I didn’t know that much really, but I didn’t tell him that. In spite of the gnawing voice that kept whispering that I might become sick, sicker than I’d ever been before, I couldn’t help feeling thrilled. He’d finally noticed me. I had to grab my chance.
“Sure,” I answered. “See you later.”
I dawdled after school, pretending to feed Felicity, to give Kean a chance to catch up with me. I half expected it to be a cruel joke, but instead he came running to me, out of breath, like he was scared I would disappear without him.
“Glad you’re still around,” he said, trying to flash me his irresistible smile. Although my tummy still jumped, his mouth lacked its normal arrogant self-confidence and the corners twitched, as though he was trying on someone else’s face and it didn’t quite fit.
“Hey, Kean!” shouted Joe, seeing us. “What are you doing with cleaner girl?”
Kean stared at him. “You’re so lame,” he snapped.
Joe gasped, like he couldn’t believe his ears.
“Get lost, man,” Kean said, shaking his head and smiling at me like we shared a secret.
Joe shrugged, trying not to look hurt, and started rummaging busily in his suitcase like he had something important to do, but I noticed he turned his back to us so we couldn’t see his face. Maybe I would have felt sorry for him if it hadn’t been for all the times he’d taunted me before; maybe I should have felt sorry for him. But I didn’t.
Instead, a warm, smug feeling nestled over me, like a blanket in winter, and all I could feel was pleasure that Joe was getting some of his own medicine at last.
“How’s your week been?” asked Kean, turning away from his friend and staring away from me too, down the length of the cracked pavement, lost in thought. Distractedly, he kicked an old, crumpled Coke can into the gutter. Felicity opened her eyes and started whimpering quietly.
Kean’s question made me feel like someone stumbling through the desert who’d found an underwater spring. “Not great,” I said. “My brother and my parents had a massive fight last night. It really sucked because I was right there when it happened and …”
“Shame, man,” he interrupted, shoving Felicity’s eyelids closed to shut her up, and I fell silent.
Without wanting to, I suddenly thought of June, and how she always seemed to want to hear what I was saying. She would lean forward as I spoke, as though she wanted to catch my words before they disappeared into the space between us.
“So anyway, I wanted to ask you,” Kean continued, “what happens to you if you get …” He swallowed as if saying the word would be admitting that it could happen to him.
“Meningitis?” I asked.
He nodded. His eyebrows covered his eyes like a shield and he stared down at his feet as we walked. I had never seen him so scared.
“It’s really serious, Kean,” I said. “It affects your brain.”
“How do you get well again?”
I thought of my cousin’s coffin, so small that his mother was able to cradle it in her arms.
“Not everyone does,” I replied.
“You mean I could die?”
I noticed he didn’t say “June”, and for a moment I felt ashamed of him.
“Yes.”
Kean stopped in his tracks. He looked up, but his eyes weren’t focusing on me.
“This is the turn-off to my street,” he said, half to himself. “See you, Helen.”
He lifted his hand in greeting and, as he did, a flashy blue car cruised past us. The hood was pulled back, so I could see the driver, his arm draped over the passenger, spit out his cigarette onto the tar and lean across to kiss her.
She turned her face to the man, giggling as the car swerved slightly, and then suddenly she shoved him away, waving as she saw Kean. “Yoo-hoo!”
I realised I was looking at Mini and beside her was Kean’s father. The man waved nonchalantly at his son, then took the bend without looking back. Kean’s shoulders slumped and he started walking away from me. A minute later, he had rounded the corner too, also without turning round, and I was left standing there alone. I’d thought he was going to walk me home.
Suddenly, my cellphone rang. Not that many people had my number, besides my family and our group for the pregnancy project.
“Maybe it’s Kean,” I whispered to Felicity, fumbling to unearth the phone from my blazer pocket, nerves making my fingers sticky and clumsy. “Maybe he changed his mind and he’s coming back!”
