The Seven Rules of Elvira Carr

by Frances Maynard

  We reached the orangutans. Only part of Rojo’s great bulk was visible, dozing in a hammock, but Cinta was sitting near the fence, with Pernama, auburn fur sticking out untidily, round eyes blinking, swinging around her as if she were a tree.

  Charlie stood watching them, smiling. “They look wise.”

  “They are wise.” I’d tried modeling myself on an orangutan, because I’d felt like one, but it hadn’t worked. I wasn’t much good at conversation, but I could talk, and, anyway, there hadn’t been any other humans modeling themselves on orangutans for me to communicate with. The nearest thing was the website for women with my Condition. I looked at Charlie. “They don’t tell each other lies so…so there’s no disappointment.”

  “No.” Charlie stuck his hands in his jeans pockets. “I expect you know where you are with an orangutan.”

  “You’re at Animal Arcadia, at the orangutan enclosure,” I reminded him.

  Charlie knocked his forehead against the fence. “So I am. Come on then, show me where you work.”

  • • •

  Karen was on the phone, sorting out an adoption certificate. I showed Charlie the table where I put the newsletters into envelopes, the pile of donated linen waiting for me to check, and the photos of the two hundred and sixty-three animals on the walls. She put the phone down with a click and a swear word.

  “Hello, Karen.” I pointed to Charlie. “This is my long-lost distant relation.”

  Charlie’s eyes crinkled. “We’re getting less distant, though.” He smiled over at her. “Hi, Karen. I’m Charlie, Ellie’s half brother.”

  Karen smoothed back her crest of sticking-up hair. “Hi, Charlie. It’s great my little NCO’s found some family.”

  Charlie was family, she’d said. I blinked at someone else saying it, out loud, just like that. As if it was normal.

  She got up from behind her desk, something she rarely did, to chat with Charlie about ecology and species preservation, while I tested myself against the animal photos, matching all but two to their names.

  Karen was livelier than usual, and she and Charlie found a lot of things to talk about before the phone rang again and she had to go back to her desk.

  • • •

  I said the same things about Charlie to Paul.

  Paul slapped his open palm against Charlie’s. “High five, bro!”

  Charlie and Paul had a conversation too, one I could join in, because it was about Wildlife Documentaries.

  • • •

  Josh and Shelbie’s car was parked outside Sylvia’s house when Charlie dropped me back home. Shelbie was unfastening Roxanna from her car seat.

  “Hello, Ellie,” Roxanna shouted. “I’ve drawn a picture of Per…Pern.…”

  “Pernama,” I said loudly, but not shouting.

  Shelbie turned around to stare at me through black-lined eyes, then flashed her brilliant white teeth into a smile.

  “I’ve drawn a picture of Pernama wearing a dress.” Roxanna struggled free of her straps. “It’s in my case. I’ll show you.”

  I closed my eyes, shaking my head. When I opened them, Shelbie was staring not at me, but at Charlie. She tossed back her long, dark hair.

  “Hello, Ellie.” She shifted her chewing gum to her other cheek and stuck out her hand, still looking at Charlie. “And hello…?”

  “Charlie. Ellie’s half brother.”

  Shelbie clasped her hands to her chest. It stuck out in two large pointed peaks, and her hands just fit in the gap between. “Oh! It’s like something out of the soaps!” She flapped a hand in front of her face, although it was a cold day. “Sorry! It’s just that I feel things, you know.”

  Roxanna clung to Shelbie’s leg, encased in pale-blue denim like a sausage in its skin, and stared up at Charlie.

  “Hello, Roxanna.” Charlie crouched down to shake her hand. “It’s great you’ve drawn a picture of a monkey.” He got up. “You must be an animal lover like me and Ellie.”

  “Pernama’s an ape, actually, because she’s an orangutan,” I corrected. A lot of people got that wrong.

  Sylvia came straight up to Charlie, her high heels clicking on the pavement, and introduced herself. Her smile was nearly as big as Shelbie’s.

  Trevor loomed behind Sylvia, his arms folded. “Hello, mate. So, you’re Ellie’s brother.” He examined us both from over his horn-rimmed glasses. “I hope you know what you’re letting yourself in for.”

