The Night Rainbow

by Claire King

  I hold out the flowers. Hello, I say.

  We hope we are not disturbing you, says Margot.

  Are you hungry? she says.

  No, I say. Claude left us some biscuits and water.

  Did he now? Josette folds her arms.

  In the girl-nest, Margot says.

  In the low pasture, I say.

  I hope it wasn’t meant to be a secret, says Margot.

  Maman yelled at Claude, I say. So we have no one to play with.

  Who? says Josette.

  Me and Margot, I say.

  Suddenly I hear music, and we look up to see a band walking up the path to Josette’s house. There is a man with long hair and a trumpet. A man wearing a hat with a green ribbon around it and holding an accordion. There is a lady with long dark hair and rings all over her fingers and a shiny brown guitar. There is a big boy, with thimbles on his fingers, who is carrying a big tray and scratching the thimbles on it.

  Are you having a party? I ask. Josette laughs.

  It’s the llevant de taula, she says.

  The what? I don’t know those words at all. But Josette doesn’t speak English.

  That’s Catalan, she says. In French it’s the lever de table: it means dessert.

  These people are a dessert?

  Josette laughs again. They have come to play us a song, and to invite us to the village fête tonight.

  I remember now, how last year they came to our house. It was the day I saw Papa smoke a cigarette. Papa followed the band up the path on his tractor. They all arrived in the courtyard and Maman was hanging out clothes, just like Josette today. Papa asked them to play a song, and the words kept saying Je t’aimais, je t’aime and je t’aimerai. That is in French and it is telling about how the singer used to love someone and still does and always will. It sounds like it should be a happy song, but when they played it, it came out all sad. I thought maybe they had played the wrong song. But Maman and Papa danced to it in the courtyard, so close they looked stuck together, and Papa sang and Maman cried. Afterwards, Maman went back into the house, and Papa and the musicians drank some pastis and smoked some cigarettes and they made their glasses chink.

  Everybody kisses Josette, and the man holding the accordion gives her a big hug.

  So, what song would make you happy today? asks the man with the trumpet.

  ‘La vie en rose’, says Josette.

  That is a song about life being pink, says Margot.

  That’s silly, I say. You have to have all the colours.

  Everybody laughs as though I have made a joke.

  But I’m serious! I say. They laugh some more, and then they begin to play. It’s quite a happy song and Josette sings the words while we listen.

  Sit down, says Josette when it is finished. So the musicians sit around the table and Margot and I sit on the grass and look at them. The man with the hat has taken it off and put it on the table. Underneath he has no hair! He takes out a red handkerchief and wipes drops of sweat off his shiny bald head.

  Josette comes back with a bottle of wine and puts some coins into the hat with the green ribbon. Then she whispers in the ear of the man with the accordion. He smiles with his yellow teeth, then squats down next to me.

  What’s your name? he says.

  Pea, I say.

  Pi? Like the number? he says.

  Or Pie like the bird? says one of the ladies. Everybody laughs and I feel shy.

  Pea just like pea, says Margot.

  My name is Pea, I say. P, E, A. And this is Margot. I am five and a half years old, I say, and Margot is four.

  The musicians all have their eyebrows up.

  She is tall for her age, I say. They laugh.

  Well then, he says. Your house is next, so come on, we’ll walk back with you.

  The band has a white truck, like the peachman’s only bigger. It is open at the back and they all climb in and pull me up. Come on P, E, A, Pea, they say, come on Margot-Tall-For-Your-Age. And we get into the truck with the drum and the accordion and the trumpet and all of the people and we drive along the road. And they are playing happy music. A car passes us going in the other direction and the people wave at us. I wave back and do my best smile. I feel like a princess at last.

  The musicians follow us around the house into the courtyard. They are still teasing me.

  Shall we get your maman? says the man with the long hair and the trumpet. His hair is shiny and I would like to touch it to see what it feels like.

  Better not, I say. She prefers it inside and she’s probably asleep.

