Disclaimer: Skins doesn't belong to me, anyone fancy kidnapping JB and Bryan Elsley so that I can? ;-)
Author Note: Thank you to everyone for your lovely reviews! I hope you enjoy this mostly fluffy chapter, just what the doctor ordered after the drama of Skins series four I feel. Please review!
It Ends Tonight; Seven
The stair creaked in the hallway alerting Gina to her daughter's arrival. She didn't move, instead continued to play cards with Emily until a tired looking Naomi appeared in the doorway. She stopped a smile from forcing its way onto her face at the sight of Naomi's hair sticking up at all angles and her eyes barely open.
'Good Morning love,' she greeted, with a usual amount of cheer.
'It's fucking four fifteen, what's so good or morning about it?'
Emily did what Gina hadn't dared, a small chuckle escaping her mouth, to which Naomi sent a death stare. Gina placed her cards face down on the table, watched Emily's expression for a moment before standing up to fill the kettle with water.
'Cup of tea anyone?' she asked, taking three mugs out of the cupboard before either girl responded.
'I need coffee,' Naomi begged, slouching into her mother's vacated chair and taking hold of her cards.
Gina raised an eyebrow. 'No coffee in this house, you ought to have remembered that love.'
'Fuck this house, I want some,' Naomi moaned, holding the hand of cards up to her face.
'Have some tea,' Gina suggested, placing three randomly selected teabags into the mugs and sitting in the spare chair. She stole her cards back from Naomi and turned to Emily. 'I'll raise you.'
'Not again,' Emily groaned. 'I fold.'
She grinned, her success one of several in the very same night. Emily threw her cards face up on top of the pile and picked up the plateful of biscuits she kept by her side. Gina reached out and took half a dozen from her.
'What the fuck?' Naomi asked, watching the transaction. 'You're playing for biscuits?'
'What else is there to play for?' Emily asked, piling up the cards and shuffling them.
Naomi rolled her eyes in her usual sarcastic manner. 'Err, money?'
The kettle boiled and Gina finished making the drinks before sitting back down between her daughter and friend. She watched Emily deal the cards, handing a set over to Naomi, despite her not having asked to play. It was happening a lot lately. One day Naomi appeared in the kitchen eager to join in and though she enjoyed time alone with Emily, what she enjoyed more was to see both girls happy.
'I win!' Naomi grinned after seven hands, more wide awake than before and a second mug of tea on the table beside her.
'Now I've got no biscuits left,' Emily noted with a sigh.
'There there Ems,' Naomi laughed. 'Maybe you'll win them back tonight?'
Emily stretched, pushing her hands outwards above her head. 'Think tonight's a sleeping night.'
'Why don't you stay here?' Gina offered, throwing an empty biscuit packet into the bin. 'That's if your girlfriend doesn't mind.'
'Oh,' Emily frowned. 'Yeah, I'm sure she won't. I'll be here.'
The knowing look between Naomi and Emily was not missed by Gina, she stayed silent until Emily cleared her throat and looked away, her face painted in a shade of redness. She wished she'd tell her the truth, just once. It wasn't the lying that bothered her, it was the fact that Emily was keeping things to herself. She turned to Naomi, wished it was easier with her than it was with Emily. But if she was honest, she understood her less.
'Who's up for some shopping this morning?' Gina suggested, piling the dishes into the sink and running the tap.
'I have no money,' Emily pointed out. 'Erm, gotta pay the rent and stuff.'
'I have no money full stop,' Naomi reminded her.
The water filled the sink part way until Gina switched off the tap and turned around. 'You girls have no idea how to go window shopping, do you?'
The sarcastic roll of Naomi's tongue responded. 'Yeah, if I want to be bored out of my brains and have to dodge all the little old ladies with their trolleys.'
'Oh yes, I forgot you turned into a moody, sarcastic mother-hater before we had chance to do the mother and daughter bonding thing,' Gina sighed. 'Go get ready, we're leaving in an hour.'
