Lynne jerks us to a stop as we round the corner by the gym. Jenny is standing with Sonny Rawlins and Fred. They’re all holding cigarettes.
Before I can tug the other two away, Phee marches over. ‘You said you were quitting, Jenny. What are you doing letting these two morons get you started again?’
‘Hey, she’s the one begging fags off us,’ Fred retorts. ‘Maybe she just likes it.’
‘What would a stuck-up swot like you know who’s never even tried one?’ Sonny Rawlins sneers. ‘Come on, I dare you.’
‘Like I care. Why would I want to try something that can give me cancer?’ Phee asks. ‘Come on, Jenny . . .’
‘You scared you’re gonna die from one little puff?’ Fred taunts.
‘Well, delicate little Evie might,’ Sonny Rawlins adds with a snort. ‘Poor baby.’
‘OK,’ I say. ‘Give me one then.’
‘Evie, don’t be stupid,’ Phee says, pulling at my arm. ‘Why would you let him talk you into anything this dumb?’
I shrug. ‘One isn’t going to do me any harm and then I can sneer at him all I like and what’ll he be able to say to that?’ When we went to live with her parents, Fiona soon picked up her mother’s pack-a-day habit. I stole one once, on one of those days when my hands were shaking, just like Fiona’s sometimes did, and I couldn’t stop crying. It didn’t help then, but I am pretty sure that I can at least take a few puffs now without puking, perhaps without even coughing, and won’t that just show Sonny Rawlins.
Jenny shuffles awkwardly on the spot, taking a last drag of her cigarette, then she grinds the butt into the mud, mumbles something under her breath and hurries away.
Phee turns her glare from me to Lynne. ‘Thanks for the help,’ she says.
Lynne raises her hands with a shrug. ‘So I want to see Evie get one over on the little git. So sue me.’
‘Well?’ I say, raising an eyebrow as I hold out a hand.
Sonny Rawlins glares at me while Fred fumbles in his pocket for the packet and reluctantly holds it out to me.
‘Yeah, you can give me one too,’ Lynne says staunchly.
‘Jesus,’ Fred says. ‘Why don’t you just take the whole pack while you’re at it?’
It is Sonny Rawlins who takes out a lighter. He flicks it on, twisting it so that the flame catches my thumb instead of the cigarette.
I jerk my hand away, dropping the unlit cigarette.
‘God, you’re such a jerk,’ Lynne says, snatching the lighter away from him.
Phee gives him a solid shove to the shoulder that pushes him back a pace before he lunges forwards, shouting in her face. ‘You want to try that again, bitch?’
‘What on earth is going on here?’ someone asks.
Already crouched over the fallen cigarette, I snatch it from the mud and palm it, then stuff my hands in my pockets as I stand. I needn’t have bothered with the subterfuge: Mrs Poole’s attention is fixed on the boys, her hand outstretched as Fred slouches forward to hand her the cigarette packet.
‘We were trying to explain to the boys about how it’s probably the smoking that’s stunted their physical and mental development,’ I say, ‘and how they shouldn’t be encouraging other people to end up the same way.’
‘A perfectly reasonable concern for your classmates’ health,’ Mrs Poole says tartly. ‘One that, however tactlessly worded,’ here she turns her glare briefly on me, ‘does not merit violence or swearing in return.’ She looks pointedly down at the butt Sonny Rawlins tried to grind into the mud when she came round the corner. Mumbling under his breath, he picks it up and pushes it into the cigarette packet proffered to receive it.
‘Well, you know how it is. Boys our age, with their hormones running wild, trying to show off to impress the girls,’ Lynne says airily. ‘I don’t suppose they can help it, poor dears.’
‘Though it’s a shame they didn’t think about how unimpressive the smoking’s made their growth. I mean, the three of us are nearly taller than Sonny Rawlins now,’ I add, smiling sweetly.
Mrs Poole, who has said as much about the results of smoking before, gives me a hard look.
Lynne, Phee and I assume bland expressions.
