by Jo Cotterill
Two centuries ago the first Pearl was named by her five times great-grandfather when he had come from a sunny place called The Carrib to a settlement in the North of England. It felt good knowing that she was a part of a chain of women linked by a name.
She could not wait to find out about Tomos’s past. When he returned she would brew up some of her mother’s special green tea for him. He loved tea and the drink would loosen his tongue. He had already told her in confidence that his uncle was one of The Top Officials and that was why he was allowed to travel.
She breathed deeply and conjured up the delicate tang of the tea in her nostrils. She would use one of the precious china bowls to serve it to him. The green liquid would match the colour of his eyes. He would smile at her and say, “You make beautiful tea and you are so brave and strong to manage everything by yourself,” as he threw a scented log on the fire and they would naturally lean in together to soak up the warmth…
All of a sudden the blanket was pulled from her face.
“PEARL, PLEASE!” Her mother’s breath on her cheek stung and left an icy film as if it had been hit by a miniature snow blower. She sat down on the bed so hard that it made the metal frame creak. “If I’m going to reach grandmother’s bunker before the light fades, I have to leave now.” She put the blanket back over Pearl’s shoulders, the softness of her fingers contrasting with the harsh tone of her voice.
“I’m taking her my special tea,” she added.
Pearl blushed. Had her mum read her mind? She was strong and smart and could skin a rabbit in seconds but she could not rip her thoughts out of her head, could she?
Her mother held her hand. She stretched out each of Pearl’s fingers and tenderly pressed the large bunch of keys into her palm.
The familiar scent of apples and straw from the inside of her mother’s pocket made Pearl’s pulse race with panic and her blood run cold. She had been so wrapped up with the thought of seeing Tomos and spending some time by herself that she had lost her grip on reality. How would she manage without her mother? Since her father’s death they had never spent a day apart from each other.
Down to the last sinew and fibre of her body Pearl did not want her mother to go. She wanted to hurl the keys on the floor and scream ‘I am not ready to be a Custodian, not even for three days! Don’t do this to me!’
She curled her fingers around the keys. The jagged shapes pressed themselves into her palm. Ever since word had come through about her grandmother this moment was inevitable. Her mother would not be here. But the routine of checking on the Ice Palace had to be maintained. Ice Palaces contained secret powers. Pearl would have to take on the role.
Every day, for as long as she could remember, she had joined her mother on the walk down the pathway from their bunker to the Ice Palace. It was her mother’s job to visit every day and to let The Officials in, if they turned up. She had watched her mother go through the unlocking process many times but it had never been left up to her before.
“You know I wouldn’t ask you to do this if it wasn’t an emergency.”
Pearl’s heart beat faster.
“Listen carefully,” her mother began.
A panic cloud formed in Pearl’s brain. Would she able to do it? She swallowed and tried hard to listen but the clouds kept on gathering.
“The main entrance door key needs three turns to the left and one to the right.”
Pearl’s fingers twitched as her brain tried to hang on to the information. ‘Three turns to the left and one to the right. Three turns to the.. it is the left isn’t it? I haven’t got it the wrong way round?’
“Now you use the next key for the outer door. It’s the one shaped like wolves’ teeth. You need to waggle it in the lock until it settles and then give it one firm turn and then push the door.”
Pearl tried so hard to look like she was listening that she wasn’t sure she was taking anything in. Her mouth felt dry. All she could visualise was a pack of hungry wolves baring their blood-stained teeth at her. Her father had been killed by these creatures and she feared and hated them in equal measure.
Her mother continued in a slow and steady voice, “The inner door is the tricky one. It has two locks that you have to open simultaneously and before you remove both keys you have to listen for them to catch. What does that sound like Pearl?”
For a second the panic clouds cleared as Pearl replied, “Like bones cracking?”
Her mother nodded and then stood up, “I must go. I have left you my old gun in case of …danger.”
