All of the Above

by Juno Dawson

  Beasley came into the kitchen waving my phone aloft. ‘It’s Polly,’ he said. ‘She wants to speak to you.’

  The knot swelled again and I took the phone. ‘Polly?’

  ‘Hey.’ Her voice was tiny. She sounded like a terrified little girl at the bottom of a well. ‘Can you come over?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Just you. I can’t handle everyone.’

  ‘OK. I’ll come over now. You OK?’

  ‘No. Not really.’

  ‘Sit tight, I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.’ I hung up. ‘She wants me to go over. Just me.’ I inwardly felt quite pleased that she’d selected me to go over, but then hugely awkward the next second. Beasley had known her for a lot longer than I had. ‘Is that OK?’

  Beasley did look disappointed, but none of us were going to squabble today. That would be inappropriate. ‘Yeah. We’ll continue our marathon here. Come back if you want. Bring Polly if she’s up for it.’

  I gave Beasley a bear hug, which he returned. ‘I love you, Martin Beasley.’

  ‘I love you like a fat kid loves cake.’ He stopped. ‘Oh shit, that’s really inappropriate.’

  ‘No. I think that’s OK.’ I still refused to say It’s what Daisy would have wanted.

  I hardly recognised Polly when she opened the front door. She looked seventeen for one thing, which, of course, she was, but I realised I’d never seen her without any make-up on. She looked so young and fresh. Her hair was swept into a top-knot and she still wore her pyjamas. Her eyes were pink raw.

  ‘Come in.’

  I entered the hall. ‘Are you OK?’

  Polly blinked. ‘I was doing OK. I thought my tear reserves had finally run out, but I don’t know if I can talk actually …’ She tried to laugh, but it came out more like a sob.

  ‘Come on, let’s go to your room, OK? We can talk … or not. It doesn’t matter.’ I took Polly’s hand and led her upstairs. The shutters were shut and her usually immaculate bed was a heap of sheets. ‘I’m so sorry, Polly. This … it’s so awful.’

  ‘Don’t …’ Polly managed to say before her face folded in grief. Her hands flew to her face to mask her tears and I took her in my arms. I cocooned her, rubbing her back as she shook with sobs.

  ‘It’s OK,’ I said. ‘It’s OK. Just … cry.’ It figured. Without a filter, Polly Wolff wasn’t especially complicated: when she was angry she was angry, when she was sad she was sad.

  ‘****,’ she said, almost choking. ‘I miss her already.’

  ‘I know. I know. Me too.’

  ‘I can’t even remember what the last ******* thing I said to her after school was. I wasn’t paying attention.’

  ‘I bet it was goodbye,’ I said, my own voice wobbling. ‘I’m sure it was.’

  In the end, Polly cried herself to sleep. She lay in my lap like a cat while I stroked her hair. Her sobs slowed into regular, tidal breaths. In and out, in and out, gradually longer and deeper. The whistle down her nostril said she was calm. Sleepily she rolled off me and I covered her with the faux fur throw at the foot of her bed. I lay alongside her. I suspected that when she woke, the worst of it would be over, like an almighty thunderstorm passing in the night. I didn’t plan on leaving; I wanted to be there for her when she awoke.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Tribute

  We had another day off before returning to school. Our parents offered us more time off, but sitting around and being sad is really hard work. Mourning is actually quite boring and I couldn’t very well watch back-to-back episodes of Friends on Comedy Central, could I? At least school dragged our minds off Daisy. I didn’t want to feel bad about Daisy. I didn’t want her to become a cloud when she’d always been sunshine. I held fast to what Nico had said about wanting Daisy back. This yearning. My blood felt like liquid lead in my veins, slowing me down, every step laboured, but I tried as best I could to ignore it.

  We were never going to ‘get back to normal’, but as I got ready to go to school I was determined to make a new normal.

  Polly only lasted till registration before freaking out. ‘I can’t be here without her. It’s too weird. I’m going to an arcade or something. Coming?’

  ‘No. I want to stay. I want … I like the routine.’

  ‘Fine. I’ll see you later then.’ She didn’t seem cross; she just didn’t want to be in a place filled with memories of her. I let her go.

