by HC Michaels
And if that moment meant standing naked in front of the mirror laughing at how hideous she’d become, then to hell with it, she was having a great day.
“Come on, Clara,” said a voice behind her. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”
In the mirror, she saw a nurse standing behind her.
“I’m not crazy,” she said, uncertain as to why she felt the need to defend herself.
“Of course, not,” the nurse said. “You’re a ballerina.”
Clara frowned, noticing a flash of colour near the door of her room.
It was the boy again. Some people really didn’t know how to take a hint.
9 Days Before The Break
Amber hadn’t realised it was possible for builders to build so fast. It made her wonder how much extra her father had paid them. Her new shedroom had been made ready for her in record time.
Even Jeff had moved quickly to help the project along and he hadn’t moved quickly on anything in his life—except marrying her mother and producing three children. Which wasn’t so bad she supposed.
She didn’t have a problem with Sammy, James or Rory, except for the fact they were her mother’s children. They’d make very nice next-door neighbours or cousins. But siblings ... she wasn’t too sure about that.
She remembered how nice it was when she was her mother’s only child. She felt special and important, not having to fight for attention or space in her heart. She’d occupied all her heart’s spaces in those days. Now it was divided into five. One piece for each of her children and another for Jeff. Sometimes Jeff’s piece seemed to be the biggest, which was annoying. It wasn’t as gross as watching her father with Skye (at least they were the same age), but still it wasn’t great.
Jeff followed her mother about with his tongue hanging out like some kind of demented puppy dog. Weirdly, her mother didn’t seem to mind. She actually seemed to enjoy it.
Thankfully, none of her siblings looked like their mother. Rory had her voluminous black hair, but his skin was fair like his father’s. James had her dark skin, but somehow his eyes had turned out blue. And Samantha hadn’t seemed to inherit any of her mother’s traits. She looked more like a miniature female version of Jeff. Maybe even a tiny bit like Skye, which was quite funny.
Being the only one to resemble her mother connected them in a way the others weren’t.
She decided her powerful father’s sperm must be weak. It hadn’t seemed to have had any impact on her appearance whatsoever. That must bug a man like him. Not that she’d dare ask him about it. It was kind of ironic that meek and mild Jeff was the one with the super sperm.
Eeew! Gross. The thought of Jeff’s sperm made her gag.
She spat out her chewing gum and sprawled out on her new bed, desperate to think about something else.
She looked around her cool new pad. It was okay, she supposed. She could never admit that to anyone, of course. Jeff had a new, smaller shed on the other side of the yard. This older, larger shed was unrecognisable from what it’d been before. The outside had been lined with weatherboards and painted in a sunny primrose colour, with pots of flowers sitting on the porch. She’d requested it be painted purple but had been forced to compromise when her mother said she couldn’t stand to look at anything so gaudy while she washed her dishes. So, they painted the front door purple instead. The old tiles had been pulled off the roof and replaced with shiny new tin panels. She loved the sound when it rained. The inside had been insulated, then lined with plaster, and a bamboo floor floated on the old concrete slab. Internal walls had been put up to divide the space into a bedroom, bathroom and living room with a small kitchenette off to one side.
It was a lot bigger than she’d expected it to be.
Her father had sent Skye’s interior designer around and together they’d filled the space with colour and warmth. Clearly, this was a much more interesting job for the designer than decorating Skye’s washed-out house must have been.
She supposed it was nice of Jeff to let the builders come in and make so many changes, all for her. He was a nice stepfather, really. She’d never given him much of her time, figuring she already had a father. Maybe things would be different now. She’d make more of an effort with him.
The whole family had to help sift through Jeff’s father’s hoarded rubbish that had been carefully carried from the shed and placed in piles in the backyard. She’d watched Jeff with wry amusement picking through the junk, marvelling over each piece of trash as it sparked some precious childhood memory.
Her contribution with the clean-up had been minimal. She’d shuffled a few boxes around from pile to pile to make it look like she was doing something but had given up the pretence when she’d kicked at a carton and four smaller boxes tumbled out almost breaking her toes. She’d left the rest of her family to it.
The whole building project had taken less than a month and the result was kind of breathtaking. She wasn’t so sure anymore that she wanted to return home to her father when Skye was better.
Sammy had already asked if she could move in with her and their mother had to steer her away from that idea, telling her she could have it one day when Amber was a grown up and moved away.
Obviously, this was something Sammy was now counting down the days for. Amber promised her she could have the occasional sleepover in the meantime. This had lit her little sister’s face with joy.
“No boys allowed, though,” Sammy had whispered to her.
“Definitely not,” said Amber. As much as she loved James and Rory, they’d destroy this place in about three minutes flat with their wrestling matches and inability to sit still. Rory would drop crumbs everywhere and James would pick up every item she owned and ask her a thousand questions about where it came from.
She smiled at the thought. Maybe the boys could visit occasionally.
