Frankie & Me

by Marie Yates

  ‘Yeah, in comparison to my grandma’s funeral, you’re the best thing that’s happened over the last couple of weeks.’ I laugh. Thankfully, we are both laughing again, and the awkward silence is behind us.

  Seven

  Back to reality. After the summer holiday I’ve just had, I thought going back to Sixth Form would be a break. I don’t think that anymore.

  This morning, I couldn’t figure out where the annoying tune was coming from. I recognised it, but it had been so long since I last heard it that I had forgotten what it was.

  ‘Turn that bloody alarm off,’ was the morning greeting from Mum who was shouting from downstairs. The smell of burning toast drifted into the room. ‘Will you get up? Have you forgotten where you’re going today?’

  I couldn’t bring myself to shout back down the stairs and the smell of burnt toast wasn’t making me want to join Mum for breakfast. After attempting to wake myself up with a cold shower and then succeeding in waking myself up by stubbing my toe on the bathroom door, I was almost ready.

  I only had two lessons timetabled for the day and even that felt like too much of an effort.

  ‘U up? See ya soon x,’ came the first message of the day from Frankie. That message turbocharged my morning; I was dressed and shovelling cereal before Mum could tell me once more that I was running late.

  ‘Have a good day,’ she shouted. I grabbed my bag and, shutting the front door, started the walk to Sixth Form.

  A text came in from Katie. ‘This is the beginning of the end x.’ We hadn’t seen each other for ages. She had been my lifeline at secondary school and had introduced me to Callie and Maya, who had kept in touch and were really nice to me while I was away with Grandpa. Katie was totally preoccupied with her boyfriend, Cal, so I didn’t know if I would see her today.

  ‘Bring it on x,’ I replied.

  Just as I thought about my friends, my phone went off again in my pocket.

  ‘Back 2 skool, loser. Ready 4 ur tattoo yet? x,’ Callie messaged. Ever since she decided to abandon us at Sixth Form and go to Art College she had been following her dream of becoming a tattoo artist. She was going to be amazing, and I reckoned she’d be world famous, but I was waiting until she’d had a lot more practice before she took the gun to my skin.

  ‘Almost ready, as soon as you win your first award, you can have my arm. x.’

  ‘I don’t wanna do this x,’ was Maya’s plea to the Universe.

  ‘I have cake x,’ I lied, but I knew it would make Maya smile. She was one of the calmest, gentlest people I’d ever met. Hanging out with her made me feel like everything was going to be okay, even when she didn’t say anything, or when she sent messages like that. I knew she would have done all her work and would be at the first lesson five minutes early, no matter what she said.

  Katie was right, it was the beginning of the end. Jane had dropped a few hints about thinking about the future and deciding whether or not I wanted to go to Uni. It was only because of everything that had been going on that she had let it go over the summer. Bang on cue there was the text I knew would come from her: ‘Good luck, kid. Work hard, this is a big year for you. x.’ It wouldn’t be long until she started on her lectures too … ‘You need to think about what you want to do with your life. You’re too smart to stand in your own way. You can be anything you want to be.’ That would be great, if only I knew what I wanted to be. I still thought I wanted to be a Sports Psychologist, but might need to be better at sport … and psychology!

  I was sure I’d figure it out. Today, I just needed to see Frankie, catch up with my friends, and then stay awake for two lessons. That was also the order of priority!

  My heart skipped a beat as I heard, ‘There you are, I’ve been waiting.’ Frankie touched my arm as she said it and my whole body tingled.

  I managed a pathetic, ‘Hey,’ and looked around to see if anyone had noticed that my face had turned bright red. At least, that what it felt like.

  ‘Who are you looking for,’ she asked, and I felt silly.

  ‘Just Maya, we’re meeting up for the lesson,’ I lied. Lying is not something I do well and I was convinced my face was so red that it would blister at any minute.

  ‘Cool, well have fun and I’ll see you in an hour.’

  We both knew that Maya would already be sitting outside the classroom door, which was exactly where I found her two minutes later. We went into class together.