  Maybe we shouldn’t play, then, he says. We shouldn’t wake her up.

  I think about it. I am still extremely cross with Maman. That’s OK, I say. She’s deaf.

  Oh, says the man. OK then P, E, A, Pea, what song would you like me to play?

  I try hard to think, but I can’t think of anything.

  I don’t know, I say.

  Well, says the guitar lady, bending down and taking one of my hands. She has a soft, kind face. She is very pretty. Well, she says, when is your birthday?

  My birthday is on the seventeenth of September, I say. I will be six years old.

  Well then you are more than five and a half years old, says the lady. You are nearly six.

  I suppose that is true. Papa told me I was five and a half but that was a long time ago.

  How many days is it to my birthday? I ask the lady.

  More than you can count on your fingers and toes, she says. But less than if we used my fingers and toes too.

  But how many? I say. The fingers-and-toes thing is very complicated. Why do grownups complicate things all the time?

  Pea can count to a hundred, you know, says Margot.

  Thirty-five, says the lady, smiling.

  Three and five, I say. And I draw it in the air with my finger.

  Very clever, says the lady.

  That’s not such a long way off, is it?

  No, not so far at all.

  If you took a car you could get there faster, says Margot.

  I could get there really fast on an aeroplane, I say.

  The lady laughs. Come on, let’s celebrate a little bit early. She strums the guitar once and then the band starts to play. They play ‘Happy Birthday’ and the lady sings. I have never had a band play ‘Happy Birthday’ to me before. It makes me feel a little bit shy. But Margot is not feeling shy.

  Come on! she says, and she grabs my fingers and starts to twirl me around, so I twirl her back. We dance to ‘Happy Birthday’. Not like Papa and Maman danced, but more like ballet dancing or flamenco dancing, or both. Our special colourful, sparkly dresses spin up around our legs so we look like the ballet-dancer on Maman’s musical box.

  When the song is finished, everyone smiles at me. I know we are supposed to give them some money now to say thank you, or a drink. I suppose they won’t want to drink from the outside tap.

  The peachman has not left us any money, I say.

  That’s OK, says the man with the hat. It was nice to meet you. The long-haired lady comes and holds his hand and he puts his arm around her.

  Bye, Pea, she says.

  Don’t forget Margot, says the man.

  Bye, Margot, she says with a smile, and then they all start going away.

  We’ll see you next year, they shout, and they wave at us. Margot and I stand and watch until the truck has gone down the path out of sight and the dust has fallen back out of its cloudiness on to the ground. I look around us.

  We’d better water the plants, I say. They are looking sad and thirsty.

  Yes, we should, says Margot. But I don’t know what we can do about the hanging baskets.

  The hanging baskets are by the door. The leaves are yellow and crispy and there are dead flowers on the ends of dried-up stalks. But I can’t reach them to give them a drink.

  If we had Claude he could bring a ladder, I say.

  Maybe we could get the ladder from the barn, says Margot.

  Do you
think we could carry it? I say.

  Well, it is a silly idea putting flowers up so high anyway, says Margot, if you want the children to water them.

  Yes, I agree, let’s just leave them.

  I look up at Maman’s bedroom window. The shutters are closed, which means supper is whatever we want, and bedtime is whenever we say. To start with I thought those things were good but now it is quite boring. It is quite late and I don’t want to go out again, but it is too early to go to bed. It has been a long and complicated day today.

  What did you like best about today? says Margot.

  Best about today, I say, was it being my birthday. What did you like best?

  I liked best about today, says Margot, the man’s hat with the green ribbon around it.

  That was my next favourite thing, I say.

  And what didn’t you like about today? says Margot.

  Nothing, I say.

  Nothing? says Margot.

  I don’t want to talk about it, I say.

  Margot waits for a while, and when she sees that I am not going to ask her, she says, Well, what I didn’t like about today was the …

  Shush, I say. And she does.

  After a while, though, I feel sorry for being rude. I hope Claude is OK, I say to Margot.

