"Dude Looks Like a Lady"

Chapter 13 Hannah (Strings POV)

Chapter 13

Hannah

~Strings

I grew up in Glasgow- the nice part away from the gangs and violence. Didn’t stop me getting into fights though. I was a popular guy, which made me very unpopular with the outcasts. And my family was rich- which didn’t help.

Hannah was five years younger than me and we weren’t your usual brother and sister. Maybe its because our ‘rents paid as much attention to her as they did to me- which wasn’t a lot. Maybe its because we were all each other had.

Our folks were the working type, they were in business companies, dunno what the companies did or even what they were called. I remember before Hannah was born mum didn’t work much and spent a lot of time with me. Being a kid, I put the wrong pieces together and thought it was because of Hannah that my mum was away from us as much as Richard- well, my dad, sorta. I hated her at first but like I said, we were all each other had. Us and the nanny, ‘til I was seven. Turns out we had some financial troubles to do with some bad investments Richard had made, which was why my mum had to work and why we had to get rid of the nanny. We couldn’t afford one, but mum couldn’t afford to stay at home so I practically raised Hannah from there. I remember one day, near Christmas, we were snuggled up on the couch eating chocolate snowmen and watching Home Alone. Half way through the film she ran up stairs and came back down with her Barbie suitcase yelling, "Kiwi! Kiwi!" Which was her pet name for me, "Help me pack! Get your bag packed too!"

"Hannah, what are ya doing?"

"They forgot about us! They forgot to take us on holiday!"

"Who?"

"Our parents! And if we don’t go soon they’ll miss us for Christmas!"

I had to explain to her that they didn’t leave us behind, that they were at work and they’d be back in time for Christmas. Mum had the decency to phone us when she was snowed in down in Paris. Richard was only the next town away and the roads weren’t bad, but apparently he had work to do. So I guess in a way we were neglected. I guess it helped train me up for life alone, I had to figure out how to make a Christmas dinner that Christmas- turkey, stuffing, pudding- all of it. It tasted disgusting so we ended up eating alphabet spaghetti and chicken nuggets, but it was worth a shot right? I knew Santa wasn’t real though, since Richard told me when I was three. I kept Hannah believing though, I found some presents stashed away in mums cupboard and wrapped them up. And I even found one gift from Richard, which was for Hannah. But what she wanted was a puppet theatre and puppets, which if they were home long enough to read our lists they would have known. So I spent three weeks making it for her with a saw and my folks wardrobe. They weren’t too happy but it served them right- they only noticed three months after anyway.

She always, always broke the strings though until I ended up carrying spare wherever I went- which is how I kinda got my nickname but it was only my close friends who called me it.

Anyway, because we live in a small world, I’d met Jake before and instantly fell in hatred with him. He was an angry looking kid with freckles and gelled up hair that made him look like a boy band reject. He dressed like a scruff though and what pissed me off was the giant grin on Hannah’s face.

"This is my new boyfriend!" She said. Hannah was beautiful. She had long blonde wavy hair, my gorgeous blue eyes and her smile was worth a thousand quid, so she went through boyfriend like a sick guy goes through a box of tissues. I didn’t expect it to, or I hoped, it wouldn’t last long. Two years and a half. And they got engaged on her tenth birthday- I mean how the hell does a nine-year-old get engaged to a guy- let alone a sour faced scruff?