by Joanna Nadin
I hated Rachel, and said so. Dad never saw anyone after that. Said we weren’t ready. He wasn’t ready. So now he just works. And has his nightly drink.
I hear his voice rise above the music. It’s nothing. Nobody. And I feel the grip around my throat and chest again. This suffocating house. Town. Life. And I know that I won’t tell him. Not now. In case he spoils it. This perfect day.
I pull the door shut, fold the letter, stuff it into the pocket of my jeans, and go back to the Spaghetti Hoops and the papers and the endless clutching monotony of his world.
“BLOODY HELL, Jude. Come on!” Stella is leaning on the gate, one hand on her hip, the other tight around the neck of a half liter of vodka. £4.99. Second shelf down, next to the cherry brandy.
I’m struggling up the path in a pair of three-inch Mary Janes and the black dress. Not really outdoor wear. But Stella just says, “Lily Allen wore a wedding dress to Glastonbury.” So I don’t argue.
Told Dad I was going to see Ed. Just not where. Or who else would be there. Only half a lie, then.
I trip on a clump of grass and twist my ankle. “Ow . . . oh, shit . . . I told you I should have worn boots.”
“Take them off, then.” Stella unscrews the cap and swigs back a mouthful. “You can go barefoot. Like the hippies.” She twirls around, her tulle skirt sticking out like a ballerina’s. Or a fairy. She is Tinkerbell. On crack. Which makes me who? Wendy?
I unstrap the shoes and put them in my bag on top of the cans of lager and the jumper I brought (on the grounds that there is nothing decadent or sexy in dying from hypothermia). The path is dusty underfoot. My ankle hurts, and I know I’ll tread on glass or mud or something worse on the way home. But right now, I just want to get there. I reach the gate and we climb over, and onto the Point.
It is wide and long. Covered in grass, its rocky tips stretching out like fingers, stroking the sea. It seems friendly, benign. And during the day it is. Bathed in sunshine, its skin alive with walkers in candy-colored rain ponchos. But that’s not where we’re going. Beyond the fence that keeps the tourists in are the ledges. Three platforms going down the cliffs. Salt-spattered. Worn flat by the tides. And by surfers and smokers and daredevils, watching the waves, drinking until dawn.
“Ciggy?” Stella holds out the packet she took earlier.
I hesitate for a second. I see him in the stockroom on the phone, among the boxes of cornflakes and tins of soup. Then I see her, Mum, in that photo. Pink heels, cigarette trailing in her hand. And I know which one I want to be. So this time I say yes.
Stella lights it. I take a drag, carefully, trying not to betray my amateur status. It tastes familiar. Of biscuits and bonfires. It hurts my throat, but I don’t cough. I have passed.
“Whose cars are those?” Stella nods down the hill.
I look. A Land Rover, a VW Camper, and a cluster of hatchbacks are parked randomly on the grass.
“Um. The Land Rover’s Ed’s. Camper van is Matt’s. Not sure about the others.” Then I see the Mini Cooper. Red convertible. Still shining new. My stomach lurches. Because if he’s here, so is she. Then I feel the cigarette between my fingers. The dry grass beneath my bare feet. And I remember who I am. Tonight, at least. I can do this, I think. And, anyway, she’s the least of my worries. It’s Ed I should be afraid of. Of what he’ll say when he sees Stella.
“Blair Henderson. The Mini, I mean. It’s Blair’s.”
“Who’s Blair Henderson?”
“Yachtie. Goes to County Boys’. Daddy owns a marina.” I look at Stella. “He’s going out with Emily Applegate, before you start getting any ideas.”
“Moi?” Stella mouths. “As if. Anyway, why’s he hanging out with Ed? Or, why’s Ed hanging out with him?”
“He’s not. They both know Matt. He’s in Ed’s band and Blair gets dope off him. . . . Plus there’s no one else to hang out with around here, is there?”
“Well, there’s us now. Come on. Let’s plow.” She links her arm through mine, and, still smoking, we walk down the grassy hill toward the sea.
“You are joking.” It is not a question. Emily Applegate stares at me and then turns to Matt. “What is she doing here?”
“Jude?” Ed looks at me, the same shock on his face as on Emily’s. Because I’ve finally shown up after years of maybes? Or because of who I’m with?
