A Boy Called Hope

by Lara Williamson

  Love Mum x

  Not only does my stomach somersault at the thought of cottage pie, because that’s what I thought Mum was cooking the night Dad left, but if I was reading between the lines of the note Mum has written, it would say I miss Big Dave and I want him back. I’m halfway up the stairs to talk to her when I stop and sit down. My head rests against the daffodils on the wallpaper. Maybe I shouldn’t try to have this conversation with her. Perhaps I’ll only make it worse if I tell her I saw him sitting outside our house. But I did see him and I think he might have been crying.

  Later that evening I take Charles Scallybones on his nightly toilet trip. Past the eerily silent scout hut then over the slushy wasteground we march, up Skateboarding Hill and down again, beyond the spot where Big Dave and I flew the sky lantern. And it’s the thought of the sky lantern that makes me decide to find Big Dave and tell him how much he means to Mum. If I plead with him he’ll come back and explain the truth about Caroline, and Mum will get out of bed instead of leaving fiery gristle in the microwave.

  Big Dave’s house has a LET BY sign forced into the grass and his silver Mondeo is parked in the usual spot. The curtains are open and I can see cardboard boxes on the window ledge. Big Dave suddenly flashes into my vision and comes to the window and peers out into the street for a second. I duck down behind a wall, which is ridiculous when you think about it, because I’ve come to talk to him. Big Dave pulls the curtains shut.

  I hang around for ten minutes, trying to pluck up the courage to ring the doorbell. At the moment I think I’ve built myself up enough, the front door flies open. A woman steps out into the cool night air and pauses as Big Dave lounges against the door frame. They have a conversation but I can’t hear much more than the word “Kit”. The woman has brown hair cut so bluntly I imagine she could saw her own shoulder blades in half. She’s wearing a black and white stripy coat that reminds me of a zebra. As she raises her hand and runs it through her hair, she leans back towards Big Dave. They’re going to kiss, it’s a dead cert. Big Dave moves towards her and clasps her shoulders as I squeeze my eyes shut. When I open them, Big Dave and his wife have moved apart and she is walking down the pathway, blowing more kisses.

  Oh Big Dave, you’ve blown it now.

  The day after that, Christopher and I spend our morning break firming up plans to bring our guitars to the Project Eco Everywhere show. We’re not going to waste our time sitting between old pie cases, oh no. We agree on playing “Over the Rainbow” because that’s the only tune I know off by heart. Christopher says he has played it a few times, but he’ll bring along his music book just in case he’s rusty.

  Jo sees us whispering and wanders over to ask us what we’re up to. Christopher looks shifty but tells her it’s nothing. “Why are you keeping secrets?” she asks, throwing a gum wrapper into the bin.

  “There isn’t a secret,” I say.

  “You’ll get struck down by lightning if you’re lying and Saint Barbara won’t help.” Before I can ask who Saint Barbara is, Jo offers, “She’s the patron saint against thunder and lightning, by the way.”

  Of course she is.

  “We’re talking about the Project Eco Everywhere show,” Christopher finally admits. “We’re just deciding what to do when we’re backstage.”

  Out of her blazer, Jo pulls a plastic card with a prayer on it, a piece of Lourdes rock, a small statue of Saint Anthony, an unused tissue, a string of blood-red rosary beads and a tropical lip balm, which she rolls over her lips. “I’m more worried about being on the actual stage. I’ve got a whole beauty routine to start tonight: cleanse, tone and moisturize. I cannot get a spot.”

  “Can’t you wash your face in holy water? Surely that’ll stop you getting a spot,” I say.

  “One cannot use religious items for everything,” she retorts. “Then when you need help they won’t be there for you. I’ve told you before.”

  I’m sorry I even asked.

  Jo wraps her hair around her finger and says, “I’ve got to look beautiful on the Project Eco Everywhere catwalk.”

  “You don’t need to worry, Jo,” replies Christopher, “because you’re already…” Then he stops mid-sentence. “You’re already good at walking.” He looks like he’s about to sprint away in embarrassment. “I mean, on the Project Eco Everywhere catwalk,” he explains. “You’ll be able to put one foot in front of the other.”

