Page 20 of Cuckoo

Noah’s eyes widen as soon as he sees me. ‘Oh my God. What are you doing here?’ I can barely hear him, but I can read his lips and his panicked body language. He did not expect to see me here.

He edges back in his seat. He has gone ghostly pale, eyes bulging out of his lying face.

Before I even have a chance to answer, Sukhi has leapt to my defence. ‘I think the better question is: what the fuck areyoudoing here?’

Noah’s eyes widen a fraction and I almost feel sorry for him. Almost. Around us, people stop sipping through their straws to eye the show with interest, eyebrows raised, girls smirking and guys gawping.

‘Excuse me? Who the hell are you?’ the dimpled blonde pipes up, her words laced with indignation.

I’m about to tell her I’m hisfiancéewhen Noah moves. It’s subtle, a small movement, but the response it triggers from me is potent. He shifts so she is slightly behind him, his left arm coming down protectively in front of her.

He is protecting this woman from me. He is choosing this woman over me.

I want to slap Noah across the face. I want to rip the blonde’s pretty little necklace off her dainty little throat. I want to flip the table over. I want to tackle them like a rhino running through plate glass, so that they’re cut and bloody with tiny shards caught in their flesh, red specks decorating me. Of course, I don’t do any of these things. But God, I really, really want to.

Sukhi must sense my shock and outrage because she mirrors the action, placing herself ever so subtly between myself and my fiancé.

I tear my gaze from Noah and direct it towards the blonde. I notice that at the very front there is a single grey hair in her head, slightly thicker than the others and falling in front of her eye. It somehow makes her more beautiful, this tiny flaw proving to me that she is just as human as I am.

I rip my engagement ring off my finger and throw it at him, with all the force I can muster. It hits him on the shoulder, bouncing off into the depths of the club. Another bit of meaningless bling to decorate the tacky interior.

‘It’sover,’ I scream, my voice breaking into a distressed warble. I turn to rush out before I cry. I notice Sukhi beside me in my peripheral vision. She grabs a glass off the nearest table and chucks the contents at him, her aim perfect. ‘Sorry,’ she shrugs to the bewildered owner of the drink, which is now dripping off Noah’s perfect golden hair. He is bright red. I glance quickly at the girl beside him in the booth, who has shrunk back, her eyes perfect wide circles, hand covering her mouth. ‘What the fuck?’ she yells after us.

I turn back to face her. ‘What, you didn’t know he was engaged?’ I yell back.

‘He’s not engaged to you, you psychopath!’

At this, I see Noah put his hand on her waist, lean in and whisper something to her. He’s trying to usher her away. He doesn’t want her to know the truth.

‘Walk away, Claire,’ an older girl told me, her disapproving glare fixed on Laura and her cronies as they cornered me in the hallway. I was thirteen at the time.

‘Poor pathetic Claire needs defending, boo-hoo,’ my main tormentor, Laura, mimicked making a show of wiping away tears from her face, balling her hands into fists. The girls she was with laughed. I tried to hold my head up tall and stay strong. I tried not to cry.

I went to walk away, to push through the small crowd that was forming, but she yanked my arm back, pulling me into the centre again.

‘Leave her alone, Laura,’ the older girl tried again, and I heard her voice crack as she tried to maintain some level of authority over the situation.

‘Or what?’ Laura sneered.

Her followers crossed their arms, eyebrows raised expectantly at my defender, waiting to see what would happen.

My heart was in my throat.

The girl shrugged, walked away.

Laura turned back to me, grinning. ‘Poor sad Claire, with her shitty cheap backpack and her greasy hair. Ewwww! I bet it smells,’ she screeched.

I saw red flames and tried to push through again, but some boys blocked my way, intent on the confrontation, and was sent staggering back towards Laura.

I started to feel angry, trapped like a wild animal.

‘Fuck off, Laura,’ I said.

‘Oooh, Claire has grown a backbone,’ she jeered, turning to the crowd of spectators.

I stepped forward, fed up of being walked all over, ready for a confrontation.

‘And I heard your mum’s a filthy slag,’ she hissed.

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