Skylarks

by Karen Gregory

  I hear Annabel’s intake of breath at the other end, then it’s like a storm breaking. ‘Why has everything got to be a competition? Everyone’s the same! Did you ever consider you might have things I could never have? Like parents who love you for you, unconditionally. Not as some sort of fucking trophy?’ She’s shouting now, the sound of it shocking me into silence. ‘You know, it didn’t even cross his mind you might actually like me for me,’ she says, and her voice is bitter like mine.

  But I’m still so angry. ‘And how hard did you try to convince him? You’re the one who’s too scared to do anything that might threaten your oh-so-perfect life that you pretend you hate anyway. You’re terrified of even thinking about letting go of your massive bit of the orange, even when –’

  ‘What on earth –’ She’s more controlled now and posher than I’ve ever heard her. It feels like a weapon. ‘– has an orange got to do with anything?’

  ‘Everything. It’s got everything do to with it. But you’ll never get that because you won’t open your eyes.’

  I hear her breathing hard down the phone, picture her fighting for composure.

  But I only have one thing left to say.

  ‘You remember the talk we had at the stones? About being brave?’ My voice is starting to crack, but I plough on. ‘Well, I did do the research and I decided what I want to be. I’m going to become a conservationist,’ I say, and then my voice gives in completely.

  I press the button to end the call without waiting for her reply.

  Heartbreak isn’t like in songs. This pain is too big for music. I stay in bed for a whole day and then I find I can’t keep still. I spend a lot of time on the Downs and in the tree in the garden, trying to find comfort in the branches, the open sky and the birds, but nothing helps. It’s like someone’s ripped out my insides and had a good stomp about.

  A couple of weeks in, I cut my hair, slicing off strands with vicious snips of the scissors. Then I dye the remainder bright purple. Mum gets really pissed off about the dye marks on the bathroom rug, but even she relents when she sees my face. About the only person I can stand to be around is Jack, and now it’s the summer holidays and I have nowhere else to be. I spend a lot of time with him on the PlayStation, shooting stuff, which kind of helps.

  I go to see Kelly and tell her everything.

  She listens right through and then she simply says, ‘What a bitch,’ and holds me while I cry.

  The anger comes back slowly, then all at once, but this time it has a different texture.

  It finds me in my dreams, where Annabel’s face is so vivid. I feel it in the sharpness of the wind up on the Downs. And it lifts my head up, slows my tears until they dry altogether and in their place is a cold fury that feels strong.

  I can’t change what’s happened with Annabel, can’t undo what she said, how stupid I still feel. But there’s one thing I can still do and that’s the campaign. Every time I picture Annabel’s dad’s face on those steps, or the way Mrs H simply went along with him because of who he was without even talking to me first, it makes that fury inside harden that bit more until I feel like I’ve got icicles shooting out of my fingers.

  Dad’s still in bed most days and Mum is working every single shift she can manage, even though it’s not going to do any good. The eviction process is rumbling on, a date set for the end of September.

  One day I go through every single bit of information on the campaign that I can find on Jamie’s laptop.

  I’m waiting at the kitchen table for Jamie when he gets in from work that night, a notebook and his laptop open in front of me.

  ‘How you doing, chick?’ he says, then takes in the stuff on the table, the hardness in my eyes. ‘Like that is it?’

  I nod and he sits next to me, starts to read the list I’ve made over my shoulder. ‘You’ve been busy.’

  ‘I had to do something.’

  Jamie nods slowly, then gives me a long look and I suddenly see it again in his eyes, the thing he backed off from telling me before.

  ‘You know I would never say I told you so,’ he begins and I raise an eyebrow at this, because he totally would, but he’s still talking. ‘There was a reason I said what I did about Annabel. You remember when I was working up at the old place? Well, I didn’t just leave for no reason.’

  ‘Figured as much,’ I say.

  Jamie stares off for a while. ‘I really thought I had it made there. Anton was going to teach me everything, and I’d get my own restaurant eventually.’

  ‘I remember.’ I could hardly forget; Jamie used to talk about nothing else. The old Jamie. ‘So what happened?’

