by Sarah Jasmon
Once again, Helen held her breath, but any possible repercussions would have been inaudible in any case, drowned by the triumphant whoops from Victoria, who was already gathering a handful of pebbles for her next throw. She straightened up, saw Helen’s face, and stopped.
‘What’s wrong with you?’
Helen hesitated. ‘I don’t know, I mean, we could get into trouble …’ Her voice tailed off. How could she explain the level of her discomfort? It was wrong: there would be consequences.
‘You honestly believe there’s someone out there who’s worried about how many panes of glass are left?’ Victoria’s tone was both incredulous and scathing. ‘Have you seen the holes? It’s like … it’s like …’ She screwed up her eyes, grappling for the right metaphor. ‘It’s like poking at a dead dinosaur with a matchstick.’ She looked up at Helen and grinned. ‘No one will care! Now come on, throw!’ and she lifted her arm and let the stones in her hand trickle over Helen’s head.
‘Stop it!’ Helen turned, more than half inclined to walk off. There had been dust in with the stones, and she could feel it thickening her hair and sticking to the sweat on her neck. She was too angry to trust herself to say anything, and had a satisfying vision of throwing Victoria herself through the glass walls.
‘Come on.’ Victoria’s voice was wheedling now, a hint of a laugh at its tail, and she started to rub at Helen’s head.
‘Get off.’ Helen wriggled away, running through the doorway into the next greenhouse. Victoria followed, and Helen dodged behind an abandoned workbench. It was too hot to keep running, though. She tipped her head down and ruffled at her hair to get the grit out.
Victoria scooped up another handful of stones. ‘There isn’t anyone to care, you know.’ She threw the whole lot, hard, against the end panes. The stones bounced off and scattered, too small and spread out to make an impact. She cast a glance about and took a step towards some bigger stones piled in a corner, then shrugged the canvas rucksack she was wearing off her shoulders and put it down, squatting beside it in the dust as she undid the buckles.
‘Have you got a drink in there?’ Helen asked, trying to make light of the situation. ‘I’ll do anything you want for something cold and wet.’
‘No.’ Victoria was shielding the bag with her body as if on purpose. ‘Piet let me borrow it. I need to get the settings right.’
When she stood up, she was holding an expensive camera with a long lens. She pointed it towards Helen, squinting through the viewfinder, then held it out in front of her, doing something with the dials on the back.
‘Does he know you borrowed it?’
Victoria kept her head down as she replied. ‘You have such a suspicious mind.’ She positioned the camera in front of her face again but carried on talking. ‘What I want is an action shot of you breaking the glass.’
‘No.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I’d be the one who got in trouble. On film.’ Helen went back to the workbench and leaned against it, her back half turned. She heard a click from behind.
‘OK.’ Victoria’s response was unexpected. Helen swivelled in surprise, but Victoria carried on, as if she was thinking aloud. ‘I can come back another time. Not the twins, though. I’ll have to ask Moira.’
There was a half-brick lying a few feet from her. Without letting herself stop to consider, Helen stooped to grab it. The smash was intoxicating, the pleasure of destruction unexpected. She could hear the camera clicking away behind her.
‘I hope you got that, I’m not doing it again.’ She heard her voice shake, felt the remnants of the adrenaline rush burn at her skin.
‘This would be a great place to practise for an insurgency.’ Victoria had let the camera dangle on its strap and was juggling a stone between her hands.
‘A what?’
‘An insurgency, like plotting to overthrow a government.’
‘I know what an insurgency is, thank you.’ Helen took a deep breath. She was feeling a bit dizzy. ‘I meant, why an insurgency?’
‘It’s so boring sometimes.’ Victoria threw her stone up in the air, hitting it away with her palm as it came down. ‘Moira was telling me about all these campaigns she’s been in. Barricades and sit-ins. And revolutions.’
‘How many revolutions has Moira been in? She’s making half of it up.’
‘How would you know?’ Victoria headed towards the entrance. ‘You haven’t heard her stories.’
Helen followed her; the air outside was cool in comparison to the still air of the glasshouses.
‘It’d be fun, changing things,’ Victoria carried on. ‘And revolutionaries have that cool vibe.’
