by Susie Day
I don’t have time to spare, though.
First stop: the tiny Penkerry pharmacy, to buy hair dye.
Second stop: every other shop in Penkerry, because the pharmacy only does Ash Blonde and Dad’s Espresso Coffee Deluxe, Guaranteed to Blend Away Greys! and I need a little more electricity.
At last, I find a bottle of wash-in, wash-out Sonic Red in a tiny tucked-away place that smells like patchouli.
“What are you doing?” hisses Red.
I look round, and spot, over her shoulder, the neon sign:
EAR-PIERCING AVAILABLE
My stomach turns over, but I can’t ignore it. It’s as if the universe guided me here, and is speeding me down my road towards Red.
“Blue, wait, are you sure. . .?” says Red, as I poke through my purse.
The last of my birthday money is enough to cover it. One bottle of hair dye, and two fat gold studs, throbbing painfully in my ear.
“What are you doing with those scissors?”
“Nothing,” I tell Mum, slicing the leg off my favourite jeans.
The other follows, snip-snip-snip. I slip them on. Not straight. One leg’s longer than the other. I don’t have time or money for the biker boots, but it’s a start.
“I’m just going to borrow your T-shirt, Tiger, OK?”
I poke at the clothes mountain on the floor.
“No chance,” Tiger calls back from the bathroom, where she’s soaking the redness from her eyes. “I’m never lending you anything ever again, not after you lost my best ever, most beloved favourite scarf.”
I can’t argue that. Who knows where it ended up. There’s probably a starfish somewhere at the bottom of the sea using it as a house. I start excavating through the layers of socks, Austen novels and headphones anyway.
Tiger swishes through the curtain in a smog of her favourite perfume. White-blonde dreadlocks, vast blue eyes – and a scruffy purple T-shirt, with a smiley yellow face.
She catches me staring, and smirks.
“Duh! Catrin gave me this. I’m probably never taking it off again.”
She crosses her arms across her chest, firmly.
No T-shirt. No boots. But it’s OK. I can compromise on a few details, so long as I get the big stuff right.
“I need you to cut my hair.”
I hold out the scissors, handle first. Tiger is the family hairdresser: has been for as long as I remember. I hope I can describe the parakeet wing over one eye right. It’s not like I can show her a photo.
“I’m going out,” she says crossly, grabbing her bag and stepping over me.
“You can’t! I need you to do this first!”
I contemplate the scissors, wondering if I could just chop the ponytail off myself, all in one go. Is that how Red did it?
“Can’t you at least help me dye it?”
“Dye it?” Mum pokes her head through the curtain, as Tiger swishes out. “Don’t think so, baby. I’ve already had an earful about the stains in the bathroom. Wait till we get home, then it’s only our sink you’ll be buggering up. And our towels. And our carpet. Yeah, maybe you can’t do it when we get home either.”
She plucks the bottle of wash-in dye from my hand, and eyes me. “Sonic Red? Seriously?”
“Mum!”
“I don’t want you mucking about with your beautiful hair, sweetie,” she says, combing her fingers through my stupid ponytail. Then she gasps. “Oh my god, what did you do to your ear?”
“Nothing,” I say, jerking my head away. “It’s pierced. Don’t yell at me.”
“Who’s yelling?” Mum frowns, squeezing my arm. “I don’t mind you having your ear pierced, baby – though I’d rather you’d told me, before. But you definitely don’t want to do your hair now. You need to keep the piercing clean, you don’t want to get dye in it.”
I shake her off. “It’s not up to you. It’s my ear. It’s my hair.”
I push past her to the bathroom. I pull out my ponytail, and start rearranging it in the mirror, brushing out a too-long wing to sweep across one eye, pinning up the back. Not Red, not right, but closer.
Dad groans from the sofa. “Please tell me Peanut isn’t going to grow up to be a teenager?”
“Sorry, love. Looks like we’re two for two so far.”
They laugh together, as if they think they’re so so funny; as if all of this panic and rush isn’t their fault.
