Save Her by Abigail Osborne (novel books to read .txt) 📗

to say and put it back up on the shelf with all the other boxes. She was getting quite the collection.

Flora spent the whole of the journey and dinner talking about their new house. Sophie tried to seem interested but inside, she was still trying to ignore the shaking boxes in the recesses of her mind. She was emotionally drained. The fight with Greg before she had left was ferocious. It was hard trying to keep control, prevent things from escalating, and it was getting harder to predict his moods and his actions. Her whole life was exhausting.

Trying to shake off her negativity, she focused on Flora and attempted to absorb some of her positivity. But even this did not help. Flora had no idea what was really going on. She lived in a fantasy world; and her bad mood made her less forgiving. After all, they were both in danger because of her stupid decisions. Thanks to Flora, Sophie was working tirelessly behind the scenes to fix everything, trying to guarantee their safety.

Flora seemed to sense Sophie’s mood as she took her hand and squeezed it. The feel of her friend’s affection melted away the dark clouds that were consuming her. Flora was like the sun that way. Her sensitivity and kindness could light up the world when it felt oppressive and dark. Sophie smiled and squeezed Flora’s hand back.

‘You are my best friend, Soph. Spending time with you, it’s like you’re my reset button. Everything builds up and feels overwhelming. Then I spend time with you and it all goes away.’

Sophie flushed with pleasure, blinking away the tears that pricked her eyes. ‘Stop being so slushy. I don’t remember you saying such nice things to me when I accidentally lost your S Club 7 CD all those years ago.’

‘Oh god. Do you remember all those routines we used to perform to my parents to S Club 7. Mortifying.’

‘For you maybe. I happen to be a great dancer.’ Sophie began to wave her hands above her head, dancing to imaginary music.

They spent the rest of the night reminiscing about their childhood, then their university days.

Not for the first time, she felt guilty that she had engineered the direction that their lives had taken, they had been broke; but they had been safe. Now, they had the real possibility of their lives crumbling around them.

Sophie leaned over the table to smooth back the errant bit of hair that always fell in front of Flora’s face and tucked it behind her ear. Flora sniggered as usual, used to the gesture and amused that Sophie couldn’t cope with unruly hair. Flora’s laughter was a balm to her soul. It made her all the more determined to ensure that her friend laughed like that for the rest of her life. It was the least she deserved and she would do whatever it took.

30

Justin was running around the room naked. Typically, he was a quiet, shy boy which was why it had caught Flora by surprise when she looked over to find him naked in the corner of the room, scratching at his skin. He saw her move towards him and began to run around in circles. As he was younger and faster than her, she was struggling to catch him.

‘No, too itchy. No clothes.’

Many people with autism find their senses are easily overwhelmed, and a common trigger is clothing. Certain types of material can overload the senses and cause considerable distress and anxiety. Justin ran towards the clothes he’d piled on the floor, swiping a bottle of paint from the side as he went. Before Flora could reach him, the clothes were doused in a startling blue paint. In soothing tones, Flora eventually convinced him to come into the back room where she had some clothes that would not itch him. Justin’s parents insisted he wore Ralph Lauren polo T-shirts despite the fact he could not tolerate the fabric. She had tried to broach the subject sensitively, but it had fallen on deaf ears. They were the type of people that could afford to buy a whole shop full of Ralph Lauren polo shirts and so they just replaced the ones Justin destroyed.

She could not decide if it was a relief or not when the day was over. She was sporting a scratch down the side of her face and her arms ached from holding Alicia tightly to her to calm her down when she began to lash out at everything around her. It was not her fault: having autism meant that Alicia perceived the world differently, and the sound of one of the other girls dropping a cup on the laminate flooring had overwhelmed her. Instead of crying, or withdrawing like some of the children, Alicia would become angry and violent as she struggled to regulate her emotions. But Flora had managed to calm her down and only received a scratch in the process. She had experienced a lot worse. Besides, it had distracted her from thinking about Cecelia.

She had told Sam over the phone about the worms. Not having seen it, it was obvious he could not understand the gravity of it and how awful it was to wake up to find worms on her body. It was like he thought of it like a practical joke. She tried to explain to him, make him see the reality of the situation.

‘Sam, don’t you realise that for someone to have put worms in my bed whilst I was sleeping. They must have been in the house. They were standing over me whilst I slept.’ Tears choked her and no amount of reassurance from Sam that they would get to the bottom of it would stem her fear. It didn’t help that her constant anxiety was chasing away any chance of sleeping through the night.

Despite her decision not to let Cecelia get her down, as much as she told herself that she could handle whatever her mother-in-law threw at her, Flora was