by Louisa Reid
‘People will think it’s weird if we drop out just after we’ve started. This is only my third week! And I am learning a lot, I promise. Stuff that’ll be really useful. Imagine how proud you’ll be of me when I get good results!’
He sucks in air between his teeth and thank goodness we’re back at the vicarage before I get myself into any more trouble. I run ahead and upstairs to see Rebecca, who looks glad when I slam in. Her face is still swollen but a bit better than it was, and her smile is more real.
‘Good day?’
‘Yeah, great.’
‘How was the test?’
I wave a hand in dismissal. ‘Flunked it for sure. But I don’t care. Craig was waiting for me this morning.’
‘What?’
‘Yeah, he wanted me to cut school with him.’
‘What?’ Her voice is an octave higher. ‘You didn’t, did you?’
‘Nope. But only because of you.’ I give her a hard look and she nods and sinks back on to her bed.
‘Next time, I’m out of there though, quick as a flash, that I can guarantee. There’s no time to lose, Reb, I mean it. You Know Who followed me home, it’s like he was trailing me or something, and then he started going on at me about college and how girls should just stay at home. All that crap. Anyway, he’s going to try to stop us going. So I need to find a way out, and fast. This is my only chance.’
There’s a long pause which I barely register until she speaks again in a voice so small I hardly hear it.
‘And what about me?’
I exaggerate a huge sigh. Hands on hips, I stand over her.
‘God helps those who help themselves, Rebecca, surely you know that by now?’
She manages a giggle and I sink down beside her.
‘Seriously though, sis, you need to think what you’re going to do. You can’t stay here forever. It’s not safe. He’ll kill you one of these days.’ She grips my wrist tightly.
‘I know. I know. But how can I leave? Where could I go?’
‘Start working on it.’
‘Well, what about with you?’ She sounds tearful. I squeeze her hand gently.
‘That’d be fine with me, Reb, you know that, but I don’t even know how I’m getting out yet, do I? So I can’t make any promises. It’s best if we both have our plans.’
‘Why don’t we leave together? Just run away?’
‘With what money? We’ve got nowhere to go and I don’t want to be some kind of homeless runaway living on the streets. No. We’ve got to have help. You need to start thinking about that.’
‘You don’t have to rely on a boy, you know.’
‘At least it’s a plan. It’s better than nothing.’ I pause and decide to defend myself. ‘And I’m not totally relying on him, I just really like him. OK?’
She shrugs, I know she thinks I’m pathetic but she’s just as bad. She won’t do anything to help herself. But I can’t have her hanging on to me, relying on me. I can’t manage everything for both of us. I can’t even manage just for me, that’s why I need Craig’s help. I’m scared to do it all on my own.
After a while she pipes up, ‘You need me just as much as I need you, you know.’
I don’t bother answering. Just let her see how wrong she is.
Craig’s party is causing me serious worry though. Not only do I have my own twin sister refusing to help me out but I also have my father breathing down my neck, watching me wherever I go. Or if not him, his spies. God knows who he’s got reporting back to him. My teachers? My friends? I wouldn’t put anything past my father. But if I don’t show up I know I’ll have blown it with Craig once and for all.
My mind spins in tiny circles trying to think of a way to go to the party. I get down on my knees to Rebecca but she doesn’t budge. It’s no use trying God, I don’t think he’s listening to us. Like I told Reb, you’ve gotta help yourself.
Maybe I could get Samara to invite me to stay over, then get her mum to phone and speak to my mother and tell her that I’m invited there and staying the night. But I don’t know how to float this idea with Samara and I’m worried about what I might have to say to get her to help. There are way too many things that could go wrong with that plan, she might want to come here or something and no way could that happen.
I speak to Mother on Thursday evening after spending the whole day stressing out over what to do. Saint Roderick’s out at a parish council meeting and there’s no chance he’ll interrupt us. I corner her in the kitchen. She’s wiping round, tidying up, busily distracted as always. It’s cold in the kitchen even though it’s been warm for late September and I shiver. She doesn’t want to sit still and listen to me but I push her into a chair.
