The Shock of the Fall (Special edition) Read Free Page A

evening together the three of us sank onto the big green couch, which is how it always was because Simon preferred to sit cross-legged on the carpet – his face right up close to the television.
    That was sort of our family portrait. It’s not the kind of thing you think you would miss. Maybe you don’t even notice it all those thousands of times, sitting between your mum and dad on the big green couch with your big brother on the carpet getting in the way of the telly. Maybe you don’t even notice that.
    But you notice it when he isn’t there any more. You notice so many of the places where he isn’t, and you hear so many of the things he doesn’t say.
    I do.
    I hear them all the time.
    Mum switched on the television for the start of EastEnders. This was like a ritual. We even videoed it if we weren’t going to be home. It was funny because Simon had a huge crush on Bianca. We all used to tease him about it and tell him that Ricky would beat him up. It was only for fun. He used to laugh out loud, rolling about on the carpet. He had the sort of laugh people call infectious. Whenever he laughed it made everything that bit better.
    I don’t know if you watch EastEnders, or even if you do, I don’t suppose you’ll remember an episode from so long ago. But this one stayed with me. I remember sitting on the couch and watching as all the lies and deceit about Bianca sleeping with her mum’s boyfriend and a whole load of other stuff finally came to its bitter conclusion. This was the episode when Bianca left Walford.
    We didn’t speak for a long time after that. We didn’t even move. Other programmes started and ended well into the night. This was our new family portrait – the three of us, sitting side by side, staring at the space where Simon used to be.

PLEASE STOP READING
OVER MY SHOULDER
    She keeps reading over my shoulder. It is hard enough to concentrate in this place without people reading over your shoulder.
    I had to put that in big letters to drive the message home. It worked, but now I feel bad about it. It was the student social worker who was looking over my shoulder, the young one with the minty breath and big gold earrings. She’s really nice.
    Anyway, now she’s skipped away down the corridor, acting bright and breezy. But I know that I’ve embarrassed her because people only skip like that, and act all bright and breezy, when they’re embarrassed. We don’t need to skip when we’re not embarrassed – we can just walk.
    It’s good to be able to use this computer though. I had a teaching session on it with the occupational therapist. His name’s Steve, and I don’t suppose I’ll mention him again. But he was satisfied I knew not to try to eat the keyboard, or whatever it is they worry about. So he said it’s okay for me to use it for my writing. Except he still didn’t give me a password, so I have to ask each time, and we only get forty minutes. It’s like that here, forty minutes for this, and ten minutes for that. But I am sorry about embarrassing that student social worker. I really am. I hate stuff like that.

kicking and wailing
    I had no right to attend my brother’s funeral. But I did attend. I wore a white polyester shirt that itched like mad around the collar, and a black clip-on tie. The church echoed whenever anyone coughed. And afterwards there were scones with cream and jam. And that is all I can remember.
    But now I should slow down a bit. I tend to rush when I’m nervous. I do it when I’m speaking too, which is weird because you tend to think it’s just those small tightly wound men who speak quickly. I’m about six feet tall and might even still be growing. I’m nineteen, so maybe not. I’m definitely growing outwards though. I’m way fatter than I should be. We can blame the medication for that – it’s a common side effect.
    Anyway, I speak too quickly. I rush through words I find uncomfortable, and I’m doing that now.
    I need to slow down because I want to