Tripping

By Darren E Laws

Tripping is a surreal black comedy drama that looks at the lives of four friends and how the ripple effect of an event at university comes back to haunt them over a decade later.

Samantha arrives in London for a reunion with three university friends, but she is hiding a secret with a ten-year history that has touched and irrevocably changed the lives of everyone, even if they don’t quite know it yet. The story charts the lives of the four girls who at university have the world at their feet. Ten years later they have become women searching for the most elusive of dreams…happiness.

Tripping is a modern fable that explores the complexities of life’s most intricate paradox, balancing the mundane world of shattered dreams with secrets, lies and deception. Tripping is a step into a modern day wonderland. The events of a hot summer week in May during their reunion will change their lives forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Darren Laws
• Release date: Apr 24, 2013
• ISBN: 9780955407048

Darren E Laws

Born in East London in 1962. Darren's first writing success came in the mid 1990's, winning first place in a short story competition for a BBC Radio 4 arts program. The thrill of hearing his words read on Radio 4 drove him to write short stories of a dark and quirky nature before progressing to lengthier works.  Darren then crafted his first novel ‘Turtle Island’, a crime thriller, which was picked up by an American publisher. Darren is now a seasoned author with another novel, ‘Tripping’, a surreal black comedy described as chick-noir, published.  The sequel to Turtle Island is now completed, entitled ‘Dark Country’, and a fourth novel is in-progress which is another stand alone book outside of his series of Georgina O’Neil crime thrillers.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Friday 12 May 2000

‘Hurry up, she’ll be here soon.’ Becky swept Tom’s feet from the coffee table as she passed. Tom raised his legs as though he was the human equivalent of Tower Bridge to let her pass unheeded. She looked down at her dishevelled spouse. Tom was still unshaven, his usual condition during the week; only at the weekend or special occasions was his face ever likely to come in contact with a razor. He was dressed in his bathrobe, a cigarette hung from his lips, sucked but unlit.

‘Jesus, Tom, put some pants on.’

Tom lowered his legs unabashed, and sucked harder on the cigarette. It was so much easier to recover from a session when he was younger. He was trying to present as positive a disposition as possible, given the circumstances of having been totally rat-arsed a mere six and a half hour’s earlier.

‘She’s your friend.’ The cigarette thrashed about between Tom’s lips like a break-dancing haddock.

Becky continued her journey from the lounge up the stairs.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ She fiddled with an earring as she walked, trying to snap the small clasp into place to secure it. Becky heard the television spring to life. A breakfast television show boomed from the speakers of the home cinema unit.

She groaned inwardly.

Tom took the cigarette out of his mouth and gazed at it longingly.

*****

Alice Doughty hovered briefly on the edge. Staring at the glistening water, pleased that it was nearly summer and that this was one of the few open-air swimming pools that remained open, albeit for a few brief weeks in what appeared to be increasingly shorter summers. The water looked cold. The May sun would not have provided enough heat yet to make the water temperate for the human body or to be more precise, for her body, so only the serious swimmers glided like dolphins through the near empty lanes, as the meek gathered around the water’s edge drinking in the weak sun along with their diet Pepsi's and fat Coke's.

Alice stood. Her towel was wrapped around her waist. Her toe skimmed the surface, testing the temperature. The water's coolness sent shivers up her body forming thousands of goose pimples.

A seasoned swimmer reached the end of the pool and turned gracefully in one swift, motion. The sun felt nice on the back of Alice’s neck and fought eagerly with the rising fleshy goosebumps, sending them back below the surface of her skin.

She now felt aware that she was being watched, that ‘eyes’ had concentrated on her, making her indecision seem foolish. Alice knew that within a length of the pool she would join the growing ranks of swimmers immune to the temperature of the water; just one length and she would join the elite. She imagined her audience cheering her on, shouting her name, calling for her to enter the pool. Al-ice, Al-ice, Al-ice...She turned. No one was the least bit interested.