‘Look. This is how it is.’ I tower over her and although her eyes look defiant I know I can make her give in. If I didn’t think I could make her help me then there’d be no point even trying.
‘I beg your pardon?’ She crosses her arms. Blinks rapidly.
‘I have to go out on Saturday night. I need you to sort it.’
‘You can’t go out.’
‘Yes, I can. Because if you don’t make this happen then I’m telling.’
‘And what do you mean by that?’ Her sharp eyes open wide and look at me dead on. I know she’s jealous of me, but I’m still her favourite. She wouldn’t give Rebecca the shit off her shoe. Favourite’s the wrong word actually; I’m just the one she hates least. Things might be better between us if he didn’t keep pestering me, I know that’s what winds her up, but it’s not like I encourage him, even if that’s what she thinks. It’s not as bad as when I was younger but there’s something about how he looks at me sometimes that makes me shiver. Even though he never does more than hold my hand or brush my hair, or make me sit on his knee. Yuck. I’m sixteen, not a little dolly. I don’t pull away, that would only make it worse, and I’m never alone with him, Reb makes sure of that.
I go in for the kill.
‘I’ll be letting my teachers, and anyone else who wants to listen, know exactly what goes on in this house.’
Her chin juts out in determination. ‘You wouldn’t dare. Your father will sort you out.’
‘No, he won’t. If you don’t do this for me, then I mean it, I’ll make your life hell.’
She hasn’t got a clue that I’m on the verge of peeing my pants I’m so scared. Blackmail, if that’s what you could call it, is new to me but I’m desperate now and am willing to try anything. In the past I’ve manipulated her just by copying our father, shouting, stamping my foot, giving her the silent treatment or, if that doesn’t work, shoving or pushing her around. I’m bigger than her and I’m stronger. She’s nearly as thin as Rebecca. But I hope I won’t have to resort to that. It makes me feel like him.
‘What do you want me to do?’
She’s given in too quickly and I eye her warily.
‘Make sure he’s looking the other way on Saturday night. Make sure I get in and out without him knowing.’
I wait for her to laugh in my face.
‘How?’ she says finally, her tone derisory.
‘I don’t know. Drink? Have sex? Pray? Whatever it is you two do together. I don’t give a shit.’ I’ve never said things like that to her before. The swearing wasn’t planned but I reckon it added quite nicely to the overall effect. She goes green. ‘Do we have a deal, then?’
Very, very slowly she nods and I step back from her, although she’s in no hurry to rise. If she goes back on our agreement then I’m finished. Surely she can see that. The fact that I’ve trusted her to help me means she has to decide. Me. Or him. That’s the choice.
After that the hours go slowly by. Thanks to Mrs Sparks’ bag of goodies at least I have a half-decent outfit to wear, so I can almost relax about how I’ll look. I nicked a new blusher from the chemist on the way home from school tonight and added it to my stash. Now I have one lip gloss, Mother’s eyeshadow,
the blusher and an old mascara I saw Daisy chuck in the bin in the girls’ loos at school. I went back and fished it out and there’s loads left in it, like I guessed. Daisy has everything and I try not to be jealous or at least not to let her see how much I covet her things. But she’s still not really speaking to me after the whole row about the party invites and I haven’t forgiven her for what she said about Rebecca, so I suppose she’s not my friend any more. I’m guessing she’ll show up anyway, Samara reckons so too; Daisy hates missing out on anything. We’ve been bitching about her a bit but I’m careful not to say too much, just in case. She and Samara have been friends forever and I don’t know if I can trust her really, sometimes people don’t mean what they say.
Craig will be different though. You can tell your boyfriend anything, that’s how it works, and they tell you their secrets too. We’ll do everything together. He’ll be my new best friend and love me more than anyone ever has. It’ll be like one of the books Rebecca reads. Jane Eyre, maybe, but he won’t be blind and I won’t be dull. Still, he’ll love me in that sort of way – passionately, like he’d die for me if he had to. Perhaps we’re more like Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy. Mainly he has to help me get out, that’s what Darcy did, he rescued Elizabeth from her awful family, and Craig can do the same, cos I’m darn sure I can’t do it on my own and Rebecca’s deluded if she thinks we could make it out there together on the strength of a few exams. I mean, I can’t look after myself, let alone her as well. You have to know your limits; without money or qualifications I wouldn’t get further than the next town, he’d chase me down and round me up and bring me back here quick as you like.