*
Eleven
“HELEN, GET OVER to the garage next to Maths Magicians! We need your help doing something for Mom and Dad.”
Great. Hank.
“What for?”
He’d rung off before I’d even finished asking the question, but I didn’t feel like walking back home to an empty house, so I meandered towards Bill’s Garage.
Rows of cars were queuing at the BP, with tired, impatient drivers waiting for their tanks to be filled. I remembered that there was going to be a petrol hike the next day. Mom and Dad had been complaining that with our car having broken down, they wouldn’t get a chance to fill up before the price went up at midnight.
“Over here!” called Caryn, waving to me from outside the workshop. I saw our car and Hank fiddling with its petrol cap. Caryn was in overalls, crouching next to a bucket and washing the passenger door. Hank nodded silently.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Trying to refit the cap,” he said. Hank’s not too handy when it comes to mechanical stuff.
“Why?” I asked, and then I realised he must have asked Bill to fill up the car so that my parents could have a full tank before the price rose. I wanted to tell him how nice his gesture was, that I would never do that for my parents after they’d spoken to me the way they’d done to him last night, but I didn’t know how to put it into words, so I just asked, “Did Bill find the problem?”
Hank nodded. Grabbing a dry rag, he started drying and polishing the areas of the car Caryn had finished cleaning while she washed the next door, their arms almost moving simultaneously, like synchronised swimmers mirroring each other’s actions. I felt like a spectator sitting in the stands, looking on.
“Grab the vacuum over there.” Hank jerked his head towards the workshop. “Bill said we could use it. Once you’ve done the inside of the car, you can open up the bonnet and remove the dead leaves.”
That’s the kind of comment that reminds me of the difference between someone like Marilyn Monroe and me. She would have been posing on the bonnet – I was going to be under it.
“Why doesn’t Bill do this himself?” I asked, crawling into the car and directing the nozzle at the dirtiest corner.
“I bargained a discount on the car if we cleaned it for him.”
Hank and Caryn stayed on after we’d finished because he had to teach a class, so I drifted home, only to find Mom and Dad were already back. I’d forgotten today was a half day for her, and as soon as I came in, she rushed up to me.
“Helen, where have you been?” she said, her face creased with worry.
“Nowhere,” I said vaguely. “I just took a longer route home.”
“I’ve been worried sick about you.”
Little did she know how often I only got home just before dark. Then one day she came home early and suddenly she was worried. I felt angry, but knew I couldn’t show it after last night.
“I should try to get home earlier,” she said, half to herself, turning to switch on the kettle.
I silently agreed.
Over the sound of the kettle I could hear a faint snoring from their bedroom. Dad was not a light sleeper. “I wish there was a way to be here when you get home,” Mom was saying. “But without my salary …” She didn’t finish her sentence but smiled at me instead. “Do you want some tea, Helen?”
I couldn’t remember the last time she’d asked me. Usually, neither she nor Dad drank anything much, except occasionally water before bed.
“Okay. Tha
nks.”
She pulled at the full plastic bag holding all the tea bags, then tossed it down, frustrated.
“Here, I’ll do it,” I said, gripping the end in my teeth and tugging at the other end.
I pulled a bit too hard and the tea bags tumbled onto the working surface. Usually, if I did something wrong at the end of the day, Mom got annoyed, though she tried not to show it, but today, maybe because it was earlier, she just smiled and picked up the tea bags. She was about to put one each into a cup when the phone rang.
“Pour in the water so long, Helen,” she called over her shoulder.
The steam was rising from the kettle as the little light beneath the handle clicked off. I carefully lifted the kettle from its stand and poured the water into the cups, giving Mom a bit extra. Then I pulled down an extra cup and made tea for Dad too.
I took out a tray I’d made for Mom a few years ago at school. As an afterthought, I poured the sugar out of its Huletts packet and into a tarnished silver holder. I imagined their smiling at the handmade tray and silver holder the way they did when Hank has aced yet another test.
