by T H Paul
I’d also done it in such a way that for once, Millie was still around me. She wasn’t racing off to some academy for the gifted healer, or anything daft like that. Millie was much the same, really, even somewhat close to me after that. Was she suspicious that I’d made it all up, fearing I’d lead the group against her? I don’t know. All I cared about was the asset she now was to me, the first piece of a future me centred puzzle.
During Penny’s fourteenth and fifteenth years on planet earth, her own internal emotions and moods mirrored those of her home life. Her parents’ constant arguments, their ups and downs, fell in sync with her growingly stronger mood swings, though she did her best to keep the real extent of this side of her from her mother, who never seemed to take her eyes off her daughter, given a chance. She was always watching Penny when she thought Penny didn’t know, which was ironic––Penny would have loved to have had her mother there for her as a fourteen-year-old; however, the drink bottle had robbed Penny of that privilege.
At best, her mother was a spectator, looking in on her teenage daughter’s life as one does from the stadium seating, always at a distance, always thinking they are part of the action but never actually joining in. She was just one of the crowd. Penny felt like the opposing team, standing on hostile soil. She’d always felt that, knowing that in fact, her arrival had been unwanted. Up to that point, Penny had never worked out why. What she could do, the powers she now had, for the first time, started to fill in the blanks. Did they know?
Why take the risk, she told herself for the hundredth time. Why be even more the outcast she already felt, though the truth was, she had freedom. More freedom than most in her class and that was saying something. There were a lot of lowlifes in her measly excuse for a school.
“Talk to me,” Mr Jenkins said after yet another disappointing training session. Penny had messed up all her parts, things didn’t seem to be coming together at all, and she’d stormed out of the dance hall five minutes before the end. Now it was just the two of them, alone, the other girls having got themselves ready, leaving Penny to her thoughts in the corner before tentatively saying goodbye to her and scurrying away.
“I don’t know what to say.” She went silent for a while.
“Here,” he said, pulling out a wrapped gift from a bag he’d been carrying. “It’s for you.”
“What is it?”
“It was a gift for your fifteenth birthday, though you never came around to mine this year as you have in the past, so I saved it.” Going round to Mr Jenkins’ house anymore had been forbidden months ago by Penny’s mother, with no reason ever given for why that had to be. “Go on, open it,” he encouraged.
Penny tore at the wrapping paper, glad for the distraction, happy for the change of focus that only an unexpected gift could do. She opened the box, the clean white material of a new dancing outfit filling her with awe, as she ran her hands across the fabric, the silk-like cloth as if liquid through her fingers. Underneath the leotard was some underwear, which Penny pulled out from the bottom of the box, examining the knickers and bra set.
“I thought it would go well with the new dance-wear,” he said, not looking at Penny at that moment, his eyes on the clothing still being worked through Penny’s fingers.
“Thanks,” she said, throwing it all back into the box together.
“You don’t need to tell your mum about the gift, she’ll only feel she owes me something, and she doesn’t. She won’t understand.”
“It’s okay, I won’t say.” That much was evident as she wasn’t telling her mum anything nowadays, so would add it to the list.
“Very good,” he said, tapping her on the knee with his hand as he stood up, squeezing it before letting go. “Very good. Well, I’ll leave you to it. Would love to see you try it on one day, to see how it looks on you.”
“The leotard, you mean?” Penny said, as her teacher made it to the door.
“Yes,” he replied, with no conviction.
Penny stuffed the new items into her bag, hiding it underneath her dance clothes she’d used earlier, and threw the box and wrapping paper into the bin before she jogged out of the changing room and went to find her mother. Barbara was the last one left in the carpark; the only mother sat there wondering why her daughter was always so slow to go. They hardly said a word to one another. Barbara was doing all this driving back and forth so that her daughter could have her dance lessons so that the potential effects of being an Enchanti could, if possible, be avoided. That was the only reason why she kept up with it, making sure Penny kept moving, kept working out, kept her focus. She just hoped the wild rumours about the teacher were nothing but disgruntled former students, not good enough to carry on and making up lies to cover up their failings.
Still, for all that it put Barbara out, her fifteen-year-old was still clear. She’d been only thirteen herself when it had first happened. Two whole years younger than her daughter now was, and it had been obvious to so many other people in her case that she’d been different. She would surely know, therefore, if Penny was manifesting. She would be able to spot it. While her husband––she could hardly call him that, they’d not slept in the same bed together for ten years despite living under the same roof for that decade––wasn’t holding out much hope on either of them, this was all she had left.
“What’s this?” Barbara screamed later that night, as she collected the dirty washing together. Penny, as always, had failed to clean out her gym bag and inside her mother had found the two leotards, and a new set of underwear, still with the shop’s sales tags. It was the wrong size, too.
Penny froze. She knew instantly the mistake she’d made.
“What?” she replied, regardless, as if there was nothing to discuss.
“Where did you get these?”
