Boy Underwater

by Adam Baron

  The rest of that evening was terrible. After Uncle Chris hung up he immediately started to redial as I turned back to the table and saw what was on it. The envelope addressed to ‘Chris’ that Auntie Mill had put on the work surface that morning. It was open. Juni had the letter in her hand and I watched as she looked up from it, then tore it into pieces.

  ‘She’s left us,’ Juni said, which made Clay cry even more.

  Juni, Clay and Uncle Chris were so upset that it was sort of like I wasn’t there. They were in their own bubble and I couldn’t get through to them. Auntie Mill had left? How, ‘left’? Mum had left, but she was ill. Had Auntie Mill just left on purpose? That was nearly impossible to understand. I did care that she’d left of course, but not as much as I wanted to know where my mum was. I couldn’t ask anyone there for help, though. Uncle Chris kept calling Auntie Mill and then he called the tennis club, shouting at them because they wouldn’t give him the phone number he wanted. Juni and Clay either hung around him, asking if he’d got hold of Auntie Mill yet, or they looked really dazed. All I could do was look out of the window, my last hope being that Mum had gone shopping for my present; she’d arrive any minute.

  But when it got to eight o’clock I realised that the shops would have shut ages ago. I had no idea where she was and, even worse, I had no idea how to find her. Eventually I forced myself to tell Uncle Chris, who didn’t understand what I was saying at first. But then he seemed to pull himself together. He called Auntie Mill – again – and when her voicemail came on he said, ‘Please. We need to talk. We can work this out, but there’s something more. Janet’s walked out of the hospital and we don’t know where she is. Has she called you? Please let us know – Cymbeline’s frantic.’

  I waited, really hoping that Auntie Mill would phone back. But she didn’t. I wandered over to the window again and saw the flowers I’d bought for Mum that Auntie Mill had thought I’d got for her. They were in a vase on the windowsill, but the water they were standing in was brown and there were dirty rings going down the sides of the glass. The petals were dangling down from the stalks like hangnails and, as I watched, one of them dropped, rocking for a second on the sill before stopping.

  Veronique and Billy had already gone home by then. But Alisha stayed and cooked some pasta with pesto for Juni, Clay and me, while Uncle Chris stayed on the phone. We couldn’t eat much and afterwards Alisha got the Carcassonne out for a game, but Clay said he was going off to his room. I played but I kept looking out of the window for Mum. I didn’t see her, but I did think Auntie Mill was back because I saw puffs of smoke coming from out of the treehouse. I told Uncle Chris and he ran down there and climbed the ladder. But it wasn’t Auntie Mill.

  ‘Clayton!’ he bellowed. ‘What on earth do you think you’re doing? And, hey, what is that stuff?’

  Alisha, Juni and I played Carcassonne while Uncle Chris took Clay up to his room to have a word with him. We played, without talking, until Veronique and her mum came in carrying dishes of food. Because we’d eaten, they put them in the fridge and then sat next to me. Seeing them together was weird. They looked so similar, like opening up a Russian doll to see the smaller one underneath. But I could also see Veronique’s dad in her face too, probably because he’s Chinese and Veronique’s mum’s not. It was so obvious that she was made up of two different, separate people. With only her mum next to her, it looked sort of like there was a bit of her missing. The bit of her that didn’t come from her mum. It made me think about me. I was just made up of my mum. Her only.

  She was all I had.

  Veronique’s mum put her arm round me and leaned down so that her face was really near. She smiled but it wasn’t a pretending-everything-is-okay smile. It was more of a I-know-things-are-absolutely-terrible smile.

  ‘Veronique told me about your mum,’ she said. ‘You don’t know where she is, do you?’

  There was nothing I could do but admit the truth. So I shook my head.

  ‘And no one can get in touch with your aunt?’

  ‘No. She’s really working on her backhand. We can’t reach Uncle Bill either because he’s away.’

  ‘And your mum wasn’t at home when you went there?’

  I saw myself banging on our door. ‘No.’

  ‘Have you tried calling home from here?’

  ‘Uncle Chris has. There’s no answer. I just don’t know where she is.’

