by Ali Land
When I arrive on the tower block roof she’s smoking a cigarette, says, ‘There’s a bird over there, I think its wing’s all fucked up.’
‘Where?’
‘Over there.’
She points to a crate, and says, ‘I covered it up with that, it was flapping about all over the place, freaking me out.’
I walk over, crouch down, look through the gaps in the plastic. Honeycomb-shaped gaps. A pigeon, one wing hanging low. Broken. Its head moves fast, a continual bobbing. I don’t know why I do it, but I rattle the crate, a flurry of panic from inside, it begins to coo. An SOS to its friends, fly away, Peter, fly away, Paul. It would join them if it could, but it can’t, it’s been caught. Morgan squats next to me, asks me what I’m doing. I lift the crate up at one side, reach my hand in and grab the bird. Hard. I hold it into the ground, a tiny thud reverberates against my fingers. Broken wing, not heart. Not yet. It begins to coo again, calls to the others. Beady eyes and bobbing heads hidden on rooftops, the baby birds watch too, the adults make them.
I do it quickly, it’s the kind thing to do.
‘Fuck, that’s gross, why did you do that? Jesus.’
She looks away.
‘It would have been worse if I hadn’t. It would have died slowly all on its own.’
‘We could have taken it to a vet or something.’
‘It was in pain, but it’s not any more. I helped it.’
‘Rather you than me.’
Yes.
I place the crate over it again and we go back to the vent, lie down like statues on the cold ground, the sky awash with noise from aircraft as they roar overhead to Heathrow. Beam me up, Scotty, anywhere will do. Morgan lights another cigarette, blue fingers of smoke move in swirls, stroking the air above us. Witches’ breath.
‘Why so quiet, not got any stories for me today?’
Only one, but I’m not sure I should tell it.
‘Not really, no.’
‘Great company you are. I can’t stay for very long, my uncle’s here, he’s dead strict.’
Just a few more minutes please, let me get it right in my head before I say it out loud. My mother is. No. Have you seen the news, the woman that. No. Fuck. What am I doing? I’m not supposed to tell anyone.
‘What’s up with you today?’ she asks.
‘Nothing, why?’
‘You’ve made your finger bleed. Look.’
‘Sorry.’
‘No need to be sorry, but if you’ve got something to say, just spit it out.’
It’s like skating on a frozen lake. It looks safe, feels safe, but somebody has to go first, test it out to see if the ice will hold. She likes me, we’re friends. I can tell her, not all of it, some of it though. Can’t I?
‘If you’re not going to talk, I’m off. I’d rather watch telly than sit in silence.’
‘Wait.’
‘Fuck’s sake, what’s your problem?’
It’s getting dark on the roof, just me and her. Nobody else is here, nobody else has to know. She likes me. I’m nothing like you. She’ll understand. Won’t she?
‘If I told you something would you still want to be my friend?’
‘Yeah, I reckon we can tell each other anything, can’t we?’
I nod because it’s true, she texts me most nights, asks if I’m getting any hassle from Phoebe and not to worry, she’s got my back.
‘What is it you want to tell me?’
‘I’m not sure I should.’
‘You can’t start then not finish.’
‘I shouldn’t have said anything in the first place.’
‘Well you have now and I’m not leaving until you do.’
Rules are made to be … Aren’t they?
‘Mil, you’re starting to piss me off, I have to go soon.’
‘Just promise you’ll still be my friend.’
‘Okay, whatever, I promise. Now tell me.’
I sit up, use my foot to hook a strap of my rucksack, pull it towards me. She sits up too. I ask for her lighter, too dark to see it without. I remove the newspaper clipping, the one I rescued from the common room, from the front pocket of my bag, smooth it out on my jeans. Risky carrying it every day I know, all it would take would be for Phoebe or Izzy to empty my bag, their manicured nails unfolding the seams across your face. My face and yours, so alike.
‘What is it?’ she asks.
I contemplate backing out, burning it instead of showing it to her, but I’m not sure I could hold a flame to your face. The first time I flick the lighter, it blows out.
‘I didn’t see, do it again.’
The second time, it lights up your face, your mouth and your lips. You can’t see it in the photo, but there’s a freckle that sits to the right of your chin.
This time she sees who it is.
‘What the fuck! That’s that woman who’s been in the news, the one that killed the kids.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Why are you showing her to me?’
The lighter goes out. Why am I? Push. Pull. The damaged things damaged people do. I was sure when I left the toilets at school that telling Morgan was an okay thing to do. That she’d feel differently about me, not like the girls in my year. I know what they’d say, how they’d feel. But they’re not my friends, she is, and I long to hear her say the words: you are nothing like your mother.
I ask her what she thinks about it, about you.
‘What do you mean, what’s to think? She’s a psycho, clearly. Why do you care?’
‘What if it was someone you knew?’
‘As if. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot of shit goes on in the estate, but nothing like that.’
She promised she’d still be my friend, I can tell her.
‘What if it was someone I knew?’
‘Nice try, it’s October though, not April Fool’s.’
A greedy feeling of relief lapping at my heels, tempting me. Of being able to release some of the burden of you.