Alice dried her feet. Maybe she would swim another day, a warmer day, yes that was it, a day when the sun would be at its zenith, when she would look so brown and so fantastically beautiful. Today was not a day like that; today the water was too cold and she was too pale. She lay down on the grass and stretched her arms above her head. A copy of Zadie Smith’s latest novel was open by her side, destined never to be finished. Eventually it would occupy prime space on her glass-topped coffee table in the lounge, before taking its place amongst the ranks of other 'works of literature’ that she could never be bothered to read.

The sun was warm. Alice closed her eyes and began to fantasize. She dreamed once more of making love in an office, on a desk. Her skirt pushed up around her hips and his hands all over her body. She felt warmed by the fantasy, as warm as the sun beating down on her. Alice sighed, it was the third time in a week that she had had the dream, and still she could not see the face of her mysterious lover. She smiled as warmth flushed through her.

*****

‘Kings Cross Station...this train terminates at Kings Cross Station.’ The voice of the train driver crackled through a speaker system that had the audio quality of two tin cans connected with a piece of string. ‘Don’t forget to furmbal flidup algorithm in the berdoink.’

Samantha Baldwin rubbed the sleep from her eyes and metaphorically massaged the fug from her mind.

Around her, fellow passengers were gathering their bags, slipping rucksacks over their shoulders and preparing to meet and greet London. An old man who was sitting adjacent to her had magically disappeared. She hadn’t heard him leave the carriage, but she fell asleep near Doncaster and short of the train crashing, nothing would have awoken her. She stretched her body hoping to ease out the feeling of anxiety, which had dogged her since she opened the letter.

The train was slowing down, a general air of anticipation flowed through the compartment as passengers flitted back and forth in search of exit places. Two children ran through the carriage, their klaxon voices bellowing excitement. Exhausted parents followed the children’s wake, smiling apologetically to Samantha and the other passengers.

Samantha reached between the seats for her suitcase. It was decorated with dog-eared stickers proclaiming visits to exotic and some not so exotic destinations. It was as much a visual embarrassment as Samantha could bear, but having borrowed the case from her mother she felt she could not protest at the far-flung tack adorning the luggage. Anyway, apart from Becky she was unlikely to meet anyone she knew in London. Samantha lifted the case and plopped it on the threadbare seat next to her as she watched the station approach. Signs pronouncing Kings Cross were interspersed with the faces of passengers awaiting the return journey back to Newcastle.

‘Samantha?’

A hand rested on Samantha's shoulder. Suddenly she went cold.

‘Samantha Baldwin, I don't believe it!’

Samantha turned to greet a ghost from her past: Zoë Harrington. At the sight of Zoë, Samantha’s brain went to mush.

‘It is you!’ Zoë beamed.

Zoë Harrington didn't look a day older, though instead of jeans and a scruffy tee shirt proclaiming that 'Meat is Murder', ‘The Smiths’ or ‘legalise cannabis’, she was wearing a summer dress from Karen Millen that Samantha rightly guessed cost more than she earned in a month.

‘You look so...so...well.’ Zoë said, after a thoughtful gap.

Samantha knew exactly what Zoë meant. Zoë looked fabulous. Her blonde hair was radiant in the sunshine, extremely fine in texture and cut into an expensive style that looked every bit as healthy as the rest of her. Samantha self-consciously rubbed at a dribble patch that had collected on her lapel while she was sleeping. Her own hair stuck at different angles like cartoon electric lightning forks. Part of her wanted to feign a Scandinavian accent and lie through her teeth.

‘Noooooooo, I’m sorry, I am not knowing you, I am from Vetlanda.’ but she pathetically mumbled ‘Hi, Harry.’

*****

The mid-morning traffic was unusually heavy. Tom cursed as he guided his Honda Civic through Islington High Street.

‘We’re going to be late.’ Becky was using the mirror in the sun visor to apply her make-up and managed to sound disinterested yet sarcastic at the same time.

