Came Back to Show You I Could Fly

‘I just wish I still had my little car!’ Angie said as they walked up the long hill towards the hospital. ‘You should have seen it, Seymour, it was a little VW painted mauve and I stuck daisy tranfers all over the bodywork. Only paid a couple of hundred, but it ran like a dream…oh, I miss that little bomb!’

‘Wrapped it around a power pole, total write-off. I went into a skid and next thing I knew there I was over this slope nearly into someone’s front garden. Talk about freaky! There were all these live wires draped over the bonnet and no one could get me out. And faces…you know how a whole crowd always gathers when there’s been an accident, can’t miss out on a good old gawk, can they? Specially with an ambulance waiting just in case. Exhibit Number One, that was me! All these faces peering in at me and talking in low voices like I was going to panic or something. I wasn’t panicky. It was sort of…well, like being in a dream. The only thing that worried me was maybe they wouldn’t get me out safely. I’d had a bit of a domestic with Jas that morning and I thought that if I died, how sad it would be, the last thing he’d remember was me yelling and screeching and calling him every name under the sun. And then the cops turned up, naturally…I mean, they always do for an accident, but some of those guys remember number plates and…other stuff. They really have it in for you. Out for promotion, they never let up…’

Her face suddenly twisted with what seemed to Seymour to be irrational rage, but when she caught his eye she added quickly, ‘Oh, these shoes are killing me! I shouldn’t have worn them. I shouldn’t have worn this top, either. Seymour, do you really think I look okay, you weren’t just being smarmy?’

‘You look all right, Angie, honest,’ Seymour said. He thought she looked sensational in her gelati-striped shirt of lime green, bright yellow and pink. Her hair was caught up on top of her head with a twist of pink cord and spiked like a pineapple. He’d had an easy time choosing earrings to go with all that, for amongst the collection he’d actually found a pair of huge, yellow plastic pineapples.

‘I’m not really sure about this top!’ Angie said anxiously, still seeking reassurance. ‘The neck’s a bit…well, you know. I guess I should have worn Susan-Jane instead. My mum’s always hassling me about the way I dress. She’d still like me to be wearing long white socks and tartan skirts.’

They reached the hospital and she told him again to wait outside by the goldfish pond. He watched the sad, introspective people seated on the veranda, then jumped, for Angie had returned and crept up behind him and was whispering evilly in his ear, ‘Psst! Liddle boy, vant some nice candy?’

‘Get lost, you old dero,’ Seymour said. ‘Who’d take candy from strange blokes wearing pineapple earrings?’ Angie giggled, and he realised suddenly that he’d made a joke and caused someone to laugh, and he couldn’t remember one other time in his life when that had happened.

She caught his hand and swung it as they went back down the main road. Seymour, unused to physical contact, felt woodenly self-conscious, but her hand held his lightly in uncomplicated friendship, and after a while he relaxed and swung in time to her singing. He wondered why kids at the various schools he’d attended so often spoke disparagingly about their sisters. If older sisters were as nice as Angie, making you feel special, as though they could think of nothing better than to spend their free time with you, he wished he’d been lucky enough to have one.

She sang all the way down the long road past the factories, and coaxed him into joining in. His voice, unaccustomed to being raised in melody, was no more than a feeble croak. He didn’t know many songs at all, but she didn’t laugh at him.

‘Hey, heard this old one?’ she said and began to sing, partly to him, mostly to herself, forgetting some of the words and having to improvise:

Seymour listened, enchanted, for she had a sweet, lilting voice, but when they came to the steep part of the road leading to the bus terminal, she sang more slowly, pausing for breath at the end of each line, so that the tempo of the song changed and became almost unbearably poignant and sad.

They reached the terminal and her voice dwindled into silence. Seymour was relieved, because you didn’t sing in front of a crowd of people, though he had a suspicion that Angie might have no such scruples if she hadn’t been made breathless by the long walk.

‘Got to take a different bus this time, over to Merken,’ she said. ‘That’s where my folks live. It’s a bit boring, I should warn you, in case you’re expecting something like Gresham Avenue. Oh, I used to hate Merken, you can’t think how much!’

‘Merken’s like…well, say one person gets ducted heating in their house, everyone else breaks their necks to do the same, not because they actually want ducted heating, but they can’t bear to lag behind. That wouldn’t do at all, the roof of the world might cave in. It’s not really posh, but mind you, they’re all working on it like grim death. Mortgageville, one of those subdivided places where they bunged up a whole lot of boring houses all alike so everything looks the same. I never really fitted in, you know. The only reason I go back is to see my family. Oh, I can hardly wait to have a good old natter with Lynne and David, I haven’t seen them in months! Or Mum…Seymour, are you really sure I look okay?’