“Someone left the leotard in the changing room, and I picked it up so that it wouldn’t get lost.” Barbara threw the white leotard to Penny, her hands holding firmly to the obviously new underwear.
“I’m not talking about the bloody leotard; I’m talking about these. Where did these come from?”
Penny didn’t have an answer, smart or otherwise, that came to mind. Her insides were running laps, it seemed, her special powers as present as ever. Make mum forget all this. Make mum not be able to see the underwear.
“Well?”
“Well, what?” Penny said, still willing with all her might inside. Make her forget, make it all go away. Penny’s eyes were focusing on nothing, in particular, her concentration in another place, though it was clear nothing was working, it was all not affecting the woman still standing and gazing at her, mouth now open, the underwear she was holding dropped to the floor suddenly.
“My God, you do have the power, don’t you?”
Penny stood transfixed at what her mother had just said as if a rabbit in the headlights of a speeding HGV, no possible escape, certain death just seconds away.
“I don’t know what you are talking about, mum.”
Barbara swore loudly. “Don’t mum me.” She swore again. “All this time, you’ve been using it, haven’t you? Haven’t you!” She was shouting now. Penny didn’t know what to say; no words seemed suitable, nothing she could say would explain anything, nothing could help. She was lost and exposed.
Barbara walked into the kitchen, opened the cupboard and produced a wine glass. She then bent down to the bottom cupboard––the booze cupboard––and lifted up a bottle of vodka. Penny didn’t know her mother’s drinking habits had moved on from just wine. She’d not noticed the hard stuff before. Barbara poured herself a glass and downed half of it in one go, while silence dominated the room, the only sounds being of glass on glass, bottle to the worktop and her mother’s deep sigh as Barbara pulled the half-full container from her lips, the liquid doing what was intended. She walked into the lounge.
“Follow me,” is all she said, her previous rage seemingly quelled by the drink she’d just had. Penny slowly moved into the lounge too, a few paces behin
d her mother, sitting on the sofa opposite once her mother had taken her usual place.
“Tell me, Penny, tell me finally. I’m right, aren’t I? Can you do things? Impossible stuff?” She took another sip, Penny for all her talents, for all her secrets, lost for what to say, or how to say it. The truth, for Penny especially, had been for so long something she had to hide, something she had to deny. It was her secret, her gift, and no good could come of anyone else knowing, and yet that was now not the case. Her mother knew. “Of course,” her mum said before Penny had answered, her mum sitting back in the sofa, realisation flooding her mind as the vodka thinned her blood. “The Lawrence girl. Abbey. It was you, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” Penny said, quietly. Finally, she’d admitted it, spoken it out, dared to mention it to someone. Anyone would have done, but it now felt right talking about it with her, with her mother. The full comprehension of Penny’s answer seemed to do many things to her mother at that moment. There was relief at being told the truth, understanding that her daughter was honest with her, and an absolute finality as if it only confirmed her deepest fears. That her yes had been anything but good news.
“What it is?” Penny asked, her mother still silent, glass now empty, as she took in the change in her mum’s now pale face.
“It’s nothing, dear.” She stood up quickly, back in the kitchen but talking as she poured another drink, so that Penny just waited, her mother then returning to the sofa mid-sentence, as if her actions of taking more vodka, of leaving the lounge, hadn’t happened at all. “It’s something me and your father have wondered about since the moment you were born. Wondered if you would, in fact, have something different about you. He always knew you would. I still lived in the hope that you wouldn’t.” She was sitting down again now.
“Hope that I wouldn’t? Why?” She waited for her mother to finish the slow sip she’d just taken of the colourless liquid.
“I just didn’t want you to be picked on, not to fit in. I wanted others to like you.”
“Like me?” She’d always felt hated and unwanted by her parents, her mother especially––she just felt abandoned by her father, the bastard––so it felt now rich coming from her own mother’s lips the fact she wanted Penny to be accepted, loved even.
“Darling, what you have is different. It’s hard to fit in.”
“How do you know what I have?”
“I think you know,” and she did. Somehow, as if a faint echo from the ocean floor, Penny sensed something that had always been there, the truth that her mother had been just like her. She also realised why the minor things she’d tried on her mother over the years had never worked, that only something major would. She pushed that thought to one side, for now.
“You were like me when you were younger?”
“Yes, I was.”
6
That day was probably one of the single most defining days of my life, so far, and in regards to my relationship with my mother, arguably the most important. Two days later it would be my father who would have his day, an equally permanent impression that was to change everything for me in much the same way my gift had.
We had talked like we hadn’t talked for years that day on the sofas. It felt incredible at the time like a heavy weight had lifted, though the more we talked, the more depressed my mother seemed. I couldn’t help escape the feeling, even during those initial moments of pouring out my heart, opening up my secret to the woman who bore me, that something was wrong.
Mum was scared.
