Jemima Small Versus the Universe

by Tamsin Winter

  After Miki’s mum dropped me off, I went upstairs, dumped my Brainiacs revision cards on my desk and knocked on Jasper’s door. The door opened a tiny bit. I could just make out an eyeball through the crack. A fake one.

  “What do you want?”

  “I need to talk to you about something,” I said.

  “Okay, hurry up.” Jasper opened the door and quickly closed it behind me.

  I hadn’t been in Jasper’s room for ages. It still smelled weird. The poster of Grandad as the Amazing Apollo still covered the back wall. It said, The Amazing Apollo’s Magic and Wonder Show! The corners were starting to curl and one of the sides had a rip in it. Jasper’s room was usually eerily tidy; it was one of the ways he showed off to Dad. But tonight, boxes were scattered all over the carpet. He picked up one labelled DISAPPEARING TRICKS and took the lid off.

  “It’s such a mess! What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Just looking for something,” he said, spinning the fake eyeball on his palm.

  “Gross. What have you lost?”

  His real eyeballs shifted nervously towards his tarantula’s tank. The empty tank.

  “JASPER!”

  “Shh! Dad will hear you!” He pulled a plastic tray out from under his bed where he kept all his magic stuff. It was organized into boxes and each one had been specially labelled. He printed them out last year from Dad’s computer. He’d also printed out a label that said FAT and stuck it on my desk. It was one of the few times he’s ever been in proper trouble.

  Jasper lined up the boxes next to his bed. DEFYING GRAVITY, ILLUSIONS, LEVITATION, MIND POWER, SIXTH SENSE CUBE. It took me about five seconds to realize he was putting them in alphabetical order.

  “This was the trick I was supposed to do with her the other day.” He held up the DISAPPEARING TRICKS box. “Before Dad totally overreacted. I’m pretty sure I put her back in the tank.”

  “Wait a minute. Are you saying she’s been missing since you did that ball of flames trick?”

  Jasper gulped.

  “Jasper! That was four days ago!”

  “Shh! I’ve been looking for her! But she’s gone.” He opened and closed the DISAPPEARING TRICKS box a few times, like she might magically appear out of nowhere.

  “I don’t think she would hide in there, Jasper. She can’t actually read.”

  He sat on the floor looking through the boxes. “I just don’t get where she can be.”

  “She’d go somewhere dark. And warm.” I opened his wardrobe doors. “Maybe she’s escaped because she’s sick of doing your boring magic.”

  But Jasper didn’t say anything back, so then I felt bad. I peered inside his wardrobe. Maybe there was some kind of porthole in our house which family members disappeared through. Like the one that led to Narnia. It definitely wasn’t inside Jasper’s wardrobe though. That was just made of wood. I’d already checked years ago.

  “She’s got to be in here somewhere,” Jasper said. He tapped the torch on his phone and crawled under his bed.

  “I’m sure she’ll come back when she’s hungry.” I typed into Google. “Uh oh. It says here they can survive without food for two years.”

  Jasper wriggled out from under the bed. “Maybe I could tempt her out with crickets.”

  “Gross, Jasper. You have to tell Dad.”

  “No way! He’s petrified of her. If he finds out she’s missing he’ll call pest control or something.” He looked at me with eyes exactly the same silvery-blue as Luna’s. “If you tell him, I’ll kill you, Jemima.”

  “Hmm,” I said. “I wonder what pest control would do. Probably some kind of thermal fogging.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Think Ghostbusters, but instead of the proton stream, it would be insecticide.”

  “That’s horrible!”

  “Yeah, well, death threats aren’t exactly very nice either.”

  “Sorry,” Jasper said, wincing like apologizing to me was physically painful.

  “Have you checked everywhere?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Apart from Dad’s room. We’re not allowed in there.”

  I sighed. “Jasper, I don’t think Tornado’s aware of that rule.” I headed towards the door. “I’ll keep Dad talking downstairs. You go and search it.”

  Jasper smiled at me. “Thanks. Hey, what did you want to talk to me about?”