  Sylvia laughed loudly and gave Trevor a little push, and Shelbie’s white teeth flashed again. I stretched my mouth upward.

  “I never wanted to be an only child”—Charlie smiled, looking around at everyone—“so I was thrilled to find a sister.” He looked down at me. “And such a nice one.”

  “That’s lovely, pet.” Sylvia pulled out a tissue from her leopard-skin sleeve.

  I bounced up and down on my toes—I couldn’t stop myself—until Roxanna frowned and said that it was only her that did dancing.

  • • •

  Hello, Charlie.

  I hope you are well.

  I enjoyed going to Animal Arcadia with you.

  I’m glad you met Sylvia and quite glad you met Roxanna.

  Karen in the Adoption Center asked me for your email address. She wants to send you a link to a Tiger Project in India where they rescue Circus Big Cats and give them a proper retirement Abroad where they should be living. She told me to say that she will Facebook you as well.

  I look forward to seeing you again and I hope you have a good Christmas.

  Yours sincerely, Ellie

  Charlie’s email had an e-Christmas card of Father Christmas and some reindeer that really moved. The music to “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” played when I clicked on it.

  Hi, Ells.

  Nice to hear from you so quickly. It was great to meet the clan next door.

  Animal Arcadia and your mates there are ace. It’d be cool if you could give Karen my email address—that Tiger Sanctuary in India sounds really interesting. I’ve always wanted to travel, especially to that part of the world.

  Perhaps we could meet up in January, before I go back to uni, if that’s OK with you? When we do, could I go inside your house? Would you mind? I can’t quite get my head around Dad living there, leading another life there with you. I hope that doesn’t sound crazy. It’s just that seeing it might make it seem more real.

  Till then, Keep Dancing (as they say on Strictly Come Dancing—Mum’s favorite TV program, not mine!) and have a happy, happy Christmas!

  Love from Charlie

  38.

  You just never know with Dad, do you?

  —Charlie Hargreaves (Carr), half brother

  Christmas 2016 was my first as an orphan, half sister, and volunteer. My sessions at Animal Arcadia carried on throughout the holiday because it was open every day except Christmas Day, and I helped out at a special festive Pet Therapy session at Bay View Lodge on December 21. Buster, the Caring Canine, had worn a pointed elf hat and a green coat, and, as Santa’s Little Helper, had delivered small gifts—soap and hankies—to the residents. The guinea pigs hadn’t been in costume, but they’d been given presents of seed sticks wrapped in red tissue paper, which Brenda had opened for them there.

  On Christmas Day itself, I’d lit a candle next to Mother’s jar to keep it company and gone over to Sylvia’s for lunch. I’d only gone to be Polite (Rule One). Roxanna and Shelbie were spending Christmas Day with Shelbie’s father in his caravan in the New Forest, and Josh was taking part in a pretend Viking invasion down at Sandhaven Harbor. I practiced my conversational skills on Katie and her husband and found out that his favorite program was Top Gear. The two little boys were not very good at conversation.

  I’d been glad to come home and watch a Coronation Street festive special in the quiet of the living room. I blew out the candle
first so that Mother would not “see” me watching Lowbrow Television.

  January 1 passed like any other day except that Asda was shut.

  A week later, it was the anniversary of Mother’s stroke. I lit the candle again and stood in front of her jar. Until this day a year ago, Mother had still been in charge. A year ago, I’d still looked up to Father although he was dead. A year ago, I had not even heard of Charlie Hargreaves.

  “Hi, Ells!”

  “Hello.” I opened the front door wide.

  “Bear hug,” he said, wrapping his arms around me.

  I started a small growl in my throat, but there was no answering sound from Charlie, so I stopped. My arms remained stiffly by my sides because I wasn’t expecting the hug.

  “This is weird!”

  We went into the kitchen first. He recognized the photo of himself as a baby next to the spreadsheet on the fridge. After I’d met Charlie for the second time, I’d turned it facing outward again, but I’d partially covered Ms. Katharine Hargreaves with a Sandhaven Council list of recyclable materials. “I’m wearing a tiger onesie! Still my favorite animal twenty years down the line.” When I told him I’d found the photo in Father’s wallet, he gulped and then he got something in his eye, which he had to remove with a piece of paper towel.