  I was so totally preoccupied I didn’t hear a word that she said. After a whole summer of not seeing her I felt bad, she deserved better than that. I wasn’t going to turn into Katie and ignore my friends because I’d found someone I liked. At least, I didn’t want to turn into Katie.

  Sitting through the hour of psychology with Maya, all I could think about was seeing Frankie at the next lesson. Then, when I got to the next lesson, I felt awkward and wanted to go home.

  Thinking about it now, I can’t spend my final year of Sixth Form like this and I’m pretty sure that Frankie’s getting annoyed with me too. I had no problem talking to her before we said those words. She’s the same person. I’m the same person, and yet everything feels completely different.

  I think my friends know how I feel, but if I talk to them, I’m scared I’ll be talked about. I can’t face another year of people talking behind my back. That final year of secondary school was the worst year ever and I can’t do it again. Maybe things should go back to how they were before that night at the cinema. Life was much simpler then.

  Eight

  ‘That thing is an extension of your hand, do you ever put it down?’ mutters Grandpa.

  I quickly text Frankie to say I’ll be stuck at home all day. ‘I’ve been instructed to be here for dinner x,’ I write.

  ‘Gutted x,’ she replies, and I want to text back ‘me too’, but that would be a lie.

  I was almost relieved when Mum had said that Grandpa was going to be staying for the weekend and she wanted me to spend some time with him. I shouldn’t need an excuse not to see Frankie, should I?

  The fact that Grandpa has started to annoy me after only half an hour this morning almost makes me rethink going out this evening, but I know he’s having a rough time. It must be so hard, losing the person who has been by your side for so many years.

  ‘We need to be patient,’ Mum said earlier, and then screamed into a tea towel. That was after only ten minutes, so I’m doing quite well with my half hour.

  Grandpa isn’t the easiest man to be around and he has a tendency to follow us around, which neither of us are used to.

  I go to join Mum who is making tea in the kitchen and he appears in the doorway. I’m just preparing Reggie’s breakfast when he comments that Reggie doesn’t seem to like him anymore. ‘Let him eat, and then I’m sure he’ll love you again,’ I say with as much patience as I can manage, but sounding a bit snappy.

  ‘All right, I’ll go and be quiet somewhere else,’ he mumbles, and he shuffles off back to the living room. Two minutes later, he’s back. ‘I can’t find the mugs and I’m gasping for a cuppa.’

  I also need to carry a tea towel around with me to scream into. Mum soon finds a reason to ‘pop to the shop’ and I wish I had thought of that. I do have an essay to write.

  ‘Come and sit with me,’ Grandpa says with noticeable sadness in his voice.

  I feel awful. The essay can wait, although it doesn’t take much for me to decide an essay can wait. At least when we are sitting together in the living room he isn’t appearing in doorways. Reggie settles with us, which is a relief as Grandpa doesn’t seem to understand how much sick a dog of his size can create if he plays on a full stomach. Mum has managed the longest ‘pop to the shop’ in the history of ‘popping to the shops’ and I will admit that I’m thinking about Mum owing me a favour or two for babysitting Grandpa because she has bailed out.

  ‘Your grandma was very proud of you, you know.’

  I instantly feel bad about silently listing all the things I am planning to ask M
um for.

  ‘I wish I’d got to know her better. Her friends told me stories about her that made her sound really cool.’

  ‘She would’ve liked to have been described as cool.’ Grandpa laughs. That is the first time I’ve heard him laugh since we found out Grandma had died. ‘She was a trailblazer in her day. A cool trailblazer. All of the things you take for granted, she had to fight for.’

  He doesn’t say that in a patronising way, he says it with pride and he’s right. I have never had to fight to wear trousers! Well, maybe once when Mum tried to make me wear a dress for a wedding, but that’s not really the same thing. The fight hadn’t lasted long. I remember my full-on tantrum being effective and Mum throwing my ‘smart’ trousers on the bed and then trying to find the iron to sort out my ‘smart’ top.

  ‘She had to fight to marry me too.’

  ‘Why? What was wrong with you?’ The words come tumbling out of my mouth before I have a chance to stop them. Luckily, Grandpa laughs.

