‘Did I find the ski?’
He propped himself up on his elbows and I could see him looking at me in the sliver of light from the street lamp. I waited for him to ask what I was talking about but there was only a moment of hesitation before his mouth stretched into a grin. ‘Yep, we found it. It took hours and hours and I was ready to give up, but you insisted that we weren’t going back to the chalet without it. You didn’t know how to use the button lift. Remember when your legs were dangling in the air? You looked like one of those cartoons of a girl attached to a balloon.’
‘And you had to grab me?’
‘Exactly.’ He rubbed his eyes. ‘What time is it, Diz? Why are you up so early?’
‘I couldn’t sleep. And then I couldn’t remember what had happened.’
‘Ah, I see… It would have come to you. Memory often catches up later.’
‘I know, but I wanted to be sure. Dad?’
‘Yeah, Diz?’
‘Have you given up on Project Elephant?’
‘Given up? Of course not. There are so many animals out there I haven’t even met yet and that need my help. I’m hoping you might even come with me one day.’
‘Maybe I will…’
I could see his eyes drooping again when I suddenly burst out, ‘Dad – I’m sorry.’
‘What for?’
It was a good question. There was so much I was sorry for that I was bursting with it. And even if I tried to put it into words for Dad, I knew I wouldn’t be able to.
‘That I don’t visit Mum every day. I just… I can’t…’
‘I know, sshh. It’s all right. It’s not easy. You need to do things in your own time.’
I was closer than ever to telling him everything, to asking him about the colour thief. Dad would know what to do, and he would know how to stop him. But his eyes were properly closed now and within moments he was fast asleep.
I tucked the duvet around him and slowly crept back to my own room.
‘How are you feeling this morning?’ Aunty Lyn asked. ‘Did you sleep OK?’ She was still in her pyjama bottoms and an oversized jumper, and without make-up her face looked different – softer.
‘Mmm.’ I’d woken up to the sound of clanging glass from downstairs.
‘Sorry about the racket, but I wanted to get all of this out before the bin men come.’ She was dragging stacks of recycling bags through the front door, double bagging some of them to prevent the contents spilling everywhere. The stench was horrible. Milo was busy running round sniffing each bag in turn.
‘Would you mind giving me a hand, Izzy? Take some of the smaller bags, would you?’
I picked up three at once, which was probably too many, but I forced myself to drag them into the front garden. The weeds had disappeared and Aunty Lyn had mowed the lawn. Even the lavender bush that Mum had planted was neatly clipped. She would have been happy to see it so well looked after.
‘Where did this come from?’ I asked, pointing to the bags.
‘The back garden. Didn’t you notice the smell? You had about eight bin bags there and nobody had taken them out for the collection.’
She wiped her hands on a dishcloth and changed the subject.
‘I popped out and got us some chocolate twists for breakfast. I thought you’d like them. Hattie and Mick always insist on at least one a week. Mind you, they’re probably having more now that I’m not there every day to monitor their diet. But they’ve got all these mock exams so they deserve a treat.’
She opened the fridge, which had been scrubbed clean, not a hairy carrot in sight.
‘You probably should be there with them…’ I said, suddenly guilty about the amount of time that she had spent with us.
‘They’ll be fine with Uncle Tom and I want to be here with you for now,’ she answered simply. ‘I’m going to take these bottles to the bottle bank. I thought I could give you a lift to school on the way if you’re sure that you want to go in today?’
The bottles were lined up on the kitchen table, rows and rows of them like a small glass army. Some were tall, clear wine bottles, but most were small with a brown tint. They were a reminder of the most recent of the colour disappearances on my mural. I climbed the stairs to pack my bag and surveyed the wall. In the light of day, the absence of brown was even starker. Combined with green, its disappearance had caused a change in weather – everything that was lush and spring-like looked as if it had turned to winter. I moved close to the wall then, peering at it from just a few centimetres away. And the more I stared, the more I realised the colour was still there, although only the very faintest traces. It was as if somebody had dabbed at it with a sponge, intent on stealing its energy and spirit. But why? Why did the colour thief want my colours?
