‘You know Spiderman isn’t real, right? You know that’s an actor? And that no one can actually scale buildings using sticky webs oozing from their fingertips?’
‘Ha ha. Do you want me to help or not?’
‘Yes,’ Phoebe grinned. ‘I want to hear your amazing ideas. Are we also going to get a guy in a cape to fly over us and shoot lasers from his eyes?’
‘No… but you’ll be flying over the road when I kick you up the arse in a minute.’
Phoebe giggled. ‘Sorry, but for someone who takes the piss all the time you’re very easy to wind up.’ Midnight folded her arms and pouted at the road. ‘I actually think that all sounds great, in principle,’ Phoebe continued. ‘I have no idea how we can make any of it real, and we definitely don’t have the budget for real actors – not that I’d know where to find them if we did – but if you can come up with something doable I’ll love you forever and ever.’
‘Till death do us part?’
‘I’ll be haunting you long after I’m gone.’
A slow smile spread over Midnight’s face. ‘But you have to trust me, yeah? You have to let me run with some ideas even if they sound crazy.’
‘Um, I think I’d have to run them by Dixon first. He is my boss, remember? And he’d probably have to run them by Mr Hendry.’
‘And Adam.’
‘And Adam…’
‘Who will totally go for it if you say you think it will work because he loves you.’
Phoebe rolled her eyes.
‘He does!’ Midnight insisted. ‘He has the hots for you. He wants to handcuff you to the Barbie shelves and have his wicked way.’
‘Here we go again! He’s not remotely interested in me. I’m a shop girl and way beneath him.’
‘He’d like you to be beneath him.’
‘Mid –’
‘Anyway, not a shop girl now, a PR executive. And I’m a shop girl, if you don’t mind. There’s nothing low about it.’
‘I’m a promotions assistant. In a shop. So technically I’m a shop girl too. And I didn’t say that there was anything wrong with that. It’s just that Adam Hendry mixes with the great and the good of Millrise. His wife will be a girl whose daddy is a member of the county polo club, is intimately acquainted with the Masonic handshake, and will have known the Hendry family since their days at a select and expensive public school.’
‘Whatever. Anyway, nobody mentioned marriage. I just think he fancies you and that’s a totally different thing.’
‘As a bit of rough? That’s even worse. I’m never going to be anyone’s bit of rough.’
‘I’d be a bit of rough for him.’
‘Be my guest.’ Phoebe pointed towards the road ahead. ‘This looks like our bus.’
Her tone invited no more discussion on the matter. Phoebe didn’t want to talk about it, think about it, or have it penetrate even the outer limits of her subconscious. Part of the reason for this, as her subconscious was trying to tell her, was that she was afraid she really rather liked the idea, and that disturbed her. She loved Jack, didn’t she? So why were thoughts of Adam unsettling her like this?
Half an hour and a bumpy, overheated bus ride later they were outside the newly-expanded and renovated Manchester Museum of Science and Industry. If the name suggested a fusty old building full of crankshafts and Wankel rotary engines attended by myopic middle-aged men dressed in corduroy and tweed, the reality was very different. Walking into the vast foyer of the main building, the first thing they saw was a huge ball of TV screens suspended from the ceiling playing snapshots of the day’s visitors so far. School parties full of wide-eyed, giggling children (primary school) and not so wide-eyed but still giggling children (high school) were everywhere, being yelled at by exasperated teachers who had about as much chance of being heard as a laryngitis stricken gnat during the Proms.
Phoebe had wanted to see how somewhere that seemed so functional and purely educational still managed to wow its guests and make them want to return time and time again. Because if they could do it, then surely Hendry’s, with its added attraction of being a toy store and not a museum, would be onto an irresistible winner. Phoebe didn’t think they needed exhibits, exactly, but she did need to know what fired the imagination of an age group she felt she’d lost touch with.
She and Midnight visited a booth that played musical notes as you broke various beams of light within it by leaping about, a recycling quiz played over a giant dance mat, and a bicycle connected to a skeleton that replicated your movements as you peddled. Midnight seemed to enjoy herself more than the kids as she hollered into infinite wells, cranked up an old Mini attached to a huge crane whilst pretending to be The Hulk and played with a giant, spinning model of Saturn. They settled on a surprisingly good lunch in the museum café before heading back out into Manchester to search for its biggest toy store.