*
The reluctance from Naomi was to be expected, but Gina didn't anticipate Emily's own unwillingness to participate. She had hoped the plan to get out of the house would be enough to cheer up her girls, yet neither seemed at all interested in her fun and games. In the end she took them to a clothes shop that she loathed, one of those chain stores that sold the same clothes to every teenager all over the country.
'Is this some sort of joke?' Naomi spat out.
'Pick out three of the worst items of clothing you can find,' she told them. 'You must choose something that can go on your top, something on the bottom and then one other thing, then I want you to meet me at the changing rooms in ten minutes.'
Naomi and Emily looked at each other with more doubt than Gina knew what to do with. She rolled her eyes, watched Naomi and Emily laugh at her impression of her daughter. What they didn't know was that she'd perfected the eye roll long before her daughter was even born.
'What are you waiting for?' Gina asked, pushing the two girls off across the shop floor, before heading in her own direction in search of an outfit.
By the time Emily and Naomi arrived at the changing room entrance, Gina was already raring to go. She had a quick look at their choices then ushered them into the cubicles opposite one she picked out for herself.
'What the fuck are we doing mum?' Naomi shouted, her skirt partway down her legs.
'Just change into the clothes.'
'All of them?' Emily checked. 'At the same time?'
'Yes,' Gina replied, sliding a half-sized top over her head and tugging as the material went down past her breasts.
Once the outfit was complete, Gina opened the curtains and stood in front of the large mirror to admire her handiwork. The lack of noise from the other changing rooms prompted her to demand what was going on.
'I'm not coming out,' Naomi replied.
'It's just a bit of fun love,' Gina called back. 'I can guarantee that neither of you look as bad as I do now.'
'That's what I'm worried about.'
'Christ Naomi, you'd think the Pope was coming to visit the Catholics the way you're carrying on. Now hurry up and come out before someone else comes in and sees me looking like a forty year old chav.'
'Forty year old,' Naomi asked, opening the curtain and stopping when laughter forced her words to dissipate. 'Oh My, Jesus mum!'
Emily's curtain opened and she stepped out to see Gina dressed in a mini skirt, a tiny half sized top and a jacket that looked like it belonged to some female rapper in a gangster movie. Naomi and Emily couldn't stem their laughter, which only made Gina grin.
'What the fuck are you wearing?' Emily asked after the laughter had calmed down, her attention honed in on Naomi's black laced top, bright pink jacket with eighties sleeves and a pair of knee length jeans. The combination enough to make Gina cry with laughter.
'You can fuck off now,' Naomi muttered, covering her face when Gina pulled out a camera and started snapping photographs. 'Take pictures of Emily, she's got the worst one.'
'I think it's quite stylish actually,' Emily joked, posing in front of the mirror in a long, lime green, flowing peasant skirt, a pink and red checked flannel shirt with a pointed Madonna-bra shaped top underneath.
After a number of photographs, too much laughing and a couple of shop assistants looking at them with wary eyes, Gina led her two girls out of the clothes shop and towards a small café where she shouted Naomi and Emily to a drink and something nice to eat.
'It's lovely to see you both smiling again,' Gina pointed out, wiping the crumbs from her face when she finished off her cookie.
'Have you always been this fucking hilarious?' Naomi questioned, her eyebrows raised.
Gina looked back at Naomi, a proud smile on her face. 'Well Naomi, if you'd taken five minutes out of your teenage angst to spend some time with your lonely old mother, maybe you'll have discovered, that actually, I fucking am.'
'Oh fuck,' Emily called out, breaking the relaxed atmosphere and slouching down in her seat.
'Ems, what's wrong?' Naomi asked, looking behind her to what Emily was previously glancing at.
'Shh, don't say my name,' Emily muttered, covering her face with her hands.
Naomi and Gina both continued to search the room until their eyes landed on the brunette standing at the counter ordering a takeaway coffee. They both turned back again, staring at Emily for an explanation, of which she didn't give. Once Katie had left the café, Emily sat back up in her seat with a grin on her face that only sought to worry Gina.
'So, where to next?'
AN: Has anyone actually done that? Gone into a shop and tried on the worst combination of clothes ever? If not, you should, it's rather quite hilarious!
