Sal

by Mick Kitson

  And I said aye and he smiled at me and said ‘I can’t believe you’re only thirteen’ and he got up to go as Maw got back and she said thank you to him and shook his hand and he told her to see a doctor.

  We watched Adam drive off out of the car park in a little blue car with a roof rack with skis on it. Maw said ‘He’s bonny Sal so he is.’

  I said ‘Peppa fancied him.’

  Maw said ‘I fancy him’ and she laughed.

  Then she held my hands across the table and said in a quiet voice ‘I got too hungry and I got too angry and I got too lonely and I got too tired. And I got too scared. And when I’m scared I run.And I was running to find somewhere to blot it all out Sal, that’s what I’ve always done. When I saw you and Peppa and what you’d done and why you’d done it I just wanted to run and blot it all out.’

  Her face was soft and her eyes were bright again. She had no make-up on and she’d washed her face in the toilets and it shone.

  She said ‘I thought you were going to shoot me.’

  I said ‘I was. I will again if you leave Peppa.’

  She sighed hard and picked up my hands and kissed them.

  We paid and I bought some ibruprofen from the wee shop for Ingrid and we got milk. We started back up and I ran up to the top of the ridge above the Little Chef and got the gun.We went on the path up towards the valley and we went slow because Maw said her legs were sore.

  Maw told me about when she was wee. She was fostered to an old couple called Cliff and Mary because her maw couldn’t look after her and she never saw her and she didn’t know who her da was. Cliff told her her da was a gangster. Cliff and Mary were alright but they were old and she thought they only fostered her for the money and they never adopted her. She wanted to find her maw one day she said and see what she was like and if she was still alive. They lived on a scheme of new houses and they had a garden and garage and they went to the kirk. Maw said she liked the kirk and Sunday school and she learned the bible and they went on holiday to Spain one year when she was about eleven. Cliff did electrics for the council and Mary was a dinner lady in the school.

  She met my da at school. He was a year older than her and his name was Jimmy but everyone called him Maz. Maw said she hated school and she was thick and she plunked it most of the time. She used to go to the park and drink and smoke weed with kids from school. She said the first time she drank she felt brilliant. She said it was like someone had turned all the lights on in the world.

  She said ‘I’m not clever like you Sal. I don’t know anything. I don’t even know how to stay sober.’

  I said ‘Just don’t drink. Not even one.’

  She said aye and we crossed the river and she had a rest on a rock and had a fag and I looked for ash saplings because I wanted to make a bow and I was going to laminate it. I cut one about the width of my wrist.

  We started back towards the camp and the sun was up high and starting to melt the frost and snow. I told Maw not to say to Peppa about Adam or about her running down to the Little Chef and Maw said she wouldn’t.

  When we got back to the camp Ingrid was sitting by the fire with a blanket round her and carving a bit of wood and teaching Peppa German. Peppa was sharpening thin sticks with her new knife.

  She said ‘Ah’m making arrows Sal for if you get a bow. Will they work?’

  I looked at them and said they’d need flights and the end would need a weight to make it go straight and she said ‘The German for arrow is Pfeil. They have a P and an F together in some words, like the word for Pepper, not my name, the stuff they put in haggis, has got a P and an F, it’s Pfeffer and you say it pffeffer, so my name would be Pffeffereppa. Why have different countries got different words for everything?’

  I said I didn’t know. And I didn’t but it was a canny question. Maw sat next to Ingrid and Ingrid put her arm around her and said ‘Okay?’ in a quiet voice and Maw nodded but then she started crying.

  Me and Peppa watched her. I’d seen her cry a lot and it didn’t upset me but it made Peppa look worried. She said ‘Maw do you want to go and see the Goddess called Cheryl?’ Maw laughed and said okay. Ingrid took some of the ibruprofen and went back to her bender to sleep and then we went up through the woods towards the moor and Magna Bra. I left the gun back at the camp but I brought the monocular and my knife. I took the backpack with the raisins and the paracord and I filled a bottle of water from the kettle in case we got dehydrated.

