by Terry Tyler
May 23rd 2010
Erin was great yesterday, she wasn’t doing anything in the afternoon so she took me into town and bought me some clothes, stuff that girls like to see guys in, she said, then we went for a pizza. When we got home, though, she went out on some date, so it was just me and Pat, watching telly, while all my new clothes sat upstairs in their carrier bags. But yesterday was still good compared with today. Today was shit. Laurel sent me a message back. Said she’s really sorry but she’s going out with Wanker Barnes. Well, she called him Noah, obviously. She said she stopped being in love with me because I was too clingy, always messaging her to ask her what she was doing. Clingy! I thought were always messaging each other, because we were boyfriend and girlfriend. Women! I felt suicidal, but then I had to be picked up by Uncle Ned to spend the day at theirs. Bor-ring. Granny and Granddad were there and they were dead sweet, but they’re old and don’t understand where I’m coming from, they think I’m still a kid. I was so depressed about Laurel and not being allowed out with my mates that I was a bit quiet and Auntie Angie started saying vomit-making stuff like, ‘it’s okay, Jaz, we’ve all been teenagers too!’, and giving me little motherly winks. I hate the way she says ‘Jaz’, like it’s a real effort, pronounced all pointedly. Jaa-aaz. I’d rather she just called me Jasper, instead of trying to be ‘down with the kids’. I felt like chucking my drink in her face. Lemonade, of course. When they all went out in the garden I opened the drinks cabinet and glugged down a load of something disgusting called crème de menthe, which tasted like alcoholic toothpaste. But at least it cut through that lump in my chest.
May 25th, 2010
Having to go to school and concentrate on stupid work and join in with everyone having a laugh at break and lunchtimes makes me realise how hard it must have been for Dad after Keira died. She was his wife before Kate, but I was only little and don’t remember much about her. And after my mum died, of course, but I was a baby then. I know he just drank in the library for months after Mum died. Don’t blame him.
Oh fuck, I wish he was still here. I’d give anything, all of it, Laurel and all my mates, if I could have my dad back. Shit, fuck, I’m going to fucking bastard cry again. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. No, I’m not going to cry. I’m going to go downstairs and see if there’s any drink I dare nick. Dad, if you’re up there somewhere, I know what you were going through.
Ollie said that Sonya’s dumped him, too, but he just said ‘she’s a filthy slapper, anyway’, and doesn’t seem to care, in fact he’s already sniffing round his mum’s cleaner’s daughter. She’s Latvian, he keeps telling me in a showing off voice, as if that makes her more exotic. I thought being Eastern European just made you poor.
May 29th, 2010
I got through the week by watching a load of DVDs every night, and by being a rowdy shitbag at school. Couldn’t stand the inside of my head today, though, so I was glad it was Hannah’s day to come round, not one of the others. Then Iz came round in the afternoon anyway, with her friend Jane (I think they might be lezzers) and Erin was at home, and even though it was Pat’s day off she said she hadn’t got much else to do, so we had a barbecue. Obviously it wasn’t as good as the ones at Ollie’s, and it was all grown-up women, but at least it was the best of the PPs, and Erin sneaked as much wine into my lemonade as she dared.
Hannah kept saying, “I love this garden,” and beaming round. Dorothy and Parker were chasing each other in and out of the bushes, and I could see how much you would like it if you were old and didn’t want to do more exciting things. I remembered Will telling me about him and Dad playing there when they were kids, while their dads drank gin and tonics on the terrace, where we were all sitting. Hannah got the photos out (yet again!) and I looked at the actual pictures of it all, then, back in the 1960s with Dad and Will playing cowboys and wearing sad hats.
“When you’re grown-up and have children, you can watch them playing here, just like your grandfather did with your dad,” Hannah said, but that’s too far away for me to get my head round.
Got a text from Zach saying that they were all in the pool over at Ollie’s. He sent me pictures of him and Ollie with the Latvian cleaner’s daughter who is lush and has ginormous tits. Said Ollie reckons he’s well in. As if! She had on this little bikini top, and I had to stop looking at it because it was giving me a stiffy, not something you want to happen when you’re sitting there with a bunch of middle-aged women and your sisters. Saving it for later. I sent a text back saying that some of Erin’s friends had come round and given me some cocaine. I wish! Wonder what it’s like. I’ll have to look on the internet to see what happens when you take it, because they’re bound to ask me on Monday.
