Attack of the Cupids

by John Dickinson

  Billie was up – unusual that she had managed it before Mum started shouting. She had gone straight into the bathroom, just as Sally was clearing her plate and was ready to go upstairs. Why couldn’t she have come down to get breakfast? But no, she was in the bathroom, and now no one else could get in there until she had finished.

  Sally’s bag was packed. She had done that the evening before – R.E. books, Maths and History, as well as the English for Mr Kingsley. Her games clothes had dried overnight. She folded them and put them in her sports bag. There were no bloodstains on any of them, which was astonishing. Billie’s kit was still hanging on the radiator. It looked as if one of Billie’s sports socks had got lost somewhere in the washing process. Probably it had never made it into the machine in the first place. Mum-and-Billie screaming match, here we come. When Billie managed to get out of the bathroom.

  ‘Right,’ grumbled Greg, passing in the hall below. ‘I’m off. Maybe someone at the office will be pleased to see me.’

  The front door closed behind him.

  She’d be more pleased to see you, thought Sally, if you could be the same for her.

  Here came Mum, climbing the stairs. ‘Isn’t Billie up? I thought I heard her?’

  ‘She’s up all right,’ said Sally. ‘She just can’t get past the mirror.’

  Mum looked at the bathroom door in surprise. She banged on it.

  ‘In a minute,’ came Billie’s voice.

  ‘What’s she doing?’ said Mum.

  ‘Her make-up, at a guess.’

  ‘Billie’s doing make-up?’

  You haven’t spotted a thing, have you? thought Sally. Amazing what grown-ups don’t notice.

  ‘But Billie never makes up!’ said Mum.

  She was this morning. She was making up thoroughly and carefully. And breakfast, sports kit, schoolbags, the whole of the rest of the world, could just wait until she was finished.

  Mum banged on the door again. ‘Billie?’

  ‘In a minute, I said.’

  ‘It’s just that we’re all waiting out here!’

  She had got to the bathroom ten minutes early, Sally calculated. How long could she take over a five-minute job? Fifteen minutes? Twenty? It was ten to eight already.

  ‘I’ll wash my face in the kitchen,’ she said. Makeup would have to wait till she got a moment at school. Teeth, until she got back home again. She’d have all day to decide what Marmite tasted like now. Joy.

  ‘Billie!’ Thump-thump-thump.

  ‘All right! Billie catapulted from the bathroom. At the top of the stairs she looked herself over in the mirror, sideways. Sally saw her frown as she took in the profile (or lack of it) of her chest. Why couldn’t you have a film star’s body parts when you needed them? Too bad, Billie. Find some other way to pull your boy. Preferably without getting the rest of us murdered.

  She hadn’t done a bad job on her face, though.

  She really meant business today.

  ‘Keep still,’ said Windleberry. With a fine brush he dabbed at Muddlespot’s cheek. Once.

  ‘What was that?’ said Muddlespot.

  ‘A dimple,’ Windleberry said. ‘At least, that’s what it will look like.’

  The Inner Sally passed, dressed for school and wiping at her face with a kitchen towel. She glanced at them and frowned. ‘Are you sure that will work?’

  ‘Of course I’m sure,’ said Windleberry. ‘Why shouldn’t it?’

  Because, Muddlespot thought, I am standing in a coat of flesh-coloured paint. Thick flesh-coloured paint. I smell of flesh-coloured paint, I drip flesh-coloured paint, I even sweat flesh-coloured paint. When I move, I’m going to leave flesh-coloured footprints wherever I go. And if I wait till it dries, it’ll start to crack and peel and I’ll look like a walking encyclopedia of flesh-coloured skin diseases.

  ‘Just have faith,’ said Windleberry.

  It was possible, Muddlespot discovered, to be both madly in love with someone and yet to have no faith in them at all.

  ‘This is. Not. Going to work,’ he said.

  ‘Yes it is,’ said Windleberry. ‘Wig.’ He plonked a wig of soft blond curls on Muddlespot’s head.

  ‘How can you be sure?’

  ‘I know them. You don’t.’

  ‘Yeah? And how much do you know, exactly?’

  ‘I was one of them once,’ said Windleberry grimly.

