[Fiction] 10 days last summer

[alli55]

Author's note.

This is just my second story! The first was The sleepover that changed my life, which you can find here: http://www.getdare.com/bbs/showthread.php?t=323842

The kind comments and enthusiastic response that I got to that story from all you lovely people enabled the writing bug to well-and-truly take hold of me ... and this is the result.

It's another slow-burner, where the development of the characters and the way they interact with each other is the main focus of my writing. That's not to say that nothing happens, it just happens at its own pace!

I have another story I'm already writing (which is turning into a bit of an epic!), so I'm going to pace the release of this story to fit in with my plans for that - if that makes sense!? That means I will be posting updates for this story twice a week, generally on a Sunday and Thursday - just so you know when to look!

I hope you like it! As always, all comments (positive and otherwise) are welcomed.

Thanks,

Alli

[alli55]

Ten days last summer


Tuesday 1st August 2017


“Are we nearly there yet?” asked Zack, more out of mischief than genuine interest.

Zack was my six-year-old half-brother, and was as cheeky as his sister was cute. It was Gracie who had started this off, when, in her four-year-old innocence, she had asked the very same question just under ten minutes into our journey. Given that we live in Milton Keynes and were holidaying at a caravan park just outside Bournemouth, 150 miles away, the answer was obvious, and we had all laughed. Playing up to that, Zack had asked the question at regular intervals for the entire journey.

That’s the trouble with six-year-olds: they don’t know when a joke isn’t funny anymore!

“We’re nearlier there than when you last asked!” said Jenny to her son. She wasn’t helping, playing along with his game like that!

“Actually, it’s only just around this next corner,” Dad announced, and Freya and I exchanged looks of relief with each other. We had been cooped up with the littlies in the back of the car for far too long!

I love Gracie to bits, and Zack of course, but there’s only so long you want to have someone sleeping with their head in your lap. The look that Holly gave me when Dad told us we were finally, actually, nearly there told me that she was as fed up with the journey as I was.

It must have been worse for her, because at least I was happy to come on this holiday. She had tried ever so hard to get out of it.

“We’re 16 now,” she’d told Dad and Jenny, our sort-of-step-mum, “we can stay at home while you take Zack and Gracie. We can look after ourselves, and, anyway, Gran’s only a mile away.”

But it hadn’t worked. Possibly the fact that I wasn’t bothered and so didn’t back her up enough didn’t help. That’s certainly what she told me.

“Let’s have one nice, last family holiday, all together,” Dad had said. “You two have plenty of years ahead of you to take holidays without us getting in your way! Do it for me, please?”

That had been the clincher, because neither of his twin daughters would ever do anything to hurt Dad. We had seen him in enough pain in the past to never want to be the cause of any.

I mouthed “At last!” to Holly and she nodded back. We all jerked forward as Dad hit the brakes when he discovered the entrance to the caravan park was literally immediately after the corner. A sharp left turn took us onto the site and before long we had pulled up in front of our home for the next 10 days.

We left Freya holding Gracie while the rest of us got out of the car and began to unpack.

The caravan had three bedrooms, one double and two twins, so I picked the room that Freya and I would share and then took advantage of Freya’s predicament to choose the nicer of the two beds for myself! The littlies would share the other twin room and Zack did exactly the same with the beds in that room as I’d done with ours.

After most of the stuff was unpacked, I gently woke Gracie and took her in to find our rooms. I left her in the littlies’ room, and went to see our room. I noticed Holly had grabbed the bed that I would have chosen if I’d got there first!

“You win some, you lose some!” she told me, with a smile. Generously, she added, “But we can swap halfway through the holiday if you want!”

“You’re alright,” I replied, “this one will do fine! Now, budge over so I can get a picture of us; I told Lottie I’d WhatsApp a picture of our room.”

“Really?” she teased, before rolling over to allow me to join her on the bed and snap the picture. I sent the pic, and we lay there together scrolling through my WhatsApp, sharing memories.

After a while, we got up and found Dad.

“Can we go and have a look around the site?” we asked. “We want to see if we can find anyone we can hang out with.”

He told us to be back for five, and we set off.

Hopefully there would be some other young people here. It was bad enough being dragged on this ‘last family holiday’, but it would be even worse if there were only the two of us. As much as I loved my other half, I needed other company as well if I was to survive this!

It didn’t take us long to find them. They were sat outside a caravan that looked much like ours, hunched over an A4 pad of paper. He looked about our age, she was maybe three or four years younger. We walked over to them. As always, I let Holly do the talking initially. That’s how we work: she’s the outgoing one who can start a conversation with anyone; I’m much more shy, needing to get to know people before I’m really comfortable around them.

“Hey!” she said.

They looked up and each replied, “Hey!”

He asked, “You just got here today?”

