Birdy Flynn

by Helen Donohoe

  At the school gate I dipped in and out of the flow of bodies, getting clipped by excited arms.

  ‘Oi,’ someone shouted from the gawping crowd.

  ‘Oh my God. You look like a prostitute,’ Samantha Gobold howled.

  I took a deep breath and listened to my head telling my heart, You are a girl. Stop putting it off. You’ve got to start.

  It’s OK, I could feel myself thinking. You’re just a girl. Girls do it every day. Being a girl can be great. I told myself to walk like a girl, calm and straight. And think like a girl. Think in a girl-like way. But my head wouldn’t stop thinking in its same old way.

  From lesson to lesson I tried to move properly, but my body clunked. I wobbled like a drunk. Like I’d been taken apart and put back together without important bolts. The shoes got no better so the tights got ripped and stained. I was desperate for a wee, but the toilets were too risky for me. The dinner ladies gave me a nervy smile. I missed the boys properly for the first time.

  It was a storm, that was all. A bit of bad weather, I told myself, and it couldn’t last for ever. It was like the time we stayed in Aunty Noreen’s caravan. ‘It’ll pass,’ Dad said, and he was right. Four and a half days later, the sun was out and the sky was bright. So I agreed with myself to get through the day. To be brave. To do it for Murphy, and not let anyone hurt me. I knew I wasn’t beautiful, but at least I wasn’t ugly. At least I didn’t look like I was playing clothes snap with all the copycat girls around me.

  None of my class was back from the school trip so I had to go to different classes, with other people that I didn’t really know. In the afternoon it was Art and Craft with Mr Gonell.

  ‘You look special,’ I heard someone say while pushing past me.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said in a broken voice.

  I walked to a table and perched on the end of a wobbly bench. There were three others on it; they shifted up in silence. Sarah Paice was next to me. She leant in and I could smell her cherry lip gloss. The banging pulse in my veins relaxed a little as her warm breath came close. Her big backcombed hair sponged into me.

  She whispered in my ear, ‘I’m not being funny, Birdy, but what the Hell are you wearing?’

  ‘Close the door,’ Mr Gonell shouted, and Simon Jackson did and the bang was like a starting gun.

  There was noise, Mr Gonell waving his arms about, but he disappeared. Then blurry noises around me, chairs moving and excited giggles in my ears.

  ‘Sir,’ I shouted.

  But they carried on. Pushing and shoving and pulling me about like a puppy’s doll. Don’t do what they’re expecting, Birdy. Don’t give them any clues. Then I realised they were not that clever and no way would they have thought it through. They didn’t tie my hands – they didn’t have to.

  ‘Leave me alone.’ I pushed one away, then another.

  That made them turn angry and gather in closer.

  Eileen’s jumper got stretched as big as a parachute as three girls yanked it off. They heaved as a group, two each for sleeves. One girl scratched my neck with her fingernails. I pulled in the opposite direction with such force they fell back when the jumper flew off. I curled up to bury my head.

  I shouted, ‘Get off.’

  They didn’t.

  I shouted louder, ‘Get off me.’

  One of them snatched at my blouse. I held it firm. She was strong. Really strong. She grabbed hold of my collar and I realised girls could fight really well. The rest of the room was a moving, chattering blur. I thought I saw Mr Gonell.

  Again I shouted, ‘Sir.’

  Then, in a blink, I was dragged off my chair. I pulled myself up and got steadied. I held one arm across my chest and pushed back with the other. Most of them stepped away and sat down but two were having too much fun and I could see in their faces they would never back down.

  They attacked my locked right arm like the handle to a safe full of diamonds. Then one of them tickled me and all my holding was gone.

  ‘Oh, come on,’ she said as I lost all control. ‘It’s just a laugh.’

  ‘Don’t be such a fridge.’

  ‘You should be glad.’

  ‘You should be grateful.’

  Mr Gonell appeared. He’d been in the cupboard for ever but he had nothing in his hands. ‘Sit down’ was all he said. ‘Sit down, everyone.’

  The two girls went back to the benches with their mouths smiling and their fake frowns, thinking it hilarious, loving being bad.

