‘Here you are, darling, baby rusks,’ she said, shaking the packet at me.
She got back into bed and started feeding me crisps, popping several into her own mouth too.
‘Oh dear, we’re getting a lot of crumbs in the bed,’ I said. ‘Mum will murder us when she comes home.’
‘No, we’ll murder her for leaving us all alone,’ said Bliss.
‘Hey! Bliss, that’s not like you!’
‘I’m not me any more. We’re all getting different.’
‘What, you mean Baxter’s very quiet and gentle and sensible?’ I said.
We both giggled and dabbed our fingers round the packet for the last little crumbs of crisp.
‘We won’t need any breakfast now,’ I said, but when the others woke up and we were all sitting at the kitchen table, Bliss and I ate a mound of toast. I was a bit worried about the bread running out, but I couldn’t help it. I didn’t feel exactly hungry, but there was an empty sick feeling inside me and food helped fill it up.
I was just buttering a third piece of toast when there was a knock on the front door. We all stared at each other.
‘Mum!’ said Pixie.
‘No, it won’t be Mum, silly. Mum’s got a key.’
‘Dad!’ said Baxter.
‘Your dad’s in Scotland, it won’t be him. Anyway, he’s got his own key too. Listen, we won’t answer it, just in case,’ I whispered. ‘Keep quiet, now.’
We sat still, not even munching. There was another knock – and then the letter box rattled.
‘Lily! Lily Green, are you there? It’s me, Sarah,’ she called.
She lived on the next floor up from us, and was in Mr Abbott’s class too.
‘What does she want?’ I decided I’d better go and see if she was going to carry on like that. I didn’t want Old Kath hearing her and shuffling down the balcony to investigate.
I went to the door and opened it a crack, peering round. Yes, it was Sarah in her green checked school dress.
‘Aren’t you up yet?’ she said, squinting at my pyjamas.
‘No, I’ve got a bug. We’ve all got it. Don’t come too near, Sarah.’
‘OK, don’t breathe your germs on me! Anyway, Mr Abbott wants to know if you’re coming on the gallery trip tomorrow. He says to tell you he’s saved a place on the coach.’
‘Oh! But I haven’t paid.’
‘He says you’re not to worry about that. It sounds as if he’s going to pay for you.’
‘Really! Oh, he’s so lovely!’
Sarah wrinkled her nose. ‘Mr Abbott? He’s not lovely, he’s weird.’
‘No, he’s not.’
‘Well, you would say that, because you’re a bit weird too,’ she said.
‘Will you tell him thank you?’
‘Yes, OK. And I’ll say you’re coming?’
I hesitated. I badly wanted to go on the school trip with Mr Abbott. I imagined this gallery lined with famous paintings and Mr Abbott and me walking round it together. Mr Abbott would tell me about each painting and then ask me solemnly if I liked it, acting like he really wanted to know . . .
‘I’ll come if – if I’m better,’ I said.
Pixie scrabbled at my back, squeezing through my legs.
‘Mum?’ she said.
‘What?’ said Sarah. ‘I’m not your mum, dopey!’
‘Pixie’s not very well either,’ I said, picking her up. ‘Come on, darling, we’d better put you back in bed. Bye, Sarah.’
I shut the door on her. Pixie struggled with me.
‘Not bed, not bed, don’t want to go back to bed.’
‘No, I was just pretending. It’s OK, Pixie.’ I let her run back to the kitchen. I stayed in the hall, thinking about lovely Mr Abbott. Could I risk going to school on Wednesday? Could we all go? But they’d wonder where Mum was – they’d certainly ask at the nursery – and Pixie would talk. Was there any way she could stay at home? Bliss could perhaps look after her? No, Bliss was far too little. She could maybe manage Pixie but she’d never be able to control Baxter, he walked all over her. I couldn’t leave them. I couldn’t go to the gallery.
I stamped back to the kitchen, wishing I was an only child. Everything the kids said got on my nerves. I’d planned to take them back to the magic garden in the park but it was a grey, gloomy day, already drizzling, and by the time we’d all got dressed it was really pouring with rain.
‘Well, we’ll just have to stay in instead,’ I said, sighing.