I pull on Merlin’s coat, grab the bottle of dye, and slam the caravan door behind me.
“What are you doing?” says Red, face crunched as she looks at my new halfway hairdo.
She’s been waiting outside, listening in.
“No time,” I say.
It’s not her I need right now. I want to go straight to Merlin’s, spend every last second I can with him – but I want it to be perfect when I see him. I’ve got a picture in my head: exactly how it should be. For that I need Fozzie. She’ll understand why I need to dye my hair, today, right now, without me needing to explain anything. I can’t wait to tell her about the hand-kissing. She’ll lend me some fabulous clothes; better than a T-shirt. She’ll show me how to do my face all painted and perfect. We can have a girly teenage talk about boys. I’ve never had one of those, and now I need one. Urgently. With instructions.
I breathe in the spearminty smell all around me, and break into a run.
The Shed is in chaos; a van parked outside, crammed with boxes of crisps and ice-cream cones. Inside I can see Dan and Mags, sweating over a new table, puzzling out how to fit it together. I peer hopefully past them, but I can’t see Merlin.
Fozzie rounds the van carrying a huge bag of paper cups, and nearly walks right through me.
“Oh!” She doesn’t give me her usual smile. She’s not like herself at all: hair scraped back, face pink from the effort. “Hi. ’Scuse me.”
“Sorry!” I step back, as she dump the box, and collects another from behind the van. “You look really busy.”
“I am,” she says, hefting the box, sliding it on to the other. “I’d have asked you to come down and help, but, well, I haven’t seen you, have I?”
“I’m sorry!” I start helping her take bags out of the van, but she snatches them angrily from my hands. “I had to. . . Something came up.”
“Let me guess: you had to go off to hang out with that other special friend of yours? Guess you two worked out your issues. Jason, who runs the Red Dragon now? He says you were down here last night having a whale of a time.”
“I did look for you,” I say feebly. I don’t know why she’s so cross. She’s got other friends too.
Dan bangs out of The Shed, his usual cheery grin fading right off his face the moment he sees me.
“All right, Foz?” he says, rolling up his sleeves.
She gives him a grim nod.
“Hi, Dan,” I say.
He hefts two bags on to his shoulders and goes back inside without a word; only a dismissive shake of his head.
This is awful. This isn’t how this is meant to go at all.
“Is that Merlin’s coat?” Fozzie crinkles her nose, critically.
A smile sneaks on to my face. I can’t help it. I’m longing to see him. Like that wait in a restaurant when you’ve ordered lasagne, and they bring out other people’s plates first, hot and delicious-smelling, and all you can think is lasagnelasagnelasagne till you can almost taste it on your tongue.
This is how much I need a girly chat with someone who knows what they’re doing: I think boys are like lasagne.
“Yes! Foz, I’ve got so much to tell you. You won’t believe it. Unless – is he here?” I ask, peering into The Shed.
“Yeah, right, like he’d actually turn up when he says he will.” She narrows her eyes. “Is that the only reason you’re here? To find Merlin?”
“No,” I say, in a
voice that means yes. “No! I wanted to – look, I need you to help me. We’re going on a date! And I’ve got hair dye. Because – see – all this stuff has happened, and. . . Can we go and just, you know, hang out?”
I want her to smile at me, and tell me about some weird film I’ve never heard of that will teach me about dating. I want to sit in her bedroom, waiting for my hair to turn cherry red. I want her to stop looking at me like I’ve broken something.
“I’m busy.”
She grabs two huge plastic sacks of popcorn and hauls them towards the doors.
“Wait! That’s not the only thing I came to tell you. We’re leaving. We’re not staying for the rest of the summer. We’re leaving this weekend.”
“Oh!” she says, honest disappointment sneaking into her eyes before she can hide it. “Right. I heard they were changing the band line-up, getting someone else in to open the Fest.”
“Yeah. Mum’s not well enough to play. We’re going to stay to watch, but we’ll be off Sunday morning.”
