Lost Girl: Julie's Story Ch. 01

I calmed her down while she hugged me protectively. "Nia, he wasn't in the room, mum just launched one at me, he couldn't have stopped her, it's not his fault, honest!"

Nia's mother came out and saw me, her eyes narrowing in anger, and her arm going around me as she took me into the sitting room. Jamie came back with a teacloth full of ice-cubes, twisted the ends together and gingerly held it to my face. It stung with the cold, but it dulled the pain, and stopped my eye watering.

Mrs. Morrison held me as she took the icepack and gently held it against my eye, but I could tell she was furious.

"Who do this to you, Julie, really?" she asked, and I told her what had happened.

"She hurt own daughter like this, you just little girl, she not deserve daughter, I find big stick, I teach her a lesson! You not hit children! You want to hit child, leave room, count to fifty, come back, still want to hit child, leave room, count to fifty again!"

I was feeling sick and dizzy now, and my eye was throbbing again, so Jamie picked me up and carried me up to Nia's room, putting me on her bed. He gave me the ice pack and gently, carefully, showed me how to hold it properly, then turned to leave, turning the light down as he went to walk out the door.

"Thank you, Jamie!" I called out, and he looked surprised that I knew his name.

"It's quite alright, er, Julie. You just lie quiet here; I'm going to talk to your brother properly about this!" he was livid, ready to kill someone, and I called him back.

"Jamie, please, Mark had nothing to do with it, he was in the kitchen! When he heard, he came running in and pushed her away from me, he brought me here because he thought I'd be safe here, he'd never hurt me, I swear!"

Jamie looked mollified.

"Well OK, if you say so. You rest now; Nia'll be here when she's finished with your brother, so I think I'd better go rescue him!" He smiled and walked away back downstairs.

Nia came in a few minutes later, sat next to me and stroked my hair. I began to tremble, shock and reaction setting in, plus I still felt sick and dizzy

"Poor Jules, you must be really frightened! My mum's bloody furious, she wanted to call the Old Bill, have her arrested for assaulting you, Jamie talked her out of it, now she just wants to go to your house and wallop her with a big stick! Let's have a look at your eye!"

She pulled the makeshift icepack away from my eye and clenched her teeth as she hissed through them.

"Jesus wept! Will you look at that thing! What did she do, punch you? 'Cos you look like you just got a dig from Mike Tyson! What a bitch! I'll tell you one thing, you're not going to school looking like that, the first teacher who sees that is going to call the Old Bill, and you'll end up in care somewhere two hundred miles away!"

Just then there was a knock on the door, Nia called out to come in, and her dad came into the room.

"Hello Nugget, Hello Julie. My wife tells me you've had a bit of trouble today; do you feel like telling me about it?" He sat on the bed and gently lifted the icepack and looked at my eye, his lips compressing into a thin line and his nostrils flaring as anger flared in his eyes at what he saw.

There's something very comforting about Nia's dad, so I told him what happened, and he nodded slowly as I spoke. When I finished he looked at me and patted my hand.

"I really should report this; I want to, this is a criminal assault against a minor, and the police should be dealing with her, now, but if I do that, it will probably put you and your brother into the care system, and I don't think you want that; I know Nia and her mother don't. I know you're feeling sick at the moment, that's most likely a concussion, and you really need to see a doctor. I'll take you, and Nia, along to St. George's A & E, report that as a head-clash playing volleyball, and get you scanned, just to be on the safe side. I really don't like doing this, she should be made to pay for this, but I like the alternative even less, so this is how we'll do it this time. If it happens again, though, if she hurts you or hits you again, I'm going to the police; you're too small to take another blow like this, she could have killed you! I want you to stay here tonight, with Nia, so does everyone else, after that we'll see how it goes. At least you'll be safe here."

I tried to thank him, but the fright, and the pain got there first, and I started crying.

He gathered me in immediately, letting me cry into his shoulder while he held me close, smoothed my hair, soothed me, making it all go away. Nia's dad is a class act, she's a lucky girl.

I must have fallen asleep against his shoulder, because the next thing I remember is being carried to the car and sitting on Mark's lap in the back seat, and Mr. Morrison going over the story, that I'd been playing volleyball in Brockwell Park, there was a head-clash, I came back home with Nia and started feeling sick, so he brought me to Accident & Emergency.

