by Daniel Hurst
Hell yeah.
I swallow hard as if to keep that knot of anxiety down in my stomach and remind myself that I am doing the right thing. What other choice do I have? Stay in my job and keep catching this train every day for the rest of my life? The thought of that terrifies me far more than the thought of failing. I know I can do it. I have to stay positive. My writing is good. Somebody will like it. Somebody will buy it.
I won’t end up homeless at the end of it all.
But I know my fears are only made worse because it’s not just me I have to worry about. It’s my daughter too. Louise is seventeen, and she lives with me in our small flat in Brighton. While I have the money to pay the rent now, that might not be the case in the future if my book doesn’t take off. Therefore, it won’t just be me who ends up screwed.
It will be my child too.
I wish the damn train were here. I wouldn’t be getting this worried if it was. That’s because I’d be too busy writing to even think about the fear of failure. But as it is, I’m still stuck here on this platform, and my overactive imagination is running away with itself.
I know I am taking a risk. I know it’s not just my life that could be ruined if it doesn’t work. Louise could have hers ruined too.
That explains why she doesn’t agree with what I am doing.
I reach into my handbag and take out my mobile phone, deciding at that moment to give my daughter a call to do something nice for her. I’m going to ask her if she would like a takeaway tonight. That will earn me a few brownie points. It won’t be a big thing, but an Indian or a Chinese will go a little way to keeping things civil between us, at least for one night anyway.
I unlock my phone and navigate towards my daughter’s number and notice the wallpaper on my device. It’s the one I saved as a way to motivate myself every day whenever I look at my mobile. It’s a photo of a sandy beach in the Caribbean along with an inspirational quote typed across the clear blue sky: “Dreams only work if you do.”
I saved that wallpaper to my phone a couple of years ago after a particularly hellish commute left me needing a little lift, and it always makes me feel good when I see it, even if it is a little cheesy. That tropical beach is certainly a long way away from this crowded platform in Central London, but I guess it wouldn’t be a dream if it were real.
I tap my finger on the number on the screen and then hold the phone to my ear as I wait for my daughter to pick up. She will be at home now, most likely lying on the sofa and watching TV, because that’s all she has done ever since she finished school last year and told me she didn’t want to go to college. I wasn’t too disappointed about her lack of interest in further education because I’m all for people doing whatever they want to do, and my daughter clearly did not want to sit in any more lessons. But the problem is, she isn’t doing anything at all right now. She doesn’t have a job, and she doesn’t have a dream, other than to go travelling, which I am fully behind, but she needs to earn money before such a thing can happen. Louise talks about exploring far-flung continents like Asia or South America, but she doesn’t seem to recognise that in order to fund those adventures, she needs to put in the work in less glamourous locations.
She can’t hope to lie on a beach in Brazil if she doesn’t make any money in Brighton.
Of course, Louise’s answer to that is that I should just give her the money she needs to go. She knows I have been saving up, and she expects me to just give her a big chunk of that so she can jet off and enjoy herself while I keep working. But I’ve explained to her that life isn’t as simple as that. If you want something, then you have to work for it yourself. Unfortunately, Louise doesn’t seem to want to work for anything. But she won’t have much choice for long. I’m going to give her a deadline to find a job. I don’t care what it is. I can’t have her sitting around at the flat all day, wasting her life, as well as my hard-earned money.
As the call connects and I hear my daughter’s voice on the other end of the line, I say a silent prayer to myself in the hope that this conversation won’t end up in yet another argument between the two of us.
But I’m not holding my breath.
3
LOUISE
‘What?’
Most people answer the phone with friendlier words than that, but I don’t because it’s only my mum calling. Why would I bother to be polite when she is probably just ringing to give me another lecture on why I should be doing more with my day than sitting around the flat?
She thinks I’m lazy and barely move from my bed to the sofa in all the time she is at work. But she is wrong. I’m not lazy, and I do more than just hang around sleeping and watching television. I have so much more going on in my life than she realises, and the fact that I can’t be honest and tell her that only proves to me how rubbish a parent she really is.
‘How was your day?’
I can only just hear my mum’s voice over the line through all the background noise around her. It sounds like she is at the train station, and it seems busy there, but I can still make out the weariness to her speech. She always sounds tired because she always is. She gets up early to go to London, and she gets back late. What a life. Is it any wonder I’m not in a rush to follow her into the world of work?
‘Fine,’ I reply.
‘What have you been up to?’
‘Not much.’
I’m making sure to keep my answers short so this conversation doesn’t go on any longer than it needs to.
‘Please don’t tell me you’ve been watching TV all day again. We talked about this,’ Mum says, and I roll my eyes.
‘I haven’t. I spent a delightful ten minutes in the bathroom having a shower. Happy now?’
‘Lou, you promised me you were going to apply for jobs today.’
I sigh because I can’t be bothered to explain myself again. I only told her I would apply for jobs to shut her up last night when she was on my case. Of course I haven’t applied for any. Why would I? She knows what I want to do. I want to go travelling. I’m seventeen. These should be the best years of my life. Yet my mum wants me to waste them making minimum wage in some poxy job. That might be what she did with her youth, but I’m determined not to go down the same path.
