Minus Me (14 page)

‘Who said my parents were coming? I thought you might come down to the south coast with me.’

Linda laughs at Maria, who looks like her eyes are about to pop out of her head.

‘And your parents will let you go? Just like that?’ says Maria, sounding sceptical.

‘Not exactly. But after a lot of nagging, they said I could go with your family to your holiday cottage. Come on, it’ll be an adventure. Our first trip all on our own.’

Maria sighs and leans back against the wall.

‘It’ll never work.’

‘Yes, it will. I’ve planned it carefully. I’ve told my parents I’m going up into the mountains with you and your family, and now you have to tell your parents you want to stay in town with me. And since I’ve been at death’s door, they’re guaranteed to let you stay here with us. Our parents won’t know a thing. And if they do realize, we’ll already be miles away,’ explains Linda, impressed at her own cleverness.

‘You are completely mad. Even if your plan works, how do we get there? Flights are really expensive. I don’t even have enough money to get the coach out to the airport.’

‘I got some birthday money. We can take the bus some of the way, then the train, then the ferry, and then hitch-hike a bit.’

‘Hitch-hike?’ says Maria, her voice rising to a falsetto.

‘Sure, lots of people drive just one to a car,’ says Linda, wishing Maria was a bit more daring.

‘Do you realize we could be kidnapped or murdered if we hitch-hike?’

‘Now you’re being negative,’ sighs Linda. She’s realizing pretty quickly that this is not going to happen. She’ll never persuade Maria to do anything so outrageous as to run away.

‘I’m sorry, Linda, but I can’t go along with this,’ says Maria firmly.

‘Okay, I’ll go without you!’ says Linda, with growing defiance. She’s damned if she’ll let this stop her. And come to think of it, perhaps it would be better to go alone. Then she won’t have to put up with Maria’s constant whining.

‘You’re at it again,’ says Maria.

‘At what?’

‘Being mean. Was that why you came here and apologized? Because you wanted to involve me in another crazy plan?’

‘Yes, but we wrote on our list . . .’

‘I don’t care what we wrote on our list! Why can’t you just be normal again?’

Linda wants to scream, but takes a swig of chocolate instead. It tastes vile, and the oily globules of melted cream make her retch. Linda doesn’t want argue with Maria again. She couldn’t bear to fall out with her now. Besides, she needs her friend as an alibi. Maria has got to cover for her so she can get far enough away before her parents realize she’s gone.

‘I’ve got to go, Maria. Axel and I are meant for each other. It’s just that I never realized it before. And I don’t know how long I’ve got left.’

‘Yes, but can’t you just call him, or send an email? Do you have to travel the whole country?’

‘Puh, it’s barely half the country.’

‘Well, even so, you can’t go. Imagine if something bad happens. Imagine if you meet someone dangerous, or your heart stops again, and you’re all alone.’

Maria grabs Linda by the arm, her fingers digging into her, and it hurts.

‘Oh, imagine this, and imagine that!’ says Linda, wrenching her arm out from Maria’s claws. ‘Shall I tell you a story? There was this woman who had her fortune told, and it said she’d die in a traffic accident, so she stopped going out of her house. One day a trailer drove off the road and right into the house where she lived, so she died after all.’

‘What’s that got to do with it?’

‘Everything. I don’t want sit around taking it easy, frightened that my heart might stop any minute, only for it to stop one day while I’m sitting there shivering with fear. I’m still alive, it would be pathetic to throw it away.’

‘You’re starting again,’ says Maria, banging the back of her head against the wall.

‘Starting what?’

‘It’s like yesterday, when you wanted to go into the cathedral. Did you go, by the way? You didn’t answer my texts. I was really worried. I lay awake for ages.’

‘Yes, I climbed into Nidaros. Zak came, so I wasn’t alone. It was really exciting. I’m finished with being scared, Maria.’

‘Are you?’

‘Yes, I think I am. But I need you,’ says Linda, taking Maria’s hands in hers. She kneels down in front of the bed and looks up at her friend. ‘I need you to cover for me.’

‘But you know I’m bad at lying,’ says Maria.

‘I’m not asking you to lie. I’m just asking you not to say anything. Please. You’re my best friend ever. Better than I’ll ever be,’ says Linda, kissing Maria’s hands. Kissing and kissing them until Maria can’t stop herself laughing.

‘Alright, alright. But you’ve got to promise me to stay in contact all the way. Send me texts and call,’ says Maria.

‘I promise,’ says Linda, leaping up and throwing her arms around Maria’s neck.

‘But what about Oscar?’ asks Maria, fixing a pair of stern brown eyes on Linda.

‘I’ll just send him a text,’ says Linda, extracting herself from her friend’s embrace.

‘Linda, there you go again. You can’t dump someone by text!’ protests Maria. And again Linda feels her sharp claws in her arm.

‘Perhaps you can tell him for me?’ Linda suggests, already knowing the answer.

‘No! There are limits to what I’ll do for you! You’ll have to do it yourself.’

‘Okay,’ says Linda freeing her arm and heading for the door. ‘Wish me luck.’

‘Good luck, you nutter!’ says Maria. Linda can see there’s a little smile lurking behind the stern mask.

‘You love me anyway?’

‘Always,’ says Maria.

Chapter 29

‘Yay!’

Linda leaps off the sofa in a wild dance of victory. She never knew she was so good at racing games. She has just annihilated Oscar completely. But now she gets a weird sneaking feeling and stops mid-dance. She turns towards Oscar who is on the sofa smiling up at her. He doesn’t look the least bothered about having lost so badly.

‘Did you let me win?’

‘Perhaps,’ he says, shrugging his shoulders.

‘Why?’