  “Oh, just…” I felt nervous for some reason. Probably because we hadn’t talked about Mum for so long. We used to talk about her a lot when we were younger. What we’d do if she phoned, or sent us a card, or turned up one day. But when none of those things happened, talking about them seemed kind of irrelevant too. “I was thinking about Mum today. Like, say I did get through to be on Brainiacs, what if she watched it?”

  Jasper’s eyes moved around his room, looking everywhere except at mine. “I dunno.” He went over to his desk. “Here. I found some old photos last night when I was looking for Tornado. This was under my desk.” He handed me a photo of me and Mum splashing on the shore in Dolphin Bay. I only looked about two. Mum was holding both my hands so I didn’t topple over.

  “See that tattoo?” Jasper pointed to Mum’s wrist. I looked closer and could just make out a black swirl. “It reminded me of this thing she told me. It’s kind of stupid but…”

  “What?” A lump came into my throat. I looked at Mum on the beach, gripping my hands tightly, my feet half-disappearing into the sand, wondering how it would feel to see her again.

  “It’s really stupid,” Jasper said. “So you’ll probably like it.”

  I fake-smiled.

  “We’d stayed on the pier really late, and it was pitch black when we walked home. Mum pointed up at the sky and told me…” He stopped, cracked his knuckles and picked up a pack of cards from his desk. He shuffled them perfectly, in one hand, like Grandad used to do. “Forget it. It’s really stupid.”

  “Please, Jasper. I won’t think it’s stupid.”

  “She said shooting stars are the universe telling us that magic exists. And she told me to never stop believing in magic.” He blinked a few times. “See? I told you. It’s like something Luna would say. I only remembered because that’s her tattoo. A shooting star. And because that’s the night she had that massive argument with Dad. Then she left.”

  I stood by the door for a minute. Neither of us said anything. I didn’t tell him about the empty feeling I got in my heart whenever I thought about her. Because I knew he had it too. He’d told me that years ago.

  “Anyway, forget it,” Jasper said eventually. “Shooting stars don’t even exist.”

  I nodded. Jasper was right. Shooting stars aren’t real. They’re not even real stars. They’re meteors. Fragments of rock burning up in space. Not shooting anywhere, just incinerating into dust. But sometimes, your heart doesn’t care about any of that. Because there were Mum’s hands gripping mine. Stopping me from sinking. Protecting me from the waves. And I wanted that feeling back.

  I went downstairs to keep Dad talking so Jasper could check his room, but he was already on the phone. He was laughing and looking at his iPad. He called that “double screen time” and moaned any time I did it. I raised my eyebrows at him and he walked to the other side of the kitchen so I couldn’t hear what he was saying.

  I sat halfway up the stairs, leaning against the banister with Hermione on my lap, thinking about Mum. And Brainiacs. Part of me wanted Mum to notice me. I didn’t even care about impressing her. I just wanted to wave at her from across the universe so she might remember I exist.

  That night, I stayed up really late revising for the Selection Day. Because I couldn’t stop thinking that maybe Mum was out there. Waiting. With a gigantic hole in her heart like mine. If Mum believed in shooting stars and signs from the universe, maybe she’d been waiting for a message to come back. Seeing me on Brainiacs could be that message.

  And I had exactly sixteen days to make it happen.

  By the next night, I’d learned so many facts I felt like my
brain might burst, so I dumped my revision stuff on the floor and picked up Sweet magazine. I tore open the plastic wrapping and the free gifts dropped onto my lap. A fluffy key ring, peach lip balm, cat nail stickers, and a mini set of Electric Energy Hair Chalks. I turned an illuminous pink pot over. Washes out instantly. I unscrewed the lid and pulled a strand from the back of my hair, underneath, where Dad wouldn’t notice. I pulled it through the chalk a few times and smiled as my hair turned from sludgy sand to electric pink. I stuck a few cat faces on my fingernails and peeled them off again, then flicked through the magazine.

  Every girl smiling out at me was thin. Even the ones on the Meet our Readers! page. Maybe you were supposed to look like a model just to read this magazine. As I turned the pages, it was like watching a conveyor belt of perfection. Each body a million times better than my own. I wondered what I’d look like if I was model-thin. I didn’t think about stuff like that when I was reading Go Science! magazine. When I was reading that all I thought about was how much trouble I’d get in for doing their “dastardly experiments” at home. Then I had an idea.