  ‘Mr Campbell. Or his son at least.’

  I frown. Mr Campbell was the guy who owned the hotel; Anton was the Head Chef but he didn’t actually own the whole place.

  ‘I don’t think you said –’ Then I do remember suddenly, Jamie mentioning a guy called Tarquin, mainly because we all thought the name was hysterical. ‘Didn’t there used to be a guy called himself Quinn?’

  ‘That’s him. Tarquin Campbell.’ Jamie narrows his eyes. ‘One of the Edrington types, although he’d already left there. Pretty sure he’d have been booted out if it hadn’t been for Daddy’s money. Anyway. He was a posh twat all right. He’d come swanning in when we were doing service, getting in everyone’s way, bragging about how he knew his cuts of meat or some bollocks. And we all had to tolerate him, even if Anton threw him out once for wrecking a plate just before it was due to go out.’

  ‘Sounds like a knobber.’

  ‘Oh, he was more than that. He’d mess with the waitresses as well, try and grab their boobs or arse as they went by, and everyone was too scared to say anything because one girl did and she got the sack. I used to give them the nod when he was coming, so they’d go the other way.’

  I raise my eyebrows, but he’s not done.

  ‘Anyway, one night after service had finished I was walking out with one of the waitresses, Gemma, and he did his usual trick of grabbing her arse as she went by, and the look on her face … I lost it, shoved him up against the wall and threatened to smack him one if he carried on. After that, I knew I wasn’t going to last there long and funnily enough, about a week later at the end of one of my shifts, Mr Campbell marches in with a coat, shouting he wanted to know whose it was. Well, it was mine, wasn’t it and guess what was in the pocket? A nice shiny bag of white powder. He said if I went quietly – without my wages of course – he wouldn’t call the police. Didn’t want the scandal in his establishment. God, he looked at me like I was a piece of scum when he told me I wasn’t going to get a reference and he’d see to it I’d never work in any high-end restaurant again. And that little scrote stood behind him, giving me these looks like he knew someone like him would always win and someone like me would always lose.’

  ‘Jesus Christ, Jamie. I had no idea.’

  I do remember him being out of work, how he went everywhere before he got the job at The Olde Inne – for way less cash than he’d been on before.

  ‘Don’t tell Dad, OK?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘I’m only telling you now because I think it’s important you know what people like them are like. They’re all the same and you shouldn’t ever forget it. And they’ve got the dice rigged. Anyone who doesn’t think it’s us against them is deluding themselves.’

  The way he says ‘us against them’ reminds me so much of Deal that it makes me say, ‘Then you met Deal.’

  Jamie’s face brightens. ‘Yeah. He taught me a thing or two for sure.’

  And suddenly I can see what a big gap Deal filled for Jamie, after he lost Anton and the restaurant. I sling my arm around him and he hugs me back. ‘I’m sorry, Jamie.’

  ‘I just wish I could’ve stayed there, you know? Someone like that Quinn knob gets as many chances as they want, but that was my one shot.’

  I stare at him, at the mixture of pain and humiliation on his face, and I know what he’s feeling, because that’s where I
am too.

  He blinks a couple of times and then says, ‘It’s all right. I’m over it now. But it taught me a lesson about people like that. I kind of hoped I was wrong, about you and Annabel. I’m not pleased I was right.’

  I put my head on his shoulder. ‘God. I can’t believe you never said.’

  ‘I was embarrassed as well. The whole thing, it made me feel really small inside.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘And I swore to myself I wouldn’t let anyone make me feel small like that again.’

  ‘I’m glad you told me.’

  We sit for a while, my head still on his shoulder, and then he stirs himself and points to the stuff spread out on the table. ‘So what’s all this then?’

  ‘I guess it’s like you said. I don’t want to be small either. I don’t want to just leave here without a fight. And I’ve been doing some thinking. Petitions and demos aren’t going to do anything. They’re like, I don’t know, a fly on a horse. Annoying, but doesn’t exactly hurt.’ I point to the list I’ve made. ‘But some of these things, they might. I don’t know if they’ll stop the eviction – probably not, but we can at least cause some pain, make it harder for him. That would be worth it on its own.’

