Someone Like me

by Lesley Cheetham

  I texted her and told her to ring me immediately when she woke up. Seconds later my phone rang.

  ‘I’ve been up ages,’ she said. ‘Mum’s been hoovering outside my door for the past hour. I am about to kill her. What’s up?’

  ‘I think I saw Michael last night on television.’

  ‘Michael?’

  ‘My so called father.’

  ‘What do you mean he was on television?’

  ‘It’s beyond complicated,’ I said. ‘I wish I didn’t have to tell you over the phone.’

  ‘The holidays will be here soon enough,’ she said. ‘I break up a week before you, remember. Only one week to go for me.’

  ‘You won’t believe what Mum’s trying to make me do. She’s got to work in New York and is trying to get me to stay with one of her friends. Can you imagine?’

  I was trying to work out which of Mum’s awful friends she would try and fob me off on. Esme was her best friend, she was OK but she lived with her boyfriend in a tiny flat in Hampstead and I didn’t think she’d want me hanging around cramping her style. Clare was the obvious choice, but she was Mum’s boss so I wasn’t sure whether she would be going with her to New York. The worst-case scenario would be her friend Shona from her Pilates class; she was a health nut, a non-smoking teetotal vegan who never stopped talking about her latest fad.

  ‘Jas! You can come and stay at Mark’s!’

  ‘Do you reckon? That would be amazing!’ Tess had moved away in year seven. Her father had got a job up north and within weeks of telling me, tears streaming down her face that she was leaving, she had gone. Her elder brother had recently moved back down here and I couldn’t wait to spend the summer with her again, just like we used to.

  ‘So come on, tell me about Michael.’

  ‘OK, well you won’t believe this but last night Michael’s picture came up as one of the wanted people on Crimewatch. Apparently he found the body of a teenager but didn’t wait around to give the police his name.’

  I swear I heard her jaw drop open, like they say in books, I really did.

  ‘OMG,’ she said, ‘you mean your dad – Michael – is wanted in relation to a murder?’

  ‘He reported it,’ I said, ‘but whether he had anything to do with the actual crime…’ Jeez! Were we really discussing a murder?

  ‘It can’t possibly be your dad,’ she said, regaining her composure. ‘For a start, how do you know what he looks like? Weren’t you still a baby when he left?’

  ‘Yes, but I’ve got all mum’s photos of him – I took them before she could throw them away. I’ve got quite a few of his things. She doesn’t know I’ve got them. She chucked most of his stuff out apart from a few things which she shoved in the loft. When I was about eight and curious to find out everything I possibly could about him, I went up there and had a look. The photo they showed on screen is identical to the one that I have. I’ll email it to you later. He looks slightly older, but then he would do, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘Well it’s easily sorted – when you show your mum the wanted picture she’ll definitely know whether it’s him or not.’

  ‘Tess,’ I hissed. ‘Mum can never know about this. She’d report him straight away.’

  ‘Well that’s good isn’t it?’

  She didn’t get it at all. ‘Of course it isn’t good, I don’t want her interfering. I need to find out what he is up to.’

  Tess went all serious.

  ‘Jas,’ she said gently, ‘you don’t know anything about this man. He might well be guilty.’

  ‘I know, and if he is then I will have been right about him all along,’ I said. ‘But I need to know. I’m going to find out exactly what kind of person he is. And you are going to help me.’

  CHAPTER 4

  I stared at the now silent phone in my hand, wishing it would come back to life with Tess’s voice. It was still early. Mum wasn’t up and wouldn’t be for hours. A boring Saturday morning stretched ahead of me. Unless… Saturday meant Sadie would be in the café in town. Somehow after following her the first time I was curious to see exactly how far I could go. It wasn’t as if I had anything else to do. I grabbed my coat and headed out of the door.

  She looked at me curiously when I walked in and I put my head down. I didn’t want her to see my tomato cheeks. My heart was fluttering extra fast.