  Veronique’s mum shifted up right next to me and her arms went round my shoulder.

  ‘I’m sure it’ll be all right,’ she said. ‘She’ll probably get here when you’re asleep. But if she doesn’t –’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Then I think we might have to call the police.’

  I went to bed feeling numb. I picked up the tablet and stared at the black screen, trying to imagine Mum’s face on it. But it stayed black. She wouldn’t appear. I wanted to ask Uncle Chris if he had a charger but I didn’t, not with everything else going on. I pushed it aside and lay on my back in the huge bed, wishing I could just be asleep so that I wouldn’t have to feel what I was feeling. I wouldn’t have to feel anything, nothing at all, though perhaps I might have a dream, which even if it was horrible couldn’t be as bad as being awake. It might even be a good dream, with Mum in it, and for a second that thought lifted me. But actually I hoped I wouldn’t dream about Mum, because waking up without her would be even worse then, wouldn’t it?

  Uncle Chris woke me up the next morning. He was wearing the same suit as yesterday, which made him smell of yesterday and everything that had happened then. Just seeing him, the look on his face, told me that Mum hadn’t got there during the night. I followed him downstairs and saw Veronique and her mum back in the living room again, smiling up at me from the sofa. A policewoman was standing next to them.

  I stared at the policewoman, slowly, reluctantly remembering why she was there.

  Veronique’s mum stood up. ‘Cymbeline, this is Sergeant Cartwright.’

  ‘Catherine,’ the policewoman said.

  She asked me to sit down, which I did. Everyone was watching me and a strange, still atmosphere spread around as Catherine perched next to me on the sofa.

  I was hot, and uncomfortable, and barely able to speak when she smiled and asked me what had been ‘going on’. I got the words out, though, going through it all as I’d done with Alisha the day before, even the bit about going back to my house at night. And what I’d found there.

  ‘She only ever painted Mr Fluffy,’ I said.

  ‘I see.’ Catherine scribbled that down on a pad and looked up at me. ‘I think. Mr …?’

  I told her all about Mr Fluffy and then about Not Mr Fluffy (But Teddy In His Own Right). I asked if she wanted to see him but Catherine said no, though she would like to see my painting. I fetched it and Catherine studied it for a minute before telling me it was really good and reaching forward to take a photo of it on her phone. Her sleeve rode up when she did that and a snake poked its head out before ducking back in again. I didn’t know police people were allowed to have tattoos and I wondered if she had a whole jungle, lions and tigers and elephants all running around underneath her stiff black clothes.

  Catherine asked what Mum’s height was and Uncle Chris had to answer because who knows that about their own mum? She said she was sure Mum was going to turn up and she smiled again, which got me really frustrated. She wasn’t making calls. She wasn’t sending out copies of the picture. She seemed far too relaxed about Mum being missing. I couldn’t describe how absolutely wrong it was that Mum hadn’t come to find me after leaving the hospital. Was she still ill? Had she tried to find me but couldn’t for some reason? That thought made me want to cry and Catherine put her hand on my arm.

  ‘I’m sure she’ll turn up, love. Really. Meanwhile I’ll ask my colleagues to keep an eye out for her.’

  ‘But you don’t understand. She should be here. She really should be. Especially today.’

  ‘Today?’

  ‘Because it’s my birt
hday,’ I said.

  That comment seemed to change the atmosphere. Veronique’s mum’s mouth opened but she shut it, quickly, her hand going up to her mouth as she studied me. Catherine looked more serious. She stood, thanking me quickly before asking Uncle Chris to show her out.

