by Adam Baron
‘Yes,’ Mum said. ‘And, while it won’t change anything, it might make you feel better.’
‘What is it then?’
‘Go for ice cream,’ Mum said. ‘And lots of it.’
She pulled away and, instead of turning round towards home, she drove into Blackheath Village and parked. I thought she was taking me to the ice-cream van that’s outside the church sometimes. Instead, we went to the posh place at the top where I stared at all the flavours, finally opting for blueberry and raspberry (Barcelona’s colours). I was expecting a cone – but Mum frowned.
‘I said lots of ice cream, didn’t I?’
Mum ordered a whole tubful (mixed flavour) and we found a bench on the heath, using Mum’s bamboo cutlery set because she didn’t want to use plastic spoons. Mum is no-plastic OBSESSED these days, which of course I approve of – but it can be quite difficult. We go to this no-packaging shop where you take your own bottles and jars to refill. Mum’s never got the right ones and, last week, when we were making flapjacks, she squirted shampoo in because it was in a golden-syrup bottle. The next morning I poured lentils into my cereal bowl and put cornflakes in the bird feeder. And later, in the bath, Mum squeezed tomato ketchup on my head.
It was organic, though.
Despite these ‘teething problems’, as Mum calls them, I’m totally behind it. There’s plastic everywhere. We went to Margate at half term and the beach was covered, from little pieces we made a mosaic out of to big drinks bottles. I even found a toy soldier in the seaweed, separated from his platoon. I played with him all day, wondering who’d lost him. I wished I could give him back because maybe he was really special to the owner. And maybe the kid was feeling something like I was at that moment.
Which, in spite of ice cream (though thanks, Mum), was still terrible.
‘Mum?’ I said, when the tub was all gone. ‘Dad’s an actor, isn’t he?’ Mum nodded. ‘Which means he’s always pretending. So do you think …?’
‘Yes, love?’
‘That he was ever going to take me. I mean, really?’
Mum took a deep breath and turned away for a second. But then she shrugged. She hugged me and checked the back of the empty ice-cream tub for the recycling sign. She wasn’t sure it could be recycled, but we decided to take it home anyway, just in case. Though, when we got there, the ice-cream tub was the LAST thing on Mum’s mind.
We drove back past my school. Miss Phillips was leaving and she waved. I gripped the door handle, biting my lip as I shuddered – because it wasn’t just our class I’d told about Barcelona. Everyone in the WHOLE SCHOOL knew. Isabella in our class told me about these things called churros, which you dip in hot chocolate. Her mum teaches Spanish to the Year 6s on Monday mornings and, for the last three weeks, I’d been allowed to sit in. Mr Ashe (our football coach) told me to write down five things I’d learned from Messi. Vi and Daisy wanted me to find out if Barcelona have a girls’ team and Lance had given me money for a pennant. Even Veronique was excited, though she doesn’t care about football.
‘Wow,’ she said. ‘You’re going to love Salvador Dalí. And Gaudí of course.’
‘They don’t play for Barcelona.’
‘What? Cymbeline …’
‘You might be thinking of Real Madrid,’ I said.
So how could I go in on Monday? The questions. The excitement. After hyping it up so much, how could I tell everyone that I hadn’t gone? I hadn’t just bigged up the fact that I was going to the Nou Camp, but that my dad was taking me. Now they’d know that he hadn’t shown up and they’d feel sorry for me. Facing that would be terrible and I sighed, wondering if Mum could send an email out to explain so that I wouldn’t have to. I was about to ask, turning to her as she reversed into a parking space opposite our house, when I stopped.
‘Is Stephan here?’ I asked.
I was talking about Mum’s fiancé. He comes round a lot, often with his two girls. I’d never heard of him being there when we weren’t, though.
‘No,’ Mum said, looking over her shoulder as she straightened the car up. ‘He’s coming round later. And …’
‘And?’
‘Well.’ Mum sighed. ‘There’s something we were actually going to surprise you with when you got back.’
‘Is there?’