I would definitely ask Dad tonight. I had put it off for long enough.
A shrill whistle pierced the air. I hurried over to the window and saw Toby waving at me from the riverbank. I couldn’t quite make out his expression, but I sensed that he was excited.
Aunty Lyn was still outside when I came downstairs, attempting unsuccessfully to fit all the bottles into the recycling bin.
‘I’m going to walk,’ I told her. ‘Thanks for offering to drive me, but it won’t take long.’
I went quickly down the alleyway to the river and over the bridge. The mud squelched around my newly cleaned school shoes and by the time I reached Toby, I could already feel the tell-tale signs of damp on my toes.
‘What’s up?’ I asked him.
‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘It was just that I found these in the garage yesterday.’ He indicated a box of logs balancing on his lap. ‘I thought we could build Spike a shelter. I’ve been worrying about how he’s doing when we’re not there, and I figured he’s probably not so safe on the open water while he’s still tiny. This is what I thought we could do.’ He showed me a sketch of what at first glance looked like a small house, complete with a veranda.
‘It would only be about this size,’ he said, spreading his arms to slightly more than the width of his knees. ‘The roof would give him a bit of shelter, and we could put some straw inside, in case he gets cold.’
‘Where would you put it?’
‘That’s what I came out here to figure out. You see that bit of land that juts out under the bridge? I think maybe that would be a good spot.’
‘The current’s strong there, though. What about putting it here? We could wedge it in above the water, between these two branches. It’s where we saw him first, and he always seems to come back here for his food,’ I said, pointing to Spike’s bush.
Toby considered it for a moment. Then he passed me two of the bigger logs.
‘See if they’re long enough for us to use as a base,’ he instructed me. I scrambled carefully down the bank. I almost, almost made it…
I fell on my bum with a thud, but then I heard Toby chuckle, and pleasant warmth spread through my stomach. Before I knew it, I was laughing so hard that I could barely lift myself back up.
‘You’re completely caked!’ he yelled, as I finally managed to make it to the bush. I laid the logs between two of the biggest branches – they were perfect.
I climbed back up the bank and handed them to Toby, who was still doubled over in his chair chuckling.
‘I wish I’d filmed you, Izzy! Oh, it was priceless; absolutely priceless!’
‘Shut up,’ I said to him, although he’d set me off again. Then I looked at my watch, and saw that I didn’t even have enough time to get changed. I swung my rucksack on to my muddy back, and legged it, telling Toby that I would meet him after school.
In the few minutes left before the bell, I tried to wash off the worst of the mud in the loos. It was hopeless. I managed to get most of it off my shoes, and I took off my jumper and rolled it up in a ball in my bag, but there wasn’t much I could do about the back of my skirt.
I was so worried about being muddy that at first I thought it must be the cause of the sudden silence when I walked into the
classroom. It was as if somebody had just turned off the sound in a film. Even Mona and Harpreet looked down at their desks and avoided my gaze when I said hello.
One of the boys in the back row shouted out, ‘And the winner of Round One enters the arena. The question on everyone’s lips is: when’s the rematch and who will come away victorious? I’ll be taking bets this lunchtime, folks. Roll up!’ It was then that the real reason for the silence sank in and the spiders went mad in my stomach.
Lou was sitting in her usual seat, a team of devoted friends gathered round her. She had a large white bandage stuck to the side of her head. Get Well Soon cards were arranged in an elaborate display in front of her.
I sat down, trying my hardest not to look in her direction, and saw a note on my desk. On the front was a tiny cartoon picture of a man reading a newspaper.
PTO it said at the bottom. On the reverse the same man was scrunching the newspaper and aiming it through a basketball hoop.
Below it was written:
It will be old news tomorrow.
Frank looked at me and grinned reassuringly. The spiders settled instantly.