  Please, ground, open and swallow him up.

  “Yeah, that makes sense.” Jo gives him a quizzical look before walking off. “I suppose I’ve had eleven years’ practice,” she calls back.

  I burst out laughing. “She’s not particularly amazing at walking. Why did you say that?”

  “Because I keep opening my mouth and saying the wrong thing,” Christopher replies. “And that annoys me. Everything does at the moment.”

  I stare at him, my eyes wide. Obviously there’s something bothering him, so I ask if there’s a problem I can help with. At first he says there isn’t and then he walks across the school playground and sits down on the frosty stone steps, near the water fountain. I join him. For a while, neither of us speaks. Christopher fiddles with his school tie, rolling it up and down, while I concentrate on various children trying to get the water fountain to work, even though it’s icier than an ice pop in Iceland.

  “Yes, okay, I have a problem,” Christopher finally offers, kicking some glistening leaves from the steps. “I suppose I might as well tell you. It’s my dad. A while back he said we’d need to move again. And I don’t want all this. It’s happening too quickly.” He shrugs.

  I rest my hand on his arm for a second then take it away in case anyone sees me. “Sorry.” I blurt the word out.

  “Don’t worry, I can put up with it. At least I wouldn’t have to change schools if it happened. My Aunty Yvonne said it’d be a good change. But what does she know? She doesn’t have to move into a stranger’s house and be all happy about it. I refused to go when Dad mentioned it at first and he said he’d give me more time.” Christopher makes a Swiss roll with his school tie. “He’s in a really bad mood. I think it’s because of me, opening my mouth and making everything difficult. Dad says his girlfriend is lovely and she isn’t a stranger because I’ve spoken to her on the phone, but that’s not the point. I’d like my mum back.”

  “Oh.”

  “She left me.” Christopher lets his tie unfurl.

  “Left you?”

  “Packed her bags and moved to Scotland with the man from Human Resources where she used to work. She didn’t take me with her. Apparently, it was better for me to stay where I was settled.” Christopher’s eyes glisten but he tilts his head back far enough for his tears to disappear back inside. “Six months ago, I saved up some money and tried to buy a ticket to Edinburgh, only the man at the train station wouldn’t sell me one. Said I was too young to travel all that way on my own. I’d even packed a bottle of Irn-Bru and a packet of shortbread. They like that in Scotland, you know.” Christopher gives me a small smile and wipes his nose with his index finger. “In the end I had to go back home and picnic on the front step before ripping up the note to Dad that said I was emigrating.”

  “Oh,” I echo.

  “That’s why I took up tae kwon do, you know.” Christopher runs his fingers through his hair. “I thought if I ever met the man from Human Resources I could…”

  “Kill him with your little finger?”

  “Yup, something like that.”

  Christopher rises up and wipes the damp from the seat of his trousers. “But that’s not even what tae kwon do is about. So Catriona can stay in Scotland with her boyfriend and I’ll just get on with my life.”

  “Who’s Catriona?”

  “That’s my mum. I don’t even like calling her ‘mum’ any more. She doesn’t deserve it.”

  “You’re right,” I say, jumping up. My bum feels a bit clammy. “She’s missing out. You’re better off without her.”

  Only I don’t believe those words, b
ecause having no mother must be terrible. That’s why he made his dad his hero. Everything fits now. But no matter how awful his mother is, I can understand why he wants her back in his life. In fact, I understand his pain so completely that I feel an unexpected and uncontrollable pang in my stomach.

  Today is show day. Everything is going to be perfect. Everything except the weather, that is, because right now there’s a monsoon raging outside. Like an angry monster, it whips leaves, batters trees until their limbs snap and then blows out great gusts of water. Somewhere in the distance there is a low thunderous growl, and Mum pulls back the net curtain and stares out at aluminium skies. From her expression, she isn’t impressed. For ten minutes she walks up and down, worrying about us going out in a storm.

  “It’ll be okay, Mum,” I say, pulling on my coat. “It’s only water. I can’t miss the show because of the rain. Mrs Parfitt will go ape if I’m not there. She’s relying on me to help backstage. Without me, the whole show will go down.”