They’re on the top ledge. Fifteen or so of them. Cans and bottles already open. Crisps and Mars bars and a spliff being passed around. Everyone dressed in jeans. My stomach flutters again. Like I’ve been told to come to a fancy dress party but the joke is on me. At least I took the shoes off.
Emily sneers. “It’s poor little Cinderella. All dressed up for the ball.”
Dawce laughs.
I open my mouth to speak, but it’s Stella’s voice I hear. “God, Emily. You’re so predictable.”
“At least I’m not mental.”
“Oh, give it a rest.” Stella lights up another cigarette.
Emily turns to Blair to back her up. But he isn’t looking at her anymore. He’s staring at Stella. The way men stare when they see someone like her. Stella smiles at him. The corners of his mouth crease. And he’s talking to Emily, but his eyes don’t move for a second from Stella’s face. “Yeah, Emily. Don’t be such a bitch.”
Everyone is silent for a few seconds, and all we can hear is the sound of the sea and music from someone’s iPod speakers. Then Emily snorts. “Give me that.” She grabs the spliff off Blair.
He smiles and looks at her finally. “That’s what I love about you.”
Then he kisses her, taking the smoke into his mouth and breathing it out again. Blow back.
“Jude? Want to sit down?”
I realize I’ve been staring at Blair and Emily. The way you stare at car crashes or sex on the telly — horrified but fascinated at the same time. I look away and smile at Ed, relieved that he is here. And that he hasn’t recognized Stella. Ed, my big brother. Or something like it.
I drop my bag on the ground and sit between him and Matt, who is busy skinning up.
Ed swirls his beer around in the can and looks at me sideways. “So, how come you are here, Jude?” he asks.
“Why, shouldn’t I be?” I’m embarrassed. Like the little kid who’s snuck downstairs to play with the grown-ups.
“No.” He shakes his head. “I don’t mean that. It’s just . . . you never did before.”
I shrug. “There’s a first time for everything.”
“It is good to see you.” He nudges me with his elbow.
I smile. Nudge him back. It’s OK. I can do this. I can fit in here. “Can I have one?” I say, nodding at the can.
He looks surprised again. And I am surprised, not sure where it came from. But he shrugs and pulls a can off a four-pack and hands it to me.
The beer is warm and metallic. I wish I’d brought lemonade for the vodka instead. Or could swallow it neat like Stella. But I take another mouthful of beer anyway. Dutch courage. That’s what Mum always said.
“Anyway, I came to see you.”
“Really?” Ed half smiles.
“Yeah. I . . . um . . . I’ve got some news.” I wait for Ed to ask the question. But he doesn’t, just looks at me, waiting.
“I’ve got an audition. For drama school. The Lab.”
“The Lab?” I can see Ed processing these two little words. “But that’s in London, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“Right. Well done, I guess . . .”
I sink into myself. Well done, I guess? Is that it?
Ed sees me shrink. “Sorry. That’s not what I . . . I mean, that’s brilliant, Jude. I mean . . . you’re brilliant. It’s just . . . It’s a long way. And your dad . . . He won’t let you, will he?”
“I’m sixteen, not six. I can do what I want.” But somehow I sound like a six-year-old. Stamping her feet and pouting.
“But even so.”
“Thanks for raining on my parade.”
“Sorry, Jude
. I didn’t mean to . . . It’s great. Seriously. If you get in — I mean, when you get in — we can hang out in London. In Covent Garden. Or Camden. It’ll be just like Churchtown.”
I smile. “But without the rain.”
He laughs. “Or the tractors.”
“Or the cows.”
“Or Emily Applegate.”
I look over at her, lying on Blair’s lap, hair fanned out, Smirnoff Ice in her hand. His arm slung over her shoulder. Hand on her tank top. Can see Stella watching them too. Smoking a cigarette with artful detachment. Vodka already a quarter gone.
“Yeah,” says Ed. “Or the Plastics . . . or Blair Henderson.”
I laugh and lean on Ed, his body warm under the black of his T-shirt. And I feel safe. And strong. Not the fragile way I feel with Stella, the way that needs bravado, defiance. Just a kind of calm. Ed kisses the top of my head. And I don’t move. Just lie against him. Peaceful. Then it’s gone. The moment is over. Because Matt has finished skinning up and has handed the joint to Ed.
