Fighting My Demons

Meeting my dad

Chapter 8

Becky

Today has been one of those days that starts badly and refuses to get better.

It began at home, which is where most of my bad days begin.

I should explain something about Boma first, since she has been on my mind since the moment I woke up. She is a girl with a beautiful soul, the kind of person you notice immediately not because of how she looks but because of how she carries herself. She is half Nigerian, half American, her father African American and her mother a Nigerian woman who grew up in the States. She is stunning in the way that people are stunning when they have no idea they are. I have wanted to be her friend since the first day I walked into that school. She keeps pushing me away and I keep coming back, which probably says something about both of us.

But this morning was not about Boma.

I woke up exhausted, the kind of tired that sleep does not fix, and walked out of my room to find a woman I had never seen before stepping out of my mother's bedroom.

This is not a new story. Since my father left, my mother has brought home a parade of strangers, a revolving door of women that I have had to smile through and ignore and eventually watch leave. My mother is bisexual. I have made my peace with the fact of it, even if I have not made my peace with the chaos it creates in our home. New faces, new tension, new mornings where I have to decide whether to say something or say nothing.

Today I said something.

We fought. Badly. I grabbed my car keys, got into my Range Rover and drove myself to school because I could not bear to be in the same enclosed space as my mother or her guest for one more minute.

By the time I pulled into the school car park I was still simmering.

Felix and David were already waiting near the entrance, standing approximately three feet apart and radiating mutual irritation. Those two are going to come to blows one of these days. The tension between them is almost impressive at this point. They both like Boma, that much is obvious to anyone with eyes, and neither of them is handling it with any particular grace.

"Hi, guys."

Felix looked up and smiled. He has the kind of face that makes you do a double take, almost unreasonably good looking, all easy charm and warmth. The kind of boy who would be insufferable if he were not also genuinely kind.

David is a different matter entirely. Handsome in a way that feels almost dangerous, the sort of face that makes every girl in the school think twice before approaching him, which is probably why most of them want to. He does not smile much. He worries. He watches. There is always something moving behind his eyes that he never quite lets reach the surface.

"Hi, David. You could at least say hello," I said, nudging his shoulder.

He looked at me. "Hi, Becky. What is taking Boma so long? She is turning into a professional latecomer."

"Relax. She just arrived."

We all turned at the same time. And the moment I saw her walking through the gate, something about my terrible morning lifted. I ran over and hugged her before I had even thought about it.

We caught up quickly. She told us she was not worried about the HOD situation, which I was fairly sure was not entirely true, but I let it go. We were about to be late for first period and I refuse to miss classes. People call me a bookworm and I do not especially mind. I just do not like losing, and showing up late feels like losing a small battle before the day has properly started.

We all asked Boma to lunch at the same time, which was deeply awkward and also somehow very funny, and she turned us all down with the particular look she gets when she has something important on her mind that she is not ready to share.

"Okay. See you all later." I headed off to my classes, already dreading the man I was about to walk in on. He and I have a long and mutual dislike of each other that neither of us has ever bothered to disguise.

Halfway down the corridor I felt the sudden urgent need to use the bathroom.

I turned and ran back toward the nearest block, pushed through the door to the girls' restroom and nearly collided with Vivian.

"Hi, Becky." She smiled at me with that particular smile of hers, the one that never quite reaches her eyes and always means she wants something.

I stopped. "What do you want?"

"There is something I want to show you. Come inside." She pushed the door open wider and gestured for me to enter.

Every instinct I had told me this was a bad idea. But I genuinely needed to use the facilities, so I went in, did what I needed to do and came back out to find Vivian locking the restroom door from the inside.

With both of us in it.

I went very still.

"Why did you lock the door?" I asked carefully.

She did not answer immediately. Instead she walked toward me slowly, tilting her head to one side.

"Has anyone ever told you how beautiful you are?"

She raised her left hand and stroked my cheek.

Then she leaned in to kiss me.

I jerked my head away so fast I nearly gave myself whiplash. And in that same instant everything clicked into place. The girls she surrounds herself with. The way she looks at certain people. The possessiveness. All of it suddenly made complete sense.

"You are a lesbian," I said.

She smiled and reached for my face again.

I grabbed her wrist, spun her around and shoved her hard into the wall.

"If you do not want to regret this, open that door right now."

She fumbled with the lock and got it open. I pushed past her and walked out as fast as I could without running, my heart hammering and my skin crawling.

Of all the days. Of all the people. In a locked bathroom.

I was halfway down the corridor when I realised I had left my phone on the edge of the sink.

I turned back, steeled myself and went in to get it.

Vivian was still there, straightening her hair in the mirror. I glared at her, grabbed my phone and walked out without a single word.

It was only when I was outside, leaning against the wall and trying to slow my breathing, that I remembered.

I had been recording a video of myself when I first walked in. Just a casual clip, nothing important. I had put the phone down on the edge of the sink to wash my hands and completely forgotten about it. When I picked it up just now, the recording was still running.

I stared at the screen.

Then I hit play.

There I was, washing my hands, completely unaware. And then Vivian walked in. And then the door locked. And then every single thing that happened after that played out in full, captured from the phone's position on the sink ledge, which had a perfect unobstructed view of the entire room.

The conversation. The approach. The attempted kiss. My reaction. All of it.

I watched it twice, barely breathing.

Then I saved the video, locked my phone and stood there for a moment thinking about what I was now holding in my hands.

Vivian had spent the past week making Boma's life difficult. She had slapped her across the face in front of witnesses and engineered a punishment that had Boma scrubbing toilets for a week. She had declared, loud enough for Bianca to hear, that she intended to make Boma's school life a nightmare.

And I had just accidentally recorded proof of something Vivian would go to considerable lengths to keep quiet.

I needed to think carefully about how to use this. And I needed to talk to Boma.

Not today though. My father had just called, which he did rarely these days and I always stopped everything I had on my plate just to have a talk with him and I was going home. As for that girl,

I would deal with Vivian tomorrow.