  On the way up Peppa talked all the time and I walked behind them. She told Maw all about what Ingrid said about the Goddess and about Ingrid being wee in Berlin and losing her maw and living with Klausi and Hansi. She told Maw loads of German words and all the swear words and Maw laughed at them and kept saying ‘Peppa!’ when she swore.

  The snow was soft at the start of the moor up towards the stones and we saw a Buzzard. As we climbed the snow got thicker and in some places it was blown into ridges that were iced on top in the wind. The wind got up and was stiffer the further up we got and it was a northerly and cold. We all sat in the lee of a drystane dyke and ate the raisins and drank water and looked back down at where we’d come from and you could see our prints in the snow. The wind was making clouds skid along and they made big grey shapes that flew across the snow. Then Maw said ‘What’s that?’ and pointed.

  Just below us about fifteen metres away there was a snow ridge and sitting in against it was a white hare with black ears. We all sat still and I watched it through the monocular. I said ‘It’s a mountain hare. It’s gone white for winter.’

  It was sniffing and its nose was twitching but its ears were flat and it didn’t look bothered by us at all. Peppa said ‘Don’t kill it Sal’ and I said ‘Ah’m not going into kill it.’ Even though it would be good to eat and the skin would make a good hat.

  Maw said ‘He’s sweet.’

  The hare just sat and looked at us and then scraped a bit under its front feet. It was a big one, much bigger than a rabbit, and through the monocular I could see it still had some tufts of grey hair in amongst the white. Its eyes were yellow and it had long lashes that blinked. When we got up to carry on the hare went rigid and alert and then ran away down away from us into snow ridges and you could see the bottoms of its big wide feet. Maw smiled at me and we carried on climbing up.

  At the stones Peppa ran around and around shouting ‘Hail Cheryl’ and me and Maw looked out at the view across and back down the valley towards the lochs, the lines of forest fading and below them flat fields and the river snaking. The town was hidden by a hill, and far beyond it was a flat bluey-grey smudge that could’ve been the sea.

  Maw said ‘It’s a big place.’

  I said ‘It’s three hundred and seventy-nine square miles total area.You can see it from satellites in space because there is no light pollution. It’s just a dark patch in the southwest of Scotland above the Solway Firth.’

  Maw felt the top of the stone she was leaning on. It had ice across the top and the lichen looked like it was under glass. She turned and watched Peppa running around the stones. She said ‘Does Peppa know about what Robert was doing?’

  I said ‘A bit.’

  She sighed and held my hand and squeezed it. Peppa ran up to us and said ‘Ah’m hungry’ and we turned and went back down. On the way back Peppa told Maw about Adam the skier. She said ‘He was lush Maw, and he made Sal go red.’ Maw looked back at me and smiled and I smiled back.

  Peppa raced off down the hill towards our woods and Maw walked next to me. She said ‘You know I told him your real names.’

  I said ‘I know. He won’t tell.’

  Back at the camp Ingrid was asleep and I made rice and beans and corned beef for tea while it got dark. We made food for Ingrid but she didn’t want it and Maw went and sat with her and they talked for a bit while I shaved the ash poles down and Peppa read her book with her clip lamp.

  Maw said she’d sleep in her bender and we put a hot stone in a towel to make the bed warm and Peppa went to bed
and Maw did too, but I sat up by the fire and watched Maw’s bender till it was late and I heard Owls screeching.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Mist

  In the morning I checked Maw was still in her bender then got my fleece on and started the fire while they all slept and the sun was just coming up. I boiled the kettle and made Ingrid some pine tea with sugar in it and took it to her bender. She was fast asleep and I left it by her bed.

  I put Maw’s Converse by the fire because they were damp and then I got the gun and my monocular and went off to have a look around and try to shoot a rabbit. I climbed along the ridge at the top above the camp all past the spruce trees and followed it along where there was nearly a sheer drop down on the side into the woods at the bottom. Then I found a twisty path going down and climbed and slid down into a dip where there were hazel trees with lots of poles and straight sticks coming out. These are good for making arrows if you make a bow and arrow like I saw Ray Mears do once. I went further along and found a wee house all broken down with trees growing out of it. There was a wall made of stones and a bit of a chimney. On the other side was a wider path going on into more woods and I walked along it. It was an old forestry track leading down but there were no tyre tracks on it.