‘Mockery is rarely effective in encouraging people to address their difficulties. And taunting people never makes for attractive behaviour, whatever the provocation,’ Mrs Poole says, looking pointedly at me.
Then suddenly her expression softens, and I can see that’s the end of it: whatever else she was going to say – would have said if it were anyone else – has been washed away by pity. Irritation sparks for a moment, then fades; I may not like being pitied but if it’s actually going to do me some good by getting me – and, by extension, Phee and Lynne – out of trouble, it’s worth putting up with.
‘Now,’ Mrs Poole says, her voice matter-of-fact once more, ‘I’d better not see you girls near any cigarettes again or I’ll start to think it wasn’t just the boys here smoking. As it is, I think you’d better go and spend the rest of your break elsewhere.’
‘Sorry, Mrs Poole,’ we mumble, trying our best to look humble and repentant.
She rolls her eyes, but turns her attention back to the boys. ‘And now we shall have a few words about appropriate language,’ she tells them, ‘before we go and see Mrs Henderson. Which we will be doing,’ she adds, raising her voice over their protests of unfair treatment, ‘since this is far from the first time the two of you have been caught smoking.’
Phee, Lynne and I exchange grins as we hurry away to the girls’ loos, though we make sure to get out of earshot before breaking into giggles.
‘They’re so going to get you for that, Evie!’ Lynne gasps.
‘Me? Why me?’
‘I just backed you up. You’re the one they’re going to want to get even with.’
‘Great.’
Phee grins and tucks her arm through mine. ‘But it was so worth it.’
‘Depends how they get even,’ I say ruefully.
Lynne links arms with me on the other side and, for now, the ribs allow it. ‘Still worth it.’
The garden table is slick underfoot and treacherous. Even the rough flagstones of the patio feel smooth. I keep to the path because the grass is so thickly frosted, every blade sharp-coated with ice, that there is no hope my tracks would vanish by morning.
The berberis is an armoury of silver-green weapons. The acer a marvel of white over red, stepped limbs dripping tiny crystals. The skeleton of the tree glows in the frozen night air as if displaying its soul to the heavens. Beneath, a plant with wide, awkward leaves – probably a weed – looks like folds of lace over silk.
The hoar frost is so thick that the world glows, though the moon is only a thin crescent. Just as deep snowfalls draw in the light and cast it back out tenfold, the frost brings even the deep shadows into half-light. But unlike the snow the frost has robbed everything of colour. No late-falling orange pyracantha berries peek out of the fur of ice. The winter pansies are ghostly, hinting only faintly of mauve where, earlier today, they were imperial purple: a wine-dark colour thick and heavy enough to drown in. Now everything is shaded in grey and silver and white. But with it the world sparkles. As I walk, diamond-flashes catch off the newly strange plants in the beds, curled over in furious rigour from the cold. The nude tree branches glimmer with the sharp sheen of sheet metal.
The cold prickles and scratches at my face, catches in my throat and chest. My ribs have been aching since the afternoon, the way they always do when the temperature is falling and there is water in the air. Rain, snow or frost: it makes no difference. The damaged bones herald it earlier and surer than any forecast.
But the frosted fens are too beautiful for me to dwell on the pain. The river is dark and free between the banks. The orange glow of a distant streetlight bleeds poison into the night.
And then we are in the fields and the whole world is alight, shimmering. Everything solid has turned to crystal. Even the mud of the path and the black late-autumn mulch
of leaves is purified, rarefied. I crouch to look at the delicate filigree of a crystallised fern.
The last tall-standing grasses are planted sword blades. I lift my finger to trace a knife-sharp edge. The ice stings my fingertip and then suddenly there is a little circle of gold in the midst of the grey and silver as a tiny droplet of water rolls downwards.
The Dragon and I don’t speak as we examine ice-furred bramble-leaves cloaking barbed-wire vines. Tiny mirrors of ice crack, splintering into wicked shards beneath my feet.
In all the nights we have walked, this is the one that the Dragon belongs to. Or which belongs to the Dragon. This enchantment of ice and crystal. Of glowing things and strangeness. As if time has frozen, and all the magic beneath the everyday world of mud and slow water is finally revealed, uncloaked beneath the cold light of the stars.