The panic inside Pearl’s brain knitted together into a thick fog. She wanted her mother to explain it all again or, better still, she wanted to cry and plead with her to stay. She was not ready for this responsibility of being the temporary Custodian of the Ice Palace. She would go to Grandmother’s instead of her mother. At that moment not even the thought of a visit by Tomos could comfort her.
Her mother turned in the doorway and smiled, “You will be fine. It’s very unlikely that an Official will call. Just do the daily patrol and sit tight and if the worst comes to the worst, never forget that it is better that the keys are lost forever than they fall into the wrong hands.”
A wry smile played across Pearl’s lips and cut through the panic as she said sarcastically, “If the worst comes to the worst! How very comforting, Mum!”
They both laughed.
“It is the first rule that a Custodian is taught, as well you know,” her mother grinned.
Pearl sighed. The visiting rituals by The Officials were probably nothing but a meaningless exercise to make them look important. Certainly, they never seemed to do anything once inside the Palace except look around and nod before leaving again.
She and Tomos would laugh about it later.
The sound of barking and a rattle of a sledge outside startled her. Her mother picked up her backpack and carefully put it on.
“That’ll be Tomos. I have asked him to come along with me. And there’s a large pot of stew by the fire – that should keep you going.” Her mother gently stroked her cheek before she left.
*
It felt colder now that she was alone with no prospect of a visit from Tomos. The tea did not warm her and she found that she had no appetite for the sweet cake so she tore it into pieces and ground them into the table. She took her mother’s finest fur blanket from her bed and dragged it back to her own room. Why was she the Pearl chosen to have been born when most of the earth was in perpetual winter? It was so unfair.
She would be trapped here just like her mother, opening doors for The Officials or monitoring the temperature for the rest of her life. What if Tomos never returned and she had missed her only chance to spend time with him? She closed her eyes and tried to sleep off the gloom of self-pity that overwhelmed her.
She woke with a start as the pale blue morning light leaked through the narrow slits of reinforced glass in the roof. They gave the plain white walls a silvery sheen. Pearl rubbed her eyes and yawned. All night long her dreams had been peppered with a voice repeating the key drill for unlocking the Ice Palace. Her eyes were drawn to the small photograph that she had placed on the wall beside her bed. It was the only decoration.
She brewed herself a pot of honey tea and set about cleaning the gun. The process of cleaning the weapon calmed her. She scraped up some of the pieces of Tomos’s cake and added them to her daily ration of stew.
She carefully added the extra layers of clothing that were required, making sure that her face was well covered. As she tightly tied up the straps to her white outer jacket she hoped her mother had arrived safely and all was well. And Tomos? Why had he not told her of the change of plan? She placed her outer gloves on and sighed. She was not going to waste any more time brooding about him. The wind had died down a little so she decided to set off early to The Ice Palace.
*
She had been walking for about fifteen minutes and had just reached the gates of the Ice Palace when she realised that she had not brou
ght the keys with her. She cursed. She had not done the most obvious thing.
‘First of all Pearl –PICK UP THE KEYS!’
She decided to take the short cut back by the Old Bunker. At least there was no one around to witness her stupidity. She looked at the sky and sniffed the air. It was probably for the best that she was returning early as there was a warm front moving in which would bring a storm with it.
It was a rustling sound that caught her attention first. Pearl stopped and attuned her ears as her mother had taught her to do. She stood still, thankful for the camouflage that her white outer layer gave her, altered her body in line with the wind direction, and listened intently. She could make out the sounds of two voices. She edged closer. There were two people and a sledge by the Old Bunker.
The first, a woman’s voice: “Tomos will deal with the Custodian on the return journey two days from now. She is carrying an injury so should be easy to handle.”
“Tomos is a fool. He should have killed them both already and taken the keys,” a high-pitched male voice added.