*
Midnight gave a low whistle as they stepped through the massive doors of Hamley’s. ‘OMFG! This place is amazing!’
‘It’s certainly how a toy store should be,’ Phoebe agreed. She glanced towards a pair of burly security guards standing sentry at the entrance. ‘Do you think it’ll look dodgy if I take notes as we walk around?’
‘Nah. I’ll just whip out my phone and take photos if it makes you feel better. They’ll think I’m some toy loving weirdo having an orgasm in here.’
‘You are a toy loving weirdo,’ Phoebe laughed.
‘Thanks. I’ll take that as a compliment,’ Midnight grinned.
The toy store visit was a success. Just as the museum had done, it gave them some fantastic inspiration and before either had even consulted a watch, two hours had passed as they checked out impromptu events, hidden play corners and epic-looking displays linked to all the latest film and TV blockbusters. After a quick discussion about what time they wanted to get home for various evening plans (Midnight: a re-watch of My Neighbour Totoro, which she could already recite line for line, with a group of college friends. Phoebe: Jack, of course, Midnight greeting the revelation with a roll of her eyes) they decided to head back to the station. Another hour filled with animated chat, biscuits and tea, notes and laughter, and they were back in Millrise. A hug goodbye, a bus ride, and Phoebe was home, too wired to stay on her own for long. She showered and changed quickly, desperate to get to Jack’s and tell him about her day. She’d be an hour earlier than she’d said, but he’d be pleased to see her, like he always was, and she could help with Maria’s tea and bath time. Without another thought, she headed out into the mild evening air to catch her bus.
*
There were raised voices when she arrived at Jack’s, clearly audible even from outside. Phoebe’s hand hovered over the doorbell. But then, filled with anxiety, she rooted in her handbag and let herself in with her key.
Jack and Archie were in the kitchen, toe to toe, yelling at each other. It looked as though they were close to blows and Phoebe wondered, with some degree of alarm, whether that would have been the outcome had she not turned up in time. Instead, they both turned at her entrance.
‘Phoebe!’ Jack exclaimed, ‘I wasn’t expecting you this early.’
Archie’s expression was dark with resentment and Jack looked shamefaced through his rage.
‘What’s going on?’ Phoebe asked
‘We’re… it’s something we need to sort out.’ Jack glared at Archie, who simply shoved his hands in his pockets and lowered his eyes. An awkward silence descended.
‘Where’s Maria?’ Phoebe asked after a few moments. She was concerned about such a fracas going on with Maria in earshot but she also needed something to say and nothing else came to mind.
‘She’s still in after school club,’ Jack replied. ‘I had to phone them to keep her a bit longer when this… situation arose.’
Phoebe looked at her watch. ‘Doesn’t it close soon?’
‘Um… yeah…’ Jack looked from Phoebe to Archie and back again, clearly having some sort of internal debate.
‘D’you want me to go and fetch her?’ Phoebe asked. ‘It’s only ten minutes away and it’s a nice evening for a walk.’
Jack looked relieved. ‘That would be great.’ There was another beat of silence. ‘Sorry…’ he added.
‘For what?’
‘Just…’ he sighed. ‘Thanks.’
‘You phone ahead to let them know I’m coming and I’ll get off.’
‘I will… thanks again.’
With one last searching glance, Phoebe headed out to fetch Maria.
Taking long, brisk strides, she turned the situation over in her head. Had Archie sunk to a new low with his gambling problem, or were they just going over old ground again? Archie didn’t usually stay long once it stopped being fun and the lectures started and with a bit of luck, today would be no different. Perhaps, when Phoebe returned with Maria he would already be gone. It wasn’t that Phoebe was callous about the situation, or that she didn’t care. Of course she did. She cared that Jack was worried about his brother and frustrated by it in equal measure. It was a problem without end and until Archie admitted that he had one (which wasn’t about to happen anytime soon as far as anyone could see), they just went round in circles. And Phoebe hated to see Jack get so stressed and upset. It couldn’t be good for Maria either, whose short life had been complicated enough as it was.
