Free My Best Friend's Girl by Dorothy Koomson Page A

always known the answer was going to be in the affirmative because the cheeky minx had already had the legal documents drawn up, naming me as Tegan’s legal guardian. She’d also sent off for the relevant forms so I could get the ball rolling to adopt Tegan. These papers were stashed in the wooden locker by her bed, waiting for me to put my moniker to them. While Tegan was gabbling on at her mother and kissing her face, Del pointed me in the direction of the papers. When I opened the locker I found she’d rather thoughtfully put a pen in there.
    “You might as well sign them now,” she said with a grin.
    “Yeah, I might as well,” I replied. I hadn’t said a word about what I’d found in Guildford. Nor a word about what I planned to do next. Come to think of it, I hadn’t even said hello.
    I’d read through the sheets in a cursory fashion, knowing there was no other way in which Adele could screw me over more than she already had, then resisted the urge to sign “World Class Mug” instead of Kamryn Matika by the Xs on the various pages.
    Even now, sitting in the corridor, holding onto a plastic cup of vending machine tea, I seethed a little. But only a little. All right, it was more than a little. I was scared. Confused. Majorly pissed off. This decision had been thrust upon me and I was feeling…What was I feeling? I’d spent most of the night galloping, jogging, walking, limping and crawling through a range of emotions and I’d finally ended up at a place called acceptance. Which felt a lot like resignation. I’d been chased down until I was trapped: I couldn’t take Tegan back to Guildford; I couldn’t leave her to grow up in foster care or in a children’s home. I had no other choice; no way out.
    So, no matter what conflicting emotions were battling inside me, I had to do this. This was my little Tiga, after all. I’d held her minutes after she was born. I’d helped name her. I’d been there when she took her first steps. I’d almost cried when she pointed at me and said, “Win take me,” when Adele had asked her if she wanted to go see Father Christmas one year. I had to do this. How could I not? This was Tiga. How could I not want to take her on?
    Very easily, actually
, the thought popped into my head before I could stop it.
You are a bad person,
I chastised myself.
A bad, bad person.
    A transformation had come over Tegan when we’d arrived. She didn’t seem to notice the tubes and machines around her mother and had practically leapt onto the bed, throwing her arms around her mother’s neck and covering her cheek in kisses. Having hardly said anything to me since Guildford, she was like a clockwork toy that had been wound up after weeks of idleness and was wearing herself down by chatting at super speed, pausing constantly to kiss her mother’s cheek.
    I’d slipped out to give them time alone together. I’d forgotten about the bond between them. They were best mates, couldn’t bear to be parted. Weren’t whole without each other. How the hell was Tegan going to cope when…
    I cracked another split in the rim of the plastic cup.
    What if Del got better?
    What if she made a recovery? Went into remission?
I seized that thought, clung to it like a life buoy in the sea of despair and self-pity I was currently drowning in. Del would live.
    Where was it written that she had to die of this? Had she tried everything? I mean,
everything
? Every treatment available? And I’m sure it wasn’t my imagination that she was looking better. Brighter. Less gray and mottled and tired. That was probably Tegan’s influence. Having her around obviously made Del feel a million times better, so we could build on that. She and Tegan would spend lots of time together. Her strength would improve and she would live.
    About half an hour later Nancy the nurse took Tegan for a walk to the canteen so Del and I could talk.
    “You could get well again,” I blurted at her the second the door shut behind Nancy and