“Yeah,” Holly told him, “we’re here for 10 fun-packed days with the family!”

“We can trump you on that;” he said, “we’re here for two weeks!”

She bent over to see what they’d been doing with the paper.

“Hangman?!” she said, the disdain in her voice clear for us all to hear. “Please don’t tell me that’s what passes for fun around here!”

The girl spoke for the first time. “It’s a cool game,” she told Holly, “as long as you know enough words to be able to play it!”

Ouch!

“Don’t mind Amber,” he told us, “she’s all bark and no bite! It’s just something we like to do together when we’re trying to fill some time.”

“That’s cool!” Holly said. “It’s just not my type of thing!” she explained. She nodded towards me, adding, “She’d like it!”

Amber looked over at me and smiled. I smiled back.

“I’m Jake, by the way,” he told us.

“Holly,” she said.

“Freya,” I told them.

“Are you twins?” Amber asked.

“Yes,” Holly told her.

“God, you look really alike!” she said. “I don’t know any twins. Can I take a selfie with you? It’d be so cool!”

She got up and we moved to stand either side of her while she took her selfie.

“Thanks,” she said, “wait till I show my friends!” She began texting. “Freya, how do you spell your name?” she asked me.

While Freya and Amber were sorting out the texting, I asked Jake if he knew whether there were any other people our age on the site.

“There’s not many at the moment,” he told me, “but we all meet up in the evenings at the top end of the site. People start getting there about seven and we just hang around till it gets dark. You should come this evening!”

“We will,” I promised, “as long as we’re not playing Hangman!”

He laughed. “No Hangman, I promise!”

“Cool! See you later! Come on Freya!”

We left them to their game and carried on with our mission to find other young people.

Our next find seemed very promising! Strictly speaking, it was her that found us.

“Hey, guys!” we heard her say, from behind us.

We turned to see this stunningly beautiful girl jogging towards us, her shoulder-length dark hair bouncing as she ran. Her coffee-coloured complexion glistened with the sweat from her jogging, and her vest-top and shorts clung to every curve of her body. She was a vision of loveliness!

“Hey!” I replied, and she even got a “Hi!” from Freya!

“Do you know about the evening hang-out?” she asked.

“Yeah, Jake told us,” I said.

“Are you coming?”

“Yeah, we’ll be there,” I told her.

“Brilliant!” she replied. “It’ll be great to have someone normal to talk to! See you later!” and she carried on, jogging past us and on through the site.

“What d’you think she meant ‘someone normal’?” Freya asked.

“I dunno,” I replied, “Jake and Amber seemed pretty normal!”

“That’s what I thought! Oh well, I suppose we’ll find out this evening!”

That we would!

After tea we set off for the far end of the site to see if we could find where this hang-out was happening. We’d waited till quarter-past seven, trying to make sure we weren’t the first ones there. Wherever ‘there’ was! After a ten-minute walk we knew we’d found the place. In a corner of the site, where the boundary hedges came together, were a group of young people.

Jake and Amber were there, and the jogger, and there was another boy as well. Sitting a few yards away to one side was another girl, doing something on her phone.

We walked towards the group.

Amber saw us coming and shouted a loud “Hi, you two!” both to welcome us and to draw everyone’s attention to our arrival.

“Everyone, this is Holly and Freya,” Amber announced. “They’re twins! Isn’t that cool?!”

Holly and I said “Hey!” and “Hi!” respectively – I hate “Hey!” as a greeting, it sounds too much like “Oi!” to me – and we both smiled at everyone.

The girl we’d seen jogging earlier introduced herself as TeeJay, and she looked even prettier now that she was in a strappy top and short skirt.

The boy seemed a little shy, so Jake did the honours.

“This is Jack,” he told us, “and that over there,” he continued, pointing to the girl with the phone, “is Caitlin.”

“She’s weird!” warned TeeJay.

We were there for about an hour and a half, before it started getting dark. We chatted, joked, played a quick game of ‘tag’, then chatted some more.

I spent plenty of time with TeeJay, who, it turned out, was representing Great Britain in the under-18 athletics championships that were being held in Bournemouth at the weekend.

Wow! Talented and beautiful! The girl had it all!

Freya got stuck with Amber, who was still somewhat twin-struck! That didn’t matter, though, because, once she gets over her initial shyness, Freya is the friendliest person I know. And I’m not just saying that because she’s my twin!

Not surprisingly, the two boys hung out together, and gradually Jack came out of his shell a bit. He was a little younger than most of us, though not as young as Amber, and since he didn’t have the benefit of an older sibling to help him along, I think he was a bit shy around all us girls. Bless!

The other girl, Caitlin, just sat with her phone pretty much all the time. She joined in with the ‘tag’ game, but otherwise I don’t think I saw her speak to anyone all evening. TeeJay was right, she was weird!