Thirteen
We had art first and I was thankful that Lou wasn’t in the same class. Mr Leah asked us if anyone had guessed his riddle. I knew, of course, but I didn’t feel like drawing attention to myself. Jonah answered. He got the name wrong, pronouncing it ‘Dally’, but Mr Leah let it go.
‘Dalí often described his paintings as “hand-painted dream photographs”,’ he said. ‘So, for your next project, I would like you to use a dream as your source of inspiration. I won’t say anything more than that. You’ll have five double-lessons in which to work on this, so really think it through carefully; maybe even consider doing a few rough sketches first. I’m going to hand out some A3 paper – you can use charcoal, poster paint, oil paint, or anything else you can find in the room.’
I sat in front of my sheet, allowing my stubby pencil to flick slowly through the fingers of my left hand. At first my mind was as blank as the paper, but then I noticed the cans of spray paint, and I knew exactly what I was going to try. I’d seen Mum use this style for a portrait that she’d been commissioned to do. At first she’d only tested it, doubting that it would work, but it had ended up looking perfect. She’d somehow managed to create the picture half in spray-painted shadow and half in the light. The side of the woman’s face that was exposed was so vividly drawn, that every vein and wrinkle was visible. I wanted to create the same sense of shadow, but I wasn’t nearly as good as Mum. I used to be sad that I hadn’t inherited her gift, but she would say, ‘You’re an amazing actress, Izzy. Don’t be greedy – leave some talents for others.’
I didn’t hold high hopes for my painting, but I would give it a go. I took the yellow can first and let loose on the page. I held it close to one edge to achieve a strong colour effect, and then moved it further away so that by the time it reached the other side, it was so faint that it was barely there. Then I did the same with blue, brown and purple, the colours bleeding into a wild cloud of smoke. Finally, I grabbed a stick of charcoal and began to draw the outline of a figure emerging from the haze. His head first – a dark, smudged, shadowy oval – two outstretched arms, the fingers curling, as if to grasp something, I was so engrossed that I didn’t even notice Frank had perched himself on the other end of my work bench. I glanced over and saw that, like me, he’d done no sketching or planning and had gone straight for the paints. He’d brought over a whole box of them and seemed to be opening pots randomly.
At last he selected black, dipped his paintbrush in, and swirled it vigorously around the page, the tip of his tongue at the side of his mouth with the effort of creating a single continuous loop.
‘It’s a vortex,’ he said. ‘I keep having this dream where I’m paragliding and I go really high into the air, above the clouds, and then suddenly schwooop – I get sucked into this vortex – like a black hole – and I go catapulting into it, thousands of miles per hour and these zombies appear from nowhere and start chasing me, so I run like mad…’
He demonstrated by hurling himself halfway across the classroom, bouncing off the back wall, then skidding in my direction. I stepped away quickly, narrowly avoiding a collision.
‘Steady on,’ said Mr Leah, grinning. ‘This is impressive, Frank. I can really see the movement in your picture, even before you demonstrated it. I like the impact of black on white, but maybe you could add a bit of texture to show the things, or the fragments of things that are being sucked into the vortex? Look, you could use some of the netting here…’
He handed the sheet of wire to Frank and then stopped suddenly in front of my picture. I was just smudging the charcoal, carefully blending the shadow man into the colours around him.
I felt the weight of Mr Leah’s gaze. I wished that he would move on and comment on someone else’s work, but his feet remained fixed to the spot.
‘What is it, Izzy?’ he asked.
‘I’m not quite finished.’
‘No, I can see that, but I’m intrigued. What is the title of your work?’
‘The Colour Thief,’ I replied, without thinking.
He looked at me, a puzzled expression on his face.
‘A fascinating name. And… how are you doing?’ he asked more quietly.
‘The same,’ I said. I felt myself growing hot.
‘Well, if you ever feel that you’d like to talk about anything, you know where to find me. And you know that it’s usually quiet in here at lunchtime, so if you wanted to come and do some more work on this and have a chat, I’ll be here.’
