The problem with having double maths first thing on a Friday is that I can’t be bothered to do it. I know our GCSEs are only two terms away, but I find maths so boring and I refuse to believe that Pythagoras and his random theorum are going to get me anywhere in life. This is why four weeks into the winter term, at nine thirty on a grim Friday morning, I am lying on the floor in the toilets with Margaret Cooper eating my packed lunch and writing swear words on the bottom of all the sinks with a black marker pen.
‘Have you done any craps yet?’ asks Margaret.
After a short laughing fit I say, ‘Crap isn’t a swear word!’
‘I think it is. Crap, boobs, balls . . . they’re all swear words.’
This is why Margaret and I will never be best friends. Anyone who thinks crap is a swear word is way too innocent for me.
‘Craaaap!’ screeches Margaret, scaring the crap out of me. ‘I think I just heard the double doors.’
I’m always amazed by her hearing. Margaret can hear an approaching teacher at a hundred feet, which is why I rely on her for skiving lessons. Without her I would be in detentions every Wednesday. We grab the remains of our lunches and dive into the nearest cubicle. Like clockwork she sits so her feet are facing the front to look like she’s on the loo, and I stand on the seat holding onto her shoulders for support. We take deep breaths and freeze.
The toilet door bursts open, but instead of the usual sound of the slow footsteps of a teacher on the prowl, it is someone running and quite obviously crying. They bolt into the cubicle next to us and wail. The sobbing is loud. Haunting. Full of pain.
Margaret looks up at me and we both mouth swear words at each other. She goes with a succession of craps, and I go with shit because the ‘shhhh’ part works well with a finger over my mouth to remind her to keep quiet.
I feel guilty listening to this person. This is real crying, and they don’t know we’re there. They have come here to escape something, to be alone, and here I am standing on a loo seat with Margaret Cooper between my thighs, hijacking their privacy. It feels wrong.
I hope that it’s Sally. That something has happened to her that’s made her realise how awful she is. That this is the beginning of her huge apology that will put an end to this horrible feud. Because as much as I dislike her, I would prefer not to have an enemy.
My head reaches the top of the partition between the cubicles, my foot digging deep into the palm of Margaret’s hand as she shakes violently trying to get me high enough. I pull myself up and tip my nose over the edge to see which desperately unhappy girl is sobbing so violently in a cubicle all by herself.
It’s Nell.
It’s difficult trying to concentrate in double maths when you’ve been up most of the night looking after a child. I lay there for ages thinking Mum would go in and get Abi, but she didn’t, so as usual it was down to me. Abi woke up at eleven, then again at two, and then for good at five, each time asking me why Daddy isn’t at home any more. I feel so exhausted that I can’t focus on the blackboard. I’m fifteen years old and bringing up a child. Mum doesn’t seem to understand, or care, what it’s doing to me.
I never have fun, not like everyone else seems to. It’s either Mum getting at me at home or Sally putting me down at school. Other people seem to live so differently. It makes me feel totally unlikeable. Why would anyone want to try to have fun with me? I follow Sally around like a lost sheep because I don’t have the courage to say what I want. It’s force of habit now, I guess. I don’t bother saying how I feel because one of them will make me feel so stupid for it. I’ve turned into a boring tagalong who watches everyone else have fun while I feel more unsure of myself every day. The only person I can be myself around is Dad, but being with him isn’t the same any more. He’s more pathetic than me at the moment.
At break time Carla and Gem invite Sally and I to a party. Sally says yes for both of us, but I really don’t want to go. I’ve nothing to wear and I can’t afford booze.
‘Do you think your mum would buy me some ciders when she gets yours?’ I ask, thinking that getting drunk might be the answer to all of my problems.
‘Flo, you’re a nightmare when you’re drunk,’ says Sally. ‘Don’t you remember puking into Mum’s welly boot in the back of her car last time you had some of my ciders? It was disgusting. Face it, you’re not a drinker. You’re good at other things, like . . .’ she tails off and pretends to squeeze a splinter out of her finger, ‘ . . . making sandwiches.’
My life is a disaster.
I feel so mad I almost run out of school three times today. How have we got to the point as a family where Nell is so full of pain that she sobs by herself at school and I don’t have the guts to knock on the toilet door and ask her if she is OK? What kind of person does that make me?
I’m so angry that we never talk about Mum, and that Dad leaving is just a fact rather than a problem. Mum died a long, painful death that we all watched, and Dad left because he couldn’t handle it. We’re all supposed to hate him for that, but from where I’m standing none of us is dealing with it that much better. My family are like four stretched elastic bands about to be pinged and land so far apart that we never find each other again. Something has to give. Someone in our house has to say something.
I wish Aunty Jo was here. Aunty Jo is Mum’s sister. She is so cool. When Mum died Nell and I thought we might end up living with her, but she met my Uncle Andrew and moved to London with him. If she was here she could make this better, but as it stands, it’s down to me. Until now I’ve just stayed quiet, never hinting at how I feel for fear of upsetting somebody else, but after seeing Nell cry like that in a toilet cubicle, I know it’s time to try. We have to talk about Mum. We just have to.
When the bell goes I’m out the door so fast I don’t even have my coat on. I feel so wound up. I ignore Carla and Gem when they call after me because I know this will be the one time I won’t be able to stop myself screaming in their faces. I need to get home before Pop and Nell, so that I can tell Nana we have to make everyone talk about Mum. If I get home after them then they will all be in separate rooms and I’ll have to go around asking them to come and meet me in the kitchen, and that will never work. I can’t do it over dinner because Pop eats like a wild animal and trying to make him focus on a conversation while that’s going on is impossible. Timing is everything, so I could really do without Lawrence waiting for me at the end of the school lane and presuming that I have nothing better to do than smoke his bum-sucked cigarettes.
‘Hey, don’t you want a fag?’
I don’t stop. I can’t deal with him right now, I can’t take the pressure he’s been putting me under lately. Does he not understand anything about who I am?
‘Renée, stop. I’ll buy you chips?’
‘I don’t have time. I don’t want a fag. I don’t want chips.’
I want to scream ‘FUCK OFF’ in his face but somehow I manage to keep that in. I know I’m being crazy and that he doesn’t know I’m on a mission to save my family from its group depression, but he is like a wall I have to run through, so I just keep running.
‘But you always want a fag,’ Lawrence shouts, sounding confused.
I feel like my heart is coming up into my face. It’s a rage I’ve never experienced before. I could explode with liquid heat, or maybe just tears. The pressure building inside of me is loud and feels like sick, but not from my stomach, just like every part of me could throw something out.
I turn to him. His face is giving me a good idea of how mine might look. He looks shocked by whatever it is he sees in me.
‘Please never presume what I want, or what I am thinking. No one knows what I want, or what I am thinking.’ My voice is calm. I am being very weird.
For a split second we stare at each other. I feel an odd sense of relief in making that statement. My breath is broken, his face is still. I want to apologise but the words won’t come. Instead I turn round and keep running home.
I grind to a halt at the kitchen door. I’m one step away from solving this problem. If I get this right then we might all be happy. Maybe Nell will stop treating me like I’m the devil, and Nana and Pop might find it within themselves to express something other than complete denial about Mum dying. All I need to do is open the door and tell Nana to sit down. And then wait for Pop and Nell, and make them sit down. And then talk. Like normal people.
I slowly open the door and step into the kitchen. Nana is standing at the stove boiling something that smells awful and my stomach churns at the thought of another one of her home-cooked diners. She turns to me and smiles. This is my moment.
‘Nana, can we talk?’
She switches off the heat, wipes her hands on a tea towel and takes a seat at the table, almost robotically, like she’s been expecting this. She looks old, but even if I hadn’t seen pictures I would know that she had once been beautiful. Her hair is suddenly silver, and I mean silver, not grey. It shines and is perfectly arranged to look like a cauliflower on top of her head. She gets it done every Friday morning. Her face is all wrinkled and her eyes are soft and warm. I love her more in this moment than I ever have before. Her gentle voice, her soft hands. One of which I reach for before I start to speak again.
