Running with Scissors

Chapter 1

From what Nicky could see he had been completely taken in by the do-gooders, maybe they had performed some kind of brainwashing-mind meld type thing on him. Instead of going to a few meetings and then giving up on them he had actually become more and more involved.  He was now one of the advisors; always on the end of the phone for a family in need, always arranging another meeting so that they could all ‘share their feelings’.  The irony of it was that he really didn’t see that in constantly being there to help others find their happy family he was completely neglecting his own.

The second part of his strategy was to send Nicky away.  He would send her to stay with his sister, her aunty Catherine.  Most weekends and school holidays her aunty had arrived to pick her up.

The three bedroom terraced house in Hemmington where Nicky lived was 25 miles way from the small village of Bilverstone were Aunty Catherine had her home, just across the county boarder.  It may as well have been a different planet.

Aunty Catherine prided herself on being the rebel in her family.  She always said she didn’t end up being a single parent family she had chosen to be one from the outset.  She lived in Bilverstone with her son Robert who was a little over 4 years older than Nicky.  She flitted from one job to another but always seemed to manage to live a luxury lifestyle.  Unfortunately this often meant forgetting that she was actually a parent at all, let alone a single parent.

When Nicky first started going to stay there Robert had not liked her at all.  She remembered that he had called her ‘an annoying little bug’ (often shortened to just Bug), because of the way she had always been hanging around him.  She hadn’t really liked him that much either, but he was company.  And he was only four years older than her so she had tried to be friends, tried to join in with him and his friends.

Looking back at it she could see that she had been an annoying little bug. 

She could clearly recall the night that it had all changed.  It had been late in the summer just before her 12th birthday.  Robert had been 16.  She had been sleeping and a thunderstorm had settled over the village.  When she first woke she wasn’t sure what it was that had disturbed her.  It was pitch black, as it usually was in the village at night.  Suddenly the room was lit by the strobe effect of lightning and thunder crashed immediately above her.  She screamed in surprise.

Robert had run into her room to see what was going on.  She was crying and for a moment he had stood looking at her as though she was being an irritating idiot.  But then he had sat on the edge of her bed and clumsily asked if she was ok. 

He had talked to her until she stopped crying and stayed sitting with her until the thunderstorm passed.  He had been annoyed at his mum for not being there, again.  In that night they had realised that family-wise they had both got a raw deal.  Her dad was so busy being a Good Samaritan that he often seemed to forget that he needed to be a dad too.  Robert’s mum was so busy being a free spirit that she seemed to forget that there was such a thing as responsibility.

It wasn’t an immediate transition, but after that night their relationship began to change.  He treated her like an annoying little sister and she tried to be less annoying while still trying to hang around, close to, if not actually with him and his friends. Over the years they had formed their own version of a family.  It worked for them.

As for the rest of her family... 

A year or so ago Jayne had come into the picture.  She and her young son, Adam had moved in almost immediately and she had become the new Mrs. Dean within a matter of months.  Nicky had a sneaking suspicion that her dad had been dating the woman for sometime but had just neglected to mention it.  From the beginning Nicky didn’t really get on with Jayne.  She had taken a dislike to the older women the day they had met.

Nicky knew that most people would say it was simply jealousy because she did not want to share her Dad.  Maybe that had even been true to begin with.  But not now.

Jayne had soon shown her true colours, constantly finding fault with everything Nicky did.  Always reminding her that she had taken Nicky on when her own mother hadn’t wanted her. 

She never missed a chance to tell Nicky what she thought of her mother for running off like that.  And of course she thought that Nicky was just like her, insinuating that she slept with every boy she was friendly with;  “Like mother, like daughter” was how she liked to put it.  Nicky wouldn’t mind so much but she had very strong views about that sort of thing, not that anyone would actually have taken the time to talk to her about it and find that out.

It surprised her that after all this time the snide comments still managed to hurt.  You would think that she would have built up some kind of immunity or something.  It was easy to pretend that she didn’t care, not so easy to put into practice.

Nicky sighed and tried to empty her mind of thoughts of her family.  It was too depressing.  Christmas was only a few weeks away; she should be thinking happy thoughts.  She pushed herself up so that she could look out of the window into the darkness, searching the darkened street for a glimpse of shining Christmas lights to cheer her up. 

Her eyes were drawn towards Paul’s house as the security light came on in the rear garden.  She thought briefly about their encounter, running through it in her mind.  She hadn’t really found out much about him, only his name and age.  He was 25.  He had said that he lived with his mum although Nicky hadn’t actually seen her.  Maybe she had been upstairs or something.  Not that it really mattered; it wasn’t likely that she would ever go there again.  What on earth could they possibly have in common?  He was probably only being polite when he had invited her to come back anyway.

She looked back at the stack of books in the corner of her room.  She didn’t have time to visit anyone; it was just study, study, study, all week.  Weekends were tied up too.  Friday night through to Sunday she always stayed with Robert, close to the stables where she had been lucky enough to get a part time job.  Looking forward to the weekend was what helped her get through the week.