Read Online Louder Than Words by Laura Jarratt - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Laura Jarratt
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in.
‘Voilà!’ she said, sliding a glass towards me and taking a deep, satisfied suck on her straw.
It tasted great: summer in a glass.
She caught my eye. ‘Yeah, good, isn’t it?’
The door opened and closed behind me and I turned nervously to find a man in a suit coming in. He was tall and broad-shouldered with a serious face. His skin was a darker shade of brown than Josie’s and his hair was buzz-cut short.
‘Hello,’ he said to me and he had the deepest voice I’d ever heard. Rich too, a voice with many layers and tones, but most of all with a quiet and undeniable authority. This was not a man you argued with. I understood now why Toby said that day on the bus that Josie would never let her dad know what Lloyd had done. I’d tremble at having to confess anything to him.
And yet . . . he gave off this feeling that he’d keep you completely safe no matter what. Maybe she should have told him. He might have been mad at her, and his version of mad at you might be terribly difficult to take without crumbling to bits, but he’d have taken care of it. Of that I was sure.
Safe. Strong. That’s what I got from him in the instant we weighed each other up. I wondered what he got from me.
‘Dad, this is Rafi from down the street. You remember I told you she doesn’t talk.’
I raised my hand in a polite little wave.
He smiled, a small, reserved thing, but oddly comforting. ‘Yes. Hi, it’s nice that Josie’s made a friend here already. She’s talked about you a lot. She says you’re a very smart girl. And I can see that she’s right.’
I felt the surprise express itself on my face.
He tapped the side of his head with one finger. ‘Policeman’s prerogative, summing a person up in a few seconds. And we have to be good at it.’ He gave me a slow, serious wink and then walked towards the hall. ‘I’m off to shower work away and get changed. Josie, why don’t you cook something for your friend if she’s hungry. She’s welcome to stay for dinner.’
And in that moment how I wished he was my dad. Did Josie know how lucky she was? That calm, stable presence there at the end of every day for her. Expecting the best of her, but there to pick up the pieces when she failed.
‘You want to stay for dinner?’ Josie cocked her head at me hopefully.
Did dogs like bones? Yes, I wanted to stay. I wanted to drink in this atmosphere so I knew forever what normal was. Like an addict waiting for a hit, I wanted this sense of family vicariously over and over again.
Right then I was glad I had no words because I would not have wanted to have told my brother about this. It would have made me too sad.
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful – a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
(John Keats – ‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci’)
CHAPTER 11
Josie and I settled into a rhythm of hanging out with each other most evenings and weekends. Despite my expectation that once the Lloyd business was over she would take up with her other friends again, that simply hadn’t happened. It seemed that, like Mr Darcy, her good opinion once lost was lost forever. I ventured to say this to her, by text of course, and she laughed about it. Threw her head right back and laughed and laughed. ‘Yeah, my sister, you’re right about that.’
She called me that sometimes – my sister – and it made me happy.
My mother had an exhibition at a local gallery and insisted, in a rare moment of desire for familial solidarity, that we all went along one Saturday. Josie, never having had to suffer the exhibitions before, was fascinated and begged to come along. Silas didn’t inflict it on any of his friends so there were just the three of us. There were a couple of other artists debuting in the exhibition, but my mother was the main attraction.
Silas and I looked politely over our mother’s work, but really Josie was far more interested than we were. And then it would have been incredibly
‘Voilà!’ she said, sliding a glass towards me and taking a deep, satisfied suck on her straw.
It tasted great: summer in a glass.
She caught my eye. ‘Yeah, good, isn’t it?’
The door opened and closed behind me and I turned nervously to find a man in a suit coming in. He was tall and broad-shouldered with a serious face. His skin was a darker shade of brown than Josie’s and his hair was buzz-cut short.
‘Hello,’ he said to me and he had the deepest voice I’d ever heard. Rich too, a voice with many layers and tones, but most of all with a quiet and undeniable authority. This was not a man you argued with. I understood now why Toby said that day on the bus that Josie would never let her dad know what Lloyd had done. I’d tremble at having to confess anything to him.
And yet . . . he gave off this feeling that he’d keep you completely safe no matter what. Maybe she should have told him. He might have been mad at her, and his version of mad at you might be terribly difficult to take without crumbling to bits, but he’d have taken care of it. Of that I was sure.
Safe. Strong. That’s what I got from him in the instant we weighed each other up. I wondered what he got from me.
‘Dad, this is Rafi from down the street. You remember I told you she doesn’t talk.’
I raised my hand in a polite little wave.
He smiled, a small, reserved thing, but oddly comforting. ‘Yes. Hi, it’s nice that Josie’s made a friend here already. She’s talked about you a lot. She says you’re a very smart girl. And I can see that she’s right.’
I felt the surprise express itself on my face.
He tapped the side of his head with one finger. ‘Policeman’s prerogative, summing a person up in a few seconds. And we have to be good at it.’ He gave me a slow, serious wink and then walked towards the hall. ‘I’m off to shower work away and get changed. Josie, why don’t you cook something for your friend if she’s hungry. She’s welcome to stay for dinner.’
And in that moment how I wished he was my dad. Did Josie know how lucky she was? That calm, stable presence there at the end of every day for her. Expecting the best of her, but there to pick up the pieces when she failed.
‘You want to stay for dinner?’ Josie cocked her head at me hopefully.
Did dogs like bones? Yes, I wanted to stay. I wanted to drink in this atmosphere so I knew forever what normal was. Like an addict waiting for a hit, I wanted this sense of family vicariously over and over again.
Right then I was glad I had no words because I would not have wanted to have told my brother about this. It would have made me too sad.
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful – a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
(John Keats – ‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci’)
CHAPTER 11
Josie and I settled into a rhythm of hanging out with each other most evenings and weekends. Despite my expectation that once the Lloyd business was over she would take up with her other friends again, that simply hadn’t happened. It seemed that, like Mr Darcy, her good opinion once lost was lost forever. I ventured to say this to her, by text of course, and she laughed about it. Threw her head right back and laughed and laughed. ‘Yeah, my sister, you’re right about that.’
She called me that sometimes – my sister – and it made me happy.
My mother had an exhibition at a local gallery and insisted, in a rare moment of desire for familial solidarity, that we all went along one Saturday. Josie, never having had to suffer the exhibitions before, was fascinated and begged to come along. Silas didn’t inflict it on any of his friends so there were just the three of us. There were a couple of other artists debuting in the exhibition, but my mother was the main attraction.
Silas and I looked politely over our mother’s work, but really Josie was far more interested than we were. And then it would have been incredibly
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