‘I think Nell is in trouble,’ I say, already thinking I’m getting it all wrong.
‘Don’t start about your sister, Renée,’ she replies, her eyes gently warning me.
‘No, I’m not . . . But I think Nell needs help. I think we should all talk, about Mum, all of us, together. For Nell’s sake.’
Nana looks down, rubs her right wrist with her left hand, sniffs, and looks back at me. ‘That isn’t something I can do. I’m sorry.’ Her face looks so broken a piece could fall off.
She looks up at me, tearfully.
‘Are you trying to make trouble, Renée?’
‘No. Not trouble, Nana. I just want us to talk about Mum.’
Her tears fall just as Pop and Nell walk in. Pop shouts at me and calls me selfish for making Nana cry and Nana leaves the room. Nell gives me a look that is so hard, so scathing, that the very thought of trying to make her happy exhausts me. Seeing her crying that way at school had hurt me just as much, but what can I do? No one in this house wants my help. I think they’re happier being sad.
Sally turns up at my house at 8 p.m. wearing red hot pants, black tights, huge black shoes with a solid three-inch platform from the toe to the heel, a skin-tight ribbed vest, huge silver hoop earrings, loads of bangles, a fake fur coat, a ton of make-up and a black velvet cap. I am wearing a pair of My Little Pony pyjamas and some Bert and Ernie slippers. She struts past me and lands by the door of the living room like Naomi Campbell at the end of a catwalk.
‘Is Julian here?’
‘He’s upstairs.’
‘You should tell him to come down. I’ve got ciders,’ she says, confidently.
‘Can I have one?’ I ask, already knowing the answer.
‘No.’
I sigh and start to walk upstairs. She follows me, walking like a total slut on the off chance Julian might see her. When we get onto the landing a loud giggle comes from his room.
‘WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?’ she squawks.
‘Julian’s new girlfriend.’
An hour earlier Julian had stormed into the house followed by a skinny blonde girl. She was dressed like a tart and couldn’t walk properly because of her silly high heels. I’d just put Abi to bed and was lying on the sofa, and they didn’t know I could see them. Julian poured them both some Sunny Delight and while she was drinking hers he put his hand up her skirt. Her face was really red and I wouldn’t say she looked massively happy about it. After a few minutes he took his hand away and told her to follow him upstairs – her walk was even more wonky after that.
‘What do you mean girlfriend? Since when does he have a girlfriend?’ Sally asked, staring at his bedroom door.
‘Julian has always got a girlfriend. Julian has hundreds of girlfriends.’
Sally looks relieved rather than disappointed. Obviously thinking the fact he sleeps with loads of girls means she is in with a chance, rather than that he has no respect for women and should be avoided at all costs.
‘Did you bring me something to wear tonight?’ I ask when we are in my bedroom.
‘Oh, no, sorry I forgot,’ she says, rummaging in her bag for some lipstick.
This is typical. All week I have been telling Sally how I have nothing to wear. How since Dad lost his job he can’t afford to give me any money for clothes, and Mum won’t either. She promised yesterday she would bring me something for the party, she promised four times. What’s wrong with her?
I feel myself starting to cry so I face my wardrobe and pretend to choose an outfit. Most of the clothes in it are Mum’s. Anything of mine is either part of my school uniform or just jeans and T-shirts and not the kind of stuff I can wear to one of Carla and Gem’s parties. I don’t even have any shoes, just my old burgundy DM boots. It’s just me and Margaret Cooper who wear them now, and Margaret doesn’t get invited to parties because she is so square. I guess that says a lot about how everyone feels about DM boots.
I’m hoping for an apology. An acknowledgement that she’s made me feel like crap about myself again, but obviously I don’t get anything like that out of her. She just sits in front of my mirror, rearranging her cleavage.
‘I’m not going. You go, I don’t want to,’ I say, trying to hold back the tears. I’m so sick of feeling ugly, and square, and uncool.
‘Flo, if you think I am walking into a party on my own you have another thing coming. I didn’t come all the way to your house for you to tell me you are not coming.’
‘I really have nothing to wear. You promised me you would bring something. I’ve told you Dad has no money and that I don’t have any clothes. Sally, do you not understand how crap everything is for me right now?’
‘Why don’t you just get a job?’
‘I can’t just get a job. In case you haven’t noticed I have a mother who refuses to bring up her own child. I spent the entire summer holidays pushing swings or making dens out of bed sheets. I sleep for no more than five hours a night and wake up humming the theme tune to Sesame Street because I spend more time watching that than I do speaking to human beings above the age of four. I can’t just get a JOB.’
She meets my outburst with a long silence. Turning back to the mirror she tosses her head, powders her nose, and breathes in deeply.
‘Where’s Abi now?’
‘With Dad. He has her on Saturdays.’
‘Well then, you have the night off babysitting duties, don’t you? Get dressed. You can borrow my lipstick if that will make you feel prettier.’ She twists the lid off a bottle of cider and takes a huge glug.
I hope she chokes on it.
I get to Gem’s house early so I can borrow something to wear. They always let me borrow what I want, but because they’re so sporty and eat healthy food I struggle to fit into most of their stuff now. Carla has massive boobs, but not big floppy ones like Margaret. Hers are firm and perfect, like everything else about Carla and Gem. I’m sure I could have the perfect figure if I didn’t eat so many chips and didn’t bunk off games all the time, but I don’t have the willpower. You have to be a bit of a goody-goody to be that skinny.
I think I might be addicted to Wotsits. I should probably try to have three packets a day instead of five. And I should probably cut down on the chips after school too, but they taste so good and mean the cardboard dinners that Nana makes don’t matter so much. Carla and Gem always laugh when I go round to their houses because I raid their mums’ food cupboards, where there are always loads of crisps and chocolates. Carla and Gem hardly have any of it, which is so weird. If Nana had a food cupboard with anything other than tins I would never be out of it, but she shops and cooks like someone stuck in an air raid shelter waiting for war.
Gem has some white jeans that are a bit big for her. I’m really hoping she gives them to me, but generous as she and Carla are they’re quite strict about me giving stuff back. Once I borrowed a tape from Carla and a week later her mum called our house to speak to me about it. I had to cycle round on my bike the next morning to give it back as apparently Carla had said I could only borrow it for a couple of days. I didn’t understand why she couldn’t just let me keep it and make another one. It was just a mix tape she made up herself. And why did her mum have to call my house for it? Sometimes I reckon mums think I’m bad news because of my family. They pretend to think I’m normal so they don’t look judgemental, but they think I’m trouble and messed up because of Mum. I guess it’s hard to argue that when I bunk off lessons all the time, but I don’t do anyone else any harm.
Despite the tape thing I’m allowed to borrow clothes for parties, and the white jeans have quite a high waist so I can bend forward without my stretch marks showing. I wear them with a baggy black top that I bought over the summer and some platform shoes I got from Pandora, the only clothes shop on Guernsey that sells cool clothes for people under the age of twenty. Otherwise it’s all about Marks and Spencer’s and Next, and all their stuff is so boring. The shoes were £39.99, which is more than I have ever spent on anything, but I had some money left over from my summer job so got them with that. They have a sole of about three inches. Everyone’s wearing big-soled shoes at the moment so it means I have something that makes me cool without looking like a total fashion victim. Unlike Sally Du Putron, who dresses like such a try-hard.
Gem’s house is amazing. You enter through two huge electric gates and the driveway is bigger than our back garden. To the right as you come through the gates is the house. It’s painted white with lots of cute windows and ivy growing over most of the front. It has a stable door and there’s a little bench just outside it where you can sit while you take off your shoes. It’s all so perfect and pretty, and homely and warm. Inside, the rooms have real fires in them, and there are pictures of the family all over the place. I always think the house smells a bit like Christmas as there are so many flowers and plants and even candles. In comparison, Nana and Pop’s house is like a hospital.