I was in Casualty for about 2 hours; Nia stayed with me in the examination cubicle for about an hour, then they wheeled me off for an MRI, and another hour while the imaging people got the scan results processed, and the attending came and spoke with Mark, as my next of kin. Apparently, there was no tearing or blood vessel damage, it was a straightforward concussion, but there was a crack in my cheekbone, so they gave me some painkillers and told me to get a few days' bed rest. By this time my eye was doing an impression of a Picasso sunset painted on a balloon, swollen up and out, all purples and bright reds, with black for added effect. To say I looked grotesque would not be overstating it.

On the way back, Nia told her dad that I would be staying with her for a few days, that I couldn't go to school looking like that, and he just nodded, and that was settled. I ended up staying a week, Mark letting the school know I was 'ill', and coming to see me every afternoon after school, and I spent the days doing girly things with Nia's mum, discovering how it should be between a mother and daughter, something I never got to do at home, simple, banal things, like brushing my long hair properly, something Mark never managed to do right, and he never had the time to do it right anyway.

Mark told me that mum had gone back to being daily drunk, she'd not asked about me, and I was glad that I was off her radar. One thing that puzzled me, what she'd meant when she said that I'd made him leave. Who was she talking about? I asked Mark for an explanation.

He looked baffled. "Look, Jules, I don't know for sure, but I think she was talking about dad. What she meant, though, search me. He left before you were born, and I don't remember him except he had hair the same colour as yours, I was only three or so; that's all, sorry."

I had to go home sometime, and much as I wanted to stay forever with Nia and her lovely family, I had to face my own personal demon. Mark collected me, carried all the stuff he'd brought for me over the last few days, and I reluctantly said goodbye to Nia and her mum. Mrs. Morrison asked me to stay.

"You stay with Nia, she needs someone here, Huyn'h never here, she lonely and you safe here, I promise, no one punch your face or hurt you here!"

She was still mad as hell, still wanted to lay into mum with something heavy, but I needed to go home, get this over with. Besides, Nia was in denial over Jamie's latest girlfriend, whom she hadn't met, (because Jamie very wisely kept her well away from the house) but already hated with a passion, and kept trying to get me to pump him for information about her, so I wanted to get out from the middle of that.

Mrs. Morrison hugged me. "Ok, if you really want go, cannot stop you, but you need family, you welcome to join mine!"

Nia's dad was just as sweet.

"You know, Julie, you're welcome to stay as long as you want, and I do mean that; two kids here is already bedlam, one more isn't going to make a difference; bedlam is bedlam!"

I thanked him for his kindness, but told him I really had to go.

"Well, Ok, but if you need to run, run back here, we're always open for business!" he grinned. Like I said; a class act.

When I got home, mum was already there, making dinner, straight and sober, and flicked a glance over me like I'd never been gone. There was no mention of her assaulting me, no hint that she acknowledged my black eye as something she'd done, or any hint of an apology; it was like she'd denied to herself it had happened, and decided to believe that version.

Dinner was...odd. Mum directed all her remarks to Mark, spoke exclusively to him, lavished attention on him, served me food as though I was invisible, gave me seconds without asking me if I wanted any, but danced attendance on Mark. I could see he was uncomfortable with the attention, he definitely wasn't used to it, and his ears were pink by the end of the meal.

When we cleared up, mum hung around while Mark and I cleared the leftovers and loaded the dishwasher, still directing all her conversational efforts exclusively to him, which didn't bother me; I was used to her ignoring me until she'd had a skinful, but Mark was clearly uncomfortable with it; affection or attention from her had been in short supply for years, and he was having a problem reconciling it with the woman who'd punched me out a few days earlier.

Mum kept it up, until eventually Mark started responding. I didn't blame him, God knows, it was time she paid some attention to him, and he needed someone, even if it was her; it didn't trouble me; I had Nia and her family as a bolt-hole if I needed it, so we eventually came to an unspoken agreement about how our family worked; Mark was hers, Nia's mum was mine, and we went on from there, mum ignoring me, still drinking, and Mark still watching her carefully if she was alone with me for any reason.