Once it started to get dark, we said our goodbyes, and made our way back to the caravan. On our way back, we talked about our new friends. Inevitably the subject of the weird girl came up.

“What do you make of that Caitlin girl?” I asked Freya.

“I’m not sure!” she replied.

“Did you notice how she never spoke to anyone?”

“Mmm,” Freya acknowledged.

“And she was on her phone all the time!”

“It was like she was using the phone to hide behind!” Freya observed.

“TeeJay was right when she said she was weird!” I told her.

“I dunno,” she said, “I think there’s something more to her!”

“Like what?” I asked.

“I don’t know that!” she answered. “It’s just a feeling!”

We arrived back at the caravan to find Dad and Jenny sat outside on fold-up chairs. The littlies had gone to bed and were asleep. Out of loyalty to Dad, and a sense of duty, we sat outside with them until we started to get cold.

Then we went to our room and chilled out, catching up with all the messages on our phones, before eventually turning in for the night.

[iceman713]

I'm excited to once again read your work. Excited to see where this one goes

[alli55]

Ten days last summer


Wednesday 2nd August 2017


Going on holiday with your family, when your family includes two children under seven, means doing things aimed at them in particular!

So, on a rather cloudy and cool day for early August, we spent the first day of our holiday at Dorset Heavy Horse Centre and Farm Park.

I must admit when Jenny announced at breakfast where we were going, Holly and I exchanged looks that told of our complete lack of enthusiasm for it! But we both understood that we had to keep the littlies amused, otherwise the holiday would be hell for everyone!

Actually, the place wasn’t bad! There were horse and cart rides, a wicked tractor & trailer ride that Zack loved, and me and Holly were even allowed to drive an actual tractor! Plus, of course, there were horses; and what girl doesn’t like horses?

The only downside was when Gracie managed to step in a great big pile of horse poo, and got really upset when we had to wash her shoe and she had to wear it when it was still wet! Oh, the pitfalls of being four!

All-in-all, though, it was a fun day out. Even Holly had to acknowledge that she’d quite enjoyed it!

Once we were back from the Horse Centre place, Freya and I played with Zack and Gracie before we all had tea. As seven o’clock approached, we set off for the evening ‘hang-out’.

Jake and Amber were already there, and so was ‘weird Caitlin’ as I’d started calling her. Once again, she was sat at a distance from the others, glued to her phone.

Before long Jack arrived, and so, after a while, did TeeJay. We chatted and joked around like we had the evening before, though I noticed Jack was mixing a bit more today. He especially seemed more at ease around Freya and Amber. That freed up Jake to join me and TeeJay. Caitlin kept herself to herself again.

About half an hour in, Amber said, “Hey guys, why don’t we play some sort of game where we can get to know each other a bit more?”

“Like what?” I asked.

“I’ve got a Truth or Dare app on my phone, I could set it just to Truth and we could all answer the questions that come up,” said a voice I hadn’t heard before.

Caitlin had actually said something!

We all looked across at her. She was looking at us, waiting for an answer.

“Yeah, that sounds great!” Jake said. “Let’s get it going!”

We sat ourselves in a circle and Caitlin came and sat between Freya and Jake. She started the app and then asked what setting she should put it on.

“There’s family, teen, or adult,” she informed us.

“Better do teen!” said Jake, taking into account that his little sister was present. “That should give us some interesting-enough questions!”

“Okay!” said Caitlin, and she selected the appropriate setting.

“How does this work, exactly?” asked TeeJay.

“The app gives us a question, and we all have to answer it,” Caitlin told her. “When we’ve all done it, we can get another question.”

“How do we know which order we answer in?” TeeJay enquired further.

“How about we pass the phone to the next person when a new question is needed,” suggested Freya. “That way we can all take it in turns to have to go first or last or whatever. Whoever has the phone is the first to answer the question and we go around the circle.”

That was agreed, and Caitlin, not wanting to be the first to answer, passed the phone to Jake.

“Just press ‘next question’,” she told him.

He did, and read out the question that appeared on the screen.

‘Are you in a relationship?’

That was an easy one to start us going. Only TeeJay was; she had been going out with her boyfriend for nearly six months.

Jake passed the phone to his sister, and Amber touched the screen and read out the next question.

‘What is the first thing you notice when you meet a person of the opposite sex?’

Amber blushed when she read the question, but answered, “I look for how tall they are, to see if they’re like the same height as me.”

Jack told us he looked at a girl’s face to see how pretty she was, whilst TeeJay looked for a nice smile. “I don’t want to see wonky teeth!” she explained.

Holly went for a nice body shape, and I explained how I always look at the eyes first. You can tell so much about a person by looking into their eyes!

