I sit in Rebecca’s study playing the Bob Dylan tape I made last time I babysat, scouring the lyrics for a clue about where he might be. Did I make a mistake with that Valentine’s card? I should’ve sent him one in my own name, then he’d know how much I love him. Why was I so shy? I should’ve told him how much I love him. Now I can’t stop crying.
Poor Mr Phillips! He must’ve waited hours, tapping his fingers nervously on the steering wheel, heart racing in case he got caught. He must’ve felt terrible when I didn’t appear. Now he’s somewhere out there, all alone. If only I knew where to find him I’d take all my savings and join him.
****
Wed 15th February
‘You did it. You wrote those things.’
‘What things?’
‘You know what I’m talking about.’ Helen takes an unsteady step into my room. ‘As soon as I saw it, I knew you’d done it. Specially that “H” at the bottom. It’s your writing, not mine. Like you did on the walls. And the mirror.’
If my sister chooses to cast aspersions at me, then I will be forced, against my better nature, to adopt a formal and severe tone with her. I tell her that I presume she’s referring to the infantile card which caused so much distress to Mrs Phillips on Monday evening. I tell her I would never be responsible for such a naïve prank as that.
‘Why did you do it? Tell me! Why did you pretend to be me?’
I carry out a rapid risk assessment of the situation. Although I feel sorry for my sister right now (especially because she must know that there will be no more secret outings with Mr Phillips now their little friendship is public knowledge at the shop), nevertheless, when all the variables are taken into consideration, outright denial is still the best bet. Also, since he disappeared, and since Rebecca made those remarks about the content of the card, I’m no longer willing to take responsibility for writing it. As far as I’m concerned, that card belongs to history.
‘It wasn’t me,’ I say indignantly. ‘I reckon I know who did it, though. Katie Nelson. You know what she’s like.’
Helen keeps placing her hand on the table, sliding a few inches forward, letting go, placing her hand down again. The neat rows of calligraphy nibs scatter in all directions, and my carefully prepared sheets of cartridge paper ruck and buckle under her fingers.
‘Be careful!’
She’s deep inside my room now, looping towards the chest of drawers. Before I can stop her, she grabs my porcelain ballerina in both hands and flings it at the radiator. The head of my statuette hits the metal with a bang and the whole figure breaks into smithereens. Only her pirouetting toes remain intact on the plinth.
‘Rebecca!’ I scream, trying to grab Helen’s arms.
My sister slithers out of my grip like a lump of soap in the bath and stands by my bottle collection making strange gagging noises.
‘Mum!’ I shout, reaching for Helen’s arms again.
Helen tries to knock the bottles in my display off the shelf, but she misses most of them. The ones that hit the floor are cushioned by the carpet.
‘Mum!’ I scream.
Helen kneels down and vomits on my bedroom floor. I can’t hear what she’s saying any more, except the word ‘old.’
****
Fri 17th February
Rebecca refuses point-blank to budge from the bedside. She’s been sitting in the same chair for a night and a day and a night and a day while the nurses move around inside the curtained space to replace drips and check the monitors.
This is my first visit since Wednesday, when we had to stay up all night waiting for news.
My sister’s hands look like dry crabs lying on the shore. Rebecca’s been holding each one in turn, covering them with salt water splashes. I give her a quick pat on the shoulder to let her know I’m here.
Helen stares at me steadily. She doesn’t move her eyes away. My face heats up.
‘Hello,’ Rebecca says, but her fingers remain locked to my sister’s hand.
‘Did they get all the pills out of her stomach?’
‘There’s no major damage. This morning she asked where she was. It’s a good sign! She’s going to be okay!’
‘When’re you coming home?’ I ask.
Rebecca shrugs. ‘I’m not sure yet, love. How’re you doing over at Katie’s house? Being spoilt rotten, I expect.’
I can’t explain to Rebecca. Even though Mr and Mrs Nelson are generous and friendly, and they’ve given me the spare room all to myself, I’ve been missing number eleven. At Katie’s house there’s too much heat from the radiators. There’s too much food on the table. I get too many cuddles from Mrs Nelson. ‘It’s all a bit too much,’ I say.
‘Sorry, darling.’