  Muddlespot staggered. He tried to imagine Windleberry in the wayward chubbiness of a cupid’s body. He couldn’t do it. Everything about his hero was neat, crisp, straight lines. The jacket, the bow tie, the squareness of his jaw, the littleness of his mouth, even the cut of his fiery hair. He was a dream of geometry, a mass of powerful rectangles and triangles. His circumference at the shoulder was approximately twice that of his waist, and both were trim.

  ‘You were a cupid?’

  ‘I’m surprised too,’ said Sally.

  ‘The day I left them, I went and locked myself in the Celestial Gym for a hundred years,’ said Windleberry. ‘By the time I walked out, no one recognized me.’

  ‘I bet they didn’t.’ said Sally, open-mouthed. ‘You pumped iron for a hundred years?’

  ‘Iron? No. I started on White Dwarfs and worked up to Black Holes.’

  ‘That’s gotta hurt!’

  ‘The pain did not matter,’ said Windleberry grimly. ‘All it means for us now is that I haven’t the shape to pass for a cupid. And he has.’ He jerked a thumb, square and powerful, at the hapless Muddlespot.

  ‘Some of it anyway,’ he added.

  ‘You’ll have to do something about his tail,’ said Sally.

  ‘I’m going to. Stay still . . .’ He bent down.

  ‘What are you . . . Ow!’ cried Muddlespot. ‘Hey! My tail is part of me! I demand that you show it resp—Ow! What are you doing?’

  ‘All done,’ said Windleberry, rising.

  ‘What did you . . .?’ said Muddlespot pitifully. He looked down.

  It felt as if his tail – his beautiful, long, hairy-tipped tail, which was the pride of any self-respecting demon – had been dragged between his legs, looped once around each thigh and then tied in a tight little bow between his legs with only the tip poking out.

  That was what it felt like. He couldn’t actually see it, because his tummy was in the way.

  Sally could.

  ‘Well,’ she said at last. ‘It’s in the right place, and it’s in roughly the right shape. But do you really think he’ll get away with it?’

  ‘They won’t give it a second glance,’ said Windleberry.

  ‘How can you be sure?’

  ‘They’ll all be averting their eyes.’

  It was half a mile from the Jones house to the gates of Darlington High. It could be done in five minutes. If they ran.

  Aching, sweating, gasping, Sally and Billie pounded into the playground. The bell had gone. The clamour was dying in the classrooms and corridors. Registration was beginning. If you weren’t in your place when your name was called, you got a ‘Late’. Last year Billie had clocked up thirty-four ‘Lates’ in two and a half terms, which was a school record. After that Mum had made her rule about the twins leaving the house together, since when Billie had been on time (just about) every morning and both girls were a lot fitter than they otherwise would have been.

  Half a mile, with a ton of books and a sack of PE kit. You try it sometime.

  They had made it, just. The last pupils were still hurrying down the corridors. Charlie B was still leaning by the lockers, finishing his breakfast (a kebab of some kind). Sally and Billie slung their P.E. bags onto the top of their lockers and scuttled for the classroom door.

  Wham! The way was blocked by a wall of school uniforms. Quite a high wall too. Cassie, Viola and Imogen weren’t really twice as tall as the twins, but this morning they looked it.

  ‘All right,’ said Cassie. ‘Where is it?’

  The twins looked up at them.

  ‘Imogen’s oboe,’ said Cassie. ‘Where have you
put it?’

  ‘Put it?’

  ‘It was there last night,’ said Cassie. ‘It’s gone this morning. Someone’s taken it. And who might that have been?’

  ‘Must have been whoever took the shin pads yesterday,’ growled Billie.

  ‘That is not funny,’ said Cassie.

  There was an air of cold fury about Cassie and Viola that was worse, if anything, than the very worst they had looked the day before. Imogen was glaring like the others, but there was something trembly about her glare that made it look as if she was about to burst into tears. She was a shade paler than she should have been.

  Stealing boyfriends was one thing, their looks said. Putting dead mice in a girl’s bag, OK. But walk off with an oboe . . .

  ‘She’s got her Grade Five this afternoon,’ said Cassie. ‘I suppose you’ll tell us you didn’t know.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Sally.

  Oh.

