FIC: "Maybe.Kind of. Absolution"
FIC: Maybe. Kind of. Absolution.
Characters: Pandora, Effy, Katie, Cook and Thomas.
Pairings: Cook/Panda, Panda/Thomas
Rating: Hard R.
Word count: 5,580
"She hates it when Effy gets like this, all half sentences and riddles, her meaning always flirting with, but never within, Panda’s grasp"
Set between episodes four and eight. Many thanks to my beta, blurubberband55 who apparently doesn't just spend all her time 'shopping Lily Loveless's head onto a duck.
"Waiting for your friends to call
Waiting for the wall to fall…"
Alex Lloyd "Black the sun"
It’s too cold to be out tonight.
Hands shoved deeply into her pockets, Panda sits, casting eager, but fruitless, glances around every few minutes. Ignores the three buses that have come and gone while she’s been sitting here on this bench, crouched over and gripping herself for warmth
She fingers the necklace Thomas gave her. It now feels more like an apology than a gift. They haven’t had much time for each other of late; with his bourgeoning musical career about to take off, Thomas is more often at the studio than his own home. She can’t help but feel a heavy weight settle onto her chest whenever they’re together, like it’s up to her to make sure even the most fleeting moment seem lovely and lush.
(she doesn’t know why the best thing she’s ever had feels like a trial)
She keenly wants him here now, because he’s the kind of lad who would offer her his jacket, even though he’s African and thinks fifteen degrees Celsius is arctic. “You people,” he said to her once, fondling a lock of her hair. “Must have blood like ice to put up with this English weather.”
She had laughed then, but it’s less funny now, when the wind is beginning to howl and the air is heavy with the promise of rain. Her hands are like ice as she fumbles for her phone and dials the first number.
It goes to voicemail, like she knows it will.
“Hi, this is Effy, I’m not talking right now but leave a message and maybe I’ll get back to you.”
“So, hi Eff. I know this is,” she blinks and tries to see her watch in the gloom “only ten minutes since I last called, but we’re meant to be heading to a movie and you haven’t shown and it’s really miserable. Can’t you call me or something? I won’t be mad it’s just…” her throat is closing up, and she blinks rapidly. “Righty-o, well, call me when you get this, Ok?”
Except Effy doesn’t call. The air gets colder, and Panda can feel a soggy mist settle in her hair, on her face. She begins to wander aimlessly, watching the flickering lights she can see in people’s houses, the gloomy, darkened outlines of manikins staring back at her from shop windows. Sticks her tongue out, feels like she can taste the rain, so heavy and damp the night air seems. She’s a long way from home, doesn’t fancy the walk back, she’ll turn up at her door probably drenched and with no explanation why she couldn’t have gotten a lift back from youth group (she’s too weary to lie to her mother tonight, anyhow).
Somehow, she’s stumbled onto a main road. Cars roar past, and Panda takes a left, swerves past several couples huddled under brollies. They jostle past her roughly, and she feels like she’s the only person in Bristol that’s not in a hurry.
Her stomach churns unpleasantly when she realises the building she’s standing in front of. A coincidence, surely? Surely the route to his place isn’t etched into her mind, a map that she can follow even in the heavy gloom that makes watching where to put her (big, clumsy) feet a challenge. But she’s here now, and she reasons it would be silly to leave, when it’s going to rain, and Cook has an endless supply of cigarettes he’s happy to give to her for free (or maybe not so free, but she banishes those kind of thoughts as soon as they come).
She takes the stairs, two at a time, and is deeply thankful she doesn’t spot anyone she knows from college lurking in the halls. Her breath is shaky and strangled when she arrives at his door, and she’s knocking before she’s aware of it.
He answers, dressed in a crumpled green shirt and dress pants. Looking tired and dishevelled, like he doesn’t even have the energy to go out and get well fucked up (or maybe he already has. Panda never asks).