Craig’s not a very romantic name. If he were called something like Fitzwilliam or Heathcliff, that would be better. But I’m not so superficial that something like that matters. He’s cool and he’s clever and he likes me. Those are the main things.
Rebecca’s telling me to go to sleep now so I’m going to have to try to nod off, even though these thoughts won’t leave me alone. I ask for a story and she tells the Darcy one again. Bliss.
Rebecca
After
The more hours I worked at the care home, the more I got paid. He couldn’t ask them to pay him on my behalf so I was managing to keep some of my wages hidden. You’d think I would have learnt my lesson, but I wasn’t a good student. Not any more. I’d found something else to be good at, you see. The people at the home were pleased with me, Mrs Sweet said I was a trouper, and I was beginning to realize that I might stand a chance. Like I’d always told Hephzi, we could do it on our own. Granny had said so too and she’d been right. When I made one of the residents grin, or was just in the right place just when I was needed, I knew I’d done well, I knew I wasn’t useless. Big deal, says Hephzi, but it was to me.
I was sure The Father suspected I was saving but so far I was getting away with my little act of rebellion. He’d been drinking more and more and the atmosphere in the vicarage had been as viscous as the glue they used in the home when the residents did craft. Feathers, sequins, felt; I helped them to stick, and I swept the floor when they’d finished. The sight of them sitting in their chairs like a bunch of crazy kings and queens wearing glitter crowns made me smile.
In the morning as I left for work I pulled the door shut behind me and took great gulps of fresh air. The early summer was warm and sweet and I drank it up, running the hundred yards out of the drive and over the road to the home. It felt good to slough off the sticky skin of the vicarage. It felt good to be like a normal person. If I saw Mrs Sparks, I’d wave. The postman said hello to me and grinned. I could almost forget the nightmare I’d left behind me in my room. I tried not to worry about them all, stuck up there, crying and complaining; after all, I’d asked Hephzi to come with me to work and it was her choice to stay behind.
I was getting used to the folks at the care home too; they meant no harm and sometimes, if I waited long enough, one of them might open their eyes and look at me and for a moment I’d see who they might once have been. One old lady who was nearly a hundred had eyes the brightest blue. They shone in her face, sharp, blinking stars, and I knew she was thinking things she couldn’t say. I sat and held her hand whenever I had a minute and she liked it, I could tell. Today I found a pile of books in the day room, someone must have donated them and they’d been plonked on a coffee table, just sitting there doing nothing. They weren’t classics or anything special, but they were books none the less, stories, pages with words. I decided I was going to read them all. Maybe I would read them aloud to my new friend, I thought she might like it.
As I work I make plans. Danny, the chef, always laughs at me and asks me what I’m daydreaming about. The first time he spoke to me I blushed.
‘It’s all right, love, I don’t bite!’
I dropped my eyes and inched away, but every so often I plucked up the courage to stop and talk to him a bit. He listened when I told him about Cyrilla, the blue-eyed lady, and said he would make sure he did her favourite more often. She couldn’t really chew so we had to mash everything up, but I knew she liked his roast beef, roast potatoes and gravy best. She never spat that out.
‘So, what’s a nice young girl doing in a place like this, then?’ Danny asked me as I was helping him with the veg for lunch. Somehow he had engineered it so that I had been moved off toilets and into the kitchen. It took ages, peeling, slicing, chopping, but it was definitely more fun than scrubbing the loos. I shrugged.
‘How old are you, love?’
‘Seventeen.’
‘Well, shouldn’t you be at college or something? My lad, Archie, he’s just turned sixteen now, he’s doing his GCSEs. He’s planning on staying on after, getting some more qualifications. You don’t want to spend your life chopping veg, do you?’
‘No. I don’t.’ I looked guiltily around, hoping no one had heard me. I didn’t want them to think I was being ungrateful.
‘So? Get out there, get yourself to college, find something you like doing and go for it.’
‘I tried. I wasn’t any good.’