‘Because you’re my girlfriend,’ he says matter-of-factly. He pats the cushion next to him as a signal for her to sit down again. Linda sits in a chair a bit further away, and puts the console down on the table.

‘Oscar, I really like you,’ she starts. She finds it impossible not to sound like a character in a movie, and right now she wishes she was, and that this wasn’t really happening. But she continues: ‘And it’s not you, it’s me.’

‘Are you dumping me?’

Linda nods and bites the skin around the nail of her right index finger.

‘Aren’t we just going out because Maria and Markus are together, and they’re our best friends?’ she asks gently.

‘I reckon we are. Or were,’ he says with an awkward shrug.

‘So is that alright?’ asks Linda, scrutinizing him. He doesn’t look in the least upset, and although she’s relieved, she wouldn’t have minded if he’d looked just a bit miserable.

‘Yeah, it was probably a bit stupid,’ he says.

‘I like you lots, Oscar, it isn’t that.’

‘And I like you too, but not really in a girlfriend sort of way.’

‘That’s good,’ she says.

She reaches up to unclasp the dolphin necklace he gave her.

‘No,’ he says. ‘That was a birthday present. And we’re still friends.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Totally. And now I’m going to take my revenge! I’m going to annihilate you completely!’ he says, starting a new game.

‘That’s what you think!’ she says, grabbing the console again. She moves back to the sofa to get a better view of the screen. Suddenly she feels a hand on her chest.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Just touching your boob, so you’ll crash your car.’

‘You’re weird,’ she says, shoving his hand away.

‘You can talk!’

Oscar shakes his head before focusing on the game again. Linda thinks he looks rather handsome when he frowns in concentration. He’s not bad for an ex-boyfriend.

Chapter 30

Linda smiles to herself. Her feet are moving in time to the music in her ears. It’s great music to walk to. She smiles even more when she thinks about the way Oscar touched her. Girls are meant to get cross about stuff like that, but it wasn’t like that. Oscar is Oscar, and thankfully not her boyfriend any more.

The tram rumbles past and stops on the other side of the street. Then as it pulls away from the stop, Linda sees Zak standing under the streetlamp. In exactly the same place as she first saw him. The sight of him makes her feel even more upbeat. She takes out her earphones and waves and shouts over to him. Zak looks up and waves back, then runs across the road towards her.

‘Hi,’ he says, bringing a waft of cold air with him in his coat-tails.

‘Do you live round here? That’s where I saw you the first time.’

‘Well, I suppose you could say that. Where have you been? You look happy. Not been kissing, have you?’

‘No. I broke up with Oscar, and then he touched my boob.’

‘Well, that’s the sort of thing boys do,’ says Zak, shrugging his shoulders.

‘Is it?’

‘Of course.’

They start to walk down the road together. They go past Ila Church and cross at the traffic lights, on the red man.

‘I’ve decided to go down to the south coast,’ says Linda, after they’ve made a quick dash for it, to avoid being run over by an angry driver hooting and shaking his fist at them.

Zak shakes his fist back.

‘Stupid idiot!’ he yells at the disappearing car, before turning towards Linda again to ask: ‘Is Maria going with you?’

‘No, I’m going on my own.’

‘You don’t have to. I can come.’

Linda stops and looks at him.

‘It’s a long way. It’s even further south than Stavanger.’

‘That suits me fine. There’s a girl I know, and . . .’ Zak bites his lip and looks the other way.

‘In Stavanger? You know a girl in Stavanger?’

‘Now you’re asking too many questions. Do you want company or not?’

‘You never tell me anything about yourself, and I tell you everything!’ Linda stops, but he just walks on.

‘See you at the station,’ he says.

‘What makes you so sure I’m taking the train?’ Linda shouts after him.

‘Well, aren’t you?’

He turns to her, continuing to walk, but backwards.

‘Have you got a mobile number?’ she asks.

‘No.’

‘Surely everybody’s got a mobile.’

‘Not me. See you later!’

Zak hurries away. Linda puts her earphones back in and shakes her head. Zak didn’t even ask when she was leaving. But then he always seems to turn up at the right time. Perhaps he has telepathic powers. She’ll have to ask him, if he turns up on time at the station tomorrow. Not that she expects a straight answer to a question like that.

Chapter 31

s
,
c
,
r
,
a
,
p
. Linda puts her next word on the Scrabble board. Her mother adds an
e
, making it into
scrape
. Pleased with herself, she laughs and announces that she’ll have the last Jelly Baby, which is already halfway to her mouth.

‘But you’ve eaten nearly all of them,’ says Linda, looking at her mother, who gets a slightly guilty look on her face as she bites off its head.

‘I’m just so hungry. I haven’t been this hungry for ages.’ She closes her eyes to savour it fully, and then pops the rest into her mouth.

‘When you were pregnant with Linda, Wine Gums were the only thing you could hold down, Ellen,’ says Linda’s father absently as he looks down at his Scrabble letters.

Linda looks at her father and then back at her mother. Will they say something now? How stupid do they think she is? She’s old enough to see what’s going on. Or are they afraid? Afraid her mother might lose this baby too? Linda’s father adds an
e
in front of the
a
and a
t
and an
h
on the other side, making
eath
.

‘That’s not a proper word,’ protests Linda.

‘Yes, it is. It’s an old word for easy,’ he says, defending himself.

Linda leans forward and looks at her father’s letters. She sees he has a
d
. She grabs it and makes the word
death
.

‘There! That’s a proper word!’ she says.

Neither of her parents answers. Her mother gets up.

‘Perhaps I should refill this,’ she says, taking the empty sweet bowl.

‘No,’ says Linda sternly, grabbing her mother by the wrist. ‘Sit down.’