Chocolate Box Girls: Sweet Honey

by Cathy Cassidy

  ‘Almost as good as mine,’ Ash says. ‘Cheats and runaways, both of them. I’m going to pretend my dad was some Hollywood star instead. Or a famous writer, or a rock star, or something. What d’you reckon?’

  I laugh, and Ash says he’ll take Johnny Depp and I pick out David Tennant because he seems cool, kind and has excellent time-travel skills.

  ‘He’d fix this hacking mess, no problem,’ I tell Ash. ‘One zap of his Sonic Screwdriver and the troll gets blasted halfway across the universe. I wish. Although to be fair, I’m not as scared now people know about it. Mum and Paddy are on to it; so is Miss Bird, and Emma was threatening to ring the police. Tara and Bennie have reported it to SpiderWeb and my sisters are sleuthing away trying to work out who the stalker might be.’

  ‘SpiderWeb will tell you, once they’ve investigated,’ Ash says. ‘And if the police are involved, I expect he’ll be prosecuted too. It’s probably just some random creep who happened to hit on your SpiderWeb page by accident.’

  ‘Maybe.’ The thing is, I am pretty sure that Surfie16 is not a stranger. He knows too much about me, right down to exactly which images would freak out my sisters, and that means it’s almost certainly someone back home. I think back to this morning’s threat.

  I’m going to destroy you, just like you destroyed me …

  Who would even say that? It’s not like I’ve had a squeaky-clean past, but I have never set out to destroy anyone. What if it wasn’t intentional, though? I feel dizzy for a moment as I think about the trail of hurt I’ve left behind me. There is someone … someone I hurt badly, used and threw away. The pieces fall into place. I know with a chill certainty exactly who has done all of this.

  ‘You OK?’ Ash is asking. ‘You’re miles away.’

  I sigh. Miles away … that kind of sums it up.

  ‘There’s something I need to tell you, Ash,’ I say. ‘Thing is … I’m going back to England. Mum’s sorting a ticket for me, and I think it might be quite soon. I am going to miss you so, so much.’

  He folds his arms round me and holds me so tight that all the hurts melt away and all the broken pieces of my past fit together again. If only I could stay right here I’d be safe for always because Ash is the only boy I’ve ever met who can see past the cool-girl mask to the real me. He’s the only boy who isn’t afraid to stand up to me and tell me when I’m wrong, the only boy I’d actually listen to. He is kind and loyal and so drop-dead gorgeous he makes my insides melt, and I have to walk away from him. It breaks my heart.

  We kiss for a long time while the sun goes down around us. My lips taste of salt, and I cannot tell if it’s from my tears or his.

  Quantas

 

  to me

  Thank you for your purchase. Your e-ticket and flight details are attached below. Thank you for choosing to fly with Quantas Airlines!

  26

  Saying goodbye is painful. Dad and Emma take me out to lunch and we talk about happy times; our hike in the Blue Mountains, our sightseeing day, Christmas Day at the beach. Anyone looking at us would think we were the perfect family, but I know better. We don’t talk about the restaurant scene and we don’t mention my failed new start and we definitely don’t discuss the laptop and the iPhone at the bottom of the swimming pool; we act as if those things never happened at all, and I wonder what kind of life it would be, tiptoeing round the bad stuff, pretending you don’t see it. It works for Dad, but I don’t think it’s working for Emma.

  ‘OK, Princess?’ Dad asks, ruffling my hair like I’m five years old. ‘We’ve had some fun, haven’t we, these last few months? Me and my best girl?’

  ‘Sure we have,’ I say. ‘But you know what? I’ve kind of grown out of the whole princess thing. I got fed up waiting to be rescued.’

  Dad frowns and goes back to his lunch, and the moment passes. The truth is, he’s no longer my hero, and although a part of me is sad at that, I’m glad as well. I can see him for what he is now: weak, selfish, charming, destructive – exactly as I once was. Now I’ve worked out the stalking thing, I can see that clearly, and I’m not proud of it. I’m sorry that my own selfish actions could hurt someone so, push them right over the edge. Facing my stalker is one thing I am not looking forward to when I return home, but it’s something that needs to be done.