‘Not so cool when they’re dead. Or locked up.’
Victoria reached a patch of semi-shade and flung herself down, setting the camera carefully upright on her stomach. With her eyes closed, she started to feel around in her pockets.
‘Nope, not even got any gum.’ She peered up at the sun. ‘I need a drink so much!’
The sun was white above their heads, the heat making its edges indistinct, bleaching out the blue of the sky.
Helen perched herself on a fallen tree trunk. ‘What would get in the way of revolution the most: too much heat or too much cold?’ She pulled at a loose piece of bark and tried to fan herself with it.
Victoria remained where she was, eyes closed. ‘The cold. It freezes your brain and jams up your guns. That’s why Che ended up in Bolivia instead of Greenland.’
Helen thought about the poster on Victoria’s wall, but in her mind’s eye, the face was the drummer’s. ‘But would you be able to kill someone just because they didn’t agree with you?’
Victoria opened her eyes, screwing them up against the brightness to study Helen’s face in apparent perplexity. ‘Your entire family has been wiped out by an evil dictator and there’s someone in front of you who represents the whole rotten system and you have a gun. It’s a no-brainer.’ She closed her eyes again. Clearly no further discussion was necessary.
Helen could feel a wave of stubbornness building up in her brain. ‘I wouldn’t shoot them. It still wouldn’t be right.’
‘OK, I won’t call on you when the revolution comes.’ Victoria blew up into her hair. ‘But I can tell you one thing, if it’s this hot I’m going to demand a siesta.’
They stayed where they were for another silent few minutes. Helen slid down until she was sitting on the ground, her back against the trunk. If she tipped her head back, she could see plane tracks crossing each other, turning the sky into a huge web. How many people were up there? Thousands, all reading books or watching films, some of them gazing down at where she was sitting. Were the glasshouses within sight? She imagined someone glancing out, bored with their newspaper or trying to avoid a conversation. They would briefly catch the sunlight reflecting back from all those neglected roofs, but wouldn’t have a clue about her and Victoria, down on the ground and discussing insurgency.
‘We could do anything we wanted here, and no one would know.’ She felt it as a great revelation.
‘Yeah, well, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.’ Victoria propped herself up slightly and shook her head with the weariness of a long-ignored elder. ‘You could strip naked and run around with a frog on your head if you wanted.’ She paused and squinted up at Helen. ‘I mean, don’t. Not while I’m here.’
‘OK.’ Helen closed her eyes again and rubbed a shoulder against the trunk behind her to get rid of an itch. ‘If I feel the urge, I’ll find something else. A … a …’ She let her head slump. ‘No good, can’t think of anything else that would sit still.’
‘And a frog would sit still?’
‘A dead frog would.’
They lapsed into silence again. Helen stretched her arms out to either side, palms down, feeling the angular edges of the bark against the skin on the inside of her arm. She felt suddenly happy, as if a balloon was being inflated in her chest, the world spread wide out around her.
‘What
’s so funny?’ Victoria sounded drowsy. Helen hadn’t realized she’d made any noise.
‘I dunno, it’s—’ She broke off. Was somebody there? The rush of adrenaline was back, making her fingertips tingle. It came again, some way into the acres of glass and frame, but surely there. A person-shaped shadow. The owner, come to kick them out? A peeping Tom?
She reached out a foot and gave Victoria a gentle kick. ‘Look. Over there.’
Victoria followed the direction of her nod. The shadow had gone, but they both heard the sound of glass shifting under someone’s foot. For a second they held each other’s gaze, and then Victoria was up and running, camera in one hand, while Helen scrambled to catch up, one shoe falling off. She paused, trying to tug it back on, but it wouldn’t go. She could hear Victoria calling in a loud whisper for her to get a move on. The footsteps were coming closer.
Giving up, shoe in her hand, she started to run again, a half limp, keeping to the ball of her bare foot, hoping the plaster over her cut would stay in place. When she reached Victoria, they clasped hands and ran on together, laughter starting to force its way out in huge, breathless waves, until they stumbled back into the lane.
‘Let’s go to your house.’ Victoria came to a halt outside the gate. ‘I need a drink.’