To the left of the driveway is the pool house and the pool, which is where the party is. There’s a note stuck on the front door of the house saying NO ENTRY TO THE MAIN HOUSE but someone always manages to sneak in at some point. Last time Gem had a party one of the boys from the year above, Adam, snuck up into Gem’s room, took off all his clothes and put all of hers on, including her underwear. He came back down and paraded around before jumping in the pool. Gem was furious at first but she ended up jumping in the pool after him and now he’s her boyfriend. Everything always works out for Carla and Gem.
By nine thirty there are around twenty-five of us in the pool house and around the pool. I’ve had three 9.2% ciders and I’m sitting on a bench near the pool with Samuel Franklin – a guy from the year above at Grange College who nearly everyone in Year 11 has got off with. He thinks that makes him a stud, but it actually makes him a bit of a joke. He’s funny though, so he gets away with it. I like him, but even though his hand is full of intentions and stroking my leg, I have no plans to kiss him. Well, that is until I see Lawrence out the corner of my eye, staring at us. He looks really upset.
I should go and speak to him, explain that I don’t feel the same way as he does and let him go gently. But I am drunk now, my head is spinning, and I wonder if maybe my family is right – if you ignore a problem, it will go away. So rather than do the right thing I kiss Samuel Franklin until I am sure Lawrence has gone. I hate every second of the kiss. And myself too, for being so cruel.
‘Boys like it when girls touch each other,’ Sally says, wrapping her arm around my shoulders and standing far too close to my face.
‘Only if they’re lesbians, Sally,’ I say. ‘I don’t think just you sitting on my lap turns them on like you think it does.’
‘Quick, sit back down. Here comes Owen Jones.’ She pins me back to the chair and starts flirting shamelessly with Owen. I lean back and scan the room. Just opposite, with her back to us, is Renée Sargent, getting off with Samuel Franklin. I think everyone in our class has kissed him at some point, apart from me. The last person I got off with was Liam Miller. I’d fancied him for ages and he finally noticed me at a beach party last term. We were snogging and I was loving it until Sally put her face really close to ours and shouted ‘HA. HA. HA’ then told everyone how weird I am because I kiss with my eyes open. My eyes had not been open, I just opened them when I felt the presence of her big face. Liam never spoke to me again. Why would he? I’m just a freak who snogs with my eyes open.
‘Sally, are you sure you need all six of those ciders? Just one won’t get me that drunk,’ I say, hoping the alcohol might have made her more generous.
‘No way. Just face it, you can’t take it. You are not a drinker.’
Apparently not. I wriggle out from under her.
‘I need the loo,’ I say as I walk away.
‘Good, I can have the chair.’
I go into the pool house and pick up a bottle of white wine that no one seems to be claiming. Me? Can’t drink? We’ll see about that.
I can’t be sure how I ended up underneath the weeping willow tree kissing Samuel Franklin, but it’s definitely happening. He is licking my teeth. Is that a thing? And where has Renée Sargent gone, wasn’t she . . .? I can’t do any more thinking, it’s making me spin. I can hear the party still going on so we can’t have been here long. Even so, I can’t remember how we got here, or how we have come to be kissing.
A belch flies up from my stomach and shoots out of my mouth, leaving the distinct taste of licorice.
I see Samuel recoil, but I’m too drunk to care.
‘Do you want some more?’ he asks.
‘Some more what?’
‘Sambuca?’ He fills up the cap of the bottle and I down it. He has one too, and then we both have another. I’ve barely swallowed the second gulp before his tongue is running over my teeth again.
I burp again. He scrunches up his face but doesn’t say anything. Instead he puts his hand on my boob. After a quick squeeze he moves down and starts undoing my jeans. My faculties must be down because I seem to be willing for him to go ahead. Everyone else has done it, so why not me? He undoes my zip. I can feel his hand against my skin. And then I remember.
‘Oh no, stop it. I can’t!’ I screech, grabbing his hand and trying to push it away.
‘Don’t be frigid,’ he says, half his mouth still inside mine.
He pushes his hand further into my pants and then yanks it out so fast he nearly takes my knickers with it. He is on his feet.
‘GROSS. I can’t believe you let me go in there with that going on.’ He runs over to the pool and dunks his hand in like he’s being attacked by a swarm of wasps. I’m still lying down under the tree, just my feet illuminated by the outside lights. The empty bottle of white wine is next to me, my jeans are undone, my limbs and head are about as useful to me as cucumbers.
‘I’m sorry, I forgot,’ I slur.
‘How can you forget?’ he says with total disgust.
‘I’m not a very good drinker.’
‘No shit!’ He picks up his bottle of Sambuca and storms back to the pool house. After a few minutes I hear a roar of laughter. One cackle in particular makes me want to shrivel up and die under this tree. I have proved her right again.
I feel so sick. If I can just get to a bed to have a little lie down then I can sleep this off and get home later. I grapple onto all fours, then, like a sick dog trying to find somewhere to die, I follow the perimeter of the garden wall all the way to the main house. The door is open. I fall through it. This is better. I have no idea what happens next.
It’s 11 p.m. I am drunk. I think I’ve had about six ciders and quite a few shots of Sambuca. Carla and Gem are both straddling their boyfriends on a sofa and there are loads of people round the pool smoking weed. Samuel is getting off with a girl from the year above and Lawrence is nowhere to be seen. Sally just left, she was really drunk. Just before she went she was sitting alone on the floor with make-up down her face, her eyes rolling into her head. I was watching her through the window. After a good half-hour of no one talking to her she stumbled out of the pool house and down the driveway. Just as she got to the gate she threw up in a hedge, then her mum got out of her car and ran to help her, but Sally pushed her away and climbed into the back seat. It was like watching Cruella De Vil have a nervous breakdown. People like Sally really shouldn’t drink.
I’m starving. Drinking does that to me. Carla and Gem never eat when we drink, they say it’s a waste of calories, but I have to. The snack cupboard is all I can think about. Maybe Gem’s mum will have some of that ready-made prawn cocktail dip she gets. I need a big dollop of that between two slices of white bread and a packet of salt and vinegar Walkers, that’ll sort me out. I have an excuse to go into the house because my bag is in there, so I walk boldly and with purpose so I look less suspicious.
As I walk through the entrance hall towards the kitchen I see a DM boot sticking out of the downstairs loo. I go to pick it up but realise it has a foot in it, and that there is a leg attached to the foot.
‘Margaret?’
I pull the door open and expect to find her lying dead and murdered on the floor, but it isn’t Margaret. It’s Flo Parrot. She’s passed out on the floor with her pants down, holding a tampon. Further inspection reveals a used one in the toilet. I’m no Miss Marple but I am guessing she’s fallen off the loo halfway through the job. This is doing nothing for my nausea.
‘Flo. FLO.’ I shake her with my foot but she doesn’t wake up. It’s a moral dilemma. This is Sally Du Putron’s best friend; she’s an enemy by proxy. Really I should just leave her, but she’s about to make a total mess on the floor. If she does that Gem’s mum might get mad for once and not let us have any more parties and besides, Flo Parrot has never actually done anything to me. She has to wake up.
‘Flo. FLO.’ I kneel next to her and shake her as violently as I can without risking a brain injury. She is breathing and making groany noises but is totally out of it. I try all the obvious things like splashing water in her face, running her hand under the cold tap – but then I remember that is what you do when you want a sleeping person to wet themselves so I stop quite quickly. I shout in her ear, but nothing. It’s getting late, Gem’s parents will be home soon and I can’t just leave Flo lying here with her pants down surrounded by period paraphernalia. I flush the toilet, prize the unused tampon out of her hand, think for a moment about doing the unthinkable but instead fold a massive wedge of loo roll and put it in her pants. After a bit of yanking and pulling, she is dressed again.
‘Flo, wake up . . . you can’t stay here. Flo. FLO!’
I now feel totally responsible for her, which is annoying. If I leave her and she chokes on her vomit then I will have played a big part in her death. Sally has left – not that she would have tried to help Flo anyway. She’d probably have taken loads of photos and then passed them around class on Monday. I exhale loudly, for no one’s benefit other than mine, and think about doing a runner, but I can’t do that. Nope, this is down to me. I have to get her home.