The Dragon is suddenly rigid: muscles locked with intent. It takes me longer to see it: something ghostly approaching across the fields. The Dragon tracks its progress, turning its head in so smooth and controlled a motion that it seems half-fixed into carved bone once more. But then its tail starts to twitch back and forth and, for a moment, I wonder if it is going to leap into the air and fell the approaching creature.
This is not the type of prey I hunt, the Dragon tells me.
I realise what it is just as it swoops into a dive, thick legs extended, claws outstretched. The owl draws the mouse in and sails away. In my palm, the Dragon purrs with the thrill of power and the delight of dominion over this wide, strange world of ice. And I thrill with it for in my palm I hold all the power that anyone could ever need: power that is bound to me not by blood, but by bone.
My eyes ache with the cold, but I try not to blink as I stare around, trying to fix the vision of the hoar-frosted fens in my mind and, with it, this terrifying and wonderful feeling that I will never be helpless again.
I shall make sure of it, the Dragon says. And then we are silent.
We go back the long way tonight, pressing footsteps like bruises into the frost-brittle grass of the golf course until finally we turn on to the blackly glittering footpath by the graveyard wall.
A sudden raucous laugh sends me darting into the shadow of the dry-stone wall. The moss prickles sharply against my fingers as I fumble for purchase to hold myself tight into the lee of the darkness. More laughter. Shouts. A beam of torchlight spears into the branches of the yew tree above me, then dances away.
Someone starts singing in the graveyard. Other voices join in. But it’s not a song to the beauty of the ice. It’s barely a song at all. More like a roar of anger. Of mindless defiance and ready cruelty. A song for drunken men to yell to the streetlights as they stagger home.
I feel a rush of anger, cold and sharp as the ice. Adam is buried somewhere beyond this wall. Adam and Aunt Minnie and Grandad Peter and Nanna Florrie. And there are drunken men shouting and laughing in that place of sadness. I peer over the wall, see dim shapes moving and staggering over the uneven ground.
And then the Dragon is in front of me and saying, No. This is not for us.
And I want to say ‘But’ and invoke the names of Amy and Paul’s family like a spell, but the Dragon breathes warm, moist smoke in my face and I turn away, creeping along, bent over, until I can’t stand the pain the position calls up in my ribs. And then I am running. Running, running, running. Trading hurt for hurt as the air and ice bite sharp and bitter in my chest as if I’m breathing fir needles. I stumble to a halt, bent over the stile to the canal path, and gasp as pain blinds my thoughts.
The Dragon settles on the back of my hand, splayed shaking over the top of the fence post.
Ms Winters is studying me, waiting to see if I’ll decide to fill the silence if she doesn’t speak. I’m not biting today, so I just study her back. But I’ve got no clue what she’s thinking. I don’t recognise the expression on her face at all and wonder what to make of that. Is it a good or a bad thing, this look that I’ve not seen before?
Then Ms Winters’s expression shifts: she’s come to some sort of decision and, sure enough, a moment later she says, ‘You seem happier today, Evie.’
I take a minute to answer, not quite sure what to make of this statement: not sure what sort of response she’s looking for. ‘My ribs don’t hurt all the time and I get to sleep every night,’ I offer. ‘Proper, deep sleep, not just little catnaps where I wake up every time I move. Before, I had maybe one day a month when I really slept, rather than just dozed all night. And now I sleep,’ I say, drawing the word out reverently, ‘and it’s lovely. Why wouldn’t I be happy?’
‘And school?’ Ms Winters asks, and I still can’t tell if the questions are as simple as they seem or if they’re leading somewhere.
‘It’s good,’ I say cautiously. ‘I’m getting back into things. I mean, I’m still sitting and watching during PE, working on that stinking pencil case,’ I say, wrinkling my nose as I think about the number of times I’ve let my concentration wander for a moment and ended up clumsily sticking the blunt needle under a nail. ‘Lynne’s always running by sticking her tongue out at me.’