Chapter Twenty
They found a bottle of lemonade at the back of a kitchen cupboard, and Helen chipped at the icebox until she could force out the ice-cube tray. She filled a couple of glasses with what she dug out, and carried them through, the bottle wedged under her arm. Victoria was already in the sitting room, sprawled across the sofa.
‘Have you got anything we could to add it?’ she asked as Helen began to loosen the cap, her hand curved over in case the bubbles came out too fast.
‘Yes, but we can’t—’ Helen paused, glancing at the drinks cupboard. It wasn’t as if anyone ever checked it. ‘I suppose we should celebrate our escape.’ She screwed the lid back on again. ‘Hang on a sec.’
The car was gone and, when she stuck her head around the garage door, there were no signs of life. The boat was starting to change, a framework sketching out the shape of a cabin, some of the gaps already filled with pale sheets of ply. The smell of fresh sawdust hung in the air. Helen climbed the ladder to be sure, but the boat was empty, the new engine marooned on its base, the old office chair fallen on to its side.
When she got back to the house, Victoria greeted her with a wave of a bottle.
‘Martini! The perfect afternoon cocktail!’ She handed Helen a glass of lemonade and poured some in.
‘You could have waited ’til I was back.’ Helen took a sip. ‘My dad might have been right behind me.’
‘S’OK, we’d have given him some.’ Victoria sat back and gestured to the television. ‘Now, entertainment!’ She already had hold of the remote, and she cycled through the channels: a quiz show, someone in a garden, horse racing. She paused on a black-and-white film, then carried on round before ending back on the film.
‘But it’s in French,’ Helen groaned. ‘I’m too tired to read subtitles.’
‘Then you’ll have to guess at what’s going on, won’t you.’ And Victoria dropped the remote down beside her and settled back with her drink.
The film had finished and Mick still wasn’t back. Had he said where he was going? Helen didn’t think so, and she felt a buzz of annoyance. It was fine for him to shout when he didn’t know where she was. Victoria had wandered into the kitchen and was eating a slice of bread from the packet. Helen followed her and started to hunt for butter, but a thought struck her as she opened the fridge door.
‘You know what?’
‘No I don’t. What?’ Victoria pushed her to one side and helped herself to a pot of jam.
‘The actress in the film, the one with the short hair?’ She picked the butter up and turned back to the table. ‘She’s on the cover of the book Piet gave me, the French one.’
Victoria looked blank.
‘You know, the one I was telling you about? Where they’re on the beach, the father and daughter?’ She didn’t want to say the name again – Victoria had been scathing about her accent – but she wasn’t even trying to remember. ‘Bonjour Tristesse.’
‘Better, much better.’ She’d known all along. Helen decided to ignore the jibe.
‘She was beautiful, wasn’t she, the actress? With her hair and everything?’
‘Well, short hair isn’t hard. Take a pair of scissors, voila!’ Victoria waved her mug in the air, water slopping on to the floor.
Helen sighed, and took another bite. ‘Piet said that you would suit short hair, but I should keep mine long.’
‘You’ve been doing a lot of talking with my uncle lately.’ Victoria poked her head forward, one eyebrow raised and the other scrunched down. ‘Are you sure there’s nothing going on there? I mean, he does find long hair veeeery sexy …’
‘No!’ Helen felt her cheeks redden. ‘I mean, he’s your uncle.’
Victoria gave her an assessing look. ‘I don’t see why you can’t be a French girlie, if that’s what you want. Let’s swap, I’ll cut yours off, and you do mine.’
‘I don’t know.’ Helen drank the remainder of her glass and reached for a knife. She was starting to feel a bit sick, maybe a sandwich would help. ‘Tomorrow, perhaps.’
‘Although,’ Victoria continued, giving Helen a poke. ‘Seth is quite into long hair as well, if you ask me.’
They’d no sooner drifted back into the sitting room than Mick arrived. He didn’t say anything, but sat down, a four-pack of beer to hand, and held out a hand for the remote, turning over to some documentary. Helen managed to edge the empty bottle of martini round the side of the sofa, and, as the voices on the TV droned on, closed her eyes to avoid the jerky procession of images that were making her head swim. It was soothing, lying there without having to talk. She didn’t realize she’d slept until she came to. The credits were rolling up the screen and her dad was speaking, but she missed it. Victoria, though, was jumping straight in.