Tom glanced across at his wife, malice imprinted in the whites of his eyes. She was a master in stating the patently obvious. Becky remained calm and continued to apply mascara to her lashes as Tom searched for a pothole to bounce into. He turned the radio up. Becky reached forward and turned it back down.

‘Train will probably be late anyway.’ Tom offered an olive branch, feeling partly to blame as he had spent forty minutes in the bathroom trying to shave his face without accidentally cutting his throat or moving his pounding head too much. He swerved the car to avoid a cycle courier that overtook them for the third time in less than a mile. Tom blasted the horn and was promptly given the finger in return.

‘Bastard! Did you see that?’

‘Tom, don’t swear in front of Josh.’

‘Sorry, didn’t know it was his turn.’

‘You know what I mean, Tom.’

‘He’s a baby for Christ sake! He’s hardly going to start swearing at nursery is he?’ Tom looked in the rear view mirror; he could see his son smiling, oblivious to the world outside the car, and for the most part inside it too. For a moment, Tom wished he could change places with his son, until Josh’s face began to redden. A serious look of concentration overtook Josh’s features followed by a loud ‘parping’ sound. The smell that filled the confined interior of the car confirmed Tom’s suspicions.

‘Great, he’s had a dump.’

‘Tom!’

‘Ickle Joshy woshy’s filled his sacky with a load of cacky, didn't he?’ Tom said in his best patronising baby voice.

Josh promptly farted his reply

‘We’ll have to stop.’ Becky stated without batting a well-painted eyelid.

‘We can’t, we’re already late.’

‘I can’t meet Samantha with little Josh like that.’

‘It’s shit for Christ sake. All babies shit, that’s all they do, shit and cry. She’ll probably think it’s cute.’ After a pause, Tom suggested, ‘We can change him at the station.’ Ideally, Tom would like to change Josh for a SAAB Turbo 900. So far the expenditure on their baby son had reached the same outlay.

‘Good idea, you can change him while I meet ‘Sam.’

Sam, the name was already grating against Tom. He ground the gears and continued driving, cursing inside his head at this intrusion on his life. His mind went over the list of do’s and don’ts Becky had given him.

‘Always use the downstairs toilet, don't leave the seat up, open the window after you’ve been, light a match if there’s an odour, don't make too much noise if you must have sex, try and pick the pubic hair off the bath soap, wear pants under your dressing gown, try not to fart or belch...’ The list went on, but suicidal thoughts began to overwhelm Tom. Images of his car mounting the pavement and mowing down all the pedestrians before playing Russian roulette at the traffic lights entered his head.

Becky lowered a side window to allow fresh air to circulate.

‘I wonder what she looks like now,’ Becky mused, not really wanting or expecting a reply from her husband. ‘Ten years.’ She said airily, as though it was meant to mean something to Tom.

‘Kings Cross, half a mile, not bad.’ Tom said.

The two of them continued one-way conversations until they reached the station.

*****

The train ground to a halt and jerked the standing passengers sideways. Samantha instinctively reached out and steadied herself using Zoë’s bare arm for support. As soon as the train stopped she relinquished her grip and noticed four white indentations from her fingers. Zoë felt cool, almost cold to touch.

‘So where are you staying?’ Zoë said.

The doors to the train started to open and a mad exodus for freedom began. Samantha picked up her case, hoping that Zoë wouldn’t look down at it, which of course she did.

‘With a friend.’ Samantha replied, hoping to distract Zoë’s eyes from the adornment of curly stickers that screamed ‘I'M A WELL SEASONED TRAVELLER BUT HAVE ABSOLUTLY NO TASTE.’

‘Who?’ Zoë glanced upward and met Samantha’s pale grey eyes. ‘Anyone I know?’

Samantha started to walk to the open doors of the train. All the time she was trying to think her way out of telling Zoë whom she was staying with. With her back to Zoë, Samantha knew she could just lie and say...

No. No one you know.