  If you cast your mind back to my first day at Brompton Cliffs, you’ll remember how much of a big deal a new girl was, so you can only imagine the reaction to a dead girl. We were mobbed on our first morning back. Well-wishers fell over themselves to give us hugs and tell us how sorry they were – and teachers were not exempt from this public outpouring of grief.

  I could have been angry. I could have called these people who taunted and stared at Daisy’s skinny frame hypocrites and two-faced turds, but, as much as I hated it, they meant well. They were sorry. Sorry for our loss and sorry to lose Daisy. She may well have been part of the freak show, but she was a hugely popular attraction at it. It shouldn’t come as a surprise to learn that everyone liked Daisy. She was, after all, lovely.

  ‘This is so weird,’ Beasley said once we’d fended off the Pot-Pourri girls. ‘I feel famous.’

  ‘It’s a shame Daisy isn’t here to see how much everyone loved her.’

  ‘Oh I think she can see.’ Beasley smiled. ‘Not like from heaven, that’s tacky. I mean more like The Exorcist.’

  I laughed because, finally, it was absolutely what Daisy would have wanted. I clung to his hand. We were using each other – propping each other up like a house of cards. When one of us wobbled we borrowed a bit of strength from someone who was doing better, like symbiosis.

  Beasley said, ‘Oh, I should have told Polly …’ We paused outside his next lesson. Other students filed in around us. ‘The funeral is next Monday. They want a quiet family ceremony, but we’re allowed to go. Just the gang.’

  ‘I know it sounds trite, but we were her family.’

  ‘That’s what I told my mum.’

  ‘Have you told the others yet?’ He said he hadn’t. ‘I’ll text them.’

  I made my way to my first lesson – English – arriving after the bell had gone. ‘Sorry I’m late,’ I said as I hurried in.

  ‘That’s OK, Tor. I understand,’ Mr Marshall said, less subtext and more just text.

  Suddenly I stopped. There was an empty desk: one space for me, and one that would be permanently empty. I should have been ready for that. It was the closest I’d come but I still didn’t cry. I told myself to get a grip – I was not going to give my English class a grief performance to talk about at lunchtime. Daisy didn’t die so that I’d have no mates in English. This wasn’t about me. I forced myself to slide under the table. The seat felt cold.

  The day was improved massively by Nico bringing me a bagel for lunch. Sixth-formers were allowed off site so we met on one of the benches overlooking the sea. It was a local suicide spot, but it was also very pretty.

  ‘I got you tuna melt on poppy seed.’

  ‘You are actually the best. Thank you.’

  ‘You’re welcome. How was the first day back?’

  ‘Weird. Like Tim Burton weird.’

  He chuckled – gallows humour is still humour. ‘Yeah. It’s gonna take a while. How’s Polly?’

  ‘She bailed after fifteen minutes.’

  ‘She’s not handling it,’ he stated matter-of-factly.

  ‘She’ll get better. “No pain is forever” – who was it who said that? Euripides?’

  ‘That was Rihanna, babe.’

  I blushed. ‘Oh. Well, it’s still true.’

  ‘I dunno. You’ve met Polly, right? She can hold a grudge like a mothertrucker. She can’t let stuff go.’

  ‘Hmm,’ I mused. He was right, but I didn’t know what to do about it yet.

  ‘Look,’ he said, picking at his own salmon bagel. How sophisticated, I thought, shame it tastes like fish slime. �
��I have to tell you something and you’re not allowed to get cross.’

  ‘OK …’

  ‘You won’t get cross?’

  ‘I’m prepared to say that in order that you tell me …’

  ‘That’ll do. Look, I got your text about the funeral and I can’t go. It’s the day of the meeting with Sony.’ He grimaced.

  ‘What? Just tell them. They’ll reschedule.’

  ‘Babe, I can’t. Unsigned bands don’t tell Sony to wait for them. If they asked us to hand over one testicle each we’d clearly say yes.’

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. This was a Blackmail Bagel, bought to soften me up. But, whatever, it was a no-brainer. Anyone would move the meeting. ‘Nico, it’s Daisy’s funeral. We have to say goodbye to her.’