‘Does it upset you that she’s jealous?’
‘No.’
Ms Winters sighs. She thinks I’m being difficult and maybe I am, but I wish she’d just come clean with what this is all about.
‘What I meant,’ Ms Winters continues, ‘was that it might bother you that Lynne is thinking about not wanting to do sports and being jealous that you aren’t, rather than thinking about the fact that you can’t . . . and why you can’t.’
‘Lynne thinks I broke my ribs in a car crash. Everyone at school thinks that, apart from you and Mrs Henderson, and she only knows because my stupid social worker insisted that my headmistress needed to be told,’ I say, a hint of irritation creeping into my tone.
Not all of it is directed towards the stupid social worker: Ms Winters knows exactly what everyone else at school thinks, so why would she expect me to hold what Lynne doesn’t know against her?
‘Perhaps we should talk about whether you should confide a little in your friends,’ Ms Winters says then, and my heart sinks. ‘You’ve been best friends with Phee and Lynne for almost four years now.’
‘And that means I shouldn’t have any secrets from them?’
‘It’s not so much that you shouldn’t have secrets, Evie, but perhaps you shouldn’t let your close friends believe a lie.’
I roll my eyes, slouching down into my chair. ‘So what if it’s a lie? They don’t need to know the truth. It’s nothing to do with them. The only thing it’ll do is make everything awkward. They’ll be all sorry for me. Even more than they already are. They’ll look at me and all they’ll see is . . .’ I shut my eyes, trying to close out the images that flood across my mind. ‘The first thing they’ll think of every time they see me is all the things I don’t want them to.’
‘I know it might feel that way, Evie, but . . .’
‘What do you think of first when you think of me?’ I snap.
Ms Winters’s face goes blank. ‘That’s different, Evie,’ she says, but I can see that the calm, even tone takes effort. ‘Especially at the moment, when part of what I’m doing here, out of school, is talking with you about your problems. But it’s not always the first thing I think of, you know. Sometimes I think about how nice it is to have a pupil who really loves books the way that I do: sometimes I think about how much I’m looking forward to sharing my favourite books with you, especially the ones you haven’t read before. It almost makes me feel like I’m reading them for the first time all over again.’
I turn my gaze to the window. A robin darts into the pyracantha, tearing away a stem of berries, then flutters off again. ‘Does it really count as a lie when you have to tell people something to explain things but you can’t tell the truth?’
‘Who says you can’t tell the truth?’ Ms Winters asks. My face must have done something peculiar then, because she hurries on, ‘I’m not trying to criticise you, Evie, or call y
ou a liar. I’m just suggesting that you might want to think about telling your closest friends about some of your problems.’
‘It’ll end up all over school.’
Ms Winters frowns. ‘Do you really think Lynne and Phee are so untrustworthy?’
I shake my head, wondering why Ms Winters is being so thick today. ‘They’re fine. They’re just normal. They tell people things. Even secrets. They tell one person and then that person tells one person . . . And how could I blame them? No one wants to hear this stuff. They’ll be upset.’
‘You don’t think it’ll be enough that Phee and Lynne can talk to each other?’
‘They’re normal,’ I say again, and can’t stop it coming out sharp and impatient.
‘What does that mean to you, Evie?’
I roll my eyes and slump lower in the armchair. Surely this is the sort of thing she should be explaining to me, not vice versa.
Today, Ms Winters is the one who fidgets. I outwait her. After a while she sighs, uncrosses her legs, then crosses them the other way. Finally, she sighs again and says, ‘Let’s go back to what we were talking about earlier. The fact that you’re sleeping better, feeling happier, not being in pain. It’s natural that you’ve been focused on those things, but since that’s all in hand I think it would be good to start talking about what your goals are now.’
I frown, still stuck on why she’s so keen on my blabbing my secrets all over the place.
‘OK,’ Ms Winters says, ‘I can see that that’s a pretty broad subject. How about we start by exploring what your general goals are? What do you want to accomplish? Do you have any plans for things you want to do?’
The Bone Dragon Page 10