It was the day after Penny had finally told her mother the truth, a sunny Saturday morning. Penny had woken earlier than normal, freedom and lightness to her spirit that she had never known before. Maybe, finally, everything could be right again at home. She could talk to them both, share this side of her that she’d kept locked away. Maybe there was hope?
As Penny finished breakfast, there was still no sign of her mother––the empty vodka bottles next to the bin telling Penny all she needed to know. It didn’t bother Penny, as she would be spending the day with Millie later anyway, her dance class friend due around within the hour.
Showered and ready, Millie walked up the front driveway right on schedule and Penny had the door open before Millie had had the opportunity to ring. Penny didn’t want the chance that the doorbell would wake her mother. Let the woman sleep it off; she’d had a big shock.
The two friends walked towards town, very little money to spend on, but enough to have some fun. Millie knew a boy who worked at the local cinema who said he’d be able to sneak them both in if they each first kissed him. The girls had laughed together when Millie had tentatively repeated the demand.
“So you did feel better that time?” Millie asked a little while later, the conversation finally landing back to what she most wanted to talk about again.
“When I had a headache, you mean?” Penny knew perfectly well about what her friend was asking.
“Yes.”
“I did, Millie, I really did.”
“It’s just that, mum said, she doesn’t think I have the gift. It’s never worked on anyone else since.”
“Maybe it’s just me then. Maybe it only works on me?” They both laughed and seemed to leave the conversation hanging there for a while, neither then saying anything, both processing their thoughts on the subject, but both would ultimately leave their conclusions unvoiced.
“So what do you want to do today, besides the cinema?” Millie said. They’d agreed to go and catch a film later after Millie decided the boy was cute enough to kiss.
“How much have you got?” The money would always be a limiting factor, but Penny was delighted when Millie produced a ten-pound note from her coat pocket. “Wicked! Where did you get that from?”
“I took it from my dad’s wallet. He had loads in there, for some reason, so I don’t think he’ll miss just one of them, now, do you?” They laughed again.
The rest of the day they spent going in and out of shops, before buying an ice cream from the van that sat on the high street and then chips for lunch from the Fish and Chip shop. The cinema would follow––and a shocker for Penny––as it was classmate Jack Ferguson, the boyfriend of Abbey Lawrence, who was Millie’s connection at the cinema. He didn’t work there, as Penny soon realised––he was just fifteen like she was––but knew how to force a door and had been there waiting for them for about ten minutes Jack said, as he kissed Millie on the lips and then stood to face Penny.
“Well?” he said, a smile just showing behind his otherwise blank expression. Neither had made it clear to Millie that they knew each other. Penny leaned forward to give him her cheek, but he went for her lips instead, kissing her briefly––his breath smelt of popcorn––and Penny was allowed in as well. Both girls smiled at one another. “So what are you watching?” Jack said.
“None of your business,” Penny replied for them both, and they turned, laughing louder than ever and disappeared into the female toilets. Penny had always had a crush on Jack, and despite his recent attachment to Penny’s former best friend Abbey, that crush hadn’t yet gone away.
During the afternoon Penny said goodbye to Millie and walked back home, entering her cul-de-sac and hearing angry exchanges even from that distance. Her parents were at each other again. Her mother was awake, and her father had returned home from whatever business trip had meant he’d stayed away over Friday night. She knew before even getting to the driveway that the argument this time was about her.
“I knew this was going to happen. You should have told Penny years ago!”
“How could I have done that? It would not have made any difference.”
“It might have, you have no idea.” Her father sounded desperate. “There might have been some hope?”
“After all this time, you still believe that? You’ve not lived like that since the day I told you I was pregnant!”
“Because I bloody well knew nothing good would ever come from it. You have to leave. Immediately.”
/> “And abandon her, just like that?”
“Don’t talk like you care for her more than you love a bottle of bloody vodka!”
She slapped Thomas around the face, hard. “How dare you say that to me. Where have you been? It’s been me who has had to raise her, me who has taken the time to drive her to dance lessons, to put up with that pervert Jenkins and despite my reservations, encouraged her to continue with the dancing. What have you done for her? What have you ever done for her?”
There was silence for a moment, so much so that they both heard the front door closing, something Penny had tried to do stealthily, but the sudden break in shouting had caught her out.
“She’s home,” her father could be heard in a much quieter tone, still loud enough for Penny to hear. How she loathed him all the more at that moment.
Penny went straight upstairs. She didn’t speak to either parent for the rest of that day.
Sunday seemed like an entirely different world, the unruffled calm after the previous night’s storm. They were all driving to the countryside, together, the plan was to have a picnic while the weather was still beautiful. Penny couldn’t remember the last time they’d done such a thing, the last time the three of them had done anything together.
They stopped at the supermarket just a few miles from home, Barbara getting out of the car to buy what they needed for the picnic, Thomas staying behind the wheel, with Penny in the back seat. When it was just the two of them, Barbara having disappeared in through the main doors of the shop, Thomas turned around in his seat and spoke to Penny.