I remember where she lives from a birthday party she had when we were in primary school. It’s not too far away. If I can just get her to stand up I can probably walk her home. It’s amazing how an experience like this can sober you up.
I get her to her feet. With one arm around my neck and her legs dragging on the ground, we’re off.
‘Come on, Flo. I’ll get you home. Everything’s going to be OK.’
It takes us three-quarters of an hour to walk just under a mile. She falls into three hedges, nearly gets run over twice, and she keeps saying ‘I am not a good tinker’, which I presume means she isn’t a good drinker. I don’t think she has a clue that it’s me who’s with her.
The house is bigger than I remember, a huge white town house on a main road just up from the hospital. Three cars are parked in the driveway and there’s music and male voices coming from inside. I prop her up the best that I can next to me. I bang on the door.
When he opens the door I nearly drop her. He’s holding a bottle of Budweiser that’s half full. His dark blond hair is messy but thick and clean. His eyes are dark brown and they sparkle. His bottom lip is full with a perfect curve to his mouth that exposes some of his teeth. His nose is straight and he has a bit of a beard. He’s tall, with broad shoulders. He’s wearing quite baggy jeans with a black T-shirt and the top of his boxers is poking out. His chest is wide, his middle narrow, his legs are long. His fingernails are clean and his arms are the perfect amount of hairy. He is the most handsome person I have ever seen in real life. Every detail of his body floods into my head at a million miles an hour. Who is he?
‘For fuck’s sake,’ are his first words. ‘Did you get her into this mess? Who are you?’
‘Renée. No, I found her and brought her home.’ I feel very small all of a sudden. Like a little mouse.
‘Sure you did. Good one.’ He takes her from me and we go inside. He drops her onto the couch in front of all of his friends.
‘We should take her upstairs. I don’t think she would like everyone seeing her like this,’ I say, feeling sorry for Flo, who is looking pretty rough.
‘She’s my bloody sister. Who are you again?’
‘Renée,’ I say, trying not to stare at him too much.
‘OK, well, I am going to carry her upstairs and you’re going to get her into bed. Does that work for you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good.’
He picks her up and throws her over his shoulder like a lumberjack moving a tree. I follow him upstairs. He’s bumping her around but at least she isn’t being stared at by all his mates. In her room he drops her on the bed.
‘OK, over to you.’
‘Thank you,’ I say, as he goes to the door. ‘Where does she keep her pyjamas?’
He laughs and goes downstairs.
I rummage through her drawers and find a pair of My Little Pony PJs. She probably hasn’t worn them in years but they will do for tonight. It isn’t easy getting them on her but her clothes are filthy so I can’t let her sleep in them. She barely opens her eyes as I do it. When I’ve finished I turn off the light and close the door.
Downstairs in the hall I nervously push open the door to the living room. All five of the boys go quiet.
‘Bye then,’ I say, trying to sound confident.
He looks at me as if to suggest I should only have entered with something interesting to say. I go to leave.
‘Hey, Renée,’ he calls after me. ‘Nice jeans.’
I could die.
Sally’s been a real cow this week. I don’t know if she’ll ever stop laughing at me about what happened Saturday night. There are only so many times you can be reminded of the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to you. I don’t think I’ll ever go to another party again. Samuel is always out, I won’t be able to avoid him. I’ll be known as Period Pants Parrot forever. Maybe it will be all forgotten by everyone else, but there’s no chance Sally will let it go. She’s told everyone at Tudor Falls and I know her dream scenario would be to bump into Samuel and his mates so that she can embarrass me in front of them.
Double science on a Thursday morning is my favourite time of the entire week. Not because I’m riveted by the Periodic Table, but because I got dropped down a set, which ended up being the best thing ever. Sally is in Set One, I am in Set Two. This means I can only get a C or below in my GCSE but also that I get an hour and ten minutes of freedom away from her, which is worth the sacrifice of a Grade A.
I sit on the second row back in the science lab because the teacher, Mrs Suiter, has a tendency to hold really uncomfortable eye contact if you sit at the front. I think it’s a nervous thing. When she’s speaking for more than say, thirty seconds, she picks someone on the front row, locks eye contact and doesn’t let it go until she turns to write something on the blackboard. I can’t handle it at all. I find myself not knowing what part of her face to look at – her nose or mouth, or sometimes I just go cross-eyed trying to focus on the bit in between her eyes. Sitting on the second bench from the front is the best solution.
When Mrs Suiter turns to write something on the blackboard, something hits me on the back of the head. I look down. There’s a paper aeroplane by my right foot with my name on it.
Hey
I hope you didn’t feel too awful on Sunday morning? Sorry about the My Little Pony pyjamas, I couldn’t find anything else.
Renée x
I don’t move for around three minutes. What is she talking about? How does she know about my My Little Pony pyjamas? I turn around to make a confused face at her. She smiles and waves. I smile too but I’m not sure why. This is very weird.
Hey Renée
Did you mean to send this to me?
I fold the piece of paper, following the lines. It doesn’t quite make it to her at the back when I throw it, but she pretends to drop a pen off the front of the bench and walks around and picks it up. I’m not sure it would have crossed my mind to do that.
A few minutes later it hits me on the head again. I unfold it to see a picture of a girl with horns on her head and big, mean teeth. SALLY is written across the top. I laugh so loud that Mrs Suiter asks me what’s so funny. I tell her it was a sneeze and she believes me, which makes me laugh even more because it sounded nothing like a sneeze. She doesn’t think to tell me off as I hardly have a track record of messing around in class. I turn around and Renée giggles back at me. When the bell goes, she comes over to my seat.
‘Do you not remember me taking you home?’
I think for a second. I remember something, something about falling into a hedge, and headlights. And someone helping me up.
‘Was that you? Oh no, was I embarrassing?’ I ask, bracing myself to be laughed at.
‘No, just drunk. We’ve all been there,’ Renée says, as if it was nothing.
We start to walk into the corridor. I don’t really know what to say. This is all so bizarre. Renée Sargent was in my house? She dressed me for bed?
‘I’m sorry I got off with Samuel. I hope I didn’t upset you or anything,’ I say, feeling guilty about that.
‘Don’t be silly. Samuel gets off with everyone. I really don’t care.’
I look at her. Her face is so cheeky. She’s smiling like the sides of her mouth are being pulled by pieces of string. I find it absolutely impossible not to smile too. Then Sally’s voice comes booming down the corridor.
‘Flo, hurry up. We need to get down to the pavilion for hockey training early to tell Miss Trunks you’re swapping partners.’
Back to reality.
I’m currently doing everything I can to be kicked off the hockey team. Today’s tactic is by simply not going to training. For months now I have been deliberately rubbish but all that seems to do is get me yelled at by Miss Trunks, who is by far the moodiest person I have ever met in my entire life, and from someone who lives with Pop THAT is saying something. She’s fat, ugly, and she hates girls. Well, she hates girls who don’t creep up and who are not Olympic-standard hockey players. Do they even play hockey in the Olympics?
Why would I want to run a around a field in the freezing cold wearing a tiny skirt and a massive pair of hideous regulation green knickers? I hate having to wear regulation green knickers, but if Miss Trunks sees we’re not wearing them then she screams so loud her face goes red, and we get an order mark. I don’t want to get order marks for things like not wearing massive pants. I need to save up my order marks for stuff that actually matters, like skiving lessons, being caught smoking, flicking fountain pen ink at people, and playing really funny tricks on Sally Du Putron when she isn’t looking.
So today, instead of hockey training, just on the other side of the wall to the hockey field, I am sitting in a circle in an old stone Victorian bath holding hands with Margaret Cooper, Nancy Plum, Bethan Collins and Charlotte Pike. We are having a séance. I nearly asked Flo Parrot to join us, but just as I went up to her Sally ran over waving a hockey stick, and I honestly thought she was going to hit me with it. I can’t see why Flo is best friends with Sally. She seems so nice, and Sally is a real tit.
