At least I don’t have to think about my hair any more since I shaved most of it off.
Carrot top.
Ginger Nuts.
Dickhead.
All names I’ve got just for being a redhead, and not just any old ginger, no, a curly haired redhead, at that. Jesus, I grew up looking like an invitation to kick my head in. There are things I could do about it, Rose likes to tell me. She’s desperate to put product on my hair and straighten it. And I’m like, er no. And about every three days or so she offers to dye it black, but again I say no, I’m ginger, OK, deal with it.
Besides, if my hair was black they couldn’t still call me Red, and my nickname is the coolest thing about me.
What I did was to have it cut really short the day before Nai disappeared. Didn’t tell anyone, just went to a barbershop, told them shave it round the sides, long on top, long enough to flop in my eyes and bounce and freak out like mad when I’m sitting on the rig. Mum screamed at me for a solid hour when she saw it. I’m not even joking, she said I looked like I came out of a maximum security prison.
When Dad came in from one of his ‘all night council meetings’, she screamed at him for not screaming at me.
It was worse than when I had my ear pierced four times, so after that I don’t bother telling them about the things I do that help me feel like me. It’s not worth the aggro.
And long before that I had realised that my parents weren’t going to be the ones to save me, fix me or help me. They are both so caught up in their own self-destruction, me and my kid sister Gracie are pretty much nothing more than collateral damage. Once I realised that, life seemed easier, believe it or not.
Sure, it’s hard to ignore that my mother hates me and my dad’s a sleaze. But I give it a good go.
Mirror, Mirror Lyrics
Where Did She Go?
There was always sunshine in her step,
Power in her smile.
She never lived with one regret,
But she only stayed for a while.
Where did she go, the girl I want?
Where did she go, the girl I haunt?
Where did she go, I can’t find her.
But I won’t stop looking, I’ll keep on looking until . . . .
I find out.
2
Rose owns the room, shutting down the pricks that thought they could learn bass in a week with a single death stare.
‘Jesus, Toby, the way you mangled that bass puts me off you for life, mate,’ Rose tells her latest victim. ‘Do you finger your girlfriend like that?’
‘Sorry, mate.’ Leo shrugs. ‘Maybe stick to . . . not playing an instrument?’
As Toby leaves, his pink cheeks blazing, I peer out into the corridor and look at the queue. There is a queue. Once I was that awkward twat in the corner that everyone ignored, and now people are queuing to be in my band. It feels good and bad at the same. Nai helped us build this band, she’s the best songwriter out of all of us, the heart of it all. It was her tunes, her words that made people stop and listen. And now these people are queuing to replace her.
I want this band, I need it. I think that’s what makes me a fucking bastard. They fall one after the other and I watch them go, safe behind my kit until there are only two contenders left.
This girl called Emily, pretty and cool. Not so sexy she might eat you alive, but sexy enough that you could look at her all day long, and dream up poems about her hair and shit.
The second Emily walks in the door, I can tell that Rose is having none of it. She doesn’t have to say anything, you can just see the lightning flash in her eyes. She’s the hot girl in our band, there isn’t room for two.
Which is a shame, because as she starts to play, I can feel that Emily is good, I can sense her moving in close to my rhythm and inserting herself between each beat of my sticks. It feels good, really good, intimate. I find myself meeting her blue eyes and smiling at her – because playing drums is the one time letting a girl know I like them doesn’t make me want to kill myself. She smiles back and before I know it one of my sticks slips out of my hand and clatters to the floor.
‘Sorry love,’ Rose says, not even looking at Emily. ‘Not really working, is it. Nice try though.’
Emily doesn’t react, she just shrugs super cool, smiling at me again before she leaves.
‘I liked her,’ I say. ‘Can’t I have her?’
Rose punches me hard in my bicep, and pain shoots into my shoulder. That girl can hit.
‘Jesus, Rose! Lay off the guns!’
‘They aren’t guns, they’re water pistols more like.’ She shakes her head. ‘Fuck’s sake, Red, keep it in your pants. This isn’t your chance to pull any old slut that walks in.’
‘Emily’s not a slut,’ Leo says. ‘I liked her.’