  A peal of laughter made me look over at her table. Two of her friends had just come in. I was feeling a bit conspicuous. Usually I put my hair up under a cap so that she wouldn’t recognise me, but I’d rushed out without thinking. My hair is scarlet red – the exact same colour as Sadie’s. Her hair had been so different to mine and I’d started obsessing about whether it would suit me. I’d taken a photo to the hairdressers and they’d done a really good job matching the shade, and the style was pretty accurate too.

  The two boys who had sat down with her were gazing at her from under their identical hair, swept forward into carefully arranged mops. Their t-shirts and jeans were like a uniform too. Sadie was so popular she made me sick. Her ruby lips were pouting and talking and the boys were hanging onto her every word. Every now and then she picked up her pink phone and tapped away, showing the screen to the boys and laughing. She had her bag at her side, my identical one was on the chair next to me. I hunched down into the armchair. A good detective does not get spotted.

  I kept my head lowered but she was so engrossed with her admirers that there wasn’t much danger of her noticing little old me in the corner. I sighed and looked around the café. The place was livening up now, there was a queue at the counter and the enormous pile of pastel coloured cupcakes had gone down loads since I had last looked. The baristas in their identical black t-shirts and aprons were darting about, conjuring up a hundred different varieties of coffee. Sadie always drank espressos and never ate cakes; she was obsessed with her weight. I couldn’t be bothered with all that. I scooped up the crumbs from the remains of my cake and licked my fingers.

  Sadie and her boys were leaving now. I had no intention of following her today, I was too conspicuous with my hair and bag. I switched on my laptop and opened it up. My Sadie file would distract me. I added the number plate that I had jotted down the other day. So far the facts I had accumulated were:

  Sadie 17

  St Helena’s sixth form year 12 A levels Art French and History

  Lives with mum dad sister Alicia 13 and brother Joshua Boyfriend AJ, 20? Works as a fashion photographer.

  Drives a Porsche registration number T5XQ OLR

  Best friend Madeleine

  Drinks double espresso and vodka and diet coke

  Smokes menthol cigarettes socially

  Favourite designer Stella McCartney

  My Sadie list was growing. The car the other day annoyed me. Who was the driver and what had happened to AJ? I clicked on Sadie’s Facebook page. AJ was still listed as her boyfriend. I opened his picture just for the hell of it. Gorgeous, brown eyes and dark curly hair. Why would she cheat on him? I dragged myself away from AJ and added a description of the car. Red sports car. I googled it to get a name for it. Jeez, cars are boring but detail was crucial to being a good detective. AJ’s Porsche was black and two years old – a gift from his dad when he upgraded his own car. I bet he didn’t know about Mystery Man.

  The tables around me were heaving now and a woman with an extremely loud voice was shouting into her phone. I wondered where Sadie was going on holiday – I was pretty sure about one thing – no way would she be expected to stay with one of her mum’s sad friends for the summer.

  I had first encountered Sadie in the public library in town. I’d done a double take at the sight of such an exotic specimen in the teen zone. Since the library had been done up, it wasn’t such a sad place to hang out in. She was seated at the end terminal staring furiously at the screen. I went and sat down in the space next to her. I had my headphones on, but my music had come to an end. I moved my head around a little; let her think I wasn’t paying attention to her.


  A librarian was walking past with a pile of books and the girl had put her hand in the air and summoned her over.

  ‘Can you help me?’ she asked. Her voice was, as I expected, smooth and refined, a bit plummy. ‘I’m trying to log into my email account and I can’t remember my password.’ The librarian gave her a curious look. ‘It sounds like you need to set a new one. Make sure you choose something you can remember this time.’

  The girl glared at her and typed something into the screen. After a few more minutes and a bit more tapping, she fished a pen out of her bag and jotted something down on an envelope that was lying on the table. It must have worked because after that she started typing furiously. I watched her out of the corner of my eye. Her hair was a brash, unnatural but wonderful shade of red, cut into a severe bob with the straightest fringe I had ever seen and her fingernails matched exactly. She was wearing gorgeous jeans and a black leather jacket. The jeans were Armani and her bag was one I recognised from a magazine. Envy filled every pore of my body. At that moment, a stream of rap blasted from her bag. Now it was the librarian’s turn to glare. Sadie looked at the screen to see who was calling and raised her beautifully neat eyebrows.