‘All we have to do is close our eyes, hold hands and imagine a dead person,’ says Nancy, our class hippy. ‘My mum told me the spirits just appear.’
‘I’m a bit scared,’ says Bethan in her littlest voice. ‘What if they want to kill us?’
Everyone loves Bethan because she is small and has a voice like a five-year-old. She’s best friends with Charlotte Pike, who is massive, but not in a fat way. She’s ‘big boned’, or so she tells us all the time. She’s quite manly, with a deep, loud voice, but she’s got long black hair and big boobs.
‘Don’t be scared, Bethan,’ she says. ‘It’s daylight and we are outside. If any spirits are scary then I will just sit on them and you can run away.’
We all laugh.
‘Right, who we gonna call?’ asks Nancy. We all yell ‘Ghostbusters’ in unison, then apologise to each other for being so obvious. The nice thing about these girls is that no one is remotely cool. Bad jokes happen with no piss-taking and no one cares about boys or clothes. It’s very different from being with Carla and Gem. Lovely as they are, all they talk about is their boyfriends, their new clothes, the parties they go to. It all gets a bit boring. I like being girly to a point but it can all get a bit high-pitched and frilly with Carla and Gem. With this little crowd I am the cool one. I like that.
‘I don’t know anyone who is dead,’ says Bethan.
‘What about Marilyn Monroe?’ suggests Charlotte.
‘Do you honestly think Marilyn Monroe will come and visit us in this old stone bath in Guernsey?’ Nancy snaps.
‘She might. My mum says that when you die it doesn’t matter who you are or what you look like any more,’ says Charlotte, confidently.
‘Well, we can’t call Marilyn Monroe. Has anyone get any other suggestions?’ Nancy says, losing her patience a little.
There are a few minutes’ silence. I find myself closing my eyes and screwing my face up as if preparing to be punched. And then Margaret blurts, ‘What about your mum, Renée?’
I open my eyes. All four of them are looking at me like hungry puppies.
‘I’m not bothered,’ are my first words. Shortly followed by, ‘Sure, whatever.’
I never let on a shred of emotion about Mum at school. I pretend I don’t care if I mention it at all. It’s easier for me that way, because generally as soon as someone shows me sympathy I burst out crying.
‘Great!’ says Margaret as she grabs Bethan and Nancy’s hands. Charlotte squints at me and lowers her head to find my eyes. When I look back at her she raises her eyebrows as if to ask ‘Sure?’
I nod dramatically and reach for their hands. ‘Let’s do it! I don’t believe in this nonsense anyway.’
‘Calling the spirits. Spirits, are you there?’ starts Nancy in a weird, breathy voice. ‘Spirits, come to the bath and show us your face.’
‘SHOW US YOUR FACE?’ cries Margaret hysterically. ‘What if they died in an accident and their face is mangled?’
‘Bloody hell, have some respect, Margaret,’ says Charlotte. ‘Renée’s mum didn’t die in an accident, she died of cancer. Her face will be fine.’
This isn’t true. The last time I saw my mother’s face it was grey and loose, like an empty plastic bag. Her eyes looked lower than they had before. Her cheekbones stuck out like hard lumps that were hurting her from the inside. Her face wasn’t fine at all. I don’t want to see it again, not like that.
‘Oh yes, sorry. I forgot we were calling your mum. Maybe you should ask her to come on her own, Nancy? We might get all sorts turning up if you just say spirits,’ says Charlotte, taking control.
‘OK, good idea. What was your mum’s name, Renée?’ asks Nancy, with no sense of awkwardness about using the word was.
‘Helen,’ I say, my eyes still closed. My head is telling me not to believe in this, but I still find myself imagining her face. What if she comes? What would I say?
‘Right then, Helen it is. OK, everyone hold hands again.’ Nancy gets herself back into the zone and tries again. ‘Helen, are you there, Helen?’
My mind starts to wander – back to when I didn’t even know she was dying. The warmth of Margaret and Bethan’s hands feels so nice in the cold air, the distant sound of the hockey game turns into a low hum. I start to visualise her. I can smell her, the best smell in the world – Chanel No. 5, cigarettes and leather. The perfect smell.
I go back to when I must have been all of five, still having afternoon naps but old enough to have them on the sofa and not in my room. Was that normal? I’m not sure. I woke up to see her face at the living-room door. Her black hair in loose waves sitting just above her shoulders, her nose red from the outside cold, her long eyelashes bold and upright. They surrounded her massive brown eyes like the over-pronounced sun rays I used to draw that Mum would stick on the fridge. As I woke up from my sleep she came over, took off her fur coat and crawled onto the sofa with me. She scooped me up into her arms and put her cheek on top of mine. ‘How’s my girl?’
I turned around and buried my face into her neck. We lay there cuddling while I woke up properly. She yawned, and even when I was ready to move I lay there and let her dose. ‘I love you, Mummy,’ I said.
‘I love you too, darling.’
‘OH MY GOOODDD!’
Mum vanishes as the sound of Nancy’s voice makes us all jump.
‘OH MY GOD, did anyone else see that?’ Nancy shouts, out of breath.
‘Keep your voice down,’ orders Charlotte. ‘Miss Trunks is only behind that wall.’ A loud whistle sounds as the hockey is called to a close.
‘Seriously. WHO. ELSE. SAW. THAT?’ Nancy is standing now. White as a sheet. ‘Renée, your mum. She died of cancer, right?’
‘YES,’ says Margaret.
‘And her ashes are spread on Herm, right?’
‘YES,’ repeats Margaret. I would answer the questions myself but she is getting the answers right so I guess I don’t need to bother. Mum died after getting breast cancer for the second time, and Nana and Pop spread her ashes on a small island just off Guernsey called Herm because she loved it there so much. I wasn’t allowed to go.
‘Well, I just saw a crab floating over an island,’ Nancy says, panting.
‘You saw what?’ I ask, thinking she has finally lost the plot.
‘Think about it. Crabs are the symbol for cancer, and your mum is scattered on Herm. Crab over island? She is here, Renée. She is TRYING TO SPEAK TO ME.’
Nancy is the kind of person who could find something spiritual in a sausage roll. As if Mum would appear to us as a crab flapping its claws over an island. I still find myself unable to ask her to shut up.
The bell rings.
The girls get up and leave. There’s a hum of chatter as they walk away.
‘No way, did she come? Did we actually make a dead person come?’
None of them seems to notice that I have stayed where I am. I know I’ll get an order mark for missing French, but this one will be worth it.
I thought I was OK after Rebecca Stephens, my new hockey partner, thwacked me around the face with her hockey stick. But halfway through French I thought I was going to pass out from how much my head was spinning. I went to the sick room and when I felt better I told Miss Trunks I’d called my dad from the payphone in the foyer and that he was waiting outside. He wasn’t really.
It’s all Sally’s fault. Rebecca is rubbish at hockey, she has the coordination of a drunk person. She usually goes with Charlotte Pike but Charlotte wasn’t in hockey training because she has period pains, so when Sally said she didn’t want to go with me any more Miss Trunks put me with Rebecca and used Sally for all the demonstrations. Charlotte is really good at hockey, probably because she’s big boned. I realised pretty quickly that part of her talent is dodging Rebecca’s stick – that’s a skill in itself. When Rebecca hit me I thought my brain had exploded. I don’t remember much about it, but I do remember Sally laughing and saying she could see my regulation green knickers when I was lying on the floor.
As I leave school, Renée Sargent is coming in.
‘What happened to you? Did Sally do that?’ she asks, referring to the big red lump on my forehead.
Do people think Sally beats me up?
‘No, I was partners with Rebecca in hockey. Turns out she isn’t very good at hockey.’
‘It looks really sore. Is someone picking you up?’ Renée asks, obviously concerned.
‘No,’ I lied. ‘I’m going to walk to my dad’s, he isn’t feeling that great.’ I notice that Renée’s eyes look red. ‘Are you OK?’ I ask.
