I rushed out into the corridor. It was her, the woman from the cemetery. I could see her up ahead. She was smaller than I remembered and impossibly thin, but it was definitely her. I opened my mouth to say something but nothing came out. It was as if someone had stolen my voice again, like the day Nan collapsed. Wait! I thought. Don’t go. Please don’t go. I really need to talk to you.
She disappeared round the corner heading towards the exit.
“Wait,” I tried again, and this time it came out – not very loud, but loud enough to spur me on.
I rushed down the corridor and round the corner, pushing past anyone who got in my way, but she wasn’t there. I swallowed down a sob, batting the tears away. She couldn’t have disappeared that quickly. She couldn’t! She must’ve gone into the school office.
I waited for as long as I dared, praying she’d come out. I had to speak to her but I couldn’t go barging in without a good reason. I should’ve moved faster, called out louder. The hall began to clear around me until it was almost empty. A monitor came over to ask where I was supposed to be, threatening to report me if I didn’t go straight to class.
It was a nightmare. I couldn’t stop thinking about her for the rest of the morning. I kept imagining a flash of blue silk every time I came out of class or turned the corner. I needed to know who she was and how she knew Nan and what she was doing here, at Church Vale. It was so frustrating. But there was no way of finding out. I didn’t even know her name.
“What’s going on with you and Kieran Black?” said Gemma. We were in the canteen at lunch and she was staring past my shoulder across the room. “He hasn’t taken his eyes off you for a single second, not for the entire time we’ve been in here.”
“There’s nothing going on,” I said, thinking of the nurture group and how he’d kicked off, the way he’d looked at me when he said he didn’t need any help. “I’m not even turning round.” He was only trying to intimidate me, scare me into keeping quiet, but I meant it when I said to Vivian that I wasn’t scared any more. I felt sorry for him more than anything else.
He kicked off again later that day during art. Mrs Morris had displayed all our portraits around the studio for everyone to see, like a mini exhibition. They weren’t finished yet, but she thought it would be cool for us to see how they were progressing so far. There was a buzz in the room as we walked round, everyone talking about which ones they liked best and who they could recognize.
Kieran turned up fifteen minutes late. By that time everyone had claimed their pictures so his was the only one left, propped up on a table against the wall. He’d done a simple portrait of a woman using very thin charcoal. I thought it was really beautiful, especially the eyes, and I wondered if it was supposed to be his mum.
A shadow passed across his face as he scanned the room and saw the picture on show. I remembered the way he’d been working on it, bent right over the paper so no one else could see what he was doing. A split second later he lunged towards the table, grabbed the portrait and tore it in half – chucking the two torn pieces at Mrs Morris.
It all happened so fast Mrs Morris didn’t have time to say anything or try to stop him as he stormed out of the room – she seemed to be as shocked as the rest of us. She asked us to get on with our work and then spent ages taping the two pieces of the portrait back together until it was difficult to see it had been torn in half in the first place.
At the end of the lesson she asked me to stay back for a minute. I stood at the front waiting for the others to file out, wondering if I was in trouble. Was she going to say my marks had slipped or I wasn’t concentrating enough in class?
“There’s no need to look so scared, Maddie,” she said when everyone had gone. “I just wanted to have a chat with you about your portrait of Gemma. You know, in all the years I’ve been doing portraits with Year Eight, yours is definitely the most unusual. I think it’s fantastic.”
I stared at her as if she was speaking another language. My portrait? Fantastic?
“Seriously, Maddie,” she went on. “I can’t wait until it’s finished. I’m going to get it framed and put it up where everyone can see it. I just can’t believe how well you’ve managed to capture the essence of Gemma’s face using something as simple as newspaper.”
I couldn’t believe it either. Any of it. I was smiling so hard it felt as if my face was about to split in half.
“That was all really,” she said. “I just wanted you to know how impressed I am and that I’ve told Mrs Palmer as well. You should be really proud.”
I practically floated through the rest of the day. I couldn’t wait to tell Mum and Dad; it was ages since I’d had anything good to say about school. I forgot all about Kieran kicking off and the woman in the blue headscarf, it was as if Mrs Morris’s words had pushed everything else out of my head.