  I watched them chatting on the front doorstep before she left, then Catherine started speaking into her walkie-talkie before Uncle Chris had even closed the door. Meanwhile Veronique’s mum was squeezing my shoulder, her head cocked to one side, and her eyes were a bit shiny. I gave her a quick smile and looked around at the room, amazed because it was only when I’d said it that I remembered what day it was. It was so weird. All the anticipation, like water pressing up to a dam, and I’d just forgotten. I normally wake up buzzing, almost unable to believe that the day has actually come. And this one was going to be an even better birthday than normal because, for the first time that I could remember, it was on a Saturday. A WEEKEND. For weeks I’d been imagining waking up at home, with Mum, early, knowing I didn’t have to rush about, that I could just jump into her bed with her and open my presents and watch The Simpsons on her tablet. Seeing it in my mind’s eye at that moment, it was almost as if it really was happening – but to a different Cymbeline. Not me. A Cymbeline living the life that should have been mine. I wanted to run home again. I wanted to make the imagined birthday true, but I couldn’t of course. I was the Cymbeline in this Cymbeline’s life and there was nothing I could do about it.

  Veronique’s mum coughed and then wished me happy birthday before asking what I wanted to do. I shrugged.

  ‘Well, what do you normally do on a Saturday?’

  ‘He plays football,’ Veronique said.

  I frowned at Veronique, wondering how she knew this, though it was obvious, actually. On Mondays we do go on about it, replaying our goals or complaining that Danny Jones has to pass it more. Everyone knows about Saturday football and I’d been looking forward to it because on my birthday Mr Delap (Vi’s dad/our coach) wouldn’t make me go in goal at all. That didn’t matter now, though, and when Veronique’s mum asked if I wanted to go today, I said no because I wanted to wait here for my mum.

  ‘But if you normally go, that’s where she’ll think you’ll be, won’t she?’

  I hadn’t thought of that so I agreed, and Veronique’s mum asked if Veronique wanted to go as well.

  ‘But what about Mandarin? And French? And piano?’

  ‘You can catch up later. During reading time. Yes?’

  ‘Football,’ said Veronique. ‘Hmmm.’

  Uncle Chris drove us. Clay lent me some old boots and shorts and Veronique and I got into Uncle Chris’s car. Billy came round for a lift as well. I was pleased to see him, which you are with a friend, and that finally proved that he was my friend, though the first thing he did was ask me if my mum had come back. That hurt, and it didn’t get any better when I remembered that Mum normally drops me off at football. We do drills and stuff and then Mum comes back to watch the match at the end – with the other parents. They’d ask me where she was and I’d have to say I didn’t know. I shivered when I thought of all the kids in my team asking too, which they would because I’d told them Mum was going to bring cakes because of my birthday. And then I shivered even more because of course one of those kids would be my supposed best friend, who’d said my mum was crazy.

  Lance – sorry, I mean Bradley – had been going to come back to my house after football. Mum had been going to take us to see a film. She’d promised us popcorn, and not homemade stuff in old Iceland bags but bought in the actual cinema (without Mum even tutting about how expensive it was). This was my special outing. It wasn’t going to happen of course, but I was still going to have to see him. Was he going to laugh? Would he have some great joke up his sleeve about Mum being missing? I felt sick at that thought and when Uncle Chris pulled up by the heath I wanted to stay in the car.

  He wasn’t there yet, though, so when Billy and Veronique scrambled out I grabbed my bag and followed them on to the grass. Uncle Chris said he’d pick us up later and drove away, and Billy ran off towards Danny. I looked for Mum, squinting against the sun, my hand shading my eyes as I scanned the huge green space all the way up to the road near Greenwich Park, where the cars looked like they were being pulled by a piece of string. There were so many people, near or far away, but I didn’t have to look at each one to know Mum wasn’t there. She felt not there.

  I just shook my head and then looked at the coach-dads putting poles out and the kids getting ready to play, some kicking balls, others shouting, some in school kits but others in their own shirts with Messi on the back or Ronaldo or Sturridge, though Mickey in Year 5 had some random person because he supports Grimsby Town. Without Mum it didn’t look real. It felt as if I wasn’t actually there, not in the wrong Cymbeline’s life any more, but in no life. A ghost. Vi Delap and her brother Franklin (Year 6) were trying to do headers while their little sister Frieda (Reception) grabbed hold of Franklin’s legs. I could hear them laughing, but it was like they were a thousand miles away, or on telly

  When Franklin kicked the ball towards me I stared at it, hardly knowing what to do, though usually I’d have been nervous because he’s older, and really good, and I wouldn’t have wanted it to go under my foot. I would have trapped it and chipped it back, or even done a rabona to impress him. But I just watched it bang up against my leg before nudging it to Veronique.

