The bus glides to a stop and I slide in behind a large elderly lady. I find old people the best to trail, as their movements are slow and considered and people usually give them a wide berth.
The lady takes up most of the double seat so I perch on the edge, betting that nobody will ask the woman to shove over. I’m right, as the bus packs up, people are steering clear of the old woman. It helps that she has a distinctive off-butter smell about her.
I leap off when we get to the city, the doors snapping at my heels. It’s embarrassing to get caught with your leg in a bus; when it happens the doors swing open again automatically and the driver stares quizzically, and you’re lying in a tumbled mess on the road with nobody offering to help. Not that it’s happened to me. Much.
But today I’m out free and running to the grass. Nobody walks on the grass in the city. I catch my breath before I move into the slipstream of pedestrian traffic. It’s important to ride the right tide. I slide in behind two women in intense conversation. They won’t break apart for anyone, the perfect shield. I walk close behind, watching for signs of them slowing, stopping or changing direction. As luck would have it they stroll me straight through the doors of a large department store.
I stand by the wall to get my bearings. Walking in a busy area is a lot more stressful than you’d imagine. I’ve had some horrific elbows in kidneys, fingers in face, et cetera—people always look baffled for an instant but move on pretty quickly (usually shaking out their accountable body parts), meanwhile I’m left trying to stop a bloody nose or bent over trying not to cry out because someone has inadvertently poked me in the eye. Not fun.
Nobody is waiting for the elevator so I ride up to the designer level. The more expensive the wares, the fewer people around, so luxury goods are my best bet. I stroll lazily around the glossy floor, where bored saleswomen pick at their nails and noses when they think nobody is watching. When you see people like this, as they truly are, you realise how fake society is. What masks they wear. I’m almost glad I don’t have to deal with them.
The lingerie is calling me; red and black; frills and lace; suspenders and stockings. Who wears this stuff? How must they feel to be seen in this? I think about strutting around a five-star hotel room wearing this stuff, thunderous high heels too, someone watching me walk. In my dreams there is always someone watching. I am never invisible.
But I’m glad nobody is watching me now, of course. I pull a black bra off the hanger plus the matching pants. They fit neatly down into my shirt and disappear. I could wear this for Tom, I think. Then blush at the thought. No, that’s never going to happen. I’m actually terrified by the idea of him getting that close. Of him seeing me and not liking me. Why would he?
Fortunately the rush of kleptomania overrides my despair. I’m caught up in the illicit thrill of it, even though I’m pathetic as far as thieves go. I try to keep my stealing to a minimum; a dozen times a year when I really need the kick, and I’ve never stolen more than a couple of hundred bucks’ worth.
Sometimes I wonder about robbing a bank. It’d be easy slipping behind a teller, pulling out wads of cash when nobody was looking, stuffing it into my pockets. A few weeks in a few banks would do it. I could set up Rose and me in a penthouse somewhere with some loyal butler, like Bruce Wayne’s Alfred, someone sworn to keep the family secrets. With a ‘gift’ like mine it seems criminal not to take advantage of it.
Unfortunately though, I had a good moral upbringing. Already I’m starting to feel bad as I’m walking down our street. Rose hates it when I steal. She gets really disappointed in me. You’re better than that, she says. She’s right. Besides, it’s terrible karma. I’ve proven that a few times.
I think of Jordan and me; we’re eight years old and I’ve convinced her to climb the orange tree in Mr Vasetti’s front yard a few houses down. Its branches are weighed down with the fat ripe orbs and we’re sitting high at the top gorging on fruit; the tangy juice smeared around our mouths, in our long tangled hair, dripping off our fingers onto our bare feet. Delicious. ‘Dare you,’ I say, chucking an orange onto the street. It hits the path with a satisfying splat.
‘All right,’ Jordan replies, never to be outdone.
I have a vivid memory of the orange she plucked from the branch above her. It was greener than the others, more dimply and large. Very large. I gasped as she hurled it through the air but Jordan chuckled maniacally. Nicole Whatley was walking past the fence hand-in-hand with her mother and I can still see the way it bounced off the brick fence and smashed into the side of Nicole’s head. It was quite beautiful.