‘But they were fighting for what they believed in! That’s got to be better than sitting back and pretend everything’s OK.’
Mick reached for another can of beer, shaking his head. ‘They were half-arsed, self-indulgent and irresponsible. They killed innocent people and destroyed property for no good reason.’ He tipped his head back for a swallow. ‘And for what? Not a lot, as far as I can see.’
Victoria took a deep breath and leaned forward to reply.
Helen stood up, too quickly, to create a diversion. ‘Shall we go upstairs?’ She walked across to the door, trying to appear casual, but Victoria ignored her.
‘It’s better than sticking your head in the sand. Look what happened to the Germans when they tried doing that.’
‘Well, I’m going to put the kettle on.’ Helen said it to no one. As she let the door swing to, the voices continued. She filled the kettle, then sat down at the table, vaguely surprised to see it was nearly dark outside, and rested her head on her folded arms. When the kettle boiled, it took her several minutes to be bothered to stand up. She noticed her book, jammed down the side of the bread bin from when she’d been reading it this morning. She took it back to the table, but the words swam around and she let it drop.
She’d finished her tea by the time Victoria clattered through.
‘What are you reading?’ She tipped the book sideways to see the cover, knocking over Helen’s almost empty mug. A small puddle of cold tea ran out on to the table. ‘Sorry.’
Helen wiped at it with her sleeve. ‘Not reading, more giving up. It’s Moby Dick. Did you read it?’
‘What, the book? No, skipped to the end. Everybody dies.’ Victoria was over by the window now, gazing out into the dark. ‘Can I have a cup of tea?’
‘There’s the kettle.’ Helen rested her chin on her hands. ‘So did you come to any conclusions in there?’
Victoria picked a mug up from beside the sink, peered inside and rinsed it brief
ly under the tap. ‘Not exactly. East is east, and all that.’ She opened a cupboard, shut it, opened the next one. ‘But it was fun. And he’ll be swept away in the new order, anyhow.’
‘Second on the right, the thin one.’ Helen got up. It was easier to get it herself. ‘And you call that fun?’
‘Well, you’re out here reading Moby Dick. Wild.’
‘It’s from your list.’
‘Oh yeah.’ Victoria picked the book up again. ‘We’ll have to finish that one day.’ She fell back in a chair. ‘Sugar. I want lots of sugar.’
Helen made herself some more tea while she was up. The garden was impenetrable beyond the window, a blank darkness where anything could be happening. She drew the blind.
‘Can I stay over?’ Victoria was leaning on the table in mock exhaustion. ‘I can’t face the walk home.’
‘I guess. We’ll have to get some cushions from the sofa.’
‘Oh, your bed’s wide enough. We can go top to tail, then we won’t disturb your dad. He’s having a sleep to recover.’ Victoria spent a minute stirring her tea. She lifted the spoon out, watching the swirl of the tea as it carried on with its momentum before dipping the spoon down again to make the circling stop. ‘Did you stay because you felt sorry for him?’
It took Helen a minute to catch up. ‘What? Oh …’ Sorry wasn’t the word. She had stood there on that awkward, hideous day with her mother’s explanations still hanging in the air, and she had looked into her father’s face and seen the defeat and she’d made her decision.
‘A bit.’ She shook her head to rid herself of the memory. ‘Anyway, who’d want to live with my mum? She’s a nightmare.’
Chapter Twenty-one
Helen slept on the floor in the end, on the spare winter quilt she’d remembered was kept on top of the wardrobe. It took a long time to get to sleep and then she dreamed of breaking glass and bombs. When she woke up in the morning, there was no sign of Victoria. She got dressed and went downstairs, checking the rooms before going out to stick her head around the garage door. Piet was sitting astride the gunwale holding up a piece of ply, and she recalled what Victoria had said about him liking long hair. How would she feel if he did, well, think of her in that way? A wave of disconcerting warmth tingled through her stomach as he glanced up. She was glad she was in the shadows.