Read Me Like a Book Read Free Page B

with him behind the recycling bins as a winning move!”
    “You didn’t!”
    “’Course I did. Anyway. Come on. Back to the party,” she says as the bus rounds the corner. “What’re you going to do about message-in-a-bottle boy?”
    We get on the double-decker bus and go upstairs, where we carry on sorting out the minutiae of each other’s love lives till we part company at my bus stop. “FaceTime me later,” Cat calls as I get off the bus.
    “Will do,” I call back as I brace myself for an evening at home.
    Mum and Dad are driving me mad. They’ve had a row and haven’t spoken a word to each other for three days.
    Dinner is a nightmare. A silent nightmare.
    Mum perches martyr-like on a stool at the other end of the kitchen while Dad and I sit at the table. He’s reading the paper while he eats, and she’s staring pointedly out the window.
    It’s been like this for months. Things will be OK for a bit, then it all blows up over something tiny and the atmosphere makes the North Pole feel like a Caribbean cruise.
    It upset me when it started happening. I tried to make them sort it out. I’d be crying and I’d beg them to make up. And they would, kind of. At least, they’d be civil to each other in front of me. Then they stopped doing even that.
    I guess I’ve kind of cut off from it now. It’s horrible. I hate myself for it, but it’s better than crying my eyes out in my room because I can’t make them stop.
    Dad is slurping his soup. It’s making me want to scream.
    Has he always done that?
    I’ve got a vague memory of very different mealtimes: Mum cooking while Dad would open a bottle of wine and pour them both a glass. They’d talk about their day, smiling, interrupting each other, refilling their glasses. Then we’d play word games while we ate, and afterward Dad and I would clear up. He’d wash, I’d dry, racing each other. He’d flick bubbles in my face to try to distract me. He’d make me laugh.
    Mum interrupts my nostalgia trip. “Ashleigh, please could you ask your father to remember to put the trash bins out?” she says as she gets up and takes her plate to the sink. “And it’s recycling this week too.”
    A while ago, I might have said to ask him herself — but it’s easier to give in and do what she says.
    “Dad, remember to take the trash bins out tonight,” I say.
    Dad doesn’t raise his head from his newspaper.
    “Dad. It’s trash night. And recycling.”
    Nothing.
    This is what it’s like. Arctic, I’m telling you.
    I try a new tack. “Dad, by the way, I’ve dropped out of school, become a drug addict, and committed a string of violent acts.”
    Dad turns the page and looks up briefly as Mum leaves the kitchen and closes the door behind her. “What, dear? Sorry. Oh, good, that’s nice,” he replies before going back to his paper.
    I get up with a sigh and decide to sort the trash out myself.
    That Philip Larkin knows what he’s talking about.
    Later, as I scribble down a few thoughts on the poem, I get this weird feeling about the next English class. As if for the first time in forever, the lesson might be remotely relevant to my life. As if I’m looking forward to it or something.
    What the hell is
that
about?

It’s a week later and I have to say, my parents are not the number-one thing on my mind. Nor is my English homework.
    I’m on a date. With Dylan.
    I sneak a glance at him as we drive to the cinema. He’s got his window open, his elbow leaning on the frame as he drives. His other hand is resting on his knee, fiddling absentmindedly with the fraying rip curling into a smile in his jeans. Kiss FM on the radio. Does it get better than this?
    It’s easy to get away with looking at him. He’s doing most of the talking, so it’s only polite. It would probably be polite to listen more carefully as well — and then I might not come across as a complete moron. Example:
    Him: There’s a chick flick, a French film, or the new James Bond at the Odeon. Which