And then bang on cue, Becky appeared in front of them. Jumping up and down like an over wound clockwork toy, arms flailing in a dysfunctional epileptic greeting. Becky’s voice screeching ‘Sam, Sam.’ so loud that every passenger on the train momentarily stopped what they were doing to focus on Rebecca Beckett. On seeing Zoë, Becky screamed. ‘Bloody hell, Zoë Harrington...HARRY’.

Chapter 2

Alice lay back in the bath and watched the water ripple as it clung to her body. The trouble with men, Alice thought to herself, is that they’re all so selfish. Selfish lovers, selfish conversationalists, selfish with the time they give you to wallow in their presence. The air was filled with aromatic vapours released from an aromatherapy set given to her as a present by her mother at Christmas. Of course at the time Alice scoffed at the idea of using such a thing, but over the past few weeks she found the solitude spent bathing, with nothing more than Górecki’s Symphony number three for company, an absolute blessing. The symphony always made her cry, but then again so did any show with Davina MacCall; sadness, as Alice defined it, dogged her entire life. The water in her bath was soothing and hot, so much warmer than the pool earlier in the morning. The tiled walls were misted, weeping condensation streaks adding to the content of the bath. Alice didn’t know if it was Górecki’s work or that of her boyfriend ‘Gerald’, that was to blame for her sense of melancholy. She always thought about ‘Gerald’ in inverted commas, he was that kind of guy, a boyfriend when it suited him, when the need, or his penis arose, which it seemed to Alice was happening with less frequency these days. God, what she’d give for a bloody-good knee trembling, sheet soaking shag, but alas as usual, Gerald was not around when he was most needed. But there she was, there was Alice, dependable Alice, on standby, awaiting instructions, being the dutiful mistress accompanying him to functions that he decreed his wife to be too old to attend; Alice would be waiting by the phone, -‘the Batphone’ as she thought of it- like a female Bruce Wayne awaiting the call to once more don her mistress costume and enter Gotham City.

Well not tonight.

Somewhere in the distance, somewhere beyond the golden voice of Dawn Upshaw, a phone was ringing. Alice looked through the half open skylight window; expecting to see the Bat-crest illuminated against an ochre sky, but all she saw was a cloudless, azure blue backdrop.

*****

Nothing had changed. It was over nine years but nothing had changed, Zoë Harrington was still the centre of attention. She was still gorgeous; ‘she’ was still 'Harry'. Harry sat in the coffee bar the key focus of Becky’s attention. Samantha hated her. She stood in line buying the drinks and Danish, while Harry sat and talked with Becky. Tom had disappeared with Josh who had just had another little 'accident'. Samantha hoped this wasn't going to be a portent of the near future.

‘Fourteen pounds forty.’ The woman spoke with a deep Jamaican accent.

‘What?’

‘Fourteen pounds for-ty, me dear.’ The Jamaican woman reiterated, separating the syllables as though Samantha was stupid or deaf, or both. Samantha opened her purse and rummaged around inside, fishing for a twenty-pound note that she knew to be lurking inside. She pulled out the note and unfolded it. Lines of purse detritus filled the creases, shamefully exposing Samantha's monastic lifestyle. The woman behind the counter blew the debris from the note and smiled at her sympathetically before lifting the note to the light and inspecting its validity.

‘Five pounds, sixty pence change.’ The small amount of money was handed back to Samantha. Samantha looked at the tray and the meagre contents on it. Three coffees steamed wistfully in polystyrene cups, one diet Pepsi, (‘Sorry I don’t have Coke, will Pepsi do?’) and four yolk-glazed Danish pastries sat forlornly on paper plates. This unappetising fare represented almost an eighth of Samantha’s weekly personal allowance. She put the change back in her purse and turned to find Becky laughing uproariously. Harry was trying but failing to stifle an expression of equal hilarity. Samantha couldn’t help but think that she was on the butt end of the joke. Her sense of paranoia had been cultivated through many years of self-doubt, and re-enforced by a total lack of confidence. She smiled as she walked to the table, trying to establish an air of self-possession, but failed utterly when she stubbed her toe in the well-worn carpet that gathered in conspiratorial bunches for no other reason than to trip her over. It was only the mildest of stumbles, but enough to send waves of coffee cascading over the Danish pastries. Samantha rested the tray - now swimming with pastry flotsam and soggy paper napkins - on the table, amidst another barely stifled snigger from Harry.