‘I’m going out,’ said Baxter. ‘I don’t mind a bit of rain. I’m going to that park.’
‘No, you’re not. No one goes out when it rains like this. People will notice and think it’s weird.’
‘No one will see me if no one goes out,’ said Baxter triumphantly. ‘I’m going, so there. You can’t stop me.’
‘Stop being such a pain, Baxter.’
‘No, you’re the pain, bossing us about. I’m nearly as big as you and I’m the boy anyway. I should do the bossing. So you can just shut your big mouth, right? I’m going out.’
‘Oh, go out then, see if I care,’ I snapped.
‘Right! Well, I’m going,’ said Baxter.
‘OK. Go!’ I said.
‘Yes, watch me,’ said Baxter, and he marched out. He slammed the front door behind him as hard as he could.
‘Oh, great, Baxter, let Old Kath know too,’ I muttered.
‘Baxter’s naughty,’ said Pixie.
‘Yes, he is,’ I said.
‘He won’t really go to the park, will he?’ said Bliss. ‘He might get lost.’
‘Good,’ I said.
Bliss started nibbling at her fingers.
‘Don’t look so anxious. You’re such a wuss, Bliss. Of course he won’t be going all the way to the park. He might go as far as the den, but I doubt it. He’s probably just lurking on the balcony. He wants us to worry but I’m not worried one little bit. Now, are you girls going to help me wash up?’
I fetched a chair for Pixie and she stood at the sink with Bliss, washing up the dishes. They poured so much washing-up liquid into the bowl that soapsuds came up to their armpits. When they’d done all the dishes I fetched my old Barbie dolls and they gave them a deluxe spa treatment.
I kept listening out for Baxter. Every now and then I thought I heard him and went running to the door, but there was never anyone there. I hung over the balcony, peering along to the playground, but I couldn’t see him there. It was still bucketing down, so if he had any sense whatsoever he’d be huddled up in the den, out of sight.
I waited until the Barbies had had their plunge baths and massage and their hair newly styled, and I’d organized a glamour photo shoot in the studio under the kitchen table. Bliss and Pixie laughed uproariously as I made the Barbies show off their pointy chests and strut about provocatively, but Bliss’s laughter sounded high-pitched and hysterical, and I knew she was near tears.
Baxter was generally pretty mean to his sister, bossing her around and giving her a thump whenever he felt like it, but she acted like she’d lost an arm and a leg whenever they were apart. Maybe it was a twin thing and she simply couldn’t help it. Pixie didn’t seem to be missing Baxter at all.
‘Lily,’ Bliss whispered, as we dressed the Barbies. ‘Lily, do you think Baxter’s all right?’
‘No, Baxter’s all wrong, we all know that,’ I joked. ‘OK, OK, I’ll go and fetch him back. He’ll be hiding in the den. You shouldn’t worry so, Bliss.’
I went to get my coat and tied Mum’s leopard-print scarf over my head.
‘Can we come too?’
‘No, you stay here, Bliss, with Pixie. There’s no point all of us getting soaked. Now, be good girls, won’t you, and don’t answer the door to anyone.’
I went out, along the balcony, creeping past Old Kath’s and down the stairs. I wondered if Baxter might simply be hiding there on the stairwell, but there was no sign of him. I sighed, and trudged across the yard towards the playground.
The rain pelted down
. In a few seconds Mum’s headscarf was flattened against my head and my coat was drenched.
‘You idiot, Baxter,’ I muttered, squinting through the solid sheet of rain.
I went stomping and splashing to the slide and hauled myself up the steps.
‘Baxter, for goodness’ sake,’ I said.
I expected him to leap out at me, but nothing happened. I got to the den at the top and scrambled inside. I peered around in the dark. I even felt the sodden logs. Baxter wasn’t there.
I stood up in a panic, banging my head.
‘Baxter!’
I poked my head out again and looked all round the playground. There were the swings, swaying slightly as the rain beat down on them. There was the muddy little roundabout. There was the pole with the rubber tyre dangling. No Baxter. No Baxter anywhere.
I’d been so certain he’d come here. So where had he gone? Surely he hadn’t really tried to go to the park all by himself ?