Then she reminded herself how upset she was about being evicted from her home by Skye. She was going to have to get up at the crack of dawn to get to school in time from now on. And none of her friends would ever visit her all the way out here in Burwood. Not that they’d visited her much in Malvern either.
She crossed her arms and sat up on the edge of the bed, cursing the day her father had choked on his muesli. If only it was some other woman he’d fallen in love with.
Sammy was mad. No, she was madder than mad. There was another word to describe it. She chewed on her bottom lip as she tried to think what it was. It started with F. Not the rude F word (ten year olds weren’t allowed to use that word). Another F word. The one that meant really, really mad.
Her big sister, Amber, had moved in. That wasn’t the bit that made her mad. She loved her big sister. It was nice to have another girl in the family. One that didn’t burp and fart all the time like James and Rory.
It was just that Amber got the new bedroom in the backyard and it wasn’t fair. She’d lived here her entire life and Amber had lived here for only a little while years and years ago. If anyone should get the good bedroom it should be her. Or she should at least be able to share it with her—it might be a bit scary to be out there at night all on her own.
It was so pretty and yellow and shiny and new. Her bedroom had cracks in the wall, a cordial stain on the carpet and sometimes when you opened the window it got stuck and wouldn’t close properly again.
Her mum bought her a new bedspread, like that was going to make her feel any better. It was just a bedspread. Amber was getting a whole new room. And it had its own living room. It even had a kitchen!
She picked a blade of grass from the back lawn where she was sitting watching the painters finish the final coat on the weatherboards.
It looked so good she wanted to die. It made her furious.
Furious! That was the word she wanted.
She was FURIOUS.
Amber had said she could have sleepovers. She didn’t say James and Rory could. Just her. Maybe she could start off doing that once or twice a week, then build up until she lived there permanently. If
she did it slowly enough maybe Amber wouldn’t notice before it was too late and she had all her stuff in there.
She pulled more grass from the lawn, shredding each blade down the middle with her fingernail.
Amber would notice if she moved in. She was practically a grown-up and grown-ups noticed everything.
Amber’s dad must have a lot of money to pay for all of this. She heard her mother telling her friend once that he was loaded. She’d never heard that expression before and had to google it to find out what it meant. It was hard to figure out. The first definition she read said it meant he was drunk.
She knew about drunk. Sometimes her mother got drunk when they went out for dinner and she had too much wine. She’d sit at the table giggling and rubbing her father on the leg and he’d say, ‘You’re drunk, Tamarin!’ Then they’d both laugh like he’d told some kind of joke.
So, she’d decided loaded must mean he carried around a lot of things, but that didn’t sound right either.
The few times she’d seen Amber’s father he hadn’t been giggling or carrying any big bags on his back. He hadn’t even been smiling. He’d sat in his fancy car outside their house frowning like the sight of it scared him or something. Once, she gathered her courage and stuck her tongue out at him from her bedroom window. He didn’t notice. Unfortunately, her father had been standing in the doorway and he noticed. She hadn’t been allowed to use the Playstation for a week.
Her dad could be strict like that, but she’d still rather have him than Amber’s dad. At least her dad was soft and friendly and smiled more than he frowned. Amber’s dad seemed more like a movie star than a father. She wondered what Amber talked to him about.
Eventually she asked James what loaded meant. He was always reading books, so he knew a lot of things like that. He told her it meant he was rich. She wondered if that meant Amber was rich.
“You all right, Princess?” asked her father, taking a seat next to her on the lawn and draping one of his arms around her shoulder.
She shrugged. “Yeah.”
“Looks good, doesn’t it?” He nodded towards Amber’s new room.
“Yeah.”
“Do you like the yellow?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re chatty today.” He laughed, squeezing her that little bit tighter.
“It’s not fair, Dad. Why does Amber get the good bedroom?” She shoved her father’s arm from her shoulder and turned to face him.
He sighed. “She’s older than you, darling.”
“But she’s not even your real daughter,” she protested.
“Don’t say that.” He pulled the face he always used when she was in trouble, which sucked because she was only telling the truth.
“But it’s true,” she wailed.
He reached for her again and she shifted away a little, not ready to give into him just yet. “Well, if you want to look at it that way, her real father is paying for it.”
“Is Amber rich?” At last, her chance to ask the question.
“Where did that come from?” He looked genuinely shocked.
She shrugged. “I just wondered. So, is she?”
This time he shrugged. “I suppose so.”
“Are we rich?” she asked.
He put his finger under her chin and tilted her face upwards. “If you ask me, I’m the richest man in the world.”
“You mean you’re loaded?” she asked, testing out the word.
“Yep, loaded with love.”
She shuffled back across to him, deciding things weren’t so bad after all.
8 Days Before The Break
Skye hated visiting her mother in the lounge with all the other residents. It was so depressing.
“Hi, Mum,” she said, reluctantly taking the vacant seat beside her.
Her mother’s eyes lit up, not at the sight of her daughter, but at the brownies she held in her hand.
Skye wanted to tell her how much she’d have liked her mother to have made her desserts when she was a child instead of the constant supply of celery sticks she set down in front of her.