‘Jesus, you simple-minded fuckheads. Really, all it has to have is tits on it and you’re like sheep.’
Leo and I exchange a glance, repressing a smile.
‘Isn’t that how you basically rule the school?’ Leo mutters and Rose cuffs him across the back of the head.
Next up is Leckraj, this random kid from year eight. He reminds me of me aged thirteen, no idea how to handle the jungle of Thames Comprehensive. His bass is almost bigger than him, but at least he can play up to grade five. Not as well as Emily, nothing like Naomi, but he’ll do. It looks like he’ll have to, because he’s all that’s left.
‘So, Leckraj, I’m going to take you through the bass line for “Head Fuck”, OK? And then . . . ’
‘Kids, can you stop a minute?’
Mr Smith is suddenly in the middle of the room, and he looks like a current of electricity has glued him to the spot, forcing him upright. I’ve never seen an expression like the one on his face right now, like he’s just heard the end of the world is coming. It frightens me. My gut is twisting and churning. This is bad, it’s going to be bad.
No one says anything.
No one has to.
It’s like the air around us thickens and slows time to a standstill, sticky in my lungs. I can’t breathe.
We all know what he’s come to tell us.
‘They’ve found her?’ It’s a whisper that comes from inside me though it sounds like I’m hearing it from light years away.
He nods, unable to look any of us in the eye.
‘Is she . . .?’ Leo this time, eyes fixed hard on Smith, waiting for the axe to fall.
‘She’s . . .’ Mr Smith seems to choke for a second, shaking his head. Finally he looks at us, there are tears in his eyes, his mouth is twisted and it takes me a moment to realise . . .
. . . he’s smiling.
‘She’s alive,’ he says.
3
The world falls from under my feet. For a moment I see her face, the way it was the last time I saw her, and how she smiled, her eyes lit up from the inside, and all I want to do is be with her.
‘Well, where is she, then?’ Words rush out of Rose. ‘We need to go and see her now, right now. Where is she? Is she at home? Here? Is she here?’
‘St Thomas’s,’ Mr Smith says.
‘Shit.’ Rose shakes her head.
‘The hospital? What’s happened to her?’ Me.
‘Did someone hurt her?’ Leo, jaw clenched. ‘Who the fuck hurt her?’
‘Listen . . .’ Mr Smith raises his palms like he’s trying to quieten down a room of rowdy kids. ‘I know this is a lot to take in, that’s why I wanted to make sure that I got to tell you. But I’ve spoken to all of your parents, and they’ve agreed I can take you there now to find out more. But there’s something you have to know.’
‘Where’s she been?’ Rose asks, before he can get another word out. ‘She must have said where she’s been.’
‘Did she say why?’ Leo’s voice is low, full of anger. ‘Did she say why she ran away?’
‘What happened to her?’ Me again. ‘Did she say what happened?’
Mr Smith’s shoulders slump as he sinks down onto the corner of the
platform stage, staring hard at the floor. I can see him figuring out how to say what he has to say next, trying to make sense of it all himself, with every carefully chosen word. He’s trying to protect us. That’s bad.
‘Something . . . something happened to her in the last few hours. Some rivermen found her tangled up in the ropes used to moor the river tour boats around Westminster Bridge. In the water. She was unconscious, breathing but barely. The rope kept her head out of the water . . . but she’s injured, badly. A head injury and . . . no one knows how serious it is yet.’
‘What does that mean?’ Rose takes two steps towards him, so fast that for a moment, I think she’s going to hit him. Slowly he looks up at her, holding her gaze.
‘It means there is a very high chance that she won’t make it.’
From joy to despair in a heartbeat. I see her face again, and wonder how it can be possible to find someone and lose them in the very same moment.
There was this one year when I was ten that I was in hospital so many times, social services came to check up on me. The first time I broke my wrist playing with next-door’s puppy; it jumped up, I fell backwards and hit my hand on a stone flowerpot as I landed. Crack; the sound of it made me throw up. Then I did my ankle playing footie when Kevin Monk came in with a two-footed tackle. That hurt like a mother-fucker. And finally I bruised a couple of ribs when I fell out of a tree, in a dare to see who could get the highest, quickest. Won the dare, though.