His smile is wide and he throws his head back and laughs, long, loud and brightly. Throws the door open and smirks knowingly, filthily.
It’s all the invitation that she’s ever needed.
(she likes it when he doesn’t have a place to go, either)
------
Panda’s roused from sleep by an insistent buzzing on her nightstand. Still clinging to the last vestiges of a perfectly pleasant dream (about cows, she thinks) she blearily answers “hello?”
There’s no response on the other end of the line. Panda immediately feels a stab of irritation, but doesn’t hang up (it could well be one of those poor call centre workers from India that her mum says needs the job otherwise they’d be out on the streets in the cold begging or becoming prostitutes).
“Hello?”
“Hi.”
Panda is wide awake now. “Effy?”
“Yeah,” her voice is brittle. It stops the self righteous rant that’s balancing precariously on Panda’s tongue. “Sorry I bailed last night.”
“Eff,” Panda hisses, her resentment beginning to simmer. “It’s blooming six thirty in the morning. I waited forty five minutes at the bus stop for you, plus I was having a lovely dream about cows just now.”
“I’m sorry, I am.” Her voice sounds stronger now.
“What were you doing then? Where were you?”
“Everywhere, nowhere. In a place where it didn’t matter.”
“Right,” Panda mutters. She hates it when Effy gets like this, all half sentences and riddles, her meaning always flirting with, but never within, Panda’s grasp. “You should have told me, Eff.”
“I’m telling you now.” A pause. “I’ll see you at college, right?”
“Right.”
She throws her head back, collapses into the softness of her blankets. Squeezes her fist into a ball and shoves it in her mouth, sinks her teeth in to stop the yell (doesn’t know how she’d explain it to her mother if she heard).
It’s all she can do to stop herself from throwing the phone half way across the room.
------
The air is heavy and stale with cigarette smoke in Cook’s room. His curtains are drawn with only thin streams of light trickling through, spotlighting a few items of clothing that are strewn over his carpet (his dress pants there, her rainbow coloured tights here). She’s been trying to account for every piece of clothing that she can spot through the gloom. They had both dozed off after a rather vigorous afternoon rendezvous, and after five minutes of playing any mind game she could think of, she grew bored.
She finds a wrinkled packet of Cook’s cigarettes, lights one. Likes how she can feel the smoke twisting as it snakes down her throat. She can feel Cook’s inert body pressed against her, the only sound permeating the silence is his deep breaths.
It‘s the most alone she‘s felt for as long as she can remember.
Cook’s blankets, which lay tousled over her thighs, are now much too heavy and hot. She’s almost frantic, kicking her legs carelessly until they’ve been tossed aside, but when the air meets her bare legs, she’s still feverish. She tries to take a deep breath, but it’s like the air has been sucked away. Cook’s room is suddenly much too small, Thomas’s necklace much too heavy on her neck, and she’s dizzy with it all.
“What…”
‘I’ve got to go, Cookie,” she’s burrowing around through the heap of clothes on the floor, trying to find her bra.
He usually lets her go without a word. From the moment she’s out of his room, there’s a tacit agreement that this is never spoken about. It helps, because otherwise she doesn’t think she could cope, if what she does with Cook isn’t completely severed from the rest of her life. Yet it doesn’t feel that way now. It feels like all the facets of her life have blurred together, messily, completely and without her consent.
“Oi,” Cook says forcefully, throws an arm around her waist, grounding her. It doesn’t matter that his grip is loose, it still feels vice-like. “Where are you going?” his breath is damp against her ear. She shivers. “It’s not like you have a place to go.”
“Bog off, Cook,” she throws his arm off, turns and glares at him balefully, rage surfacing out of nowhere. “You don’t know a thing about it.”
“I don’t?” he counters, his grin unattractively stretched far too taut across his face. “I know enough, babe. You and me,” he grips her hips tightly with his hands. “Don’t owe nobody nothing.”
