Magenta McPhee

by Catherine Bateson

  Dad nodded. His smile stretched right across his face and his eyes were all lit up from behind as though they had candles burning in them.

  ‘Dad, that’s fantastic! That’s so cool.’

  ‘It is, isn’t it? It’s what I’ve been wanting for a long time now. It won’t make us wealthy, Magenta, but I’ll be able to help your Mum out with some child support and there’ll be a bit more money around.’

  ‘I think it’s just great that you’ve got a job!’ I said. ‘That’s what matters, Dad.’

  ‘It took a while,’ Dad said. ‘I was worried, I tell you. It was hard to keep faith for a while there.’

  ‘I’m really proud of you.’ I got up and went around to his side of the table and gave him a kiss and a big hug. ‘I’m really proud of you.’

  ‘Thanks, baby. I’m proud of you, too.’

  ‘I haven’t done anything.’

  ‘You tried to do something,’ Dad said, raising his glass of water. ‘To us. To Magenta, matchmaker and fantasy writer, and to Max, optimistic IT consultant.’

  ‘Failed matchmaker,’ I said. ‘Was Lianna okay?’

  ‘She seemed fine,’ Dad said. ‘She made us eat a piece of stollen. She told Sandra about the wombat. She and Sandra got on fine. Did you know a guy owns that café?’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Just that I’d always assumed a woman did, from how Lianna talked.’

  ‘What was the stollen like?’

  ‘Really good, of course. Lianna is an excellent cook.’

  ‘Is Sandra?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Dad admitted, ‘but that’s not really important, is it?’

  Sandra may or may not have been able to cook, but she certainly knew her books. Which you’d expect from a librarian. I browsed through the Diana Wynne Jones before dinner. I could see why the book came with that long message. It was weird. She had the kind of mind that reminded me of Polly. Like, for example, who would have thought to notice that no one in fantasy books wears socks? Come to that, socks aren’t exactly a highlight of most other books I’ve read. Some of the stuff she talked about was quite funny, like how crystal balls play a soundless video of your future. I wasn’t sure how it was going to help me write the Chronicles, although I was determined now to mention someone’s socks. That way if Diana Wynne Jones ever updated her guide, she’d have to say, except in The Chronicles of Forrdike Castle.

  After dinner Dad told me to put my trainers on.

  ‘What?’

  ‘New routine,’ he said. ‘An after-dinner run.’

  ‘A run?’

  ‘Yep. You wanted to train for the cross-country, didn’t you?’

  ‘That was ages ago. I don’t need to train again until next year.’

  ‘If you start now,’ Dad said, lacing up a pair of new trainers, ‘you’ll be at least eight months fitter than you would be if you only begin next year.’

  ‘I’m not sure that I want to be eight months fitter.’

  ‘Well, I do. You can be my motivational trainer. That will entail jogging alongside your poor old dad and shouting out words of encouragement. Come on, Magenta, you wanted me to get out more.’

  ‘Yeah, but I didn’t want you to run out. Just walk – preferably to the movies or dinner. Not an evening jog. You might have a stroke.’

  ‘Then it’s twice as important that you’re with me. You’ve got the mobile.’

  I knew he was joking, but there was still a certain amount of logic to his argument. I wasn’t sure that Dad, who hadn’t done a cross-country run in living memory, should be allowed out jogging by himself.

  ‘I guess I should do something,’ I said, grabbing my trainers. ‘After all, writing is all sitting down. Unless you’re getting life experience. Which clearly I can’t get while I’m still at school. I’ll come with you, but can we go down back streets where we’re not likely to bump into anyone we know?’

  ‘Sure,’ Dad said, ‘and not a huge distance our first time out. This will be fun, Magenta. We’ve been missing a bit of fun, haven’t we?’

  ‘You may have,’ I told him, ‘but I’ve been fine. Really.’

  I met Sandra the next day at the library. I’d taken my chapter outline up to photocopy so I had one copy at Mum’s and one at Dad’s. I thanked her for the book, of course, and told her about the socks.

