“And I can tell you right now she’s a fraud and a fake!” I turned to face him.

“And how could you surmise that in all of five seconds?” He stepped outside. The door caught him in the back and sent him forward a half step.

“Didn’t you pay one bit of attention?” I couldn't believe how daft he was. Men! So stupid! “Did you even look at her? You think she was born blonde? Her brows are dark! Did you see her finger nails? They’re like great talons with glittering gems on them. Acrylic! Her jumper was pure cashmere and her purse and shoes...”

“So?” He was clueless as to what my point might be. We walked together across the garden and out the gate to the road.

“Her purse, Oliver, and her shoes were Prada and not a knock off either! Fucking Prada!” I stood outside the passenger door of our car and watched him walk around to the driver’s side.

“Her shoes were hideous,” He agreed, but obviously had no idea what Prada was, “They looked like witches’ boots made out of some dead animal’s skin.”

“Doesn’t matter!” I tossed up my hands, “Prada, Oliver! Prada!”

“What the blooming’ hell is a Prada, Silvia?” He peered at me over the car.

“It’s very expensive designer shit is what it is! I don’t even know what a pair of Pradas would cost! More than any of us has! Alexander just got his degree! He’s going to be eating peanut butter without a spoon and she’ll be dripping in cashmere and sporting Prada!”

“Maybe she wore her best. You just met her!”

We got into the car, “And so did you!” I wasn't going to let it go, “By the look of you I would have thought you didn’t think much of her either, but it would appear now that you are as in love with her as your stupid brother! Soon there’ll be a full on incident of twincest! I can see it now! Both blinded by a set of rock hard silicone enhanced tits!”

He glanced at me sideways with his mouth hanging open. “Twincest? I can’t bloody believe you just said that! Your breasts are much larger than hers!” He paused, “My God, are you jealous?”

“Me? What do I have to be jealous of? The fact that she’s an irritating, plastic Barbie doll? Or the fact that she has just as much between her ears as one of them?” I yanked on my seat belt. “Or that she looks like what would happen if Angelina Jolie and Heidi Klum got smashed together too closely on the tube and became one person?”

“Aw, come off of it! Silvia!” He laughed out loud, “She’s attractive, she is, but not nearly as pretty as you are!”

“Now you’re a liar!”

“Am not!” He was still laughing, “Settle down! She’s not that pretty! Sure, she’s tall and she’s got all that…American stuff...going on, but she’s got an odd mouth and…wow! That accent is bloody awful!”

“You wanted to tell her to shut up as well?”

“Well, didn’t you know? She talks too much and too fast,” He was always good at imitating accents. He launched into an American accent, waving his hand in the way that she did as he spoke, “An-duh…oh, my God! An-duh it was like reeeeely just cra-zay and-duh I was like holy shit! An-duh then I was like…oh, my God, yeerrrrrr joking! Uh-no way! An-duh ya think?”

He had me laughing so hard I had to wipe tears away, “I thought you got on so well!”

“We did! But honestly! She’s a nightmare, I swear!” He pulled away from the curb. “My brother would marry a monster, wouldn’t he?”

We drove on for a few minutes before I spoke again, “I reckon I should apologize to her.”

“You should. You were a complete cow back there, Love.” He smiled and shook his head, “It was quite humorous. I haven’t seen you that angry since Serena McLaughlin and Amber Monaghan set about their skulking in the common room.”

After that party in Ebbw Vale when we were kids, Serena McLaughlin, Amber Monahan and Peggy McGhee went on a calculated crusade to break up Oliver and me. All three of them mercilessly stalked him around campus, getting in his face and being extra cutsie and ever-so-sweet. Oliver couldn’t stand Peggy so I was bothered very little when I saw her approaching him. Amber, on the other hand, had a lovely face and not only that, she was fairly clever. She was meaner than a skinny dog as well. Attractive, clever and unkind are a dangerous combination in a teenage girl and I knew that even then. Amber made me nervous. Not that I thought she’d take Ollie from me, I just knew sooner or later there’d be an ugly confrontation and I wasn’t interested in getting into trouble. Serena, on the the other hand, just made me insane. She was not particularly pretty, although not ugly, either, and I wasn’t impressed with her intelligence, but she had dedication, let me tell you. She was tenacious.

Sandra came to me on afternoon before class and told me she’d heard Amber talking about how the free period she and Serena shared with Oliver was the perfect time to “home in because Silvia’s in class and can’t watch his every move”. I went through the roof! Sandy asked me to settle down and told me that she’d been watching and Oliver was ignoring both of them, but I didn’t care. The very nerve of those bitches!

I was so angry I swore I’d kill all three. I skived off class and marched straight into the common room where they sat across from Oliver with their backs to me. Ollie was studying and didn’t notice me come in, so I began the conversation by kicking the back of Amber’s chair. What ensued was your typical altercation between teenage girls, complete with the boy telling everyone to quit squabbling and the girls ignoring him while hurling insults and threats. What was not typical, however, was when I reached out and grabbed Amber by her gorgeous blonde hair and shoved her so hard she flipped over her chair onto the table. She tried to stand, but I bitch slapped her back down.

Serena hadn’t possessed the brains to run away like she should have and gave me a push. I glanced a blow off of her shoulder, at which point she decided she didn’t want to get beaten up like her friend, and tried to run off to hide in the girl’s lavatory. Ollie insisted I let her go and got in my way, but by that point I was quite literally seeing red. I stormed past him into the toilet. Serena thought she was going to fight me and took another chance at striking me. I hit her once in the stomach, but beyond that, it only took about forty seconds before I had her head stuffed into a toilet. Ollie and Merlyn burst in and hauled me off. I still can’t believe nobody told on me.

“They got what was coming to them,” I mumbled, releasing the memory.

“Alexander loves Melissa, yeah? She’s an odd fit for him, I admit. He doesn’t do well with the insecure type, but if he feels that strongly about her, we have to give her a go. We have to accept her and at least try to love her, too,” I forgot sometimes how thoughtful Oliver was. He was the kindest person I ever knew, “If you think about it, Sil, she was probably nervous. Alex said he had her meet with us first because she was way too wound up to meet with Mum and Dad. I can‘t blame her.”

He had stopped speaking too suddenly. I knew immediately he was not telling me something. “Oliver, what is it?”

He stared straight ahead and screwed up his face.

“Oliver, Xander tells you everything. What did he tell you that you’re not telling me?”

“I know it won’t make you any happier, Love.” He warned.

“Tell me! I’ll find out sooner or later, won’t I?”

Oliver sighed, “I want to get home first. It could take a while.”

“Tell me, Oliver!”

He said nothing until he stopped the car at the bottom of our hill. He made me get out before he told me that Melissa was pregnant.

Then he held me while I cried.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

It took me two days to phone Melissa. I hadn’t been sad about our baby for a long time, but finding out Alexander’s wife was pregnant had brought back the emptiness inside. It wasn't fair that they were having a baby without trying and Oliver and I weren’t. It made me hate her all the more that on top of not liking her, I was jealous, too. But regardless of how I felt, she was family now. Alexander had married that dim tart monkey and there wasn’t anything I could do to change the fact. Family was everything and I wasn't going to create a rift in it that I could avoid. So I decided it was better to gather myself than to act like a troll again.