A Tall Order

The duvet smelt funny, like toffee apple with a hint of banana, it wasn’t unpleasant but it was unfamiliar and unwelcome. He had no choice but to cover himself, the room was clammy and the dark grey clouds migrating past his window made him feel worse. He had been under now for two minutes and breathing was becoming more difficult but he refused to give in. Before long, the wetness came, soaking the white sheet, defying his strength, but he didn’t move, even when he heard the bedroom door open.

“Luke, come downstairs and introduce yourself. Don’t worry, I know it seems like a tall order but nobody will bite, it will get easier, I promise.”

He ignored the female voice, it wasn’t his mother, although he would have disregarded that too.

“Your social worker said that you like the Playstation? We have one downstairs if you’d like to give it a go?” The voice trying again with a softer tone.

Now he was reminded of the scar he kept hidden, the one his step-father had branded him with when he had refused to stop playing Grand Theft Auto. The Playstation controller had been forcibly sliced across his head as his mum stood by and said nothing; she had always been on his side.

“Oh come on Luke, dinner will be ready soon. Ok, well, why don’t I leave you to get yourself ready and I’ll come back and get you later.” The voice then disappeared.

As the door closed, Luke ran his fingers over the raised markings on his head, now covered by mounds of brown curls. His skinhead had revealed too much and invited too many questions that he wasn’t willing to answer; he trusted nobody.

As he removed the covers and took in his new room, he was beginning to realise that this was his punishment; every punch, kick, and dishonest word had finally brought him here, although it hadn’t been without several warnings from step-father, Wayne;

“You’re a waste of fucking space, you’ve brought nothing but pain and heartache to me and yer poor mother and I will do something about it, you mark my fucking words!”

So here was the ‘something about it’ part, a house full of painful secrets and jangling keys, strangers that had left their walls encrusted in scribble, words that just about read “Lisa woz ere” and “Jack’s a dikhed’, the ‘c’ and ‘a’ noticeably missing; although his schooling had been brief, this word Luke knew how to spell. A white metal-framed bed chained to the wall screamed violence and the clinical smell of bleach disguised any recent grief.

His suitcase lay closed in the corner of the room, to open it would mean surrendering to those ‘fuckwits’ that he could hear running through the corridors, shouting “fuck you, wanker!” It would also involve succumbing to his changing story that was locked away in the staff office only they had access to and then, yielding to a fight that he wanted no part of, he was done with all of it. He sensed his mother would not be coming for him, she had never come for him, even on those rare occasions it hadn’t been his fault; she always chose Wayne.