The Kiss by Lucy Courtenay Read Free Book Online Page B

forget any kind of sensitivity.
    ‘Maria.’ Tabby’s tone of voice indicates Maria is perfectly interchangeable with Witch Knickers .
    I look at the girl again. She seriously lucked out in the hair lottery. ‘Don’t lose faith. They’re only talking,’ I soothe. ‘I’ll do the bank thing on my own, it’s fine. See you after college, OK?’
    ‘Jem had better call Sam,’ Tab wails after me as I head for the street. ‘Or there’ll be murder in the corridor this afternoon!’
    The personal manager that has been assigned to me is finally saying goodbye to an old lady who’s been yakking at him ever since I arrived at the bank fifteen minutes ago. It’s weird being in here on my own. I feel cowed, like I am in the head teacher’s office for setting fire to the staffroom. Not that I’ve ever done anything like that, of course, unless you count that time with the Bunsen burner and the corner of the supply’s lab coat.
    I sit on the mauve chair in front of the manager’s desk and smile nervously. He looks back at me with all the emotion of an egg as I stumble through my situation.
    ‘Do you know your account number?’ he asks when I’ve finished.
    ‘I normally look on my card only I can’t do that now, can I? My name’s Delilah Jones though and I live at twenty-three Wyvern Court and my security question is Marie Curie – that’s the name of my fish, but you probably don’t need to know that?’ I know I’m waffling but I can’t seem to stop.
    He looks impassively at me. ‘We have that information.’
    ‘Oh. Well, this is my branch and everything so you’ll have my details on your computer,’ I stumble on. ‘When can I get my card back?’
    ‘Assuming everything’s in order, it’ll be a different card,’ says the manager, tapping his keyboard in a bored fashion.
    I think a little sadly about the nice picture I had on my old one. Then I frown.
    ‘ Assuming everything’s OK? Are you maybe assuming that it isn’t?’
    ‘Can you tell me how much you have in your account?’ he asks, still tapping.
    ‘I had about four hundred pounds in there a couple of weeks ago. I earned it at the lido in the summer,’ I say, feeling the need to explain myself.
    ‘You have exactly four pounds and twenty-three pence in your account. According to the records, you have tried to access non-existent funds three times, hence the recall of your card today.’
    I grip the chair. ‘That’s . . . that’s not right. Four pounds? As in . . . as in four hundred pence ?’
    ‘Four hundred and twenty-three pence, yes.’
    I reel. I’ve spent a fair bit recently, getting ready for college and so on – but I haven’t spent all of it. Have I? There was my winter parka, of course. And eating out in France. And my new phone, lost forever somewhere in the Mediterranean. And – well, a bunch of other stuff. My heart sinks. Stupid, stupid, stupid. How can I have messed this up so badly? Has the Euro exchange rate short-circuited my head?
    ‘Independence is more expensive than most students realize,’ he says a little more kindly. ‘It’s easy for our inexperienced customers to lose track of their finances. I’ll order a new card for you, but unless you put some more money in your account, you won’t be able to use it. Your age means we can’t give you an overdraft.’
    ‘Oh,’ I say, trying to control the wobble in my voice. Like ‘Oh’ covers even one millionth of the situation. ‘I’ll check it out and . . .’
    I have to leave or I am going to burst into tears and no way is Egg Face seeing that. Flapping my hand in silent farewell, I back out of his office and make my way to the doors of the bank, where I take several deep, shocked breaths. I’ve spent four hundred pounds without noticing. I am totally skint in week one of my first year at college. This is bad.
    For one brief unwitting moment, I think of asking Dad to loan me some money. A millisecond later, I realize what a pointless hope that