  Jamie’s nodding. ‘Show them we’re not flies they can squash without bothering to even think about it.’

  ‘Yeah.’ I square my shoulders and look at him. ‘Why shouldn’t we show them we’ve at least got some bite?’

  ‘Well, then.’ He grins at me suddenly. ‘I’m in.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  I don’t feel nervous. Instead I’m filled with this coldly buzzing energy as I go through the huge iron gates of Edrington’s with Jamie, Deal and Kelly the evening of the Grease showcase. Pete’s already inside. He wasn’t one hundred per cent happy about the idea, but Kelly talked him round, though she’s sworn him to secrecy where Ananya’s concerned.

  We’ve been working all week on the main event, which is going off on Saturday, so this is kind of a warm-up. We want to send Edward Huntington a sign and where better to do it than on his home turf?

  The musical’s already started; we didn’t want to get there too early and get spotted, so we’re going in now. Kelly talks us past the person in the main office and leads us through the grounds towards the theatre, which is in its own separate building. Edrington is something else: all cold stone pillars, red brick and a beautiful central square of grass. It’s like stepping into some costume drama, going back hundreds of years to when people had servants and you were either born rich or a peasant, and nothing you could do would change that. Sometimes it feels like nothing’s different on that front. I remember suddenly that first evening I saw Annabel, how out of place I felt in the restaurant. The way I thought about that school trip and the servant costume.

  But things have changed. They do change. It might not be easy but we don’t have to put up and shut up any more.

  I wonder whether Annabel and her parents really will be here tonight. His name’s on the bursaries so we’ve assumed he is, but what with how much he’s been in the papers this week, he might want to keep a low profile. I’m betting not though; he’s styled it out the last few weeks, giving no comment beyond some rubbish about regeneration and local prosperity and multiple mentions of his charity work and the library. I actually think he believes he’s in the right.

  You see, people like him don’t simply refuse to see the rest of us. They can’t. As we go under a stone arch and into the theatre, I wonder if maybe I’d be like it too, if I grew up with all this.

  It’s huge, compared to the tiny Drama studio at our school, with proper seats and a lighting rig and big stage. There’s a song just finishing.

  We don’t stop when we get inside, but keep walking, taking out our signs and holding them above our heads as we go down the central aisle. They’ve all got one picture on them: Edward Huntington’s face and the words Local Hero? printed across it. Deal’s right in the front, but tonight Jamie wanted to do the talking.

  The song finishes with a flourish as we stride up on stage and line up in front of the open-mouthed kids in their leather jackets and jeans. The last notes die away and then there’s total silence. I can’t see anything except lights, only rows of dark heads, but I know, I can feel, Annabel’s there in the audience with her parents.

  ‘What on earth?’ I hear someone say and then Jamie starts to speak.

  ‘You don’t know us, but we see you. We live here like you, but ours isn’t the same town as yours. Our families clean your toilets, cook your food, pick up your rubbish. We keep your lives turning and you don’t even notice us unless you have to. And now one of you –’ He holds up his sign with Annabel’s dad’s face, ‘– wants to make us homeless so he can turn a fast profit. I’m talking about Edward Huntington and his company, LCA, buying up the entire Cherry Tree Estate and evicting the families who’ve lived here for years.’

  Jamie takes a breath to go on, but a tall suited man is on the stage now, catching at his arm, saying, ‘You need to leave before I call the police.’

  Jamie shakes him off roughly enough that the man takes a step back and I can feel this worried thrill go through the crowd.

  One of the lads in costume behind us says, ‘Look, I think you should –’

  ‘I think you should shut your mouth,’ Deal snaps, and stares him down. I look out into the crowd again, still holding my sign up, and feel like my heart should be going fast, I should be feeling something other than this strange calm, but I can’t seem to.

  ‘We’ll go when we’re ready but first we’re here to tell you, Mr Huntington, that we’re not going quietly, cos you know what? This is our town too, and we have just as much right as you to live here.’

