All the Little Things by Sarah Lawton (the best books to read txt) 📕

We walk out of school as the bell rings for the end of the day, and gravitate to the tree where we first spoke. The trunk is broad enough for us both to sit back against the rough bark. We are holding hands and mine is starting to feel sweaty and I don’t want to feel gross so I take it back under the pretence that I need to tie back my hair using the bobble that’s currently digging into my wrist. Alex leans over and kisses the patch of skin behind my ear I’ve just exposed, then the inside of my wrist where there’s a red line, and a live wire shoots right through me. I want to feel his hands on me, which is troubling because I don’t like being touched. I can only think that my attraction to him, his mystery, is overcoming my natural inclinations about germs and romance and things. Even I am not immune from biological urges it would seem.

I don’t know if he’s pretending not to notice the effect he’s having on me, but I’m exasperated when he turns away, leaning back and closing his eyes. I take the opportunity to study his face. Nothing is out of place. Usually when you look at someone for long enough, you start to spot flaws or anomalies – something. Molly has a freckle on her lip line that fractures their shape. Serena has a cowlick that means her hair never falls straight, however much she attacks it with products. Tilly’s nose has a scarred bump in the middle from when she went over her handlebars after her bike chain fell off when we were kids. She’d been mean to me all that day, I remember. There was blood everywhere.

I’m looking and looking. I have an eye for detail, I notice things, but his face is just perfect. He’s got thick – but not too thick – eyebrows that don’t have any nasty stray hairs in the middle, or on his brow bone. They are lighter than his hair, more brown than black. He’s got eyelashes that would put mascara out of business if girls had them. I trace the lines of his face with my eyes, follow creamy smooth skin over his cheekbones. No nibbled dry patches on his lips. Even though his hair is dark, his skin isn’t. He’s got the same sort of tone as Molly: lightly tanned, but in a blond person kind of way. I could look at his face all day, but the best part of it is currently hidden under shut eyelids, delicate and pale with a fine tracing of blue: ink dropped into milk.

‘Vivian, are you staring at me?’ He speaks in an amused, low rumble and one green-gold eye pops open looking right at me, caught in the act. I open my mouth, but my words aren’t working, and then he puts his hand behind my neck and pulls my lips to his and it doesn’t matter any more.

I walk in through the back gate of the garden thinking of nothing but a cold shower. The short walk through the woods back from school has left me with a tickle of sweat on my lower back and more gathered at the place where my hair meets my neck. I feel dirty, and sticky. Alex didn’t seem to mind the heat, he never looks anything but chilled. He didn’t walk me to the gate because he had to go back and get something he forgot from college, but that was fine because I don’t want Mum to know about him. I know she’ll think he’s a complication that I might not be able to handle, but I’m practically a grown-up now. I’m nearly the oldest in the year: I’ll be sixteen in a couple of months. He kissed me again before he went, and it made me want more of him.

I see Mum in the studio and before I can sneak past she spots me too and waves me in. Ugh, I just need a shower! She catches me in a sweaty hug, and I can’t help but shudder with disgust. She notices, and lets me go with a pathetically forlorn look on her face.

‘Hello, darling. How was it? Were the girls there?’

‘No. Hardly anyone was. It was fine, though, I just revised. I think they are just going to drop some of our exams, or push some back. It doesn’t matter to me, anyway.’

‘Not everyone is like you, Vivian.’

I look at her as she says this, surprised by the snap in her tone, but her eyes have drifted back to her painting. She’s used my face again for the girl in the book. She always does. Her paintings sell really well because people want the illustrations or the cover art as prints, and I hate it. I don’t want my face on the walls of strangers’ houses. What might my painted eyes be seeing? At least she’s changed my hair, though I expect that’s because of a description in the book rather than any effort on her part. I look ridiculous with that massive, braided mess. Are those bells? Imagine having bells in your hair – everyone would be able to hear you coming.

‘Mum! It looks like me again! I asked you not to!’ I hate the whine in my voice, but this is a conversation we have had several times and she still does it.

‘Sorry, darling. I can’t help it – you’re always the first face in my mind.’

‘Well, can you paint me out of it, please? Gross. I need a shower.’ I notice a different painting set up on an easel. ‘I like that fox, is he going in the book?’

‘Ah, no, that’s a different project.’

‘It’s really good. He looks like he’s going to jump off the paper.’

I manage to make my escape and run for the bathroom. I wonder if Alex will come back tonight? At least I