“She OK, your mum?”
I nod, and she nods back, once, sharp.
“Give her my best.”
“I will.”
We stand there.
“Nothing else you want to say?” Fozzie says, tapping her foot, her mouth a flat line of annoyance.
Why’s she being like this? She should be hugging me, telling me she’ll miss me, demanding we spend every last second together.
“Is this because of Merlin? Are you . . . jealous?”
Fozzie groans out loud. “Jealous? You are having a laugh. Can’t believe you even think that. But then you’re not the girl I thought you were, are you?”
She wheels inside with the popcorn.
A few seconds later, she marches back out and thrusts a parcel into my hands, wrapped in shiny gold paper.
“What’s this?”
“Your birthday present. The one I was going to give you at your birthday party in the Cave. You remember that? The party I organized for you? The one you ran out of in tears, without a word of explanation, and never even said thank you?”
She presses her lips together, her face burning.
“I’m so sorry,” I mumble. I feel terrible.
“No, it’s fine. You’ve got this other friend, who treats you like crap and upsets you, drags you away from your mates – you know, the people who actually like you. But it’s fine that she’s the one you want to hang with. Her, Merlin, whoever. I mean, I think we would’ve had a laugh if we’d hung out more – but, hey, not my choice. It’ll be jammed in here for the Fest tomorrow; don’t know if I’ll see you again. So, here you go. Call it a leaving present.”
She folds her arms, tilting her head at the present expectantly.
Guiltily, I peel back the wrapping paper.
Rebel Without A Cause, on DVD. Her favourite.
“We could go and watch this, together?” I say, hopefully. “Right now. We can go to your room, and while it’s on you can dye my hair, and lend me earrings, and. . .”
Fozzie sighs and picks up another two sacks of popcorn.
“Have a nice life, Blue.”
She goes back inside.
Mags slams the Shed door shut behind her, glares at me through the window, and flips the sign over, hard.
Closed.
13. Merlin
“What the hell are you doing?”
Red is standing outside Madame Soso’s, feet planted.
“Go back in there!” she shouts, jabbing a finger at The Shed. “That was your chance to make things up with her, do you not get that? You might not get another.”
I scratch my fingernail into the plastic of the DVD box.
“So? I’m leaving anyway, it’s not like it makes any difference.”
I don’t mean it. Everything Fozzie said is sitting in my stomach, rolling over.
But Red won’t stop. “You don’t get any of this, do you? This was your second chance. My second chance. Do you know how many people get one of those? Do you know how many people would kill for one? And what do you do with it? You yell at Mum and Dad like a spoiled brat, treat Tiger’s stuff like rubbish. You run around making friends and having a laugh and not caring, not even noticing when you let them down. Did you never think Fozzie might have been hurt that you ran off from the party? You didn’t even thank her for the leaving present!”
I shake my overlong wing of hair off my face, flash my eyes, not caring that we’re in the middle of the fair and I’m yelling at air.
“That’s not my fault! You made me leave the party. You lied. Everything that’s gone wrong is your fault!”
“How is it my fault?”
“Because I’m running out of time! I’m supposed to be a butterfly when we go. I can’t go home still being stupid Bluebell who collects toy mice. I need to do it all before we leave: my hair, the earrings, the boots. . .”
Red starts back like she’s been stung.
“You really think that’s what this was all about – a haircut and a pair of shoes? You know what really proves you’ve grown up? Acting grown up. Caring about other people instead of just yourself. Taking some responsibility. Thinking about the consequences of your actions. Choosing what kind of person you’d like to be. Trying to be a better one.”
“I am doing all those things!”
“You’re not.” She stares at me, her face crumpling. “I thought this time around I could at least get some of it right. Blue was a nice girl, you know. There was nothing wrong with who you were.”
“What would you know, you’re not even real!” I can’t believe how nasty my voice sounds, but she’s hurting me: I want to hurt her back. “You’re only here because I wished you here – and the only reason you’re saying any of this is because I’m replacing you. Because I’m better at this than you are!”