I’m cold all of a sudden. I sit up and hug my legs, goose pimples stippling the skin. I think about getting my jumper out. But I know what Stella will say.
I watch Ed inhale and wonder how far I can go in this charade.
“Going to offer me some?” I say.
But he doesn’t. Instead he laughs, coughing out lungfuls of sweet, heavy smoke. “Your dad would kill me.”
And then I know he isn’t fooled. Not for a second. I’m still just a kid to him. Always will be.
“Whatever,” I spit. I pull the beers out of my bag and open one.
“Easy, Jude,” he says.
“Who put you in charge?”
He shakes his head. “Forget it.”
I drink long and hard to punctuate the silence.
“Just be you,” he says finally.
And I want to say, I am. This is me, the new, improved Jude.
But he’s known me too long. So I tell him the truth. “That’s the last person on earth I want to be.”
I WAKE up on the floor, doing that whole “Where am I?” thing in my head. Then I see the Doors posters, the shelves with the tacky swimming trophies and Harry Potters. And I remember.
Ed is in bed, asleep, one arm trailing on the floor. I am hot. Too hot. I try to stand up, but for some reason I can’t move. Then I realize I am straitjacketed into a brown nylon sleeping bag. The same bag I’ve slept in a hundred times. The same floor. The same room. Not like waking up in a stranger’s bed, I think. But we’re not kids anymore.
I feel inside the bag to check my clothes. I am still dressed. Can’t remember going to bed, though. Can’t even remember how I got back here. My stomach churns. I’m going to be sick. I manage to squirm out of the sleeping bag, like I’m emerging from a cocoon. But I’m not a butterfly. I am vile, a crawling insect. I lurch across the room and out of the door, praying that Mrs. Hickman is already gone. The bathroom is at the end of the landing. I make it in time to throw up across the closed toilet seat.
The next three heaves actually go into the toilet. I clean up with someone’s washcloth and a bottle of bleach, then rinse the washcloth and put it back on the edge of the bath. Then think better of it and drop it in the bin, covering it with a toilet-paper roll to hide my crime. My legs are shaking. I pick a toothbrush and turn on the taps. Leaning against the sink, waiting for the water to run cold, I look up into the mirror. My face is pale, my eyes ringed by dark circles, hair messy. The confidence that filled me last night is gone. I am ugly. I am nobody. I clean my teeth and creep back to Ed’s room.
He’s awake. Sitting up against the headboard. A mirror of Jim Morrison on the wall above.
“Why, Miss Polmear, you really are beautiful,” he says. But it’s not like when Stella said it. And I don’t know if he’s laughing with me or at me. So I just crawl back into the sleeping bag and close my eyes. Like it will all go away. But it doesn’t.
“Don’t you want to know what happened last night?”
And I don’t. Not really. Because I know it will be bad. But it comes out anyway. “What?”
Ed smiles. And then I know it’s with me. “Nothing,” he says. “Well, not nothing. I mean, you got royally drunk and me and Matt put you in the back of the van.”
“You drove?”
“Matt. He doesn’t drink.”
“Just smokes,” I say.
“It’s different.”
I look at Ed. And I need to know. Need to make sure. “Was I awful?”
“No. I mean, you were totally out of it. But you didn’t do anything dodgy.”
“What, like dance naked or fight with the Hollys or anything?” I try to joke.
Ed laughs. “Nope.”
“Thank God.” I clutch myself tighter in the sleeping bag.
“You’re a happy drunk,” I hear him say. “Kind of nice. Until you passed out, anyway.”
I smile. Even though my head is pounding. “I feel terrible.”
“You look it.”
“Thanks a million.”
I close my eyes. I try to see it. There are flashes. Like twisting my ankle, still throbbing, even now. Like the sun setting and someone raising a toast to the god of the sea. But no one could remember who that was. Like Matt kissing Holly Harker. Like Blair’s hands, moving inside Emily’s top. Like Stella dancing, leaning over the ledge . . . I open my eyes. Oh, my God! Stella. Ed has said nothing, but he must have seen her. So either he didn’t recognize her or doesn’t care. Or . . .
“Jude.”