  I wobbled as I stood; I thought my legs were giving up. Nothing rose up in me. No wild thoughts. I felt the room stare at me. All their eyes on me made my body ache. I bent down to get Eileen’s jumper and reached over to get my bag.

  ‘Flynn, sit down,’ Mr Gonell shouted at me.

  I stood up and stared straight at him. A whole speech ran through my head.

  ‘I’ve done nothing wrong,’ I said.

  ‘Sit down,’ he repeated.

  Then I said, ‘No.’ I waited.

  The girls giggled, and he called them to the front. As he gave them a lecture about behaviour and conduct, I thought about sitting, but I turned to the door and carried on walking.

  ‘Flynn,’ he shouted again, but I was already gone.

  ‘Hello, Bernice.’ A happy voice came towards me on the stairs. It was Mr Rice, the caretaker. ‘You look smart,’ he said in his northern voice.

  I pushed past him, ran out the door and across the playground.

  A woman in a long beige coat walked towards me. I waited for the teachery bit.

  ‘Are you all right?’ she said.

  ‘Yes, miss.’

  ‘You look in a muddle.’

  ‘Sorry.’ I looked up.

  ‘Oh dear, Bernice,’ she said, putting her hand on my arm.

  I pulled my arm away.

  ‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ She reached again.

  ‘Get off.’

  ‘Excuse me?’ she said, and I looked to the ground. ‘I suggest you get to your class, young lady. With your uniform back on. Right now.’

  I nearly gave her a salute. Instead I smiled, held my head up and walked steadily across the playground and through the car park. She may have called after me but I didn’t hear because, as I walked through the gate, the coach from the school trip appeared.

  I pulled up my skirt and ran like I was in a hundred-metre race. In the massive front windscreen of the coach I had seen Mrs Cope’s smirky face.

  I took off my shoes and sprinted along miles of grey cracked pavements, past rows of shops, the factory warehouses, the army-only pubs. I rubbed my face red raw with the rough wool of Eileen’s jumper and wore holes in the tights from the toes to my bum.

  When I reached the town precinct and the National Westminster Bank, I stopped. I peeked through the window, but nobody looked up. The revolving door kept missing me but I forced myself through. People tutted as if I was blocking them or was there to steal their money. I looked for Eileen.

  ‘Is Eileen in?’ I asked someone in a smart uniform with a neck scarf.

  She shooed me away with a flick of her hand.

  ‘Eileen Flynn. Can I speak to her, please?’ I said.

  The woman looked annoyed. ‘There’s no one here with a name like that.’ She stood waiting, arms folded.

  I walked backwards. She held the door and waited, making sure I was gone.

  I hobbled past Woolworths, two travel agents, the baker’s that sold the best jam doughnuts, Peacocks, Burtons, the Jolly Cod, where we got our fish and chips, and Halfords. My tights were worn through so I was almost barefoot. At the entrance to the precinct there was a semicircle of benches, so I stopped. In front of me, three green concrete pipes spewed out water, trying to be a fountain. Behind it the sign above the glass doors said, Welc me to hoppers Paradise. Shoppers strolled past with tartan shopping trolleys and little dogs. Some smiled. One man had no teeth, but waved his walking stick in a friendly way at me.

  I put my jumper on, sat my bag on my lap, and when spit
s of rain started I got up and felt the cold concrete under my feet. I put the shoes back on and walked the length of Victoria Road extra carefully. The rain got heavier and darts of it hit my eyes. Passing cars turned their headlights on. I crossed the road to test the iron gates of St Peter and Paul’s Cemetery. They were still unlocked. I could take the shortcut. But the rain clouds had turned the sky darker than it should be on a summer afternoon, and the home-time crickets were already chirping and Mum wouldn’t approve. The cemetery path was ten times quicker though, and I was desperate to get home for food.

  I dragged one of the grindy gates open and squeezed through. It was a straight path in one direction and I glanced at each headstone as I walked, like I was in the video shop looking at titles of films. In the top field was the Catholic section. You could tell from the priests buried there, Father This and Father That, lying on top of each other, sometimes three of them all budged up.

  Our family area was in the far corner. I loved walking through there, and thought of the stories that Nan would tell me about the families: the O’Neills, the Bradys, the Doyles and Moyles, Mahoneys and Murphys. She knew them all.