‘What at?’
‘Maths.’
He laughed. ‘There’s more to life than Maths, you know.’
‘Not just that. The other kids, the teachers, they didn’t like me. I didn’t fit in.’
‘Look.’ Danny stopped what he was doing and came and stood next to me. I stared into his broad chest. Then he gripped my shoulders so I had to turn my eyes up to his face and meet his gaze. It was incredibly kind.
‘It don’t matter how you look, love. Those kids, they act funny maybe, but you’ve got to give ’em a chance. My youngest, Ben, he’s Down’s. He goes to school and he’s got loads of mates. Don’t give up on your life. All right?’
I felt the tears start to well, and hung my head so he wouldn’t see. If Danny had been my dad then things would have been different. I would have been different.
‘Look,’ he said. ‘It’s a big world out there and this is a small place. Small town, small minds. You can be bigger than this. OK?’ He patted me on my shoulder, kindly, with his big paw. I gave him a smile through the tears, scrubbing my face with the sleeve of my jumper. ‘Now get back to those carrots!’ I smiled again and peeled away.
The next day he invited me to go to his house for lunch, to meet his kids and his wife that Sunday.
‘It’s my day off. Cheryl does a great roast. Come over, she’d love to meet you.’
I didn’t answer. It was my first invitation and what was I supposed to say? I wanted to thank him. But on Sundays I worked at home, there was the church to clean, the services to attend, the washing to do, the prayers to be said. The Mother would never let me off and, well, I wouldn’t even try asking The Father. We hadn’t spoken in over a week and it was better that way. So I just shook my head and he shrugged and tried not to look annoyed. I think I probably drive Danny mad, I bet he tells his wife I’m a wet fish, but I couldn’t explain,
I didn’t have the words.
‘Some other time, then. Let me know.’
I nodded and sloped off to make myself useful somewhere, sinking sands of disappointment clutching at my ankles. That night I lay in bed wondering how I might get to go to Danny’s. Hephzi sniggers. If I couldn’t even pluck up the guts to pay someone a friendly visit then how would I ever leave this place? I told her to be quiet and she says Danny’s a stupid old bastard anyway. I decided I would have to risk it and lie.
Hephzi
Before
Friday I’m in knots, watching for Craig round every corner, in every class. He’s nowhere and the disappointment makes me annoyed when Rebecca pesters me back at the vicarage that night.
‘So you’re really going to go to his party, then?’
‘Yeah.’
I’m hanging out of the window gazing up at the sky. It’s full of stars. The skies here stretch forever; I wonder where he is, under which little piece of heaven. I sigh.
‘What if you get caught?’
I haven’t told her what I said to Mother. I don’t know why, it’s just I need some secrets round here, and anyway I can’t have Rebecca in my head one hundred per cent of the time. We used to tell each other everything but now things are different and she’s going to have to get used to managing without me.
‘Just cover for me, OK?’
I turn to look at her and she draws her knees up under her chin; her pyjamas are too short in the sleeves and legs, she’s all elbows and ankles and that sad face. I sigh again and tut. She gets the message and crawls under her covers.
‘It’ll be fine, I promise. You’re not going to get into any trouble and I’m going to have a great night. Be happy for me, Reb. OK?’
She shrugs from somewhere in the blankets and mutters something I don’t hear. Who cares.
I can’t sleep for worrying though.
About midnight it suddenly occurs to me that Craig might not really be into me after all. I don’t exactly have much experience with these things, maybe I’ve read the signs all wrong, that could easily have happened. I’ll look like a right idiot then. Or it could be a joke, I’ll get there and they’ll all point at me and laugh. I sit up in bed, horrified, and almost shake Rebecca awake to ask her what she thinks. But she’s so still and peaceful for a change that I can’t disturb her. Her nightmares usually keep her up half the night; I can sleep through them, thank goodness. Instead I send myself a message to remember to play it cool, not to seem too desperate and to let him do the chasing. Samara and Daisy laugh at girls who trail after guys – they’re sad, losers, pathetic. I don’t want people saying that about me. Like Samara said: treat ’em mean, keep ’em keen. It’ll be hard though. I just want him to like me.