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Leigh smiled wide. ‘Yes, please.’

Alex sighed with relief. All this time, she’d been waiting for just this and had never known it.

***

Sometime later, Alex awoke.

It took her a moment to realise where she was, but when she saw Leigh’s sleeping face, it all came back to her. They’d slept together, and now everything felt different.

She watched Leigh sleep as the sun rose, entranced, wondering what came next. Would Alex change? Become gentler, more open, a gooey, love-up softy? Alex was amazed to find that the thought wasn’t terrible.

Her phone beeped. It was her mother.

Call me.

Alex was immediately pissed off. Reality couldn’t give her a day off, could it?

She crept carefully out of the bed, grabbing a throw blanket off a chair and wrapping herself to cover her butt-nakedness. She took her phone out of the room, down the hall, and into an open bathroom. The bathroom was gross, but it wasn’t hard to figure out why—boys.

Alex rang her mum. ‘Everything OK?’

‘I’m so, so sorry for texting this early,’ her mother said immediately. Her mother was always apologising and rarely had anything to apologise for.

‘It’s fine. What’s up?’ Alex asked.

‘It’s, umm…’ She lowered her voice. ‘I need to borrow some money. Just until payday.’

Alex tensed. ‘What’s going on?’

‘Umm, I lost some money,’ her mother almost whispered.

Alex was instantly furious. ‘How?’

‘It just went missing.’

‘Where?’

‘In the house,’ her mother said vaguely.

Alex pinched the bridge of her nose. ‘That fucking bastard.’

‘Alex, come on. It wasn’tnecessarily—’

‘Didn’t you change the locks after he moved out?’ Alex interrupted.

Her mother sounded embarrassed. ‘Well, no. It seemed excessive.’

‘No, Mum. It’s never excessive. Not with Dad.’

‘But I don’t think we canassumeit was your dad, Alex,’ her mother said weakly.

‘You do know it was him, don’t you?’ Alex asked, frustrated. ‘You’re just saying it might not be him for my benefit, right? Tell me you know it was him.’

‘No, Alex,’ her mother said, matching Alex’s anger. ‘He promised me when he left. He said he was sorry for it all and he’d leave me in peace. He meant it.’

‘Yes, of course he meant it. Healwaysmeans it. And then he gets itchy.’

‘It’s a disease,’ her mother cried.