She shuts her eyes. Tries to ignore his hands which now are roving possessively over her body. Tries to ignore the insistent dull ache she can feel between her legs.
"What about…”
“Fuck them,” he growls, his voice laced with anger. She clenches unexpectedly. He pushes her down none too lightly onto the mattress. Settles on her fully, sucks on the base of her neck roughly, and she tries to twist away, doesn’t want him to leave a mark (she doesn’t want to be claimed by him ever). He coarsely palms her tit in his hand and grinds his hips down until a moan trips from her mouth.
He kisses her, fiercely, again and again until her lips throb. He takes an earlobe into his mouth, sucks on the underside, presses against her desperately. She gasps and wriggles under him, likes that it’s rough.
“Fucking stop,” he hisses “thinking about it.”
Then he’s kissing her again and again, hand sliding down her stomach, and Panda closes her eyes kisses him back, and forgets.
(she likes it better, this way)
-------
She’s not quite sure when it became routine for Katie to sit with them during lunch. All she does know is that, somehow, Katie’s persistence has paid off, because finally Effy’s lips don’t contort into an almost sneer the minute Katie sashays down the hall towards them.
It doesn’t surprise her, really, Panda muses, munching on her sandwich idly. Effy likes nothing more than being pursued. Likes it when someone manages to impress her just enough. Pandora remembers that vividly, wanting to cherish the moment when, blood rushing to her ears as she hung suspended from a tree, bra hanging from her hand triumphantly, Effy had for a moment been intrigued. It had felt like a victory of sorts, when Effy’s eyebrows slid into her hair and she really bothered to look at Pandora for what felt like the first time.
“Licking whipped cream off her tits. How fucking low can you get?” Katie hisses, throwing a dismissive hand in the air for emphasis. “And you know what fucking gets me? I was the one who gave him that idea. He thought he was lactose intolerant until I showed him otherwise.”
“Finally through dating tossers then, Katie?" Effy asked blandly.
“Completely through. My WAG days are over, nothing but tossers there. Plus,” Katie begins to chuckle cheekily “let’s just say Danny sometimes had trouble even starting the game, right?”
Katie laughs for a moment before she seems to remember that Panda is there. She turns and places a placating hand on her arm. “I mean, fuck, sometimes he couldn’t…”
“Get it up,” Effy finishes.
The two of them share a knowing look, and Panda flushes, knows how she’s meant to react by rote. "Right, well…”
“No need to be embarrassed, babe,” Katie says slowly.
And she tries to think of anything, anything, except the memory she suddenly can‘t shake (hot breath ghosting over her nipple, tongue sliding down her stomach.) “I’m not. I know loads about this stuff, Katie.”
“Lucky Thomas,” Katie snorts, before launching into a rant about fashion that Panda doesn’t even hear, deafened by the sound of blood whooshing to her ears. Hopes no can hear the sudden frenzied beating of her heart.
She doesn’t look at Effy for another five minutes. Just in case.
-----
“I think we should wait,” the words tumble out before she can stop them, and she’s so shocked she can’t say anything more.
Thomas’ hands stop and he draws away, confusion clouding his features. They’ve snuck out to a field a few blocks from her house. It’s one of the few moments they’ve had to be alone together of late, each lying to a mother who sees demons lurking around every corner.
“I’m not, not ready,” she whispers, and he smiles gently, takes her hand and kisses her knuckles softly.
She swallows the hot lump that’s lodged in her throat. “Sorry.”
"It’s fine,” he says, takes out some spliff and begins to roll it. She nestles into the crook of his shoulder, marvels at how soft and pliant his hugs are. She likes it, because when he holds her, it’s so distinctly him, them, that she can keep the boundaries in her mind clear.
(she doesn’t want to sully these moments with memories)
“Sorry,” she repeats, and he smiles and kisses her hair, once.