‘Sorry for not wanting to be miserable like you,’ I reply, and I don’t even feel bad for saying that. My mum hates her life, and she’s always in a bad mood. It annoys me that she thinks the right thing for me to do is become just like her.
‘I’m not miserable. I just want the best for you.’
‘No, you want the best for yourself. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be following your dream and stomping all over mine.’
There, I’ve said it, and now here we are again. Less than a minute into our conversation and we’re back having the same old argument. But I don’t care. I want to make my mum feel bad about what she is doing because I feel bad about it. As long as I am unhappy, then I will keep reminding her why.
‘Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not stomping on your dream.’
‘Yes, you are. You have the money to give me so I can go travelling, but you’re quitting your job and spending that money on your stupid writing instead.’
I’m trying to stay calm, but I get frustrated when I think about how selfish Mum is being. She’s giving up her job in London and putting our future at risk all because she thinks she can be a full-time author.
And she has the cheek to call me lazy.
‘I’m not having this argument again,’ Mum says as I hear a loud voice come over the tannoy at her end of the line. ‘I just called to ask if you wanted a takeaway for dinner tonight.’
‘Shouldn’t you be saving your money for yourself?’ I reply, my voice dripping with disdain.
‘Louise, come on. I’m trying to do something nice here.’
‘No, you’re not. You’re just trying to make up for being a crap mum. But it’ll take more than a takeaway to do that.’
‘Don’t be like this. What do you fancy? We don’t have to ha
ve a takeaway. We could do something else. Go out somewhere maybe?’
‘Why are you bothering to ask me? Do whatever you want. You always do anyway.’
I hang up the phone, and it’s a relief not to have to hear my mum’s voice and that noisy train station anymore. For now, things are quiet and calm again. At least they will be until she gets home in an hour’s time.
‘Everything okay?’
I turn to look at the man lying beside me in my bed, and I smile. Thank God for my boyfriend, James. He’s the only good thing in my life right now.
‘Mum’s just being a bitch again,’ I tell him as I drop my phone on the bedside table and snuggle back down under the duvet with him.
‘What did she say?’
‘She asked if I wanted a takeaway.’
‘Wow, what a bitch.’
I laugh and slap James playfully on the arm. ‘That’s not what I mean. She’s just always on at me to get a job. I’m sick of it.’
James gives me a kiss on the head because he knows that will soothe me before speaking again. ‘Try not to let her stress you out. And never mind that, what takeaway are we having? I’m starving.’
I smile at my boyfriend because he always makes light of things. He’s just what I need to combat my mum, who only ever seems to bring me down.
‘No takeaway for you. Not with your allergies.’
‘That’s not kind!’
I laugh because it’s my nature to sometimes joke about things that scare me, and having a boyfriend who is severely allergic to peanuts is definitely one of those things.
‘I’m only teasing. But you know you can’t stay for dinner. You need to get out of here before she gets back.’
‘Are you sure? I was thinking tonight would be a good time for me to finally meet her.’
‘There is no good time for you to meet her. Trust me.’
I pull back the duvet to show James that I am serious about him getting up and leaving the flat before my mum comes back, but he reaches out and pulls it back over us.
‘But I’m so warm under here. You wouldn’t kick me out onto those cold streets, would you?’
‘Cold? It’s the middle of summer!’
‘But it’s still not as warm as in here.’
‘That might be so, but I’d rather kick you out myself than have my mum do it for me. Seriously, she would kill me if she knew you’d been coming around here while she was at work.’
‘I’m just your dirty little secret, aren’t I?’ James says, feigning disappointment. ‘I feel so used.’
I laugh at my boyfriend’s sense of humour again and really wish he didn’t have to leave, but I’m not joking when I say that my mum would kill me if she found him here. It’s not just the fact that she has no idea I have a boyfriend that would get me in trouble. It’s also because of the age difference between us.
James is twenty-two, and while I don’t care about the five-year gap, Mum most certainly will. She’ll say he’s too old for me, and she’ll also say I’m too young to be having sex with anybody, let alone a guy I’m falling in love with. But she’s wrong. James and I have been seeing each other for a month, and we are careful. This is nothing like when Mum was nineteen and got pregnant with me after a one-night stand. Unlike her, I’m actually taking precautions because I don’t want to mess up my life by having a baby before it’s even got going.
‘You’ll get over it. Now come on, get up,’ I order James as I climb out of bed and pick up an old T-shirt from my bedroom floor and pull it over my head quickly. I’m not self-conscious of my body while I’m under the duvet with James, but I’m certainly self-conscious of it once I’m out in the open again.
‘Your mum can’t be that bad. I bet I could charm her into liking me,’ James says as he puts his hands behind his head and watches me get dressed.
‘No chance. She hates all men these days, not just the ones I’m seeing.’
‘How many are you seeing?’
I pull my face. ‘You know what I mean.’
