The End is Where We Begin by Maria Goodin (open ebook .txt) 📕

they’re not really what you would call rich, and I’ve never been particularly materialistic anyway, which is handy under the circumstances. But it’s the comfortable middle-class security of the Stapleton-Porters’ lifestyle I begrudge. I know I have no right, but they have one of those perfect-looking lifestyles that brings to mind the families I knew at St John’s and aggravates the chip on my shoulder. They’ve been able to give their child everything I would have liked to have given mine – great birthday parties, nice holidays, music lessons, a lovely home. And, most importantly, two parents.

“So you’ve never sat down with Chloe’s parents to eat?” I ask.

Seeing as she’s been brought into the conversation, I’m reluctant to let talk of Chloe drop. I want him to open up about his feelings for her. Josh can be a typical cagey teenager, but with a little probing he tells me most things. I think.

“No, we’ve never sat down to eat dinner with her parents. In the same way we’ve never sat down to eat dinner with you.”

“Because?”

“Because it would be cringeworthy. Plus, you’ve never asked her to stay for dinner.”

“Well, maybe I should.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t.”

“I could get to know her better.”

“You’ve known her for, like, seven years.”

“Yeah, but I never get to have a proper conversation with her. It might be nice to find out what’s going on with her these days, what she’s up to…”

Josh frowns at me as if I’ve lost my mind.

“What for?”

I shrug. “I don’t know.”

I’m not even sure why I’m suggesting this now. The idea of sitting down and making polite conversation with Chloe over dinner would probably be just as painful for me as it would for her.

Josh shakes his head, bemused. “You’re hardly Mr Sociable, Dad.”

“All right, forget I mentioned it.”

“I’ll do that.”

Josh shovels pasta into his mouth, his head bent over his bowl. I pick at a couple of pieces of fusilli. I’m not hungry despite the fact I haven’t eaten anything since a bacon roll at ten o’clock this morning. My appetite’s been non-existent ever since my ill-fated trip to Camden.

“Can I go out after dinner?” Josh asks.

“Where?”

“Just into town.”

“With?”

“The usual.”

“Specifically?”

“Specifically, the same people I always hang out with.”

“To do what?”

“Don’t know. Whatever.”

I chew slowly and stare at him, waiting.

“Probably go to the park for a bit,” he offers.

“You’ll come home before dark,” I order, wagging my fork at him.

“I’ll come home before dark,” he sighs, as if he’s heard it all a million times, “and I won’t talk to any strangers and I won’t take the shortcut home and I won’t walk too close to bushes people could jump out from and I’ll watch out for any cars or vans pulling up alongside me.”

I hate his smart-arse attitude, but I’m also glad he’s able to reel off all these safety precautions. He thinks I’m over the top, but he has no idea of the dangers out there.

“Have you done any work on your assignment today?” I ask.

“Yeah.”

“Can I see?”

Josh probes his pasta.

“Well, I mean I didn’t get that much actually done. But I thought about what I’m going to do next.”

“Well, thinking about doing something isn’t the same as doing it, is it?”

Josh sighs, reaches for his glass and very slowly gulps down an entire pint of orange squash. Then he picks up his fork again.

“Josh?”

“What?”

“It’s not the same thing, is it?”

“I’ve got the whole summer.”

I shake my head despairingly. I am so sick of having to bang on about schoolwork.

“Josh, come on—”

“Dad, just drop it okay? I’m doing it.”

“Yeah, except you’re not, are you?”

“Oh my God, will you just get off my back about this project?!”

“I’d love to not have to be on your back all the time.”

“Really? ’Cause, seriously, it’s, like, non-stop.”

A tense silence falls between us while we pick unenthusiastically at our food.

“You know what would be way more useful to me than doing this dumb music assignment?” he finally mutters. “If you’d actually let me get some experience—”

“Don’t even start this again.”

“Why?!”

“Because you’re too young!”

I could kill Michael for having put this idea in my son’s head. I know he thinks Josh is talented, and that he wants to nurture that talent, but suggesting my child jumps in on one of his gigs was way out of line. He should have asked me first, but when he gets excited by an idea, he just never stops to think.

“It would just be a couple of songs—”

“No. You’re not doing a gig in a pub—”

“The Canal House!”

“Which is a pub! It still gets rowdy down there when there’s a band.”

“What exactly do you think would happen to me?”

“That’s not the point. You’ve just turned fifteen—”

“Exactly! I’m not a child anymore!”

“That’s exactly what you are! And it’s my job to keep you safe.”

“I am safe! I couldn’t be any bloody safer!”

He stands up and angrily scrapes the reminder of his pasta into the bin.

“Where are you going?”

“Out,” he mumbles, leaving the kitchen, “unless you think leaving the flat is too dangerous.”

I open my mouth to call him back, but suddenly I feel exhausted and can’t face the drama. It’s been a horrible week of regret and rumination following my meet-up with Libby, and I need to shift this mindset. I glance out the window at the clear blue evening sky.

There’s somewhere I want to go. I’ve been thinking about it a lot this week, and there’s plenty of time before it gets dark.

A few seconds later, I hear the door slam.

Exactly one year on from the night of the fairground I walked all the way to the cemetery. It took me well over an hour, and by the time I got there, my new trainers had rubbed both heels to the point of bleeding. It seemed fitting, like a penance. I vowed I’d do that walk on the same date every year.

I never went again.

Until now.

I park the van on the main road, and by the time I walk apprehensively through the wrought-iron gates, the sun is going down. The