-----
The next day she spots Effy leaning heavily against the wall by the steps to the side entrance of college, nonchalantly smoking a cigarette. As Panda approaches she sees that her clothes are ruffled, her hair a tousled mess. Her eyes are still heavily made up but her lips, Panda’s notes with dismay, are dry and chapped. Effy greets her with a wisp of a smile, and she looks so bedraggled the words are out of Pandora’s mouth instantaneously.
“Blooming heck, Eff, did you even go home last night?”
Effy’s smile fades. “No.” She says as she stubs her cigarette out under a scuffed boot and blows a trail smoke into the air. “Coming in then?”
“No,” Panda sighs, grips her lunch box tightly. “I just…” gropes for the right words (useless, useless) “Effy, what’s going on?”
Effy sighs and doesn’t meet her gaze, finds something fascinating to stare at on the pavement.
Panda steps forward, emboldened. “Is it your parents? You can tell me, because…”
“It’s nothing,” Effy breathes, closing her eyes in a pained, slow manner. When she opens them her gaze is still. “All of it, nothing.”
Her face must look a fright because Effy takes one look at it and sighs, takes one of Pandora’s hands between hers.
“Come on,” she says kindly. “Let’s go get a hot chocolate and make fun of those blonde twats you used to have class with.”
It’s all she can hope to get, really, so Panda nods and falls in step behind Effy as they enter the crowded hallway.
(she likes that she has secrets, too)
------
Somewhere along the line, she begins to like him.
“We just don’t spend any time together,” Panda sighs, languidly stretching her legs out as far as she can.
“Mmmm,” Cook mumbles, fumbling with his lighter, fag lolling gently from his mouth. He takes a drag and stares off into the distance. It’s one of things that’s surprised her most; he’s always so quiet, after.
“We used to hang out loads, right messing about, just doing, whatever,” Panda smiles fondly. “She got me fired once. I was working for this German bloke, who was actually going to be my uncle until my aunt found out he was making monkey with a ‘lady of the night’. Dunno what they are, most ladies go out at night, right? Anyway, he was mental; made me wear this stupid uniform and everything.” Cook snorts and shakes his head. “But that was before….college and all this.”
The smile on Cook’s face looks forced. “You shouldn’t be fretting so much, cupcake,” he says lightly, handing her the fag. She inhales. Likes that it stings. “Friends fall apart. For life means nothing, these days.”
“You don’t understand,” Panda says, softly. “She noticed me before anybody.”
“Alright,” Cook says, and his smile takes on a different hue. He plucks the fag from her fingers and snuffs it out. Reaches for her tit and squeezes. “I’m noticing you plenty, now.”
-------
The assembly room is packed, and Panda can barely squeeze through the crowd. She almost steps on some bloke’s toes, and she curses her feet, so big and unwieldy. She sees Effy and Katie, both sitting primly on a desk near the back of the room. Katie waves her over with a wide smile.
“All right, yeah?”
“Real swell thanks. Hiya, Eff.”
“Hey,” Effy meet her gaze for a second, then her eyes flicker away. Moves slightly so that Panda can sit next to her.
“Anyone know what this assembly is about?”
“Just going to bang on again about that student election thing, as if anyone gives a fuck,’ Katie snorts, then rolls her eyes magnificently as Naomi’s arm shoots into the air insistently. “Oh god, here we go.”
Immediately Pandora gets the disconcerting sense that someone is staring. She looks and sees Freddie, sitting slumped on the ground, hands shoved into his pockets, lank fringe clinging to his forehead. He’s looking so hard that Panda feels the hairs on her arms rise. She whips her head around and sees Effy meet his gaze, hold it for a long second, then look away, pained. When Panda glances over again, Freddie’s still staring, looking like some impossibly pretty, sad, statue.
"What’s all this then?” Katie asks, sounding extremely intrigued.