  How do you get at a girl you really want to hurt? Pick something that matters and spoil it. Nothing mattered as much in Imogen’s family as music. They spent hours at it. She and her brothers were ticking off their exams one after the other. Grade 4, Grade 5, Grade 6. There’d be a Music Diploma too, at some point, But the thing about exams was, you don’t just have to be good at it. You have to be in the right place, and the right time. With your music. And your instrument.

  Ameena had been right. The assassins had closed in.

  ‘It wasn’t us,’ said Sally. ‘We’ve just got here.’

  The three looked down at the twins. At their flushed faces, heavy breathing, shirts that had come untucked during the run from home. It was obvious that she was telling the truth.

  ‘We’ll all get “Lates”, standing around like this,’ Sally pleaded.

  ‘Then let’s do that, shall we?’ said Cassie.

  ‘We’ll say we were looking for the oboe,’ said Viola. ‘And you were helping us.’

  ‘I can’t do it!’ cried Muddlespot.

  ‘Yes you can,’ said Windleberry.

  ‘Just go!’ urged the Inner Sally. ‘Things are getting really bad out there!’

  ‘You don’t understand!’

  They stared at him.

  ‘Look at me!’ Muddlespot cried.

  ‘We are,’ said Sally.

  ‘I mean – I can’t go to Heaven. He can. Maybe you can. But not me! I’m everything that place isn’t. I’m – I’m deceit. I’m foul. I’m pride – and proud of it. I can’t begin to get there! And if I did, it’d kill me, just being there. Anyway, the Fluffies will tear me to pieces!’

  Windleberry looked thoughtful.

  ‘How do you think I’m going to do it?’ Muddlespot pleaded.

  Still Windleberry looked thoughtful.

  ‘There’s a song,’ Sally said, ‘that Mum sings in the shower – Three Steps To Heaven. Step One, you find a boy to love. Step Two, he falls in love with—’

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ said Windleberry. ‘Muddlespot,’ he said. ‘Follow me.’

  Muddlespot teetered on his toes. It was the first time that Windleberry (his beloved and admired Windleberry!) had ever spoken his name. The sound of it shook him to his core. It hauled him forwards. Even as every ounce of his own being hauled him back.

  ‘Follow me,’ said Windleberry. He seemed to be climbing a set of stairs – stairs that had somehow appeared in Sally’s mind. They were ordinary, straight stairs. No gold, no marble, no statues or ornate carvings. Just very, very plain, drudging steps, and each one was a little higher than you could lift your feet with comfort. He was above them now and looking down on the two of them. And his eyes said Follow me.

  Muddlespot knew he could not even put his foot on the first step. If he did, he would be blasted apart from outside and from within. It just Could Not Be.

  And yet . . .

  Something within him pulled upwards. It was like a hook, fastened into his breastbone where that arrow had hit. It was a spark that burned inside him and lifted him as it burned. It wasn’t fire. (He would have been comfortable with fire.) It was colder than the deepest depths of space. And it tugged at him. It tore. His body was fighting it like a fish on a line, and yet like a fish he was being hauled where he would not and could not go. His feet were on the stair. He could not remember putting them there.

  ‘Good luck,’ he heard Sally say. ‘We need it.’

  He took a step upwards. He felt the stairs shudder beneath his feet as if there were a living thing that recoiled at his touch. He felt the fabric of Creation tremble. And still the spark in his breast tugged him upwards, and he seemed to hear a voice whisper Yes. Yes, foul though you are, because of this one thing within you, you may rise. You may. If you can.

  Windleberry was above him. He was taking another step.

  ‘Wait!’ Muddlespot gasped. ‘I’m coming.’

  Love is the reason things happen when they shouldn’t.

  Where is Heaven?

  Up above the clouds? Really?

  Up above the clouds (depending on which clouds you mean) there’s the stratosphere, where the air is so thin and cold that if you jumped into it you’d freeze and burst at the same time. There’s no Heaven there. Try further up.

  In the Van Allen belts maybe, ten thousand kilometres above the Earth’s surface? This far up there’s no atmosphere at all, and enough radiation to fry whatever’s left of you after you’ve done your bursting and freezing.

  Not here either, guv.