I rushed out of school and down Banner Road as soon as the bell rang; my tummy flipping over every time I replayed the conversation. My portrait, the best she’d ever seen! I could feel the words fizzing around inside me, warm and bubbly, bursting to get out. I didn’t even stop at the cemetery, there was no time. I wanted to get straight home.
I’d only been in for about half an hour when Mum and Charlie got back. They came slamming through the front door shouting at each other about something. Charlie yelled at Mum to leave him alone and then ran straight into the garden and began to kick the ball, pounding it against the wall.
“What’s going on?” I asked, as Mum came in behind him. “I don’t think the wall can take much more!”
“I don’t think I can take much more,” said Mum. “There’s been an incident at school.”
“What do you mean, an incident? What happened?”
“I’m not sure exactly. Mr Maddox was waiting for me when I went to pick him up. He said Charlie lost his temper, kicked a boy in the year below him called Finn. We had to go and talk to Mrs Conner. It sounded really bad.”
“What did you say? Did you tell them how upset he’s been about the football team?”
Mum shook her head. “I don’t want Charlie to get into the team just because they feel sorry for him. He’d hate that, and anyway, kicking someone, Maddie. He can’t do that however angry he gets…” She glanced out of the window to where he was kicking the ball. “I don’t know, maybe we’ve given in to him too much, treated him differently? It’s just I can’t bear to see him get hurt…”
Charlie…it was always about Charlie. I looked past Mum’s worried face, my eyes blurring, desperate to conjure up Nan behind the kitchen counter – desperate to go back to the days when she was waiting for me after school, excited to hear my news.
“Mrs Morris loves my portrait of Gemma,” I whispered. “She thinks it’s fantastic…”
And suddenly Nan was there, lifting her arms above her head, cheering for me just like she used to whenever I had something exciting to tell her. She was even less smudgy than on the rounders field, more solid. I could almost stretch my hand out and touch her…
“Maddie? Maddie?” Mum touched my arm. “What’s the matter? Why are you crying?”
I blinked at her, confused for a moment and when I looked back there was nothing there, no outline or anything, just thin air.
“Maddie? Please, talk to me.” Mum pulled me into her arms. “What is it? What’s happened?”
“I just miss my nan,” I said, leaning my face against her shoulder. It felt as if someone was squeezing my heart, wringing it out, as if the tears would never stop. Mum held me tight, stroking my hair, telling me over and over that everything was going to be okay, and I wanted to believe her, more than anything, but I knew it wasn’t true. Nan would never be there again. She’d never be waiting for me in the kitchen after school to hear my news.
Dad was hardly around all weekend. He had a big rewiring job on Saturday and then on Sunday he left straight after breakfast without really saying much. Mum said he had an arrangement he couldn’t break and that there was nothing he could do. I wanted to ask her straight out if he was spending the day with Sharon, but every time I opened my mouth I had a rush of nerves and clamped it shut again; scared Mum might say something I didn’t want to hear.
Charlie was much more vocal than me. Dad usually takes him to the park on Sunday mornings to play football with some other dads and their children and it was the third week in a row he’d missed it. He was in the foulest mood all day, slamming in and out of the house, refusing to come in for lunch, answering Mum back.
Dad didn’t get home until just after eleven in the end. I was still awake, listening out for him, my ribbon twisted round my hand so tight it hurt. As soon as I heard his key in the door I let out a long, ragged breath, but a moment later Mum was in the hall, half-shouting, half-hissing at him for being so late.
I sat up, straining to hear what she was saying…something about putting us second and getting his loyalties wrong.
“I knew this would happen,” she said, her voice growing louder. “You don’t know what sort of day I’ve had. It’s so bloody selfish. Leaving me here to pick up the pieces! It’s up to you to talk to the kids. I can’t keep fobbing them off. It’s Charlie’s check-up next week and I’m already worried enough about that!”
I couldn’t hear what Dad said back, if he said anything, but Mum went on and on. He was letting us down, putting himself first, forgetting his responsibilities, upsetting everyone. It was horrible. She was still hurling insults at him when Charlie pushed my door open.