She feels words bubbling up from her tummy, words that she can’t help but say, verbal diarrhoea, Effy calls it, “but maybe” Panda thinks “If Katie knew too…”
“It’s like this epic love story,” Panda babbles, words stumbling out. “Freddie fancies Effy, but Cook doesn‘t want that, see, but Effy isn’t sure…”
“Shut up,” Effy snaps coldly.
"Sorry?” Panda asks (stupid, stupid). Swallows all her words, until she feels them there, all gluggy in her gut. With an obviously betrayed expression, Effy gets up and strolls out of the classroom, ignoring Doug, Naomi, Freddie, Cook, (her), everyone.
Katie snickers and pats her hand; cold comfort. When assembly is finally done, Katie stands and makes a bee line for Emily. Panda sits and grips the table fiercely, feeling quite faint, frantically wondering if she would look right mad if she started doing her breathing exercises. One I’m calm, two, I’m calm, three…
Cook only has to shoot her one filthy glance, and she follows him.
-----
She’s riding him, gripping his chest like her life depends on it. “Fuck,” she moans.
“I’m feeling it,” he gasps, eyes shut tight, grabbing her ass roughly. “Effy….”
She comes. Hard.
------
She’s arrived late, which is why she has to squeeze her way through the heavy, rowdy, throng of people. Thomas has finally scored a gig, his career as an amateur rap artists has really begun to take off. She’s proud of him, even if it means attending more dark, dank and loud dance parties than she can handle, even though she’s Effy Stonem’s best friend.
She knows the others are here, already said hello to Freddie, who barely looked at her (because I’m not beautiful, like Eff) and Emily, who seemed more fucked up than she’d ever seen her, hugging her, slurring and taking huge hits of tequila as if it were water.
She orders a cherry vodka shot, swallows it in one. The vodka burns any residual guilt right away. She almost sways into Naomi, who sniffs at her a bit, but Panda doesn’t care, just gazes across at the seas of bodies, bobbing and grinding and laughing. The air is thick with smoke, cologne and perfume and she mentally makes a note to sneak over and wash her clothes at Effy‘s, lest her mother take one sniff at her and lose her head completely.
“All right?” Effy asks softly, gliding up from nowhere. She looks askance at Panda, mascara smeared haphazardly over heavy lidded eyes, hair a tangled mess of knots and sweat. “Still looks“, Panda thinks “Real beautiful.”
She threads an arm through Panda’s. “Getting along all right with the vodka, there.” There’s a laugh in her voice even though her face isn’t smiling.
“Yeah, I love cherry vodka, it‘s brill.”
“Know what else you’d love?” Effy’s voice is so low that Panda has to lean in, steely blue eyes hinting at something Panda can’t grasp. “I’ve got MDMA. Let’s get totally, totally fucked up.”
“I dunno, Eff," Panda objects weakly, as Effy pulls out a little plastic baggie, waves it at her suggestively. “I just thought it was some vodka and dancing. Thomas will be on soon.”
“Plans change, Panda.” Effy says, voice sounding so cool amidst the humid room. “Thought you loved drugs now.” She sucks hard on her finger, then dips it into the baggie, slipping and sliding, coats it with as much flaky white powder as she can. With hint of a smile she slowly withdraws and drags her dry finger across Panda’s wet lips.
“What the bog, Effy," Panda gasps, wipes at her lips furiously. Glares. “You’re all fucked up already, aren’t you?”
“Maybe I am," Effy agrees. “Come on Panda, live a little. Don’t you ever…don’t you ever want to just forget?”
Panda takes an involuntary step back, as something darker, wilder, fiercer coalesces together, so much so that she wants to slap Effy, hard. Her voice angrier than she means it to be. “I asked you not to get fucked up tonight, it’s Thomas’s gig, and I asked you to do this for me!”
Effy’s blinks. Drops her head and wipes her offending hand all over her black little slip that’s so short it borders on indecent. For a moment that drags on forever Effy is still, tense, as if she’s moments from dissolving back into the crowd. Eventually, though, when Effy drags her gaze up she can’t meet Panda’s.
