by Sara Barnard
What does that mean? ‘OK.’
‘Do you want to talk about all of this?’
‘No.’ An image pops into my head of Mr Cohn demonstrating how to play a cowbell in Year 7. He’d been so enthusiastic about that stupid bell thing, striking it with an expression of such earnest joy, we’d all nearly wet ourselves laughing. The boys had called him ‘Bell-end Cohn’ for the entire year.
‘Eden,’ Carolyn says. I blink and look at her. ‘It’s OK to feel shocked about this. Talking about it might help. Shall I make us some tea?’
‘No,’ I say again, wriggling free of her arm. I have to call Bonnie. Right now.
Carolyn’s face clouds over with frustrated disappointment, an expression I recognize. Sometimes I indulge Carolyn’s desire for a close mother–daughter relationship. Sometimes I don’t. And when I don’t, I get that face.
‘The police will be back to talk to you at some point,’ she says. ‘Wouldn’t you feel better talking to me first?’
The only person I want to talk to is Bonnie. ‘Maybe later,’ I say.
‘Eden—’
I take the stairs two at a time and go to my room, closing the door behind me. I grab my phone from my bag and unlock it, seeing two messages from Connor – I’m more awake now! and Come over later? – but none from Bonnie. I ignore Connor’s messages and instead send Bonnie an urgent, all-caps what-the-hell text, and then try to call her, but it just goes to voicemail again.
Oh God, this is completely insane. And wrong, right? Now I’m on my own again, away from Mrs Wiston-Stanley’s glare and the policeman’s sharp gaze, I can let myself think again, and it is not good. Maybe I should have told them about Bonnie’s message as soon as I found out about Mr Cohn? But I promised.
I sit down on my bed, staring off into space, trying to reason with myself. There’s no need to get all panicky. This is Bonnie, for God’s sake. The most responsible teenager in the world. But she’s gone off with Mr Cohn, AND ANYWAY it’s not like she’s in any danger or anything. How much of a difference does it really make that her secret boyfriend Jack is actually Mr Cohn – Mr freaking Cohn, Jesus – instead of a guy our age? It makes a big difference – Yeah, it’s a bit of a weird situation – It’s a totally weird situation – and I guess it makes sense that she’d want to get away from the drama for a while, now it’s all blowing up – But it’s blowing up because they’ve run off together – OH MY GOD, THEY’VE RUN OFF TOGETHER – and she’ll be back soon, obviously. There is no reason at all for me to grass her up. It’s not up to me. But everyone’s really worried – I can just wait for her to get back and then it can all get sorted out. Maybe I’m a bit worried too. I wonder where they’ve gone. I wonder where they’ve gone. I hope she’s OK. God, I hope she’s OK.
I text her again, pointlessly. I try and think about what she’d do if it was me who’d buggered off instead of her. Imagining the look on her face if I tried to pull something like this makes me smile, but then I remember that she really is pulling something exactly like this, and the smile drops off.
This is not how my Saturday was supposed to go. I’m just wondering whether I should ask Connor to come over so I can talk to him about all of this and/or let him distract me, when my door comes flying open, slamming against the wall, and a short, blue-eyed nightmare bounds across the floor and jumps on to my bed.
‘Ohmigod!’ she yells.
‘Daisy!’ I snap, getting up and inspecting the wall for puncture wounds. ‘For God’s sake.’
‘I can’t believe your Bonnie’s done a runner!’ she says, eyes wide with excitement, sitting up on her knees on my mattress.
‘Go away,’ I say, but I don’t mean it and she knows it, because she doesn’t move.
‘Do you think they’re shagging?’ she asks.
‘Daisy!’
‘They must be, right? Gross!’ She says this with the same level of delight as if someone had given her tickets to Disneyland.
I give her a shove as I lie down beside her on the bed, grabbing a pillow and holding it over my face.
‘Tell me everything,’ she commands, drumming her hands on my leg.
‘I don’t know anything!’ I say, my voice muffled, glad she can’t see my face.
She snorts. ‘Yeah, right.’
I lift off the pillow and glare at her. ‘Who even told you, anyway?’ Is it public knowledge already? God, people don’t hang around, do they?
‘Carolyn, course,’ she says, flopping on to her back on my bed. ‘So. Where are they then?’
‘I obviously don’t know, Daisy.’
She raises a single eyebrow – a skill she perfected last year and has been unduly proud of ever since – and then laughs, scooting across the bed and resting her head on my stomach. Daisy can switch between bloody irritating and cute as hell in a heartbeat. It’s as charming as it is annoying.
Here are a few things about Daisy, aged twelve years and three months:
• When she was seven she fell into a pond trying to catch a frog and has refused to go swimming ever since.
• She has ADHD and dyscalculia, which she says are just stupid adult labels for ‘likes fun’ and ‘hates maths’.
• She makes me laugh like no one else in the world.
• She used to be all soft and sweet, but since she started secondary school she’s been getting tougher and sharper.
• She’s turning out to be one of the trouble kids in her year. Carolyn and Bob have been called into the school three times already.