  “I know you’re important.” Mum fluffs my hair before returning to the window. “But it’s torrential out there and I can hear thunder in the distance. I was certain they’d cancel.”

  “They can’t cancel.” I blink back the fear. “There’s no way they can do that.”

  “Why not?” asks Ninja Grace, whacking me on the head.

  “They just can’t, that’s all.”

  “At this rate we could join Noah on the Ark.” Mum sighs and reaches for her coat and bag. “Well, if you insist it’s still happening then there’s a bus at the end of the road in four minutes. We need to be on it or we’ll have to row there.”

  I pick up my guitar and the plastic glasses and tell them to hurry up because we can’t miss that bus. Tonight is going to be my night.

  “The guitar, what’s that for?” Grace plucks one of the strings and the guitar protests.

  I touch my nose and smile.

  We catch the 36 bus, which will take us from Paradise Parade directly to the Amandine Hotel. Mum calls it the QTW bus: Quicker To Walk. That’s because it stops at every lamp post and tree on the route. As if to prove the point, a soggy boy-racer pensioner on a mobility scooter manages to overtake us, and by the time we’ve reached the end of the road we’re eating his dust.

  “Stan can’t come,” says Grace, checking her mobile phone. “He’s watching the end of his favourite quiz show. Someone is going to win either 1p or £100,000.”

  “I wouldn’t want to be responsible for him missing that,” I say, staring out the window as rain turns the street into a kaleidoscope of grey.

  When we eventually reach it, the Amandine Hotel is blurred by a veil of pelting water. Flinging my guitar over my shoulder, I hop off the bus, waving at Mum and Grace and shouting to them that I’ve got to go backstage and they should grab a seat in the ballroom. Grace screams back something about breaking a leg, which doesn’t seem entirely impossible as I hurry through the rain arrows. I arrive at the small black door at the side of the building and let myself into the darkened corridor leading to the backstage room where we are to meet.

  Before anyone spots me, I slide my guitar behind a velvet curtain and then present myself to Mrs Parfitt.

  “You’re soaking wet.” Mrs Parfitt ticks my name off using a red pen.

  “It’s raining, Miss.”

  “I gathered that much.”

  “But the show must go on, Miss.”

  “Indeed.” Mrs Parfitt looks up from her clipboard. “You’re very keen, Daniel. I must say, I like this. Considering you’re not on the stage, it is nice to see you embrace the job you’ve been given. You’ll still get your moment, I’ll make sure of it.”

  “Thank you, Miss.” A dribble of rainwater runs down my forehead and along the length of my nose, where it hangs like a gymnast on the rings.

  While I’m talking to Mrs Parfitt I spy Christopher sneak his guitar behind the same curtain where I put mine. He gives me the thumbs up and begins whistling “Over the Rainbow” as he merges with our other classmates.

  Jo turns up a minute later looking like the Virgin Mary, if the Virgin Mary was wearing a soaking wet tea towel and had a chicken pie foil case attached to her head to look like a halo. Saleem is a mass of wet toilet roll and says he’s his mummy if she got caught in a monsoon. Kevin arrives looking like a soggy yeti. He’s wrapped in the brown furry blanket and the underpants over his trousers are so wet they’re slapping his knees. When Mrs Parfitt asks him to repeat who his hero is and how this woolly mammoth look represents them, Kevin reminds her it is his dad. Even though Mrs Parfitt doesn’t probe any further, Kevin volunteers the information that his dad has a hairy chest all the way down to his— Mrs Parfitt puts her hand in the air to stop him from going further.

  “I was going to say toes,” says Kevin.

  As soon as I get the chance to escape, I lope over to the curtain separating us from the audience. My finger teases the fabric aside and I can see Mum in the second row. Already she has a tissue crumpled between her hands. Every so often she dabs at her eyes. The seat beside her is empty – Grace has gone off who knows where. Row after row of faces build behind Mum and, despite trying to scan them all in ten seconds, I can’t see Dad. What I can see is a TV camera at the back of the hall and it’s focusing on the chandelier, which is throwing silver smudges into the audience, making them look like they’ve got sequined chickenpox.

