Gloves Off
Page 2
that there
is more fun without me.
i bring her lies from outside and
she serves up love
spoonfuls of kindness,
platefuls of hope
that make me choke.
and then, as if she knows,
sometimes she takes my hand and says,
“one more year, lil,
just one more year.”
and i think about moving on
and leaving her behind.
planning who i might become
is something
we cannot resist.
except i don’t think she realizes
i only want to get away
from this.
NEW SHOES
i’ve been ignoring all the talk,
cotton wool for ears,
but,
then,
at break on thursday, mollie says,
“you coming tomorrow? stacey’s thing?”
the girls pull me over.
i know better than to
believe,
but they’re smiling
and seem
so real,
hide my smile in my sleeve.
my friend,
(true friend?)
old friend,
(real friend?)
mollie.
our history began
with our first day at school.
finger-painting
playing house
daisy chains and hide and seek,
jumping in puddles,
secrets, stories, sleepovers at hers.
until just lately. not so much these days.
not really for a while.
so i’m a little shocked
to be included.
yes, all right, i say,
thinking fast,
regret already beating hard, making my blood rush,
cheeks flush.
i’ve got nothing to wear,
you know.
“well, don’t worry.”
she shrugs, “that’s okay.”
they slide their eyes
to one another
then to my feet –
share more than a glance.
“i’ve got these shoes,
don’t need them any more,
you can buy them off me if you like,
thirty quid,
they’ll look cool,” mollie says.
(i don’t miss the smirks. i’m not a fool.)
no point asking mum for
the cash –
dad’s payday
is weeks away.
but i know where she keeps
her secret stash –
money she got when granddad died
and that she keeps
for
emergencies.
i’m thinking this counts.
FRIDAY
we catch the bus to hers.
mollie talks non-stop
about the boy she fancies,
how she plans
to get with him tonight
if things go right.
her mum sees me, exclaims in surprise,
“how are you, lily? it’s been so long!”
we run upstairs,
away from questions,
we laugh and plan.
i watch mollie transform.
(but i’m not staring, just snatching a look
now and then
as i pick at the polish
that’s already
peeling from my nails.)
her jeans are tight and ripped.
her top is short,
a second skin,
her breasts pushed up high
and her stomach taut,
still tanned from summer
(or bottles of sun –
orange,
fake beauty,
better than none).
she watches herself, pouts and preens
likes what she sees, turns to me.
now it’s my
cue.
i can nod,
look up,
exist
for a moment,
now my opinion is
required.
“do i look all right?”
mollie already knows,
but, still,
i tell her she is beautiful.
“god, i look so fat,”
she says
still staring at
the girl in her mirror
who gleams –
resplendent
and
astonishing.
you look amazing,
i tell her again,
thinking about shrinking.
she doesn’t thank me
and i accept
without complaint the fact that she
does not reciprocate.
LAST YEAR
mollie invited me round hers,
and i stayed the night.
on monday morning
she told them all
i’d watched her undress
and she’d caught me staring
pervy lez.
OUT OF THE DARK
they go to a party to dance,
i go
to watch.
to see how the business is done:
the work of growing up, of creating
yourself, the hatching and flourishing of
girls,
butterfly bright,
dragonfly gold.
(their teeth as sharp as fangs
their nails like claws.)
i sit at the edges.
the shoes
are too tight
to stand in,
don’t fit me at all,
(i didn’t say a word
handed over the money,
and something else
that made me burn).
stacey’s house is transformed:
darkness flashes,
music pounds,
the air is full of smoke and lights.
the boys
huddle, shove.
the girls
scream and strut.
like venturing to the moon,
a group begins to dance.
they know the steps
synchronized,
jump
ing
back-
wards,
for-
wards
shoulders turning,
bodies sliding, quick, fast, streaks of brilliance, white
teeth, bright eyes.
so much skin.
i stare.
everyone understands the way they ought to
be.
(maybe
i know, too.
maybe
i have learned
upstairs in my room, quietly tried out
these steps.
imagined moving
lightly, easily,
made of air, everyone watching, seeing
at last, that i am just like them.
dreamed it, at least,
because
the mirror would have laughed
if i’d have let her see.
she would have reminded me
not to be
such a fool.)
RUN, RABBIT
the varnish picked clean away,
i chew my nails,
wonder, should i leave?
mollie dances towards me,
pulls my hands and drags me up and off my chair,
into the crush.
out of the edges, out of the darkness,
i totter centre stage
the beat thuds
i like the boom of it,
catch the rhythm,
move my feet and hands and arms,
begin to
twist and dance beside my friend –
next to her no one will notice me.
but kids from my year
circle near,
clapping, smiling,
jumping to the beat.
“go lily, go lily!”
what?
my skin prickles
i look for the door
mollie steps back, becomes the crowd, lost –
i can’t catch her eye.
another face
aidan vaine.
he dances closer
so
i step away.
he shakes his head
and pulls me in.
panic
heat
spreading
over
my
cheeks
and
neck,
itchy
and
red
panic
crawling
up
and
over
my
chest.
