss in the garden filled my head. What had I been thinking?

You weren’t thinking, I told myself. It was stupid. A mistake.

Well, it was also over.

Except that, at the back of my mind I knew that whatever else I did, I would have to find some way of returning this wallet to Flynn. Even if he didn’t want the money, he would surely need
the cards.

Trying to put him out of my mind, I texted Grace, telling her that I’d had to leave the party because Gemma had been rushed to hospital. Then I tried to ring Dad. The call went to
voicemail.

My thoughts drifted back to Flynn and the argument he’d been having with Cody. What was the name of their boss? Cody had said very clearly that he wouldn’t let Flynn ‘walk
away’.

I frowned, trying to remember.

That was it . . . Bentham.

I googled the name, then scanned past the first few entries for a philosopher, a restaurant and a railway station. At the bottom of the page I came across a newspaper report from March last
year:

I stared at my phone. Was Bentham a gangster? A shiver ran down my spine as I flicked open the folder of matches again. So Flynn had been to this Blue Parrot bar. What the hell
had he got himself caught up in? My thoughts careered around for most of the journey back to Norton. One moment I was worrying about Dad and Gemma, the next, full of concern for Flynn. At least the
roads were virtually empty, my taxi making the entire journey in just one hour and fifteen minutes, depositing me outside the hospital at 2.45 a.m. and leaving Flynn’s wallet half emptied of
cash.

I felt a stab of guilt, but reasoned Flynn had insisted I use his money. In fact, he’d said he didn’t want it, that he was going back to college.

Did he mean that?

My head spun. I couldn’t make sense of any of it. Right now, it didn’t matter. Right now, all that counted was finding Dad and checking on Gemma. I headed into the hospital’s
A&E department and gave the receptionist Gemma’s name. Unsmiling, she directed me up to the maternity ward. It took me a while to find my way but at last I arrived at the nurse’s
station where a harassed-looking nurse said she’d try and find Dad for me.

I sat in a plastic-backed armchair in a small waiting room near a radiator blasting out heat. Occasionally nurses and doctors bustled past, but the place was fairly empty – and very warm.
It struck me that even though I’d said I’d be late Mum might well be worrying by now, so I sent her a text explaining that I’d got a lift to the hospital. I had just finished when
Dad appeared in the doorway. He looked terrible, his face pale and lined, his eyes full of worry.

I jumped up from my chair.

‘Dad? What’s happening? I got a text from Leo. Is Gemma okay?’

Dad nodded. He didn’t speak. I went over. To my horror his eyes filled with tears. He pressed his lips more firmly together and I realised he wasn’t speaking because he was trying
not to cry.

‘Dad?’ My voice came out small and terrified. ‘Dad, please, what’s going on?’

‘Gemma’s fine, love,’ he said at last. ‘It was a long, long labour. They had to do an emergency c-section in the end.’ He paused and pulled me into a hug. I put my
arms around him, breathing in the musty, incense-scented smell of his jumper. ‘How come you’re here, River?’

‘I . . . I . . .’ There was no way I could tell him about the money from Flynn. Not while he was in this state. ‘Leo sent me a text. It sounded bad, so I got someone at the
party to give me a lift back here.’

Dad squeezed me tight. His body was shaking as he fought back his tears. I held him, feeling scared. I had never seen him like this before. After a moment he pulled away and blew his nose.

‘Sorry, River,’ he muttered. ‘It’s just been . . .’ He shook his head, clearly unable to find the words for just how awful a night he had had.

I bit my lip, close to tears myself. ‘Dad,
please.
What about the baby?’ My whole body tensed, waiting for his reply.

‘She’s hanging in there.’ Dad wiped his face. ‘There was some problem, stress in the womb or something. They took her off to the neonatal intensive care unit as soon as
she was out.’

I stared at him. I had a sister. He was telling me there was a new person in our family, a little girl. Despite the fact that I’d been preparing for this moment since I’d found out
Gemma was pregnant, it still felt like a shock.

‘River, will you go down there and see how the baby’s getting on?’ Dad asked. ‘Gemma’s in a terrible state. I can’t leave her, but I hate to think of the baby
being all alone.’

‘Of course,’ I said.

Dad disappeared. A moment later he was back, with a young nurse – all smiles and crisp, blue uniform – who took me along to the neonatal intensive care unit. I wasn’t allowed
in the room where the baby was but the nurse showed me through the glass window.

‘There she is,’ the nurse smiled.

I followed her pointing finger to one of the clear-sided cribs that lined the wall. A tiny baby lay inside, red and scrawny and wearing a little pink hat. Tubes and wires ran in and out of her
body.

I gasped. ‘Is she going to be all right?’

The nurse parted my shoulder. ‘The next twenty-four hours are what counts.’

I stared at her. What did that mean? The nurse smiled again.

‘I’m sure the doctor will give your parents an update as soon as she can,’ she said.

The nurse left soon after. I stared in through the glass wall, watching my little sister. I said the words to myself: my little sister.

It didn’t seem real that I was related to that tiny scrap of life in the crib. I could still feel Flynn’s hot breath on my mouth, his strong back under my hands, the urgency in his
voice as he propelled me into that cab.

That
had been real.

I stayed in the intensive care unit for another half-hour, then Dad came and found me. He said Gemma was asleep, that he and I should go home, get some sleep ourselves, so that we could come
back in the morning. As we left, he put his arm around my shoulders.

‘Thank you for coming straight here, River. I don’t know what I’d do without you.’

‘Oh, Dad.’ I gave him a hug, not knowing how to put my own feelings into words.

By the time we got back to the commune I was totally exhausted and fell asleep as soon as I lay down. I woke, hours later, as glorious sunshine poured in through the window. I lay on the bed,
remembering everything that had happened last night.