Caitlin agreed with me on the eye-thing, and finally Jake confessed that he was a breast man! TeeJay congratulated him on his honesty!

The phone passed to Jack and the next question was completely different.

‘Have you ever thought about killing someone?’

Mercifully, no-one had!

TeeJay took the phone from Jack and brought up the next question.

‘When did you have your first kiss?’

“Are we talking about our first proper full-on kiss, or just our first kiss on the lips?” asked TeeJay.

Of course, none of us could know which the question meant. It was up to us to interpret it how we wanted. Jake, me and TeeJay said it should be the first proper full-on kiss, but the two younger ones wanted it to be just the first kiss on the lips. Ever the diplomat, Freya suggested that we each answer how we wanted, but told everyone which sort of kiss we were talking about. We agreed to go with her idea.

TeeJay went first: “My first full-on kiss was with an older boy, who I was going out with at the time. I was 15 and he was 17. We were sat in the park and he asked if he could kiss me, and I was like yeah, please do! He gave me a full-on kiss, and even put his tongue in my mouth! I was a bit shocked, but I was soon giving him my tongue as well!”

I could see the others all hanging on TeeJay’s every word, and Amber’s eyes were getting wider with each new detail. Jack, I noticed, was blushing.

It was my turn next, so I told them about my first proper kiss with my first boyfriend. It wasn’t as full-on as TeeJay’s but it had been a big thing for me at the time. Freya knew the story already, of course, but the rest listened intently.

I knew what Freya’s tale would be before she began it. Being shyer, she hadn’t had so much experience with boys, but she had gone out with Darren for about four months earlier this year. He was who she had got her first kiss from, and she went into quite a bit of detail about how it had made her feel after he’d kissed her. That’s Freya, she wears her heart on her sleeve much more than I dare to!

Caitlin was next and she told us about her first kiss on the lips, which she got from her next-door neighbour when she was 11. We were all a little surprised, or even shocked in some cases, when she told us her neighbour’s name: Lucy.

Jake didn’t go into much detail, perhaps because his little sister was listening eagerly, but told us his first proper kiss was with a former girlfriend, Emma, when he was 15. Amber seemed disappointed that she hadn’t learnt any more than that, and was equally brief when it came to her tale. Being younger, she hadn’t yet had a full-on kiss, but said that a boy in her class had kissed her on the lips on the last day of term this year. She didn’t reveal his name, keeping Jake in the dark.

I think Jack had been dreading his turn and, when he spoke, we knew why.

“I’ve not actually properly kissed a girl,” he said, looking down at his feet in embarrassment. “Pretty feeble, eh?”

If we thought it was feeble, we were at least too polite to say so, not wanting to embarrass him further.

TeeJay gave me the phone and I touched the screen to get the next question.

I read it first before telling the others what it said.

“Do you have lots of friends of the opposite sex?” I asked on behalf of the app, and then proceeded to give my answer. Without thinking, I kind of answered for Freya too. “Yeah, we’ve got quite a few friends who are boys. We kind of like just hanging out with a mixed crowd, so yeah, I’d say so.”

“What she said!” Freya answered next. She elaborated a little, “But only because Holly talks with them first and I drag along with her. Don’t you, Holly?”

I grinned at my twin. “Pretty much!” I confirmed.

I don’t think any one of us was surprised to find that Caitlin didn’t have many boy friends. From everything I’d seen of her, I doubted she had many friends of any kind!

Jake confessed that he mainly hung around with the guys, and that he found it difficult to have girls as just friends, always feeling there might be more than simply friendship available.

Amber claimed she was friendly with lots of boys, which caused her brother to raise an eyebrow, but he didn’t dispute it.

Jack, we knew, didn’t. He did, though, reveal that his best friend since the age of 5 was a girl. That caught us by surprise!

Finally, TeeJay told us that she had always been friendlier with boys than girls, mainly because of her athletics, which tended to be a bit male dominated.

Holly passed me the phone and showed me what to press. Like I couldn’t work it out for myself! The question appeared and I just looked at it, almost in disbelief. Who writes these things?

“It says, ‘what is the weirdest place you have ever peed?’” I informed them.

“Are you sure?” asked Holly and she leaned over to take a look. Satisfied that I could actually read, she commented, “weird question!”

I had to answer first and I was struggling to think of anywhere that I had peed other than into a toilet.

Helpfully, Holly jogged my memory.

“What about that time you peed behind the garage at our old house?!” she reminded me.

“Oh, yeah,” I said, and felt myself starting to blush a little.

“Well, do tell!” urged TeeJay.

“We were in the garden playing, I think we were building something, and I’d been needing to go for a while but was hanging on until I’d finished building. I was nearly bursting by this time and I knew I’d never make it all the way to the bathroom, so I ran behind the garage, yanked my knickers off and just went there!”