When Phoebe arrived at the club, Maria was beside herself with excitement to see her. The reaction that a change in routine elicited in children never ceased to amaze Phoebe and the novelty of someone other than her dad collecting her sent Maria into a frenzy of sentences without end and without breath, rolling into one another like waves onto a beach as she recounted her day. Phoebe listened patiently, nodding and smiling in all the right places but at the back of it, still worrying about their return home and what she might be taking Maria into.
‘Hey… how about we have half an hour in the park before we go home?’ she asked.
Maria gave a squeal of delight.
‘I take it that’s a yes?’ Phoebe smiled.
‘YES, YES, YES!’ Maria cried as she bounced up and down like a deranged frog.
Phoebe hoped it would wear Maria out for an early bedtime and give her and Jack space to talk. Archie had never done anything to upset or offend Phoebe, but something about him made her uncomfortable whenever he was there. Maybe it was the fact that his moral code seemed to be the opposite of everything Jack stood for. Maybe it was that she had already, rather depressingly, reached an age where she no longer understood teenagers, especially nineteen-year-old boys. Maybe it was all the trouble he seemed to bring with him whenever he turned up. Whatever it was, she was happier when he wasn’t around, although that did make her feel guilty. How would she feel if she knew Jack was thinking the same about her brother? Pretty wretched, she supposed, but that didn’t make it any easier to like Archie – at least not all the time. When he was behaving, Archie could be almost as charming and funny as his brother; the problem was he didn’t behave very often, or not to her eyes, anyway.
A quick phone call to Jack, letting him know where they were and that they’d be in late, revealed that Archie was still there. Phoebe let Maria race about for an hour, then took her for a burger and milkshake (which she was certain Jack would not approve of but desperate times called for desperate measures) and then, when she really couldn’t keep her out any longer, began the walk home with a very tired little girl riding piggyback most of the way.
Phoebe was pretty exhausted too, after stomping the streets of Manchester for hours on end and then coming home to more walking. Whatever happened when they arrived back and however early Maria went to bed, all Phoebe wanted was to snuggle down too. She always kept spare things at Jack’s – toothbrush, pyjamas, hairbrush etc – and it might be just as easy to stay over as go home. A lovely evening falling asleep in Jack’s warm arms would be just the ticket. It didn’t sound like she was going to get that for a while, though.
At the house, Phoebe let herself in and slid Maria to the ground. The place was quiet – an unnerving kind of quiet after the scene she’d left earlier. Maria seemed to gain her second wind immediately and raced down the hallway.
‘DADDY, DADDY!’
They found Jack at the kitchen table nursing a coffee. He looked up at their arrival and Maria threw herself into his arms.
‘Did you have a good day, spud?’ he asked.
‘Uh huh. I played and then Phoebe got me strawberry milkshake!’
‘Sorry,’ Phoebe mouthed, but Jack simply gave her a weak smile. He sat Maria on his lap and gave her an absent kiss on the head.
Phoebe sat opposite him. ‘Where’s Archie? Has he gone home now? Did you sort–?’
‘Actually…’ Jack ran a hand down his face, as if somehow trying to iron the tension from his expression. Before he could finish, there was a shout from upstairs.
‘Hey, Jack! Is this the only shower gel you’ve got? It’s a bit poncey for me.’
Phoebe raised her eyebrows.
‘Archie’s staying with us for a couple of days,’ Jack said.
‘Archie!’ Maria shot to attention. ‘Is he going to sleep here?’
‘Yeah, spud. A little holiday with us. What do you think of that?’
‘YAY! Can I see him now? Is he upstairs?’ Maria leapt from Jack’s knee but he held her back from running to find her uncle.
‘He’s having a shower right now. Why don’t you go and watch some telly while you wait for him to finish?’
‘I want to stay in here,’ Maria replied.
‘Just go to the living room for a little while. I need to talk about some grownup stuff with Phoebe.’
‘I don’t care if you kiss her; I’ve seen it.’
