Popping The Cherry

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Butterflies took flight in my gut. The big bad world was waiting for me out there. No time like the present I suppose.

‘Ready,’ I bluffed, satisfied to hear my voice sounding far more confident than I was feeling. I still didn’t know how I was going to walk out of there, as in physically, without all the mental crap on top. Especially with no shoes on. The next thing I knew, Jake had hooked his other arm behind my knees and lifted me into the air so I lay cradled in his arms. He was strong, I had to hand it to him. He’d made it look easy too.

After some careful manoeuvring through the narrow doorway, we were back outside. I instantly slipped into red-alert mode, turning my head left and right to scan the area the best I could. Nothing. No cars parked up nearby, and the road was deserted, with only a single set of tail lights somewhere off in the distance. My brain tricked me into seeing things in the shadows that weren’t really there, turning me into a nervous wreck by the time we got to Jake’s van, parked exactly where he’d said it would be. If it hadn’t been for Jake and his steadying hold, I think I’d have turned around and run straight back to the takeaway.

‘Damn,’ Jake muttered, under his breath, but loud enough for me to hear and strained enough for me to tense in his arms. I think I might have whimpered too. ‘Sorry,’ he said, shooting me a sheepish look. ‘I’m just annoyed with myself. I forgot to take my keys out of my pocket to give to you to hold, so I’m going to have to put you down.’

‘Oh …’

‘Actually, scratch that, just hang onto my neck. It won’t take more than a second, OK?’

‘OK.’ I said, trying to get a good grip so I didn’t plummet to the ground, which looked quite a long way away from up at Jake’s chest height.

To help me out, he leaned me up against the side of the van, the chill coming off the cold metal making me shiver, as he fished in his jacket pocket. Orange lights flashed, reflecting off the shop windows as the doors unlocked with a mechanical whirring sound, closely followed by a clunk as Jake yanked on the handle to open the passenger door as wide as it would go.

He put his arm back around my shoulders and adjusted me so that I was in line with the seat, then gently lowered me into it. I looked over his shoulder towards the takeaway and saw the lady standing in the doorway, with my shoes in her hands, and she had been joined by the chef man, too.

‘Can you come back soon, let us know how you are getting on?’ she asked.

‘Yes, I will,’ I said, touched by the kindness of these two complete strangers, making a mental note to get them a card or something. Jake sprang back up to his full height and reached for the door. ‘Bye,’ I called out before the door completely closed. ‘And thanks again.’

Jake dashed around to the driver’s side, collecting my shoes along the way, but it was never going to be quick enough. I was on my own and it scared me. Blood rushed through my ears as my heart rate sped up, my throat tightening with each ragged breath. Ridiculous as it sounds, panic had started to build in my chest the moment he had become cut off from me, as if he was the source of my bravery, and it didn’t matter one bit that I could still see him through the glass.

Gemma would have come and got me if she’d been home, and she’d have done her best, but it would have been like the blind leading the blind. Plus, she’s even smaller than I, inheriting her mum’s delicate stature rather than her dad’s brawn, and now Jake’s too, I guess. He used to look a bit weedy when I first started hanging out with Gemma but he’d filled out loads in the last few years.

To be honest, Gemma and I would probably still be stuck in the takeaway, and there’s no way I’d have felt as safe out in the open if it weren’t for Jake. A gust of wind swirled inside the van as he opened the driver’s door to get in. He turned his head to look at me but I couldn’t let him see me in the state I’d got into, so I looked away and reached for the seatbelt.

‘Hey, let me do that.’ His hand closed over the top of mine to stop me, then drew it back onto my lap, pausing there for a moment before letting go to grab my seatbelt.

As he reached across me, I caught a trace of his scent, something I’d never really registered before. Crazy when you consider I’d been practically draped over him since the minute he’d shown up, so I put it down to sharing the close confines of the van. I doubt I could put into words how grateful I was that he had been the one to answer my call.

‘Thanks, Jake,’ I murmured as his deft fingers clipped me in. After everything he’d done for me tonight, how could I not class him as a friend? ‘And I don’t just mean for helping me with the seatbelt.’