  He followed me into the hall, his footsteps slowing. I opened the door of Father’s study. “Fu…flipping heck! Bl… blimming hell!” Charlie stood stock-still. “I can smell him! His cigars.” He reached out, hesitating, to touch one of Father’s books, Parachute Drop to Poitiers by Major B. F. Gibson. It was a spy story, and I imagined it springing from the shelf at Charlie’s touch and bursting open on the floor, spilling out a lie or something secret from between its pages.

  I slapped myself on the wrist, something I’d seen Sylvia do. “Father spent a lot of time in here, reading and smoking and telephoning people,” I told Charlie. When I used to play in the garden, I’d see him through the misted-up study window, leaning back in his chair, a hazy presence like one of Shelbie’s after photos, the telephone to his ear. I frowned, realizing something. “He might have been telephoning your mother.” A picture came of Ms. Katharine Hargreaves, in a fuzzy, pink, hand-knit cardigan and silver dancing shoes, smiling into the phone, a BBC4 program about Ancient Mesopotamia that she was pretending to understand on in the background.

  “Yeah.” Charlie tilted his head to read the book titles. “He did phone Mum a lot. Every Friday night for sure. I remember that. I always wanted to go to the cinema or out for a pizza, but she never would because we had to stay in for that phone call. Mind you, he phoned because she hardly ever saw him.”

  “He didn’t only use the phone on Fridays,” I said. I leaned against Father’s desk, no longer quite so bothered about touching it, watching two magpies squawking and clattering at each other, fluttering their feathers and taking little jumps off the ground. One for sorrow, two for joy. There wasn’t much joy in going over how Father had lied to me.

  Charlie arched an eyebrow. “What was he up to? Who else was he phoning? You just never know with Dad, do you? Come on then, show me the rest of the house. You don’t mind?”

  I shook my head. “It makes his two separate lives more real.” I smoothed down my sweater. “In the end it’s better to know things. Then you know where you are, and you’re not telling lies to yourself.”

  “You’re as wise as an orangutan, Ells.” Charlie put his arm around my shoulders. He moved us toward the stairs, his face set. “I’ve psyched myself up for feeling bad,” he said. “It’s going to be weird seeing what Dad kept secret. After the weirdness we’ll have to compare notes, get things straight in our heads. And feel really bad, probably.”

  Charlie was right. We did feel really bad. But that was later.

  • • •

  “No offense, Ells, but your house looks so different from ours. It’s all vintage. Or, what do they call it? Shabby chic? Like being in a time warp! A museum!” We were back in the study and Charlie waved his hand at the bookshelves. “And this, it’s like a stage set, somehow. Do people even have studies anymore? I’ve got some academic textbooks at home and Mum’s got a few knitting books, but mostly we use our Kindles.”

  I knew what a Kindle was because Karen had one. She read it during her lunch break. I turned around. I was surrounded by books on all sides except for the windows.

  “I like books.” I pressed my lips together. “I like my Mills & Boons.” They were in my bedroom. Three shelves of them in alphabetical order, because Mother hadn’t allowed them in the study.

  Charlie squeezed my shoulder. “It’s what you’re used to, I suppose. My mum’s really modern, but then, well, she’s quite a bit younger than your mum.”

  I raised my chin. “Mother had me late in life.” I nearly added that she hadn’t gone around sharing other women’s husbands. I really wanted to say it, my hands clenched, but it wouldn’t be Polite or Diplomatic.

  “It’s not that I don’t like your house, Ells. It’s just that it doesn’t seem real. I feel as if I’m playing a part in a film here.” He gestured toward the stairs. “And all that dark furniture, that massive wardrobe… Don’t you feel it’s kind of oppressive?”

  “It’s been handed down through generations. Mother was proud of it.” I felt a rush of loyalty.

  “They’re beautiful things”—Charlie nodded—“but not what you’d expect in, well, quite an ordinary suburban house. A lot of your stuff looks like it’s escaped from a stately home.”

