Pretty, Ugly Girl

It was now the beginning of March and Abi had known Tommy and the others for about two weeks, give or take a few days. Out of that time she had been in school a grand total of three days. Mel was getting worried that they were going to be called in to the school for a meeting about it. She knew that Abi's father wouldn't go to it so it'd be up to her to turn up but she highly doubted that Abi would show a single bit of care about it and she most certainly wouldn't turn up to it.

James and his girlfriend were around a lot more much to Mel's surprise and Abi's disgust. He was also staying the night more often then not which also meant that she did too. Though it seemed the more he stayed the night the more Jade was out of the house. It was clear that she really didn't like his girlfriend and it went a lot deep then just thinking she was a slut. After all Abi thought she was one too but she was in the same house as her most nights, unfortunately.

But despite the fact that his girlfriend stayed over most nights, she rarely ever had dinner with the family. Then again Jade would have never stood for that nor would Abi appreciate sitting next to her. Though Abi, as of recently, hadn't been eating too much of her food and always went back up stairs after around seven bites of whatever was on her plate. Sometimes she wouldn't even have that much.

Mel was starting to think that her cooking was going a bit off because normally Abi always ate the whole of her dinner, though sometimes she would leave bits and pieces because she was full or something. But Jade and James carried on eating the food as normal so it made Mel a bit confused as to why Abi wasn't eating as much. Of course she didn't ask her because she knew that she wouldn't get a proper answer from the girl and she would just be blatantly rude to her without so much as a thought to her actions. Mel wouldn't expect any less seeing as she knew her as well as she did.

Or at least she hoped she did. She couldn't be too sure because recently Abi was acting really strangely. A week ago she asked for some money (from her dad of course, but Mel was the one who gave the kids it) for some clothes and went out and brought a few sweaters and jumpers which looked awfully warm in Mel's opinion. She didn't think that was normal because even though it was only March, it was going to be heading into the summer soon and most people would start buying summer clothes now. Though, she reasoned, you could never really guess how the summer was going to turn out so in a way, she figured that maybe it wasn't that bad buying sweaters and jumpers now.

Their dad was home for dinner which was something they rarely saw. They were never overly enthusiastic whenever he was because they were so used to the fact that he was barely even apart of the family. They were all sitting on the sofas in an awkward air whilst Mel was in the kitchen finishing up on the dinner. Their dad was watching the news on the television whilst Abi and Jade were sitting on the same sofa, a short distance away from each other and kept passing one another looks. It was times like this when they got along.

Hannah was upstairs doing her homework. Every time she came home from school she would go upstairs and do her homework until dinner was called and then she'd come down and spend the rest of her night watching the TV. Abi thought she was a swot for doing her homework straight away; she'd never done her homework the night that she got it, nor even the week she had most of them for. If she even did her homework it'd be in the lesson before the one she had to hand it in to. And even then it was mostly copied from other people so it wasn't really her work.

She wasn't the only one to do things like that, many people did it whenever they 'forgot' they had homework or just couldn't be bothered to do it because they just wanted to copy someone else's. It never mattered that the work in which they were copying from could have been wrong, as long as they had the work done it was okay. Well in their eyes anyway. Most teachers didn't really enjoy the fact that the same people kept getting their work wrong and that it seemed to be a recurring occurrence.

When the front door went no one moved from the sofas to get it. Neither Abi nor Jade wanted the person at the door to come in and their father just couldn't be bothered to move from where he was watching the news. When a second knock sounded harder than the first one, they heard a huff from the kitchen before Mel appeared in the doorway. “Don't everyone move at once then,” she snapped before disappearing off to answer the door. No one even batted an eyelid at what she said because they just didn't care.

A few seconds later James and his girlfriend entered the sitting room much to the dislike of Jade. She couldn't be staying for dinner could she?

Evidently she was because Mel started calling people's names to come and get their food before they sat at the table and the forth person she called out was James followed by his girlfriend. Jade and Abi looked at each other and grimaced. They made sure to side next to one another at the dinner table so that Hannah would be made to sit next to James' girlfriend. They didn't care about whether or not she would want to because they didn't want to and she wasn't down here to say anything.