  ‘I can’t. The timing sucks. I’ll have to say goodbye to her in private some other time. I think that Daisy would –’

  ‘Oh god, please don’t say Daisy would have understood because she bloody would have but that doesn’t make it right.’ I got what he was saying; I just didn’t want him to be saying it. The Nico I wanted would have moved heaven and earth to be at that funeral. To be at my side. Isn’t that what having a boyfriend’s meant to be about? Having someone at your side, someone who’s got your back, without even having to ask?

  ‘I know it’s crappy but there’s nothing I can do. The other guys won’t wait. They’ll go without me and there’s no way, Tor. You saw what happened to Zoë – no one’s irreplaceable. I’m sorry. You understand, right?’

  It was hard to keep the disgust off my face. It was interesting. There was a time, early into my infatuation, when I’d have acquiesced in a heartbeat to please him, but there wasn’t any parallel world out there in which I would prioritise a band over a friend. ‘Yeah, I understand that this band is more important to you than your friends.’

  Nico raised an admittedly still very lovely eyebrow. ‘At the moment, yeah, it probably is. I don’t think you understand how big a deal this is for me.’

  ‘Nico, Daisy died. Did you turn two pages over at once?’

  He started to speak and then stopped himself. ‘You know what? Anything I say right now is going to make me sound like a dick, so I’m not gonna say anything.’

  ‘Yeah, that might be for the best.’ I had a few opinions of my own that were probably best kept in my head.

  He swung his bag onto his shoulder. ‘I’m going back to college. I knew you’d freak out … but this is an impossible situation, Tor. I really need you to be OK with it.’

  ‘Well, I’m not.’

  ‘Will you at least hug me before I go?’ I held out my arms and he embraced me but I felt like I was made out of wooden cubes, all blocky and square and awkward. ‘Please don’t be cross with me.’

  I said nothing, but I couldn’t suppress the red mist I was seeing. My first fight with Nico and it was a really top-notch one. Looking back, with 20/20 hindsight, I’m not sure we ever really recovered from that. Everyone disappoints sooner or later.

  The day of the funeral came around freakishly fast. At the weekend, I was forced to accompany my mum to the Big Shiny Shopping Mall outside town to look for a funeral outfit, despite the fact that literally ninety-five per cent of my clothes were black, with the other five per cent white or grey. Apparently I was to look ‘grown-up and respectful’.

  After schlepping around at least ten shops, we returned to the first item I’d tried on – a simple tailored dress that made me look like a teenage girl masquerading as an executive in a wacky rom-com called Trouble at the Top or something equally banal. I’d fall for my older (but not too old) boss with hilarious consequences.

  If you thought the dress sounded bad, I won’t even mention the shoes. Mum assured me I could wear them if I had to interview for universities. When I wear heels I still walk the way I did when I was five and used to clod-hop around the house in Mum’s shoes. It’s not a good look.

  Mum and Dad came with me on the big day. The service was being held at a Catholic church (who even knew Daisy’s family was Catholic?) and the mourners filed in like stick figures in a gloomy Lowry painting. The sky hung low and white, the church a smudged charcoal etch.

  Doctor Who has ruined churches forever. Weeping Angels EVERYWHERE.

  We shuffled into the chapel and I saw Polly and her family seated near the front, where the pews were full. We had to settle for a space near the back, which Beasley’s mum had saved for us. I liked Beasley’s mum, she was basically him in drag. Polly, seated further towards the altar, turned around to see me. She hadn’t come back to school all week but I’d seen her out of school. She’d dyed her hair a hot fuchsia shade (‘Black hair doesn’t feel like my hair.’) and today she was wearing more make-up than I’d ever seen her in.

  It was almost warpaint.

  Polly, Beasley and I were the only people from school there. Apparently, Mr and Mrs Weekes hadn’t wanted a ‘church full of kids’. I knew, knew, that Daisy would have been as furious as Daisy could feasibly be. She’d have wanted everyone there. She’d have definitely wanted Alice and Alex there. And Freya and Zoë. And Nico.

  I knew I had to let that go, but I couldn’t. Right now he’d be halfway to London. I was still so disappointed.

  I was sat next to Beasley, who looked gorgeous in his suit and tie, like a proper man. I saw it for the first time: Beasley, once he’d come out the other end of the puberty tunnel, was going to be so handsome. He just needed a beard or some stubble and he’d be what I believe is known as ‘a cub’.