  I hope he left the tomatoes, she replies. And then she winks at me.

  We go back around to the front door and the tomatoes are still there in the basket on the doorstep. They are hot from the sun, almost cooked, and their skins are tight. When I bite into one the sweet warm juice squirts out straight away on to my chin. For a while we just sit there and eat the tomatoes, staring up at the pink-blue sky, and the swallows diving past the window every now and then, catching insects as they go. A lizard scurries down the wall and around the corner to where we found our specimens.

  Shall we go and look for more specimens before bed? I say. I would like to find another butterfly wing to match the one in my tin.

  That’s a very good idea, says Margot, and I say, I know.

  The problem with following insects is that they are flying, so you are looking up into the air instead of where you are going. This is why we chase the blue-green damselfly right into the nettles. First I notice the jaggedy leaves brush my legs with a kind of tickle. I stop looking at the damselfly, and look down instead, wondering why I didn’t feel any sting. But then it comes, the hot stinging right by my knee. I open my mouth because I am going to cry hard and loud, but then I see Margot in front of me. She has been stung much worse. My leg has a small pink patch, with white dots bubbling up. But Margot is smaller and she has the nettle stings all over her arms as well.

  Oh, help me! she says.

  OK, I say. Don’t worry. We will find you a dock leaf. My arm is stinging, but I am being brave, and when I find the dock leaves I make sure Margot is all rubbed better before I have one for myself.

  By the time I am in bed the nettle bumps have gone, but I still cannot get to sleep. I can hear the thumping of faraway music in the village. People there will be dancing and being happy. I have never been to the fête in the night-time but I have seen the posters that are put up on the road to the village. There are men standing on stage wearing white trousers with gold on. They have microphones and trumpets and there are ladies in sparkling swimming costumes doing dancing behind them. There are people listening to the music, waving their arms and smiling. The faraway music doesn’t sound like I imagined it to sound. Still, I can imagine all of our neighbours, the people from the village, Tante Brigitte and Sylvie, the priest who buried Papa and the man from the post office, holding up their arms and dancing. I wonder if Claude is there, because Claude probably is rubbish at dancing and also he doesn’t have many friends. Maybe he went with Josette and they will do the slow dancing. There is also food. Party food, I think. I am hungry now, but I don’t want to get out of bed.

  Instead, I plan what I would have for my midnight feast if I could make it appear magically in front of me. I would have ham and butter sandwiches. I would have the leg parts of roasted chickens that you can pick up with your fingers. You can always find a bit more chicken on them even after a long time. I would have pain au chocolat and lemonade, pizza and peaches and avocados and chips. Imagining my midnight feast makes me feel better. I am pretending to taste the butter and the fizziness. I am starting to half-dream things. People are coming to my picnic. Claude is there with Merlin. Some rabbits. Margot. We are on Windy Hill and all the wing turbines are turning but it is not windy. I watch my turbine number five and start to breathe with the turns. My breaths turn to yawns.

  Outside my room the floor creaks, jumping me awake. I can feel my heart thumping inside. I wait to hear a flush from the bathroom but nothing comes. I listen carefully, but everything is quiet. Then the floor creaks again.

  Margot! I whisper.

  What’s up? she replies, straight away.

  There’s someone out there.

  Another creak. There is some shuffling of my bed sheet and Margot climbs into bed with me. Margot has never been in my bed. Normally I like to have my bed all to myself like a big girl. I can turn my pillow over when it gets too hot so that I can feel the cool side against my cheek. I like to have the cow that Papa gave me on the side nearest the wall, and on the other side I have the blue bear that I have always had. I would share my bed with Maman or Papa if they asked, although their bed is bigger, but otherwise it is my bed and on the wall above it there is a little plaque that says Pivoine and tells what my name means in French, just to prove it. But now I don’t mind Margot sharing because it is late and someone is standing on the other side of the wall. It is nice to have somebody close. Margot is clever and she is not afraid of anything. It’s just her personality.