‘Watch,’ I tell her.
I hold the clipping next to my face and light the flame again.
‘Watch what?’
‘Just look at her face, then look at mine.’
She moves in for a closer look.
‘Shit,’ she replies. ‘You look really like her, eww.’
‘That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.’
‘What?’
‘I look like her because. Because.’
Please don’t leave when I tell you.
‘What? Because she’s your long-lost aunt or something?’
‘No, it’s not my aunt, it’s my mum.’
I let the flame go out, fold up the picture, put you back in my bag. I can feel Morgan staring at me, waiting for the punchline, but there isn’t one. She’s the first to speak.
‘Tell me you’re joking.’
She knows by my lack of reply, I’m not.
‘Holy fuck,’ she says.
I can’t help it, tears begin to brim in my eyes. She gets up, takes a step away from me.
‘Don’t go yet, please.’
‘I have to, my uncle will be mad.’
She’s lying, she’s leaving because she’s scared.
‘You said you’d still be my friend, you promised.’
‘It’s not like that, it’s just a lot to take in, you know.’
Yes, I do. It was a lot for me too.
‘Is that why you’re in a foster family?’
I nod.
‘Do they know about her?’
‘Mike and Saskia do, not Phoebe, and the headmistress at school, she knows.’
‘Nobody else?’
‘No.’
‘Not being funny, but why did you tell me?’
‘I’ve wanted to tell you for a while, it felt wrong keeping it secret from you.’
‘For real it’s your mum?’
‘Yes.’
‘Jesus, she needs to be put down, all those kids she took were about the same age as my little brothe
r and sister.’
I nod again. What she says is true, you do need putting down, yet it hurts to think about it happening.
‘Tell me you weren’t living with her?’
‘I wasn’t, I lived with my dad until he died. I haven’t seen her for years.’
The lie slips out easily, and she doesn’t question it. If she reads that there was a child living at home with you I’ll tell her I don’t know who it was, that it must have been someone you’d taken in at some point.
‘Thank fuck you haven’t seen her for years. How did they catch her?’
‘Not sure, somebody at work I think.’
Not true. Somebody much closer to home. The biggest betrayal of all when blood hands in blood. Families are supposed to stick together, birds of a feather, but I want to fly in a different flock, to a different place.
‘She got what was coming, I guess.’
‘I guess so, yeah.’
‘I have to go,’ she says.
‘Okay.’
She walks towards the door, I call out to her.
‘Morgan.’
‘Yeah?’
She walks back over to me, I stand up and ask, ‘Has it made you feel differently about me?’
‘Not really, no. It’s not your fault, Mil. Nobody should blame you for what your mum did. Anyway, you’re nothing like her.’
‘Do you mean that?’
‘Yeah.’
Thank you.
19
Last week, sat in the alcove, Mike talking to June on the phone. Just before he hung up, he said, it’s the calm before the storm. I knew what he meant, he was right, the past week has been very calm. Outwardly. After the initial reporting of the trial date being moved, there hasn’t been much mention of you in the press. The journalists are resting, gearing up for the trial to begin, only ten days from now. You, also resting, saving your strength. You’ve only come to me twice. Both times you said nothing but laid your scaly body across my neck. I couldn’t breathe or move, the weight of concrete. The weight of our secrets.
When I saw Morgan over the weekend I wasn’t sure how she would be. Whether she’d have changed her mind, decided she didn’t like me any more, but she was the same as before. She likes to talk about you though, about what you did, which is harder than I thought it would be because it’s not just your story, it’s mine.
June came over on Wednesday evening while Saskia took Phoebe and Izzy out for dinner. She and Mike went over the lawyers’ questions again. She kept saying I was doing grand, and how hard it must be to have to keep going over what happened, that it’ll be easier once the trial’s over. Mike didn’t say much. Usually he would, he’d agree, but not this time. He sat and watched me closely, nodding every now and then. I didn’t like the way it made me feel. A small seed of panic. Inside. Vulnerable. We ended the session with a game of cards. Blackjack. It’s my favourite, Mike said. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that although your version was different, it was your favourite too.
Today we break up for half-term. We have a play rehearsal all morning, it’s a big deal, Miss Mehmet’s words, not ours, because Ms James the headmistress is due to watch. When breakfast is over Mike insists on driving us both to school as he’s going that way.
‘Humour me,’ he says, winking at Phoebe.
‘Fine, all right, Dad. I just need to text Iz, tell her not to wait for me.’
Saskia smiles, says it reminds her of the school runs years ago. Phoebe ignores her, walks out to the car, sits up front next to Mike. He asks about the play, how things are going.
‘Good, yeah, the rehearsal should be loads of fun today,’ she replies.
‘I’m sure it will be, we can’t wait to come and see it.’
When we get to school we sign in at registration and head to the Great Hall. As soon as Miss Mehmet arrives she begins to fuss, she wants it to be perfect. She bosses around the technical crew, two external guys brought in to man the lights and stage effects. It’s the first time we’ve used them and everybody laughs as a whoosh of smoke fills the stage in preparation for the pig-hunting scene. A few of the girls are missing, the art history trip to Paris left this morning, so Miss Mehmet asks me to step in as the pig. I don’t like the idea of being hunted, but I can’t say no in front of everyone.
