I knew I was in trouble as soon as I neared the house and saw the car in the drive.
I stopped dead in my tracks for a minute and considered my options. All kinds of pictures raced through my brain like little pieces of film, but none of them offered a solution. I thought about visiting Mr Driver and then pretending he had been ill and I had been helping him, but I didn’t want to implicate him in my dilemma. I thought about saying we had used up all the bread and I had gone to the shop to get a new loaf, but then realised I didn’t have one as evidence. I briefly considered the idea that I wanted to understand more about the Catholics, and that this was a good day to go and look at their church because usually I couldn’t because we were at our church, and I said some of the words out loud to try them out and knew they wouldn’t make the grade.
I thought about pretending what I had done was preventative. It was Sunday and we shouldn’t fight on Sunday and Ruthy was baiting me and I thought it was better to leave than to have an argument, because that would have been disrespectful to Jesus. It was thin – very thin – but it was all I had. And I knew from all our family games of Snap and Canasta that you have to play the cards in your hand.
I walked up the back steps quietly and peered through the screen door into the kitchen. There was no one in that room, so I quietly opened the door and let myself in. I crept into our bedroom, where Ruthy was sitting crying on her bed hugging Milly Molly Mandy. She was doing that irritating kind of crying that was more like a continuous moan. Her mouth was all out of shape and she looked ugly. I thought of telling her that, but luckily stopped myself.
‘Mum! She’s here!’ screamed Ruthy, despite my hushing noises and flapping arms trying to communicate the need for stealth.
‘Dorcas. What on earth do you think you were up to?’ asked Dad at the bedroom door, in a much angrier voice than he usually used. ‘Didn’t I tell you to stay in the house until we got home? Was that so much to ask when your brother was so sick?’ he hollered.
‘Is he all right, Dad?’ I asked, suddenly frightened. There was something going on here that was bigger than my unauthorised absence.
‘No, he’s not all right but he will be fine, no thanks to you. Now explain yourself.’ By this stage, Mum was standing next to him with her arms crossed and her chin stuck out and thunder on her features.
‘I … I … Ruthy was annoying me so I thought it was better to go for a walk than to have a big fight on the Lord’s day … and …’
‘Don’t try that nonsense on me. I’m not in the mood, Dorcas. And don’t blame your sister. She’s already told us about bouncing on the beds and watching TV and the lipstick on your mother’s blouse. I am so disappointed in you both. And all this when Caleb was sick in hospital and had to have another adrenaline injection. I just don’t know what to say to you.’
My head snapped to look in amazement at Ruthy, even though I would have told it not to because it was definitely going to make things worse.
‘And don’t look at your sister like that. We came in and found the tellie on. At least she told us the truth when we asked what had happened. Imagine a grown-up girl like you leaving her in the house all on her own, and with all the mess to clean up. Really, Dorcas, this is the living end. The living end,’ said Dad.
He hadn’t struck me yet. Dad preferred not to hit us. But when Mum was really upset she handed him the wooden spoon and insisted he give us a good smack across the back of the legs. When he walked out of the room, I presumed I was about to get the spoon, and stayed stock-still on the bed in fearful anticipation. Instead, I heard the back door slam and the car pull out of the drive.
Mum was still standing with her arms folded, and her lips squished into a thin line pointing downwards at each end.
‘I hope you’re happy,’ she said.
‘Where’s Dad gone?’ I was almost too scared to ask. I felt decidedly less safe without him in the house.
‘He’s gone to work of course,’ said Mum. ‘On top of everything else he’s gone to work. On a Sunday. For Henry. Henry calls and he sacrifices everything because Henry sacrifices him.’
‘Mum,’ Caleb called out weakly. ‘I don’t want Dad to be sacrificed.’ And then he had a coughing fit that at least drove Mum to his side and stayed what I was sure would be my execution.
‘Why did you tell her?’ I hissed to Ruthy when she’d gone.
‘You left me everything to do, and that wasn’t fair. When they walked in I was trying to get the lipstick off the shirt because I saw what you did, Dorcas. And you can’t blame me for telling them because you are the oldest and you started it all and you should be a role model.’
She started bawling her head off until Mum came to the door and said, ‘Dorcas, leave that girl alone. Haven’t you created enough trouble for one day?’
‘Is Caleb okay?’ I asked Ruthy when Mum had gone.
‘He’s sicker than usual, I think. He’s all white and shallow breathing and noisy wheezing. They wanted to keep him in the hospital but Mum says hospitals are full of germs, and nurses are too busy to look after children and so she asked to take him home. She’s really upset, Dorcas. Like, I mean, really upset. Dorcas, she ate two biscuits!’ Ruthy then returned to more of the ugly, moaning crying.
‘What?’ I said in amazement.
Could this day be any more worrying and confusing? My mother was always doing what she called watching her waistline, which Caleb thought was very funny because he said it meant she would have to go everywhere with her head pointed down or she wouldn’t be able to watch it. It was pretty much unheard of for Mum to eat anything sweet, or actually anything much at all. This was a very bad sign.
And now Dad had gone to work on a Sunday. I couldn’t ever remember that happening before because Mr Bednarski knew we were Christadelphians and always said he respected Dad’s beliefs. And that he’d rather have a good Christian family man working for him than a heathen, even if Christadelphians were a funny kind of Christian if you asked him anything about it. But Mr Bednarski was a Jew, and that meant he didn’t work on Saturday but he did work on a Sunday.
I was scared that Dad had gone to work after what Mrs Edwards had said about Mum leaving, but then I realised I was confused because Dad had left, not Mum, and it was to go to work, not to go to Scotland, and so I calmed down a bit. Ruthy’s moaning was really getting on my nerves now, and I considered threatening to push her into the wee patch if she didn’t stop, or even telling her what Mrs Edwards had said, but knew I wouldn’t do that because it would frighten her to death and she might tell Mum and then Mum would know I had lasagna when I left Ruthy by herself and so all round this would not be a good idea.
Sometimes when I had to work things out, or I wanted to make myself small and invisible because I was in trouble, I crawled into our wardrobe and sat in the dark. This seemed like a good wardrobe day, and I took off my shoes, pushed things around to make a kind of nest, climbed in and closed the door behind me. Thinking in the quiet can help when the world gets a bit too big or busy. I screwed my eyes shut and made a low humming noise, so I wouldn’t notice doors closing and people’s voices and Ruthy coming in and out of the bedroom. I tried thinking about the palace I’d live in when I became a knight. I would choose only pink and blue and white flowers – no orange ones. And I’d move Sixpence’s grave to the garden and put a special arbour over it. I don’t think an arbour counts as an idol, so it shouldn’t cause trouble with the Arranging Brethren. And because I am a very selfish child, just as my mother says, I started to think that if Caleb could just stop getting sick, I might one day have a guinea pig.