Mom wasn’t on the phone any more; she was probably in the bedroom. I walked through, balancing the tray like a tightrope walker to avoid any spilling.
“Here’s your tea,” I said.
Mom barely glanced at the tray as she took it.
The curtains had been drawn so that Dad could sleep, but he was sitting up now, his battered lampshade sending out shards of light across the room. Mom sat next to him on the duvet, holding his hand.
“Come here, Helen,” she said. Her voice sounded different.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“That was Mrs Smith.”
“Is it June?” I asked quickly, and my heart was beating so fast it hurt. “What happened? Is she dead?”
“No, no.” Mom’s words were soothing, like a lullaby, and my heart slowly stopped threatening to force its way out of my chest. She pulled me closer. “Mrs Smith phoned to let us know that June has contracted meningitis. She’s concerned because she knows you’ve been spending lots of time with her. Helen, why didn’t you tell us?”
I shrugged. “I didn’t want you to worry,” I said. When did I have the opportunity anyway, with everyone fighting?
“We are supposed to worry about you, Helen,” said Mom. She put her palm on my forehead. “How do you feel?”
“Fine,” I answered, although the fragile coolness of her hand felt so soft against my forehead that I was tempted to tell her that I felt sick, just to make her do it again, the way she used to when I faked illness to stay home on Mondays.
“You must tell Mom or me immediately if you feel unwell, do you understand?” said Dad, propping himself up in bed.
“If you start feeling feverish or have a headache at school, you’re to phone us at once and we’ll make a plan and come fetch you, even if we have to borrow Dad’s boss’s car.”
For a moment I wished I could get sick, not really sick, but just a little. I imagined Mom and Dad rushing to school and escorting me out of the secretary’s office, an arm around each shoulder. I imagined Mom tucking me into bed, the way she did when I was little, pulling the duvet right up to my chin and tucking in the side sheets so that I couldn’t fall out if I tossed and turned. Then I felt guilty, wanting to be sick while June really was sick and in hospital.
“Can I phone June’s mom, please?” I asked. “To find out how she’s doing.”
Mom nodded.
“Don’t talk for long,” Dad warned. “Her mom is probably very tired.”
I ran to the lounge and punched in the number, rubbing my chest with my hand to stop the sudden tightness I felt. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know how June was. Perhaps I was making things worse by phoning all the time.
“No answer,” I said to myself. I rubbed my chest again. The pain was making my head ache, which made my chest hurt more. I took a deep breath.
“Are you all right, Helen?” asked Mom, coming through.
I nodded. I took another deep breath and my head stopped aching, to my relief. “I’m just worried about June. I can’t get hold of her mom.”
I also couldn’t forget that I was the one who had let June go home on her own, but I couldn’t tell Mom that. Before she could answer me, we heard the sound of a car pulling into the driveway. We peered through the kitchen window and saw Hank and Bill get out. Bill, who had been driving, dropped the keys into my brother’s hand and waved goodbye before getting into a mechanic’s car which was parked behind ours. Mom glanced sharply at the car, so I knew she was looking for Caryn. She turned away when she saw that Bill and Hank were alone.
Hank shoved the kitchen door open and caught Mom’s eye from across the room. He approached her warily, the way a boxer would step into the ring, always watching his opponent. “Here are the keys, Mom,” he said, releasing them into her hands. I noticed his fingers didn’t touch hers as the keys slid out of his fist. Mom tapped the keys against the kitchen counter in a repetitive pattern that sounded like a marching army.
“Thank you, son,” she said quietly.
He nodded and hunched up his shoulders as he slipped out and headed for his room. I listened to the soft shuffling of his shoes against the floorboards and then the metallic click as he locked his door. Mom put her palm to her forehead and rubbed her eyes, almost as a small child would do.
“I’ll tell Dad the car’s back,” she said, turning to go. She paused for a moment, glancing back over her shoulder, her eyes seeing, I knew, my cousin’s white face. “I should start supper now, but would you like me to take you to the hospital tomorrow?” she asked. “We won’t be allowed in, but we can at least find out how June is progressing.”
