That made me feel sicker than ever. Kendall was usually so shy and strange with anyone new. But now he was holding Jake’s free hand, skipping along happily, George carefully tucked under his armpit. He was babbling non-stop, most of it nonsense, some me-and-George saga. Jake wasn’t even listening, but every time he gave a little grunt Kendall’s face lit up delightedly.
Jake’s other hand was holding Mum’s.
I wanted them to look ridiculous as a couple.
They looked great together. Mum seemed so different when she was around Jake. When she was near Dad Mum was always twitching, scared because the slightest thing could set him off. She was always glancing anxiously at him. She never dared look at anyone else. Dad went berserk if he thought she was eyeing up any other men.
But now Mum mucked about and giggled and sang little snatches of song. Heaps of men turned to look at her. Some of them said stuff. Mum waved and blew them kisses. Jake grinned and waved too. His new silver bangle slid up his slim arm when he waved.
It was a present. Mum bought it for him. She bought me some sparkly stud earrings that looked like real diamonds. She bought Kendall a real wristwatch even though he can’t tell the time yet. She bought herself a moonstone pendant. She got Jake to fasten it round her neck as if he’d bought it for her.
‘Aren’t moonstones meant to be unlucky?’ he said.
‘Not on me. I’m Lady Luck,’ said Mum. ‘Don’t you like it?’
‘It’s pretty, very pretty. You’re pretty,’ said Jake. He kissed her neck where he’d fastened the clasp.
‘Um! Look at Mum and Jake, they’re kissing,’ said Kendall.
It was obvious what was going to happen next.
‘Maybe it would be a good idea to rearrange the flat a bit,’ said Mum. ‘I’ve been thinking. You and Kendall might like your own den, more of a play space. So how about us turning the bedroom into your room. It’s purple too, your favourite colour.’
‘Lilac isn’t purple.’
‘It’s light purple, Miss Picky. Anyway, I was thinking of getting a little portable telly for you two. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Then the living room could be more – well, my room.’
‘And you want to put a socking great bed in it for you and Jake,’ I said coldly.
‘No I don’t! Well. I was thinking about one of them sofa beds. Then if Jake should want to stay over . . .’
‘Why can’t he stay in his own place?’
‘He hasn’t exactly got his own place,’ said Mum. ‘He’s staying with a friend at the moment.’
‘Why can’t he get his own place, then?’ I said.
‘Because he hasn’t got any money. He’s a student.’
‘They give them rooms in the university, don’t they?’
‘Only the first year. For God’s sake, Lola Rose, give it a rest. He’s coming to live with us and that’s that. I don’t see why you’ve got such a problem with it. We’re in love, can’t you see?’
‘He doesn’t love you. He’s just shacking up with us because he hasn’t got anywhere else. And you spend a fortune on him. Our fortune.’
Mum slapped me straight across the face. Kendall was watching. He cried. I didn’t cry. I stared Mum out.
‘You only slapped me because you know it’s true.’
‘I slapped you because you’re a spoilt little cow,’ Mum snapped. ‘What’s the matter with you, Lola Rose? You can’t be jealous, can you?’
‘What, jealous of Jake?’ I folded my arms. She was asking for it. ‘Well, he is more my age than yours.’
I stepped back smartly in case she tried another slap.
She was meaner than that.
‘Don’t kid yourself you’ll ever get a man like Jake,’ she said, looking me up and down.
I didn’t want her to see me cry. I slammed straight out of the house and down the path. I hoped she’d yell after me to come back but she didn’t. So I went on walking, though I didn’t really know where I was going.
I knew my way to school, I knew my way to the chippy and the Chinese, I knew my way to Mum’s pub, I knew my way to the video shop. And I knew my way to Harpreet’s house.
I could go and see Harpreet. She was my best friend now. We had our own special handshake and we each wore half of a Friends Forever locket. We told each other all sorts of secrets. We had very long whispered conversations about sex and often ended up giggling helplessly. But I didn’t want to tell her about Mum and Jake. It was the one thing I couldn’t talk about. My family.
Harpreet talked about her family all the time. She quarrelled with her brothers and sisters sometimes and she argued a little bit with her mum and dad, but they never had a proper row. They never ever hit each other.
