The tears hadn’t stopped when Alice came in. I looked up, and saw the comprehension dawning in her eyes. She reached out to touch my shoulder, but stopped, seeing me tense and wince. Quickly, she sat down and held my hand, as the wet continued to spill down my face.

“Again, Fi?”

I nodded.

“Fi…”

I saw her struggle to control the anger that I knew came out every time. I knew what she wanted to say, and she knew I wouldn’t let her say it. Still, she couldn’t stop herself.

“Fi, please, no listen to me! Fiona, you have to tell someone! You can’t deal with this! You’re not supposed to deal with this! No one is supposed to deal with this-“

“I have told someone, Alice. I’ve told you.” My voice sounded raspy and misused even to my own ears.

“I know.”

I felt the bitterness in her voice then, the accusation she fought to keep out. No words were being spoken, but I heard her screaming at me, “Why me, Fi? Why am I the one that has to understand? I don’t even know you!”

* 

Fi.

I’m Fi. Short for Fiona. I am seventeen years old, I have brown hair and green eyes, and I’m quite tall and slim, though I have my curves. I live with my mum, this important executive, in a big, empty house by the park. My father left before I was born. It took him five years to realise that I was his, and another five to accept it. Still I know that even now, if I saw him with his family, he would not acknowledge, not even recognise me.

It has always been my mum and me. She gave him up so she could keep me, and she never lets me forget it. “He wanted to do it himself, you know! He wanted to rip you out of me when you were still as big as my finger! I should have let him!” - Her daily speech. Of course losing him was entirely my fault.

It had started when I turned seven, the beating. I had come in from my day at school, triumphant from having beaten my best friend, Charlie, at top trumps three times in a row. She was sitting by the kitchen counter, gripping it so tightly that her knuckles were whiter than the marble.

She didn’t speak. She didn’t look at me.

Instead, she stood up and grabbed me by my hair in one swift motion. She kicked me to my knees and then didn’t stop kicking. It hurt everywhere.

I don’t know if it lasted a minute, an hour, a year. But when she was done she straightened her back and spat at me.

“You stupid, stupid little bitch. Get out of my sight.”

When she saw I was incapable of movement, she took both my hands and dragged me to the next room.

 Later, it emerged she had just found out my father was getting remarried. My father, who still stayed the night every time he visited, at the sound of whose name she literally whimpered. Apparently, his wife was to be one of the many “skinny blonde whores”.

My mum once told me I was 99.9% him and 0.1% her. I couldn’t blame her for hurting me, if I was like him. The thought made me want to hurt myself.

* 

Fi.

I still don’t know why I told Alice. I saw her everyday at school, but we barely spoke. A smile and a wave when we saw each other in classes, but that was all. I always thought that if I’d ever tell anyone, it would be Charlie.

Alice is always surrounded by people, but she isn’t one of the self-obsessed populars like all my friends; she’s just someone who everyone liked.

One day, she walked in on me sitting in the cloakroom, my eyes damp. When she sat next to me, it was not to grill me for information and drama, but just to talk, to joke around, to make me feel better.

Then, suddenly, the words were gushing out of my mouth. I told her everything; I talked until my voice was hoarse. And she stared at me.

Too late, I realised she hadn’t wanted to know.

* 

Fi.

There is never a good time to tell someone that there is nothing they can do, especially when something needs to be done, as Alice feels it does. I listen to her rants on how it’s unfair, how I don’t deserve it, and I know somewhere that she had a point. I also know that it makes no difference; after all we’ve been through, my mum and I, I simply could not act against her in anyway. She had given up the love of her life, caused herself unthinkable pain, all for me. It seems only fair that I too should feel some of that hurt. It seems reasonable that we should share the burden.

My mum and I, against the world.

 The world against us.

* 

Charlie.

I walked Fi home again today. Same as every day since we were eight, but it’s suddenly become a big deal. She’s suddenly a big deal. Ever since her sixteenth, when I saw her getting off with that jerk Liam. That’s the first time I have ever wished I was Liam, and that’s when I realised.

I held her hand today. She looked at me, confused, from under those lashes. Sexy without trying to be, without even knowing it. And then she just smiled like it was normal. It should have been normal, I’ve known her long enough. But I was fighting the urge to pull her up to me and kiss her everywhere, was imagining it the whole way home so I couldn’t even give her simple answers when she talked to me. That’s just what I need, to lose the power of conversation around her. Bloody fantastic.

*

Fi. 

 My mum was being unbearable last night. I guess I should have seen it coming; she’s been great for the past few months, we were due a bad time. Anyway, I managed to get out and ran the 30 seconds to Charlie’s house at one in the morning. He didn’t even think it was strange that I was there.

* 

Charlie.

 If she’s bloody turning up at my house at all bloody hours of the morning, what the bloody hell am I supposed to think?

 The most maddening thing is, if it was anyone else my suspicions (hopes?) would have to be true. But they can’t be with her.