‘Sorry, spilt some.’ Samantha apologised, feeling a sense of her teenage awkwardness returning to haunt her.

‘Oh look, here’s Tom.’ Becky said.

Samantha looked over her shoulder to see Becky’s husband enter the café holding Josh close to his shoulder.

Tom smiled acknowledgement before navigating through the obstacle course of chairs and tables. A plastic cigarette-substitute was sandwiched between his pursed lips. His face made gestures like a goldfish in trauma as he sucked for comfort. Josh mimicked the gesture with his dummy teat.

‘Got you coffee, darling.’ Becky said, almost as though she was talking to her child instead of her husband. Tom handed Josh across the table to Becky’s waiting arms, pulled out a chair and sat down.

‘Isn’t he a darling?’ Harry was looking directly at Tom, but somehow managed to convey to Becky that she was talking about Josh; Samantha knew better.

‘He’s my boy.’ Tom shuffled proudly on his seat.

Becky sat the romper-suited child on the table for all to see, as though he was a contestant in a country show, some sort of prize vegetable, dressed in a blue-cotton all in one. Josh didn’t mind; he liked the attention; it gave him a chance to do what he done best; look cute, gurgle and break wind from every conceivable orifice. With his waves of extremely curly, almost white, hair sprouting from his head, Josh looked like a Swedish Shirley Temple. He was still at the stage where women thought him to be lovely and men worried whether the Y-chromosomes were in place.

‘I've often thought I'd love one...one day.’ Harry drawled, still looking at Tom.

The plastic cigarette in Tom’s mouth stiffened.

A waiter, swarthy, authentically Italian and theatrically camp flashed past and produced a Zippo lighter, which he ignited with a seasoned flick of the wrist, promptly engulfing Tom in plumes of acrid blue toxic smoke. Tom gasped, collapsing in a fit of coughing and smog, as the plastic melted and raced to his lips. Becky remained cool. She drained the contents of her coke before spurting it like a fireman’s hose in the direction of her husband's face, though exactly where that was, was hard to tell in all the confusion and billowing pollution. She heard a satisfying slosh as the liquid impacted against something, that something being Josh, who had crawled through the smog, his bright white locks now firmly plastered to his head.

‘I'm sorry, I'm sorry.’ The waiter screeched, now in a bad north London/Italian accent, while at the same time slapping the burning object from Tom's lips.

The cigarette substitute flew from Tom’s mouth across the room like a cruise missile, landing three tables away in a stunned diner’s vegetable soup, where it was promptly extinguished after ricocheting off a small floret of broccoli in the bouillon base.

‘Oh my god, my lips.’ Tom said, or he thought he did. In fact all anyone heard was ‘Oh fly dribble, ribble blip.’

*****

Alice had spent the last ten years dressing conservatively; she didn’t know why she dressed conservatively, when all she desired was attention, but she had made up her mind that tonight she was going to dress to kill. Tonight she was not going to be waiting at home for Gerald, on the off chance that he would call by for two and a half minutes of pre-coital fumbling, before an equally un-astounding 45 seconds of coitus.

She looked in the mirror and wondered when she had made the wrong turn in life. Where was the excitement in her life, where was the romance? Gerald's idea of romance was to cut his fingernails before having a rummage in her 'plumage.’ Plumage! God knows it was hard enough coping with his speech impediments, the stutter was bad enough, but mixed with his inability to pronounce any word with an 'R' dwove Alice to d'd'd'd'distwaction. Gerald had tried to pronounce 'Clitowis' on three separate occasions, but as hard as he tried, Alice knew he'd always have trouble getting his tongue around it. The only ‘UP’ side of the affair was the fact that he was absolutely loaded, and that his wife knew about her and didn't seem to mind. Truth was, Alice thought Gerald’s wife positively encouraged him to be adulterous, because he was so boring.