“Panda…”
“I can’t…just, I asked one thing, Eff, why can’t you do this for me?”
Effy doesn’t reply, just stares at her with that in that way that means she’s not present, somehow, and it makes Panda so mad she doesn’t hide the sob, “Bog off Effy,” she manages, barely, her mouth is suddenly sodden with saliva. “Just fuck the flipping off.”
She turns and dives into the crowd, who jostle against her carelessly. There isn’t enough air as she roughly elbows people aside, not even caring as some tosser gropes her on the way through. The strobe lights flash, bathing the whole place in a ghostly, white pallor. Then it’s darkness again, throwing Panda’s equilibrium off, until she finally smacks into cool, fresh air that she greedily sucks into her lungs.
She sits down heavily and curls into a tight ball, feeling the vibrations of the drum and base pick at her nerves. Before she’s conscious of it she’s crying, pained, keening kind of sobs, that wrack her whole body. Her chest feels like it has been scrubbed with sandpaper, raw and sore and chock full of too much feeling.
It takes ages for anyone to find her, and whey they do, it’s the wrong person. Thomas doesn’t say a word, just sits next to her and wraps his big, warm, arms around her. Like a gilded cage.
Whatever makeup Effy had applied earlier in the night smears all over his oversized jumper.
“Pandora…”
“I just…I just can’t anymore, T-Thomas.”
Faintly, she feels his big hand thread through her hair. “Is this about Effy, sweetness?”
She sobs harder.
“I just…I don’t understand…what you see in her, ma douce fluer`”
“It’s…you don’t understand….I, she saw me, before anyone. Before her,” Panda throat closes and she swallows thickly, pushes the words out. “Before her, there was nobody.”
Thomas holds her for a long moment. Then from somewhere above he says “I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner.”
Something insides her breaks. She sobs until can’t anymore, and Thomas wordlessly pays for the taxi. When she gets home she hides her clothes in her closet collapses on the bed and wishes for long stretches of nothingness.
(she wonders if it’s only Effy who can forget)
------
“You look tired, dear. I do hope you are getting enough sleep,” her mother chides, firmly slicing into her steak tenderloin.
“I’m sleeping fine, Mum.”
“Well, you keep on eating your dinner. There’s nothing a good, honest, hearty meal won’t cure,” her mother’s smiles fades almost immediately. “Don’t frown, Pandora, it will give you lines.”
“Righty-o, Mum. Sorry.”
They eat for another few moments in silence, permeated only by blunt knives clinking against china. Her mother clears her throat ominously, and Panda’s stomach immediately clenches. Without fail, this is going to end in praying, her breathing exercises, or her being sent to her room without dessert.
“You’ve been going out a lot, lately.”
“Told you, loads of times, stupid, youth club. With Effy.”
“Effy, right.” Pandora’s mum folds her hands together, demurely, tightly. “Are you sure dear, about Effy? Is she really….appropriate?”
“You don’t know a thing about it,” Panda snaps, and her mother’s eyes bulge so much that Panda has a ridiculous urge to laugh. It doesn’t quiet her frantic heart, though, that’s clanging loudly in her chest “I’m making this worse” she thinks, and plasters on a placating smile. Seeing it, her mother softens, slightly.
“Effy’s parents are a bit bonkers, Mum, it’s why she dresses the way she does, all black and depressing and see-through. And, she didn’t go to youth group until I started dragging her there, and now she can’t get enough of it. She goes so she doesn’t have to be at home with her parents who are getting divorced cause her Mum got it whacked in the pants and her Dad went mental. It’s just…she needs me, Mum.”
It works like a charm. It always does. “Oh Pandora, my little angel.” her mother breathes, positively glowing. “You’re taking this poor girl, and showing her the right way to live. I am…my heart is just throbbing, Pandora. I am tickled pink!”