‘Thank you,’ I mumbled. ‘But I have nothing to talk about…’
I was first into the biology lab. I sat by myself at the back, as far away as possible from Lou, who took a prime spot on the front bank of desks. My night of broken sleep was catching up with me. I felt exhausted and my eyes drooped in the heat of the lab. Before I knew it, I’d dozed off. I dreamed of somebody whose face I couldn’t quite see, who took my painting and ran it under the tap until the colours merged into an ugly grey sludge and disappeared down the sink.
I was tugging at the person’s arm to make them stop when I heard nervous laughter. I opened my eyes to see twenty-four faces watching me closely.
‘Turn around,’ said Mrs Yen impatiently. ‘There’s nothing to see.’ My face burned with shame. Jemima sniggered and muttered something to Lou.
‘I want you to get into pairs and start planning your demographics project,’ Mrs Yen continued, battling the chatter. ‘You can choose what you want to survey, be it eye colour, hair colour, shoe size or anything else. On your posters, I’d like to see a summary of what causes variations in your demographic and then you can use the class as your sample to see the spread of difference.’
‘Maybe we’ll do a spread of how dangerous people are,’ I heard Lou whisper loudly, as she glanced in my direction.
‘Louise, I would appreciate if you stuck to the subject, please, and stopped talking nonsense. You have the rest of the lesson to start planning with your partner and then we’ll continue next week.’
There was a buzz of activity as everyone got into pairs. I turned to Mona, who was sitting closest to me, but she’d already paired up with Harpreet. To my left, a pair of boys had also coupled off. It didn’t take me long to figure out that there was an odd number of us in the class and I was the one left out.
Mrs Yen noticed and came over immediately.
‘Izzy, join Mona and Harpreet. You can be a three,’ she said. But the moment she walked away, the girls looked at me, scared expressions on their faces.
‘Why don’t we do two projects?’ suggested Mona. ‘You work on a separate thing, Izzy, and then we can just put them together in one poster. We’ll leave you a space.’
I didn’t understand.
‘That’s just more to do, though. Why don’t you want to work together on it?’ I asked.
They looked shiftily at each other. ‘Well,
it would just be easier because… what if you get angry and…’
‘And what?’ My face felt so hot that I thought it might melt.
‘Lou said that it’s best not to say anything to you… in case, you know… you lash out,’ Harpreet explained.
I looked at the floor. The squares of lino danced before my eyes. I leaned my hand on the desk to steady myself.
‘Izzy, are you… are you OK?’ I heard Mona ask. And then suddenly I found myself on my feet, walking swiftly in the direction of the door, past Mrs Yen who had her back turned, writing something on the whiteboard, through the dimly lit corridor of the science block with its rows of lab coat hooks, past the netball courts and school office. As it was still the middle of the lesson, nobody was around and so nobody spotted me. It would be a good fifteen minutes before anyone in my class realised that I wasn’t coming back.
I walked right through the main doors next to the school office and through the front gates. Within moments I was on the street and still my feet moved in a steady, marching rhythm. Left, right, left, right.
I walked instinctively in the direction of the park, breaking into a jog and then into a wild run.
I ran all the way down Gulliver Avenue, passing ghostly trees on either side, their branches open to the wind. I pushed through clusters of office workers at the zebra crossing, past Mr Joshi’s corner shop with the fruit bowls lined up outside, the ripe plums, the shiny apples, and into Jamieson Park. I only stopped when I reached the water fountain. I leaned on its edge, breathing fast. I turned to see whether I’d been followed, but there was nobody familiar in sight.
The park was empty apart from a group of mums with their young children sitting on rugs arranging a picnic. One of the women took off her jacket and stretched her arms, enjoying the weather. I saw a glimmer of brightness seeping through a gap in the pale, pale sky and realised that it was a clear, sunny day.
I strolled past the playground and the tennis courts, staring down at my shoes as I walked. I’d thought I was moving forwards without aim or agenda, but when I arrived at our favourite spot, I wasn’t surprised to find myself there. My feet must have known where they were heading.
The Mystery of the Colour Thief Page 7