If I Can't Have You by Federica Bosco

Author:Federica Bosco [Bosco, Federica]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781838932916
Publisher: Head of Zeus
Published: 2020-02-20T06:00:00+00:00

12

‘Don’t worry, Mum, I’ll call you as soon as we get there,’ I shouted from the rear window, waving at her.

In fact, I would have preferred to stay at home and do my chores. I was in a black mood, just for a change. I didn’t want to go to Bath and I was increasingly convinced that accepting the invitation had been a terrible idea, but Nina seemed so happy and I was feeling really guilty for not having told her anything about the phone calls with Patrick. Friendship, like love, evidently required its share of compromises.

Carl drove in silence, as if he was just waiting for me move so he could say something unpleasant. Nina, on the other hand, never stopped talking and laughing. She was the personification of joy, an unbearable explosion of enthusiasm and positivity. If she hadn’t been my best friend I would have thrown her out of the window.

I wished I could experience for myself that happy feeling of reciprocated love, but as usual, I found myself witnessing something that it seemed would never happen to me, and all those high spirits got on my nerves.

Alex tried to cheer me up by offering me a biscuit, but it did no good. We were going to be stuck in the car for at least three hours, and all I wanted to do was put my earbuds in and go to sleep.

‘So Mia,’ said Carl, ‘Did you decide what you want to be when you grow up?’

‘Are you offering careers advice?’

‘Well, if you don’t become a star you could always find work as a dancer at surprise birthday parties. Jumping out of the cake and singing happy birthday, that sort of thing.’

‘Great idea, I’ll keep it in mind,’ I replied, fighting the urge to strangle him.

‘Or you could be one of those buskers who dress up as statues in Covent Garden. You’d be close to the Royal Opera House then. Or a snake charmer, you’d be great at that…,’ he went on, to an atmosphere of general embarrassment. ‘Or.’

‘Or you could shut up and leave her alone!’ Alex intervened.

‘It was only a joke!’ he said, unrepentant and seemingly intent on continuing to bother me for the next hundred miles.

‘Shut up, Carl, I’m not in the mood. If I ever need a snake to charm I’ll know where to find you!’

I didn’t want to ruin things for Nina, but I wasn’t going to let him spend the weekend trying to wind me up, either. She turned on the radio to try and diffuse the tension and turned to look at me with an embarrassed and pleading smile, and I rolled my eyes and smiled back as a sign of truce.

I turned to look out of the window, determined to ignore Carl for the rest of the journey.

‘I can’t wait to come back, either,’ Patrick had said.

That sentence had haunted me ever since I’d heard it, and every time I recalled it, my heart leapt in my chest and I began to feel a strange sense of euphoria.

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