‘Yes.’ She sighed again. ‘You know what it is, actually. I’ve been telling you about what we’re doing this weekend for weeks. But you haven’t wanted to engage with me. You keep saying you’re too busy or you want to talk about it later. So I thought we’d just do it. But now you’re not going away, well … Cym?’ Mum frowned. ‘Are you listening to me?’
No. The truth is I wasn’t. I was looking over Mum’s shoulder at our house. I was on the pavement side and, without saying another word, I turned and pushed my door open. I went round to the front of the car, checking to make sure nothing was coming. The road was clear so I hurried over – to our door.
Which was open.
And not open like Stephan maybe WAS there. Or even as if Mum had left it open earlier, by mistake.
It was WIDE open. And wonky.
It was hanging on one hinge like a tooth that’s about to fall out. The letterbox was broken and the frame was all splintered. Two windowpanes were missing, their glass in shattered pieces all over the hall floor.
Milly stared, daring me to back down – and say I didn’t care. That she could have it. But there was NO WAY that was going to happen. This is something you’re probably not going to believe when I tell you what I’d seen in the stream – but Milly and I are sisters. That means we’re MEANT to fight over things. And we’re not even normal sisters. You know that Milly’s bigger than me, but what I haven’t said is that she’s actually YOUNGER than me too. She’s a whole YEAR younger, which means that backing down to her feels wrong as WRONG. So there was no way in the WORLD that Milly was having that teddy.
Yep, you heard right.
All I’d found was a small, and very smelly, teddy bear. We were WAY too old to care about teddy bears – but I ran after Milly like she had my most precious object in the world. I tried to grab it, but she clung on. We carried on fighting about it all the way back along the stream. The birdwatchers weren’t impressed because a big flock of ducks flew off – and Mum wasn’t either. She’s a Friend of Cuckmere Haven and she said we were embarrassing her. Benji was refusing to walk, though, so Mum picked him up and told Dad to sort us out. He tried to get us to chuck the teddy in a bin and, when we refused, he said we had to take turns with it.
‘But I saw it first!’ I complained. ‘She stole it from me.’
‘Rubbish. You were probably looking at a dead slug or something.’
‘Milly,’ Dad said, ‘you’re not even into teddy bears. And you’ve had it long enough. Hand it over.’
‘Nah, I’m Gucci.’
‘What?’
‘Totally fire.’
‘What?’
‘It means she’s fine, Dad. It’s her class: they all use this supposedly cool language. It’s pathetic.’
‘Well, in my language, I’ll make it clear. Hand. It. Over.’
‘No point,’ Milly said, running off ahead. ‘We’re nearly back at the car.’
Dad told her that THAT didn’t change ANYTHING, so Milly scowled, stuck her tongue out (talk about dead slugs) and threw the teddy at me. One of the eyes hit me in the forehead and it HURT. I picked up a stone, but Dad grabbed my arm and, when Mum finally came up with Benji, he told her to move his car seat into the middle.
‘To separate these two wildcats,’ he said, though I wasn’t the wildcat, something Milly demonstrated as soon as we got in.
I’d only had the teddy two minutes, but, as soon as Mum pulled away, Milly reached over Benji and snaffled it! Dad snatched it back for me, but then Mum started going on about politics – and Milly took her chance. Dad was too busy saying things like !MADNESS!, !LUNACY! and !DISASTER! to notice Milly grabbing the teddy back again. I tried telling him, but he was banging o
n about what should happen to all politicians. So I took the teddy back myself, during which Milly’s wrist got the tinsiest bit scratched. It was nothing really and actually HER fault, but Milly didn’t see it that way. She punched me in the head.
Now this (as well as HURTING) provided me with a dilemma. Should I just let her win, and have the teddy? It would mean a safer head, but she’d think she was the boss FOREVER. I thought about punching her back, but she was ready for that – so I kicked her. This was in self-defence of course, and it really should have ended things. But Milly kicked me back – MUCH harder. Soon we were going at it so fast that you couldn’t tell which legs were mine and which were Milly’s, though one thing did become clear. Someone (probably her) had managed to kick Benji, which was actually Dad’s fault for putting him between us. Benji didn’t care whose fault it was, though. He just went off like a fire alarm until even he was drowned out.
By Mum.