The mother spun around in horror as Nicole began to wail.
‘You could have killed her!’ she screamed up at Jordan. ‘Don’t you think I won’t tell your mother about this, Jordan Withadrew, you little wretch!’
Then Mr Vasetti came out, shaking his fist and yelling in Italian. He picked up his hose and turned it on us (well, Jordan), so Jordan and me scrambled madly down through the branches and bolted away laughing.
The karma was not swift, it was insidious.
‘It was Olive’s idea,’ Jordan told her mother later.
That was the first time I saw her mother narrow her eyes at my name. In that moment, I went from a cute and whimsical imaginary friend to something that needed to be ‘dealt with’.
I shoo the memory from my mind—I’ve cried enough tears over that lost friendship—and jump the low fence to walk down the side of the house. It’s embarrassing I can’t use my own front door. I understand the logic; the suspicion it would raise, seeing the door open and close itself. But it feeds a little seed of shame in me every time I walk by it. Shame I don’t need to grow bigger. I scoop up the cat, Mr Perceval, and nuzzle him into me. He feels soft and warm and rumbles a contented purr into my neck. He doesn’t care what I look like. I wonder if he sees me at all.
I push the back door and go straight to my room to hide the evidence. I am stuffing the lingerie into my drawers when Rose appears at the door.
‘Olive, are you there?’
I consider not answering for a minute, but she knows I’m here. It would be a dumb move. Mean, too.
‘Yes.’
‘Where have you been? I thought you’d be here when I got home.’
‘Just out,’ I say, sitting down on my bed.
‘Have you thought about calling Tom?’
‘No point.’
She’s picking at the paint on the doorframe. ‘You really think that?’
‘He’s a nice guy, it’s too risky for him. Besides, I don’t even think he likes me.’
‘He likes you,’ Rose says definitively. ‘And yes it is risky, but you’ll regret it if you don’t try. Who knows when you’ll meet another …’ She drifts off. She can’t say the words.
I let her off that particularly insidious hook. ‘Yeah, yeah.’
‘You just need to plan your next date better, make him feel comfortable, don’t be so confronting all the time. Men need to feel like they’ve got some control, and you—well, you’re all over the place.’
‘Just say it, I’m a bitseach.’
Rose laughs. She likes it when I swear in Gaelic. ‘No, just a bit of a cíoch,’ she says fondly.
A tit. ‘Great,’ I say, rolling my eyes. But she’s got me thinking.
After she leaves I pick up my phone.
‘Hello?’
Oh god.
‘Hello?’
Is it too late to hang up?
‘Olive, I know it’s you. I can see your caller ID.’
Stupid caller ID.
‘Okay scumbag, so it’s me.’
Tom snorts some kind of laugh. ‘I’m glad.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah.’
‘So … I hate the phone.’
‘Me too.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Yeah.’
Arghh! Say something normal, stupid!
‘Look, anyway, I’m sorry about before.’
‘It’s okay. I probably overreacted.’
‘Yeah you did, but I, well … Do you want to go out on a date?’
‘That word sounds weird coming out of your mouth.’
‘Then don’t make me say it. Are you going to come over or what?’
‘You want me to?’
His stupid voice is so confident. He knows I do. What a jerk. A hot jerk, unfortunately.
‘Plah,’ I say. There are no words.
‘Is that a yes?’ He laughs.
‘If you strip off half that arrogance.’
‘I’ll strip off anything you like.’
‘You’re unbelievable, do you know that?’ I say it with disgust but we’re both smiling. You can hear it clear as dawn. My eyes feel like they’ve opened for the first time in days.
‘Is tomorrow okay?’ Tom asks.
‘Tomorrow—that’s eager.’
‘I’ve been eager since the first minute I saw you, my little Olive Oyl.’
I grumble and grunt into the phone, making the right noises of disgust—I’ve told him not to call me that. But the reality is my heart has left my body and somehow it’s flying around my shitty dark room.
‘Just come.’
‘Righto.’