  ‘I didn’t think there was anything wrong with me and neither did your grandma. Her father didn’t think I was good enough. I was a milkman in the mornings and a window cleaner in the afternoons, trying to save enough money for our first home. He thought she could do better.’

  ‘She probably could have,’ I whisper to Reggie, and Grandpa agrees.

  ‘We made each other laugh, she was my best friend.’ We sit quietly, watching Reggie as he stretches in his sleep and settles against my leg. He is always the perfect distraction and allows us to sit in silence without any awkwardness.

  ‘You remember that, Dani. You can’t go wrong if you marry your best friend, someone who makes you laugh and makes your heart skip a beat every time you see them.’

  My eyes shoot to the floor and my face turns the colour of my strawberry Ribena.

  ‘There’s someone special, isn’t there? If you won’t tell me who it is, I’ll have to ask Reggie, I know you tell him everything.’

  I panic for a second and then remember that my secrets are safe with my boy. Doh! ‘I don’t know, but if I can be as happy as you and Grandma were, then I’ll be lucky.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, good answer. Does that mean you’re not going to tell me who they are?’

  ‘Nope!’

  He said ‘they’. He didn’t say ‘he’ or ‘she’. That’s weird, or is it? I don’t know.

  ‘Well, whoever they are, they’ll be lucky to be with you, and if they ever hurt you, send them my way.’

  That makes me smile. The thought of Grandpa trying to catch Frankie, the superstar runner, when he struggles to get to the kitchen without a rest would be something worth watching.

  ‘Are you two okay?’ Mum says when she finally makes it home. She’s bought cake so all is forgiven.

  ‘Actually, yeah, we’re really good,’ I tell her, and mean it.

  Nine

  After a quiet birthday over the summer in the midst of everything that was going on with Grandma, Mum surprised me this morning. I heard her and Grandpa laughing downstairs which was weird in itself and went downstairs to join them for breakfast.

  ‘We have something to tell you,’ Mum announced as she handed me my mug of tea.

  Why do I always panic when I hear something like that? Even though both Mum and Grandpa were smiling, I still thought I’d done something wrong and was about to get a roasting.

  ‘Your grandma wouldn’t have wanted you to miss out on your birthday because of her,’ said Grandpa as he handed me a card.

  ‘What’s this?’ I asked, even though I could clearly see it was a card. My eyes began to fill up with tears as I saw her writing on the envelope.

  ‘We didn’t give it to you at the time as we wanted you to be in a happier place so you could enjoy it.’

  There was me thinking Grandpa had forgotten my birthday. I knew that he wasn’t in charge of birthdays and that it was Grandma’s job to buy the presents and write the cards. He had said ‘Happy Birthday’ but I knew that Mum had prompted him and I didn’t think much more of it while there were so many other things going on.

  ‘This is something your grandma, and grandpa, wanted to give you for your seventeenth and I couldn’t stop them,’ Mum said, becoming tearful.

  They must have been talking about this before Grandma died. None of them had any idea that I’d be opening the card without Grandma being there to see my reaction. In that moment, I missed her. I really missed her. We all did.

  ‘Open it,’ Mum and Grandpa said in unison.

  ‘YES!’ They were as pleased with my reaction as I was with my present. ‘Driving Lessons!’ I shouted. ‘That’s awesome, thank you so much.’

  ‘Keep reading,’ said Mum impatiently.

  ‘TODAY?’ I reached a pitch that made Reggie tilt his head at almost ninety degrees and then sat staring at the card. Grandma had written that they were paying for a course of driving lessons for me and in Grandpa’s scrawl, below it, was written, ‘The first lesson is booked, so we’ll all be staying off the roads at 3pm today.’

  ‘Your grandpa wanted to be here to wave you off on your first lesson and laugh as you bounce up the road,’ Mum said, beginning to look a little bit nervous.

  ‘Thank you so much, I can’t wait.’ I looked up and mouthed the words, ‘Thank you, Grandma,’ hoping that somehow, she’d know how grateful I was.

  First things first, I wanted to text Frankie. My first thought was that I wanted to tell her my news, but something stopped me. I hadn’t heard from her since yesterday and I still hadn’t replied to her message. Should I tell her or not?

