Amber by Heather Burnside (great novels of all time .TXT) 📗

Amber said her goodbyes then checked the time. It was already far later than the time she usually went to work. She needed to go. There was no point sitting around here on her own downing more drink while she tried to pluck up the courage.

And it didn’t matter how much drugs and alcohol she’d consumed because Amber would still be frightened. So, in the end, she finished her drink and set off through the shady backstreets of Manchester, dreading encountering her attackers once more.

20

March 1999

It was midday on Saturday and Loretta still wasn’t up. Amy knew it had been late when her mother had gone to bed the previous evening as she’d heard her come in. She’d made a lot of racket and had been mumbling to herself. Amy couldn’t tell what she’d been saying but, once she’d heard her mother on the upstairs landing, she’d closed her eyes, pulled the duvet around her shoulders and pretended to be asleep. She hadn’t wanted her mother coming into her room and waffling on drunkenly about nonsense, which she’d got into a habit of doing lately.

Amy had already pulled the washing out of the machine, which had been in there since the previous day, and she’d hung it outside. Then she’d tidied up the kitchen that her mother had left in a mess the previous night. She was putting the last of the plates away when she heard her mother stir.

It had been a few weeks since Dale had left them and, despite being upset, Amy had accepted his departure and adjusted to their reduced circumstances. It was the change in her mother that she was finding more difficult to cope with. Loretta’s tears had lasted longer than with any other relationship break-up and when they had finally subsided, they were replaced by bitterness and apathy.

When Loretta appeared in the kitchen, she had bed hair, and her face was pale and smudged with remnants of last night’s makeup. Amy always marvelled at how her mother could switch from glamorous to shoddy within the space of a night.

‘Put the kettle on will you, Amy?’ she muttered as she trudged across to the dining table and plonked herself on a chair. ‘Jesus Christ! My bloody head’s throbbing. Fetch me my tablets, will you?’

Amy flicked the kettle on and reached inside a drawer for her mother’s prescription tablets as well as some paracetamol. She didn’t know exactly what the prescription tablets were, but she knew that her mother’s hands gradually stopped shaking once she had taken one. And her mother’s hands were always shaking when she’d been drinking the night before.

Loretta grabbed the pills from Amy. ‘Ooh, fetch us a glass of water as well will you, love?’

Amy did as she was told but, by now, she was becoming a little irritated by her mother’s demands. Loretta slipped a tablet from the packet and swallowed it down with a gulp of water before draining the rest of the glass. ‘That’s better,’ she said, letting out a heavy sigh. ‘I was bloody parched.’

Amy continued tidying around the kitchen, deliberately slamming the cupboard doors as she put items inside them. Loretta looked across at her and seemed to pick up on her irritation. She glanced around the room. ‘Ooh, you’ve got it nice and tidy, love. You are a good girl. Why don’t you go and watch some TV or something as a treat?’

Despite her irritation, Amy was grateful for her mother’s compliment and even though she was becoming increasingly difficult to live with, Amy still sought her approval. Now that Dale was no longer around there was nobody else to impress except the occasional male visitor who stayed around long enough for Amy to meet him. But most of them quickly disappeared once they had spent the night.

She left her mother at the kitchen table downing her tea and comforters while she went into the living room to watch TV, glad that her brother was out at a friend’s house. She wasn’t in the mood for him at the moment.

It wasn’t long before she heard her mother on the phone in the hallway. The first call was to one of her friends Amy assumed. Loretta was giggling like a young girl. There was a reference to the previous night out then she whispered something down the phone that Amy didn’t catch. The tone of the conversation changed, and Amy soon realised that her mother was complaining about Dale again.

‘I can’t believe he had a wife all along. What a complete bastard!’

Amy had heard similar countless times over the past few weeks and, deciding she didn’t want to hear any more, she went up to her bedroom. Her mother went quiet as she passed her in the hallway but didn’t speak to her.

Amy wished she could ignore what her mother was up to, but she couldn’t help being curious. Listening on the upstairs landing, she heard Loretta round up the conversation. But then she seemed to be talking to someone else. Amy presumed it was a man because she was talking all nice like she did when her boyfriends came round.

*

March 1999

Amy stayed in her room for a long while until she heard her mother go into the bathroom. Still feeling irritated with her, she decided to get out of the house and spent a couple of hours wandering aimlessly around the shops.

By the time Amy returned home, her mother was dressed up and she was sitting in the living room with a glass of wine in front of her.

‘Where the bloody hell have you been?’ she asked.

Amy noticed straightaway that her voice had changed like it did when she’d been drinking. It was a bit slurry, and she could tell the glass of wine wasn’t her first.

‘Just out,’ she said.

‘Well, now you’re back you can help me with the tea. We’ll have to get a move on. I’m off out soon.’

‘What, again?’

‘Eh,