Page 80 of Let Me Love You (Excess All Areas 5)

Another smash.

He tried to ignore it, but couldn’t, thinking of Moira dealing with that kind of fury. “I’ll be back in a minute, Nan.”

“Be careful, lad.”

He let himself out of the back door and jumped the wall between Nan and Moira’s like he used to do whenever their ball got kicked over. Moira never minded.

He knocked on the back door that was perched open, then followed the voices inside.

“Just want to go out with my mates…fucking boring…need some money…”

“Everything alright, Moira?” Ben was faced with an angry kid about sixteen years old.

“Oh, Ben. I’m sorry. Was it disturbing your nan? We’ll try to keep it down, won’t we, Shawn?”

“Don’t worry about that, Moira. Am more worried about why Shawn thinks he can move into your house and smash up your shit.” Ben looked at Shawn, who was teetering a line. There was a burning need to remain sullen and angry, but a flutter of recognition.

“You’re the guitarist with Sad Fridays,” Shawn said.

“I’ve also known Moira my entire life and want to know where you get off behaving like that when Moira doesn’t actually have to deal with you.”

Shawn shrugged and looked down at the floor. A flush of embarrassment crept up the side of his face. This was good. Meant the kid was salvageable. If he wasn’t embarrassed, it would be so much harder.

“Piss off.”

“Pretty short answer. You had plenty to say when it was just you and your gran. You want to tell me, see if I can give a different perspective?”

“It’s boring as shit here.”

“You got somewhere more exciting to be?”

“Yeah. Out. With my mates.”

Ben shrugged. “Those exciting things you want to be doing? They going to put a roof over your head?”

“Sure someone could put me up if I needed it.”

Ben placed his hands in his pockets. The tone might sound gruff, but he’d seen eyes like Shawn’s before. Sad ones, confused ones, lost ones. They reminded him of Luke. “Big difference between having your own room, a bed, a comfortable place with someone doing all your cooking and cleaning for you, and crashing on the floor of someone’s room or outstaying your welcome on a sofa.”

“Whatever,” Shawn muttered.

“Those exciting things you want to be doing? Are they free?”

“What?”

“Do they cost you money?”

Shawn looked up at him and sighed. “Bit preachy, you coming in my grandma’s house, talking about what things cost. You’re fucking loaded. The rest of us aren’t.”

“Nothing to do with how much I have or don’t have. What I’m really asking is who you think is going to pay for them. You got a Saturday job?”

“He’s doing his GCSEs, right now,” Moira said. “I didn’t want to add to the stress by making him get a job.”

“That’s really good of you, Moira.” Ben looked around her living room and found the smashed dinner plates. “But he should clear up the plates and pay for them, seeing he obviously threw them. Accidental damage is one thing, but that’s disrespect.”

“But I expect him to stay home and revise,” she added.

All of Nan’s grandkids had Saturday jobs, paper rounds, and dog walking gigs. Anything to make a few quid. “So, let me get this straight, Shawn. You’re mad because you get to live in a nice house, with your sweetheart of a grandma, who provides everything you need and doesn’t expect you to pay anything, but you want to fuck it all up, go out with your mates, and are pissed you don’t have enough money? You smash up her things because you think sheowes youthat shit?””

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