‘I’ll stay in my room,’ I said, knowing I sounded sulky, but not quite able to stop.
I sat cross-legged on my bed, listening to the music and chatting of the Dead Kids Group downstairs. Way too much laughter and fun when you realise these people became friends only because the vicar got them together after their kids died.
Or husbands or wives died – whatever. Either way, someone died young to make them sad. And now it’s like, they’ve known each other so long, they have parties.
I wonder what the dead kids would think, looking down/up from heaven/hell.
I once said something like that to Mum. That the parties sounded like people were having too much fun.
‘It’s such a relief,’ Mum said, ‘to be with people who get it. Something so big changes your relationship with your friends because they can’t understand. It was a lonely time.’
‘It doesn’t sound lonely now,’ I’d said.
With the sound of chatting and laughter downstairs, I sat on my bed with some drawing paper. I cut it carefully into a square, and then folded it, copying the way Kirsty’s paper was folded.
I slotted my fingers and thumbs into my new spy fortune teller. ‘What should I do tonight?’
I moved the paper with my fingers and made my choices.
Morse Code. 4. Eavesdrop on someone.
I sighed. I folded the fortune teller into its resting position and placed it onto my bedroom table.
I sat on the landing, tucked behind the top of the stairs so I was invisible. Hoping no one needed to come upstairs to the toilet.
‘She was well out of order, saying that,’ a man said. ‘Well out of order.’
‘And what did you say to that?’ a woman in a green skirt said.
‘I told her, that’s not how I operate.’
‘Fair enough,’ Green Skirt said. ‘I don’t like having a female boss myself. They’re so much harder to work for. Women can be so bitchy.’
‘Exactly. And you know me, I’m the kind of person who says things straight.’
I heard footsteps at the base of the staircase. I jumped up and hurried to my room.
When the toilet had flushed, I waited a minute and came out again.
‘But she shouldn’t have been so bossy. And you know me,’ the man was saying, ‘I’m the kind of person who hates unfairness.’
There was a pause.
‘Shame about the football,’ Green Skirt said.
‘Yes.’
There was a pause.
‘How’s Fiona doing now?’ Green Skirt said.
I wondered why she was asking the man – you know me, I’m the kind of man who knows about other people’s kids – but it made more sense when Mum’s voice replied, ‘Oh. You know.’
I licked my lips.
‘A proper handful,’ Mum added.
I wondered whether to get angry, but thought – fair enough.
‘She’s started watching Gardeners’ World and reading the newspaper every day, and I’m not sure what I feel about that. And glasses must be in fashion at school because she wears hers all the time now.’
I pushed my glasses back up my nose.
‘She wanders round the house in those glasses like a little skinny owl,’ Mum continued. ‘Quiet for ages, then piping up with a fact about the constitution of Ukraine.’
I thought about this. Yep. Sounded like me.
I was pleased Mum had noticed.
‘Is she still . . . you know?’ – Green Skirt had put on a sad voice – don’t put on your sad voice for me, Green Skirt – ‘The stuff at school?’
‘She’s OK.’ Mum sighed. ‘Still a bit of a loner. Though she does have one good friend and he’s worth his weight in gold. So nice and patient.’
I thought of the last time I’d seen Lewis, running away from me in the corridor. I looked at my feet.
‘I worry about her a lot,’ Mum said. ‘How she drives nice kids away.’
Sometimes, when I’m not around, I want my parents to be thinking about me. And then I find out they were thinking about me and I think – oh.
‘She pushes all the boundaries. She acts out’ – don’t tell them about the monkey bars don’t tell them about the monkey bars don’t tell them about the monkey bars – ‘and she wants to know everything. Always listening at doorways. She never misses a trick.’
Never misses a trick. I felt my chest swell. Yes.
‘It’s not uncommon,’ Green Skirt said. ‘Dr Ali told me kids who’ve had traumatic childhoods are often very astute when it comes to—’
‘What?’
At the tone of Mum’s voice, the whole room went quiet.
I leaned back against the wall. Whoa.
‘Gail, I—’
‘She hasn’t had a traumatic childhood.’ Mum’s voice was cold.
I felt sorry for Green Skirt.
‘She wasn’t even here.’ Mum’s words were pointier than usual. ‘She’s had a very happy childhood. We dealt with everything long before she was born.’
‘I just meant, it would be hard, having parents who, with the best will in the world, would find having another kid—’
‘Are you saying I’ve messed up my child?’
‘Gail. No.’
She was, though. Green Skirt was.
‘You know I didn’t mean anything, Gail, I was just making conversation.’
At the sound of footsteps on the stairs, I scurried back to my room and threw myself onto the bed.
I didn’t want to think about what Mum had said, so I picked up my fortune teller and slotted in my fingers and thumbs.
Double Mirror. 2. Practise walking with a limp.
I nodded firmly and stood up. I made my left leg heavy and dragged it after me, deciding maybe I wouldn’t eavesdrop again for a while.
But I didn’t have to try to eavesdrop later. Not when I went to the toilet in the middle of the night.
Downstairs, there was the sound of clinking glasses and fluffing cushions.