• She has dark blonde hair and blue eyes, and no one ever believes we’re sisters because we look nothing alike.
• She doesn’t remember what it was like living with our real mum. She says her memories are all me, and then the McKinleys.
• I would walk over burning coals and broken glass if she needed me.
• She’s the world’s biggest pest.
• I adore her.
The thing with Daisy is that, as annoying as she can be, she’s the truest family I have, whatever definition of ‘family’ you use. The way I think of it is, I have three families, some overlapping, some cancelled out by the other, but all there. The most obvious one – as in, the answer I’ll give during my French GCSE oral exam to the standard ‘Describe your family’ question – is the McKinley family. I’m the middle child of two parents, Carolyn and Bob. They adopted me and my little sister Daisy seven years ago, and now we’re part of their family along with their biological daughter, Valerie.
But being adopted means you had some kind of a family to start with, a different one, maybe even a ‘bad‘ one. And me, I came from the Kostenko family, and that was my mother – my ‘real‘ mother – my little sister and me. The three of us in a messy, broken little unit. In my head, where I keep my secrets, that unit still exists. Even if it’s just in the past – even if I can never enter it again – it’s still there. Time and adoption can’t really take it away.
My third family, the tiniest one, is what exists in the centre of the Venn diagram. Squished together in the oval is Daisy and me, bound by blood, kept together through adoption. My link to my past, and my companion through to the future. Daisy can be a pain in the neck, a constant worry in the back of my mind, but she’s mine, and I’m hers.
Sometimes I feel like I wandered into someone else’s life, and I’m not actually meant to be here. But then I look at Daisy, and it’s like . . . Oh yeah. Here I am.
She hangs around to annoy me for a while longer, demanding that I braid her hair, and then complaining that I’ve made her look terrible. She finally leaves me alone as it starts to get dark, which is excellent timing because not five minutes after she’s gone my phone buzzes and I glance at the screen.
It’s a new message on WhatsApp from an unknown number. Shit. What if it’s . . .
Unknown
Hi! It’s me! New phone! (Well, new OLD phone)
And a new old car! They’ll never find us ☺ ☺ ☺ ☺
Oops, me = Bonnie ☺<
br />
Me
HOLY FUCKING SHIT BONNIE.
Ah . . . so you know then?
Me
HOLY FUCKING SHITBALLS BONNIE.
Unknown
Does this mean everyone knows?
MR COHN?!?!?!
OK, wow. Um. Surprise! Is everyone freaking out?
YES. I AM FREAKING OUT.
Don’t freak out. It’s a good thing. I’m so happy.
Where are you, Bon?
Can I tell you?
What?
Seriously, can I? Will you promise not to tell?
Of course I won’t tell.
Even if my mum asks you?
Bon, I won’t tell. Where are you? And when are you coming back?
Wales.
Wales?!
Wales?! I don’t know what, exactly, I expected, but it wasn’t Wales. What do I even say to that?!
Me
Bon, are you kidding?
Unknown
?? No! It’s perfect. There’s no way they’d come looking for us here. It’s not forever, just for a bit.
A bit? You mean until you come back home?
No, I mean until we go somewhere else.
Somewhere else?!
What did you think I was doing? I told you I was running away.
I didn’t think you meant it! AND NOT WITH MR FREAKING COHN.
Minor detail
Do you realize what’s happening here? Your mum is going MENTAL.
Don’t say ‘mental’ like that.
BONNIE.
‘Eden?’ Carolyn’s voice travels from down the hall, and I jump, dropping the phone.
‘Yeah?’ God, my voice sounds so guilty. I’m so bad at this.
‘Dinner in five minutes, OK?’
‘OK!’
I reach for my phone again, my heart thudding.
Unknown
Look, calm down, OK? It’s fine. I know my parents are going to be freaked out, but it’s really fine. I’m fine. I’ve never been so happy. This is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.
That’s a lot of ‘fines’.
Me
The police came to my house.
Unknown
Oh wow. I’m sorry, Eeds :( Did you tell them anything?
No.
Thank you xxxxxx
I swallow, looking down at my phone screen, trying to figure out what to say. What should I say? Doesn’t she realize how wrong this all is? Should I try telling her? Before I can figure out what to type, a new message appears.
Unknown
Don’t worry. Really. You know I’m safe. My parents know I’m safe. Maybe they won’t like that I’m with Jack, but he’d never hurt me, and one day they’ll understand that I’m happy and I didn’t do this to hurt them. I love him, and he loves me, and we’re going to be together.
Me
But it’s our exams this week.
Unknown
Love is way more important than some tiny exams, E.
When we were thirteen, Bonnie cried during a Maths test. It wasn’t even an exam, just one of those little tests you get every month or so to check everyone’s been paying attention. Even more meaningless than actual exams. But Bonnie worked herself into such a state that she actually cried because she couldn’t answer three questions in a row.
I’d thought it was pretty funny at the time, to be honest. I thought she was being ridiculous, getting so upset about a pointless little test. But now, with our GCSEs just days away, I want that Bonnie back. I may not have understood why she cared so much about a test, but I understand even less how she can suddenly not care at all about our GCSEs. Her future.