“He has taken a fancy to the girl,’ the woman countered. ‘ He likes to keep his cover when he’s operating in an area. It’s our job to go to the trading post and gather as much information as we can. If Tomos thinks he can keep the girl he is in for a shock. She knows too much. He has too much time on his hands to indulge in foolish dreams.”
“He won’t have once we get the keys to the nuclear reactor.”
“Ice Palace, please call it by its official name!”
They both laughed.
*
Pearl knew there was precious little time. Only enough to swallow down any panic and keep moving. She walked backwards, reusing her previous footprints. She made a determined effort to slow down both her breathing and her movement whilst at the same time her brain was firing thoughts as fast as bullets. Who were these people? What was a nuclear reactor? How long would it take her to reach grandmother’s house on foot?
After about twenty minutes she returned back home. Like an automaton she forced herself to eat up all the remaining portions of stew. She gathered up the gun and carefully zipped the keys into the inner pocket. She was never going to forget them again. She burned the photograph. The image was imprinted on her brain. She had another Pearl to worry about. Her mother.
If she was going to reach her mother in time she had to leave now. It was going to be a long hard walk to get to her grandmother’s but she was travelling light – the only excess weight came from the stone crust of hatred that had encased her heart.
She secured the gun to her backpack. She felt the muscles in her jaw tighten. In fewer than five hours she was going to have to face Tomos. And if it came down to a choice between his life or her mother’s, it was a simple enough decision.
On the way she stopped by a ravine but something stopped her from throwing the keys away. Her mother was right: she did not need protecting from the past; she desperately needed to do something about the present. She needed the keys. They would be a useful bartering tool. They gave her power. The keys to the Ice Palace were going to unlock a new life for her mother and herself.
Evie’s Christmas Miracle
by Jenny Smith
My name’s Evie Doyle, and you could say that I’m a little bit – well – different.
“We’d like Evie to play Mary in the Nativity this year,” Father Mitchell said, sitting in our living room, drinking from a mug with ‘Keep Calm and Drink Tea’ printed on it.
Mum looked nervously at Dad and did her ‘face’, which meant: ‘Say something.’
Dad cleared his throat. “Father,” he said. “You may have noticed that Evie has...well, I mean, I’m not sure Mary, the mother of Baby Jesus, would be as...unpredictable as Evie.”
Father Mitchell nodded and smiled. “Mr Doyle, we are aware of Evie’s issue. But is our Lord not all loving? Is He not all tolerant? Evie has many fine qualities, and we think she deserves this honour.”
Mum fluttered with pleasure. “What do you think, Evie? Would you like to play Mary this year?”
Three pairs of eyes were on me. I got the bubbling feeling. It started in my tummy, then bubbled up and up so fast that I couldn’t stop it. The words popped out, in a great big shout.
“HITLER TOILET!”
*
Most people know about Tourette’s Syndrome because they’ve seen some documentary on TV about it. I can understand why a lot of people think it’s quite funny when they see people shouting out rude stuff.
But believe me, they’re a lot less understanding when they see somebody randomly shouting down the local supermarket. And when you’re the person doing the shouting and trying to control the tics and the twitching, there’s nothing funny about it at all.
I’ve had Tourette’s since I was about seven. I kept jumping up in class and shouting things like ‘FUGGLE BOTTOM!’ and ‘SMELLY WONGLE POO!’ and sometimes whole sentences like ‘PUT A WOOLLY HAT ON IT!’ or ‘NOT ON A TUESDAY!’
My older brother Luke loves it when I shout ‘NOT ON A TUESDAY!’ It’s his favourite.
Of course I say worse stuff, but I don’t want to write it here, so just assume that something like ‘NOODLE DUMPLINGS!’ is possibly really something a little bit ruder.
*
After I shouted ‘HITLER TOILET!’ Dad said perhaps it was not the best idea, my being Mary. But Father Mitchell seemed more enthusiastic than ever. Maybe it was because he was new in his job and wanted to shake things up at St Anthony’s.
“If Jesus was with us today,” he said solemnly, “he would choose somebody just like Evie to play Mary.”