“come on, let’s see you dance,”
he says,
and –
when nothing happens –
except that he just nods
and smiles – a smile that is not a smile,
a smile that threatens more than it could say –
i hesitate,
then
decide
okay.
what choice do i have?
aidan gets closer.
i’ve never liked him,
never, ever could.
but everyone is watching,
and everyone will see
that maybe it’s okay
to like a girl like me.
aidan plays football,
thinks he’s a man.
he’s all mouth and muscles,
there’s stubble on his chin.
everyone hears about the girls
he says he’s had.
and the things he’s done on a friday night
drunk
and
high.
time i
sidle off,
sit down,
safe,
because right now
vertigo strikes –
i wobble,
almost fall
but he isn’t letting go.
he’s closer still,
his breath on my cheek
sour, not sweet –
warning signs.
he smells of drink.
i lean away from the scratch of his skin
the thickness of his face,
and heavy breath.
but he’s moving nearer, stretching towards me,
towering over me.
it is the first time a boy has
touched me like this,
been so close.
well.
(unless you count that time
last year
another party here,
they’re all watching porn.
her brother
pushing your hand
into his pants.
you freeze.
you
do not know
if you have the right
to scream.)
backing away
i think i’m smiling,
even as my heart hammers
because
he’ll feel the sweat on my skin,
the bulges at my waist,
he will know,
if he touches me
everything i hide.
(he knows already,
fool –
didn’t he hurt you
on your way home
from school?)
i force myself to last
another second
and another.
look into darkness and it stares right back –
with an eye that
blazes,
angry and alive.
aidan’s arms are tighter, he’s welded to me now,
as the beat explodes,
and i’m crushed into his bones
the music
rises,
it’s pulsing, pounding,
juttering and demanding,
and aidan has me around my waist.
he’s shouting like he’s having fun,
a whoop!
another!
faces leer,
fists punch the air, as they close in
on him
on us.
hands and hips and mouths,
making gestures,
something foul,
obscene.
something i wish i hadn’t seen.
and aidan’s laughing,
then whispering in my ear.
what is it?
he’s still holding on.
what? I say.
lean back, away.
he laughs.
he smells of dead things
of the alley near our house
of the leaves
and the gutter
and i can smell my own fear –
its stink on my skin.
he’s swinging
me
round and round
“Yee Ha!” he cries,
“Yee Ha!”
and i shrug and struggle,
but i cannot throw him off,
he’s got my clothes, my flesh
my body in his hands
and he’s pulling and grabbing, riding me –
on my back,so heavy he’s crushing me,
bucking
and squeezing
buttons popping
my brain exploding
no one hears me
or knows i’m screaming.
“Yee Ha!”
he hollers,
as he spins,
and my
feet are tangling, my clothes are tearing,
ripping, in tatters,
i grab at my top,
try to hide my breasts, my flesh
but
he won’t let go.
they’re roaring, jeering,
bent double, laughing –
and aidan holds on.
how long is it before i get away?
i shake.
face burning
throat raw
eyes streaming.
everyone saw.
i stumble somehow out of there
force my way free.
mollie’s disappeared,
but,
i hear her laugh
and crow,
“did you see the state of her?
those shoes!
can you believe she thought
that we actually wanted her here?”
outside autumn’s arms are thin and cold.
WHAT
did i ever do
to aidan vaine?
there’s nothing to say,
no way to explain
why he hates me
because i simply exist.
maybe he hates me
because i don’t resist.
HOW TO HIDE
“what happened?” mum asks,
she’s breathing, fast and heavy,
face flushed,
hot and bothered,
panting panic,
taking all the air.
i push her away –
there’s too much that
i can’t say.
i’m fine,
i tell her
she stares at me,
blinks,
worried eyes,
creased with questions,
and the hallway
waits for all the words
i’m keeping under lock and key.
i want to ask my mother, who decided
that girls who look like me are wrong?
who says girls like me are not allowed to dance
or run or swim and know
that they are lovely too?
the mirror laughs
i told you so.
i want to smash its smirking grin.
you should go out,
i shout at mum.
stop being so pathetic. get a life.
although i really think that everyone
should be allowed to hide.
because if you were to come and force her
out of this hole, like a fox beaten
into the chase of hounds, i wouldn’t think
that fair, or right.
i say the words
harsher still,
it’s your fault, mum,
i hate your guts,
and leave her alone to cry.
BEACH
here’s a memory.
years ago, but sharp.
my mother sitting
far from me,
as if we’re strangers after all.
who cares about the beach, the sun, the sky?
i can only watch her sitting there,
alone,
as if she does not belong and has no right
to even that one square of sand.
come and play with me,
i call, as if
sandcastles and shells and ice cream cones
will be enough to make her smile. and yes,
she lifts her face,
but then she shakes her head, and seems
to draw a wall around herself,
a barrier i cannot break.
head in a magazine, she waits
until i’ve had enough.
it was supposed to be fun –
a holiday!
we were going away,
making lists of things to do,
dreaming of waves
and hot, bright days.
planning and packing, excitement growing –
sunflowers bursting bright yellow into
the grey.
clouds passed across the sun and i
wondered why she wouldn’t feel the sea against her
skin,
the sun on her shoulders, the sand between her toes.
she sat apart from us as if she did not want to tar us
with the same brush,
she kept her body over there and for all she hid
everyone stared.
we are not beach people.
not summer people.
not shorts and t-shirts and strawberries and cream
on long green lawns with a view of the sea folks.
BERNADETTE (4)
Your daughter’s eyes
Ash grey,
Burnt out.
You’d waited up,
Hoped she’d come home
Happy,
That tonight was going to be the start of something
Better –
Friends, at least.
But her face is white and