Helen’s eyes are fixed on me. Her skin’s a horrible colour, green and grey on a base shade of yellow. Inside my head I can hear her voice listing all the terrible things I’ve done. ‘Will she get better?’
‘It’ll take a long time. They don’t know how much internal damage…’ Rebecca chokes and stops talking.
Tall, silent machines lean over the bed like trees.
Liquids drip in. Fluids drain out.
The only sound in the ward is the steady suck-blow of a ventilator from the bed next-door, making a boy’s chest rise and fall. His mum’s asleep in the chair by the bed. She looks dead.
Helen’s still staring at me.
‘I’ll be off then,’ I say, handing Rebecca her Marlboro and matches.
‘I think I’ll be here a few more days.’ She takes the cigarettes and slides them into the drawer of the bedside cabinet.
‘Katie and Mrs Nelson are waiting for me outside.’
I can feel Helen’s eyes following me as I hurry away.
****
Thurs 23rd February
‘Call that a bob, do you? More like a pudding-bowl! Where does your mum take you for haircuts?’
‘She does it herself.’ I flick through my biology textbook with a studious expression. On a scrap of paper I’ve been designing an elegant secret code where his initials clasp mine. Once I’m happy with the design I’ll write it out properly in calligraphy.
‘And she’s a qualified hairdresser, is she?’ Mrs Nelson has criticised Rebecca a lot this week. I need some peace and quiet.
‘No.’
‘It’s disgraceful for a girl your age.’ Mrs Nelson slams down her tumbler, releasing a rush of angry bubbles, and reaches into her Gucci handbag. She pulls out a pink suede address book, holds it at arm’s length, and locates a number with a scarlet fingernail.
They make an appointment for me straight away because she says it’s an emergency.
‘Come along, Katie!’ she calls up the stairs. ‘Chop-chop! We’re taking this young lady for a proper haircut!’
I stuff my homework into my schoolbag for later.
Katie appears on the landing wearing the red birthday dress I gave her, a cream mohair wrap-around cardigan, and Mrs Nelson’s cerise stilettos. She’s been trying on clothes and makeup in different combinations all evening, coming downstairs and cat-walking along the corridor to the kitchen. She looks really fat.
I haven’t changed out of my school uniform. All I wanted to do after school today was sink into the sofa with my scraps of paper and a glass of bubbly.
‘Get out of those shoes! They make you look bloody cheap,’ Mrs Nelson shouts.
Mrs Nelson drives the Cortina like an ambulance into town.
‘Cheri’s the best hairdresser round here,’ she explains as we tear along the country roads. ‘Senior stylist, very experienced for her age, used to work at Head Case and Hair Necessities, but now she’s nicely settled at Hairobics. Did my perm.’ She glances in the rear-view mirror and pats her tight yellow curls. ‘They always start having babies just when you’ve got them trained.’
‘Mum, slow down! I feel sick.’
Mrs Nelson plugs in the Simon and Garfunkel tape. ‘This’ll calm you down.’
The walls of the salon are plastered with
posters of models with shiny suntans and hair that looks synthetic. The whole place smells strongly of chemicals.
Leaning back in the chair, exposing my throat like this, having a strange woman’s fingers in my hair makes my heart race uncontrollably. I try to concentrate on breathing slowly, in out, in out, but this reminds me of the ventilators in hospital, so I stop. But now I can’t remember how to breathe without thinking about it.
Once I’m upright again, Cheri lifts handfuls of my wet hair in her fingers and moves closer to examine each clump. ‘How would you like it cut?’ she asks, pumping the swivel-chair with her foot.
There’s a haircut I’ve secretly wanted for ages. ‘Can you do me a Princess Diana haircut?’
‘A nice bob please, Cheri,’ says Mrs Nelson, laughing.
Mrs Nelson sits down to read Cosmo and Katie goes across town to tell her dad to meet us at Pinocchio’s for dinner.
All around me are women in white gowns. They sit completely still, leaning back, heads half-lost inside metal domes. I watch them in the mirrors. Some of them have closed their eyes. Stylists hurry to and fro, checking the monitors, making incisions with scissors, putting on plastic gloves, delicately unwrapping little plasters and prodding people’s heads with tongs.