  Jamie casts one more look at the rows of shadowy faces staring back at us and then says, with bitterness in his voice, ‘Enjoy the rest of your evening.’

  He marches out and we follow. Behind us this babble of noise erupts. A moment later, I hear someone yell my name. I turn to see Ananya, hair teased into big curls, leather jacket on, her make-up smudged, running out after us. ‘Oi! Joni!’ she shouts.

  More people are coming out behind her: the man in the suit who I think must be a teacher, some of the parents. And then I see Annabel and her parents. Annabel’s face is white, her dad’s flushed with anger.

  Ananya gets to us first. ‘What the hell was that?’ she yells.

  ‘We were making a point,’ I say.

  ‘Well, thanks very much. I worked on that play all fricking summer and now it’s all wrecked because of you. Didn’t you stop to think about anyone except yourself?’

  I give a short bark of laughter at that, but then Annabel’s dad walks up and he’s not looking at me, he’s looking at Jamie.

  ‘You don’t intimidate me in the slightest,’ he’s saying, but I’m not sure. There’s the tiniest flicker of something in his eyes as he says it. Deal spots it too and pushes forward.

  ‘Oh yeah? Well, we will before we’re done. Don’t you worry.’

  I’m getting anxious now. Someone’s talking about the police behind me, Deal and Annabel’s dad are practically nose to nose. I tug on Jamie’s arm.

  ‘Come on. We’ve done what we wanted.’

  Out of the corner of my eye I see Annabel’s mum holding on to Annabel’s wrist. I’m not going to look at her, I refuse to even meet her eyes, but the next moment I can’t help it.

  She’s just standing there, looking at me, and I can’t work out her expression from this distance, only that she’s thinking hard. I can’t seem to look away. Then Jamie moves his arm to my back and steers me away.

  ‘That’s it?’ Ananya yells. Then to Kelly, ‘Should’ve known you’d do something like this.’

  Kelly stiffens next to me, then says, ‘It’s not about you.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’

  I glance at Ananya and see she’s almost ready to cry. For a second I feel bad for her and the others up on the stage who just had their big mo
ment ruined, but then I shut it down, mutter, ‘Come on,’ to Kelly, and keep going.

  Behind me, I think I hear Annabel’s voice and it sets off a jolt of pain, but I walk on, head up, following my brother, until the pain is replaced by an almost brutal feeling of triumph.

  Outside, we walk faster in case they do call the police, but like Deal says, we had tickets and all we did was stage a ‘peaceful protest’. That feeling of triumph is growing as we walk, the initial nervous reaction being replaced by shouts and laughter.

  ‘Did you see his face?’

  ‘You were brilliant, Jamie.’

  Then Deal: ‘Next time maybe our protest shouldn’t be so peaceful.’

  And before I can ask him what he means, Kelly starts up a song and we all join in and we’re singing together and laughing, high on adrenalin and this feeling like all the rules we got told were for us and not them might be breakable after all.

  Even with my crumpled-up heart, it feels good.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  We don’t stop after the Edrington play. I’m working flat out updating social media, and getting people to sign the petition, which is growing faster now. I can’t be bothered with school any more, even though the new year’s started. I go in sometimes, to get Mum off my back, but I mainly sit in the common room working on the campaign. I’ve changed my tune on trolls too. Every time I get an abusive message, I reply with the most cutting things I can think of, which takes hours but gives me a strange sense of satisfaction. Sometimes the abuse gets personal now my face has been in the papers. I get called a bitch dyke so often it almost starts to feel meaningless. Almost. It’s like I’ve wrapped a stone block around myself and every threat just makes it thicker.

  We got Pete to film the whole Edrington protest on his phone and I post it online with a link to our website. Jemima picks it up and then she’s in the papers too because she’s just won some award, and suddenly things are taking off. The petition is getting more signatures every hour and Douglas Lattimer is stopped on his doorstep by journalists. I feel a massive stab of triumph seeing him squirm on the local news as he refuses to answer questions about his involvement, but the story is growing, taking on its own life, a many-headed monster.