  There was a clearing further down and sheer rock walls all around it and big flat stones lying about in it, covered in thin snow and frost. I saw a flash of a rabbit tail running away across it and hid down behind a pine tree. I sat and waited and got out the monocular slowly. Across the clearing under the rock walls there were rabbit holes. One had new mud outside and I scanned across and saw one just sitting near it. A big one. Its ears were straight up and I could see the whiskers twitching. Then two more hopped up next to it. Then another came out of the hole and there were four all just sitting. The big one started scraping at the snow and a smaller one hopped up next to it. It hopped away coming towards me and then turned and watched the other three. They started scraping and pushing at the snow and they were nibbling at grass underneath. The big one just sat with his ears up. He hopped further away then, still towards me, and sat again. He was watching the others and keeping lookout. The other three were hopping along, scraping and nibbling, and he just sat.

  Then really far off a dog barked. The big rabbit stamped his back legs three times – bang bang bang – and all four of them shot off towards the hole and vanished.

  I sat where I was and the dog barked again. I got up and I was glad I hadn’t shot the rabbits. I didn’t want to kill those rabbits.

  I climbed up through the woods again and got to the top of the ridge and followed it along to the top of the sheer cliff that looked down on the clearing. You could see the forest stretching away down white and grey in the frost and two big stretches of mist like arms lying along the bottom of the valley. In a gap in the mist I could see the road faint between the trees and a tiny grey car went along it and disappeared into the mist. It was quiet then and I sat on the cliff edge looking down at it all. The dog barked and it was even further away like a wee gruff voice shouting ‘Arc!’

  I sat with my feet hanging over the cliff. I felt filled up with the cold and the silence and started feeling my body go light and numb, first my bum and my legs and then it crept up till I was just looking again from a big empty space out into the silver misty valley. The wee lights started dropping down like raindrops across it and I was hanging there peering out at them. They formed little lines and zigzags that danced across the view in front of my eyes and my eyes were holes and behind them was nothing. Not even me.

  A crow brought me back. It squawked right above me in a high Scots pine and then two others started. I don’t know how long I had been there but my legs and bum were still numb and I had to stand up and rub them.

  Peppa and Maw and Ingrid all flashed in my mind and I started running. I was panicking and my heart was throbbing and I heard a voice in my head start saying ‘You can’t do it.’ It said it again and again in the rhythm I was running, holding the gun down in my left hand and the monocular bashing me in the chest on its strap round my neck. You can’t do it.You can’t do it. I hammered along the ridge with the forest below me in and out of the big trees slamming my feet down on the frosted snow that chugged under me. You can’t do it. You can’t do it.

  I was heaving for my breath by the time I got to the path that leads down to Ingrid’s bit and I flew down it feeling pains stabbing in my chest, dropping onto my heels as I went down and down towards the camp getting whipped by twigs. Two Pheasants burst out from the bushes flapping and clattering off away into the wood. I could smell the fire as I got nearer and the voice stopped. I slowed and just walked the last few metres once I got on the flat and jumped the wee burn by the pool and Maw and Peppa were by the fire in blankets drinking tea.

  I said ‘Where’s Ingrid?’ and Maw said ‘Still sleeping.You alright Sal?’ I was still breathing hard and my face felt all flushed and red. I went into Ingrid’s bender and felt her forehead and she was warm.

  She opened her eyes. She smiled at me. She said ‘I’m okay Sal. You don’t worry.’ I got in with her and cuddled her. She felt light and bony and tiny like a baby. Her hair smelled of smoke and pine.

  When Ingrid was asleep again I got out of the bed and went out to the fire. Maw was stirring a pot of porridge and Peppa had bowls and a pot of jam. Maw said ‘Sal . . . are you okay?’

  I said ‘Ingrid’s ill.’

  Peppa said ‘She’s got a bad back. She breaks all the wood with her feet and it makes it sore.’

  Maw said ‘We’ll look after her Sal.’