I don’t like the way I am bound to my chair in this white gown.
I need fresh air.
‘Stop fidgeting, please,’ Cheri says, drawing a comb through my hair and snipping slowly, strand by strand, with exaggerated flicks of her wrist. ‘Uncross your legs.’
I don’t like the way she presses her stomach into my head. ‘Will you be finished soon?’
‘Not yet. Magazine? Cup of tea?’
Before I know what’s happened, I’ve flung off Cheri and I’m standing in the cold street outside, gasping for air.
I can’t work out how I got to be on the wrong side of the door.
A man walks past and winks at me. ‘Didn’t like your haircut, eh?’
Katie runs down the street. ‘What’s the matter? What’re you doing out here?’
‘Come back in!’ Mrs Nelson shouts through the door. ‘You’re only half-done!’
Katie puts her arm round me. She smells strongly of cigarettes. ‘You okay?’
‘She was standing too close.’ Scarlet with embarrassment, I wish I was sitting quietly in the chair again.
Cheri stares at us critically through the smoked glass.
Katie opens the salon door. ‘Lizzie thought she was going to faint. Can you give her a couple of minutes? We’ll be in again soon.’
‘Thanks.’ My whole body feels limp.
Katie laughs suddenly. ‘Watch out, they’ll think you’re pregnant! You should see the way Cheri’s looking at us.’
When we go back inside, Cheri accelerates the pace of the haircut. She doesn’t speak to me again.
I don’t recognise myself in the mirror when she’s finished. My hair looks like a glossy wig, ruffed up and perched dangerously high on my head.
I slip my arm through Mrs Nelson’s as we walk down the High Street to Pinocchio’s. She smells strongly of sweat, and her forehead looks damp. ‘I’m really sorry about what happened. I felt dizzy.’
‘It was ever so stuffy in there. Full of ammonia.’ She gives me a brief smile, but I’m sure she thinks I’m ungrateful.
Although the bill came to ten pounds, the only thing I can think to do is refund the cost of the haircut.
‘No!’ Mrs Nelson says firmly. ‘My treat. Don’t mention it again.’
Mr Nelson is at the table already with a glass of beer. His tan leather jacket hangs over the back of his chair. He wolf-whistles at me when we approach. ‘Look at you! Well! A real lady!’
There’s a picture of the Leaning Tower of Pisa on the wall. The town of Pisa is the birthplace of all pizzas, Mrs Nelson tells me.
‘We always come here. The desserts are rubbish,’ Katie complains, sitting down heavily in the chair next to her dad. ‘Can’t we go somewhere else for a change?’
‘It’s the best food in town,’ Mr Nelson replies. ‘You must have a steak, Lizzie.’
I try to remember all the rules of politeness Dad taught us as children. I unfold the linen napkin and place it on my lap. My mouth is dry, but I don’t reach for the jug of water because it’s on the other side of the table, beside Mr Nelson’s elbow. I remember to say please and thank you when placing my order and, to be on the safe side, I choose ‘medium rare’ for my steak because it’s the middle option out of three completely unknown choices.
‘Mercy bow coop,’ Mrs Nelson says when the food arrives.
We start to eat.
Blood runs out of the meat when I try to cut it. I gulp each piece down with a mouthful of wine so I don’t have to chew. It takes quite a lot of wine to get the lumps down.
‘You alright, Lizzie?’ Mrs Nelson asks after a while as she tops up my glass. ‘You’ve gone very quiet.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Poor love.’
I cut the remainder of my steak into minute pieces and slide each one surreptitiously into the napkin on my lap. My head spins when we get up to leave, but I manage to throw the meaty parcel under the table without anybody seeing.
****
Fri 24th February
A crusty black nose, stained yellow whiskers and a pink tongue insert themselves through the crack in the bedroom door, followed, as the door creaks open, by a pair of adoring black eyes.
The pink tongue extends and rasps across the nose.
‘Go away!’ I purse my lips and close The Lord of the Flies.