I was really blushing by now, and Holly didn’t help when she explained, “She went so much, there was like a little yellow river running down the path! It was so funny!”

“How old were you?” asked Amber.

“Er, about 8, I think.” I checked with my twin. “Weren’t we Holly?”

“Yeah, I’d say 8,” she confirmed.

Caitlin claimed not to have peed anywhere other than the toilet, at least not since she was very little, and we didn’t push her.

Jake confessed to peeing in the sea, and Amber said she’d done that too.

Jack’s tale was brilliant! He told us how, when he was 7, he’d had some sunflower seeds to grow as a school thing, and one of his uncles had told him that peeing on the soil made them grow quicker and bigger. So he’d religiously peed on them once a day until his mum had caught him and asked what he thought he was doing. When he’d told her, she had to tell him that his uncle had been messing with him.

We all laughed and congratulated him on such a good story.

Then it was TeeJay’s turn. She explained how, in athletics competition, you sometimes have to do a post-race test, to make sure you’re not taking performance-enhancing drugs. This test involves peeing into a bottle, and is always difficult because you generally don’t need to go so soon after a race.

“So,” she concluded, “I’ve spent quite a long time sat in a cubicle somewhere, with some lady watching me, waiting to pee!”

How was I going to follow those last two stories?

“It’s not weird,” I explained, “but the only place I’ve peed where I shouldn’t, is when I wet the bed when I was younger.”

Freya chipped in, “Yeah, but what she hasn’t told you is that I was in it at the time! We always slept together until we were about 7.”

“Oh, poor you!” Amber said to Freya. “Not for sleeping together, but for getting peed on!” she clarified.

“I didn’t pee on her,” I protested.

“It felt like you did!” joked Freya, grinning at me.

Freya passed the phone to Caitlin, who announced the next question.

“Have you ever seen your parents making love?”

Damn, these questions were getting worse!

We went around the circle rapidly, with everyone saying “No.” I added my “no” to the list.

“Yes, you have,” corrected Freya, “remember?”

Thank you, Freya!

I did remember! I had remembered all along! But I didn’t want to share it with everyone, and I didn’t think Freya would either! So her intervention caught me unprepared.

“What?!?” I half-asked half-exclaimed.

“Mum and Dad, when we were little, and wanted a cuddle one night!” she continued.

Well, seeing as she was so keen on everyone hearing this story, I found a convenient way to get out of telling it myself and let her do it.

“Well, we both saw them, so you tell the story,” I told her.

She did!

“We were 5, and I’d had a nightmare and woken Holly up and unsettled her. So we decided to go and ask Mum and Dad for a cuddle and if we could sleep in their bed. When we went in, Mum was kind of laying on top of Dad, and the bed was like rocking, …”

Freya was going bright red by this point, and I could feel myself starting to blush just hearing her tell everyone about it.

“… but Holly just tapped Mum on her back and asked for a cuddle. I’ll never forget the look on Mum’s face when she turned to look at us standing there. She quickly rolled off Dad and then we were allowed to get in and lay in between them. At the time we didn’t know what they had been doing, but I’ve always remembered that night, and now, obviously, I know what we interrupted!”

“Aww, that is so cute!” remarked TeeJay. “You guys are really lucky being twins!”

Freya and I looked at each other and said, with our built-in twin synchronicity, “We know!”

The phone was passed to Jake once more, but when he tapped the app he frowned.

“We’ve had that one already!” he said

“Oh, yeah,” explained Caitlin, “it does that. Just press it again.”

He did and said, “The next question is, ‘Do you really love your boyfriend or girlfriend?’ Well, seeing as only TeeJay has a boyfriend or girlfriend at the moment, I suppose only she can answer this one.”

“Yes, I do!” shouted TeeJay. “I love him with all my heart, and I want everyone to know!”

Amber took the phone from Jake and announced the next question.

‘Have you ever been dating more than one boy or girl at a time?’

One after another everyone said “No”, until it got to Jake. He said “Yes”!

“Explain yourself,” TeeJay told him, “and it better be good!”

“It’s not!” he confessed, before telling us how he had been going out with a girl who he liked, but that another girl that he had always fancied but never had the courage to ask out had asked him out. He had gone out with her but not broken off with the first girl … and had continued to do this for two months.

“What made you stop?” I asked.

“The two girls suspected, got together, and confronted me. I had to admit it, and they both dumped me.”

“Good for them,” exclaimed TeeJay, “you deserved it! I hope you’ve learnt your lesson!”

“I have,” replied Jake, then teasingly added, “I’ve learnt to be more careful and not to get caught!”

“You bad, bad boy!” she told Jake, and laughed.

Amber gave the phone to Jack, and he touched the screen twice in fairly quick succession.