  She looked a little confused. ‘Kick it,’ I said.

  ‘Oh.’

  She did, trying to toe-prod it, though she got the edge and it spun off towards the Year 2s. I went to get it and I kicked it back to Franklin, who was on his own now because Vi was digging in her bag. She ran up and I thought she was going to be the first to ask where my mum was, and I steeled myself for that. But instead she held out something to me.

  A birthday present.

  I was relieved. But I also felt guilty. Vi had got me a present and I hadn’t invited her to see Star Wars. The present also made me feel strange because, again, I couldn’t connect to it. It didn’t mean anything, which made me realise that actually presents never do. Birthdays aren’t about them, but about being in your family, right at the very middle of it, all of it moving around you for one whole day. Nothing else mattered without that.

  And maybe that was why nothing seemed real to me – because without Mum there was nothing for me to be in the middle of.

  I said thanks, though. It was really nice of her. I smiled, about to take the present, but I didn’t. Because I couldn’t. And that was because, weirdly – and I do mean weirdly – Veronique leapt forward and grabbed it out of Vi’s hand!

  I stared, confused, my first impulse being to shout ‘Hey!’ and grab it back. But Veronique had been really nice to me in the last few days, and I also knew that she had problems of her own. She was always doing things. She did more things than I even knew there were to do. It must be exhausting. Was this some reaction? Was she going a bit mad, nicking people’s birthday presents? Instead of complaining, I smiled and was about to hold out my hands so Veronique could give me the present back. But before I could do that she did something even more weird – she started to unwrap it. And not just unwrap, but tear and rip, scrabbling at the paper like a two-year-old until the actual present fell on to the grass.

  That really was a bit much and I was about to reach down and pick it up when Veronique suddenly shoved the paper in my face.

  ‘Look!’ she insisted.

  ‘Yes. It’s quite nice to take it off yourself, you know.’

  ‘I know. But don’t you see?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, pushing Veronique’s hand away from my nose. ‘Reindeers.’

  ‘It was all we had in,’ Vi said. ‘You don’t mind, do you?’

  ‘Of course not. And thanks for –’

  ‘DON’T YOU SEE?’ shouted Veronique.

  I didn’t, but Veronique’s behaviour was so weird that instead of bending down to the present I watched her as
she spread her hands out, shouted again, and then dropped down to her knees – to my bag. Not asking me if she could, she pulled the zip and started yanking things out of it. Eventually she came out with the picture of Mr Fluffy and spread it out on the grass. I was cross – she was being rough with it, and it was mine – but I couldn’t help following her finger as she jabbed it down on the picnic rug. No, not the rug – the balled-up pieces of paper on it.

  And I could see.

  Wrapping paper.

  It wasn’t litter. It wasn’t paper for sandwiches. It was obvious now.

  Mum had painted wrapping paper. Which meant …

  My mouth fell open. Vi asked what was going on but we both just glued our eyes to the picture and ignored her (sorry, Vi). I stared at Veronique’s finger on the paper, then followed it as it moved – to Mr Fluffy.

  ‘It’s for him,’ she said.

  ‘For …?’

  ‘It’s for Mr Fluffy. It’s for him. He was in it. You had just been given him. In the painting. He was wrapped up. And that means that in the picture –’

  ‘It’s my birthday,’ I said.

  We were silent for a second. Then Veronique said something that was really obvious but still needed saying.

  ‘And it’s your birthday today. It’s your birthday today as well, Cymbeline.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ Vi said.

  Again we ignored her. We weren’t being rude. We were just too stunned, and having the same thought. The picture scene was on my birthday – that was now clear. But that wasn’t all: we also knew the time. Veronique had worked that out from the shadows.

  Midday.

  It was only two hours from now.

  And if Mum wasn’t here, where she knew I’d be, or at home, or at Auntie Mill’s, where else could she be?

  She had to be there, where the picture was, and she had to be there right now. Or at least she would be soon. She’d painted the same painting, of the same day, at the same time, over and over again.