  I rummaged through my desk for an old photo of me, cut out my face and stuck it on some paper. Then I scoured Sweet magazine for the best bits. I cut out the torso from a girl advertising perfume, arms from a girl band member, legs from a vlogger and feet from This Week’s Trend Crush. It was like dissecting the anatomy of the perfect girl. A girl everyone would want to see on TV. I picked up my glue and started sticking.

  I’d almost finished when I heard Dad’s footsteps on the stairs. I quickly stuck down the left arm as Dad opened the door without even knocking. It’s an invasion of privacy. Not illegal according to the United Nations, which just shows you how much they know.

  “You’re not still revising are you, Jem? I know it’s important to you, but seriously! It’s a school night. It’s nearly ten o’clock!”

  I rolled my eyes.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing.” I tried to hide my picture, but the glue hadn’t dried and it got stuck to my forearm.

  Dad peeled it off and looked at my creation. Me as the perfect girl. Only I didn’t look very perfect. My arms were thin and misshapen because I’d used too much glue, and they jutted out at unnatural angles. My feet looked about twenty sizes too big for the skinny legs and one of the ankles looked fractured. It was terrifying. I looked worse than the people on Plastic Surgery Disasters. The only normal part of it was my head. Although I looked bald because I hadn’t stuck Ariana Grande’s hair on yet.

  “Is this…homework?” Dad asked. “Or a science experiment gone wrong? Because, I’m sorry, Jemima, but…you look like Frankenstein’s monster!”

  He burst out laughing as we both took in the freakish mishmash of skinny limbs under my face. It did look like something Frankenstein would create. And I knew that ended badly. I’d read it at primary school.

  Dad made the arms twitch, shouting, “SHE’S ALIVE! SHE’S ALIVE!”

  In three seconds flat, Jasper burst into my room. “She’s alive?”

  “My mini-me,” I said, holding it up. “Dad was pretending to be Frankenstein. Although Frankenstein doesn’t even say that in the book. His exact words are—”

  “Yes, thank you, brainbox.” Dad narrowed his eyes at Jasper. “Who did you think I meant was alive?”

  Jasper squirmed. “No one! I was just checking Jemima was okay, you know. She did yoga yesterday.” He fist-bumped my shoulder. “Always here for you, sis.”

  I pushed him off.

  “Yoga?” Dad said. “That’s great, Jemima! Now, get some sleep. Hopefully your creation won’t give us all nightmares. Come on, Jasper, leave your sister to get ready for bed. Future Brainiacs need their beauty sleep. As do future YouTubers.”

  Jasper mouthed “Thanks” as he closed the door.

  I looked down at the picture in my hand. In my head, she was the girl I wanted to look like. But in reality, she looked a million times worse than I did already.

  The backs of my legs still ached from yoga yesterday as I stood up and walked over to the mirror. I looked at my body, supporting my head like it’s supposed to. I was two weeks away from the Brainiacs Selection Day, and thousands of light years from looking anything like the girls in Sweet magazine. But looking down at my desk, filled with severed limbs and decapitated heads and half-screwed-up smiles, that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.

  The next day, I got to school just as Lottie and Alina were walking through the gates. Jasper headed to his form class and I waited for Miki on one of the concrete benches, watching the wind blow leaves into little eddies. I noticed Lottie looking over. She said something to Alina, but I couldn’t hear because of the wind.

  “Jemima!” Lottie called, waving me over. “Come here!”

  I slowly got up off the bench and walked over to where they were standing.

  “What’s that in your hair?” Lottie screwed up her nose.

  At first, I thought she was attempting a joke. When we first started in Year Seven, she asked what was on my face, then said, “Oh, nothing! Sorry, you’re just ugly.” I didn’t laugh so she said, “It was just a joke, Jemima!” If they asked Lottie for the definition of “joke” at the Brainiacs Selection Day, she’d be in serious trouble.

  “There’s something in your hair! Something pink. Look.” Lottie pulled a strand of my hair from the back and I caught a glimpse of electric pink. The hair chalk. I’d forgotten to wash it out.