‘Yeah, I’m fine. My eyes just get puffy when it’s cold.’
We stand awkwardly for a few seconds. Eventually I say, ‘Cool, well, Miss Trunks will tell me off if she sees me. I’d better go.’
Renée looks weird. Kind of sad.
‘Can I walk with you?’ she asks quietly.
I look up at the French class window. Sally isn’t watching.
‘Yeah, I guess so.’
Renée and I walk separately until we get to the end of the school path and totally out of sight. When she catches up with me I feel so conspicuous. Bunking school and cavorting with the enemy? This is the baddest I have ever been.
‘Wanna go get chips?’ she says, her eyes still puffy.
I am about to say no, but I haven’t had chips in ages. ‘OK,’ I say. ‘Why not.’
‘Come on then.’
We walk to the Cod’s Wallop and order two portions of chips with loads of salt and vinegar. Renée starts to eat hers as we step outside.
‘What are you doing?’ I say. ‘We can’t eat in public in school uniform. If someone sees us we will get into trouble.’
‘That’s stupid. We’re hungry, they can’t stop us eating,’ Renée mumbles with her mouth full.
‘Can’t we just go somewhere out of sight?’ Once I was caught drinking a can of Coke in town and Miss Grut called my mum to say I had been seen ‘hanging off the end of a Coke can’ in my uniform. Mum was so mad at me for having the headmistress call home.
Renée sighs but wraps up her chips again and says she knows a field nearby. We walk there and sit under a big tree behind a hedge. No one can see us.
‘So what’s up with your dad?’ she asks boldly.
‘Oh, it’s really boring. You don’t want to know.’
‘Yeah I do,’ she insists.
‘Really?’
She nods, her mouth completely full.
‘OK, well, he lost his job nearly a year ago and hasn’t found one since. My mum just kicked him out because he’s drinking too much and . . .’ I suddenly feel very uncomfortable. ‘I shouldn’t really be telling you this.’
‘Families are idiots.’
I don’t know what to say to that.
‘I need to go and talk to him.’ I eat a chip, and feel an unfamiliar impulse to keep talking. ‘It feels a bit like I’m the only one who says anything at the moment. Mum and I don’t really get on.’
‘Talking in my family doesn’t happen,’ says Renée. ‘The trick for me is to live on the edge and never tip over. It’s a right laugh.’
‘What’s funny about that?’
‘Nothing. That’s why it’s funny. It’s so bad I just think it’s funny,’ Renée says, tilting her head back so the chips don’t fall out of her mouth.
‘Do you really?’
‘If I don’t laugh about it what else will I do?’
She doesn’t actually laugh though. She falls back, throws chips into the air and tries to catch them in her mouth. She misses them all but picks them off the grass and eats them anyway.
‘So what about your brother?’ she asks as she chews.
‘What about my brother? You don’t fancy him as well, do you?’ I blurt, embarrassed by my defensiveness.
‘What? No way! Why would I fancy him?’ Renée replies, obviously offended.
‘Everyone fancies Julian. Sally is obsessed with him. Sometimes I think it’s the only reason she’s friends with me.’
‘Well, Sally is an idiot, and I do not fancy your brother. He’s way too skinny, and beards are gross. I could never kiss someone with a beard.’ She stuffs her mouth full of chips again, probably to stop herself slagging off my brother any more.
I don’t like it when she calls Sally an idiot. Not because I don’t agree, but because going behind Sally’s back frightens me. If she finds out I skived school with Renée she’ll make my life hell, and come to think of it, what am I doing bunking school? Sure, I have a lump the size of one of Miss Trunks’ boobs on my forehead but how am I going to pass my GCSEs if I skip lessons? The rebel inside me is short lived.
‘I need to go.’ I reach down to pick up my bag.
‘OK, well, do you want to meet up after school tomorrow?’ Renée asks, as if that would be completely normal.
I shake my head. ‘We have clarinet on Thursdays.’
‘Ooo, well, I wouldn’t want to get in the way of you and your boss playing the clarinet,’ she says under her breath, with a little smirk. It makes me feel so small. I stare at her for a while, half expecting an apology.
‘No offence, but you barely make it to lessons, let alone anything extra-curricular. What do you actually do, anyway? Is this it? Chips in fields?’ I am surprised at how easy I find it to answer back to her. Building up to speaking to Sally like this takes weeks of preparation, and then I usually chicken out.
‘So what if it is? Where’s honking down a piece of wood going to get you in life?’
‘That’s not the point. You learn things to make life more interesting.’
‘You think playing the clarinet is interesting?’ Renée says, annoyingly making me question why I do play the clarinet.
‘I think it gives my brain something to think about, gives me something to focus on. What do you focus on?’
‘I dunno. Fun?’
I watch her throwing chips into the air and into her mouth again. She won’t look at me now. She’s pretending this conversation isn’t happening.
I start to walk away, but then turn back. ‘You know there’s more to life than skiving class and being the joker, Renée. Don’t you care about the future?’
‘What’s the point in worrying about the future? Who says there will even be a future? What happens if you die tomorrow and all you ever did was sit in maths classes and play the clarinet and moan about your family? What good is the future to you then?’ She sits up and lights a cigarette. ‘Have fun at your dad’s.’
‘Fun . . .?’ I think better of keeping this conversation going and leave her alone, sitting in the field smoking and eating chips. I get the impression she’ll be there for a while.
As I get to Dad’s house I can hear the TV. He’s watching Countdown. The house is so small – barely a house really, more a little bungalow surrounded by overgrown weeds with his banged-up old Ford Fiesta in the drive. It’s the car he bought Julian for his seventeenth birthday, but now he uses it because he can’t afford another one. I remember when he gave it to Julian. Julian said he wouldn’t drive it because it was such a ‘heap of shit’.
The bungalow is a yellowy colour and the windows are filthy. It’s depressing to look at. I hate that this is where he lives now. Our house is big and lovely, and although I know it’s just a matter of time before we have to move out because no one can afford to pay the mortgage, it should be his house too. He bought it. Not her.
‘Dad?’ I let myself in with my key. The house smells of burnt food.
There’s no answer.
I go into the sitting room and see him asleep in an armchair. There’s an empty pint glass on the table in front of him with white froth stuck to its inside. A microwave macaroni cheese is half eaten on the coffee table, still in the plastic.
I stand in the doorway staring at my dad. His large belly is flopped to one side, his double chin squashed into his chest. His dark blond hair that used to be combed neatly is now unwashed and too long, and his face is badly shaven, covered in cuts. He’s wearing a blue T-shirt with jeans, and socks with slippers that he’s obviously been wearing outside. Wearing my slippers outside was one of the only things he ever used to tell me off for. It really upset him. Thinking about that upsets me now. Dad has changed so much in such a short space of time. It feels like only yesterday he was coming into my room every morning singing stupid songs to wake me up for school. I miss it.
‘Dad.’ I shake him gently. ‘Dad, wake up.’
He opens his eyes. No other part of him moves for a few seconds. It’s creepy, like he’s waiting for something to happen before he’s willing to look at who woke him up. Then he sees me.
‘Flo. Hello, darling,’ he says sleepily, like he’s been drugged or something. He shifts in his chair and tries to get up. ‘Here, sit here in my chair. Do you want a cup of tea?’ He starts to clear the table, making all sorts of excuses for not having done it earlier.
‘It’s OK, Dad. Just sit down.’ I perch on the arm of the sofa and he slumps down like a child who has been told off. There are a few minutes where we both pretend to find a word in AHOGWUSPE.
‘Sorry, Flo. I’ll get myself back on track, I promise. And I’m sure your mum and I will work things out.’
‘It’s OK, Dad, honestly.’
‘How’s school? That Sally still acting like she rules the world?’ he asks with a small smile.
My dad knows all about Sally and her ways. He’s the one person I can tell the truth to. He seems to understand it completely. When he lived at home he came up to my room every day after work and insisted I told him all the mean things she had done that day. He somehow made it all seem funny. I’d tell him what she’d said and he’d mimic her in a silly voice that was weirdly accurate. It always made me laugh.