  What can I say? I’m trying to change. Dad never will, but I still love him, in spite of it all. Like I said, you don’t get to choose who you love. Australia has been a learning process, and I am not talking about calculus or that experiment we had to do in science that made the whole lab stink of rotten eggs. I’m talking growing up, getting real, making friends, falling in love. Those things are worth crossing oceans to find.

  I spend my last afternoon at the beach with Tara and Bennie. We promise to meet up again one day, to travel the world and eat pizza at midnight and paint our toes turquoise and dance in the surf. Meanwhile, we’ll write – proper letters because it’ll be a while until I can trust SpiderWeb or the Internet again.

  Saying goodbye to Ash is the hardest of all.

  ‘I have a plan,’ he says. ‘I finish school in a few months’ time and I’ll come to the UK for my gap year, OK? To be with you.’

  ‘I’ll come back here one day too,’ I promise. ‘Go to art college, maybe, rent a little flat near the beach … if you want me to.’

  ‘I want you to,’ he says. ‘You know I do.’

  He dips into the pocket of his jeans and brings out a tiny twist of tissue paper. ‘I saw this and thought you might like it. So you won’t forget me …’

  ‘I will never forget you,’ I tell him. ‘How could I? Besides, you’re coming to Tanglewood in the summer. It’s just a few months.’

  I open up the tissue paper and inside there’s a tiny silver honeybee charm on a soft cotton cord. Ash threads it round my neck, his fingers soft against my skin. We walk barefoot along the shoreline under the stars and when we kiss, the waves wash in and out again around us, taking our sadness far out to sea, for a little while at least.

  There is one last thing I have to do before I leave. Late at night, when Dad and Emma are asleep, I sneak into Dad’s study and open up the laptop. I don’t click on to SpiderWeb – my account has been suspended while their security team investigates. Instead, I search through Dad’s online files and folders for something, anything, that might give me a clue to the past. There’s nothing. Exasperated, I hunt through drawers, files, cupboards. I have almost given up when I find a small, locked briefcase, and although there’s no key, I pick the lock with a hairpin, something Kes showed me once when his friend had shut his car keys inside the car.

  The briefcase lock springs open, revealing a big brown envelope. My hands shake as I slide out a slim sheaf of papers; handwritten letters, a London address and a glossy photograph of a grinning toddler with dark blue eyes and messy fair hair. The child looks just like Coco at that age, and my hands shake as I turn the photo over.

  On the back, a name is written: Jake Cooke, aged two.

  I have a brother.

  Less than forty-eight hours later, I’m stepping off the plane at Heathrow into a cold, icy drizzle. Mum, Paddy and my sisters are waiting in Arrivals with one of Coco’s home-made Welcome banners draped between them, and I run into Mum’s arms and stay there a long time, holding tight.

  I wish I could turn the clock back to when Dad left because now I understand what happened much better. Mum didn’t want to hurt me; she stayed quiet, protected Dad, soaked up all the anger and blame I could throw at her and kept on loving me just the same. I even know the secret Dad never told, and I wonder how I’ll ever find the courage to share it. I will, though, one day.

  I hug my sisters in turn, even Cherry. Logic told me she had to be suspect number one in this whole stalking nightmare; she’s the one person I set out to hurt, to drive away, yet instinct told me from the start that she would never do those things. I’m nowhere near the stage where I can forgive her for what happened with Shay
, but I will try to be nicer to her from now on. Maybe.

  Back at Tanglewood, Mum lets us flop on the blue velvet sofas sipping hot chocolate while my sisters ask about a million questions, and I try to answer. I tell them about Tara and Bennie, about Ash and how he’s going to visit in the summer, about Emma’s kindness and Dad’s bad temper and how I pulled the tablecloth out and smashed all the glass and china when I found him schmoozing with his latest fling.

  ‘Poor Emma,’ Mum says, and she really means it; she let go of the past and moved on long ago. I look at the life Mum’s built with Paddy and I know in my heart it is better, stronger, happier than anything she shared with Dad. I can’t begrudge her that, not any more.

  ‘Yeah, poor Emma,’ I say.