Funny thing is, I liked those trips to A&E. I liked the long waits, because it meant either Mum or Dad were sitting next to me, and I got them for however many hours it took to be seen. Even though Dad was always missing something important and Mum, who was pregnant with Gracie, would be uncomfortable and tired, for as long as we were there I had them. They’d really listen to me, and we’d talk, laugh, and they’d let me play games on their phone. After I fell out of the tree, I had to stay in overnight, because they were worried about my head. Mum rented a TV for us to watch and she sat next to me all night, balancing a massive bag of Doritos on her baby bump, holding my hand.
When the social worker came round, they talked to me at the kitchen table with Mum sitting on the edge of her chair, biting her nails. I couldn’t figure out why Mum looked so worried, but I didn’t want her to be, I didn’t like that look on her face. I wanted to make it go away. So I told the woman about each accident, one after the other, in great detail; dog, football, tree. And then I had to tell her again, and one more time while Mum was out of the room before she finally packed up and left.
‘What are you like?’ Mum had said, when she’d come back in, putting her hand on the top of my head, running her fingers through my hair. ‘My little daredevil.’
She made me a hot chocolate with marshmallows and I remember sitting at the table, wondering what it was that I’d done right.
The last time I was here was when Gracie was born; Dad leading us through a maze of corridors into a room full of curtains where Mum was sitting on the edge of her trolley bed with my tiny crimson little sister screeching her lungs out. When I’m really down I think of that day, the four of us round the bed, a unit. A family, the smell of Gracie’s hair, the smile on Dad’s face. The way Mum looked so tired and so happy. I always think of that day, because that’s the last time I remember feeling like a family.
Yeah, that was the last time.
As we follow Mr Smith through the hospital, it all slides past like some low-tech VR, the shiny floors and long corridors. Something sharp scents the air, catching the back of my throat. The silence in the lift, the sound of our rubber soles squeaking when we walk, the flickering lights overhead.
And then there is a room, and we know our best friend is in it. And maybe she is dying.
Standing outside the room, I see Nai’s mum and dad, arms wrapped around each other, heads buried in the other’s neck. I see Nai’s mum clawing fistfuls of her husband’s shirt, like she’s afraid that if she lets go she will drown.
‘Mrs Demir?’ It’s Rose that steps forward leaving Mr Smith standing by the lift. Normally we’d just call them Max and Jackie, but in this moment it doesn’t seem right somehow.
The second that Nai’s mum sees Rose, she reaches out to her, pulling her into the middle of their embrace. Leo and I follow, one after the other, our arms around the people who always let us into their home at all hours and never made us feel unwanted or unwelcome.
I’m lost for a moment in the dark, hot embrace of people, gluing my eyes shut against the threat of tears, determined not to let anyone see how scared I am. Then the moment disintegrates as we let go of each other, and I’m blinking under the strip lights again.
‘How is she?’ Mr Smith has been standing a few steps away from the five of us, watching.
Jackie shakes her head and Max turns to the window, looking through the slatted blinds at the person lying perfectly still on a bed. I’m used to seeing Max full of laughter, dark eyes sparkling, belly shaking, always another terrible joke on the way. To see him like this, shadows in the hollows of his face, thin and weak; it’s hard to look at.
I feel like I should go over and stand next to him, but I can’t, I’m afraid. Afraid of what I will see.
A head injury, what does that mean? Will she look different, will there be blood? Nai and I, when it was just us two, would find the worst possible horror movie on Netflix, chainsawing slashers and vengeful demons, the bloodier the better. But this is real. This is horror. And it scares the fuck out of me.
I keep my eyes fixed on Jackie, her banana-yellow dyed hair with the deep dark roots, her long thin arms, and skinny legs in skinny jeans, dressing like a kid twenty years younger than her, something that always drives Nai mad. My mum thinks Jackie is trash, but then again she thinks that about me, too.
‘Did she talk to you yet?’ Rose is holding Jackie’s hand. ‘Did she wake up?’
‘Max,’ Jackie whispers to her husband, who shakes his head, reaching out for a passing medic.
‘Doctor?’
A woman in a white coat stops, frowning at us.
