In Too Deep Read Online Free PDF Page B

around me, crushing me as if someone’s sitting on my chest. I have no idea what to do.
    ‘I’ve made breakfast,’ she calls again. ‘Eggs, tomatoes and mushrooms. Your favourite.’
    Actually, that’s not my favourite. It was Jacob’s. Mine used to be a bacon butty grabbed in the whirl of racing for the bus stop, eating it with the sun shining on my face while chatting with friends. I used to remember all the good things, but now just the bad stuff sticks in my mind. Favourites are long gone.
    I swipe my arm up and over, dragging the duvet off. I swing my legs out of bed.
    ‘I’ll be down in a minute.’
    I pull on my robe and stand in front of the mirror, covering my face when I see remnants of last night – grey circles under my eyes and cheeks so pale I look as if I’ve never seen the sun.
    What was I
thinking
? I ask myself, going downstairs. Being alone in the park at night, the pub, the vodka, spouting off to that guy, whoever he was.
    Truth is, I just wanted to see what it would feel like to tell someone. Someone anonymous. Someone who doesn’t know my name – my full name, at least. And even that went wrong. Thank God he doesn’t know where I live.
    ‘Hey,’ Mum says, giving me a little hug. She slides the plate on to the table.
    ‘I was thinking,’ I say, taking a mouthful, hoping the food will stop the elastic bands snapping in my head. ‘I reckon you’re right about that hotel.’
    She swings round, her face alight with hope.
    ‘We should go. Dad would want us to.’
    My mind is made up. About halfway down the stairs, I decided that getting away is a good idea, to give me achance to think, make a plan. And as things close in, it will also be a place to hide.
    Mum brings a mug of tea to her mouth. She’s lost weight these last few months. It’s not surprising. She and Dad were as close as anything. Soulmates, she used to say. Sometimes they’d get mushy in front of us – Dad wrapping Mum up in his arms when he thought no one was looking, pressing a kiss down in the curve of her neck. Jacob used to screw up his eyes, while I pretended not to notice.
    But all that’s gone now – the love, the spontaneity, the ferocious fits of giggles the four of us would get into over dinner. Something as simple as Dad slurping his spaghetti, or Cooper stealing a sausage.
    Now nothing is simple, and everything is grey and empty.
    ‘I’m so pleased, Hannah,’ Mum says quietly. ‘Dad wouldn’t want us to waste it.’ She glows at the prospect.
    ‘It’s not as though it’s even far away,’ she continues excitedly. ‘He’d have chosen it for that reason, in case you’d needed us in an emergency. We could have been back in under an hour.’
    ‘For God’s sake, I’d have been fine,’ I say, laughing, though wishing I hadn’t. The hurt on Mum’s face is obvious. She sits down next to me, cupping her hands round a mug Jacob gave her one Mother’s Day.
    ‘Thanks, Han. This trip means so much. I hardly slept a wink last night, thinking about it.’
    There’s an energy in her voice that I’ve not heard in awhile. These days Mum is permanently drenched in worry. She only has to hear the door knock, the phone ring, or a police siren streak past the house, and she’s a bag of jelly. It’s good to see her like this, as if everything really
is
better in the morning.
    ‘And you know what?’ she continues, her mouth fanning into a smile. ‘I can’t help wondering . . .’ But she stops, shaking her head. ‘No, that’s silly.’
    ‘What?’
    Mum tips her face to the ceiling before giving a little sigh. ‘It’s just that . . . Well, you don’t think Dad’s cooked this up, do you? Like, pulled some amazing stunt to . . . oh, I don’t know. To con us all, maybe.’ She hesitates. ‘But not in a bad way.’
    I stop eating, put down my knife and fork. Something in my head thrums and whooshes as I try to work out what to say. I suddenly feel like the adult.
    ‘No, Mum, I really don’t.’
    Her