Alice scattered dresses and skirts across the bed as she searched through the wardrobe. Most of them had been purchased with the credit account Gerald had opened for her. She sighed. She had already reached her limit on the card for the month, for the month, more like for the year. Gerald would have a blue fit when he received the monthly statement. Alice failed to realise until now, that she too had become as grey and boring as her lover; that there was nothing in her closet a woman of her age would be buried in let alone wear for a night out on the town with long lost friends. She slumped on the bed defeated by her own bad taste.

On the wall behind her, glistening in the reflection of the mid-afternoon sun was a small, rectangular, red framed, glass fronted box. There was a sign on it, written in equally urgent red lettering, In Case of Emergency break glass! A small hammer was connected to a brass chain underneath the tiny box. Alice turned and for once, thanked Gerald for his existence. Beckoning inside was a Platinum American Express card.

‘Now this my pwecious, must only ever be used for dire emergencies.’ Alice recalled Gerald’s stern warning, as he secured the box on the wall above her bed. Sadly, she remembered, it was the only thing he managed to screw that night. It was one of his ‘surprise gifts’, seen more as a joke on his behalf. Alice looked at the words on the box; In case of emergency break glass, it might have well said 'Eat me'. She reached forward, grabbed hold of the small hammer -and feeling a sense of liberation- smashed the glass into thousands of tiny fragments. Alice was about to go through the looking glass and enter Wonderland, or Knightsbridge as the rest of the world knew it.

Chapter 3

Past Days

1989 University of Glasgow

Samantha Baldwin fell through the door. She was laden with the weight of an overlarge rucksack filled to the brim with clothes and artefacts collected from the best part of her eighteen years existence on planet earth. This was exciting, the beginning of an adventure outside of her home, family and Newcastle. Was there really a world outside that city? Here she was an alien, everything was strange, even the air smelled...different.

She belly flopped on to the bed and instantly regretted it as she plummeted forward, pinned down by the sheer weight of the contents inside the bright yellow wax-coated rucksack. Too tired to struggle, she could roll off the edge of the bed if need be and call for help, but for now the comforting embrace of the mattress was too much to resist. A door adjacent to her opened and she was partially introduced to a girl dressed in grey knickers and a vest. The girl was brushing her teeth vigorously; sending small pellets of toothpaste flying through the air like a meteor shower, seemingly unfazed by the sight of a stranger compressed to her bed by a one-ton rucksack. Samantha twisted her neck to get a better look at the interloper. She had bright red hair tied back with what appeared to be a bootlace, exposing a freckled face and the deepest green eyes that Samantha had ever seen. Samantha pulled her hand free and offered it to the girl.

‘Hi, I'm Samantha Baldwin...’ Then she added needlessly. ‘Looks like we're sharing.’

The red haired, freckle faced girl crouched down.

‘Rebecca Platt, though everyone calls me Becky.’ She shook Samantha's hand.

‘I was actually wondering whether you could help get me off this bed, otherwise there is a good chance I could die within the next three minutes.’ Samantha jokingly gasped.

From her position on the bed, Samantha could see that Becky had already made herself at home and had started to adorn the walls with posters. Posters, in Samantha's opinion, could tell a lot more about a person than a psychiatrist could discover in a hundred sessions. To her right, Samantha could just glimpse the bottom of a film poster; it looked like Sigourney Weaver’s boiler suited legs from the Aliens film, suddenly the grey underwear Becky was wearing started to make sense.

Becky grabbed the straps of the rucksack and pulled them so Samantha could free her arms, then lifted the heavy bag off her back as though it were nothing more than a mild inconvenience. Samantha finally sat up and viewed both Becky and the room from a perpendicular perspective; she was right, it was the Aliens poster.

‘Ace film.’