‘No problem, Lena,’ he said, drawing away from me to see to his own seatbelt, yet his scent lingered around me; part body wash and part deodorant as if he’d not long showered, and part musky odour that I now knew was unmistakably Jake. ‘I’d say “any time” but I’m hoping you don’t make a habit of needing to be rescued.’

He turned the key in the ignition and the engine roared to life, his hand accidentally brushing my knee as he reached for the gearstick. With one final wave to the Indian couple, he reversed onto the road and pulled away, leaving the takeaway behind as we made our way back to his place. Neither of us seemed to know what to say, so we travelled in relative silence, listening to the radio. I sighed with relief when I saw a little purple Corsa on the driveway.

Gemma had got home OK.

Speak of the devil, she came flying out of the front door before we’d even parked up. She wrenched the van door open the moment Jake cut the engine.

‘What the hell, Lena? What’s going on?’ If it was possible to sound relieved, ticked off and happy at the same time, then Gemma was a total pro. ‘I got back from Ben’s and found a cryptic note from Jake telling me he’d gone to fetch you.’

‘Go easy on her, Gemma,’ Jake said, unclipping both of our seatbelts. ‘Lena’s had a rough night.’

‘So why did she call you, not me?’

They continued their conversation as if I weren’t there, which suited me just fine. The journey had taken a lot out of me, and, although Jake had driven really gently around the bends, I ached all over.

‘She didn’t. I just happened to be here when the phone rang.’ Jake got out of the van and walked around the front to my side. ‘I take it you’re OK to have a guest tonight?’

‘Well, duh. Always! She practically lives here half the time, anyway.’ Back under the spotlight, Gemma eyed me up as if hoping to find the answers written on my body. Maybe they were: the bruises might be showing by now. ‘Umm … Lena, do you realise you have blood in your hair?’

‘What? No. Eww!’ Like an moron, I reached up to pat my head without thinking and suffered for it. ‘Ow!’

Gemma saw me wince, and watched me drop my arm limply back into my lap. ‘Can somebody please—’ she drew the word out so it sounded more like pleeeeeeaaaaaaaase ‘—tell me what the fuck is going on.’

‘Language, Gem—’

‘I will, I promise,’ I said, cutting off Jake’s reprimand while also trying to get my breathing back under control. ‘I really want to get the call to the police over with, too.’

‘The police?’ Gemma’s eyebrows shot up and disappeared behind her fringe. ‘C’mon, you’re killing me here.’

‘I know, I’m sorry. You’re sure you don’t mind me crashing with you tonight?’

‘Of course I don’t mind, but I hope you weren’t planning on going to sleep any time soon.’

Jake jumped in before I could reply. ‘I’m banking on it,’ he said, earning questioning looks from both me and Gemma, but he ignored us and bent down, sliding one arm beneath my knees, and the other around my back. ‘Do you think you can you hook your arm round my neck for me again?’

‘Again?’ Gemma asked. ‘What do you mean “again”?’

‘Like this?’ I asked, blanking Gemma out for the moment and linking my left arm around Jake.

‘Yeah, that’s perfect.’ He hoisted me out of the van and cradled me in his arms once more, making me feel like a rag doll all over again. ‘Could you grab Lena’s shoes and then close the door for me please, Gem?’

He set off towards the house without waiting for Gemma’s reply. Her face was a picture, though. She should think herself lucky my phone was dead, which meant no camera, or she’d have been a sure-fire hit on the Internet. It was only because I was still peeping at her over Jake’s shoulder that I saw it: that trace of something else, a certain tightness around her mouth and a barely-there narrowing of her eyes. She was not amused, looking as if she was ticked off at me, or maybe Jake.

The sound of a car door slamming and running footsteps over the gravel meant she soon caught up with us, making me wonder if she didn’t want to let me and Jake out of her sight. I’d expected Jake to put me down once we got inside the hallway of the house I consider to be my second home, but instead he held onto me, not even slightly out of breath. He carried me through to the sitting room at the back of the house, formerly their playroom, then set me down on the sofa.

Gemma immediately sat beside me and helped strip my coat off, dumping it on the floor next to her. She took hold of my hand, as Jake mumbled something about tea and blankets, then, the moment he was out of earshot, she pounced.