I didn’t know what to do. My chest was so tight I couldn’t breathe properly. How was I ever going to find him? I thought of that vast park stretching for miles. And now it would be a sea of mud. I pictured Baxter up to his knees, struggling, screaming for me.
‘I’m coming, Baxter!’ I said, and I started running through the estate. I tried desperately hard to remember which way to go – and if I couldn’t remember, how could Baxter? And what was I going to do about Bliss and Pixie? I couldn’t leave them for hours while I trailed round the whole park. Bliss would get in a panic, convincing herself I wasn’t coming back.
I stood still, dithering, sucking my lips into my face to stop myself crying.
A woman from another block trudged past, shopping bags dangling from her arms as she struggled to keep her umbrella over her head.
‘Nice weather for ducks, eh?’ she said. ‘Well, don’t just stand there, you’re getting soaked. Go and take shelter!’
I suddenly wondered. Where could you keep dry on the estate? On the balconies, the stairs, down in the rubbish shed . . .
I nodded at the woman and ran back to our block of flats, right round the corner. I pushed open the wooden door to the bin area – and there was Baxter, sitting on the filthy floor amid a load of rubbish, flipping through the grubby pages of someone’s girlie magazine.
‘Baxter!’
He jumped when I yelled at him and then grinned.
‘Hey, come and look at this funny magazine – it shows all their rude bits!’
‘Put it down. Come here, you bad, bad boy. Don’t you dare go off like that again!’
‘You told me to go! You said you didn’t care,’ said Baxter.
‘Well, I was bad too. Of course I care. Oh, Baxter, I was so worried about you.’
I grabbed him and hugged his bony little body hard. For just a second he hugged me back, but when I tried to rub my cheek against his bristly head he wriggled and squirmed.
‘Ew! Don’t kiss me!’
‘I’m not kissing you. No fear. Come on, let’s go home. Bliss will be worrying so.’
‘Bliss always worries,’ said Baxter. ‘Especially about me.’
‘Yes, so you should be kinder to your sister. All your sisters,’ I said.
We walked back towards the stairs.
‘You don’t half look funny with that headscarf on,’ said Baxter.
‘Thanks a bunch,’ I said, whipping it off and stuffing it in my pocket.
‘And what have you got your coat on for, it’s summer?’
‘I’m trying to keep dry because my mad brother went out in the pouring rain and I had to go looking for him,’ I said, giving him a shove.
He shoved me back, but he was grinning. We ran up the stairs and knocked at the door. We waited. Nothing happened.
‘Come on, Bliss,’ I muttered, and knocked again.
The door stayed shut. I opened the letter box and peered in. I couldn’t see anyone. The flat was silent.
‘Maybe they went out looking for me too?’ said Baxter.
‘Bliss wouldn’t do that,’ I said, but my chest was tight again. What if she’d got so worried she’d taken Pixie and they’d run out after me? Where were they now? And how were any of us going to get back safe indoors without a front door key?
‘Bliss!’ I yelled through the letter box.
No one came – but I thought I heard whispers.
‘Bliss, are you in there? Come and open the door!’
I listened. More whispering, out of sight. Then I heard Pixie squealing.
‘Pixie? Pixie, you come and answer the door!’
Pixie came running into view, bobbing along the hall. Bliss came rushing after her, trying to pull her back.
‘For heaven’s sake, will one of you silly girls answer the door, we’re soaked to the skin!’ I said.
Bliss crept fearfully along the hall towards me.
‘That’s it. Come on, open it!’
Pixie jumped up before Bliss and managed to wiggle the latch all by herself. She got the door open and Baxter and I shot inside.
‘Thank you! Bliss, what are you playing at?’
Bliss burst into tears.
‘You told me not to answer the door. You did, you did, when you went out. And then you were gone so long, and I didn’t know what to do, and then you came back and knocked and I was scared because I thought you might be a robber or someone bad so I told Pixie we mustn’t mustn’t mustn’t open it.’
‘But I called out to you!’
‘Yes, and it sounded like you, but it could have been a robber pretending to be you, speaking in a girl voice,’ Bliss sobbed.
‘Bliss is being silly, isn’t she?’ said Pixie.
‘Bliss is always silly,’ said Baxter.