I start. “What?” I wait for it. For him to say it. Say something.
But it’s not that. “Is everything OK?” he asks.
I look at him. He’s still smiling, but it’s forced now. He’s got that “I know you’ve had a tough time, and it must be really hard” kind of look on his face. The kind I hate.
“Why, shouldn’t it be?”
“No. Just . . .” He pauses. Trying to find the words. “The drinking and stuff. It’s not like you.”
And he’s right. It’s not like the old Jude. But I’m not her anymore. Don’t want to be her. “I told you, I’m not a kid.”
“No, but —”
“What are you so worried about, anyway?”
He shakes his head, like I’m stupid. “You, of course.”
“Well, I don’t need you to worry about me. I’m fine.”
“Right. That’s why you’re here at, what?” He looks at his watch. “Eleven on a Sunday morning, hung over and looking like seven kinds of shit.”
“Eleven?”
“Yeah,” he says. “Why?”
I remember something Dad said last night. Along with the “Be back by half ten, don’t drink, don’t talk to strangers” lecture.
“Gran,” I groan. “She’s here.”
“Oh,” he says.
“Exactly.”
Then Ed is finding me a washcloth to clean my face, a hairbrush, my shoes. Making me coffee and toast and Marmite to take away.
“Thanks,” I say.
Ed is standing on the doorstep in last night’s T-shirt and boxer shorts. He smiles. “You’re welcome.”
“I mean it . . . and not just for the toast.”
“I know.”
And for one brief moment we’re us again. Me and Ed. Like we always were. And as I walk down the road, his eyes on my back, I wish I could hold on to them both. Him, and Stella. But it won’t work like that. I know I will have to choose.
DAD IS waiting for me.
I walk up the bare treads of the stairs. My head’s hanging down, heavy with sleep and sun and last night, my stomach alive with butterflies, a can of Coke in my hand to quell them, poison them. I see his feet in front of me, on the landing, faded-brown socks, a hole in the left one. I stop. And wait for the words I know are going to come out. Seen it on the soaps.
“Where the hell have you been?” Like he’s scripted.
“Ed’s.”
“I know that. His mum rang last night. But,
why, Jude? You knew your gran was coming.”
“I forgot.” True. “Where is she?”
“At the beach with Alfie. I’ve told her you’re helping Ed clear out the garage.” Lying. To cover for me.
I shrug, like it’s nothing. But it’s everything. To him.
The TV script starts again. “Have you seen the state of yourself?”
“Yes.”
“What’s the matter with you lately?”
“Nothing. God, will everyone stop worrying about me? I’m fine — No, I’m better than fine. I’m happy.”
“You were drinking . . .”
Mrs. Hickman told him, then. Must have heard Ed carrying me in. “It’s just the end of term, Dad. Everyone was out.”
Dad looks at the floor, shakes his head. “I can’t do this again.” But he’s talking to himself now. About her, I guess. And I’m sick of it. Of this ghost that stalks us. Unacknowledged. Unspoken. But we both see her, feel her.
I dig my nails into the palms of my hands. “Say it, Dad,” I demand. “Say I’m like her. That’s what you mean, isn’t it? But I’m not. I wish I bloody were. But I’m not.”
The words hang there, taunting him. I watch his face, struggling. See what he wants to say bubble up inside him. But he fights it back down.
Eventually his eyes meet mine again. But his face is set now. “Just get washed. They’ll be back for lunch at half past.”
I laugh. Quick and spiteful. “You are unbelievable.” I run up the last stairs, push past him, and slam my bedroom door. Textbook.
I hear him turn the radio on in the kitchen. Radio 2 again. Sunday love songs. I flick on the stereo and press play, not even checking what’s loaded. The Rolling Stones reverberate off the walls as I flop down on the bed. Staring at the ceiling. Craving sleep that I know I can’t have. I cover my face with my hands and feel a warm wetness. My nails have dug so hard they have drawn blood.
I’m sitting at the dressing table, staring at myself in the mirror. In trousers and a T-shirt now. Last night’s dress abandoned on the floor.
People used to say we could be sisters. Me and Mum. Mum would laugh and smile and kiss me. But they were just trying to be nice to her. Just saying the words she wanted to hear. I take after him. Quiet. Plain. A nobody.