Chocolate Box Girls: Bittersweet Read Online Free PDF Page B

yourmessages. Too bad, huh?’
    ‘Thanks for the sympathy vote,’ I huff. ‘If you’ve heard the rumours, they’re all rubbish – I was just talking to Honey, that’s all. It was totally innocent, like when you did that maths tutoring with her last term …’
    He just shrugs. ‘I know her better than you think,’ he says. ‘We’re really close. Obviously, I didn’t believe the rumours. I don’t think anything’s going on with you and Honey – but Cherry does and that’s what matters. I happen to know that Honey wouldn’t take you back anyway. She says you’re vain and shallow –’
    ‘
I’m
vain and shallow?’ I echo. ‘That’s rich! This is all Honey’s fault!’
    ‘Is it?’ Anthony asks. ‘Are you sure?’
    I scowl, staring out of the window for the rest of the journey. If I stay angry, the self-pity can’t creep in, prickling my eyes with shameful tears. That can’t happen, it really can’t; boys don’t cry.

I learnt not to cry early on, soon after the incident with Ben’s go-cart. In my family, crying doesn’t earn you sympathy or hugs, just harsh words from Dad and smirks from Ben and pitying glances from Mum. It’s safer to put on a brave face, smile and hold your head high and pretend that nothing matters. You can build a wall round yourself that way, keep the hurt inside.
    The trouble is, Cherry learnt the same lesson. She lost her mum when she was a little kid, and got picked on at school too; she perfected the don’t-care mask, the smile that hid a whole heartful of pain. When we got together, it was pretty much the first time either of us had learnt to be open and honest with anyone else – we taught each other to trust.
    I’ve destroyed all of that now.
    Days crawl by. I fix my brave face on each morning and cycle to school – let’s just say it beats the school bus. After the first day or two, I begin to enjoy the cool breeze on my face, the misty mornings, the fast pedalling along twisty moorlandlanes … but school itself is grim.
    Cherry acts like I don’t exist. I knew she was hurt, I knew she was angry, but I thought she’d calm down and let me put my side of the story. I didn’t think she’d shut me out, push me away, block my texts, my emails, my messages.
    Why would she do that? I’ve messed up, I know, but surely I deserve the chance to explain?
    ‘Maybe she was getting fed up with you anyhow,’ my friend Luke says helpfully.
    ‘Maybe she was planning to finish with you,’ Chris chips in. ‘Maybe all you’ve done was give her a good excuse.’
    ‘Thanks, mate,’ I say. ‘That makes me feel a whole lot better. Not.’
    ‘It was just an idea,’ Luke shrugs.
    I don’t like their idea, but I start to wonder if it might be true.
    Back home, I eat tea while listening to Ben’s latest exploits, teach the evening kayak club at the sailing school, mop out the shower block and tidy up the reception area, hide out in the den and play guitar for hours. No matter what I do, everything seems grey and pointless without Cherry.
    I sleep, and somehow I forget. I dream of moonlight and stars and sitting on the steps of the gypsy caravan with Cherry, last summer when we first met. In my dreams, the air is warm and thetrees are strung with fairy lights and the two of us are talking, laughing, holding hands. We have big dreams, big hopes; and all of them are still possible.
    And then I wake up, and grim reality crashes back in.
    Tuesday turns into Wednesday, Wednesday into Thursday, and still Cherry won’t even look at me.
    What do you do when you feel so low you don’t even want to lift your head up off the pillow? When your dreams of stardom bite the dust and bring you crashing down with them? When your dad treats you like dirt and your friends think you’re crazy and the only girl you ever really cared about ditches you because you tried to stop your ex running away to London?
    You write a song.
    You stay up late night after night down by the ocean, playing sad