Who spun round in her seat and …
‘I’m a midwife!’ she bellowed, as we pulled up outside our house. ‘I work ALL hours, helping OTHER people. Your dad hasn’t been feeling great. All we wanted was a NICE DAY OUT. But NO! YOU don’t even care about soft toys [she meant Milly] and YOU’VE got loads of them [she meant me]! You just wanted something to fight about. Now you’ve hurt your brother and COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY RUINED EVERYTHING! Just like you ALWAYS DO.’
‘Love …’ my dad began, and I wanted to interrupt too. It wasn’t an excuse to argue. I didn’t want to argue. But I SAW THE TEDDY FIRST! But I didn’t get a chance to say that because Mum stormed out of the car. Then she dragged my door open.
‘Out!’ she screamed.
For a second we couldn’t move. Mum was being so ferocious that it glued us to our seats. Mum’s normally really patient and reasonable. Even when we’re not. But it was like someone had set off a box of fireworks inside her. Had we really been THAT bad? I wanted to say that we hadn’t, and that she was WAY overreacting. But Mum boomed AGAIN and even louder. There was nothing for it so we climbed out, glancing at each other in amazement as Mum waited for us near the bonnet. I thought she was going to scream AGAIN – but she didn’t. She turned to our front door and marched towards it with her arms going back and forth. We followed, Milly making a little dart for the teddy, though I managed to whip it away in time.
And then I swallowed. Because what would Mum DO?
Something had clearly happened to her. She normally just sighs when we squabble, and tells us to make up. We have to hug each other, though hugging Milly right then would have been REVOLTING. But would Mum ban the TV for a week, like Dad sometimes threatens, but always forgets about? Or would she make us clean out Boffo (our rabbit, who has even worse toilet habits than Benji)?
Or would she send us to our room to ‘sort out our differences’, which Milly would do by twisting my fingers back on to my wrists until I gave her the teddy?
No.
Mum didn’t even go into the house. Instead, still fuming like some crazy thing, she stomped past the house and yanked open the door of the wheelie-bin shed. She pulled out the black bin and flipped the lid up, before turning back to us both.
I gulped. Barely able to believe what I was seeing, I jammed the teddy behind my back.
But it was too late.
Mum glared at me and shook the bin.
‘In,’ she hissed.
‘Oh no.’
I was still staring through the doorway. I was so stunned that I didn’t hear Mum at first. When I did, I turned and saw that she’d followed me across the road. Her horrified gaze was staring past me – at the mess. It wasn’t JUST the battered door. Or the glass on the floor. The coats had been pulled down too and the shoe stand tipped over, wellies, trainers and sandals piled up like rubble. Up ahead, in the kitchen, the drawers had been yanked out and the chairs were on their sides. It was only after noticing them that the truth of what I was seeing SMACKED into my brain.
We’d been burgled.
Mum’s hand landed on my shoulder. She stepped past me, staring all around as if she was in a museum, me following her into the living room.
Which was totalled.
Mum’s art books and magazines had all been torn off the shelves. The sofa had been tipped over, a huge gash in the back. The sleeping bags and tent that we keep behind it had been pulled open, my eyes falling on the silver car from Monopoly, which we hadn’t seen for AGES.
So that’s where it had driven off to.
DVDs were spread across the floor like a dragon’s scales. The TV was on its side. Mum’s sewing box had been emptied and even our big beanbag had been torn open, the little white balls spilling out like snow. Mum gasped while I just gawped, in a sort of daze as my eyes skipped from outrage to outrage – until they stopped like I’d been grasped round the neck.
My Lego.
I LOVE Lego. I love the way the pieces fit together so tightly, and how the sharp corners feel in my hand. I love the two-ers and the one-ers, how you can twist them round to move parts of whatever it is you’ve made. I love making houses, and castles, space blasters with window pieces for the telescopic sights. Lego is expensive so Mum always keeps an eye out in charity shops and jumble sales. Sometimes we go early and queue up, so we can be first in. She won’t buy kits, though. Even at jumble sales they’re too much and Mum doesn’t like them anyway. If I’m ever bought one, she lets me make it, but then throws the instructions away and tips the pieces in with the rest. Be creative, she says, which I am. I’ve made monsters and submarines, people and tanks and Daleks. I made a model of the Valley and one of our school, which I took in to show Miss Phillips. I made a rat called Kit-Kat, which Veronique keeps in her bedroom. Recently, though, I’ve been working on my greatest creation EVER (with Lance). We’ve been making it for MONTHS, drawing out the design first and identifying all the pieces we’d need. And it was SO nearly finished.