I wished I’d been born part of Harpreet’s family. I wished Harpreet’s dad was my dad. I loved the way he put his arm round Harpreet and cuddled her close and called her his little girl. My dad had done all that with me. He called me all sorts of special things when he was in a good mood. I was his Princess Rosycheeks, his Fairy Doll, his Jay-Jay Jam Doughnut. But the good mood could change to bad, and then he’d call me other stuff, short, sharp, ugly words that stuck to me like slime.
I couldn’t imagine Harpreet’s dad turning like that. I asked her once to tell me the very worst thing he’d ever done to her. She thought and thought and then said he’d shouted at her when she was little because she’d run into the road. She’d cried and then he cried and gave her a great big hug.
Harpreet laughed and said he was a silly softie old dad, though he could be horribly strict about bedtimes and it didn’t look like he was ever going to let her have a boyfriend. It seemed to me he was the best dad in the world.
I wasn’t so sure about Harpreet’s mum. She wasn’t really pretty, though she had beautiful big eyes with long eyelashes. She had a way of rolling her eyes and sighing that made me nervous.
She seemed to be quite friendly with my mum, but she rolled her eyes expressively afterwards. I don’t think she liked it that my mum got on very well with Harpreet’s dad. She never said anything but she didn’t need to. She just looked at my mum’s hair or her tight top or her short skirt, she listened to my mum’s giggle and her tales of what went on down the pub – and those eyes rolled like marbles.
I’d hoped I’d grow up little and pretty like Mum. I’d so hoped it might happen when I turned into Lola Rose. But now I wondered how I’d kidded myself. Mum had made it obvious. I wasn’t ever going to look like her.
I’d end up like Auntie Barbara instead.
I walked straight past Harpreet’s house. I walked faster and faster, as if I was trying to run away from myself. I wasn’t even sure who I was any more. I couldn’t believe how quickly Mum had settled into this new life. How could she fall in and out of love so easily? She acted like all those corny old love songs she sang, changing as quickly as a jukebox. She stood by her man but he was so cruel so it was all over and she did her crying in the rain and she would survive but then she met this stranger and then it was passionate kisses.
I thought of Mum and Jake kissing.
Then I heard kissing noises behind me. Loud, slurpy, silly lip-smacking.
It was a gang of boys hanging about outside the video shop. I knew one of them, a horrible boy called Peter who was in my class at school. He kept trying to pull all the girls’ skirts up. He had a very pink face and big nostrils in a flat nose. Harpreet and I called him Peter Piglet.
‘Give us a kiss then, Lola Rose,’ he called.
I pulled a face at him. ‘Get lost, Peter Piglet,’ I said fiercely.
Peter went pinker than ever. The other boys laughed, and made more kissing noises. They were mostly older than Peter. That Ross was with them. He was famous in Flexley Park. All the girls fancied him. He was only thirteen but he got sixteen-year-old girls wanting to go out with him.
He was looking at me too. ‘Yeah, fancy a snog, Lola Rose?’ he said.
I didn’t know if he was joking or not. The other boys were sti
ll making kissing noises.
I hurtled down the street away from them. I ran and ran away from their raucous laughter. I tripped and fell over and they laughed more. I tore the knees of my new jeans and got the sleeves of my beautiful furry jacket dirty.
I was sobbing by the time I got home. I wanted to make it up with Mum and have a cuddle with her – but Jake was there.
‘Where’ve you been, Lola Rose? Don’t you dare flounce off like that! I’ve been dead worried about you. Are you crying?’
‘No!’
I tried to go into the bedroom but she caught hold of me.
‘What’s up with you? Look at the state of you! Your new jeans! And your jacket – look at the cuffs, they’re filthy!’
I cried more then, but Mum rubbed at it with a damp tea cloth and cleaned up both cuffs. The jeans were so badly ripped at the knees she said she couldn’t sew them.
‘Maybe I can,’ said Jake.
I thought he was joking, but he cut up an old flowery shirt he said he didn’t want any more and made appliquéd flower patches on both knees.
‘Wow,’ said Mum, ruffling Jake’s hair. ‘You’re a man of many talents.’