It was a mistake to read my second-favourite book again. I needed a distraction because I was trying to stop thinking about the way Helen is threaded with tubes as if somebody has started to sew up her seams and wandered off in the middle of the job. But the story has changed. The printed words are all in the same position on the pages, but the characters seem different. I try to recapture my old way of seeing the island and the boys, but I can’t stop feeling sorry for that fat one. I used to think he deserved what he got. I wanted to hurt him too, but now I want the others to stop torturing him. I want the ending to be happy.
Trixy tunnels silently through the carpet, crawling on her stomach, a rogue white streak causing a ripple in the livid pattern. She tries not to meet my eyes and worms her way over to me, halting just beyond the radius of my feet.
‘Shoo!’ I throw a fluffy cushion in the shape of a monkey at her, and it hits her head with a thump.
Instead of running away, she holds her ground. Growling, she pounces on the monkey and clamps her teeth over its fluffy rump. The cloth makes a splitting noise. She shifts position. Now she’s standing directly over the cushion, sinking her jaws into its neck.
‘Drop!’
She tugs on the monkey’s arm, half-severing it from the body. I watch her jaws closely and wait for the muscles to relax for an instant, then grab the cushion and throw it back on the bed. She jumps up and leaps on the monkey, extracting toothfuls of stuffing from the open seams, spitting white blossoms all over the room.
We play tug-of-war with the cushion until it’s in shreds, except I’m not playing any more. I don’t want her to destroy the monkey. I want to rescue it.
I’m not one hundred per cent certain, but I don’t think I’m in love with Mr Phillips any more.
****
Sat 25th February
Mrs Phillips plays with a biro on the counter, spinning it on the flat surface. When it comes to a halt, the nib points directly at me.
‘But you must have some idea where he’s gone,’ Mrs Nelson explodes indignantly. ‘He’s your husband after all!’ She waves her hands in the air. ‘Why haven’t you phoned the police?’
Mrs Phillips keeps rubbing her eyes. ‘Is there something I can get you from the shop?’
‘What if he’s lying in a ditch somewhere?’
‘The police would have contacted me if that was the case,’ she replies. ‘I’m sure he’s fine.’ He
r eyes are more piggy than ever, narrow little slits with puffy pink lids.
I hover by the window and stare out at the road. Every time I look at the interior of the shop I think he’s going to magically reappear out of a trapdoor and point an accusing finger at me.
Against my better judgement, Mrs Nelson persuaded me to accompany her on this mission to find out the truth about Mr Phillips.
The whole shop smells different. Not one of the packets and tins looks the same as before.
‘How’s your little sister doing?’ Mrs Phillips asks me gently. I’m not sure I like the way she keeps talking to me.
‘They’re going to send her to a special unit.’ I can’t breathe again.
‘Up the loony-bin,’ Mrs Nelson says. ‘Unusual for a little girl, isn’t it?’
Mrs Phillips ignores Mrs Nelson. ‘They’ll get her back on her feet in no time. I hope she got my card? I’m so sorry this happened to her. I had no idea that he… I’m so glad I had boys.’
‘If you mean boys are less of a worry than girls, I choose to disagree!’ Mrs Nelson walks over to me and puts an arm around my shoulders. ‘All that violence. Drugs. Gangs! I’m glad I’ve got my Katie. And Katie’s got Lizzie here,’ she adds with an encouraging squeeze.
‘Try not to worry too much,’ Mrs Phillips says to me.
Mrs Nelson tries to steer the conversation back on course. ‘If my husband vanished in the middle of the night, I’d be on his case, I can tell you!’
I’m not going to speak because anything I say may be taken down and used in evidence against me.
‘What can I get you from the shop?’ Mrs Phillips asks Mrs Nelson.
We buy a bag of oven chips from the freezer.
****
Sun 26th February
‘Is Helen in hospital because Mr Phillips has gone away?’
Katie’s question makes a certain amount of sense to me. I’ve been struggling to connect the two events myself. But however much I think about it, I can’t understand why he disappeared. Of all the possibilities contained in my Valentine’s card, this was the most remote. Katie’s question doesn’t solve the riddle, but I feel as if she’s threaded a needle and tied a knot at the bottom of the strand, ready to make the first stitch. She deserves a certain amount of credit for showing she’s capable of independent reasoning like this.
The Third Person Page 20