“Hannah, dinner!” Mel called up the stairs before going into the sitting room and sitting at her seat. A few seconds later they heard a door slam shut and footsteps come rushing down the stairs. However when she came into the room she stopped suddenly at the fact the only seat free was by James' girlfriend. Sending a glance to her sisters, Hannah scowled at the fact they both had little smirks playing on their faces.

Begrudgingly, she sat next to the girl and began eating her dinner. Much like any time before, it was silent for a while until James decided to break it by clearing his voice. It caused Abi to roll her eyes, Jade to glance up at him before back down at her dinner and Mel to look at him. His father did a bit of all three but stayed looking at him.

“I actually asked for Casey to come for dinner for a... reason,” he started, faltering a bit but nonetheless, continuing. “We actually have some news to share with you guys.”

Mel was glancing at him a bit worriedly and Abi just rolled her eyes at the fact he was trying to create a build up. Or at least that's what she assumed.

James glanced at his father for a moment or two before looking at Casey. She was just staring down at her food almost like she would be sick if she looked up. If only, Abi thought bitterly. “Well Casey... Casey's pregnant and I'm the father.”

Everyone stopped eating and Jade even dropped her fork in shock. That was something they weren't ever expecting to hear much less to hear it now.

“Oh that's...,” Mel started but stopped with what she was going to say. She swallowed the rest of her food quickly before starting again, “How far gone is she – how far gone are you Casey?” she had almost forgot that the girl in question was sitting right next to James.

“Coming up to the fifth month,” she mumbled quietly. Abi couldn't help but scoff quietly to herself.

“And you've only just thought to tell us James?” his father questioned, his eyes trained heavily on his son. It was unnerving James slightly.

“I've only just found out.” All eyes turned to Casey who looked as if she wanted the floor to just suck her up or just anything to just not be in the situation she was in now.

“I didn't know how to tell him,” she mumbled more to herself than to the others.

“How long have you known?”

“A week into my third month.”

“And you didn't think to tell James any time sooner?” Mel questioned, stealing a glance at Jade who was just staring at the two of them with an unreadable expression on her face.

“I was scared.”

“That doesn't excuse it,” their father barked, “You could have kept it from us until you gave birth but you only just told the father of your child. Almost at the same time we've found out.”

James rarely ever got a reaction from his father but now, it seemed, he was getting one that wasn't so much directed at him. In a way it made James feel like his father was accepting of the pregnancy and the fact he was going to become a grandfather but wasn't pleased with the fact that he had only just found out.

It had only been a week since finding out because Casey had told her parents before she even thought about telling him and they told her that she needed to find a house of her own because now that she was going to be a mother she couldn't still live with them. In a way, she only told him because she knew that he would give her a place to stay in his house without any questions asked by either his father or Mel.

Jade had been sitting there just staring at Casey. She hated the fact that she of all people was pregnant. She was slut and everyone knew it except for James. He seemed to think that she didn't sleep around behind his back and only went round to the guy's houses that she did just to smoke a joint. Jade never had her brother down as stupid but when she found that out she couldn't help but think that he was extremely stupid to be buying that bullshit.

“Anyway,” their father said after a minute or two of silence, “Congratulation James.” After that he picked up his food and disappeared into the kitchen to just dump his plate before heading to the front door and leaving the house. Casey looked saddened that he stormed out like that but James knew that it was what he normally does and that he did actually mean the congratulations that he gave him.

“You actually trust that it's yours James?” Jade asked bitterly, staring at her brother in disbelief. Abi was thinking the same thing as well but decided not to view it because she knew that Jade would be the one to say it. And she was right. “How stupid can you get.” That wasn't a question but more of a statement. And after she said that she got off the table and went upstairs. They all heard the door to her room slam shut which signalled that she was in it.

Abi took this chance to get off the table as well. “Where you going Abi?” Mel asked as she watched the girl leave the table.

“Upstairs. Now that we've played happy families for the past twenty minutes, I'm no longer being down here,” was all she said before she followed in Jade's footsteps and run upstairs. She did debate about whether or not she should knock on Jade's door but decided against it and just entered her room, slamming her door shut as she went.

They all slammed their doors which was something that annoyed Mel. Although she had told them several times about it, no one seemed to listen or care about what she thought. It was true and she shouldn't have been surprised that they wouldn't stop slamming their doors. And in a way, she wasn't really.