  ‘Poor you too,’ Coco says. ‘Being stalked by a mad, bad Internet troll. There was me, getting all huffy because you’d stopped texting and messaging and blocked us from SpiderWeb, and all the time you were being hacked! Why didn’t you tell us?’

  I sigh. ‘I thought I could handle it, at first,’ I say. ‘And then it got so bad I didn’t want anyone to see it, especially not you guys. He was clever too. He blocked you, deleted texts, did everything he could to turn my friends against me. I guess he really did hate me.’

  ‘It’s over now,’ Mum says firmly. ‘People do bad things sometimes, lose the plot, but he’s getting help, it’s being dealt with. Best to stay out of it.’

  I can’t stay out of it, of course. The stalking almost made me lose the plot too, and although I understand a little about why I was the target, there are still so many things I need to ask.

  ‘I want to see him,’ I say. ‘Can you arrange it, do you think?’

  ‘Are you sure it’s a good idea?’ Mum asks. ‘After all that’s happened?’

  I shrug. ‘I’m not sure, no. I just know it’s something I have to do.’

  There’s a For sale sign outside the house, a pretty cottage on the edge of the village, the manicured lawns now white with frost. I am here, in spite of Mum’s advice; and I’m alone because I need answers and I know that this is the only way I’ll get them.

  A woman opens the door, her face creased with worry. ‘We’ve been expecting you,’ she says. ‘Come in. He’s just so sorry. And I can promise you it will never happen again. But please, please don’t press charges. Charlotte and Paddy have been to talk to us already – we know what’s been happening, and we are taking it seriously, very seriously indeed.’

  She ushers me inside, and I see a familiar figure in the corner, staring at a blank computer screen. Anthony. He looks across, but cannot meet my eye.

  ‘So,’ he says eventually. ‘How was Australia?’

  ‘Awesome,’ I reply. ‘Life-changing, you could say …’

  Anthony raises an eyebrow. ‘Whatever.’

  I clench my fists, fighting anger. ‘I am stronger than you think, Anthony,’ I say. ‘It took me a while to work it out, but the clues were there all along. You’re the cleverest person I know where computers are concerned. Clever enough to hack the school system and change my grades; clever enough to hack my SpiderWeb account, read my private journal, steal my pictures. And you’ve always known my password, of course. I think you helped me set it in the first place.’

  ‘I wasn’t clever enough,’ he says. ‘You worked it out in the end – I knew you would. And the trouble I was in over the school hacking was nothing compared to this. The SpiderWeb admin team has banned me for life from all their social networks, with a threat of criminal prosecution if I break the ban.’

  ‘Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?’

  Anthony’s face twists into a grimace. ‘I don’t want your pity, thanks. I’ve had enough of it to last me a lifetime.’

  He picks up a box of pills and presses one out of the blister pack, swallowing it down with a sip of water. ‘Everyone thinks I’m crazy,’ he says. ‘The doctor has given me tablets, set me up to go and see a shrink. Can you believe it?’

  It’s my turn to look away, embarrassed. Anthony was always sharp, smart, logical; he was the least crazy person I knew. He helped me with my homework and looked at me sometimes with sad, puppy-dog eyes, and I thought things would stay that way forever.

  ‘Why did you do it, Anthony?’ I ask.

  ‘Why?’ he echoes. ‘Do you really have to ask? Every day you were posting pictures of your perfect life in Sydney, even brighter and better than the one you had before. I was still here, expelled from school, my parents barely talking to me. So … why d’you think?’

  I remember those first few weeks in Sydney, how I tried to post happy pictures to make it look as if life was great. Doesn’t everybody do that on SpiderWeb?

  ‘I saw you’d started a new account,’ Anthony is saying. ‘I didn’t think you’d add me if I used my real profile, so I invented one. When I was Surfie16, you liked me. You flirted with me, cared about me. It was only on the Internet, I know. You thought I was someone else – it wasn’t real. But it felt that way, for a little while. Then you spoilt it all by telling me about the sad, pathetic boy you knew back home. The boy who threw away everything for you – and you didn’t even care. You said I was a lovesick nobody.’

  ‘I didn’t mean that,’ I argue, but the truth is I did mean it, probably, at the time. I was like Dad, too wrapped up in myself to think how my actions might hurt others. Anthony wasn’t even on my radar.