  ‘Yeah?’ she breathed, pouting at the screen. ‘You’re joking!’ She stood up abruptly, pressed escape on the keyboard, grabbed hold of her bag and strode out of the door. I too grabbed hold of my jacket with one hand, picking up the envelope she had left on the table with the other. I hesitated for a moment, but this was too good an opportunity to practice at being a detective. I glanced at the front of the envelope before shoving it into my back pocket, grinning. Hello Sadie Delaware, I said to myself. Name and address, email log in details, not bad for a first meeting. I thought back to how I’d felt then, as I hurried after the retreating Sadie, who was tripping down the High Street, phone glued to her ear. Excited.

  CHAPTER 5

  Mum wanted to talk to me, I could tell. She was like an animal, poised for the kill.

  I pretended to study the book balanced on my lap, sipping at my can of coke. I peeked at her out of the corner of my eye. My tall, oh so elegant mother. She was folded neatly behind her huge Apple Mac, all power suit and high heels. She didn’t look like a mum. Real mums wore slippers and slopped about in jumpers and sweat pants. Mum hadn’t been on that particular training course. Gran, on the other hand, was a proper gran with curly grey hair, flowery dresses and she worshipped her only granddaughter. She was actually Michael’s mother, but had been so disgusted with Michael running off like he did that she had taken mum’s side and had very little contact with him. I closed my eyes, trying to shut Gran out of my head. Why did I have to come from the smallest family ever? One girl in my class had seven brothers. I had asked Mum if we could have a pet once and she had suggested a goldfish. Really, a goldfish!

  Mum filed a stray lock of hair behind her ear. Her head trembled slightly as her eyes flew back and forth, taking in the document on screen.

  I know you’re not reading,’ Mum said, swivelling her chair and resting her icy eyes on me.

  ‘Am!’ I said, staring hard at my book. Her stare was

  making me squirm. ‘I’m surprised you noticed. Your work is usually far more important that anything I have to say.’ She stood up from the chair and placed herself onto the sofa next to me.

  ‘Look, I know you’re angry with me but we need to sort this out. I’m sorry I sprung the New York trip on you, but Clare is happy for you to stay there so that’s a weight off my mind.’

  ‘Mum,’ I groaned, ‘I’m not staying with Clare. Jeremy’s a creep.’ I couldn’t stand to look at Clare’s son, let alone share a house with him.

  ‘Oh don’t be ridiculous. He’s a perfectly nice boy, he’s just a bit awkward around girls, that’s all. It’s his age.’

  ‘Perfectly nice,’ I mocked. ‘He’s a pervert.’

  ‘Jasmine stop it. You’re being deliberately difficult as usual.’ I bit down on my lip to stop myself from exploding.

  ‘I’ve got a better idea. Tess says I can stay with her at Mark’s. He’s twenty now, and you’ve always said how much you like him.’

  She narrowed her eyes.

  ‘He’s really responsible, he’s got his own flat and everything!’

  ‘That’s not a bad idea. Let me think about it. Now let me get on with my work.’

  I headed off upstairs. Mum’s bag was in the passage, the evening’s paper sticking out. I took it up to my bedroom with me. I switched my iPod on and turned it up full blast. I’d rather scratch my own eyes out than stay with bossy Clare and creepy Jeremy.

  I lay on the bed and unfolded the paper. Miriam Jackson was on page three. The now familiar picture leapt out at me. I scanned the article, eager to verify what Mum had told me. There it was. Miriam had disappeared at four o’clock on Friday May 26th. The day Mum had met Michael at the station. I opened my laptop and typed map of Keston into the search engine. A colourful square revealed itself bit by bit. I hovered the mouse over it. Map of Keston, Buckinghamshire. I froze on my bed. Mum had said Michael was living there. Amersham, that was it. I opened the map fully and moved it around over the screen. There! Amersham was right next to Keston. I sat back, the thought that it was perfectly possible that Michael had gone to Keston going round in my head. If Michael wanted to see me, this could be a perfect opportunity to find out exactly what he had been up to when Miriam disappeared.