She doesn’t like to think too much, how lies and truths all thread together until she can’t untangle them again. She doesn’t think she could pinpoint the day, the moment, when lies slipped off her tongue easier than truths ever did. All she knows is, she could do all this in her sleep, well before college even started.
“All right, shall I do the washing up now?”
After dutifully helping her mother do the dishes, Panda wanders outside and leans against the backdoor of her house, and breathes, deep and slow. She’s absolutely desperate for a cigarette now, but if her mum gets home from the neighbours earlier than usual and catches one of Cook’s Marlborough Lights in her mouth, she’s liable to be locked up good and proper for at least a month.
She lies on the ground where her mum had ordered that bouncy castle (another thing she didn’t get to do at her pyjama party because Effy always bogs everything up) and stares up at the stars for what seems like age, until she looks so hard they get all blurry. Thoughts, unbidden, begin to sneak into her mind, thoughts like, why, when and slut but she snaps her eyes shut so tightly it begins to hurt.
She fumbles for her phone and dials the first number.
Just when she thinks Effy won’t pick up again, she answers in breathless voice. “Hello.”
For a moment, Panda has to swallow hard. Struggles to find her voice again, “Eff…”
“Yeah,” Effy’s voice is low and flat, and Panda wonders if she’s coming down from a particularly rough trip. Panda hears her light a cigarette. “You alright?”
“Just fine, thanks. Flippity dippy do.” Panda fiddles with the hem of her skirt. “I was thinking, my mum’s gone out and she could be gone for ages, and you and me could spend some time together, I’ve got a mountain of DVDs and even some low salt popcorn and we could…”
“Is that Panda?” Cook asks, and she can hear the leer in his voice.
“Oh.”
“Panda….”
“No, no, Eff,” she hates that her eyes sting. Hates it, hates it. “Didn’t know you were surfing and turfing, we can do it another night.”
“Panda wait!” Effy’s voice is vivid in its urgency. “Do you need me? Don’t worry about him, do you need me to come over?”
“I…” she hears Cook’s loud, knowing guffaw in the background. Doesn’t trust her voice any. “Another time.”
She hangs up before Effy can even say anything in response. Only then can she feel the damp grass chafing the back of her legs. Closes her eyes and thinks of the breathing exercises she does. One I’m calm, two, I’m calm, three…
It helps, and she’s thankful.
(she doesn’t think she can stand to cry, anymore)
------
Bristol has been so wet and so depressing all week, Panda almost laughed right in Katie’s face when she suggested a camping trip for this weekend. Didn’t stop her from saying yes, though, because Katie seemed to think it was really important, and anyway, Katie is turning out to be more of a friend to Panda than anyone. She never knows where Effy is and Thomas and her are spending less time together than ever.
( she doesn’t like to think what it means, when even Thomas is avoiding her)
She settles down and starts watching cartoons (Peanuts, brill) when she hears a knock on the door.
She knows she looks foolish, but she can’t help that her jaw drops dumbly as soon as she spots Effy, looking small and fragile, on her doorstep.
“Hi,” Panda says guardedly.
“Hey,” Effy whispers. Wraps two sinewy arms around her waist. “Can I come in?”
When she enters, Panda takes a good hard long look at her. Effy doesn’t look well, that much is clear. Her skin is awfully pale, like it’s been bleached of all its colour. She almost wobbles when she begins to walk through Panda’s living room, taking tentative steps before sinking down on Panda’s couch in relief. She folds her hands delicately in her lap and stares at nothing in particular. She looks exhausted, as if being the Effy everyone demands has whittled her down to nothing.
Panda can’t remember ever seeing Effy look so small, and she feels her stomach drop just looking at her. She doesn’t have a clue what to say to her now, not to this quiet, brittle Effy. So she does the only thing she can, because she’s useless, and words never seem to solve anything.