  “Oh, it’s hair chalk,” I said. “I got it with a magazine.”

  “It’s nice,” Alina said, tugging on Lottie’s arm. “Let’s go.”

  But Lottie didn’t move. “It is nice,” she said. But this look flashed in her eyes. I’d seen it loads of times before. She grabbed my hair again. “When I first saw it, I thought you might be turning into a pig!” She snorted. “A. Big. Fat. Pig.”

  I pulled my hair out of her hand and stepped back. Then I noticed Brandon was walking right towards us.

  “Don’t worry, Jemima.” Lottie laughed. “Looks aren’t everything.”

  “L-Lottie…” Alina stuttered as Brandon’s face appeared in between theirs. He coughed, and stood there for a moment, arms folded, staring at them. He’d had his hair shaved at the sides.

  Lottie gulped. Everyone at school knew Brandon Taylor. He was someone you avoided. At all costs. He got suspended last year for sellotaping two Year Eights together.

  “I don’t like what I just saw,” Brandon said to Lottie. “It didn’t look very nice.” He leaned his face towards hers. “You better leave my friend Jemima alone.”

  “S-sorry!” Lottie spluttered at approximately the speed of light. “Sorry, Jemima! I didn’t mean it!” She grabbed Alina’s arm and scuttled away like a dung beetle. Only with honey blonde hair. And not able to pull over a thousand times her body weight.

  “Thanks, Brandon,” I said.

  Brandon shrugged. “Fat Club code, innit?” Then he disappeared into the crowd.

  It took Lottie a few days to even look at me after that. She didn’t say anything in form when Mr Nelson reminded us that the camping trip was in less than three weeks. Like anyone could forget that impending doom. But that wasn’t the only thing that changed. On Friday, the day before we broke up for half-term, I passed Dylan Taylor in the corridor on the way to Gina’s class. And it was the first time (since approximately Year Two) that he didn’t say anything to me. Having Brandon as a friend was an unexpected perk of Fat Club. A bit like Percy Spencer developing radar transmitters during World War II and accidentally inventing the microwave.

  On Friday, we were doing Gina’s class in one of the cookery classrooms for a change and when I got there, Heidi, Harry, Nate and Maya were already waiting outside.

  “I don’t get how we’re supposed to lose weight if she keeps feeding us,” Maya said. Some boys walked past and she squeezed against the wall like she was trying to disappear into it. “Ms Newton said we’re doing mixed sports after half-term.” May
a rested her head on the wall. “Maybe I can get my mum to write a note.”

  “PE’s the worst,” Harry said. “Actually, getting changed for PE is the worst.”

  We all nodded. There were only two cubicles in the girls’ changing rooms, so any time we had PE, I raced to get in the changing rooms first. The teachers stay in the office while you get changed, so anyone can say anything to you. But at least there were cubicles in the girls’. Miki said there were none in the boys’.

  “They call me Tiny,” Harry said, half-laughing. “As a joke.”

  “Yeah, but it’s not funny, Harry!” Heidi said. “I keep telling him to go to Mrs Savage about it. Show them.”

  Harry shook his head.

  “Just show them, Harry.”

  “It’s not a big deal,” Harry said. “Just banter.”

  Heidi stared at him.

  He sighed and took off his blazer. “It looks worse than it is.” He undid a few of his shirt buttons and pulled it down over his shoulder. The top part of his arm was covered in bruises.

  “Oh my God!” I blurted out. “Sorry, Harry. It just looks…bad.”

  Some of the bruises were brand-new, but some were old and had gone kind of yellowy. It’s called bilirubin. It’s what’s left over after your body has collected all the iron from the bruise. Who knows how many had disappeared completely.

  “Woah, Roberts! Who hit you?” Brandon said, coming round the corner.

  “It’s nothing,” Harry said. “Just this thing my mates do.”

  Brandon looked confused. “I’d crush them with one punch, mate!”

  Nate said, “Yeah, mates don’t do that, Harry.”

  “That’s what I’ve been saying,” Heidi said. “Friends don’t give you bruises. You’ve got to tell Mrs Savage or Ms Fraser. We have to go camping with them after half-term!”