  ‘I think the photo of you with your new boyfriend was the last straw,’ Anthony says. ‘You looked as if you hadn’t a care in the world. I wanted to hurt you – smash up your lovely new life, spoil your friendships, turn your family against you. You ruined my life; I wanted to ruin yours.’

  I blink. ‘I’ve never needed much help to mess things up, you know that,’ I say. ‘Australia wasn’t great, if you want the truth. My dad’s a cheat and a liar, I missed my sisters like mad and school was awful. Then someone turned my friends against me, and it went from bad to worse. So, yeah … thanks for that, Anthony! I thought we were friends?’

  He smiles, a cold, self-satisfied grin. In that moment I can see Anthony for what he is, a lost boy who has tipped over the edge into a very dark place, laughing as he pulls the wings off flies and poisoned by his own self-pity. It’s scary.

  ‘We were never friends,’ he snaps. ‘You treated me like dirt on your shoe, so why the surprise when I did the same to you?’

  I thought I was here to confront Anthony, to make him confess and show him he hasn’t beaten me, but Anthony isn’t playing the game. Instead, he is forcing me to look at the way I treated him, to see the damage I did. He’s right – whatever we shared, it wasn’t friendship. My past selfishness has come back to haunt me.

  Anthony’s mum comes in with a tray of tea, and his anger shuts down as suddenly as it appeared. My hands shake as I take my mug and listen as she tells me they are moving soon, up to the Midlands, that when Anthony is well again they’ll help him to finish his schooling, go to university, build a future.

  ‘As long as you don’t press charges,’ she says. ‘That would finish him. We’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again. He’ll have no Internet, no access to computers.’ She shows me the electrical lead to the PC Anthony is staring at, the plug chopped off.

  It’s hard to think of Anthony as a monster. It’s hard to imagine how much he wanted to hurt me, how love turned to hate, but that’s what happened, and I have to take a share of the blame. I used him. I saw that he liked me and reeled him in, kept him dangling like a puppet on a string. I caused real damage and hurt, and I’m not proud of that.

  ‘I’m sorry, Anthony,’ I say at last. ‘I’m sorry for hurting you, using you. I didn’t realize at first; I didn’t understand, didn’t think how it might feel to be you.’

  He shrugs and turns away, back to staring at the blank screen. As Anthony’s mum shows me out, her polite, anxious mask slips and I see cold blame in her eyes. I wish I could rinse that away.

  Tanglewood wraps itself around me, and life goes on, th
e same but different. Coco is more grown-up, inches taller, riding Caramel and helping out at the stables in return for free lessons. Skye has a new hobby making feathered headbands and Summer is totally loved up after a surprise birthday trip to the ballet with Alfie.

  As for Paddy, his chocolates are on the shelves of a national department store, getting great press coverage for being fairly traded and ethical as well as wickedly tasty. Paddy’s not my dad and never will be, but I’ve stopped blaming him for that – he makes Mum happy. We have a long way to go, but we’re trying, and guess what, I am trying with Cherry too. It’s early days, but hey, it’s a start.

  Any plans of idling the next few months away bite the dust when Mum takes me to see a sixth-form college the other side of Minehead, where they agree to let me take art and English and French GCSE this June, then start A levels after the summer. Before long, I’m back on a strict study timetable; Ash would be proud.

  I’ve talked a lot with Mum about what happened when Dad left. She chose not to tell us that Dad had been having affairs ever since I was tiny; she didn’t talk about the times he went missing for days, his selfishness, his temper, the endless rows when we were all tucked up safely in bed. ‘That was between the two of us,’ she says. ‘Greg is a long way from perfect, but he loves you. He loves you as much as he can – remember that.’

  It’s too bad that it turned out not to be enough.

  A few days back I found the old plastic tiara I used to wear for dressing up when I was a kid, back when I dreamt of being a princess. I threw it in the bin; there were too many unhappy memories. I think I’ve finally outgrown the princess phase. Maybe I should thank Dad and Anthony for what they’ve put me through because I survived, and I feel better, stronger, more hopeful now. I just wish it hadn’t been such a bumpy ride.