The Death Star!
But where was it?
My Lego lives in a big wooden box at the other end of the living room. Or it normally does. It had all been tipped out, the box upside down and a miniature junkyard littering the wooden floor. I made out some truck parts and half a lightsabre, though that didn’t bother me. I could easily make them again, but I scanned the floor for the Death Star. I picked the box up and turned it over, but it wasn’t there. Did the burglars steal it? I thought they must have, but no.
I was looking at it.
The Emperor’s Tower was up against the skirting board. The Focus Lens was underneath the radiator. The Death Star had been smashed, totalled, blown to smithereens (as if Luke Skywalker really had shot it up with proton torpedoes). I stared at the wreckage and started to feel hot, red heat prickling up from my feet. It made me clench my fists and only then did I realise what it was.
ANGER.
And not just because of the Death Star.
Mum looks after me on her own. She works REALLY hard, but we still don’t have much money. Not that she complains – AND she’s really kind. She makes sure that the old couple round the corner are okay and she buys dishcloths from people who knock on the door, even though we’ve got MASSES under the sink.
And someone had come into OUR house.
To steal the stuff that she’d SAVED UP FOR.
I was angrier than I’ve ever been, and that’s saying something: when Charlton got to the play-offs last season and Jacky Chapman was in on goal, he was not offside.
But what I’d felt then was nothing compared to this, though immediately the anger began to change – into panic.
Because what had the burglars actually STOLEN?
Mum was at the mantlepiece, scanning the photos, precious ones of our past. They all seemed to be there (phew) and I’d already seen the TV (double phew). But what about Mum’s iPad? What about the Bluetooth speaker she got in Argos when the stereo broke? And what about my stuff? My Lego all seemed to be there, though I’d have to rebuild the Death Star to make sure they hadn’t nicked the odd piece. But
the games shelf was empty. Everything had been pulled off. Jigsaw boxes were scattered on the floor. Jumping Tiddly Frogs were EVERYWHERE, as were the animal dominoes that I loved when I was little. But my Subbuteo set was still there, and the Nerf gun I’d won at the school fair. Then I saw Hungry Hungry Hippos.
WHAT?!
Were the burglars COMPLETE IDIOTS?
What kind of FOOL would go to all the trouble of breaking into someone’s house and NOT steal the Hungry Hungry Hippos?! (Even if the yellow one didn’t work properly.) I couldn’t understand it, but I wasn’t complaining. I just sighed, feeling SO lucky that my three most favourite games hadn’t been taken – though WAS I lucky? I hadn’t been upstairs yet, had I?
What if they’d taken …?
!NO!
I stopped. I couldn’t even THINK it. Instead, I spun away from the shelves towards the living-room door, intending to sprint up the stairs and run straight to my bedroom. But an enormous
rang out through the house. Followed by another.
And they’d both come from upstairs.
‘Cym!’ Mum gasped.
She was staring at me, her face twisted in fear as another sound came, though not a THUMP this time. A
Mum’s eyes left my face and we both stared up at the ceiling.
So … were they still IN here?
Were the burglars still in here … NOW?!
I froze – though it was more than fear that I was feeling. This was our HOME. This was where Mum and I LIVED. A place where I’ve always felt SAFE. I had a sudden flash of Lance and Veronique coming for a sleepover. I saw Auntie Mill and Uncle Bill arriving for Sunday lunch. I saw my parties, always at home (at least for the cake), and I saw Mum and me. On the sofa, her hand ready to go over my eyes during the scary bits in Harry Potter. I saw us in my bed, Mum reading to me, then falling asleep so I’d have to finish the chapter on my own. I saw us making flapjacks, Mum using a spatula to scoop the mixture into the tins, me hoping she’d leave enough behind to make the bowl worth scraping out.