  “Gimme a look.” Christopher jumps on my back and the curtains shudder, nearly sending us both flying onto the stage.

  “Get off.” I nudge him away and look out again. At the back of the ballroom I see Big Dave slipping in and taking a seat in the last row. I’m surprised at how nice it feels to see him again. Mum didn’t say he was coming to see me, but then again they don’t seem to be on speaking terms at the moment.

  “For the love of God,” barks Mrs Parfitt, pulling me back. “What if someone sees you?”

  “No one saw me, Mrs Parfitt, not even my mother, who was waving at me from row two.”

  “Go and help the others prepare their costumes. Now scoot.” I take Mrs Parfitt’s advice and scoot as far away from her as I can, which means scooting straight into a corner. That’s when something strange happens. In the half-darkness, I scent spearmint chewing gum.

  “It’s me, backstage boy,” whispers Ninja Grace. “I’ve only got a second because I said I was going to the loo. If I’m not back soon, Mum will send out a search party.” I doubt this very much, because Grace never goes to the toilet for just a second. Not ever. But that’s not the main thing concerning me. The main thing concerning me is that Grace wouldn’t have come backstage unless she had something important to tell me. I think my perfect day is about to be destroyed by the ninja. What if Grace says Mum wants to go straight home because the weather is getting worse? Or what if Mrs Parfitt has decided to cancel and not told us yet? Worse still, what if a massive bolt of lightning has broken the TV cameras and the crew have suddenly decided to go home? Grace stares at me and pulls a strand of chewing gum from her mouth and winds it around her finger.

  “Why are you here?” I ask.

  “You are not going to believe who is out there!” The chewing gum unravels.

  I’m so open-mouthed I could hold a giant spaghetti hoop between my lips. “You just stick with the slack-jawed idiot impersonation while I carry on talking,” Grace says, putting a finger to my lips. She takes a breath. “Dad is in the audience.”

  There is this strange silence just before my bowels start doing funny things. Most days you don’t notice bowels, but on the odd occasion, like now, they fizz away to remind you that they can easily destroy you. Grace grasps my shoulders and asks me if I heard what she said.

  “Yeah,” I say, letting my eyes grow wide like flying saucers.

  “Yeah? Is that all you can say? Our dad is here in the audience. Right here, right now. It is mental. I’m not going to talk to him. I’m going to snub him if he looks at me. So far he hasn’t clocked us, but when he doe
s he’s getting a dirty look direct from me.” Ninja Grace starts going on about how he is thinner in the flesh and how TV puts ten pounds on you. I’m not listening, to be honest. I’m too busy thinking there’s an astronaut in my stomach and he’s bobbing about in zero gravity.

  Dad is definitely here. It is confirmed. It is S-U-P-E-R-M-A-S-S-I-V-E in capital letters.

  “Snap out of it,” hisses Grace, looking around to see if anyone has noticed her. “I’ve got to go now but I’m warning you not to make a scene. Mum’s pregnant, remember.” She leaves me in a minty fog as she sneaks back out into the ballroom.

  When she’s gone, I edge back to the curtain and look out again. Grace is taking her seat and mouthing rude words at me and just as I’m mouthing something back, Old Elephant Knuckles drags me away from the curtain.

  “If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you…” I’m thinking twice, when Mrs Parfitt says “a million times”. Sadly, teachers aren’t what they used to be, because they cannot tell the difference between two and one million. I think about reminding Mrs Parfitt about hyperbole, but instead I bite my lip a million times (twice) and promise not to go near the curtain again. She tells me that she’s within her rights to stop me taking a bow, but when she hears Kevin shout that his underpants are so wet that they’re going to trip him up she rushes off, muttering about health and safety.

  Less than fifteen minutes later the backstage area is completely deserted, except for Christopher and me and our two guitars. “I like the rain,” I say, my fingers plucking the strings to make them sound like raindrops.

  “Me too,” says Christopher, playing his guitar. “You were right about bringing these.” Music zaps from our fingers like an awesome superpower. Accompanying us, raindrops drum a rhythm against the window and the rumble of thunder acts as a huge crescendo. Angry flashes turn the room negative and another massive rip of thunder tears the night sky apart.