She makes Effy a meal (toast, not buttered) and a black tea. Makes herself toast and jam and some English breakfast with milk. Sets the meal in front of Effy and sits across from her, taking the unfamiliar step of being in the lead. Being brave enough to start eating and to keep staring defiantly at Effy until she caves, shooting Panda a grateful smile before starting to chew her toast slowly, painfully.
They don’t talk. Panda doesn’t think they’ve ever been this silent before. She finds it unnerving, because her life is full of sounds, especially when she’s with Effy. She doesn’t think they’ve just….been still.
It takes an eternity for Effy to finish her toast, and Panda feels like some sort of food Nazi, but she thinks it’s important that she’s firm with this. Her gut twists unpleasantly when she wonders just when was the last time someone made Effy take care of herself, even a little.
She cleans everything up and then comes and plops down next to Effy, but not too close. They sit for what seems like an age, and Panda feels hopelessly adrift, grapples for something intelligent to say, something that salves the bruises even she can see, just below the surface of Effy’s skin. But her efforts all come to nothing, as usual, because she’s useless and it’s only a matter of time before Effy (everybody) sees her for what she really is.
Unbidden, hot tears begin to prick at the corner of her eyes, and she wills them desperately to leave.
Effy notices, of course. Slowly, she reaches over and drags her fingers over Panda’s hand. It’s so wrong for Effy to be comforting her right now, but it feels good, all the same.
Effy sighs and turns and meets Panda’s gaze.
“Katie,” Effy says slowly, like the word is almost too heavy. “Turned out to be exactly who I thought she was.”
“Oh.” Panda says weakly. She doesn’t know what Effy means, but doesn’t try to weave the threads together and work this out, because Effy looks so tired, and Panda wonders that maybe figuring this whole thing out for her isn’t really her place.
“Your mum not around, then?” Effy asks.
“N-no,” Panda stumbles. “She’s…I dunno. She’s out a lot these days. It’s brill, though, because she can…she can be a bit….”
“I know,” Effy says, softly.
Panda returns Effy’s shaky smile. Likes that sometimes they still know what the other is thinking.
“Come on, let’s just sit,’ Effy says, and there’s something in her face, like the nonchalance has slipped, slightly, and she’s unable to hide the plea behind indifference anymore. “You said something about DVDs?”
“Whizzer,” Panda enthuses, bounces off the couch with vigour. Smiles easily at Effy, and is rewarded with a small smile in return. “Got a whole bunch of them. Let me go get them.”
When she returns, she lays them out on the table. “New Pixar releases, whizzer, these ones. Shrek, haven’t seen that one in ages. Monsters Inc, A Bugs Life ooooh,” Panda waves one in Effy’s face. “The Incredibles.”
“What about your old collection? Something we used to watch.”
“Ok. I’ve got to find them, Mum hid half my DVDs. Told me I would always be useless if all I did was sit around and watch telly all the time. Aha.” She grabs two that she knows Effy likes, back when it was a given that she would see Effy three, four, five times a week.
“Right well, remember these…”
“Panda.”
“What?”
“You’re not,” Effy says, and her eyes are sharp now. “Useless.”
Panda stops, reels, is uneasy how swiftly Effy can unravel her. Strike at the very heart of her. “I…”
“You never were.”
“Oh. I…um”
“Going to stand there gawping or are you going come to sit down, then? Effy asks, with a small smile, and for a moment, she’s her old, poised, self again.
“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or the Wizard of Oz, Eff?” Panda asks, her voice dangerously raspy.
“I always liked the Wizard of Oz. It’s trippy.”
“There’s drugs in the Wizard of Oz?”
“Loads,” Effy says softly, kindly, threads her arm around Panda’s. She rests her head gently on Panda’s shoulder as they watch the film in silence. It’s serene, the two of them, together, like it used to be, before boys and college that bogged everything up. Here, with Effy resting against her, she feels lighter, like maybe she has a chance of making things better between them. Just by Effy being here.
And that’s enough.
For now.