“Another repeat!” he told us.

Yeah: either that or he’d found a question he didn’t want to answer!

The next question was a bit more deep and meaningful: ‘Are you happy with the life you have?’

Could we just say “yes” (or maybe “no”) or would we have to explain ourselves a little?

Before we could begin to answer, Caitlin spoke.

“Actually, sorry guys,” she said, “but I’m gonna have to go. I’m supposed to be back earlier tonight. Sorry!”

She reached across to retrieve her phone from Jack, and then stood up, said “see you; sorry!” and walked off back towards the caravans.

We looked at each other, trying to work out what had just happened.

“I told you she was weird!” Teejay said.

Maybe. But I couldn’t help wondering what had made her suddenly up and go. Did it have something to do with the question?

“Well, we know the question, so we may as well answer it!” Jake suggested, and we agreed.

Jack said he was, apart from he wished he wasn’t so shy; TeeJay told us she was happier with her life now than she could ever remember being, thanks to both her athletics and her boyfriend.

Holly nearly answered for me again! It’s not that she meant to, it’s just, and I do it as well, as a twin you are so used to being one half of two that that’s sometimes how you think of yourself. If you’re not careful you can find yourself speaking for the two halves and not just yourself.

“Yeah, we are, aren’t we Freya,” she began, before correcting herself. “Well, at least I am, apart from I didn’t really want to come on this holiday. But now I’ve met you lot, I’m glad I did!”

“Yeah, I am,” I agreed, “and the thing that always makes me happiest is having Holly to live through everything with me!”

“Aww, so lovely!” gushed TeeJay. “You don’t want to adopt me as a triplet, do you?”

We laughed and told her we’d love to, but we didn’t think our Dad would want another teenage girl to cope with!

Jake’s answer turned the mood a little more sombre.

“I think I am fairly happy at the moment. But the past few years haven’t been great, and definitely if you’d asked me then I’d have said ‘no’. But things are getting better, slowly.”

We didn’t push him to tell us any more, sensing that there might be things he didn’t want to share with us.

Amber’s answer kind of confirmed this.

“I am mainly,” she said, “but I really, really miss my Dad!”

With Caitlin gone, we no longer had the app, so we’d have to think up our own questions if we wanted to continue playing. But Amber’s last answer seemed to dampen the enthusiasm for carrying on, so we decided to stop.

We whiled away the rest of the evening, until it started to get dark, with our usual mix of chatting and joking around, plus another game of ‘Tag’, and then went our separate ways.

On our way back to the caravan, Freya asked me, “Why d’you think Caitlin disappeared like that, all of a sudden? She seemed to be enjoying the game just as much as the rest of us!”

“No idea!” I replied. “Like TeeJay said, she’s just weird!”

“No,” Freya told me, “there’s more to it than that! I’m sure that question had something to do with it!”

Whatever!

Once we’d got back to the caravan, we did our dutiful sit-with-the-adults bit and then retired to our room.

[Sydney_sub]

Thanks for the new story, it's awesome so far. Looking forward to the next chapter.

[alli55]

Ten days last summer


Thursday 3rd August 2017


When I woke, the sun was streaming in through the window. Freya was already up and, when she saw I was awake, told me we were going to the beach. She’d put her bikini on underneath her clothes, and once I’d got up I did the same.

Although there was a beach literally across the road from the site, there were no facilities there, so we opted instead to go to Boscombe. We took all the usual seaside paraphernalia with us and found a good spot just along from the pier. The littlies loved being on the beach: that, for them, is what a holiday at the seaside is supposed to be!

Freya and I spent the day keeping the two of them entertained. Zack was really into building the “biggest sandcastle ever”, which required a lot of construction work from Dad, but all Gracie wanted to do was play with her two older sisters. She particularly liked paddling in the sea, so long as we lifted her up and over the waves as they came in!

We’d been there all day, and as Dad and Jenny began packing up, Freya and I took the littlies for one last paddle. Zack was in up to his knees, literally throwing himself at every wave as it broke, getting Freya completely soaked in the process. Gracie and I were only ankle-deep, just paddling and jumping the remnants of the waves that reached us.

We jumped the next wave, but when I landed I felt a sharp pain in my left foot.

“Owww!” I yelled, causing Freya to look across to me.

“Are you alright?” she called.

“It’s my foot!” I told her.

I hobbled back to dry sand and sat down. I lifted my leg, bent it and tried to take a look. Gracie gasped.

As she came towards me, Freya could see what I’d done, and told me, “Don’t move, Holly! You’ve cut your foot!”

She called Zack to her, and then she knelt down and said to the littlies, “Go and tell Mummy and Daddy that Holly has hurt her foot and needs help. Can you do that?”

They said they could and ran off up the beach.

“Is it bad?” I asked Freya.