I imagined Jesus sitting in our front room, drinking tea. He’d have to use the ‘Keep Calm and Eat Cupcakes’ mug. I wondered if he’d eat as many digestive biscuits as Father Mitchell.
I was desperate to shout ‘No way am I going to play Mary, it’s the worst idea anybody’s ever had in the entire history of worst ideas.’ But I didn’t say anything, because I was scared I’d shout out ‘FATHER MITCHELL HAS A HUGE ROUND FACE!’ instead.
So I nodded and smiled, and my fate was sealed.
“Evie’s playing Mary in the Nativity this year!” Mum was still on a high when Luke came in later.
“Very funny, Mum,” he said; then his face changed as he saw she wasn’t joking. “I mean, well done, Evie.”
*
When I’m at Mass I sit at the back, using tricks to keep the bubbling down. Foot tapping, grimacing and humming. I’m close enough to the door so I can run outside if I can’t control it.
Towards the end of primary school, my best friends stayed loyal, but a few others started to pick on me. So now I go to a school for children who have ‘challenges’. This can be anything from learning disabilities – for example Jack who has severe dyslexia – to anxiety disorders – like Katie, who got so wound up at her own birthday party, she spent the whole evening in the loo, being sick.
It’s much easier to be different when everybody else is too.
*
I couldn’t believe my luck at the first rehearsal. Joseph was to be played by this boy called Sean who’s a year older than me.
I’d had a crush on Sean since, well, just about forever. I thought he had the most beautiful blue eyes I’d ever seen, with long dark eyelashes. I’d even decided we might get married one day and have children.
“She’s Mary? This has got to be a joke, right?” was the first thing Sean said, as he stared at me. Father Mitchell had to take him outside to have a word with him.
Something inside me died as I stood waiting with the others. Who had I been kidding? I was the weird girl. Poor Evie Doyle with her twitching and stamping. Of course Sean wouldn’t want to be on stage with me.
Sean came back with Father Mitchell and mumbled ‘sorry’ without even looking me in the eye.
Things did not get better. During the first rehearsal I had to run outside six times, and at one point I dropped the Baby Jesus because I was stampi
ng my feet so hard.
Afterwards, a boy called Michael, who was playing the Innkeeper, complained. “Father, Mary keeps running outside. That’s not in the story.”
“Well,” said Father Mitchell, cheerful as always, “I’ve been thinking about that and I think I’ve come up with a useful distraction. This year, for the first time ever at St Anthony’s, we’re going to have a real donkey!”
I wanted to shout ‘DONKEY PANTS!’ but I managed to contain myself.
*
A boy called Charlie joined our class last term. If you have Tourette’s and you meet someone else who does the tics and twitching and shouting, it’s like being pushed in front of a full-length mirror and seeing how you look to the rest of the world.
So for the first few weeks we pretended each other didn’t exist.
Then one day he sat next to me at lunch and said, “When you can’t stop it, how does it feel?”
“It’s a bubbling feeling,” I said.
“Mine’s a tingling, like electricity,” he said. “Sometimes I expect sparks to shoot out of my ears.”
I laughed. We’re friends now. Nothing more, although I’ve thought about what it would be like if I went out with him. It would be a disaster, probably. I’d end up shouting ‘HAMSTER TROUSERS’ in his face.
*
At the second rehearsal I ran outside five times, which Father Mitchell noted was an improvement.
I was trying so, so hard not to mess up, but Sean kept making sarcastic comments under his breath. I wondered why I’d ever liked him with his beady blue eyes and his girl’s eyelashes.
*
I must have been quiet on the last day of term. Our English teacher, Miss Scott, asked me what was wrong.
“Are you worried about the Nativity?” she asked. Jack and Katie had been telling her all about it with great delight in class, including the fact that there was going to be a real donkey.
“Evie’s worried about shouting,” said Katie, before I had a chance to speak.