‘Did you hear the nerve of Andrea?’
Mum’s voice was so spiky, I paused on the landing.
‘It was all I could do not to scream get out of my house!’
‘Don’t sweat it, Gail.’
‘Of course I’m not sweating it. It’s ridiculous, that’s all.’
‘Andrea’s just one of those. She likes to poke and prod till she gets drama.’
‘If she does it again, I’m going to poke and prod her right under a moving car.’
I went into the toilet, shutting the door after me. And wondered if maybe Mum didn’t have that much fun at the Dead Kids Group after all.
Except – this time it was my fault.
Another one to add to the list.
18
Interesting things can happen in libraries.
(paradox)
Twenty days to the fair
By Saturday morning, I’d done enough spy practising. You couldn’t just practise for ever, not unless you wanted to be Lewis.
I ate my cereal opposite my parents at the peninsula. ‘Can I go to the library this morning? There’s a book I want to borrow.’
Weekends are different from after school – it’s not my own free time, and my parents expect to know where I am. I’m not exactly sure why the rules work differently, but they do.
‘We can’t take you. Your dad’s doing the big shop,’ Mum said. ‘And I’m taking the car to get the oil changed.’
‘Can I go on my own?’
Mum and Dad looked at each other.
I mean, the library. What kind of trouble did they think I’d get into? The whole point of a library is there’s nothing to do.
‘I’m meeting Lewis. We said we’d meet at ten.’
Mum blinked at me. ‘You’ve alrea
dy arranged to meet Lewis, but you’re just asking me now?’
‘It was provisional,’ I said. ‘We made a provisional appointment.’
Mum and Dad looked at each other. Both laughed.
‘You and Lewis. Making provisional appointments,’ Mum said.
My long words weren’t meant to be funny, but it was OK, for once. I was pretty sure that meant I was allowed to go to the library.
And I knew for definite when Dad stood up and said, ‘Just make sure you take your inhaler.’
On the way there, I walked past the precinct. Past the boys on skateboards, jumping up, trying to ollie but not doing it very well. Liam was one of the boys, but he didn’t look happy. Despite his efforts, he wheels stayed firmly on the ground. He was pretending he couldn’t hear the older girls who were standing outside the Co-op, smoking and watching and taking the piss.
I looked at the pile of bikes, to check if Lewis’s bike was piled up with all the others. But it wasn’t. Of course it wasn’t. Mine and Lewis’s never were.
I wondered what Lewis was doing this weekend. Whether he was missing me.
I wasn’t missing him, of course. Not with my investigations to do.
If anything, I was too busy to think of him at all.
I strode straight up to the friendliest lady on the counter – the white-haired lady wearing the glasses with green sparkly bits.
I put my rucksack onto the counter. ‘I want to’ – I looked at my letter and read – ‘access an old newspaper using the microfiche.’
I said it like micro-fitch.
‘Do you now? The micro-fish?’
‘Yes. I want to access the Monkford and District Advertiser for July 1982. Please.’
The woman smiled. ‘Why?’
Sometimes people think that, because they’re an adult and you’re a kid, everything’s their business. But a good spy prepares. ‘My mum was in a play once. She said there was a photo of it in the paper.’
The woman smiled. ‘How lovely!’
I smiled back.
‘Come with me.’
I followed the woman to the back of the library, past the kids’ section, with the caterpillar made of letters on the wall. Past the tiny chairs on the open patch of carpet, the boxes of brightly coloured toys. The smell of that area wafted up to me, like it was yesterday.
I flushed.
Thing is, I spent a lot of time on that carpet once, singing rhymes and woofing to stories. The fact I ever did makes me squeeze all my muscles really tight. But when I’m trying to forget something, my head doesn’t always do what it’s told and—
‘Lar-ry the pup-py goes
Woof woof woof
Woof woof woof
Woof woof—’
STOP IT! I screamed at my singing brain. STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT!
The woman stopped at a desk in front of a machine. She patted the chair and I sat down.
‘What date was it again, darling?’
‘July 1982.’
She got a box from a filing cabinet and placed a reel on the machine. She slid the film into a clip and pressed a button.
The reel shot forward and a heading appeared on the screen. Monkford and District Advertiser.
I sat up straighter.
The woman peered at the screen, turning a knob. ‘What date do you want to start with?’
‘The one after the twenty-fourth of July.’
The woman moved the lever. ‘You just have to keep scrolling till you find what you need.’ The writing on the screen moved down. ‘If you want a copy, printing’s ten pence a page.’
‘Thanks.’
‘You move it side to side with this handle.’
‘OK.’
‘And you can rotate it with this. Do you want me to stay and help?’
‘I’ll be fine.’
She smiled like I was cute. ‘Come and find me if you get stuck. It might be difficult to get the hang of it.’
I smiled and watched the woman walk away, her soft shoes sinking a little into the carpet. I turned to look at the screen.
Monkford and District Advertiser, Friday 30 July, 1982.