“It looks quite bad,” she said, “there’s quite a lot of blood, and it’s still coming out!”

Dad was soon kneeling by me, taking a look at my foot.

“That’s a nasty cut you’ve got there, Holly!” he said. “It looks quite deep! I think that’s going to need stitches! We’ll have to take you to A&E!”

Hospital? Oh, bum!

We dropped Dad and Holly off at the hospital, and then the rest of us went back to the caravan park.

“I’ve no idea how long we could be at A&E for,” Dad had said to Jenny, “you take the rest back and I’ll ring you when we’re done, and you can come and pick us up. Freya can look after Zack and Gracie for that long, without any problems.”

“Will Holly be alright?” Gracie asked me, when we got back to the caravan.

“She’ll be fine,” I reassured her, “she’s just got a hurting foot!”

“Was it my fault she hurt her foot?” she asked, worriedly.

“No, Gracie, of course it wasn’t your fault,” I said, gently, “it was just an accident!”

That seemed to satisfy her, but she spent the next hour making a get-well card for Holly! Have I mentioned how much I adore Gracie?

As seven o’clock approached, and with no word from Dad, I broached the subject of the hang-out with Jenny.

“Can I go and see my friends, this evening, please?” I asked her.

“Not really, Freya,” she said, “I don’t know when your Dad’s going to phone, and I’ll need you to look after Zack and Gracie while I go to the hospital. So, no, I don’t think so!”

“Oh, but, …” I began, before an idea struck me. “What if you text me when you need me and I’ll come straight back? Please?”

She seemed reluctant at first, but she was always a little wary of being cast as the wicked stepmother. Not that either me or Holly would ever do that, but she has always lacked a bit of confidence when it comes to dealing with us. So, she relented, and I was allowed to go.

It seemed odd, going there without Holly at my side. We spend so much of our lives together, that when we are apart, particularly when we are forced apart, it’s like part of me is missing. I know she feels the same, as she’s told me as much on numerous occasions.

As I approached, I could see that all the others were already there. Amber spotted me first. When she saw I was on my own, her first question was obvious.

“Freya, hey!” she said. “Where’s Holly?”

“She’s had to go to A&E,” I told her, as the others listened in.

“God, is she alright?” Amber asked.

“She’s fine!” I answered, then told everyone what had happened. They all told me to wish her well on their behalf when I saw her, and I promised I would do so.

“Can we play that Truth game again?” asked Amber, during a pause in the conversation.

“Caitlin?” asked Jake.

“Yeah, sure,” replied Caitlin, who up till then had been sat at her usual distance from the rest of us.

We re-formed the circle as Caitlin brought up the app on her phone. Once again, she passed the phone to Jake to avoid being the first to have to answer.

Jake tapped the screen and read the first question. “Woah, that’s going straight in at the deep end!” he said.

It certainly was!

‘Have you ever streaked or been naked in public?’

First Jake, and then Jack, said that they hadn’t. TeeJay seemed to be unsure of how to answer, but eventually said “me neither.”

Jake sensed that she might not be totally telling the truth, so pushed further.

“You don’t seem too sure about that, TeeJay!” he said.

She looked at him, seeming a little embarrassed. “Well, I’ve definitely never streaked,” she explained, “and I don’t know whether you’d count this as being in public or not.”

“Maybe you should let us decide,” Jake suggested, encouraging TeeJay to tell all.

“Well,” TeeJay began, “it was at a youth athletics meeting when I was 14. The athletes’ changing area was in a big tent, with a large sheet of canvas dividing the boys’ and girls’ areas. Mostly when I run, I have a sports-bra and close-fit knickers. After my races are over, I change out of them into normal underwear. So, anyway, I was in this tent, changing after my races, when the canvas sheet fell down. There were four or five boys that suddenly got a look at me naked. But I don’t know if that counts as in public.”

“Did they see everything?” asked Amber.

“Yeah,” said TeeJay, “because when the canvas thing fell, it made a loud crash, and I automatically turned around to see what the noise was. So I was there, facing the boys, whilst they looked at me.”

“Oh my days,” Amber exclaimed, “that must have been so embarrassing!”

“It was!” admitted TeeJay.

“I haven’t been seen naked,” said Amber, “but last summer, when we were on holiday, I went down this big water slide that dumped you into the pool at the bottom. I went really fast into the water, and when I came up my bikini top had come off. But even worse than that, a boy who had been nearby, found it floating in the water and came and gave it back to me. And he had a good look at my tits when he did!”

Fortunately, I haven’t had the misfortune of being caught naked, and would certainly never consider streaking, as I told the others. Caitlin was the same as me.

Jake handed the phone to Jack, who read out the next question before immediately giving his answer, “’What’s your favourite thing about the opposite sex?’ I like how girls are kind and considerate, at least Lily is; she’s my best friend I told you about, by the way.”