“It’s the only food that’s calorie-negative,” her mother used to say. “You burn more calories digesting celery than you gain by consuming it.”
Whether or not that was true, it still didn’t make it taste any good. Not to a child anyway. These days, Skye added plenty of them to her green smoothies in the morning, but you could hardly taste them underneath the parsley and mint.
“Would you like a brownie, Mum?” she asked.
Her mother nodded as eagerly as if she were a young girl.
“Then let’s go to your room.” Skye stood and took her mother’s hand. “That way you don’t have to share.”
She saw the shoulders of the woman next to her slump. There weren’t enough on this plate. Despite being a less than exemplary mother, Skye still didn’t think she should miss out on the few pleasures she had left in life.
She watched her mother as they walked to her room at the end of the hall, reminding herself she wasn’t actually old, despite the way she shuffled her feet. Her disease had aged her body and regressed her mind, sending them running in opposite directions like two poles of a magnet. She was like a toddler in an elderly person’s body when in truth both her body and her mind were somewhere in between.
“I don’t like your hat,” said her mother, sitting in the only chair, leaving Skye to perch on the edge of the bed.
Skye’s hand flew to her head and skipped across the band of her turban. There were women all over London wearing these to accessorise their full heads of hair and nobody was telling them they didn’t like it. Her mother really had lost touch with the world of fashion. She had a half wig on underneath the turban to give the appearance of having hair. She couldn’t exactly remove the turban, or she’d look like Friar Bloody Tuck.
“How are you, Mum?” She spoke more to the clock behind her mother’s head than to her directly, not wanting to see her eat the brownies.
Her mother grunted in response and Skye was glad Theo wasn’t here to see her behaving like a farm animal. It was no wonder he only ever visited once, just after they got engaged. She hadn’t wanted him to visit at all, preferring to hide her mother away. She’d heard men studied their girlfriend’s mother as an indication of how they’d look in the future. She didn’t want him thinking she’d be like that. Besides, Theo wasn’t all that much younger than her mother. She’d thought he might feel strange about meeting her.
But he’d been very persistent, insisting family was important. He wanted to meet her mother just as he wished she could’ve met his. She’d relented, taking him with her on one of her regular visits, wishing she had a father she could’ve introduced him to instead.
He’d turned up with a bunch of flowers and a smile. He left with the same bunch of rejected flowers and a look of sheer horror.
He’d upset her mother so much that they decided it was best for everyone if he stayed away. Instead, he paid for her to be moved to a facility especially set up to care for people with dementia. It was expensive, yet money well spent according to Theo who freely admitted it eased his guilt about his lack of a relationship with his mother-in-law.
She watched her mother put down the brownies and shake out her hands.
“What’s wrong with your hands?” asked Skye.
“Numb. Always numb.” She picked up the brownies and resumed eating.
“Maybe you’re sitting too much,” Skye suggested. “You really should make an effort to move around a little more.”
Her mother looked at her like she’d suggested she travel to the moon.
“My hair’s falling out,” said her mother, wiping chocolate from her lips with the back of her hand.
Skye drew in a sharp breath. Of all the ailments for her mother to invent, it had to be that one. Her feet were no longer covered in glue, this time her hair was falling out. She felt like removing her turban and showing her mother what it really looked like when your hair f
ell out.
Her mother tugged at her hair. A large chunk came free and she waved it in front of her in her fist.
“Oh my god.” Skye leapt to her feet and took the hair from her. Her hair really was falling out.
Her mother reached for her head again.
“Stop pulling at your hair! You’re making it worse. Don’t touch it.” She was going to need to talk to the nurse about this. What the hell was happening?
“The doctor is doing tests on me.” Her mum smiled proudly.
“What tests?” Skye frowned. “He’s testing your hair?”
“No, silly.” She laughed. “He took my blood to see why my hair’s falling out.”
“Right.” Why hadn’t Skye received a call about any tests? She was supposed to be informed about things like this.
“I used to be a ballerina.” Her mother rounded her arms and lifted them above and slightly forward of her head into what Skye recognised as fifth position.
“I’m going to go and find a nurse to speak to.” Skye took a step towards the door. “Finish up your brownies, Mum.”
“I’m not your mum.”
“Okay then, Clara.” She sighed. “Eat your brownies. I’ll be back in a moment.”
“My name is Clara.” Her mother let her arms fall and picked up another brownie.
“I know. That’s why I called you that.”
“I was a ballerina,” she said with her mouth full.
“You still are.” Skye smiled to hide her concern. She always would be a ballerina to Skye. Not this mad woman who sat before her. Her mother—her formerly sane mother—wouldn’t want to live like this. She’d be mortified if she could see herself.
She handed her the latest ballet magazine, squeezed her hand. She’d talk to the nurse and head home. Her mother didn’t seem to care today if she visited or not. She had her brownies and her magazine. She was happy, even if her hair was falling out.
Skye knocked on the door of the nurses’ station.
“Have you got a moment?” she asked.