  There was a new person buried. No headstone yet but a pile of drenched flowers and cards. One read, To the best mama in the world. I wondered, would the flowers melt into the ground and join up with the body as they both turned to mould? I wondered what she died of and whether she’d gone to Heaven and whether she was old.

  ‘Your make-up’s smudged,’ said a husky voice.

  I straightened up and turned to see a girl stood watching me, smoking a cigarette. It was the Gypsy Girl.

  ‘You look daft.’ As we stood there, she scanned me up and down.

  I looked back. I didn’t want a fight. Not in those clothes.

  ‘Why you in here?’ she said. ‘That someone you know?’ She pointed at the fresh grave.

  ‘I can come here if I want.’

  ‘Look at that rubbish little cross,’ she said.

  It was Nan’s.

  ‘What did you say?’ I stepped towards her. Only a small step because of the skirt. ‘What did you say about that grave?’ I cupped my right hand to my ear. ‘Say that again.’

  ‘It’s got a little cross, that’s all,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’ She stared at my clothes. ‘I’m sorry.’ She shrugged her shoulders.

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Pardon?’ She smiled. ‘Has the sex change made you deaf?’ She giggled.

  I punched her. My fist landed smack on her jawbone.

  It gave me a shock. She staggered backwards like a cartoon character. It was a good punch, but not that strong. She opened her mouth wide and touched her lips.

  ‘Why did you do that?’ She held her face.

  I didn’t hit her that hard, but she looked upset. I expected her to hit back, to pull at my stumps of hair, kick me, scratch me, tear at my skin. She did nothing.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said.

  ‘Why do you always have to hit, Bernice?’ she said, and I was surprised again.

  ‘You called me Bernice?’

  ‘I mean, Birdy,’ she said, while touching her tongue and exploring her jaw with her fingers. ‘Why did you have to hit me?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.’

  ‘Yes you did. You thought about it and you did it. You wanted to hit me. Why did you want to hit me?’

  She looked sad and puzzled and I didn’t know what to say.

  ‘You can’t keep hitting people, Birdy.’

  ‘What’s your name?’ I asked without thinking but wanting to keep her there.

  ‘Kat,’ she said. Her voice was different.

  ‘Kat.’

  ‘Don’t you know it?’

  ‘No. You’ve never actually said it.’

  ‘It’s short for Katrina,’ she said, and I nodded. ‘I also get called Cocky Kat, Kat the Rat, Cacky Kat and stuff like that.’

  ‘And Gypsy Girl.’

  ‘And I’m not even a gypsy. I live in a house on Caswell Street.’

  ‘Do you? But you’re called gypsy.’

  ‘I don’t get it,’ she said, but she did. She knew something. ‘And you’re called Birdy.’

  ‘My dad called me birdbrain and everyone thought that was hilarious and it stuck. And my mum prefers it to Bernie.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Bernie is a boy’s name.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘But not in Ireland. It can be a girl’s name there, but Mum says that we’re not in Ireland and we’ve to remember that things are different here.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And my mum’s name isn’t even hers.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘No. Her real name is Eilis.’

  ‘Eyelish?’

  ‘No, Eilis.’

  ‘Ay-lish.’

  ‘That’s it. But everyone calls her Martha,’ I said.

  Kat giggled.

  ‘Why is that funny?’

  ‘Sorry. But your real name is Bernice?’

  ‘Bernice Orlaith Margaret Flynn.’

  ‘Blimey, that’s a proper name.’

  ‘My nan’s real name was Mary. But everyone called her Ruby.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘I love your laces,’ I said. Her laces were multicoloured and carefully zigzagged across her trainers.

  ‘Thanks.’ She was different when she smiled. ‘I’d better go.’

  I nodded. She nodded back.

  I wanted to ask, ‘Can I go with you? Can we be friends now? Can you keep your gentle voice for ever?’

  ‘Why are you and Martin always together?’ I asked.

  ‘Martin?’

  ‘You hang around him loads.’

  ‘He’s my brother. Half-brother. Didn’t you know?’

  ‘Your brother? He’s never told me that.’

  ‘We have the same dad,’ she said, bowing her head. ‘Bit embarrassing.’