‘Yeah, she’s like a fly trap and I’m a stupid, dopey blue bottle that hovered around so long I got stuck. Makes me feel like such a loser,’ I say, crossing my arms and slumping.
‘Hey, it’s me you’re talking to. King of the blue bottles. I’m the loser.’
‘Don’t say stuff like that, Dad. You’re not a loser.’
We look back at the TV screen. One guy has a five-letter word, the other seven.
‘How is she, your mum? When she drops Abi off she barely looks at me. Can’t blame her, I guess.’
‘She’s angry all the time. She hates having to work, and she hates having to look after Abi when she gets home, so she doesn’t, I do it. I don’t remember the last time I actually had a conversation with her,’ I say, flitting my eyes between him and the TV.
‘Nor do I, and we’ve been married for twenty years.’
We let out little laughs, but they don’t last long.
‘I miss you, Dad. Julian, Mum and Sally do my head in so badly.’
‘Well, people who acknowledge their faults aren’t so angry about them. Oh to be a selfish, eh?’
‘I think life would be easier if I was a selfish.’
‘No, it wouldn’t. Not really. Those people aren’t happy, they’ll be on their death beds with little more than a lifetime of guilt and regret to think about. People like us die with a clear conscience, Flo. That’s the best way to be. If you admit to where you go wrong at least you stand a chance of making it better.’
I still wish I was selfish.
The guy with seven letters lost. Pogwash isn’t a real word.
I can’t sleep. Just before bed Nell told me that she hates living with Nana and Pop and that she plans to tell them that soon. She said she doesn’t care if it hurts them and that she can’t live like this any more. When I asked her where she plans to live instead she said ‘with Dad’. If she ever says that to Pop I think he would explode, and Nana would cry, and things would only get worse.
Dad made his decision to live in Spain. When Mum died him and Pop had the worst fight. I’ll never forget how loud they shouted at each other. Pop said it was his fault she got cancer, that the stress he put her under is what made her ill. I don’t think that’s true, I think Pop just needs someone to blame because his daughter died before he did and his brain can’t handle it. He turns everything into a battle, and has to make everything somebody else’s fault. Sometimes I wonder if he really blames himself. He made Mum, after all. Maybe he feels responsible for her body going wrong. Maybe that’s why he’s so mad all the time, and why he shouts and makes everyone else feel so terrible about themselves. He’s trying to make us all feel as guilty as he does. I think it worked on Dad, because soon after Mum died he moved to Spain, and now he has another wife and another child. The only contact I have with him are the birthday and Christmas cards he sends, which his new wife so obviously writes. I’ve never even met her.
If Nell tells Nana and Pop she doesn’t want to live here any more we won’t be allowed to move to Spain anyway. And even if we are, I don’t want to live in another country with someone who doesn’t love me enough to write their own cards. And I don’t want to start all over again with a new school where no one knows me. So Nell will go and it will just be me, Nana and Pop left here. Pop will be angrier and he’ll make me feel even more guilty about not being the one who died instead of Mum. And they’ll get older and older and I’ll have to start taking care of them, and I’ll have to leave school to become a full-time carer and my life will be awful. Why can’t Nell just shut up and deal with it? It doesn’t make sense that I’m the one who always gets called selfish in this house.
As I lie in bed thinking all of this over I can’t think of a single positive outcome of her saying that stuff. I just lie there, my heart jumping around in my chest, desperately trying to think of something, of something shallow and shiny to focus on to distract my thoughts, and then I remember.
Julian.
I listen to Nell’s breathing. It’s long and slow. She’s definitely asleep. I slide my hand down slowly. My duvet is suddenly very loud. On my back with my hand in place, I think about him. The curve of his top lip pressing against mine, his breath bitter but sweet. We’re in the living room, where I saw him last. He has me on the sofa. His hand is where mine is now, he’s kissing me and touching me and he feels so good. I’m totally transfixed by my fantasy, I must unknowingly jolt, make a noise, I don’t know – but Nell is now awake. She’s turned the light on, and she is telling me I am disgusting.
I don’t bother saying anything. It won’t make me feel any less humiliated to stand up for myself. I just roll over. She turns off the light and says, ‘You should always be alone, Renée.’
I fall asleep, my brain finally realising that being awake isn’t worth the hassle.
The next morning I wake up to hysteria. Nana is next to Nell’s bed with a bowl of water and a cloth. Nell is lying on her back with a tea towel stuffed up her nose. This has become normal. Nell’s nosebleeds are an everyday occurrence since she decided to torture herself by not eating. I go to get out of bed, knowing that offering my help will only get me told to GO AWAY, but as I move I feel a wetness between my legs that worries me. Is it already that time? I lift the covers and see that my pyjamas have a huge red stain creeping across them. I move myself to see if it had spread to the sheets but I’ve woken up just in time. Any wrong move will change that so I have to be careful. I roll onto my side and run to the bathroom. Pulling my PJs down as I go I just about make it to the toilet, but a dollop of blood falls onto the mat.
Why do periods have to start that way? This will be my fifteenth and I’m still not used to them. I can’t believe I have to have them until I’m fifty-something. How many pairs of pyjamas will I have ruined by then?
I clean myself up and stick a big wedge of loo roll between my legs. Holding it in place with my thighs I scrub the toilet mat until the stain comes off. After a shower I hold my pyjama bottoms between my thighs, wrap a towel around myself and waddle into the bedroom. Luckily I have one more sanitary towel in my gym bag, so I stick that in my pants, get dressed, hide the pyjamas in my bag and leave for school. Just at the end of our road there’s a row of bins. I throw my pyjama bottoms into the emptiest one and carry on along my way. As I walk, I think how weird it is that Nana has never even asked me if my periods have started. Maybe when you get that old you just forget about them.
At school, hell strikes. My tummy throbs like a wild animal trapped inside a cage. I sit on the toilet as I try to push out the pain. The registration bell rings, I crawl back to the classroom. My face can’t hide what I’m going through.
‘Get on your knees and put your head on the floor,’ insists Margaret, who is the self-confessed Queen of Periods, seeing as she started so long ago.
‘NO, don’t scrunch up. You lie on your back with your knees apart and feet together,’ says Charlotte as she tries to get me into that position.
‘I am not lying on the floor in my school skirt with my legs open,’ I say, jamming my thighs shut.
I assume Margaret’s position and continue to drop beads of sweat into the carpet tiles. Last month I didn’t get any pain at all – why now? I feel so faint. The dull ache is weakening me. With my forehead on the floor I shout, ‘Why did Mother Nature do this to us?’ I take some long, deep breaths.
‘Ahhh, babe. You’ll be OK. It’s OK,’ repeat Carla and Gem. The urge to scream ‘DO I LOOK OK, YOU PAIR OF PERFECTS?’ at them is almost impossible to control. I pant it out, by instruction of Charlotte. Then I feel a threatening presence hovering over me.
‘Why are you always trying to get attention? Periods aren’t that painful.’ It’s Sally, her feet close to my head. ‘Attention is all you care about, isn’t it? Maybe if you cared about school and did some work then you’d get attention for being clever rather than a thick show-off.’
I try to ignore her, but I’m not in the most pleasant of moods.
‘A school full of girls and I’ve never seen anyone else with their head on the floor at the back of a classroom because of a little period pain. Only you, Renée.’
Focus on the breath, focus on the breath.
I look up. Her smirking face is looking down at me. Flo is sitting at her desk pretending to read a book. It’s upside down. Being beneath Sally, no matter what the reason, is not something I’m comfortable with. She steps closer to me and kneels down.
‘Poor Renée,’ she whispers. ‘No one loves you. No friends, a mad family. It’s hardly a wonder, really.’
I feel a power surge in my belly. My muscles are tightening around the pain. One swift thrust up with my head and I’ll probably remove one of her teeth. I inhale deeply, ready to throw my head back and remove the smirk right from her face. One, two, thr—
‘Good morning, ladies. What is all this?’