  ‘But really,’ I said, ‘you wouldn’t mention socks in a normal book, would you? Not unless they were special socks someone had given you or really cool knee-high ones. We just take socks for granted.’

  ‘That’s true,’ she said, ‘but maybe Diana Wynne Jones is being a bit cheeky.’

  ‘I’m going to mention socks in the Chronicles,’ I told her. ‘I’m going to make sure I mention them a fair bit, really. I’ve already thought of one place where it would be natural to think of socks and that’s with my witch, Holly, down in the dungeon. She could be regretting not wearing socks because it would be cold down there.’

  ‘I think that’s a great idea,’ Sandra said, ‘but maybe you don’t want to talk about them too much. It might be a little odd.’

  ‘Just when it’s relevant,’ I said.

  We talked for a little while about books while she was helping me with the photocopier. She smiled at Dad quite a lot but they didn’t kiss or anything. I suppose you can’t kiss at work. I didn’t hear them call each other darling or anything like that, either, even though I was listening hard all the time. I must have missed something though, because when we got home Dad said that Sandra was coming around after the library closed and they were going for a walk.

  I stayed at home. I didn’t want to cramp Dad’s romantic style. But also I wanted to get on with my sock idea and the Chronicles. I also wanted to see if Mum was right and I could get Ricardo and Lady Rosa to kiss, just like that. Plus I needed to text Cal and I couldn’t do that with anyone else around.

  I did the socks first. The Chronicles were familiar. Texting Cal wasn’t.

  Holly must have drifted off to sleep despite the rat scuffles. When she woke up her feet were cold. She should have worn socks, she thought, rather than her best slip-on shoes. Thick, woolly socks would have made a considerable difference to her comfort at this point. She considered asking the guard if he could provide her with a pair the next time he came with food or water. Or perhaps she could give Lady Burgundy a little information in return for some? Her feet were really very very cold.

  Hmmm. Well, I could understand why most fantasy writers left socks out – they were hardly the most interesting thing to write about. But I’d done it and I wasn’t unhappy with the result.

  Next I tried the kiss.

  Ricardo bent his head over Lady Rosa’s just as she was looking up to him.

  ‘The moon...’ she said quickly, ‘it’s very...’

  ‘As are you ... beautiful,’ he said and for the briefest of moments their lips met in the lightest of kisses. Then there was a noise at the great doors and they drew quickly apart.

  Kisses were certainly more interesting to write about than socks. How I got to that kiss was to imagine Cal kissing someone. Not me necessarily. Just some girl. I’d tried to do that with Richard, of course, but it just hadn’t worked. Maybe because I’d always thought Richard’s kisses would be more ... intense? Which I just couldn’t imagine, let alone write about.

  This kiss was just right. I was very pleased with myself. Suddenly the blank squares in the chapter plan didn’t look so bad. They weren’t vacant so much as waiting to be filled.

  It was a good thing I’d stayed at home, because just as I was sitting on my bed trying to work out a text message that was both casual and friendly, my mobile rang.

  It was Mum.

  ‘Listen, baby,’ she said, ‘you know the wedding guest list?’

  I didn’t really, but I said yes anyway.

&
nbsp; ‘Trib and I are going through it now. Naturally people can bring guests and Richard, you know Richard?’

  Of course I knew Richard. What a silly question.

  ‘Well, he’s bringing his new girlfriend.’

  ‘His what?’ Richard had a girlfriend? Since when?

  ‘Girlfriend,’ Mum said very clearly. ‘He’s been going out with this girl for a couple of months.’

  A couple of months? How come I didn’t know? I felt as though I might throw up.

  ‘So I was wondering, sweetie, if there was someone you’d like to invite? You know, Polly or someone?’

  Richard was going out with someone! He was probably kissing her, intensely. They’d dance together at the wedding, if there was going to be dancing. He’d take her out on the parapet and kiss her intensely. In front of me. It was almost too much to bear thinking about.

  ‘What’s she like?’ I asked. ‘Have you met her? Is she ... beautiful?’

