by Priya Sharma
It was true. I remained resolutely strange; my features had failed to rearrange themselves into something that would pass for normal. Also, my sight had rapidly deteriorated in the last few months and my thick lenses magnified my eyes
“Be careful.” Jade leant down into Tallulah’s face. “You’ll catch her ugliness.”
Tallulah pushed her, hard, both of her small hands on her chest. Jade fell backwards a few steps, surprised by the attack. She raised a fist to hit Tallulah.
My blood was set alight, venom rising. Water brash filled my mouth as if I were about to be sick. I snatched at Jade’s hand and sunk my teeth into her meaty forearm, drawing blood. I could taste her shock and fear. If she was screaming, I couldn’t hear her. I only let go when her friend punched me on the ear.
*
After I’d apologised I sat in the corner of the room while Kath and Pauline, Jade’s mum, talked.
“I thought it would be good if we sorted it out between us, like grown-ups,” Pauline said.
Social Services had already been round to confirm that I was the culprit.
Has she ever done anything like this before?
No, Kathy was calm and firm, Lola wasn’t brought up that way.
“I’m so sorry about what happened.” Pauline lifted her mug of tea, her hand trembling a fraction. She took a sip and set it down, not picking it up again.
“Why?” Kath sat up straighter. “Lola bit Jade. I’m sorry and I’ll make sure that she is too by the time I’m done with her.”
“Yes, but Jade was picking on her.”
“That’s no excuse for what Lola did. She should’ve just walked away.”
“It’s time that someone cut Jade down to size.”
“My daughter bit yours.” Exasperation raised Kathy’s voice a full octave.
“She was asking for it.”
Kathy shook her head. Then, “How is she?”
Jade had lain on the pavement, twitching. Red marks streaked up her arm, marking the veins.
“She’s doing okay,” Pauline swallowed. “She’s on antibiotics. She’s a bit off colour, that’s all.”
“The police and Social Services came round earlier.”
“I’ve not complained. I’m not a nark. I’d never do that.”
“I didn’t say you had.”
“You’ll tell Kenny, won’t you? We’re not grasses. We won’t cause you any bother. I’ll skin Jade if she comes near your girls again.” We were known as Kathy’s girls.
“Kenny?” Kathy repeated dully.
“Please. Will you talk to him?”
Kath was about to say something but then deflated in the chair.
“Ami’s says she’s visiting him soon, so I’ll make sure he gets the message.”
*
Kathy closed the door after Pauline had gone.
“What did you do to her?” It was the first time she’d looked at me properly since it had happened.
“It wasn’t her fault.” Tallulah stood between us. “She was going to hit me.”
“What did you do to her?” Kathy pushed her aside. “Her arm swelled up and she’s got blood poisoning.”
“I don’t know,” I stammered. “It just happened.”
She slapped me. I put my hands out to stop her but she carried on, backing me into the bedroom. She pushed me down on the floor. I curled my hands over my head.
“I didn’t bring you up to be like that.” Her strength now was focused in a fist. Kathy had hit me before, but never like that. “I swear I’ll kill you if you ever do anything like that again. You fucking little monster.”
She was sobbing and shrieking. Tallulah was crying and trying to pull her off. Kathy continued to punch me until her arm grew tired. “You’re a monster, just like your father.”
*
We stayed in our bedroom that night, Tallulah and I. We could hear Kathy banging about the flat. First, the vacuum hitting the skirting boards as she pulled it around. A neighbour thumped on the wall and she shouted back, but turned it off and took to the bathroom. She’d be at it all night, until her hands were raw. The smell of bleach was a signal of her distress. There were times when I thought I’d choke on the stench.
The skin on my face felt tight and sore, as if shrunken by tears. Tallulah rolled up my t-shirt to inspect the bruises on my back. There was a change coming, fast, as the shock of Kathy’s onslaught wore off.
It hurt when Tallulah touched me. It wasn’t just the skin on my face that felt wrong. It was all over. I rubbed my head against the carpet, an instinctual movement as I felt I’d got a cowl covering my face. The skin ripped.