‘Men don’t sew,’ said Kendall.
‘He’s a man, all right,’ said Mum, kissing Jake. ‘That’s brilliant! Will you do mine too, darling? Lola Rose, don’t you just love your new jeans! What do you say to Jake?’
‘Thanks,’ I said, as if he’d simply passed me the cornflakes. But I was secretly thrilled. I watched carefully to see how he did the appliqué stitch.
‘I’ll show you how to do it,’ said Jake.
‘It’s OK,’ I said, shrugging. I’d already worked it out.
I was determined not to be won over. I didn’t see why Jake and I had to bond like Superglue just because Mum was nuts about him. She kept nagging at me to show him my scrapbook. I caught her lugging it out of the bedroom to show him herself. I flew at her and tugged it out of her arms.
‘It’s private!’ I shouted.
‘Ooh, what you got in there, then, Lola Rose? You been sticking in mucky pictures?’
The edge of my scrapbook had got bumped and the spine was torn a little in the struggle. I was furious.
‘You’re the only one who let guys take mucky pictures!’ I said.
Mum went fiery red, even flushing down her neck. ‘I never!’ she shouted, like a little girl.
‘Mucky pictures?’ said Jake. ‘Oh Victoria, you bad girl!’
‘They weren’t mucky,’ Mum protested. She gave me a shove. ‘I did some modelling once, that’s all. Glamour pics.’
‘Glamour!’ said Jake, wiggling his eyebrows. ‘Oh, show me, show me!’
‘They were in these mags ages ago. I threw them all out,’ Mum said quickly. She sighed, looking at Kendall and me. ‘When I was young, before the kids ruined my figure.’
‘I think it’s gorgeous,’ said Jake.
Mum beamed and nodded her head at me, as if to say, So there!
‘Why can’t you be happy for me?’ she hissed in bed that night.
It looked like it was going to be the last night we were all tucked up together, Mum and Kendall and me. Jake had gone back to his mate’s flat to gather his stuff together and have a few drinks. He was moving in with us tomorrow.
I didn’t reply. I pretended to be asleep, but Mum pulled me over onto her lap.
‘Do you really hate Jake?’ she asked.
‘He’s OK.’
‘Oh come on, he’s flipping gorgeous! And he’s so kind too. That’s what I can’t get over. Never loses his rag, never acts jealous. I thought you’d really landed me in it, going on about my glamour photos, but look how lovely he was. He’s a man in a million, Lola Rose.’
‘You’ve only known him five minutes, Mum.’
‘I feel like I’ve known him all my life. The moment I set eyes on him I knew. We clicked, just like that.’
‘You clicked with Dad. You clicked with the footballer. You click with any guy that’s going,’ I mumbled into the pillow.
Mum heard me. ‘I’ll click you right out of this bed if you don’t shut up,’ she said.
But she couldn’t shut up herself.
‘I couldn’t wish for a sweeter guy. I never dreamt I could be so lucky. I’m getting on a bit now, I’ve got you two kids, my boobs are getting all saggy—’
‘You’re nuts,’ I said.
‘No, really.’ She sat up in bed and stuck her chest out, feeling herself. ‘Oh God, they are! I wonder how much a boob implant is. A thousand? More? I could afford it now!’
I snorted.
‘What’s your problem? It’s my money and I’ve spent a fortune on you two.’
‘And Jake,’ I said. ‘I bet he didn’t buy his new cowboy boots himself. Or that new mobile. Or his new Walkman. Or that big set of oil paints.’
‘He’s an artist for God’s sake.’ Mum peered down at her breasts. ‘Maybe I’d better have that implant if he’s going to do a nude portrait of me. Do you think it hurts terribly? Would they have to cut you right open?’
‘Oh no, of course not! They just unbutton your boobs, pop in the implant, and Bob’s your uncle,’ I said sarcastically. ‘You’re so stupid, Mum. Of course they cut you open. They cut right along underneath and then—’
‘OK, don’t go on about it,’ said Mum. ‘Maybe I’ll put up with my boobs the way they are. Jake doesn’t seem to have any complaints. That’s what I mean, Lola Rose. He’s so good to me. You don’t think I was better off with your dad, do you?’