‘These are my daughter’s friends, really more like her family. Will you explain what’s happening to them please? I’m still not sure I understand myself.’
The doctor presses her lips together thinly, showing just a trace of impatience, but folds her hands together and starts talking.
‘Naomi was discovered by a tugboat crew on the Thames, caught up in some mooring ropes . . .’
‘Only a few minutes from home.’ Rose looks at Leo. ‘She was nearly home. Did she fall?’
‘It’s not clear how she got in the water, only that the moorings she became caught up in probably saved her from drowning, her head trauma certainly would have rendered her unconscious. That, and the severe cold from the night in the water, are factors that have contributed to her surviving so far. So we are warming her up, very slowly, and we are keeping her in a medical coma while we monitor her brain for swelling and bleeding. We should know more tomorrow.’
Any moment I expect to get it, to understand that this is really happening, but that moment doesn’t seem to come and it all feels like make-believe.
‘I mean it’s bad, but she’ll be OK, right? I mean she will be OK?’ Leo asks, with a sharp edge of anger. The doctor hesitates, maybe worried about answering honestly, upsetting this kid who is six feet tall and properly built. Leo can be scary sometimes.
‘We don’t know . . .’ she says slowly. ‘It’s a miracle that she survived any time at all in the water, that the blow to her head didn’t kill her outright. She’s a fighter, she has to be, that’s why she’s here now. She’s getting the best possible care.’
‘Can we see her?’ Rose asks. ‘Please, I want to see her.’
The doctor looks at Max, who nods his permission.
She scans each of our faces, and I hope she might say no. But she doesn’t.
‘OK, one at a time, three minutes each. No more.’
‘We should talk to h
er, right?’ Rose asks as Max holds the door open for her. ‘Because that might wake her up. On TV they say the people in comas can hear you talking to them.’
‘Well, this is a medically induced coma.’
‘A what?’ Rose frowns.
‘We’ve sedated her and intubated her to give her body a chance to heal and recover from everything she’s been through. Talking to her won’t wake her up, but there’s every chance she might hear you so . . . why not.’ The doctor smiles briefly. Squaring her shoulders Rose goes into the room, softly closing the door behind her.
‘We need to make some calls, will you kids be OK?’ Jackie asks kindly. Her mascara has run into the creases around her eyes, making tracks down her face. I nod.
‘Will you be?’ I ask her.
‘Honestly, Red.’ Her eyes fill with tears as she tries to smile for my sake. ‘I don’t know.’
As we wait outside Mr Smith finally moves himself from the spot he’s taken up by the lift and crosses over to the window that looks into Nai’s room. Peering through the gaps in the blind, the afternoon sun slashes bars of shadow across his face. I still can’t bring myself to look at Nai, so I look at him instead. His face is familiar, a safe place.
‘Does she look bad?’ I say.
‘You know I never lie to my students, Red. Right?’ he says.
I nod.
‘She looks bad.’ He nods in the direction of Naomi. ‘I think . . . I think Rose needs you.’
When I finally make myself look through the window I see Rose, her fists clenched to her face, eyes wide; her body visibly shaking as she stares at the figure in the bed. Before I know it I’m in the room, grabbing her wrist, pulling her towards the door.
‘No, no, no,’ she fights against me, snatching her hand away. ‘No. We can’t leave her here, alone. I’m not leaving her alone. Look at her, Red. She can’t be alone.’
‘Rose, come on,’ I say. ‘We aren’t helping her if we freak out.’
‘Look at her!’ Rose demands.
I look. I see her face swollen, purple and grey. And now I can’t stop looking because this face is so different from the one I know so well. It’s hard to believe she is the same person. There’s a dressing that encircles her head, and every trace of her long dark hair is gone. Another bandage is bound diagonally across her face, traces of red seeping through. Bruises blacken and discolour her skin wherever it is visible, one eye swollen shut, the other concealed under the bandage, her dark sparkling eyes seem blotted out forever. I see the machines, the thick uncomfortable tube that comes from her mouth, twisting the soft smile I remember into a frozen scream. Wires seem to be growing out of her body like she is half-machine, and I get it. I get why Rose wants to stand there and scream her head off. It’s terrifying.
Mirror, Mirror Page 2