  I raced upstairs for a shower and to get ready for what was turning out to be a much better day than I could have imagined. There was a knock at my bedroom door and Mum came in with a look on her face that meant a ‘serious’ talk was coming.

  ‘It’s okay, I’ll be safe, I won’t crash into a house or drive through a red light,’ I joked.

  ‘Danielle,’ Mum said, and I knew she meant business as I had been fully named. ‘Sit down for a minute.’

  I hadn’t heard that tone of voice in a while, and I knew that we would be talking about something I didn’t want to talk about.

  ‘I spoke to Jane about how to make these lessons as safe as possible for you.’ Yep, here we go. ‘We have arranged for a female instructor as I know that being in a small space with a stranger isn’t easy. You won’t be able to use your phone while you’re driving, but if you feel uncomfortable at any point, just pull over, stop the car and call me.’

  ‘There’s a strong chance you’re over-thinking this,’ I replied, ‘but thanks for booking a female instructor.’

  I hadn’t even thought about it. That had to be progress! I was so excited by the thought of learning to drive I hadn’t thought about being in a car with an instructor or whether that instructor would be a man or a woman. If a man had turned up, I might have freaked out a bit, so I was pleased that it was to be a woman, but I was even more pleased that it hadn’t been the first thought I’d had. A year ago, I think I would have immediately worried about who I was about to get in a car with.

  ‘I’m doing okay, Mum. I’m doing more than okay.’

  Mum hugged me. ‘I’m so proud of you,’ she said, and then quickly added, ‘Please don’t crash.’

  I couldn’t wait any longer, I sent a text to my friends and included Frankie to try to keep things normal between us. ‘Guess who’s going to be behind the wheel and driving around town later today? x.’

  I included Jane in the message and she replied with a picture of a motorbike helmet saying, ‘Your instructor will need one of these, good luck. x.’ How rude!

  I heard from everyone, except Frankie. Not hearing from her was worse than the awkwardness. It was Sunday morning so she was probably running. I hoped that’s what was happening.

  Grandpa took my mind off the lack of text reply by taking me out to his car and talking me through the pedals and the controls. I stalled the car as I turned the key, much to his amusement
. ‘We all have to start somewhere, now, remember what I said about the clutch.’

  I hoped I could drive down the road without stalling the instructor’s car as I would never live it down otherwise.

  Ten

  Finally, this morning, I had a reply from Frankie. ‘Soz, lots of zzzzzz yesterday & feel crappy x.’ She had fallen asleep. She didn’t hate me. She had just fallen asleep.

  She stayed in bed again today so Sixth Form was quiet without her. I didn’t want her to be ill, but having a day where I wasn’t constantly worrying about what to say, what not to say, when I saw her, whether I wanted to see her and whether there was a chance I was overthinking all of it, was actually quite nice.

  I made it through three lessons and remember some of what was said, which is a miracle.

  ‘Have I just seen you write some notes?’ Maya joked, during our first lesson of the day. ‘You’ve put your pen on that piece of paper and written words that are linked to what we’re writing our essay on, are you feeling okay?’

  ‘I need to get myself back on track,’ I admitted. ‘My head’s been all over the place and I’m going to fail if I carry on like this.’

  As I said the words out loud, I realised that I was genuinely at risk of failing. I was behind on all of my work, hadn’t been concentrating, and even though the teachers had been understanding about Grandma and had been patient with me, their patience was understandably wearing thin.

  That thought was backed up as I was packing up my bag to go home. ‘Nice to have you back in the room, Dani,’ my Psychology teacher said.

  Has it been that noticeable that my head has been everywhere except where it needs to be? I don’t want to be that person. I don’t want to fail and I don’t want to get myself into the state I’ve been in before, where there’s so much to do and no time to do it.

  On top of all the work I’m behind on, I haven’t long until my next grading and that’s something I really want to pass. I have been trying to follow Lucy’s advice and practicing for half an hour or so every day. When I say ‘trying’, what that really means is I’ve thought about it and then watched YouTube clips of other people doing their gradings while drinking tea and eating biscuits. I don’t think that’s what Lucy had in mind when she advised me to ‘spend at least thirty minutes a day focusing on your grading’.