In the end, we couldn’t go because Dad had to work late, but on Friday Mom took me.
As we reversed out of our driveway, I noticed the rubbish strewn outside our house. One of the neighbours had put their black bags out early again for collection, and a dirty-looking terrier had ripped open the packets and was sniffing through the sticky yoghurt tubs and rotting bones while the wind tossed discarded nappies and empty packets indiscriminately down the street.
We went the back way to St George’s, via Mill Park, its pristine houses hiding primly behind fences standing smugly erect in luxuriously thick coats of paint and trees stretching skywards like Titan security guards. “No rubbish here, thank you,” they seemed to be saying firmly.
When we got to the ward, my stomach suddenly felt funny, like it was shifting around, and I wished I were still young enough to grab my mom’s hand. Mom stopped at the nurses’ desk and called over the nearest one.
“Yes, June is here,” she said, checking her list. “Unfortunately no visitors at the moment, except family.”
“How is she?” I asked. The words stuck in my mouth and came out jumbled, but the nurse seemed to understand.
“Here is June’s mother now,” she said, looking up. “Why don’t you chat to her?”
June’s mother recognised mine, probably from parent-teacher meetings, and nodded. Her skin looked dull, as though she hadn’t been outdoors for a long time, and it showed up the lines around her mouth.
“Hello,” Mom said, and I noticed there were tears in her eyes. “How is your daughter doing?”
June’s mom nodded again. “Better,” she said. “The doctor says she’ll live.”
I turned away in relief and stared at my shoes so no one could see that my lips were trembling.
“That’s the good news,” her mom continued. She glanced at me as I looked up and closed her mouth again, as if she had wanted to say something but then decided to keep quiet. “Please excuse me,” she said. I saw that she was crying too now, from expressionless eyes, her shoulders shaking.
June’s mom hurried away and I stared after her, unable to understand why she was sobbing when her daughter was going to get better. I supposed it was just relief. I was so grateful that I had to sit down on a nearby chair, my
hands clutching my knees. Then I felt Mom’s hand on my shoulder.
“So, good news,” she said, although her eyebrows were pulled down slightly and her eyes worried. But I guess mothers are always like that. Surely things could only get better from now?
*
Twelve
WHEN JUNE WAS ABLE to come back to school, her mom brought her the first two days, maybe because she looked so thin, her school dress hanging limply and its belt held together with a safety pin because even the smallest notch made it sag.
Maybe it was because her bag was so weighed down with all the schoolwork that she was trying to catch up on, or maybe her mom was scared in case she got sick again. Or maybe she didn’t want her daughter walking to and from school with me after what I’d done. Not that it was really bad, I reassured myself. I didn’t feel nearly as guilty now that I knew everyone was going to go back to normal again.
The next Monday, I had decided that just for once I was not going to let the first day of the week defeat me; I washed, dressed and packed my bag at lightning speed and sauntered to school at my leisure. “So this is how a good Monday starts,” I was saying smugly at the school gates, both to myself and to Monday, when I realised that I’d forgotten my maths textbook on the kitchen counter and Felicity on my pillow.
“Such is life,” I muttered grimly to myself, over and over like a mantra, clutching Felicity to my chest as I stormed past exactly the same school gates twenty minutes later, puffing under the weight of the extra book that didn’t just put roses into my cheeks, but ground them into my face so that I was permanently blotchy all day.
I saw June in the car park, sitting in the passenger seat of her mother’s car, seatbelt still on. I waved but she wasn’t looking in my direction and I felt a bit awkward, in case she was still upset that I hadn’t wanted Kean to walk with her.
When I entered the class, Mrs Smith was standing there alone with June’s mom, discussing a piece of paper that looked like some sort of medical report with weird graphs on it. I tried to peer at it, but they saw me and June’s mom held the paper to her chest.
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