Heart of Glass by Lindy Dale Read Free Book Online Page A

walked into the
kitchen, Dad glanced up is from his newspaper and frowned. His face
looked bewildered, as if he had no idea what was occurring in his
house, or who the amiable young girl was. His own daughter
Annabelle was never chirpy on a Monday morning. Shaking his head,
he went back to his newspaper, probably thinking that he would
never understand women.
    “ Bye, Dad,” I said, kissing
him on the cheek and running out the door with a grin from ear to
ear.
    ***
    At lunchtime I lolled, legs
crossed, on the ghastly coloured lounge in the corner of the common
room. I’d arrived fifteen minutes earlier to find Lucy holding
court, the group’s attention riveted by her latest exploits from a
disco she had been to on Friday night using her fake ID. It didn’t
take a great deal of imagination to picture her in the pink and
mirrored den of iniquity she had been frequenting of late, doing
her best impression of Stefanie Mangano in ‘Saturday Night Fever’.
I wondered if her parents had any idea where she was or who she was
doing ‘The Hustle’ with.
    “ So, his name’s Damien and
he’s twenty-two and drives a red sports car,” she said. “He’s going
to take me out for dinner soon.”
    The other girls ‘oohed’ and
‘aahed’ but I was unconvinced. I turned to Prue. “Any normal man
wouldn’t be seen dead with a sixteen-year-old, even if she does
have big boobs and a great smile.”
    Prue shrugged, “Maybe she
didn’t tell him she was sixteen. It smells a bit fishy to
me.”
    “ That would be the anchovy.
Girls apparently smell like that after lots of sex!”
    Prue choked on her sandwich.
“You’ve become quite bawdy of late. That Ben is a bad influence on
you.”
    And he was. I was learning
so much more than naughty jokes. The only trouble was, I was a shit
of a student, or so he said. I could have taught stubbornness to
donkeys, he’d said. He was getting so frustrated he’d have to start
wanking again, he’d said. I’d just laughed. Sex wasn’t
everything.
    “ What was the party like?”
Prue asked.
    “ Excellent. My clothes were
just right. Thank your mum for the shirt, by the way. It was
perfect. You know, some kids at the party were smoking
dope.”
    Jen went goggle eyed. There
was a high probability that neither her nor Prue had smelt or even
seen marijuana. Before the party, I certainly hadn’t.
    “ You didn’t, did
you?”
    “ Don’t be silly, I would
never do drugs.”
    “ But I don’t understand?
Weren’t there any parents?”
    “ Nope. It was an adult
party. And there were people everywhere drinking and throwing up
into bushes in the garden.”
    “ Our parties sound pathetic
compared to that,” Jen said.
    I lowered my voice further.
“I was going to the toilet at one stage and got a wrong door. Oh
God, I don’t know if I can tell you it’s too gross…” I paused,
trying to clear the image from my mind. It was revolting but I knew
I had to share. We had made a pact to tell each other
everything.
    Lucy coughed. Having
finished her story she had one ear on what I’d been up to. “Oh for
God’s sake, it can’t be that bad. Were people doing it on the lawn
or something? Come on.”
    “ Well, there was a boy
sitting on the bed with his pants down. A girl was kneeling on the
floor between his knees and…and she was sucking on his
penis.”
    A collective gasp went
through the group as they screwed up their faces in
repulsion.
    Jen covered her mouth with
her hand, “That’s disgusting. Are you sure?”
    “ Saw it with my own eyes,
Jen.”
    “ But that’s gross. How
could anybody do that?” Prue said. It was mind-boggling enough to
think that her parents had sex, she had interrupted them once, but
that was too much.
    “ I asked Ben and he said
that everybody does it and it’s called a head job or something. He
said it’s fun and he ALSO said that boys do it to girls too. It’s
meant to be very exciting.” Jen’s face dropped as she flopped
against the back of the