  ‘Only once,’ Mum said. ‘She seemed okay. Quite pretty. Now back to you, who would you like to bring as a guest?’

  I wondered about Cal. For a moment I thought of Cal and me walking hand in hand through the garden party. I thought of Cal leaning over to kiss me, a feather-kiss, the lightest of kisses. We’d dance next to Richard and his girlfriend and I wouldn’t even look at Richard.

  ‘What’s her name?’

  ‘Umm, hold on a sec. I’ve written it down somewhere. Here it is. Her name’s Serena. Wasn’t that the name of some witch on a television program?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ I couldn’t really invite Cal. I didn’t know him that well. A wedding was an intimate thing – more than camping. If your crush was with someone else at a wedding you really needed someone totally on your side to be with you. You needed your best friend. ‘Can I bring Polly, then?’

  ‘Of course, darling,’ Mum sounded very relieved. ‘I think that’s a great idea. Better get back to it, then. Love you.’

  ‘Love you, too. Have a good time.’

  Serena, I thought when I hung up. Serena was one of those names that made me think of creepy things. I forgot about texting Cal. I had more important things to do, really. I wasn’t at all sure that a boy would fit into my life at the moment. Not with the cross-country practice and my father to keep on track. Obviously his romance needed all the help it could get, considering they were just smiling at each other. Then there were the Chronicles.

  Ricardo sat down on the bed to take off his socks. The bed was a magnificent four-poster one with midnight-blue drapes. Serena would love this, he thought, dropping his socks in a pile of dirty washing. She loved luxury. It was a pity ... He wished he could stop thinking about her. He was here to woo Lady Rosa. She had beauty, intelligence and money. Serena, however, was an enchantress who had long ago stolen his heart. He put his head in his hands. When would he see her again? When would she let him come back to her?

  Fantastic! Socks and added plot. The Chronicles were moving fast. I could fill in a few more squares, I thought. At this rate I’d have the first book written by the time Trib and Mum got married. That would leave the second book to finish before Dad and Sandra got married. Which they were sure to do. Everyone loves to live happily ever after, even if it’s only for a little while.

  I’d make sure something ghastly happened to Serena – in the Chronicles of course. In real life she’d probably turn out to be really lovely and lend me her special fingernail polish or something. That’s what I love about writing – you can change real life around. In the Chronicles Serena could break Ricardo’s heart and there Rosa Burgundy would be, waiting. Maybe not straight away, of course. First of all she might rescue Holly and go to find her father. On the way they could get lost and be helped by a handsome young boy called Callum, the son of a gypsy woman. Maybe Mum was right and life experience helped even a fantasy writer like myself.

  In the interests of life experience I texted Cal. It was just a little message saying hi. Nothing even an alien boy could take amiss or read anything into. I’d hardly pushed Send when my mobile rang.

  ‘Hey,’ Cal’s voice said, sounding a little wobbly as though the connection wasn’t particularly good.

  ‘Oh hi,’ I said.

  ‘I have some credit,’ he said. ‘What’s been happening?’

  I told him about Diana Wynne Jones, the socks and Sandra.

  ‘I could be the first fantasy writer in the world to bring in socks,’ I said.

  ‘Gee, maybe you should email her and let her know?’

  ‘She doesn’t have an email address,’ I said. I’d already looked her up on the Net. ‘She’s quite old, you know.’

  ‘Maybe you should write her a letter, you know, the old-fashioned way?’

  That was such a good idea that without thinking I told Cal that if he ever wanted to come around for a few hundred games of SKIP-BO he was welcome.

  ‘Hey, that’d be cool. Actually I wanted to know if you wanted to come to the Winter Solstice lantern parade. You have to make a lantern. Well you wouldn’t have to because we’ve got two and Lianna can’t take hers because she’s serving cakes.’

  By the time he hung up I had a kind of date. The lantern parade sounded like a good thing for a fantasy writer to get involved in. This life experience stuff was beginning to work for me.

  I sat down at my desk and wrote Chapter Five in big curling letters.