‘And, Phoebe, I know you’re narrator but we need more bodies on stage for this scene so can you fill in as one of the boys.’
‘Gladly,’ she replies, looking at me.
‘There should be a spear for everyone stage left by the props cupboard. Once you have one, on to the stage please and, Milly, there should also be a papier-mâché pig’s head, grab that please.’
I know this scene inside out. It’s a play, not real, but when I put on the pig’s head it starts to feel real. Though light to carry, the head is large and, once on, hard to see out of. The only way not to trip is to look down at my feet. My breath comes in short shallow bursts, creating an intense heat that rebounds off my face, and back again. Through the layers of glue and paper, I hear Miss Mehmet.
‘Milly, you’ll be entering stage right with Jack and his gang closely behind, and remember, everyone, this is a key scene where we start to see real savagery emerging from the boys. Think blood, gore, and use the hunting chant to demonstrate this. Once I call for lights and smoke, Milly, you’re on.’
The girls find it easy to get into role. Somebody to the right bangs their spear on the ground, a repetitive hammering that makes the lower part of my stomach contract. A voice on my left whispers, run, little piggy, run. You never called me piggy, but you often made me run. SO MUCH FUN WE USED TO HAVE, ANNIE, DIDN’T WE?
‘Go on, you’re on,’ somebody says behind me.
I missed my cue, listening to you.
As soon as I step on to the stage I bend my knees, drop low, as pig-like as possible. My breathing is heavy, weighed down by you. There with me. The noise of the spears unites. Thud, thud. THUD. I smell the dry ice from the smoke machine, it swirls around my feet as the stage lights up with flashes of red, punctuated with strobe lighting. The chant begins.
‘Kill the pig, cut her throat, spill her blood.’
Different words from yours, same intent.
Somebody bangs on a drum, the spears move closer, Jack and his boys. I move around the stage, it’s supposed to be a chase.
‘Kill the pig, cut her throat, spill her blood.’
Thud, thud. THUD.
I tried to find new places to hide, but you knew where to look.
‘There it is,’ a voice cries.
A high-pitched bow-wow like the noise a child makes playing cowboys and Indians lifts in the air, it’s their signal. Time to attack. Me. I move into centre stage, stumble by mistake on to the floor, not safe on the floor. Not supposed to be, the pig doesn’t make it out alive, remember? The strobe lights intensify, another release from the smoke machine.
‘Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Spill her blood.’
The feet surrounding me stamp in time with their spears. The first jab happens fast, from behind, I can guess who it was. I roll on to my back. Spear after spear begins to nudge and prod me. The drum slows to a steady hypnotic rhythm, the chant lower, more menacing.
‘Cut her throat, spill her blood,’ another bow-wow released from the person on my left. A loud single beat on the drum calls them to silence. The sound of the papier-mâché head sucking in and releasing from my face, the only noise, I’m breathing so hard. The feet around me start to move in a circular motion, disorientate me further. I hated the mask you made me wear, the same feelings now. Can’t. Breathe.
‘This time, no mercy,’ says Jack, played by Marie.
Her spear goes down to the right of me, hits the floor hard. To the audience, through the smoke and the strobes, it’ll look like I’ve been speared through the heart. I’m carried off stage by my legs and my arms but here in my new life, without you in charge, I’m placed on my feet and nothing bad happens. I wish I could cheer and join in with th
e laughter and jokes backstage, but instead I go to the toilet in the dressing room, peel off the pig’s head, splash my face with cold water, count backwards from fifty. The numbers slowly cast their spell, the flashbacks recede, and after a while I feel safe enough to leave.
As I come down the stairs from the stage, into the hall, Ms James is waiting for me. She invites me to take a seat at the front, away from the girls, she’d like a word.
‘How are you enjoying your first play at Wetherbridge?’
‘Good, thank you, Ms James.’
‘You gave a very convincing performance, Milly, but I was a bit concerned to find out it was you playing the pig.’
‘I’m not, I was standing in for Aimee, she’s on the Paris trip.’
‘I see, and I can also see it might have been tricky to say no, but still, you do need to be aware of situations that could trigger something unpleasant for you, given – you know.’
I want to put the pig’s head back on and cry. There isn’t a minute goes by at school when I don’t feel reminded.
Given – you know.
‘There’s a couple of other things I wanted to chat to you about, Milly. Mr Newmont emailed me to let me know you’ll be going to court, the week after next I believe.’
I nod.
‘Have you been managing to concentrate at school?’
‘Mostly, yes.’
‘You’re clearly very bright, Milly, so it’s not a huge concern if you need to take some time away, we can arrange for work to be sent home to you.’
‘I’d rather be busy, if that’s okay.’
‘Of course. But if you change your mind, just ping my PA an email and ask her to book an appointment for you to see me.’
‘Thank you.’
‘The other thing I wanted to talk to you about is Miss Kemp. I understand you’ve been spending a bit of time with her. The difficulty, Milly, is that Miss Kemp doesn’t know about …’