As I got older, Mark became more involved with me; I was maturing, and he finally felt he could talk to me, instead of just look after me, and our relationship became more adult for it; he'd talk about his latest girlfriend, ask me if I was dating or not (usually not), tell me I was pretty and that I should go out more, meet someone, instead of just hanging in my room and avoiding mum, or joke and banter with me, sit with me when mum wasn't around, and play-fight with me, always winning because he outweighed me by a significant margin, but never getting rough. He still called me 'Tink', and told me I was a fairy princess, though, I never got rid of that tag...

What I did start to feel, though, was a distinct attraction to him, something I pushed down and suppressed; this was my brother, for God's sake! It never quite went away though...

When I was in my room, I'd hear him talking, laughing and bantering with mum and, I'll admit, I felt a certain amount of envy, no jealousy, that he could be so happy with her, so natural, while I still didn't really exist, but also that she'd suddenly decided to take him away from me, overwhelm him with all this care and attention.

He, of course, lapped it up; it had been missing from his life for so long that he was revelling in it, and I didn't blame him one little bit; I just wished I could have had some too...

When I was sixteen, the Morrison's held a birthday party for Nia and I, as we were only a week apart, and I for sure wasn't going to get one at home, and I was struck again by how much was really wrong with our family, but I also knew that we were unfixable now, and that as soon as I could, I'd go, get out of there and find a life somewhere else, because the travesty we had was a slow-burning fuse, and one day it would blow apart again, and I'd likely be back in the A & E. Mum had seen Mark and I interacting a few times, and she'd expressed to him several times that he should talk to me about leaving soon, that I should go because I had no place there once I'd finished school. This worried Mark, he could see the resentment building again, and tried to defuse it, but I really had nowhere to go, no relatives that I knew of, and Nia's family was a refuge, not a living option.

I finished school six months after my sixteenth birthday, right after taking my GCSE examinations, and, to my surprise, found a job with a small fashion wholesaler in Bloomsbury, as a Trainee Buyer. As luck would have it, Mark worked just around the corner from my office, so he'd come and have lunch with me, wait for me and come home together with me, and generally became more like a best friend than a big brother. Some of the other girls, and women, in the office were intrigued by the mysterious tall blonde looker taking me to lunch all the time, and tried to find out more about him. Something perverse in me made me tell them that we lived together, while somehow completely omitting the fact that he was my big brother!

As time wore on, I became almost obsessed with Mark; I would spend my unoccupied time daydreaming about him, images of his smile, his lovely eyes, that characteristic head flick he'd give to clear the fringe of hair out of his eyes, especially since one of the girls in the office had seen him do it and declared it was the sexiest thing she'd ever seen...

I was confused as to why I kept thinking about him, but I was also aware that Charlotte Pryce's question was now whispering at me again: "Are you really telling me you never noticed him, or even thought about giving him a snog, just to see?"

At night, I'd dream turgid, overblown, romantic dreams about him, all cinematic and cutesy, and wake up to ask myself, "What the hell are you doing, he's your brother, got it? Get a grip!"

Eventually, I ended-up admitting to myself that the thing I'd been telling myself for months was a fact; I fancied him, and I seriously wanted a taste. It had only taken two years, two years of meeting him for lunch, laughing over coffees in the office, passing him off as someone I lived with and hinting that our relationship was something other than what it really was, before I could admit to myself what I wanted, now I had to try and see if there really could be something there, or if it was just an eighteen year-old's fevered fantasy, and he'd just give me the brush-off. I had to admit there was a big chance he'd do just that; he was nearly three years older than me, 21 now, a grown man, really, not a teenage boy anymore, and his type was more Nia than me; tall, willowy, brunette, gorgeous eyes, exotic. He'd even made a tentative pass at her once, and got the brush-off in no uncertain manner; there was only one type for Nia, and Jamie was it.

He'd be having lunch with me today, I'd see then whether I could make this happen, or if this was never going to be.

He stopped by at 12:30, popping his head into my little hutch of an office, winked at me and said

"Come on Tink, I'm hungry, fancy Chinese? I found a new place, cheap but good. Come on Shortie, time's a-wastin'!"

I grabbed my coat, and slid my arm through his as he piloted me out of the office, past more than one set of fluttering eyelashes, my ego soaring as I thought, 'This babe's with me, Ha!'