‘I think you’d be better off without any bloke,’ I said.
‘You’re starting to sound just like your Auntie Barbara,’ said Mum. ‘Watch out you don’t start to look like her too!’ She started poking my tummy. ‘Ooh yes, podgy-wodgy!’
‘Give over!’ I said. ‘You stop that, saggy-baggy!’
We tickled and poked, squealing with laughter. Kendall woke up and joined in. We had a wrestling match until Kendall fell right out of bed with a thump and the old lady downstairs started banging on her ceiling.
We hauled Kendall back into bed and then the three of us cuddled up close. We went to sleep just like that. I didn’t even have the shark dream.
Jake moved in with us. Mum turned the living room into their room. She bought them a brand-new sofa bed. No community stores shabby old stuff this time. Mum bought a computer too. She pretended it was a present for Kendall and me. But it was Jake who sat at it all evening, playing games, while Mum was out working at the pub.
Kendall liked to loll against him. Sometimes Jake let him have a go.
‘What about you, Lola Rose?’
‘No thanks, it’s boring,’ I said.
I shut myself in my bedroom with my scrap book. Mum had bought me a big pile of birthday cards, lovely flowers and seasides and sunsets and rainbows and fairy princess ladies with very long curly hair. They were brand-new birthday cards specially for me to cut up and stick in my scrapbook.
She bought them to stop me nagging her about the money. I’d found the envelope with the lottery winnings hidden under her tights. I’d peeped inside and panicked. There was hardly anything left. A fistful of five-pound notes. That was all.
I knelt there, Mum’s tights squiggled all around me like black snakes. I felt so scared.
I stayed up and tackled Mum about it when she got back from the pub.
‘Shut up, Lola Rose!’ she said. She didn’t want Jake to hear. ‘How dare you nose round my things!’ she hissed in my ear. ‘It’s my money anyway. It was my lottery ticket.’
‘It’s not anyone’s money now. It’s all gone.’
‘Gone on lovely things for all of us,’ said Mum. ‘Now go to your bedroom this minute, you ungrateful little whatsit.’
I stormed off furiously. How could Mum be so stupid? What if she lost her job and couldn’t get another? What if Jake started getting drunk and hitting her and we had to do another runner? The lottery money had made me feel so much safer.
&n
bsp; I decided I wasn’t speaking to Mum any more. But then she bought me the birthday cards and I couldn’t stay cross. I spent hours cutting out and arranging and sticking. I wore a little groove at the side of my middle finger through gripping the scissors.
Kendall teased me because my mouth opened and shut as I snipped. ‘Like a fish,’ he said, and he made George attack me hungrily.
I was so startled I snipped straight through my favourite fairy princess. I made a great fuss and Kendall cried. I decided I didn’t care. I found an African plains picture of giraffes and started creating a tribe of strange giraffe-girls, their abundant hair tumbling down their long spotted necks.
I called to Kendall, offering to tell him a giraffe-girl fairy story.
‘I’m busy,’ he shouted back triumphantly. ‘I’m playing on the computer with Jake.’
I whispered bad swear words. Kendall liked being with Jake much more than being with me. So did Mum. They didn’t seem to need me much any more.
I snipped snipped snipped at my magazine, playing guillotines. Heads tumbled into my lap. I crumpled them all together and threw them into the far corner of the room.
Well, I didn’t need them.
I didn’t need anyone. I was Lola Rose.
I just wished I looked more like my idea of Lola Rose.
I mooned in front of the mirror, experimenting with ways of doing my hair. I hunched my shoulders right up under my ears so that my hair seemed longer. I tugged at it, encouraging it to grow. Maybe next month, or the month after, or the one after that, it would have grown right down my back, fairy princess style.
I stole into the bathroom and squirted it with Mum’s hairspray. Mum was so lucky having such thick hair. I could grow mine right down to the ground but it would always stay thin and wispy. It lay limp against my head now no matter how I tried to fluff it up.
I gave up on my hair and tried my face. I’d mucked about with make-up before, putting glitter on my eyelids and gloss on my lips, but I’d always wiped it off when Dad was due home. He said he didn’t like to see his little girl all tarted up.
Lola Rose Page 9