‘I’ve got just one question before he comes back.’ Uh-oh! Here it comes. ‘I know for a fact you went to a gig with Hayden tonight, so how come you ended up in Jake’s van? With him carrying you around like some sort of damsel in distress? Did Hayden do something? Did he hurt you?’

So much for ‘one question’. I flicked a glance at her expression to try to gauge her mood, but she looked her normal ‘best friend’ self again, presumably having got over what whatever her problem with me or Jake was.

‘Not really—well, not like that, anyway.’ I stared down at our joined hands. ‘He spent the entire night stoned out of his mind and turned into a right creep.’

‘Sounds like another lucky escape, huh?’

I froze, all except for the hairs on the back of my neck and my arms, which now stood on end. I tried to take a deep breath to calm myself down but it got stuck somewhere between my throat and my lungs, coming out in a strange grunting sound. Gemma looked panic-stricken. Her words had hit me hard, slapping away the last of my brave face, but she had no way of knowing the truth of what she was saying. She slipped off the sofa and knelt in front of me.

‘What is it?’ she asked, taking hold of my other hand as well, so she now held both of mine, her thumbs rubbing across the backs of my hands. ‘What did I say?’

‘It’s OK,’ I choked out. ‘You weren’t to know.’

‘Know what?’ The tone of her voice and the look in her eye pleaded with me to explain. There was a lump to rival Mount Everest in the back of my throat, but I tried my best.

‘Pete, the guy driving the van, was off his head and tried to kill us all. I made him stop the van so I could get out, but then …’ It was no good. I couldn’t say another word even if I’d wanted to, not with the onslaught of a coughing fit, but Gemma refused to be distracted by something as minor as me choking to death.

‘You got out and then …?’

Jake timed his return perfectly. ‘And that’s when two fuckers chased her and scared the goddamn shit out of her,’ he said, his tone filled with hate and aggression.

To hear him cursing as if he were back on the building site only made the whole ordeal even more shocking. Gemma and I exchanged matching glances, both of us stunned by the words that hung in the air. This from the guy who was always so determined to watch his language around us, constantly pulling us up on it if he heard us swearing. His knuckles had turned white around the mug he was carrying, gripping it so hard I was amazed it didn’t smash in his hand.

‘Oh, my God! Is that true?’ Gemma wailed as comprehension dawned, transforming her expression to one of horror.

She burst into life as if a rocket had been lit under her backside and flung herself at me, kind of like in those bodyguard movies, when there’s a shooter somewhere in the room, turning herself into a human shield. I had to clamp down hard on my tongue to stop from yelling at her as she smacked into several of my bruised bits, effectively tackling me and pinning me to the back of the sofa, but I could do nothing about the whimper that escaped.

Jake came to my rescue yet again. ‘Gem, could you get Lena’s phone charging and send a text to her mum, let them know she’s staying here tonight? Maybe make it sound like it’s come from Lena, though.’

‘Sure thing.’ Gemma clambered off me awkwardly and waited expectantly. ‘So where is it?’ she prompted.

‘Oh. It’s in my coat,’ I said, angling my head to where it had been dumped. ‘Left pocket, but I think it might be broken.’

Gemma shoved her hand into the pocket and withdrew my pride and joy. I couldn’t look. My phone was like an extension of me. Even if my folks took pity on me and replaced it, I’d lose all my contacts and photos and stuff.

‘No, it looks fine,’ she said. ‘Open your eyes, Lena, and see for yourself.’

I settled for opening just one, to see Gemma holding out the miraculously unscathed looking touch-screen phone. Great! Unfortunately, the same couldn’t be said for my purple, woollen blazer, which she still clutched in her other hand. I opened my other eye and stared, eyeing the patch of dried blood smeared over the back of it. Not so great.

Gemma saw my smile fade and followed my gaze. ‘Oh, no, your beautiful coat.’

Ignoring my body’s protests, I reached up to inspect my head, expecting to find a whopping great hole in it for there to be so much blood. I didn’t find one, though, just a matted clump of hair, a bump, and what felt like little more than a scratch.