Me
I don’t understand what’s happening :/
Unknown
You don’t have to understand. Just don’t worry, and don’t tell anyone!! You should delete all of these messages in case someone looks at your phone. Save this number if you want, but don’t save it under my name, OK? And don’t tell anyone where I am. Please, please, OK?
What do you want your fake name to be?
:) You pick for me xxx
I hesitate, then save the number as a new contact: ‘Ivy’. I’m big into plant symbolism, and Ivy is the perfect name for my newly renegade best friend because it symbolizes friendship. Ivy is tough, succeeding where other plants would fail, continuing to grow even when the conditions are harsh. That’s how I see Bonnie. Tough, steady and determined.
I sit on my bed in the quiet, staring at the bright screen, the word ‘Ivy’. All of those incriminating messages waiting patiently to be deleted.
OK. OK, Eden. Think about this.
Everyone wants to know where Bonnie is.
I know where Bonnie is.
The thought prickles in my mind. I could tell. I could call Mrs Wiston-Stanley and say, I know where Bonnie is. I could be the hero. I could surprise everyone.
‘Eden?’ Carolyn’s voice carries up the stairs.
Carolyn would be so proud of me.
‘Dinner’s ready.’
I don’t give her many opportunities to be proud of me.
But . . . Bonnie. My best friend. Bonnie, who never questioned us being friends, even though we’re so different and she could have been friends with all the other clever girls in the top sets who can spell words like ‘accommodate’ and ‘parallel’ without looking them up and who never get detentions. Bonnie, who never judges me, not for anything, even when I put apple slices in my peanut butter sandwiches. Bonnie, who shares my sadnesses and worries, who holds in my secrets and doesn’t make me feel bad for the emotional baggage she helps me carry.
If this was the other way round, would Bonnie tell on me? The obvious answer is yes, based on the pre-runaway version of herself. She’s too responsible to keep my location from my worried parents, too rubbish under interrogation to stay quiet even if she wanted to. But then again . . . Bonnie is loyal. Incredibly loyal. It’s why we stayed friends against all the odds between the ages of eight and now. If I asked her not to tell, maybe she wouldn’t, and for the same reasons that my instinct is not to tell.
I can’t tell. I have to trust her when she says that she’s safe and happy, that this is what she wants. If I sold her out to my parents – or worse, her parents – I’d be betraying her, and I can’t do that. She’d never forgive me. I’d never forgive me.
And so that’s that. I delete our message history, lock my screen and head downstairs for dinner.
How Bonnie and I Met
It’s a Wednesday in February. I’m seven years old, two days away from my eighth birthday, and it’s my first day at yet another new school. (Moving schools is an oh-so-fun side effect of being in and out of foster care.) Over the weekend I moved into my new foster family’s house on a long-term placement – they’re called the McKinleys, which I can’t spell – and this morning my new foster sister, Valerie, plaited my hair for me. I do not feel like myself. My school clothes are so clean, they feel strange against my skin.
My teacher is called Mrs Bennet, and she keeps her hand on my back, right between my shoulder blades, as she introduces me to the class. She says, ‘This is Eden. She’s just moved here, and I’m sure you’ll all make her feel very welcome.’ She guides me over to one of the tables and points to the empty chair beside a thin girl with brown hair and glasses. ‘Eden,’ Mrs Bennet says. ‘This is Bonnie Wiston-Stanley. I’ve asked her to look after you while you settle in.’
‘Hello!’ Bonnie says, confident and warm, like she was then. The way clever kids are before they get to secondary school.
‘Hi,’ I mumble. I’m thinking, Wiston-Stanley?
‘Don’t worry,’ Bonnie says, putting an arm around my shoulder, her eyes bright behind her glasses. ‘I’ll look after you. I promise.’
And she did, right from that moment on, even when it became clear that I didn’t need to be looked after. She still did it, quietly and unquestioningly. When some of the other kids laughed at me for not being able to read properl
y, she stopped me from throwing rocks at them (all but one – Josh Williams never tried to cross me again) and told our teacher, very nicely but firmly, that the two of us were going to be reading buddies from now on. She swapped lunches with me in the weeks before Carolyn realized that I didn’t like ham sandwiches. She made us friendship bracelets with an ‘E’ and a ‘B’ charm.
I’d never had a friend like her before, never really had a proper friend at all. Before Bonnie, I’d been the often scruffy, sometimes polished, always slightly bewildered kid, watching everyone else move seamlessly through a world they all seemed to know how to belong in. It was like the other kids had sensed that, because they’d never tried to be friends with me. Not until Bonnie.
Everything about being fostered and living in a new place and going to a new school was hard, except Bonnie. She made me feel safe. I felt lucky to be her friend, to be the one she shared sleepovers and secrets and giggles with.
A lot has changed since then – it’s a long time since I was the odd kid no one wanted to be friends with – but I never stopped feeling lucky for Bonnie. And that friendship bracelet still hangs from the wall near my bed.