‘Angie, you look just fine!’ Seymour said, exasperated, but as the bus carried them through various suburbs towards Merken, she kept getting out her mirror and tweaking at her hair. She removed the pineapple earrings, then changed her mind and put them back in, and her fussing made Seymour, already uneasy at the thought of visiting strangers, even more jittery.

She’d bought a birthday card and opened it now to write a message inside. Her handwriting, Seymour thought, was like a little kid’s, large and square and painstaking, and the tip of her tongue was even protruding like a kid trying to get top marks in an exam as she wrote: ‘To Mum, Happy Birthday, love from Angela, sorry I’m late with this card, but you know me—better late than never! Not like last year, heh?!! Lots of love and hugs and kisses.’

Merken was a gridwork of quiet streets lined with tidy, unexceptional houses, each set in a garden very much like the one next to it.

‘I should have bought some flowers,’ Angie said when they got off the bus. ‘Mum always likes getting flowers for her birthday, Lynne never ever forgets. Oh, I should have remembered! It was crummy enough I forgot the proper date and she got worried when I didn’t ring and Judy went and blabbed…but that’s a long story. Well, I know how I can get round this one—hang on a jiff, Seymour!’

She stopped, looked around, then quickly broke several large stalks from a flowering shrub in someone’s garden, assembling them with a rubber band from her handbag.

‘What if whoever owned that garden came out and sprung you?’ Seymour scolded. ‘You shouldn’t do things like that, Angie.’

‘I know, you can’t take me anywhere,’ Angie said, walking on demurely. ‘But I had an excuse all ready. I was going to say we were on the way to visit the cemetery and we didn’t have any money to buy flowers for our granny’s grave. You’d have to have a heart like a gargoyle to take flowers back off someone with a good excuse like that. Well, here’s Acacia Avenue. All the streets round here are named after native flowers, original, huh? This is our house and I bet that nosey old Mrs Duke next door is perving out through her Venetian blinds as usual. She’ll be round to Mum’s soon as we leave—“Oh, was that little Angela just called in? She hasn’t been around for ages, has she, and isn’t she putting on a lot of weight?”—Old cow. Seymour, you positive I look okay? Hey, you don’t reckon I’m putting on weight, do you, not so you’d notice?’

Seymour, however, had anxieties of his own. ‘What do I call your mum?’ he asked nervously, and wasn’t reassured when Angie said, ‘Well, her first name’s Jeanette, but she’s not the sort of person you can call by her first name straight off. So you’d better just settle for Mrs Easterbrook and be grateful.’

Mrs Easterbrook made Seymour feel welcome, but he sensed a texture in the atmosphere, as though Angela and her mother weren’t quite comfortable with one another. Angie grew noticeably quieter and more decorous once inside the orderly house, as though attending some formal social event. Mrs Easterbrook seemed just as houseproud as Thelma, and even the cat bowl, he noticed, sat on a spotless white plastic mat instead of newspaper.

‘I brought you a birthday present as well as these flowers,’ Angie said. Mrs Easterbrook carefully undid the ribbon bow and smoothed and folded the gift wrapping before picking up the gold rose to look at it properly.

‘Thank you, dear, it’s lovely,’ she said. ‘It will look very nice in the china cabinet. I hope you didn’t spend too much money, this looks as though it could have been very expensive.’

‘Well, I wanted to get you something really fabulous and outdo David and Lynne,’ Angie said. ‘Why don’t you put it up on the mantel? No one will be able to see it stuck away in the china cabinet. It would look great up on the mantel, Mum.’

‘Dust would only collect in the petals,’ Mrs Easterbrook said. She opened a corner cabinet and placed the rose carefully amongst a display of other pretty things and shut the door again. It was difficult to tell if she really liked her present or not. There were some beautiful ornaments in the cabinet, but they had the air of being locked away, not to be touched, and it seemed a pity that the rose, even if Angie—no, she must have paid for it—it seemed a pity that the elegant gold rose had to join them.

‘I’ll just make a salad dressing,’ Mrs Easterbrook said. ‘I’m afraid it’s just quiche and salad, because you didn’t give me much notice, Angie, otherwise I’d have planned something more elaborate. No thanks, dear, I don’t need any help. Why don’t you show Seymour where he can wash his hands before we eat?’