James gives me a wink, and I wish I could be as relaxed about life as he is. He never seems to have a care in the world, whereas I constantly feel like I am never more than five minutes away from another stressful situation. But things have got better for me since I met him four weeks ago.
We matched on a dating app and had our first date on Brighton Pier, where we had a fun time playing in the penny arcades and throwing our chips to the seagulls as they flew past. But while the activities on the date might have seemed childish, the conversation certainly wasn’t. I like the fact that James is older because he has a confidence about him that guys my age don’t have. He seems to be comfortable in his own skin and untroubled by the prospect of the future, which is the exact opposite of me. I guess that’s why I feel so good when I am around him.
That and the fact he is gorgeous.
‘You don’t seem to be getting ready to leave,’ I say as I pick up my hairbrush from the dresser table and run it through my dark locks.
‘Your mum won’t be back for ages yet.’
‘She’ll be back in an hour, so move it.’
I see the reflection of James in my mirror and notice that he isn’t getting up, and while there is still plenty of time for him to go yet, I’m starting to regret letting him come into the flat this late in the day. He usually comes around in the mornings when there is no chance of us getting caught together, but today he just randomly showed up in the middle of the afternoon, saying that he was desperate to see me. I was happy with the surprising show of affection, so I was willing to let him inside, but now I’m starting to get a little anxious. I know Mum’s train always gets in around half six, and we aren’t far from the station. If she walks in and he is still here, then it won’t just be him getting kicked out.
It’ll be me too.
‘Are things really that bad between you?’ James asks as I continue to brush my hair.
‘Oh, yeah. We pretty much hate the sight of each other at this point.’
‘Why?’
‘Too many reasons to go into. Just trust me when I say that the sooner I get out of here, the better.’
‘It can’t be that bad,’ James replies, a little too casually for my liking. ‘Everyone hates their mum when they’re a teenager.’
I stop and place my brush back on the dresser table. I haven’t really gone into the full story of why my mum and I aren’t as close as we could be with him before, but we are starting to get serious now, so maybe it is time.
I turn to face James and take a deep breath. He’s already proven that he is more capable of handling an adult conversation than any of the guys my age, but this will be the biggest test of that yet.
‘We had a massive argument a few months ago,’ I say, thinking back to that dreadful night. ‘It was horrible. We both said some nasty things. But then Mum said the worst thing. She basically admitted to me that I had been a mistake.’
‘Ouch. She actually said that?’
‘Not in those exact words, but I could tell she was alluding to it. She was blaming not being a full-time writer already on the fact that I came along when she was young and forced her into getting a different job so she could look after me.’
James says nothing for a moment, and I worry I’ve confessed too much. We’ve gotten serious pretty fast over the last month, but maybe this is a little too deep even for us. But then he speaks again and shows that he is mature enough to handle this topic.
‘Wow. I knew things weren’t great, but I didn’t know they were that bad.’
‘Yeah,’ I say, shrugging my shoulders. ‘And it got worse after she said that. I said I blamed her for not knowing who my father is. I accused her of sleeping around.’
‘Ouch,’ James says, wincing, and the look on his face confirms what I already knew. I went too far with what I said to Mum. But then again, she went too far with what she said to me.
I feel a little teary as I recall that awful night a year ago, and James must be able
to tell because he finally gets out of bed and comes over to join me by the dresser table.
‘I’m so sorry,’ he says as he brings me in for a hug.
I feel the strength of his arms around me, and it makes me feel much better, although I know it is only fleeting. I really wish he didn’t have to leave. I wish he could stay here with me all night and I could wake up to him telling me he loves me instead of my mum just telling me to get out of bed.
‘No wonder you want to go travelling,’ he says. ‘I’m surprised your mum just doesn’t give you the money for a flight. It sounds like she’d be happy for the space too.’
‘That would mean less money for what she wants to do,’ I reply, shaking my head. ‘She’s made it clear she isn’t willing to make any more sacrifices now.’
I wipe my eyes as James lowers his arms and sits down on the edge of the bed. I really want to know what he is thinking, but I’m surprised when I actually find out.
‘If only you knew the combination to that safe of hers. We could just take her money and run away together,’ he says.
I’m surprised by that comment because I wasn’t expecting him to even remember about that. He’s referring to the safe in my mum’s room that I told him about three weeks ago while we were lying in bed together.
The safe with all my mum’s savings in it.
Mum’s told me there are thousands of pounds in there, and I naively thought that meant she was saving up to give me a big chunk of it. Then she told me she was quitting her job, and I realised what she was really planning to use that money for. I’ve never known the code to that safe, but that hasn’t stopped me from trying to access it before. Unfortunately, I could never get in, so she still has all the cash, and I’m completely broke.
‘Yeah, it’s a shame I can’t open it,’ I reply as I turn back to the dresser table and pick up the comb again. ‘If only life were that easy.’
4
AMANDA
That phone call went about as well as I expected it to. I only rang my daughter to find out what she fancied for dinner, yet it turned into another argument, just like it always does. I don’t know why I bother sometimes. I honestly thought trying to make it as a writer was the hardest job in the world, but it’s easy compared to being a parent.