TeeJay said she liked the way boys, or at least the boys she was attracted to, are manly and strong. Amber told us she liked how boys didn’t bitch like girls did.

So, what did I like best about boys? I really didn’t know! I tried to think of all my male friends. What did I like about them?

“Gosh, this is really difficult!” I admitted and paused to think some more. “I think, probably, what I like most about boys is when they joke around and make me laugh.”

“The way boys don’t hide things,” said Caitlin, “you know where you stand with them! At least with most of them, you do!”

Jake said he simply liked the way girls looked. “A boy’s body, even if he has a good body, just isn’t particularly nice to look at,” he explained, “but a girl’s body just has a nice shape. Does that make me sound shallow?”

Yes, it did, and TeeJay told him so! But I knew what he meant. My friend, Lottie, is quite the artist, and she’s always saying how much nicer the female form is than the male.

TeeJay took the phone from Jack and tapped up the next question.

“Had that one yesterday,” she told us, before tapping again. “And that one!” She tapped a third time. “That’s better!” She read the question, paused, and seemed to re-read it. She grimaced. “Oo-er,” she said, “brace yourselves! ‘Are you a virgin? If not, at what age did you lose your virginity?”

Good grief! That was a bit personal!

TeeJay swallowed hard. I could guess why! If there was anyone amongst us who wasn’t a virgin, I reckoned she was the most likely candidate! Or maybe Jake!

“Okay,” she began slowly, “no, I’m not a virgin. I lost it to the boyfriend I told you about yesterday, the one who gave me my first full-on kiss. I was nearly 16 when we did it the first time.”

We looked admiringly at her, not because she’d had sex, but because she’d been so open and honest with us.

Unsurprisingly, given how much younger she was, Amber said she was a virgin, and I confirmed that I was as well.

Caitlin was very hesitant when it came to her turn to speak, as if she was trying to decide what her answer should be. I assumed that meant that she wasn’t a virgin, but was thinking of not telling us the truth. In the end, I was half-right.

“I’m not,” she said, quietly, “I lost it the day after my 16th birthday. But if I could go back to that day, I’d definitely make sure that it didn’t happen. That’s all I can say.”

Sounded to me like she’d had a bad experience; or maybe it was from a broken relationship, which would explain why she was so distant all the time. Perhaps she was still getting over a broken heart!

Now we’d got to the other person I thought might not be: Jake. I was eager to hear his answer.

Typically, it was just at that moment that my phone rang. Just my luck! I knew it would be Jenny, so I made my excuses and left the others playing. All the way back I was wondering what Jake’s answer had been.

Zack and Gracie had been put to bed, to make it easier for me while Jenny was fetching Dad and Holly. Zack was soon fast asleep, but Gracie couldn’t settle, the incident that afternoon still playing on her mind. To avoid her waking Zack up, I brought her into mine and Holly’s room and sat with her.

She was just starting to fall asleep when we heard the car pull up outside.

By the time we got back to the caravan, I was tired and fed up.

We spent hours in A&E waiting around. They gave us an absorbent pad to put on my foot while we waited, but that gradually got soaked in blood. Eventually, I was taken into a small room, and a nurse had a look at my foot. She confirmed that it would need stitches, and put on some gel to numb the area. Then a doctor came, made sure there was nothing still in the wound, and then put the stitches in. We asked her how long they would be in for. She told me to keep my foot dry for the next couple of days, and said to avoid putting too much pressure on my foot for that time. It would be best if I just rested up for a couple of days. After that it should be okay for me to do most things, if I was careful. The stitches would come out by themselves after a week or so.

All I wanted to do now was go to our room and lie down. Dad carried me there! It had been a very long time since he’d carried me in his arms, and I liked having him do it!

Freya was there, sat on her bed with Gracie propped up against her chest, half-asleep.

Dad put me down on my bed, and, seeing me, Gracie scrambled up and ran across to me. She put her arms around me and hugged me.

“She’s been really worried about you,” Freya explained, “so I let her stay up till you got back so she could see you were okay. She’s even made you a get-well card!”

I kissed Gracie’s forehead. “Thank you, Gracie!” I said.

She smiled her cute little smile.

“Daddy,” she asked, “can I sleep in here with Holly and Freya tonight?”

“I don’t know, sweetie,” Dad replied, “I think you should ask them, don’t you?”

“Can I?” she asked us.

How could we refuse?

Dad left, and Freya and I got ready for bed. I was quite happy for an early night anyway, and Freya … well, Freya is just such a kind-hearted person that she will do anything for you no matter how much it inconveniences her.

Gracie’s only decision was whether to sleep in Freya’s bed or mine. Probably because I was the injured one, she chose me.