  Come on. It looks like it’s further than we thought. Let’s get out beyond the orbit of Mars, out beyond those frozen, gassy monsters that we on our little rock presume to call Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Out to places so far from our sun that it looks like no more than a pinpoint of bright light, to the vast emptiness of the heliosheath that stretches on and on until there’s nothing at all. And then . . .

  Let’s just think about how far it is to the nearest star. The very nearest one. Heaven? Not on this line. Must have got on the wrong train. Go back and take another look at the departure board.

  Don’t look above the altocumulus and the cirrocumulus. Look above the clouds of Want and Desire. Don’t reach for the droplets of water that glisten in the rainbow. Look for the lights of Hope and the colours of Charity. Pass the mists of the Aurora to one side. Rise boldly through the mists of, well, Mystery. There you will find it. The City in the Sky.

  It is vast. It stretches farther than the eye can understand. Its walls are higher than thunderclouds, its towers are of pure light, its domes are of moon-glow, its banners are like comet-trails across the sky. A million, million glittering lamps shine from its windows and battlements. Splendour falls on other walls and lights them with the glory of the setting sun. But this city glows from within, and beside it the Sun itself is the palest candle.

  Cue the trumpets, please.

  I don’t believe it, thought Muddlespot.

  He felt like an ant at the gates of the Taj Mahal.

  I just don’t . . .

  I mean – I knew it was here, but . . .

  It’s even bigger than our place. And a lot more scary.

  ‘Come on,’ muttered Windleberry. ‘Don’t look as though you are with me. Just keep moving in the same direction as I do.’

  The windows in the towers were long, thin and glowing with colour. They looked down upon Muddlespot, blank-eyed, as if they suspected he didn’t belong.

  There was a crowd at the gate. Above the hubbub Muddlespot heard the voices of the angels who receive the souls that come up from below. They had eyes of burning coal and swords of fire, and their song was endless. And there was more than a hint of desperation in it.

  ‘Please wait in line,’ they chanted endlessly. ‘Please do not crowd the tables. Each of you will receive your results. It’s not as though you need to hurry. You’re in Eternity now.’

  ‘Where’s Saint Peter?’ called a voice from the crowd.

  ‘I’m afraid he’s busy at the moment,’ replied an angel. ‘Please do not�
��’

  ‘Then where’s Yama?’ cried another.

  ‘He’s busy too. Please wait until you are asked to come forward—’

  A little beyond the main crush was a line of tables with angels sitting in them. Souls were being waved forward to them one by one.

  ‘Name?’ said the angel at the nearest.

  ‘Er – Jeff Coulsever, it was,’ said the soul.

  ‘Do you know your results?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Your examination results,’ said the angel patiently, holding out an envelope.

  ‘Results?’ said the soul. ‘Look, I’m sorry, I’m new here. I didn’t know . . .’ It opened the envelope nervously. ‘Oh.’

  ‘That’s not a pass mark, I’m afraid,’ said the angel kindly. ‘As things stand, we can’t admit you. Would you like to appeal?’

  The soul was looking through pages and pages of questions and answers. Its face had turned pale. ‘Er . . .’ it said.

  ‘You want to take a few moments to think about it?’ said the angel.

  ‘Er, yes. Yes, please . . .’

  ‘Sure. Come back when you’re ready.’

  ‘Er, thanks.’ The soul turned away. Then it turned back again. ‘Look, I seem to have answered some of these questions before I was three! I don’t even remember—’

  ‘Take your time,’ said the angel. ‘If you’d like a hint, I’d have a close look at questions two thousand to seven thousand – the module on Love. That’s where most appeals get lodged. To tell the truth, there’s a bit of a backlog in the Appeals Board at the moment.’

  ‘This is WRONG!’ cried another soul, pushing forward. ‘This is all wrong! You shouldn’t be here!’

  ‘I shouldn’t be here?’ said the angel.

  ‘None of this should be here! There’s no basis for you in science. You’re a delusion! I shouldn’t have to put up with this. It’s insulting!’

  ‘I see,’ said the angel. ‘And you are . . .?’

  ‘Dead,’ said the soul firmly. ‘My heart has stopped beating, my brain has died, all my crucial bodily functions have ceased. I am a mass of tissues, slowly dissipating back into the carbon cycle. And you do not exist at all!’