Chapter 9

After the dinner party , Joey was pretty vexed that yet again, he'd been unable to see Lauren. Max and Tanya seemed to dismiss any form of conversation that revolved around her and he didn't understand why. Unknown to both sets of parents, he and Lauren had been seeing each other for the past year, in secret of course. Joey had been the one to ground Lauren, they'd always been friends but when she got "ill" he was there, always at the other end of the phone when she needed that release she'd only get from other more dangerous methods. Their friendship soon developed and things grew between them.

They stole meetings on a weekend outside of Walford so they weren't seen. Sixth form was the only place they could be together and not have to worry about being caught, or so they thought.

The last parents evening had blown their cover. Lauren's teacher stating how much better her work had been since she'd been with her boyfriend, and that it was nice to see her so happy after such a long time. Unfortunately, the poor teacher had no idea that she'd just opened a huge can of worms. As soon as they were out of the school, Max and Tanya exploded. Lauren, not wanting to get Joey into trouble, had refused to tell her parents who her boyfriend was, which left her grounded and without a phone.

It was the action of her parents taking her phone off her that they found out who she was dating. A rather ill-timed text message from Joey revealed his identity as Tanya prised the phone from Lauren's grip. Just seeing his name on the screen and it all clicked together, resulting in Max heading straight over to Derek's, Lauren a sobbing mess, hot on his heels.

Despite being so angry, Max had remained relatively calm and had simply given Joey a warning to look after his daughter, knowing a complicated relationship was lightly to send Lauren spiralling back into an unstable state of mentality.

Derek on the other hand had put a stop to the relationship, warning it to end there and then or there'd be trouble. Both teenagers knew all too well the trouble it would cause. She'd seen the evidence in the form of bruises on Joey's body, that he'd passed off as boxing injuries, but Lauren could see through him. She knew he was lying.

So to save Joey, literally, the two started their forbidden love affair. Things hadn't been normal, well Joey and Lauren normal, for a while. He'd not had any contact from her for several weeks, months, if he thought about it and he was worried, worried she'd reverted to her old ways. She'd been out on the town a fair few times, especially when Bradley died and he was growing concerned. The dinner party was going to be an opportunity for him to speak to her and see where they stood but it never happened. Lauren didn't turn up, Tanya and Max explaining that she was ill.

Picking up his phone for the 10th time that minute, he called her again whilst looking out of his bedroom window and across to number 5. Unsurprisingly her phone went straight through to voicemail, and as he was about to move away from the window, something caught his eye. Max, Tanya, Abi and Oscar getting into the car, but no Lauren.

He waited until they'd pulled away and disappeared from sight to venture his risky move. His parents were out for the evening and Alice was at a friend's house, so he could escape without being questioned. Walking up the steps to number 5, something didn't feel right. There were no lights on, even from the window of the upstairs side room that he knew to be Lauren's. He knocked a few times but no reply.

"Lauren, are you in?" he questioned, shutting the letterbox with a clang as he got no reply

"That desperate, are you?" a voice asked behind me

"Excuse me?" Joey inquired, turning to see Tyler, the youngest of the Moons stood on the pavement

"Shouting through letterboxes, bit desperado, don't you think?" he questioned a sense of laughter to his voice. "Maybe she ain't in?" he suggested, raising an eyebrow at him.

"No, she's in, just not answering" Joey replied, looking through the letter box again

"Well that ain't normal" Tyler sighed

"This is Albert Square, mate. Nothing's ever normal"

so we're still no wiser as to what's wrong with Lauren any guesses ? But we have a little more background info on them back tomorrow xxx