I slapped her arse. “That’s the only bit of wish fulfillment you’re getting today, Shirley,” I told her. “Oiling you and trussing you up is not my bag.”
“Shame,” Kira said as she sauntered off towards the kettle. “If anyone could turn me it would, of course, be you.”
“Of course,” I muttered as I slumped into the kitchen stool and slumped over onto the marble work surface. “Tea,” I called weakly from under my arms and I heard Kira sigh. There was some crashing about and a pause before I felt her hand on my arm and heard a cup being placed in front of me. I groped for it blindly with my free hand and then lifted my head up enough to take a sip. Ugh! No sugar. Ofcourseno sugar. Why was everything in my life so crap?
“Urvels, you’re working too hard,” she told me, her voice soft with concern. Kira might be off the wall, as evidenced by her current outfit of UGGS, purple tights, denim cut-off short shorts and a badly knitted jumper with a badger face on the front, but she was the kindest person I knew. I felt my eyes prick with tears but managed to swallow them down.
“I’m fine Ki Ki,” I muttered, feeling the caffeine sink into my veins.
“You go to college all day and you work in that bar all night till the early hours, then you do it all again. That’s not fine. That’s a recipe for death via exhaustion. Don’t be a wankpuffin.”
I took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. Kira wrapped her arm around me and gave me a squeeze. And, because it was Kira, because, despite her tiny size, she was always so strong and familiar, because she was right and I was fucking exhausted, and because I couldn’t swallow them all back any longer I let a tear fall.
“I can’t . . . “ my voice came out hoarse from the effort of holding back actual sobs and I cleared my throat. “Iwon’tgive up my course. I have to prove that I . . .” I trailed off and another sodding tear made its way down my cheek. As my parents would say, (and did say, frequently, before they had decided to stop speaking to me that is)I’d made my bed and now I had to lie in it. It had been my decision to drop out of medical school, my decision to apply to switch to a music degree. It didn’t matter that I’d been accepted to one of the most prestigious institutions in the world, it didn’t matter how hard I’d had to work to get in. All my family saw was the lost opportunity of me having a profession, a guaranteed income for life - just like my brother had. Music was supposed to have been an extra-curricular thing to help me get into university, not theactualthing I studied there.
They thought I was throwing my life away.We haven’t struggled and saved all these years to support you just so you can bloody well write songs!Dad had shouted, as if writing songs was akin to shooting heroine into my eyeballs. Overnight the allowance they had provided to cover my rent and for basics was gone. I had no grant, as I didn’t qualify for one with my parents’ financial status, and although I’d taken student loans that wasn’t enough to fund a life in London, not if I didn’t want to be saddled with crippling debt. And now I’d recently discovered that my body was giving up on me as well. So my only option was to work day and night. I couldn’t stop now. I’d come this far, there was no going back.
“Let me cover the rent for a bit, hun,” Kira said, but I shook my head.
“No, you can’t afford that, Kira.”
Kirawasa medical student. That was how we’d met – we’d been in the same year together. After the second year we’d both been fresh out of halls and needing somewhere cheap to stay near campus. Her best friend, Libby, was a single mother and needed her own space, and Kira was living with too many other students and needed peace to revise. So we’d found a place together. It was another year before I threw in the towel on medicine. I hated every minute of the dry lectures and science-based learning – all I did was think about music and when I could get away to play and compose. The last straw had been when I’d passed out in the dissection room – the bodies weren’t even uncovered and I’d still lost consciousness. I had to accept at that point that medicine was not the career for me. And alsonotwriting music, not making that my main focus had been slowly killing my soul.
“It’s fine, I’m just being a wet flannel this morning because my feet hurt and I’m tired.”
Kira sighed again and moved to the other side of the counter so she was facing me. “Urvels, I hate to nag, but you didn’t take your pack last night and I don’t know if you had any spares in your bag.”
I bit my lip. “I forgot.”
“Urvi– “
“Please, no lectures. Not now. I forgot. It won’t happen again.”
“Your diabetic control hasn’t been – ”
“I know, okay?” I said, pushing away from the counter and from her, snatching up my goddamn sugar-free tea and nearly burning my hand. “I’m trying. It’s hard when there’s notime.”
“Maybe if we let your folks know that you’re sick,” she whispered, and I closed my eyes. It was the first time Kira had mentioned contacting my parents and I knew this was a sign of how worried she was. She had been arguably angrier with them than I was when they’d washed their hands of me.
I hadn’t spoken to my parents or brother for eighteen months (not through lack of trying on my part), and then a year ago I was diagnosed with type-one diabetes. Yes it was a shock, yes I was handling it badly - but that didn’t mean I had to go running back to my family. They’d want me to move home. They’d try to make me give up my music and I just couldn’t. Not now I had a taste of my dream.
“I’ll tell them when I’m ready to tell them, Kira. Stop pushing me,’ I snapped, but regretted my sharp tone instantly. “I’m sorry. I know you care about me like a rabid badger and I appreciate it. But please just let me have this morning without thinking about my chuffing parents or diabetes for once. Agreed?”
“Alright, love,” she said. “I’ll drop it for now. And you’re right: I’m totes rabid.”
“Thank you,” I whispered. I made a point of getting my kit out as she took a seat opposite me with her tea and then set about plugging in the lancet to prick my finger. “See,” I told her, holding up the meter. “Seven point zero. Perfect control.”
Kira might have only been a medical student, but she was clued-up enough about diabetes to know that one random good sugar reading did not guarantee perfect control, not by a long shot. But she smiled anyway and ruffled my hair before getting up to make her toast.
“I’d better get a wriggle on if I’m going to get this composition done by tomorrow.”
“Ah,” Kira bit her lip and rubbed the back of her neck. “I might have said that – ” The front door crashed open, making me jump in my seat as I hurried to clear away my diabetic paraphernalia.
“Festival peeps!” Two lanky, bearded, man-bunned lads came bursting into the flat. “Ah! The musical prodigy.” One of the men slid across the floor and then fell to his knees in front of me, lifting both hands and bowing down to me like I was a goddess to worship. The other man fished a flute out of his belt loop and played me a little tune.
I turned wide eyes to Kira and pulled a face.
“Meet the Ferret’s Testicles,” she said and I blinked at her. “They’re headlining Bunt Fest this year.”