Sally jumps up. Miss Anthony is now standing over me.
‘Renée, is there any particular reason you are on the floor?’ Miss Anthony asks with an assertive tone.
‘Period pain, miss,’ offers Margaret.
‘Oh dear. Well, you shouldn’t be on the floor. Come on, Renée, up to your feet. Do you think you can make it to the sick room to lie down? There’s a hot water bottle there. It will pass in a little while if you just lie still,’ Miss Anthony says, helping me up.
‘WITH YOUR LEGS OPEN,’ shouts Charlotte from across the room.
‘Just a water bottle will do fine, thank you, Charlotte. Do you think you can make it downstairs on your own or would you like someone to go with you?’
I nod, embarrassed that everyone in Year 11 now knows I have my period. I hold onto the wall the whole way.
Inside the sick room both bunk beds are empty. Good, there’s nothing worse than having to share the sick room. I always regret skiving when I have to lie there pretending to be ill with someone puking into a bowl underneath me. I lie down on the bottom bunk and wait for whichever member of staff is on duty to come and make me a hot water bottle. My tummy is already feeling a little better.
After ten minutes no one has come and I start to feel anxious. I need to change my panty pad. Knowing that the middle drawer in the office just off the sick room is full of them, I get up and creep in. This is where I’ve been getting them ever since I started my periods over a year ago. As I stuff as many as I can into my waistband, my bra and even a couple in my socks, I hear the door open.
Oh, SHIT!
‘What on earth are you doing stuffing sanitary towels into your bra, Miss Sargent?’
It’s Miss Trunks. She is taking up the entire doorframe. Even if I had wanted to escape I couldn’t have. She looks angry, but equally as pleased to have caught me. Catching people break school rules is why I think Miss Trunks became a teacher.
‘Stealing school property is a serious crime. Put those back. NOW,’ Miss Trunks says, spitting all over the place.
I start to unload my bra and waistband. Of all the things to get caught stealing, at least good stationery has some level of kudos.
‘So what is this about? I suppose you sell these for money to buy cigarettes, don’t you?’
‘No, Miss Trunks. I just needed some.’
‘Don’t you lie to me, Renée Sargent. A girl of your age can buy her own protection. No one steals sanitary towels unless it is to sell them to make money to spend on things like cigarettes or alcohol. Is that why you never come to hockey training? Drink? Hurry up and put those back. We’re going to see Miss Grut,’ she screams, winding herself up into a melodramatic frenzy.
She leads me down the corridor, pushing my elbow like a gear stick. I sit outside and wait for half an hour. Then the unthinkable happens. Pop walks in.
We sit in silence in Miss Grut’s office. Miss Grut, Miss Trunks, Miss Anthony, Pop and me. Pop and I sit on two separate chairs in front of Miss Grut’s massive desk. Miss Trunks, who is wearing over-stretched sports gear, and Miss Anthony, who is in a pretty high-necked flowery dress, share a two-seater sofa to the right of us. Miss Anthony looks a bit squashed.
‘Renée has been caught stealing school property. Sanitary towels. The school’s sanitary towels,’ says Miss Trunks to break the silence.
‘Yes, Miss Trunks,’ says Miss Grut, ‘we all know why we are here, thank you. And thank you for coming in so promptly, Mr Fletcher. Renée, have you been stealing from the school?’
It feels strange being asked a question directly by the headmistress. She doesn’t have much to do with us on a one-to-one level. She’s a bit like the Queen. Everyone stands up when she walks in or leaves a room, and if you see her walking towards you in the corridor the natural reaction is to stand still until she has passed. Being asked a question by her feels part privilege, part the scariest thing I have ever experienced. Pop is sitting next to me breathing really loudly, and there’s a giant pile of panty pads on her desk, deliberately positioned by Miss Trunks to remind us why we are all there.
‘Not stealing, miss, borrowing.’ I don’t know why I say this. I obviously was stealing them.
‘Why were you in the sick room?’ asks Miss Grut, trying to piece the story together.
‘I sent her down there,’ says Miss Anthony. ‘Renée had terrible cramps this morning.’
Pop shuffles uncomfortably in his chair.
‘I sent her to the sick room to lie down with a hot water bottle,’ Miss Anthony continues.
‘And THAT is when I found her stuffing her bra with the school’s Always Ultra,’ barks Miss Trunks.
‘That is quite enough, Miss Trunks. We can take this from here. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.’ Miss Grut’s eyes fix hard on the door. The horrible fat cow leaves.
‘Mr Fletcher,’ continues Miss Grut. ‘Do you know why Renée might feel the need to steal sanitary equipment from the school?’
Sanitary equipment? Adults are so weird sometimes. A minute’s silence nearly deafens me. I stare at the pen pot on Miss Grut’s desk to distract myself from how hideously mortified I am.
‘Well, Renée is a girl, isn’t she?’ Pop rubs his nose and does a fake cough.
‘She is, yes,’ agrees Miss Anthony.
‘Well, then. Girls need them things for stuff I don’t know about, but you know more than me, I’m sure.’
Never have I wanted the earth to swallow me up so much. Pop trying to explain what I might use a panty pad for is as bad as the time I farted when I sneezed during prayers in assembly. At least that was funny. There is nothing funny about this. Through pure fear of him being asked to elaborate, I start to speak.
‘I know it sounds stupid but I’m too embarrassed to buy them in shops, Miss Grut. So every few months I go into the sick room and take what I need because . . .’ I mumble, ‘. . . I don’t like strangers knowing I have my . . .’
‘Period,’ offers Miss Anthony.
‘Yes, that.’ I nod.
‘Periods are nothing to be ashamed of, Renée. You are a woman,’ says Miss Grut.
If one more person says the word period or panty pad in front of Pop I am going to have to jump out of the window, run to the sea and swim to France.
‘Look, I don’t steal stuff usually, it’s just those.’ I point at the pile of pads on her desk. ‘I’m sorry, I won’t do it again.’
‘Well, your regret seems genuine, so we’re done here,’ says Miss Grut. ‘Mr Fletcher, maybe Mrs Fletcher can help Renée in the shop next time she has a period?’ I wince, but Miss Grut continues. ‘I’m sure your situation makes all sorts of conversations very hard, but as Renée turns into a woman she’ll need your help on matters like this. Renée, I will let this go this time, but please don’t let us catch you doing this again. Thank you, everybody.’
Pop and I are up and out the door as quickly as we can. I walk him to the foyer.
‘Pop. I’m really sorry,’ I say, so embarrassed I can barely get my words out.
‘I will speak to your grandmother and she will take this from here. Don’t be late for dinner.’ Pop makes it very clear that the subject is closed. As I watch him walk away I feel like I don’t know him at all. He’s just a stranger who knows I am on my period.
I feel a hand on my shoulder.
‘Renée?’ It’s Miss Anthony. ‘I used to be the same when I was your age. Here.’ She hands me a cotton pouch. ‘Have these. Do try to build the confidence to buy your own, but this should get you through this month.’ She smiles. ‘Now take a minute to get yourself together and then get to class. You can still make the last half-hour of drama and I’ll make sure you don’t get an order mark.’
‘Thank you. That’s really nice of you.’ I start to walk away, but Miss Anthony puts a hand on my arm.
‘Renée, I lost my mother when I was young, too. I know how lonely it can feel.’
‘I’m not lonely, Miss Anthony. I have lots of friends,’ I answer defensively.
‘Are they good friends? People you can talk to? It’s really important to talk about how you feel.’
‘Of course.’ I nod. ‘Best friends. We talk about it all the time.’
‘Good, good. I am glad,’ she says, looking pleased.
Later, in the afternoon, Miss Grut comes into our French class unexpectedly. Everyone stands up, but she tells us to sit straight down. Assuming she has changed her mind and is here to punish me for theft I start to pack up my pencil case, but instead she walks over to Flo Parrot and asks her to follow her downstairs.
I have only ever seen that happen once at school before. When I was seven years old.