“I’ll get Kathy.”
“No, wait.” I grabbed her wrist. “Stay with me.” My skin had become a fibrous sheath, my very bones remoulding. My ribs shrank and my slim pelvis and limbs became vestigial. My paired organs rearranged themselves, one pushed below the other except my lungs. I gasped as one of those collapsed. I could feel my diaphragm tearing; the wrenching of it doubled me over.
I writhed on the floor. There was no blood. What came away in the harsh lamplight was translucent. Tallulah held me as I sloughed off my skin which fell away to reveal scales. She gathered the coils of me into her lap. We lay down and I curled around her.
I couldn’t move. I could barely breathe. When I put out my forked tongue I could taste Tallulah’s every molecule in the air.
*
The morning light came through the thin curtain. Tallulah was beside me. I had legs again. I put a hand to my mouth. My tongue was whole. My flesh felt new. More than that, I could see. When I put my glasses on the world became blurred. I didn’t need them anymore. The very surface of my eyes had been reborn.
My shed skin felt fibrous and hard. I bundled it up into a plastic bag and stuffed it in my wardrobe. Tallulah stretched as she watched me, her hands and feet splayed.
“Tallulah, what am I? Am I a monster?”
She sat up and leant against me, her chin on my shoulder.
“Yes, you’re my monster.”
*
I ache for the splendid shabbiness of my former life, when it was just Kath, Tallulah, and me in the flat, the curtains drawn against the world and the telly droning on in the background. Tallulah and I would dance around Kath, while she swatted us away. The smell of bleach and furniture polish is forever home. Kath complaining when I kept turning the heating up. Being cold made me sluggish.
Endless, innocuous days and nights that I should’ve savoured more.
“How was your test?”
“Crap.” Tallulah threw down her bag. “Hi, Kath.”
“Hi, love,” Kathy shouted back from the kitchen.
Tallulah, school uniformed, big diva hair so blonde that it was almost white, a flick of kohl expertly applied at the corner of her eyes.
“I’m thick, not like you.” She kicked off her shoes.
“You’re not thick. Just lazy.”
She laughed and lay on her belly beside me, in front of the TV. She smelt of candy floss scent that she’d stolen from her mum. Tallulah was the sweetest thing.
There was the sound of the key in the door. I looked at Tallulah. Only her mum had a key. We could hear Ami’s voice, followed by a man’s laugh. A foreign sound in the flat. Kathy came out of the kitchen, tea towel in hand.
Ami stood in the doorway, flushed and excited, as if she was about to present a visiting dignitary.
“Kath, there’s someone here to see you.”
She stood aside. I didn’t recognise the man. He was bald and scarred. Kathy sat down on the sofa arm, looking the colour of a dirty dishrag.
“Oh, God,” he said, “aren’t you a bunch of princesses?”
“Kenny, when did you get out?” Kath asked.
“A little while ago.” He took off his jacket and threw it down. A snake tattoo coiled up his arm and disappeared under the sleeve of his t-shirt. It wasn’t the kind of body art I was used to. This hadn’t been driven into the skin in a fit of self
-loathing or by a ham fisted amateur. It was faded but beautiful. It rippled as Kenny moved, invigorated by his muscles.
“Come and hug me, Kath.”
She got up, robotic, and went to him, tolerating his embrace, her arms stiff by her sides.
“I’ve brought us something to celebrate.”
He handed her a plastic bag and she pulled out a bottle of vodka and a packet of Jammy Dodgers.
“Just like when we were kids, eh?” he grinned.
“See, Kenny’s got no hard feelings about you staying away.” Ami was keen to be involved. “He’s just glad to be home.”
They both ignored her.
“Now, girls, come and kiss your uncle. You first, Tallulah.”
“Well, go on.” Ami gave her a shove.
She pecked his cheek and then shot away, which seemed to amuse him. Then it was my turn. Kath stood close to us while Kenny held me at arm’s length.
“How old are you now, girl?”
“Eighteen.”
