Another Me Read Online Free PDF Page B

the day wore on, the dark feeling settled on me again, like a shroud being laid around my shoulders.
    â€˜I think I’ll take the long road home today,’ I told the girls as we stood chatting at the top of the stairs. I was looking down them as the midwinter dusk was falling. In the dim lights, the bare branches of the trees that hung over the wall were like bony fingers ready to reach out and touch me. The very thought made me shiver.
    â€˜Kaylie and I will come down the stairs with you, if you like,’ Dawn offered.
    But I shook my head. I couldn’t face those stairs today, though I wasn’t going to admit that to them.
    â€˜No, honestly, I just feel like the walk. I’m going over my lines in my head, you see.’ How they couldn’t see that for what it was, a blatant lie, I do not know. They let me go, however, and stood watching me as if I was an infant heading off for her first day at school.
    I turned the corner, and disappeared behind a row of houses, but as I emerged between them and looked round, there were my two friends, still watching me. Dawn waved. So did Kaylie, and I hurried on, tryingnot to get annoyed at them. They were worried about me, I told myself, and I was touched by their concern. I was lucky to have such good friends.
    The men were fixing the odd lift when I went into our block. Or rather, they were sitting inside it drinking mugs of tea.
    â€˜Sorry, darlin’,’ one of them said and winked at me, ‘you’ll have to use the even lift today.’
    â€˜Or else walk up the stairs,’ suggested the other.
    My reflection in the steel at the back of the odd lift made me realise just how pale I was. I needed to get my circulation going to give myself a bit of colour, so I headed for the stairs.
    I was more out of condition than I thought, because I was panting by the time I hurried into the flat. The phone was ringing in the hall and I just made it in time. The mirror on the wall showed me I had colour now. My face was red and damp with sweat and my ribs were aching.
    â€˜Hello?’ I was breathless. ‘Who’s this?’
    Dawn sounded worried. ‘What’s wrong? What happened?’
    I giggled. ‘I’m not fit. I’ve just walked up thirteenflights of stairs and I’m about dead.’
    Dawn let out a sigh of relief. ‘You gave me such a fright there. Me and Kaylie are just checking up you got home all right.’
    Annoyance nipped at me again, but I pushed it away. ‘Honestly, what are you two like!’
    Kaylie piped up. I could imagine her yanking the phone from Dawn. ‘You did see us waving at you?’ There was an embarrassed hesitation. ‘Remember? When you went between that block of houses. You waved back? Didn’t you?’
    I didn’t say anything for a moment, and this time I didn’t push the annoyance aside. ‘Do you think I’m daft, is that it? Do you think I’m going crazy?’
    Dawn tried to explain, but I wouldn’t let her.
    â€˜Yes, it was me!’ I yelled. ‘This time it
was
me. I remember. I saw you. I waved back. OK?’
    And I slammed down the phone.

Chapter Ten
    â€˜I don’t think I like this Lady Macbeth very much,’ I said, slamming the book shut. ‘She’s a nag. She’s horrible. She wants her husband to murder somebody.’
    We were in the canteen with another rehearsal looming tonight, and Kaylie and Dawn were doing their best to help me remember my lines. Unsuccessfully.
    Dawn sucked milk noisily through a straw. ‘She’s a very strong woman, Fay.’
    But I couldn’t see that at all. Did you have to be so nasty to be strong? Surely not. I wasn’t nasty. Did that make me weak?
    We suddenly heard Monica’s loud giggle from the far corner of the canteen. She was sitting on a table, waving her arms around, and whatever she had just told her friends had sent them into fits of laughter.
    â€˜Now,