Read Online One Night Stand by Julie Cohen - Free Book Online

at least boring wasn’t scary.
     
    ‘Oh, June. That’s awful.’ Her misfortune made her somehow more human, less like the untouchably glamorous wicked fairy figure of my childhood.
     
    Hugh was frowning, too. ‘Bastard.’
     
    ‘I know,’ June said sadly. She drew on her roll-up with a delicate breath.
     
    ‘Well, you did the right thing leaving him,’ I said. ‘I’m glad you came here instead of staying with someone who’s beating you up.’
     
    ‘Thank you, Ellie. I knew you’d understand.’
     
    She launched herself off her chair in a cloud of tobacco smoke and hugged me. I gave her a hug back, feeling how fragile she was, how vulnerable. She was family, and she needed me. For the first time in my life, sympathy overcame the awe I usually felt towards her.
     
    It had to be traumatic to be assaulted by your boyfriend, and since she hadn’t gone into detail about what happened, it was probably even worse than she was telling us.
     
    ‘What did you do?’ I asked her, still holding her. ‘Did you call the police on him?’
     
    ‘Oh, no. I broke his nose.’
     
    She sat back down at the table and drew on her fag.
     
    ‘Got an ashtray?’
     
    I stared at her. She was still small, still thin, but nowhere near fragile. And in no way in need of my sympathy.
     
    Hugh took a plate from underneath one of my aloe plants and gave it to her to put her ash in. Then he scraped back his chair and stood up.
     
    ‘Well, it’s been a very interesting morning, but I’ve got to get to work,’ he said. ‘Catch you later, June.’
     
    ‘Oh, definitely,’ she replied, her eyelids at half mast as she gave his body the once-over from head to foot. ‘We are all going to have so much fun.’
     
    I followed Hugh to the door. ‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘Your sister is pretty incredible.’
     
    ‘I don’t really know her. Maybe this visit means we’ll get closer.’
     
    ‘That would be good.’ He ruffled my hair, shorter than June’s. ‘I hope you do.’
     
    As he twisted the doorknob, I remembered something. ‘What were you going to ask me about before June turned up?’
     
    For the first time since June had kissed him, Hugh looked uncomfortable.
     
    ‘Oh, nothing,’ he said. ‘Not important.’
     

8
     
    When I was growing up, there was one rule in our house: Eleanor shalt not act like June.
     
    No staying out all night partying. No getting a job and losing it two weeks later or starting a course and then dropping out. No sneaking men into my single bed. No starting screaming fights with my mother at two in the morning which left her tight-lipped for days afterwards. No disappearing for days or weeks or months at a time. No smoking, no spontaneous outbursts of affection, no equally spontaneous outbursts of breathtaking bitchiness, no careless beauty or excitement.
     
    Except for occasional weeks between men and jobs, she didn’t live with us in Upper Pepperton, but even when she wasn’t in the house June was a shadow there, half darkness and half nearly blinding sunlight. She was absolutely, terrifyingly free, and she was my mother’s favourite topic of conversation.
     
    My mother’s second favourite topic of conversation was the fact that, thank God, I wasn’t anything like June. I was a good girl.
     
    A good girl who fervently, desperately wanted to be more like June.
     
    Her freedom, her glamour, were shimmering enticements to everyday good girl Eleanor, who I knew lacked sparkle next to June. For a couple of weeks when I was fifteen I’d even tried dressing like her, hitching up the skirt of my school uniform, painting on red lipstick, frothing up my neat dark hair with hairspray and mousse. Until I’d caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror from afar and realised I looked ridiculous, a bit like a female version of Robert Smith from The Cure.
     
    I gave up. I was meant to be mundane.
     
    At the moment, this particular mundane good girl was celebrating the clear results