“You were born after I went inside.” He sighed. “You’ve got the family’s ugly gene like me and your mum but you’ll do.”
For what? I thought.
Kenny put his fleshy hand around Kath’s neck and pressed his forehead against hers. Kathy, who didn’t like kisses or cuddles from anyone, flinched. I’d never seen her touched so much.
“I’m home now. We’ll not talk about these past, dark years. It’ll be how it was before. Better. You’ll see. Us taking care of each other.”
*
Georgia’s unusual for a photographer in that she’s more beautiful than her models. They’re gap toothed, gawky things that only find luminosity through the lens. Georgia’s arresting in the flesh.
I hover beside our host who’s introducing me to everyone as though I’m a curio. We approach a group who talk too loudly, as if they’re the epicentre of the party.
“I find Georgia distant. And ambitious.”
“She lives on Martin’s Heath. In one of the old houses.”
“Bloody hell, is that family money?”
“Rosie, you’ve modelled for Georgia. Have you been there?”
“No.”
Rosie sounds so quiet and reflective that the pain of her unrequited love is palpable. At least I hope it’s unrequited.
“Have you seen her girlfriend?”
“Everyone, meet Eliza,” our host steps in before they have a chance to pronounce judgement on me within my earshot, “Georgia’s partner.”
I shake hands with each of them.
“Georgia’s last shoot made waves. And I didn’t realise that she was such a stunner.”
We all look over at Georgia. Among all the overdressed butterflies, she wears black trousers, a white shirt, and oxblood brogues.
“Don’t tell her that,” I smile. “She doesn’t like it.”
“Why? Doesn’t every woman want that?” The man falters, as if he’s just remembered that I’m a woman too.
These people with their interminable words. I came from a place where a slap sufficed.
“Don’t be dull,” I put him down. “She’s much more than her face.”
“What do you do, Eliza?” another one of them asks, unperturbed by my rudeness.
“I’m a herpetologist.”
They shudder with delicious revulsion.
I glance back to Georgia. A man with long blonde hair reaches out to touch her forearm and he shows her something on his tablet.
I’m a pretender in my own life, in this relationship. I know how my jealousy will play out when we get home. I’ll struggle to circumnavigate all the gentility and civility that makes me want to scream.
Eventually Georgia will say, What’s the matter? Just tell me instead of trying to pick a fight.
She’ll never be provoked, this gracious woman, to display any savagery of feeling. I should know better than to try and measure the breadth and depth of love by its noise and dramas but there are times that I crave it, as if it’s proof that love is alive.
*
Ami took Tallulah away with her the first night that Kenny came to the flat.
“But it’s a school night. And all my stuff’s here.”
“You’re not going to school tomorrow.” Ami picked up her handbag. “We’re going out with Kenny.”
Tallulah didn’t move.
“Mind your mum, there’s a good girl.” Kenny didn’t even look up.
After the front door closed, Kathy locked and chained it.
“Get your rucksack. Put some clothes in a bag. Don’t pack anything you don’t need.”
“Why?” I followed her into her bedroom.
“We’re leaving.”
“Why?”
“Just get your stuff.”
“What about college?”
Kathy tipped out drawers, rifling through the untidy piles that she’d made on the floor.
“What about Tallulah?”
She sank down on the bed.
“There’s always someone that I have to stay for. Mum. Ami. Tallulah.” She slammed her fist down on the duvet. “If it had been just us, we’d have been gone long ago.”
“Stay?”
She wasn’t listening to me anymore.
“I waited too long. I should’ve run when I had the chance. Fuck everyone.”
She lay down, her face to the wall. I tried to put my arms around her but she shrunk from me, which she always did when I touched her and which never failed to hurt me.
*
If we were his princesses then Kenny considered himself king.
“Kath, stop fussing and come and sit down. It’s good to be back among women. Without women, men are uncivilised creatures.” He winked at me. “Tell me about Ma’s funeral again, Kath.”
Ami sat beside him, looking up at him.
“There were black horses with plumes and brasses. Her casket was in a glass carriage.” Kath’s delivery was wooden.
“And all the boys were there?”