‘Don’t go thinking she means you’ve got germs,’ Angie whispered as she took him up the hall. ‘She thinks you might need the loo and you’re too shy to ask, which would be just about spot on, anyhow. Hey, have a look in here, this used to be my old room when I was a kid.’

Seymour gazed through a doorway into a room so meticulously neat that it seemed to have no connection at all with the Angie he knew. The walls glowed with pale silken paper, white curtains floated like clouds at the windows where pastel blinds were drawn halfway down to exact levels. The room looked fresh and unused, as though nobody had ever lived in it at all.

‘Mum’s had it redecorated since I left home,’ Angie said. ‘You should have seen it when I had it, wow! Once I painted a big mural all over that wall. It was my tenth birthday and they said I could choose anything I wanted as a present, so that’s what I asked for, to be allowed to paint a mural. And they couldn’t back out, seeing they’d already promised. A tropical scene, that’s what I did, palm trees and orchids and butterflies flitting about—geeze, I had a ball doing that!’ She ran a hand wistfully over the pristine wallpaper. ‘It’s still there under this lot, you know, my mural. Bit sad, isn’t it, all those poor butterflies locked away in the dark…Still, it’s Mum’s house, I guess she’s allowed to do anything she wants with it.’

Mrs Easterbrook called them for lunch at a round table by a pair of French windows.

‘Aren’t we going to wait for…’ Angie said and stopped, glancing down at the table. ‘Oh, there’s only three settings. What about Lynne and David? I’ll get some more knives and forks out…’

‘But she knew I was coming, didn’t she? I haven’t seen her for three months…Why didn’t she stay home when she knew I was coming? She could have missed one lousy ballet class!’

‘And David, how come he’s not here, either? Last time I phoned he was in such a rush he didn’t tell me anything, how he’s getting on at school or anything at all. I wanted to see them both. I was really looking forward to today, everyone being here together and Seymour being able to meet them. Dave’s going to show up, isn’t he?’

‘David had a dental appointment we couldn’t very well cancel, it was arranged weeks ago. You know how hard it is to get an appointment in school holidays. Let’s eat, shall we? Seymour, you sit over there, dear, and help yourself to the salad. Angie—oh, darling, do please put that cigarette out, you’re getting ash all over the cloth—you haven’t told me yet how you came to meet Seymour. Do you know his parents? I hope you’ve got permission to…Do you live near him?’

‘Just over the way,’ Angie said sulkily, not helping herself to salad when the bowl was passed. She looked annoyed and upset. ‘Seymour gets a bit bored because he doesn’t know any of the other kids in the street. Well, he sort of knows them, but they don’t have a whole lot in common. He comes in to chat to me and we go out together now and then. I might take him to the beach tomorrow.’

‘The beach?’ Mrs Easterbrook said. ‘I was under the impression that today was your rostered day off…Two free days in a row? Oh, I see, then I take it you’re no longer working at that dress shop?’

‘Oh, didn’t I tell you about the shop?’ Angie said, too casually. ‘That old bitch who ran it…’

‘Oops, pardon me. That old dragon, there was a mix up about Bankcard slips and she went and blamed me and it was that really dumb junior there. Talk about teacher’s pet and sucking up! Well, I opened my mouth and said a bit too much…’

‘Not all that long. It’s no big deal, Mum. Okay, four weeks ago, but I’m not worried. I’ll find something else pretty soon. Honest, I go through the employment ads every single morning without fail. Come on, let’s talk about something else. Hey, want to hear about my new flat? A room, really, but flat sounds better. It’s beaut, all self-contained and everything, isn’t it, Seymour? He thinks it’s terrific, always popping in for coffee. And it’s got this little back gate into a sort of lane, so it’s really private and peaceful. There’s even a flower garden, well, a bush with flowers, anyway. Seymour picked some for me once…Jesus, Mum, why didn’t Lynne and David show up for lunch? You did tell them I was coming, didn’t you?’

There was a taut, fragile silence. Angie’s face was suddenly pinched with distress, and Seymour found that he couldn’t swallow one mouthful of quiche.

‘Seymour, would you get a jug of water and some glasses from the kitchen, please? And some ice cubes, there’s a tray in the freezer,’ said Mrs Easterbrook. He went into the kitchen, knowing that he’d been sent out on purpose, but above the sound of the tap running he could still hear the conversation, lowered now into barbed whispers.

‘You know what your father said. You’re not to have any contact with them until you agree to go to Lakeview.’