‘Yeah. Substitute the slime ball aliens for men and bam!’ Becky made a gun shape with her hand and executed an imaginary alien/man. Seeing the look of concern on her roommate’s face, Becky felt the need to explain. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not a dyke or anything, it’s just that I’ve got this reverse misogyny thing going on at the moment.’ Becky’s arm muscles flexed, their shape was more defined than on most men Samantha had seen; let alone attached to a woman. Samantha didn’t want to ask what a reverse misogyny thing was, for fear of finding just a little too much information too soon about her co- habitué. So she nodded thoughtfully as though she understood everything, much the same way as she did through most of her academic life, a thoughtful nod being worth a thousand words.

‘I'm going down to the student's bar later, you coming?’ Becky said ‘Its full of wankers, but after a few drinks the ‘craic’ is mighty.’

Samantha nodded...thoughtfully.

The small room was going to be her home, sharing with a complete stranger, meeting new people and making new friends. Suddenly Samantha felt overawed by the prospect, it was as though she had just been given the freedom of the city, when in fact all that had happened was that she had just made the transition to becoming an adult. She was too excited to notice the final chapter of her childhood being closed.

*****

The Student bar was awash with cheap beer, cheap politics and half-eaten packets of crisps. Becky was ensconced in a corner; close enough to the bar to get regular replenishment without having to stagger too far. She was surrounded by people that Samantha didn’t know, most of them already perilously drunk, all of them looking as though they belonged perfectly in the environment. The decision to leave had already been set in motion in Samantha’s mind, but her legs lagged behind, failing to find the courage to turn and walk. She felt out of place, conspicuous by her lack of cool, awkward because of patent lack of style.

‘Can you move, love?’ A voice broke her stasis ‘You’re blocking the door.’

The door bounced off her back, as a tall, young man pushed from the other side. Samantha shuffled forward into the heaving throng of radical socialism that had adopted the bar as a general meeting place. The man eased through the opening and headed toward Becky’s table. Samantha hoped that Becky would look up and see her standing there looking like a spare part, but if Becky did look up all she would have seen would have been the gangly man wearing an Iron Maiden tee shirt.

‘Fuck it; you’re here now, buy a drink. What you gonna do, go back to your room and spend the next three years avoiding everyone?’ A voice entered her head. Samantha was shocked, she never usually swore, not even inside her head.

‘And I’ll have a pint of lager while you’re at it.’

It was only then that she realised that somebody was standing behind her. Samantha turned and was greeted by a gothic nightmare, smiling through heavy black eye makeup and white, porcelain skin.

Alice Doughty smiled. ‘Hi, I’m Alice, and you obviously need a friend.’ She held out a hand, which Samantha gratefully shook. ‘Don’t worry about the makeup, I’m going to a Goth party later on.’ She said as way of explanation. ‘You’re sharing with Becky?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Yeah, she told me. Grab a drink and I’ll introduce you to everyone.’ Alice nodded toward the table where Becky was sitting.

‘Thanks. What was it, a pint of lager?’

‘I was joking.’ Alice’s voice rose, as the level of conversation in the bar steadily increased.

‘Go on, I insist.’

‘Okay, a pint.’

As Samantha fought her way to the bar, she was hoping that life was going to be a lot easier here than in her sixth form doing the obligatory ‘A’ levels. So far she had spoken to two people and it was still only 8 O’clock. Samantha was pleased with her progress; it was a one hundred per cent improvement over the last 18 months of her school life.

Chapter 4

‘Oh stop complaining Tom, it’s only a small burn, there is hardly any swelling at all now.’ Becky viewed her prostrate husband sitting on the back seat of the car, from the rear view mirror.

Samantha sat in the front passenger seat, nervously holding Josh. The air in the car was not too fresh, and it didn’t take a doctorate in aroma to guess what or who was responsible for the pungent smell.

‘I’b goinge do boddy soo!’

‘Yes dear, soon be home.’ Becky said in her most placating tone, then changing tack almost immediately. ‘It’s so nice to see you, Harry.’

Samantha pulled a packet of wet wipes from a compartment above the glove box and began to wipe