  OK, says Margot, don’t panic. Let’s think about this sensibly. Has there been a flush?

  No! I say.

  Hmmm, she says. Were they big creaks like a monster would do, or small ones like a very heavy cat?

  Now I am not sure.

  I hear something soft bump up against the wall. I sit up in bed and I try to scream, Maman! But my voice comes out a whispery nothing.

  There is another creak. Margot wraps her arms tight around me. There must be a perfectly reasonable explanation for this, she says. She talks like a grownup.

  Then the door swings open, letting light slip in on to the floor. I hold my breath in the dark, staring at the slice of light and hurting to know whose face is going to appear in it.

  It is Maman who creeps in.

  I remember a surprising thing. How, when I was four years old, the door would open every night. The creak would wake me up but I used to keep my eyes closed because I always knew it would be Papa and Maman. I had forgotten that. They came every night, together, bringing their smells of tractors and cooking and shaving cream and face cream. They would whisper to each other and pull up the covers. I would stick my leg out again, the way I like it. Sometimes this would happen twice and Maman would make a soft tiny laugh. Then there would be two kisses, one on my forehead (Papa) and one on my cheek (Maman). And I love you, and Je t’aime. The door would click closed and the creak would creak and I would stop being awake again. I have remembered this and it makes me feel sad for everything.

  Now, though, I am not pretending to be asleep, I am sitting up by the end of my bed with my eyes open. Maman jumps when she sees me, as though I were the monster.

  Oh! she says.

  Sorry, I say.

  She comes over and sits down on the bed, lowering herself backwards with one hand on the bed and the other on her back.

  I’m sorry, Pea, she says. She tries to pull me to her to cuddle her but the baby is in the way. I move around the side and do it like that.

  Maman, I say, because the question is too big for me to keep in my mouth, is Papa not my papa?

  Maman is crying, her tears on my cheeks, bothering me, so I uncuddle from her. She shakes her head. Peony, she says, Papa will always be your papa.

&n
bsp; So who is my Real Father that you said …?

  You know, Pea, it’s a long story. Once, before I came here and met your papa, I lived a long way away in England, and people were not always very nice. I mean, not that people in England are not nice, but where I lived there were a lot of not nice ones …

  Maman’s nose is running. She wipes it on her sleeve.

  Am I a princess? I say. Did you steal me?

  Did I steal you? She laughs a little. No, Pea, you grew in my tummy, just like this. She smooths her hand over her big round belly.

  So you are my real maman?

  I’m afraid so, she says. Warts and all.

  Witches have warts, I say.

  Yes, says Maman. Big ones on their noses. Have I got one, could you have a look please?

  I look closely at her face. Margot too. Her face is normal. Her nose is normal.

  You don’t have a wart, I say.

  So it’s decided. I’m not a witch, just your maman.

  And Papa?

  Pea, I will tell you all about it one day, she says, but for now all you need to know is that Papa loved you. I love you.

  Even though I get in your way?

  You don’t get in my way, she says. Her belly goes up and down when she sighs. She tries to tuck my short hair behind my ears, but it won’t stay. The tears start to come, and she gives up and wipes them off her own face instead.

  I’m sorry I’m always so tired, she says. It won’t be long now. When the baby is out it will be better.

  It’s OK, I say. Even though it isn’t really OK, because Maman is crying. I don’t know what else to say.

  Ask about the photo, whispers Margot.

  No! I whisper back.

  What is it? says Maman.

  I’m so sorry I hit the baby, I say. I didn’t mean to.

  I know, she says. But, Pea?

  Yes?

  Don’t ever, ever, do that again. Your baby brother is so tiny and so fragile and …

  It’s a baby brother? I say.

  Yes, says Maman. It’s a baby brother.

  Oh, I say. Maman is looking hard at my face now, waiting for me to be happy.

  What is his name? I ask.

  His name is going to be Pablo, and Amaury like your papa. We are going to take care of him, you and me.