‘Oh, he’s on about that again, is he? Look, I’m okay, I’ve told you a hundred times, told him a hundred thousand times. I’m on a program, and it’s really working. It’s been a whole two months since…’

‘They got their paperwork muddled up, honest, Mum. I’d already paid that fine, so I don’t know what on earth they could have been carrying on about. It was only a piddling little parking offence. All right, then, don’t believe me! I’m not going back to that Lakeview place. You don’t know what it’s like there, how they treat you, as though you just crawled out from under a compost heap. Jas reckons it’s worse than being in…’

He’d filled and refilled the water jug several times over, had taken as long as anyone possibly could to detach ice cubes from a tray and find three glasses, and when he returned to the table, the brittle conversation stopped immediately. Angie smiled at him across the pretty lace cloth as he sat down—a bright smile, but her eyes above it were shining as though a film of tears lay close to the surface. Mrs Easterbrook had put the knife and fork down on the untouched food on her plate, and her face was filled with what seemed to be inexplicable, helpless pain. Seymour looked at all the beautifully prepared food on the table, poured himself a glass of water, then just sat, shoulders hunched, not knowing what to do.

I should start a conversation about the weather, he thought miserably. About houses, maybe, interior decorating. Nice place you’ve got here, Mrs Easterbrook, that sort of stuff…

‘Storm in a teacup,’ Angie said lightly, and he could tell she was making an effort to salvage things. ‘Every time I come here, it always ends in a squabble. Don’t take any notice, Seymour. You know how families carry on. It’s nothing. Mum, please don’t let’s argue, not when I brought Seymour out specially to meet you. He’s a really great kid, a real gent. We’re terrific mates, I’m going to take him to the zoo to see the butterfly house. Lots of places I’m going to take him…’

‘Seymour,’ Mrs Easterbrook said, ‘If you’ve finished lunch, dear, you might like to play out in the back garden for a little while. Do you like cats? Ours should be around somewhere out there.’

Seymour recognised an order, a dismissal. He left the table meekly and went out through the kitchen door and into the garden. It was an attractive one and someone had lavished much care and attention upon it, but it somehow didn’t look the sort of place you’d play in. And the cat turned out to be an aloof black sphinx who desired no company. He could tell by the disdainful way it dampened a paw and began to groom its face that he was meant to keep his distance. Besides, how could you play with a cat? he thought crossly. No one could tell cats what to do or how to behave. The sun-warmed rim of the patio was too hot for comfort, so he moved back into the wall shadow next to the windows, and knew at once he’d made an error. He could quite clearly hear Mrs Easterbrook and Angie talking; not talking, but having a passionate, bitter quarrel now that he’d been sent from the room. He stayed where he was against the wall, afraid that if he moved they’d hear and think he’d come to that place on purpose to eavesdrop. He tried not to listen, but the angry voices crackled against the windows like flames.

‘What can you expect after what you’ve put us through for the last five years? All the times you’ve promised…We’ve given you every chance in the world, Angela, all our help, and you just threw away every opportunity…’

‘Look at you, dressed like a little tramp! Those clothes, you can’t even make the effort to look respectable when you come to visit. How do you think I feel, with Margaret Duke seeing you stroll in here dressed like that? Those abominable shoes, and your hair…Why on earth don’t you let it grow back to its natural colour? Oh, you had such beautiful hair! That job your father got you, the one before this dress shop fiasco, you made absolutely no effort…’

‘A fortnight was plenty long enough, thanks very much! Dad wouldn’t even listen when I tried to explain what happened. That horrible old woman told all her friends about me, I heard her. Making out she was so Christian, it just about made me puke! Every time she went out, even just up to the shops, she’d lock away all her brooches and stuff, how do you reckon that made me feel? Some job, a home help! I only took it on to please Dad in the first place, and I tried, I really tried. It wasn’t my fault…’

‘It never is your fault, is it? We’ve just about reached the end of our tether with you, Angela. Well, no doubt we’re being fools and wasting money, but as I’ve explained, we’re willing to pay your fares up to Lakeview again. Only this time you’ve got to promise to stay there for at least…’

‘Oh, Angela…oh, my darling…It doesn’t have to be like this! If you’d only stayed there the first time, given it a proper chance…Can’t you just…’

‘Look, damn it, it didn’t work out! I can’t stand being shut up like that. You don’t even know what it’s like there. You only hear that smug counsellor all sweetness and light over the phone—as if she’d know anything about it! I’m getting it all together and staying out of strife, what more can you ask? Six weeks I’ve lasted this time plus I’ve found somewhere nice to live, why can’t you at least give me credit for that?’