  ‘Why?’ I waited. I wanted to put my hand under her chin and lift it up but I knelt down and looked upwards to see her face.

  Her expression was a smile and frown.

  ‘It’s not embarrassing,’ I said.

  ‘I’m sorry I was mean to you at school.’

  ‘You were mean to me?’ I knew what she meant, but I wanted to hear her explain.

  ‘About your shoes and stuff.’

  We both looked down to my legs and saw muddy brown tights, then I felt embarrassed.

  ‘You should wear what you want,’ she said.

  I looked up quicker than I should have. I wanted to tell her that I didn’t want to wear tights. I was desperate to have proper clothes on.

  ‘That’s what I think anyway.’

  I watched her lips.

  ‘Stuff what people think. Sod them.’ She shifted about looking nervous. ‘I hate wearing what I have to wear.’ She stamped on and snapped a branch on the ground. ‘Except these trainers.’

  ‘They’re cool.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So, Martin is your half-brother?’ I asked and, although my feet were as cold as ice and the rain was starting again and I knew the cemetery man would soon be closing the gates, I was delighted with myself for having a conversation.

  She didn’t answer straight away. She screwed up her face into a thinking expression.

  ‘We don’t live together.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I live with my mum’s husband,’ she said, and I tried to work out what that meant.

  ‘Just you two?’

  ‘No, I have four sisters.’

  ‘Four sisters?’ I blurted out, because that sounded horrendous.

  ‘Half-sisters,’ she said, and I couldn’t help smiling as I pictured them as half-size, miniature people running about. ‘I get their clothes. Passed down. I have to wear them and they’re always too big or too baggy or . . .’ She shrugged. ‘I better go.’

  ‘OK, see you later.’ I smiled.

  She held her hand up in a half-wave goodbye.

  ‘What
about your mum?’ I said as she turned to go.

  She stopped. ‘I haven’t –’ she started to say, when a piercing shriek came from a bicycle’s brakes.

  ‘Martin,’ Kat said.

  His nose looked wonky and a browny blue. He dropped his bike to the ground. He didn’t speak.

  ‘All right, Martin,’ I said.

  ‘Been looking for you.’

  ‘How was the rest of the trip?’ My voice was nervy.

  ‘I thought you might be in here.’ He walked over to us. ‘The trip was crap cos you broke my nose.’ As he got closer, I could see that he had cuts across his face and the skin around his eyes was darker. ‘Why you wearing that skirt?’

  I looked down and as I looked back up he smashed his fist into the side of my head. Kat screamed. Then he punched me lower down and I folded, clutching my stomach. My breath burst out of me; I couldn’t get hold of it. He punched my shoulders as I bent over. I thought my neck would break. I curled and twisted and tried to cover myself, but he punched anything he had sight of. Something, a foot or a fist, hit the bottom of my spine and sent a sharp shock through my legs. The skirt stopped me moving, so when my body went soft, I collapsed; I had no choice. I fell on the new grave. I did my best to get up, without hurting the flowers, but my arms flopped and I was weak and soft.

  ‘Martin, don’t,’ Kat begged.

  ‘Not fighting? You pansy,’ he said.

  My nose smudged against green fungus, snuffling wet grass and dying flowers. He knelt over me. He got my head in his hand and held it up.

  ‘You going to squeal like little Murphy?’

  ‘Leave it, Martin.’ I started to shake. I saw Kat’s legs run away.

  His other hand reached over to the new grave and pulled something out from the flowers. My legs felt naked in the skirt so I held them close together. His hand came back holding a metal pin. He kissed it. I felt undressed and unprotected and I tried to twist but he put his hand around my neck and his knee into my stomach. He held the pin against my cheek.

  ‘No grassing, Birdy. OK?’

  I stopped struggling.

  ‘Or I’ll tell your mum the whole lot. Like, everything.’ He winked. ‘Like the operation you’re going to have when you’ve got loads of money.’

  He didn’t stab me. After holding me there, he stood up and threw the pin away. I twisted and turned and, with my legs still together, I tried to get up. I got to my knees. I took a breath, then he kicked me in my ribs. Something snapped. Something stabbed at my lungs. I remember one last kick to the bottom of my back and then the whole world was gone.