“I thought you understood.” She shakes her head, bewildered. “I thought I’d said too much. Thought you’d see it coming a mile away. But you haven’t heard a thing, have you?”
She turns and walks away.
“Fine! Go! I don’t need lessons from you!”
She halts, hesitating before she looks over her shoulder.
“If that’s true, Bluebell,” she says, her eyes tracking across my pinned-up hair, my ragged cut-offs. “Why are you trying so hard to be me?”
The hill up to the far side of town is steep, but fury powers me up. I can’t believe everyone is ruining my last few days in Penkerry like this. Even Red. She’s meant to be on my side. You can’t trust anybody.
Merlin will understand, though. He’s like me: different. Dissatisfied. And special, as well. Magical.
I pick out his huge white house from the row looking out over the bay, and step through the gate to ring the bell. It’s not as white as it looks, close up. The paint is flaking away, and there’s some sort of grey mossy stuff growing over it. The paint on the door’s flaking off, too.
There’s a long wait, so I ring again.
Eventually the door opens a crack, and half of Merlin’s face appears. My chest feels tight, just seeing the shadow of his cheekbone, one hazel eye. No eyeliner today. Without it, he looks sleepy and clean.
“Hello?” He blinks a few times. “Oh. Blue. I thought we were meeting tomorrow, at The Bench?”
“We are.” My smile is automatic. “But – I sort of needed to see you now. Can I come in?”
He frowns, peering over his shoulder. “Uh. . .”
“Who’s at the door?” says a woman’s voice. “Who’s at the door?”
I hear shushing, then the door is pulled open fully.
“Excuse my son’s manners,” says a tall grey-haired man in a buttoned-up waistcoat, shirt and tie. He looks more like Merlin’s grandfather than his dad.
Merlin, now I can see all of him, looks like someone else
entirely. It’s not just the lack of eyeliner. He’s wearing flappy shorts and a red nylon football shirt, his hair flat and hatless. He looks as shocked as I feel.
“Come in, dear,” says Merlin’s dad, leading the way down a carpeted hall.
There are lots of doors. There’s a smell, too: like bins, and wee. Maybe they’ve got a cat.
I follow them into a huge kitchen. Merlin’s dad sits down to ruffle a newspaper. Merlin just stands there in his shiny shirt, awkward.
The smell’s stronger in here. There’s food everywhere: used pans on the stove, empty Pop-Tart boxes left by the toaster – and things, in piles, stacked against the walls: more newspapers, crockery, plastic tubs with tiny cardboard boxes inside. It’s like someone forgot to tidy up, for about a year.
“So,” Merlin says, shuffling his feet. “You . . . you needed something?”
My eyes shift over to his dad behind the newspaper. I want to go to another room. Talk to him properly. Have him hold my hand, and be magical again.
“We’re leaving. I’m leaving. On Sunday. So I’m only here today, and tomorrow.”
His face falls. He swallows. Jerks a hand out towards me. Pulls it back, self-conscious, eyes straying across the room to his dad. Puts his hand out again.
I lift mine too and our fingers weave together, a knot. His fingerprints press against my bones. His thumb strokes my palm.
“Gareth? Gareth?”
It’s the woman’s voice again, very quavery.
Merlin’s face closes up.
I expect the old man to go, but Merlin slips his hand from mine and darts out into the hallway.
“It’s OK, Mum, I’m coming,” he calls.
His dad goes on reading the paper, chewing on a sandwich.
I don’t know if I’m supposed to stay, or follow Merlin. The smell and the stillness start to stick to me, greasy and sad.
“My wife has early onset Alzheimer’s disease,” announces the old man, not looking up from his newspaper. “It means she has dementia. Do you understand?”
We did a project on grandparents in primary school. Harry Parker’s gran had dementia. She had to go into a home.
I nod, then realize he’s not looking at me. “Yes. It means you forget things.”