‘Do you call a court appearance getting it all together? How do you think we felt when that lawyer rang the last time?’

‘Angela, I’ve heard the same pathetic lie so many times I’m not prepared to listen to it any more! You’re just lucky you managed to get off with a good-behaviour bond, and next time you needn’t expect your father to pay for a top lawyer. You can just take your chances with Legal Aid. Oh, what’s the use, you never give a thought to all the trauma you’ve caused us! All our love, and you just keep throwing it back in our faces. We’ve got rights, too, you know, as parents, as a family…’

‘Okay,’ Angie said coldly. ‘I get the message loud and clear. I guess I’d better shove off before Lynne and David come home, isn’t that what you want? You wouldn’t want me around contaminating them, would you? I bet they didn’t even have any ballet lessons or dental appointments at all, it was you and Dad making sure they were kept out of my way! I came out here to tell you something, but I guess it’s not the right time. Maybe it won’t ever be the right time. Maybe it won’t even happen, anyhow. I think I’d better just take myself off now, okay?’

‘The only good news you could tell me is that you’ve booked yourself into Lakeview and you’re prepared to stay there for as long as it’s necessary,’ Mrs Easterbrook said heavily over the scrape of a chair being thrust back from the table.

Seymour crept off the patio and out into the middle of the lawn and pretended to be looking at a rockery, so that when Angie called him, she wouldn’t guess he’d overheard that anguished conversation which wasn’t meant for anyone else’s ears. At the front door as they went out, Mrs Easterbrook’s face was composed and neutral, and she even chided Angie gently for wearing such tight jeans instead of a cool dress in the heat, but not in a nagging way. Angie bent forward to kiss her on the cheek, but Mrs Easterbrook just held her face still, suffering the kiss, not returning it, and the door closed before they even reached the front gate.

Mrs D. Rusden

Supervisor

Mountain Gate Child Minding Centre

Mountain Highway

Elthwick

Dear Mrs Rusden,

I’d like to apply for the position of Childcare Worker you advertised last week. I haven’t had any experience professionally in this area, but I know I could handle it very well. I really like kids and being with them, and I have a younger brother and sister I used to babysit for.

Previous jobs include the following: Working at a race stable; flower stall assistant florist; dress shop assistant; barmaid waitress; pizza hut assistant manageress; vet’s receptionist; home help for an elderly lady. (Unfortunately, as I’ve moved recently, I can’t enclose copies of references as the box they were in is still in storage). However, I would appreciate it very much if I was given the chance of an interview. I can begin work at any time and also work flexible hours if you like. I’m sorry I don’t have the phone on yet for you to contact me, but either of the two people mentioned below will pass on any messages.

Yours sincerely,

Angela Fleur Easterbrook

1) Judy Anderson, Tel. 656 1123

2) Rick Harkmann, Tel. 798 7756

P.S. I’d really love working in a creche and am very anxious to find a steady job. I know it wouldn’t matter that I’ve had no experience working in a creche before, as I’m a hard worker and learn things really fast!

Big White Mansion

Gresham Avenue

Nobbs Hill

Sunday or something

Hey, Seymour, little buddy!

Don’t even know if you were planning to pop around, but let yourself in with the spare key if I haven’t got back yet. Had to go out unexpectedly. Don’t take any notice of the pair of jeans soaking up the water in the fridge (defrosting it and couldn’t find the drip tray thing)!

I left a Mars bar and some marshmallows on the sink for you—(Vant some nice candy, liddle boy?)

Hey, heard this joke?

Q: What’s the difference between ‘Ugh!’ and ‘Ugh! Ugh!’

A: ‘Ugh!’

(Pretty sick, huh?)

See ya, don’t go away if I’m not there. Be back as soon as I can and I’ll bring us both a yummy pizza and all the trimmings for afternoon tea!

Love from Angie

P.S. Have you got rid of that DAGGY shirt yet?!!! Don’t go putting it in the charity bin, either, you’ll have all the derros chasing you round town trying to hit you over the head with wine bottles.

P.P.S. Hey, we could go up the market one day and buy you some fantastic tee shirts, saw one there with the Phantom on it and his eyes light up behind his mask.

P.P.P.S. Hope this letter doesn’t land on Thelma’s head by mistake if she’s hanging up the washing! Couldn’t find a stone to weigh it down with, so I want this elephant earring back!

Chapter 6