Twenty Years Ago

Norah was seething. This was getting ridiculous. It had been a week, and she could not get hold of Poppy. She lived down the street, and she couldn’t find a single minute for Norah. After everything?

She looked at the last text she’d had from Poppy for the hundredth time.

Sorry, the band is busy right now. There’s a showcase next week and someone from a label is coming. We’re practising every minute.

That was it. That was all she had to say. Nothing about them being together. Nothing about any kind of feeling. Not a thing to imply she was desperate to see her or anything like that.

Norah had seen Poppy around school, but the few times they’d bumped into each other in school, the disinterest was unmissable. ‘Oh, hi. Nice to see you. Got to run.’

Norah was pretty sure she was getting dumped. She felt so stupid, so hurt, so blindingly angry. She’d thought they were something. She’d thought...

How could someone who’d written a song about her turn out to be a user?

Norah couldn’t take it anymore. She couldn’t just let this happen without saying something. While she had no desire to look Poppy in the eye and have it all confirmed, she was losing her mind. She needed the truth.

She walked downstairs to see her mother coming in. ‘You going somewhere?’ she asked, taking her coat off.

‘Yeah, just need a quick word with... Poppy,’ she said nervously. She’d tried not to bring her up since the snoggus interruptus incident.

‘You haven’t seen her much lately?’ her mother said.

‘Is that a question?’ Norah asked.

‘An observation, that’s all.’

‘Yeah, I guess.’ They looked at each other like there might be more to say. But no one said it, so Norah decided to tie the interaction off. ‘Well, back in a bit.’

She left the house, walked down the street and up the path to Poppy’s. She didn’t ring the bell right away. She needed to collect herself, think up a game plan, an opening line, something. Then she realised if she stood out here much longer, someone was going to look out of a window and see her psyching herself up, which would make this whole thing that much more embarrassing. So she rang the doorbell.

She heard someone walking towards the door. It was fifty-fifty whether it was Poppy or her mum who would answer.

It was Poppy. ‘Oh, hi!’ she said, trying to smile, but Norah saw the fear in her eyes.

Norah licked her lips. ‘Hello. Thought I’d pop round and check in.’

‘Check in?’ Poppy asked.

‘Yeah.’

That hung in the air for a while, heavy. In that silence, Norah hoped she was wrong about this and it was just a misunderstanding.

‘I’m a bit busy,’ Poppy said. ‘Homework.’

Norah pushed down the lump in her throat. ‘So that’s it, is it?’ she managed to say.

Poppy looked down. ‘Yeah.’

Norah realised Poppy was just waiting for her to get the hint and go.

It was all true. Norah had been used. She knew Poppy was more experienced than she was, but she’d never guessed she was like this. That it was all a game to her. That she didn’t give a shit about her now she’d gotten her ‘prize.’

‘OK,’ Norah said. She turned and walked down the path, hearing the door shut behind her.

She went home, walking into the house where her mother seemed to be waiting for her.

‘Everything OK?’ she asked nervously.

She’d seen this coming, somehow. Norah supposed it was motherly intuition.

Norah began to cry, something she rarely did around her mother. Her mother came to her and held her, also a rarity.

‘It’s OK,’ she said.

But it wasn’t—it was heartbreak.

Eighteen

Now

‘I don’t think it goes there,’ Poppy said, wiping sweat from her brow.

‘There’s nowhere else for it to go,’ Norah complained just as sweatily.

They were trying to put Luna’s car seat in next to Freddie’s, and though Poppy and Norah had clicked two straps in place, there was still a third with no apparent home.

‘Can we go yet?’ asked Freddie.

‘There’s a wasp. I think it wants to sting me,’ Luna added.

She was only wearing a T-shirt. Poppy had attempted to bundle her, too, but she wasn’t having it. Poppy decided to let her get chilly and then attack with the coat.

‘They don’t want to sting you, Luna. They won’t if you leave them alone,’ Poppy assured her.

‘What if I call it a dipshit?’ Luna asked. ‘Will it sting me then?’

Poppy stopped and turned, stunned. ‘Where on earth did you hear that word?’

‘You said it about that deliveryman when he dropped that big load of milk on your toe,’ Luna explained casually.

‘Oh,’ Poppy said quietly. ‘Right.’ She turned to Norah. ‘In my defence, I didn’t know she was around to hear it. And it was a bulk amount of soya milk. My toe was big for days.’

Norah laughed. ‘Sounds like a dipshit to me.’

‘Dipshit,’ Freddie repeated.

‘Freddie...’ Norah warned.