‘I know,’ Jack smiled. ‘There will be no kissing, only talking. Promise.’
Maria slouched off without another word. Seconds later they heard the jangling theme tune of her favourite kids’ TV show, of which she had hundreds of episodes on DVD. Usually, Jack gave a look of comical desperation when the music filled the house. But not today.
Phoebe turned to Jack. ‘What happened?’
‘Mum’s kicked him out. It’ll blow over in a couple of days, I’m sure, but he’s got nowhere to go in the meantime.’
‘Your mum’s done that? Does she know about the gambling?’
‘I don’t think so, not yet. But she’ll find out now.’
‘Bloody hell,’ Phoebe said in a small voice. ‘Are you going to tell her?’
‘I might have to. Someone’s got to talk some sense into her and she needs to know.’
‘Do you think she’ll let him go back?’
‘He’d have to do some pretty impressive grovelling first. And she needs time to calm down.’
‘What about your dad? He’d stick up for Archie, wouldn’t he?’
‘I expect he’s tried, but even he doesn’t have enough influence with mum to diffuse one of her moods once she takes the hump about something. He’ll be working on it, I’m sure, and I’ll have to talk to him when I can get him alone to find out how far he’s got. That’s why I thought Archie should stay here just for a while, where I can keep an eye on him until it’s sorted. You don’t mind, do you?’
‘How could I mind? He’s your brother and you need to look out for him.’ Phoebe did mind, of course. Archie being around threw out the delicate balance of her blossoming relationship with Jack. It made him tense and irritable. It meant she couldn’t relax in Jack’s home – what she had come to think of as home herself. But family was family and it was only for a couple of days. How could she kick up a fuss about that? She knew she’d do the same for her brother. She reached across the table and gave Jack’s hand a squeeze. ‘Are you very upset about it all?’
He gave a long sigh. ‘I’m tired of it all. I wish he’d sort himself out,’ he replied in a low voice. ‘He can’t go through life like this; he’ll end up with nothing and nobody.’
‘He’s young. There’re plenty more years for
him to put right any daft mistakes he makes now.’ She paused, uncertain whether her next question would overstep the mark. ‘What did he do? To upset your mum, I mean.’ Having met Carol, Phoebe didn’t imagine it would take much. But Archie was her son. Surely she’d be a little more tolerant in his case? To throw him out was a big thing.
‘He won’t tell me, exactly,’ Jack replied. ‘He says he borrowed something and when she found out she went mental. He says she overreacted. I’ll have to find out what happened when I speak to Mum and Dad later.’
‘Do you think your dad will be able to talk her round? I mean, she always seems very unforgiving to me.’ Phoebe gave an apologetic smile. ‘Or perhaps that’s just because it is me.’
‘I honestly don’t know. I’ve told Archie to be prepared for the possibility that he’ll have to find a flat. To be fair, I don’t necessarily think it’s a bad thing. There’s nothing like a bit of independence to make someone grow up fast. It could be the best thing that’s ever happened to him.’
‘I’m glad you’re still being positive about it,’ Phoebe replied in an encouraging tone. But she wished she could agree with him. Her version of his independence was Archie gambling away his rent every month and coming to Jack for more. But she didn’t think now was the moment to articulate it. Perhaps there would never be a right time to speak such a painful truth.
‘I can’t do much else. I’ve told him he’ll have to put college on hold, or at least get some kind of job that fits in with his studies, especially if he’s going it alone. He’s a bugger for not speaking to his lecturers about things that are hindering his studies and he’s in enough trouble there as it is, so I’ve told him he needs to go and see them, at least see the student counsellor and talk through his options with someone who knows what they are. Whether he will or not is a different matter. I don’t want to treat him like a ten-year-old and drag him along to the right office myself, but I might have to if he doesn’t go and do it. Otherwise, he may lose his place on the course. He probably doesn’t care that much to be honest, I’m not sure he’s all that keen on it anyway. But I’m worried if he does he’ll lose the one thing that grounds him and go completely off the rails.’
Mishaps in Millrise: Parts 1-4 in one book – plus a little extra… Page 15