We had a good lunch, Mark telling me of the antics of the other trainees in the brokerage house he worked at, training to be a Securities Trader. I was still laughing when he walked me back into my office, again past all the fluttering eyelashes, and, as I turned to go into my own little office, I turned to him, hugged him, and as he looked at me, I planted a big kiss right on his parted lips, licking his tongue for good measure as I slid my hand round the back of his head to hold him against me. What he did next would dictate my next move; what I didn't expect was for him to pull me closer, and kiss me back, sliding his tongue against mine as he kissed me tenderly but firmly, his hand sliding inside my coat and cupping my bum, gently squeezing the cheek as his tongue worked against mine. My heart was hammering when he finally let me go.

"If you only knew how long I've been waiting to do that!" he whispered, then pulled me close for another, shorter, but no less heartfelt kiss, before letting go of me, leaving me slightly glassy-eyed.

"See you tonight, same time, and I want another of those!" he murmured, before walking off, all the girls in the office staring at him lustfully.

I stumbled back into my office, threw off my coat, and flopped down into my chair, head spinning, my mind full of that kiss, his eyes, and the feel of his lips against mine.

I looked up to see a whole row of heads peering in my door, varying expressions of awe and envy on their faces.

Doreen, the youngest of the Junior Buyers spoke up first.

"Wow, Jules! That was the most porno kiss I have ever seen! You been keeping him on short rations, or something? 'Cos it looks like the famine's over!"

The other girls giggled.

Another one spoke up.

"If my man kissed me like that, you'd have to change my name to Bow-Legged Sally! That was so fucking HOT!"

I was blushing scarlet, but it was true, it was so fucking hot!

Doreen spoke up again.

"So, Jules, should we expect you in tomorrow, then, or will you be ahem 'not feeling too well'?" she asked, innocently, eyes dancing.

I had to grin. "I'll be in, but if you're looking for a blow-by-blow, forget it!"

Doreen grinned. "So there will be blowing then, oooh, who's gonna be a lucky, lucky boy then!"

I burst out laughing. "Out you lot, haven't you got men of your own to molest?"

Back came Doreen, quick as a flash. "Not like that, I haven't, you lucky, jammy cow!"

I laughed again. "Out!"

I spent the rest of the day in a haze of arousal, unable to concentrate on my work as the memory of his hands on me as his lips were on mine kept intruding and distracting me. The clock hands slowly crept around, each minute seemed a thousand years long, and every time I looked out of my office, a whole row of interested heads popped up, every single one of them knowing or guessing what I was going through.

Eventually I managed to find something absorbing enough to keep me focussed, and it was only the sound of people stirring around in the main office that distracted me enough to check the time. 5:30, time for him to appear, and sure enough, he peeked through the main door, and immediately a chorus of calls rose from the girls.

"Oh, yoo-hoo, Jules, someone here for you!" they all called and hooted, making me blush scarlet, and I grabbed my coat and purse, tried to hustle Mark out of there, but he insisted on kissing me, another long, deep, toe-curlingly hot kiss, the noise in the office dying down as they all stared hungrily at him.

When I came up for air, someone started clapping, and then they all did, and hooting, and someone (Doreen, probably!) going 'whoo-whoo-whoo'. I didn't know where to put my face, flushing scarlet as I tugged him out of there.

We were silent all the way home, although he held my hand instead of just letting me hold his arm, and his finger toyed with my hair on the train, and when we got off the train at Clapham Junction, he put his arm around me and held me close while we waited for the bus.

When we got in, mum was nowhere to be seen, but her stuff was lying around, and the bureau was unlocked. Mark grimaced at me and knocked on her door, receiving no answer. He cracked the door open and peered inside, then closed the door.

"She's out, and there's an empty Stolichnaya bottle on the cabinet, so she'll be out 'til morning. Can we talk?"

Oh yeah, I wanted to talk, but then I wanted to kiss him again, and then...

"Sure," I said, "but not here, my room, she never goes in there." He nodded agreement, and led me to my room. Once in, I carefully closed the door, and propped a chair under the knob, just in case.

Mark sat on my bed, and raked his hand through his hair, that smile of his melting me, as usual, and I sat next to him, grinning at him, unsure what to do next.