Page 5 of From Now On

Again.

As yet, Charlie does not know that he will not get the chance to put things right. If he had known what was to come, he would have gone after her, stopped her from leaving, reassured her that he understood the choices she had made.

He would perhaps have told her that he forgave her.

At the very least he’d have whispered that he loved her. Those three words would have meant everything to her, and she had not heard them from him in such a long time.

Now, she never would.

But Charlie, of course, does not know that he’ll never see her again as he turns around and closes the front door, his fingers on the handle, unknowingly touching the last thing at home that his mum would ever touch, the warmth from her hand already faded.

Chapter Two

Duke

Duke loves being at Pippa’s house. He sits on a stool at the breakfast bar and swings his legs impatiently. Pippa’s baking batches of biscuits and cakes to take to her party later. She says round food is good luck on New Year’s Eve because a circle indicates the old year has come to a close and a new one is about to start. Duke doesn’t care about all that – he just wants to eat them.

‘I can smell the cookies are nearly ready,’ he says.

‘You can’tsmellsomething is nearly ready.’ Nina doesn’t look up from her newly painted pink fingernails, which she’s filing into curves.

Pippa smiles. ‘You’ve a sensitive nose.’

‘A sensitive everything,’ Nina says, which is pretty much what Mum might say but when Mum says ‘sensitive’ it sounds like a good thing. Nina makes it sound bad but then ever since she’d turned fifteen she made everything sound like the Worst. Thing. Ever.

A rush of cold air blasts into the kitchen as his parents slip through the back door.

‘We’re off now.’

Duke jumps down and wraps his arms around Mum’s legs, his nose pressing against the fabric of her skirt. He breathes in deeply, a heavy perfume filling his throat; she doesn’t usually wear any. She doesn’t usually go anywhere that isn’t with him. ‘Do you have to go?’

‘We’ll be back tomorrow.’

‘Why can’t we stay here? With Pippa?’

‘I’ve told you. Pippa’s going to a party of her own tonight. Besides, Charlie’s come up from London to spend some time with you.’

‘But I hardly know him.’

‘He’s your brother,’ Mum says, like that means Duke automatically knows him, which is stupid because he rarely sees him. ‘You should go home and say hello.’

But Duke can think of several reasons why he shouldn’t.

Charlie always pays more attention to Billie than to him.

Last visit, Charlie bought him a tub of jelly sweets for Easter that he couldn’t eat because they contained gelatine. If he was a GOOD brother, he’d have remembered that Duke is a vegetarian and bought a chocolate egg.

Nina acts weird around him like she hates him but at the same time she is always trying to impress him.

Mum always secretly cries after he leaves even though he promises he’ll visit again soon.

He ALWAYS breaks his promises.

‘I’ll be back before you know I’ve gone,’ Mum says, which is another stupid thing. He’ll know she’s gone the second she walks out of the door. How will she be back before that? ‘I love you.’ She drops a kiss on top of his head.‘Love you too, Nina.’ She opens her arms and steps towards Duke’s sister, but Nina flaps her away with ‘wet nails’.

Dad rolls his eyes behind her back and mouths ‘hormones’ at Duke, which he’s been doing a lot lately whenever Nina is stroppy. He had asked Mum whether he’d get hormones too and she had said that’s part of biology he is still too young for, but sometimes she says he’s such an old soul for an eleven-year-old so he doesn’t know whether he’s too young or too old. Nina often calls him a baby because he doesn’t live in thereal worldbut he likes his world. The lists he makes and the random thoughts that filter through his head make him smile to himself and, when he does, Nina laughs and calls him weird, but if being happy makes you weird then he’s okay with her calling him that.

Duke hugs his mum and dad, telling them he loves them, before they then leave. He is sad for about five seconds until Pippa asks him if he wants to eat the remnants of the cookie dough, which is stuck to the mixing bowl. He scoops it out with his fingers and has put half of it into his mouth when Nina says,

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