Monkford Girls’ and Edge Street High schools to merge
I scrolled on to:
Precinct development on track to be completed in Autumn 1984
There was a drawing of our precinct, except it had loads of extra trees and looked really clean. And the names on the shop signs weren’t right.
I felt a prickle up my back for no reason. I scrolled further.
Census – Small Area Statistics
Pedestrians Urged Not to Drop Litter as Pigeons in Park Declared Nuisance
I kept scrolling, past pictures of people in roll neck jumpers and thick glasses.
Family Pay Tribute to ‘Perfect’ Daughter After Fair Tragedy
I took a sudden breath.
A woman browsing nearby shelves looked at me. ‘You OK, hon?’
I nodded. ‘Fine.’
The woman turned back to the shelves and I looked at the article. Next to it was Danielle’s last school picture. The one Mum has on top of the mantelpiece.
FAMILY PAY TRIBUTE TO ‘PERFECT’ DAUGHTER AFTER FAIR TRAGEDY
By Adrian Sykes
Monkford is mourning local girl, Danielle Larson, who died on Saturday, whilst attending Monkford Fair. The incident is being investigated but her death is not believed to be suspicious.
Father Jonathan Larson said, ‘Danielle was the perfect daughter and words cannot express how we feel. She was taken from us too soon and leaves a gap in our lives that will never be filled. She will always be our perfect angel.’
Emergency services were called to Festival Field just after eight p.m. on Saturday 24 July, but Danielle was dead when paramedics arrived.
A memorial service will be held at Dean Road Crematorium on Wednesday 11 August. The family have asked for any donations to be made to the RSPB, of which Danielle was an active member.
‘Have you found what you’re looking for?’
The woman in the green-speckled glasses stood over me.
I forced myself to smile. ‘No. Not yet.’
I watched her walk away. I got my pad and pen from my rucksack and copied out the article, even though it didn’t really tell me anything. Except that Danielle was perfect, which I already knew.
I scrolled through the next week’s paper, and the one after that, looking for more information. But I couldn’t find anything else.
I re-read the article I’d copied out. And realised there was something helpful, after all.
I circled the words.
By Adrian Sykes.
19
If someone’s blood type is A positive, they can joke they’re a positive influence. If they don’t mind their jokes not being funny.
Fiona Larson, 7E’s Blood Project
Nineteen days to the fair
On Sunday morning, I knew I should be trying to find out who Adrian Sykes was.
What was stopping me was, I kept imagining him. I pictured a man bigger than Mr Kellett – a man made of too much ham, with a neck wider than Dad’s head, and a furious expression.
It was the same face I pictured when I imagined who I’d stolen the magazines from.
So I didn’t feel like looking for Adrian Sykes. At least, I did, just not right then. Instead, I got out my fortune teller so I could do some safer spying.
Lewis’s words came into my head – a safer secret – and I scowled as I slid my fingers and thumbs into the paper.
Lewis Harris didn’t know what he was talking about.
I moved the paper with my fingers and mouthed my choices. Double Mirror. 3. I opened the tab. Sketch faces for Crimewatch.
I folded up the fortune teller and tucked it back in
my pocket.
Problem was, I didn’t have a suspect for Danielle’s death right now. Though there was the strange man, I supposed. The strange man, walking the streets with his ponytail, going in supermarkets and standing in windows – being suspicious.
I grabbed a pad and paper and drew him.
I sat back and looked at what I’d done. It wasn’t brilliant. If it wasn’t for the ponytail, the picture could have been of anyone. He could even have been a girl, till I drew the beard on him.
And – problem was – the supermarket man hadn’t had a beard.
I was just thinking this when the doorbell rang and the lights flashed. I heard a girl’s voice downstairs – Selina Baker!
I threw open my bedroom door. I rushed across the hallway and down the stairs.
Knowing Selina was there, watching me, made walking down the stairs harder. ‘Hi, Selina.’ I felt like a baby calf, stumbling around on new hooves.
‘Hi, Fiona.’ Selina looked from Mum to me, making her long ponytail fly horizontally. Her fringe stuck a little way off her forehead, in gelled lines, and she gave me the kindest, nicest smile I’d ever seen.
I’d been wrong when I thought she was as beautiful as Kelly from Winchester. Selina was even more beautiful.
‘Hi.’ I’d already said that. Stupid mouth.
Mum picked up her car keys from the side. ‘Fiona, look after Selina for a second while I just have a word with your father.’
I nodded. I turned to Selina and smiled.
She smiled back.
I screamed at myself – say something! She was too pretty, that was the problem. ‘I need to get a job, Selina. A proper one – a grown-up one. Do you have a job?’
‘I do! I work at the stables. I muck out the horses. Best job ever – I love it.’
I tried not to wrinkle my nose. ‘Sweet.’ I knew what muck out meant. And horses’ muck must be massive.
‘They don’t pay me for it, but this way I get to spend time with the horses and ride them for free.’
I frowned. FOR FREE? ‘Sweet,’ I said again.
Mum came back then, and that was probably best because I really didn’t know what to say to Selina after that.
All the Fun of the Fair: A hilarious, brilliantly original coming-of-age story that will capture your heart Page 12