  We had the porridge with jam in it and then Peppa said ‘I’m going to run’ and she went belting off into the wood and I shouted ‘Be careful!’ But she was gone.

  I sat with Maw and she smoked a roll-up. There were still lots of things I wanted to say to her. So I said ‘Let’s go and watch the badgers.’

  Maw said ‘Aye alright.’ She saw the airgun standing by our bender when she got up and said ‘Is that Robert’s?’ and I said ‘Aye. I nicked it and brought it with us.’ Maw stared at it for a minute then said ‘Come on then.’

  I wrote ‘Watchin the bagers’ in big letters on a flat rock we used as a seat by the fire with an ember and made an arrow with sticks pointing down to the valley below us. Maw said ‘She’ll see that.’

  I got a blanket. The wind was coming northwesterly so we walked down the river a bit before we crossed on some stones. Maw had no problems walking and jumping around in the woods. I thought she might be all girly and worry about getting her feet wet or go on about mud but she was like me. She was strong and she could climb a slope quick and she jumped the stones across the river with her big grey coat swishing and I didn’t have to help her.We walked across the flat valley bottom where there was still mist hanging in the trees. The trees were oaks and coppiced hazel and some alder and birch.

  I said ‘We’ll walk up slow and stay downwind and we might see them coming out.’ And Maw whispered ‘Okay.’

  We crept up towards the bank where the sett was and stopped by a big oak about fifteen metres away. There was a big pile of mud and dry grass outside it and tracks in the snow. Badgers are less active in winter but they do come out, especially if they can find unfrozen ground to dig for worms and slugs.

  We sat on the blanket just behind the tree where we could see the sett and I pulled the blanket up around us. I showed Maw how to focus the monocular and she watched through it. There wasn’t much wind and the sett was a bit faint through the mist but we could see the black of the hole going in against the snow.

  Maw lowered the monocular and turned and looked at me. She smiled and said ‘Peppa said you got your period Sal.’

  I said ‘She tells everyone. She thinks it’s funny.’

  Maw said ‘Were you okay?’

  I said ‘Aye. Ingrid looked after me. I had to burn ma pants. Ingrid gave me painkillers and a hot rock for ma belly.’

  Maw said ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t with
you darlin’. It’s horrible innit?’

  I said ‘It was okay. Ingrid said now I was a woman.’

  We watched the sett and it was quiet, not even crows or leaves rustling. Nothing moved and Maw just sat next to me staring out across at the sett. Then Maw put her arm round me and we sat like that for ages.

  Suddenly a badger’s head appeared in the hole with two black stripes down it looking out and Maw went all tense and whispered ‘Sal . . .’

  It came straight out and stopped and was sniffing and then another one came out behind it and then another.The third one ran out and ran in front of the others and then sat and they all sniffed.The first one was biggest. I had never seen one not on a screen before and they are bigger than you think and they move all smooth and their backs ripple. The two smaller ones started nosing about in the snow and leaves and one of them kept running away and running back to the others like he was wanting to play.The big one sniffed around and then started off on one of the tracks that led almost straight towards us. The other two got behind it and all three came rippling along towards us and Maw grabbed my hand and squeezed it and I looked and she had her mouth open and a huge smile and her eyes were all wide and bright like she was amazed.The three badgers got nearer and nearer our tree and we just sat frozen. They kept on coming and we could hear them scratching along on the snow and see the grey and black hairs on their fur moving and rolling as they walked. About four metres from us the big one stopped and lifted its head up and stared straight at us. It was staring straight into our eyes with the other two behind it with their noses down still sniffing and scraping. The two behind her looked up then and all three were staring at us. I wanted to laugh because their faces looked so startled and they had wee ears sticking up. Maw was letting out a breath really slowly. We sat like that for a while in the silent wood, me and Maw under a tree staring at three badgers.

  Then there were thumps and skittering from feet from down towards the river and I knew it was Peppa sprinting through the woods and I turned my head. The big badger turned slowly and trotted back towards the sett with the two others behind. I heard Peppa shout ‘Maw! Sal!’ and she came running up through the trees towards us. The badgers were gone straight into the sett.