“Do something, Maddie,” he said. “Please, I don’t like it. Make them stop.”
I pulled my covers back. “Come on, you can sleep in here with me if you don’t mind squashing up.”
He stumbled over in the dark and climbed in. “I hate it when Mum gets angry with Dad. It sounds like she hates him, like they’ll never make up.”
“I’m sure it sounds worse than it is,” I said, wrapping my arms round him, holding him close. “Don’t you remember what Nan used to say whenever Mum was cross?”
He shook his head, snuggling closer, his body hot and sticky through his T-shirt.
“You must remember. She used to say, Calm down, Sophie. There’s no point getting your kippers in a twist.”
“It’s not kippers, Maddie, it’s knickers.”
“Well, some people say knickers, but not Nan. She always said kippers.”
“Don’t get your kippers in a twist,” Charlie said sleepily. “That’s funny.” He lay very still for a bit. I thought he’d dropped off to sleep, but then he said, “I’m not sorry I hurt Finn the other day. Mrs Conner made me apologize but I had my fingers crossed behind my back so it doesn’t count.”
“Why did you kick him in the first place?”
His whole body tensed up. “He’s an idiot. He called me a spaz and said I was a midget.”
One or two kids at school have teased Charlie about his size before, and about the way he walks, but it’s never really bothered him. I had no idea who Finn was, but I felt like kicking him myself.
“Did you tell Mrs Conner?”
Charlie shook his head against my chest. “There’s no point. But if Finn says anything else, I’ll kick him again, or worse. I swear he’ll be sorry he ever messed with me in the first place.”
He was trying to big himself up, act the tough guy, but he’d probably never felt so small in his life.
“Hey, Charlie, who’s the best footballer in the world?”
I could almost feel him rolling his eyes.
“Messi, obviously.”
“And how tall is he?”
“Small,” he said.
“You just remember that, next time Finn, or anyone else, calls you names.”
I felt his body relax against mine and I pulled him even closer, holding him tight. A few moments later his breathing slowed and then a little while later he began to snore. It was like lying next to a tractor, or some kind of high-powered drill. I was still aware of Mum shouting, but her voice was muffled, as if it was coming from far away – muffled enough to pretend it was someone else’s mum shouting at someone else’s dad.
Charlie was still fast asleep and snoring when I woke up the next morning. I slipped out of bed and got dressed, anxious to see Dad, to make sure everything was okay. I was aching all over, as if I hadn’t slept properly for weeks. I ran downstairs and was about to go in the kitchen when I realized Mum was already in there on the phone. I pressed my ear right up against the door, holding my breath so she wouldn’t know I was listening.
“Oh, Hat, I just don’t know how we’re going to tell her,” she was saying. I realized she was talking to my aunt. “You know how hard she’s found it since her nan died and now this! It’s all been so sudden – getting in touch with him like that, completely out of the blue, asking him to meet up…”
My legs felt wobbly, as if they weren’t strong enough to take my weight. She was talking about Dad and Sharon, she had to be. I started to tremble all over.
“I really wish you were here, Hat,” said Mum, her voice breaking. “I wish I knew how to handle this but I feel completely out of my depth… I know, I know, Charlie will be fine; I’m really not worried about him, for once. But I honestly don’t think Maddie can cope with one more change.”
I turned and raced back upstairs, reaching around Charlie’s head and under my pillow for my ribbon. What did she mean? What was going on? What were they going to tell me? I held the ribbon up to my face, breathing in the satiny smell, trying to stop the awful churning in my stomach. Were Mum and Dad breaking up? Was Dad leaving us for Sharon? Is that what she was talking about? Was that the change?
The floor shifted beneath my feet – I could actually feel it move, as if an earthquake was happening right there in my room. I grabbed hold of my headboard, trying to steady myself. I was breathing too fast, short gasping breaths as the panic began to spiral out of control.
And then I did something I’d never done before, not even when Nan died. I unwrapped the ribbon from round my hand and slipped it into my bag.