  The service was:

  1. Endless. I swear I physically aged while sitting in that church.

  2. Chock-full of hymns. Not even the catchy ones.

  3. Rich in God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit and Heaven, none of which Daisy had ever mentioned.

  4. Nothing like Daisy at all.

  The result being that the service was oddly unmoving. I was bored numb. The priest said words but none of them spoke of the Daisy we knew. He could have been talking about anyone, literally anyone. Oh, don’t you worry, the TRAGEDY of YOUTH being CRUELLY SNATCHED was hit home, but this was some faceless, production-line sentiment.

  I held Beasley’s hand throughout, but I could sense his boredom too. At one point, when the priest mentioned Daisy ‘sitting on God’s lap’, Polly actually turned around and rolled her eyes. It was good. That felt like Polly coming back to me.

  One thing got me. As we exited the church we had to join a grim procession past the coffin in a morbid public expression of farewell. It was like a soul train of death. Say bye to the box. It was a shiny ivory colour with gold handles and covered in white and pink flowers. It was more than a little Barbie Dream Coffin™. As stupid as it was, as I got closer, it hit home that the pathetically small box contained Daisy. I hated it. How could that thing contain everything that was her? She was supposed to be free now, not in a horrid shoebox.

  It made me angry. My head spun a little and my legs went rubbery. Polly appeared at my side in the nick of time and steadied me. ‘You OK?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Let’s get the **** away from here.’

  ‘Yes please.’

  I told my mum that I couldn’t face the wake back at Daisy’s house and, to be honest, we didn’t feel all that welcome. I knew I couldn’t even begin to understand what Daisy’s mum and dad and brother were going through. This was their time, their loss. As much as we felt like Daisy was ours, she was theirs really. What were we going to do? Run up to them and say they’d got the funeral all wrong? Hardly.

  Perhaps it was best to leave them to it, and we’d mourn our version of Daisy in our own way. ‘Where are we going?’ I asked Polly. Beasley trailed after us and we stormed away from the church.

  ‘Alex texted. He said to meet them at Fantasyland.’

  ‘What, now?’

  ‘Yeah. He said to come quickly. Sounds urgent.’

  ‘But it’s all locked up.’

  It wasn’t though. We followed Alex
’s instructions and found a section of the chain-link fence at the back of the course had been prised open.

  ‘What the ****?’

  ‘We are going to be in so much trouble! This is trespassing.’ Beasley went chalky white.

  ‘Beasley, for once in your life, woman up!’ Polly slipped through the opening and I followed. We had to push our way through shrubbery and a sea of litter and an elephant graveyard of lost golf balls, but we stumbled through onto the course.

  It didn’t take long to see what we’d been summoned to. There was a crowd of people gathered around Hole 4. The Disapproving Seal.

  Daisy’s favourite.

  Saying nothing at all, Polly took my hand and I took Beasley’s. We made our way over. The whole year seemed to be there. The Pot-Pourri girls, the meatheads, the music crowd, the theatre lot, Zoë, Freya. Everyone. Alice and Alex stood closest to the sad-looking seal, arranging daisies all around it.

  Daisies of every colour – pink, purple, yellow, orange, white … all bright, all joyous, all the colours she had been. There was a photo of her propped up against a flipper. She was in full colour and she was laughing. It wasn’t even a good photo – it was blurry from where she’d thrown her head back. But she looked like Daisy.

  Something burst out of my chest. A howl. I broke. My hand flew to my mouth. The sob lodged beneath my ribs finally tore free and soared. Polly and Beasley jointly caught me on either side as I crumpled.

  It turned out that, while I don’t cry at death, I do cry at love.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Stasis

  I had never given much thought to what tears smelled like, but my pillow was evidence that they do indeed have a most singular odour. The days after Daisy’s funeral were damp and salty. Turns out once you start you can’t stop. And you know what? Mourning is exhausting. I wonder if I was losing sugar out of my eyes or something, because I physically couldn’t get out of bed. Not such a hard-boiled egg after all.

  Everyone seemed to understand. They left me alone. I was best left.