  Lady Rosa willed herself to stay awake until the merriment had ended. She wouldn’t have slept anyway. The kiss from Ricardo, rudely interrupted as it had been, burned on her lips. She kept touching her mouth and marvelling at the thought of his lips on hers. It was a shame that she had to leave when they’d barely become acquainted but her father and his whereabouts were more important than anything else.

  In what she judged were the early hours of the morning, she stole down the long passageways to the dungeon.

  ‘Who is it?’ whispered a frightened little voice when she opened the great door to Holly’s cell.

  ‘Lady Rosa. There’s nothing to be frightened of. I’ve come to get you out of here. We have to go and find my father.’

  ‘Oh. All right. That’s a sensible idea, I suppose,’ Holly said, getting to her feet. ‘I’ll be happy to assist in any way possible, but before we do anything, I really need a pair of socks.’

  The End

  ‘If wishes were horses, beggars would ride,’ Dad said whenever I wished for anything.

  Once upon a time, Mum had made clop-clopping noises, sounding just like a real horse, or she’d held her hands in front of her as though she was holding reins, and bounced up and down in her seat at the breakfast table, making us laugh.

  But that didn’t happen anymore. Mum was hardly ever at the breakfast table these days.

  ‘I wish they’d never decided I needed a brother. Who needs brothers anyway? They’re smelly and noisy and when they get bigger they pull your hair and break your best things.’

  But Dad didn’t say anything, because he was busy taking Mum a cup of tea and some dry crackers. He didn’t even offer to brush my hair which was in a real tangle – in the end I gave up and just put it in a pony tail with the knots all at the bottom. It would have to do. We were late again.

  I’d have to go to the office for a pass. I hated that. I even hated driving to school – I didn’t mind the walk when it was sunny. Mum and I would talk about things.

  ‘I wish things were back to normal,’ I said, buckling up the seat belt.

  ‘I wish your mum wasn’t so sick,’ Dad said sharply, scowling at me in the rear mirror. ‘I think that’s what we should wish for, Ruby.’

  ‘If wishes were horses, beggars would ride,’ I said and then wished I hadn’t; he looked at me with such disappointment. I didn’t blow him a kiss goodbye the way I usually did, just gave him a little finger wave. Not that
he noticed. Nobody noticed me these days. Still, I felt bad about the kiss all morning but at recess, Sarah, my best friend, told Bree, the new girl, that I had a crush on Bailey Ferguson. They spent the whole time following me round, chanting:

  Ruby and Bailey sitting in a tree

  K–I–S–S–I–N–G

  First comes love

  Then comes marriage

  Then comes Ruby with a baby carriage

  and I hated them so much I forgot about Dad.

  After school I always walk home with Sarah. We cross the road together and walk past the secondhand furniture shop with the little old pug dog. Then we walk past the fish and chip shop that always smells delicious and the hippy clothes shop that smells like a different country. We walk up the hill until Sarah turns off at her street and I go on past the supermarket and the library until it’s my street.

  But today I didn’t cross with Sarah. She was standing with Bree. I didn’t look at the lollipop lady but fell in behind Jess Mac, her annoying little preppie brother and their mum as though I was going home with them. When they turned into the videoshop car park, I kept going up the hill.

  I looked over, once or twice, to see if Sarah was looking, but she and Bree dawdled a long way behind. Then I saw – I was kind of standing in the bus shelter, not spying, just reading the bus timetable as though I was going to catch a bus, which I wasn’t, of course – I saw them walk into the fish and chip shop.

  Sarah and I only do that on Fridays. Friday is canteen day and Sarah’s dad gives her lunch money but she never puts in her lunch order. Instead I share my lunch with her and we go to the fish and chip shop after school and get minimum chips.

  You just can’t eat the hot chicken rolls at school. It’s not chicken in them – it’s rats. Someone had found a bit of a rat tail in one once. No one I knew, but the best friend of someone’s brother or sister. So Sarah never got lunch at the canteen.

  I didn’t stay in the bus shelter long enough to see them walk out of the fish and chip shop. I walked on, even though I was on the nasty-dog side of the road. I didn’t care if the dog bit me.