‘Oh, Baxter, I thought you’d run away to the park without me,’ said Bliss.
‘I’m not daft, it’s too wet,’ said Baxter.
‘Exactly!’ I said. ‘Come here, let’s get a towel to dry you a bit.’
I rubbed at him fiercely while he wriggled.
‘This towel smells!’ he said.
He was right, all the towels were smelling a bit now. We’d badly needed clean ones even when Mum was here. We were running out of clean T-shirts and pants and socks too. We had a washing machine but it didn’t work any more. Mum had been meaning to go down the Social and beg for a new one but she hated going there so she’d never quite got round to it. She went to the launderette instead, pushing great bags of washing in Pixie’s buggy. I could do that, I knew exactly how to do a wash and then a dry. I’d done it heaps of times with Mum – but we didn’t have any money.
‘I know what we’ll do this morning. We’ll do all the washing at home,’ I said.
I made them collect up all the piles of dirty clothes while I ran the hot tap into the kitchen sink and chucked in lots of washing powder. When the kids saw the bubbles they wanted to do the washing with me, which slowed things down considerably. Pixie insisted on getting in the sink and jumped up and down on the clothes.
‘I’m stamping the dirt out!’ she shouted.
I don’t know about the stamping – she was certainly splashing. The kitchen floor was getting a good wash as well as the clothes. They all lost interest when it came to rinsing and then wringing out the soaking clothes. I had to struggle on by myself, water running up my sleeves right to my armpits.
I didn’t know what to do with the clothes when I’d finished at last. I could hang the light things up on the line in the bathroom that Mum used for her tights and undies but the big drippy towels would break it. In the end I switched on the electric fire, arranged the chairs around it, and hung the towels from their backs.
‘This is very, very, very dangerous,’ I said. ‘You mustn’t go anywhere near or you’ll start a fire.’
I managed to impress this on Baxter and Pixie enough for them to play at the other end of the room. Poor Bliss hid in the bedroom, calling out to us to be careful every two minutes. I turned the towels round every now and then, baking them on ea
ch side – and in an hour they were bone-dry.
‘There!’ I said triumphantly, burying my face in the towels. ‘They smell lovely now, all fresh and flowery.’
‘Let’s play bullfighters with them,’ said Baxter, grabbing a towel and flapping it wildly. ‘Come on, Bliss, you be the bull, and I’ll shove all my sticks in you.’
‘Stop it! not with the fire on!’ I said, switching it off quickly. ‘And not with the fire off either. Stop jabbing at poor Bliss.’
‘She’s not Bliss, she’s the bull. Bellow a bit, Bliss, and put your hands up to look like horns,’ Baxter encouraged her.
‘Maybe I should have left you out in the rain, Baxter,’ I said.
I gave us lunch early, just for something to do – fish fingers and oven chips. I’d hoped it might stop raining by the afternoon, but it poured even harder. We watched television. Well, Bliss, Pixie and I watched television. Baxter acted out everything on the screen, pretending to be an antique expert and a quiz show host and a comedian and Tracy Beaker, repeating everything they said until we were all driven demented.
It actually stopped raining about five o’clock and all three kids clamoured to go out. I was desperate to go too, but I couldn’t help wondering if Mum just might phone again. It would be terrible to miss her twice – and maybe she’d worry if we weren’t around for a second time. So I said we couldn’t go out and Baxter yelled at me and Pixie threw herself on the ground and kicked. Even Bliss pouted and acted fed up with me.
Mum didn’t call, though I sat hunched up beside the phone, willing it to ring. I went from longing to hear from her to hating her for not even bothering to try to talk to us again. I hated Baxter and Bliss and Pixie too, crying and moaning and complaining all the time.
I barricaded myself in Mum’s bedroom with my drawing book and invented a pure white, utterly sound-proof bedroom for myself. It had white walls and white carpet so soft it was like fur. I had white satin sheets and a white silk nightie with white lace. I sat on a white velvet stool in front of the glittering Venetian glass mirror of my dressing table and brushed my hair with an ivory-backed brush, and then I lay down in my soft bed in utter silence. I lived all alone. I had no mother, no brother, no sisters.
Lily Alone Page 9