“Yes, Kenny. All the men, in their suits, gold sovereign rings, and tattoos.”
“Good,” he said, “I would’ve been offended otherwise. Those boys owe me and they know it. I did time for them. Do you know the story?”
“Bits,” Tallulah said.
“I told her, Kenny.” Ami was keen to show her allegiance.
“You were what, twelve?” He snorted. “You remember nothing. We did a job in Liverpool. A jeweller who lived in one of those massive houses around Sefton Park. We heard he was dealing in stolen diamonds. I went in first,” he thumped his chest. “At twenty-three I was much thinner back then, could get into all sorts of tight spots. I let the others in afterwards. We found his money but he kept insisting the diamonds were hidden in the fireplace, but his hidey hole was empty. He kept acting all surprised. He wouldn’t tell, no matter what.” Kenny shrugged. “Someone grassed. A copper picked me up near home. Under my coat, my shirt was covered in his blood. I kept my trap shut and did the time. The others were safe. Eighteen years inside. My only regret is what happened to Ma. And missing her funeral.”
“There were white flowers, everywhere, spelling out her name.” Ami said. He patted her arm in an absent way, like she was a cat mithering for strokes.
“I wish they’d let me out for it. Ma was a proper princess, girls. She was touched, God bless her, but she was a princess.”
Kath sat with her hands folded on her knees.
“Do you remember what Dad said when he was dying?”
Kath stayed quiet.
“He said, You’re the man of the house, Kenny. And you’re the mother, Kathy. Kenny, you have to look after these girls. Poor Ma, so fragile. When I heard about her stroke, I was beside myself. It was the shock of me being sent down that did it. Whoever grassed me up has to pay for that, too. I should’ve been here, taking care of you all.”
“I managed,” Kathy squeezed the words out.
“I know. I hate to think of you, nursing Ma when you also had a baby to look
after. You were meant for better things. We didn’t always live in this shithole, girls. We grew up in a big rambling house. You won’t remember much of it, Ami. Dad bred snakes. He was a specialist. And Ma, she was a real lady. They were educated people, not like ‘round here.”
The words stuck in my gut. ‘Round here was all I knew.
“Happy days, weren’t they, Mouse?” Kenny looked directly at Kathy, waiting.
“Mouse,” Ami laughed like she’d only just noticed Kathy’s big eyes and protruding ears, “I’d forgotten that.”
Mouse. A nickname that diminished her.
“What’s my pet name?” Ami pouted.
“You’re just Ami.” He said it like she was something flat and dead, not shifting his gaze from Kathy.
There it was. Even then, I could see that Kathy was at the centre of everything and Ami was just the means to reach her.
*
There’s a photograph in our bedroom that Georgia took of me while we were travelling around South America. It embarrasses me because of its dimensions and scares me, because Georgia has managed to make me look like some kind of modern Eve, desirable in a way that I’ll never be again. My hair is loose and uncombed and the python around my shoulders is handsome in dappled, autumnal shades. My expression is of unguarded pleasure.
“Let’s stay here, forever,” I said to her when she put the lens cap back on, “It’s paradise.”
What I was really thinking was What would it be like to change, forever, and have the whole jungle as my domain?
“Do you love it that much?” Georgia replied in a way that suggested she didn’t. “And put him down. Poor thing. If he’s caught he’ll end up as a handbag.”
So it is that serpents are reviled when it’s man that is repulsive.
*
I got off the bus at the end of Argyll Street and walked towards home. Kenny was sat on a plastic chair outside The Saddle pub, drinking a pint. He was waiting for me.
“What have you been doing today?” He abandoned his drink and followed me.
“Biology.” I was at college, in town.
“Clever girl. That’s from your grandparents. I used to be smart like that. You wouldn’t think it to look at me.”
There was an odd, puppyish eagerness to Kenny as he bounced along beside me. I darted across the road when there was a gap in the traffic. The railway line was on the other side of the fence, down a steep bank. Part way down the embankment was a rolled up carpet, wet and rotted, and the shopping trolley that it had been transported in.