  CHAPTER 6

  Pear Tree House was a series of connected low-level buildings that screamed institution from every brick. Curtain free windows revealed several seemingly empty bedrooms, with two large lounges, mostly full of old people. Rows of chairs faced a huge television screen, which had the volume turned up very loud. One old lady clutched a large clock face to her.

  ‘Three o’clock dearie,’ she said, tilting the clock towards me. I looked away.

  I signed in, then scanned the faces quickly, most of the old people were asleep and there was no sign of Gran. She’d told me she preferred to stay in her room. That was before she’d forgotten who I was.

  A nurse bustled towards me.

  ‘Hello dear,’ she said. ‘Jasmine isn’t it?’ I nodded, hoping this smiley lady was looking after Gran. ‘Margaret isn’t so well today,’ she said, ‘she’s getting frustrated that she can’t remember things. Hopefully you’ll be able to cheer her up.’ My mood dropped a little. Gran’s door was open and I could see her sitting in an armchair, gazing out of the window. She was holding something in her hand. I pulled a smile onto my face and went in.

  ‘Gran,’ I called quietly, not wanted to startle her. She turned her head slowly and gazed at my face. Suddenly a smiled made her face go all crinkly. ‘I was hoping you’d come. Sit down and talk to me. I haven’t spoken to anyone for days.’

  I perched on the edge of the bed, unable to relax. ‘It’s me, Jasmine,’ I said.

  ‘I know dear. Have you been at school today?’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘It’s Sunday, Gran.’ The object on her lap was a photograph, a black and white one. She was clutching it tightly.

  ‘You see there I go again, I don’t know what day it is in here. Every day seems the same. Where am I anyway? Is this my house? I don’t remember inviting all these people in. Its most peculiar.’

  I sighed. ‘It’s where you live now Gran. It’s very nice, lots of people to talk to and you’ve got your own room.’

  She wasn’t listening. She was staring at the photograph.

  ‘Where is he? He said he would come and see me again.’

  ‘Who, Gran?’

  ‘Him, of course.’ She held the photograph out for me to look at, but wouldn’t let go of it. I peered at the couple standing in front of an old fashioned looking car. It was Mum and Michael. I wanted to grab it from her hands and burn the details into my brain. I’d never seen a picture of them looking happy together before.

  ‘Michael,’ she said. ‘Where is he?’ She started to rock backwards and forwards, agitated. Unease sp
read through me.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I babbled. ‘I haven’t seen him for a long time. Mum and Dad got divorced. Don’t you remember?’ I added, forgetting. Duh Jasmine.

  Gran lifted her head away from the photograph and the look she gave me threw a chill right through me. ‘You’re a liar!’ she said.

  ‘Gran! Of course I’m not. How can you say that…?’

  ‘He promised me. He stood right there and he promised. He said he would come back to see me.’

  ‘When was that Gran? When did you see him?’

  ‘The other day. Look.’ She pointed to a glass of yellow tulips on the window sill. ‘He brought me flowers. First time in years a man has given me flowers.’ She laughed to herself. The flowers were fresh, the water clear. A piece of paper was tucked under the vase. I pulled it out. Gran was still chuckling. It was another photograph. I shoved it into my pocket.

  ‘What else did he say, Gran?’

  ‘He said he would be back as soon as he could but he wanted to bring her to see me. I told him no, never.’

  ‘Who did he…?’

  Gran cut me off mid-sentence. ‘How dare you come here without permission? He never could keep a promise. Why did he let you come?’

  ‘Gran, it’s me Jasmine, please…’

  ‘Oh I know who you are,’ she said, nodding slowly. ‘You look like her but I’m not that stupid.’ Her voice had got loud and shrill and I could hear footsteps approaching along the corridor. I stood up. The smiley nurse was no longer smiling. ‘Is everything alright in here? What’s the matter Margaret?’

  ‘This girl says she’s Jasmine. I know who she really is. He knows I don’t want to see her. I told him. I told him not to bring her.’

  The nurse shot me an apologetic glance. ‘I think you’d better go. She gets confused easily. Just go downstairs to the office and wait for me there.’