  I frowned, thinking about the stately home. Mother had been brought up in a castle, Father said, which might or might not be true. I reached out to touch the back of the little carved chair. If all the furniture was modern, I might disappear. It was part of me. The wardrobe, Mother’s cherub clock, all those things, weren’t alive—I knew that—but they had their own personalities, a sort of role. When I wasn’t there, I worried about them missing me.

  Charlie went on. “I suppose what I expected was a mirror image of my house. That was a bit stupid, since our mothers were really different, by the sound of it.”

  “Mother didn’t look in mirrors much. She said as long as you were clean and tidy and didn’t have spinach sticking to your teeth, anything else was vanity.”

  Charlie laughed. “My mum’s vain then. She’s always doing her hair, trying on clothes.”

  “Charlie,” I said, “talking about the wardrobe reminds me I want to show you something.”

  “It’s not a skeleton, is it, or a mummified corpse, or a stuffed bat?”

  “No.” I stopped in the doorway, staring at him. “It’s none of those things. Why would there be a dead body in Mother’s wardrobe?”

  Charlie put his head in his hands. “Sorry, sorry, sorry! It was just a joke.”

  “It wasn’t very nice. It could give me nightmares.” I shot Charlie a quick frowning glance. “I’ve always hated jokes,” I added, going upstairs.

  I returned with Father’s black leather shoes. “Have a look at these. There’s something strange about them.”

  Charlie laughed. “In this house, even shoes are mysterious.” He felt them carefully. “Expensive leather. Very soft.”

  “Feel inside.” I looked away, then screwed my eyes shut for a moment, remembering the night I’d come across them, the night in the wardrobe. And the time I’d hidden there from Roxanna. Sylvia had said afterward that Roxanna had been frightened I’d completely disappeared.

  Charlie shook the shoe. “Hmm. The inside’s built up.”

  “I thought there might be hidden compartments inside. Secret ones.” I stared at the study carpet, a dark-red Persian design, and bent to pick up a paper clip. “Before I knew about you, I thought Father might have been Away on Secret Government Missions.” I pulled the wire of the paper clip apart. “Spying.”

  Charlie didn’t laugh. “I’m not surprised, Ells. W
hen people don’t tell you stuff, your imagination goes into overdrive. And you were right about what he was doing being secret.” He held up the pair of shoes like a Show-and-Tell at school, only then it would have been a dead frog, or a foreign stamp, or a railway timetable, or Poppy’s alphabetized list of characters from Coronation Street. “Know what? I think they’re ladies’ man shoes. The secret built-up bits were just to make him look taller. Nothing more sinister than that.” Charlie shook his head, a faint smile on his lips. “They must have added about two inches to his height. To his charms.”

  So Father hadn’t been as tall as he’d looked, or felt. I remembered him stooping down to kiss me. Wearing built-up shoes had been another kind of cheating.

  “The old devil, eh?” Charlie stretched his arms above his head and yawned. “One mystery solved, anyway. He certainly was a devil for the ladies. I’ve never said, but I’ve sometimes wondered if Mum was the only one. Besides your mum, of course. I wouldn’t have put it past him to have had a third family somewhere!”

  I put a hand to my mouth. “No! He couldn’t have!”

  My heart began thumping. I turned to look out the study window again, thinking. Charlie had said they hardly ever saw him. We hadn’t seen a great deal of Father either. My hands strayed to the hem of my sweater. There could be more relations out there. I was only just getting used to Charlie. Sharing Father…Dad…with him. Ms. Katharine Hargreaves had been one of Father’s secretaries. Mother had said Father had gone through lots of them. There might be a whole chain of secretaries, all with small children looking like Father, typing, knitting, reading Kindles. Another thought came.

  “Charlie, there were some postcards.” I ran upstairs and brought them down. “This one particularly. From D. It’s signed with a kiss.”

  “Hmm.” Charlie took it, sitting down on Father’s chair. “Let’s think. Well, it’s only from one person, whoever she is. No family mentioned. And there weren’t any other bequests in your mum’s will, were there?”

  “No. And no other photos in his wallet.” I was still holding on to the hem of my sweater.