June 7th, 2010
Fucking A! Will says that in August I’m going over to Calais with him, and a couple of the guys who are working on the project, to see my hotel! I suppose we’ll be greeted by Superboy, who still spends most of his time over there, and he’ll act like it’s his—well, he’s got another think coming. I shall make sure from the outset that everyone knows who’s boss, ha ha ha! I know J.Dud is the Dark Lord, but I reckon the hotel thing is brilliant. Can’t wait to be eighteen, maybe we’ll open a whole string of them.
Will also said that the summer holidays would be a good time for me to spend a bit of time around the office, too. I imagine this is part of the Big Plan to stop me enjoying myself with Ollie. But I’m looking forward to going over to Calais. We’re going to stay in the hotel where Superboy lives, which is the best one, Will said. Or will be, until mine is finished!
Soon be summer holidays. Got to get over the end of year exams first, though.
June 10th, 2010
Guess what! Laurel has packed in Wanker Barnes! Ha—she went out with me for way longer! I know because I still look at her Facebook page every night though I don’t write anything on it ’cause that would make me look like a saddo. I don’t write anything on mine now ’cause there’s nothing to say. Oh—think I’ll update about going to Calais and my hotel! That’ll make her wish she’d never finished with me!
June 11th, 2010
Everyone was well impressed about my hotel, apart from Laurel, who didn’t comment. I looked on her page and she was kidding around with some lads. Erin came in when I was looking at it. She said, “Sometimes you just have to think ‘fuck ’em’, and move on,” and good stuff like that. Erin talks to me like a person, not like the others. All of them, even Hannah, choose their words dead carefully when they talk to me. I hate it. If there are two of them, they give each other little looks when they’re saying stuff. I’ve noticed it since I was a kid. Trouble with adults is that they think kids don’t know what’s going on. When I have my own I’m going to talk to them like they’re human beings, not retards.
June 14th, 2010
Good news—well, for me anyway: Zach’s parents have grounded him, so he’s stuck in the house until the holidays start too. So why is this good for me, you ask, oh Dictaphone? Well, because that means he can’t go round Ollie’s at weekends, either. Therefore, he’ll be at home, so we can have ‘study sessions’—ha! Uncle Ned said I can go to other mates’ houses, didn’t he? As long as we’re ‘properly supervised’. Well, Zach’s dad is a mad writer who’s always shut in his study, and his mum is a bit ditzy, so I reckon we’ll be able to do what we want. There might be next to no parental control—suits me!
June 19th, 2010
Went over Zach’s today. He seems obsessed with getting drink, but his dad keeps his wine cellar locked now because he thinks it will keep burglars out. Like your average burglar would walk past the plasma screen telly and the laptops and nip down the stairs for a couple of bottles of red! I’m not that bothered about getting drink really, I mean, it’s a good laugh to have some, but as long as I can get out of the house, just be somewhere else, that’s enough for me. Zach’s started smoking. I’ve never fancied it, because I’m told it was one of the reasons for Dad’s heart attack, but I had a couple today and I liked it. It ta
sted cack at first but I got used to it and I felt sort of ‘right’ with it in in my hand. We were in the garden, and I had Zach’s sunglasses on. His sister, who’s a year younger than us, came out and said I looked like someone in a film, with my blond hair and the sunglasses and the cig, so I reckon I may take it up. I can always pack it in before I get old. I quite fancy Zach’s sister. She’s called India. Cool name.
June 20th, 2010
It’s six-thirty in the morning. Just woke up thinking that maybe I’d better do some real studying, after all, ’cause it’s exams for the next two weeks. Fuuu-uuck!
June 25th, 2010
First exam week sucked. Good thing I’m naturally clever or I’d have done total crap.
June 26th, 2010
Went in town with Zach today. Saw Laurel with some Goth twat. She was all in black too, like a trainee Goth. It sucked seeing her again. I was glad Zach had some fags on him—I discovered that they help that upset lump feeling in your chest, too, like drink does. I went and bought some. It was dead easy—you have to be sixteen to buy them, yeah? Well, I got served no problem, the bloke didn’t even glance at me. I remember Will saying that Dad always looked grown-up, right from when he was only about fifteen. Well, I’m fourteen and a half, so maybe I’ve taken after him. I’m five feet eight now, and my shoulders are getting broad.
Wonder if I could get drink too?
June 27th, 2010
I keep forgetting about Lanchester Estates. It’s weird. I used to think about it a lot when Uncle Ned still worked there, but now I don’t hear much about it, what with Iz being up north; sometimes she doesn’t come back at weekends. Erin doesn’t talk about it much. Will says it’s fairly quiet at the moment, just ticking over nicely. Which probably means no one’s telling him anything. He says J.Dud’s being ‘as nice as pie’. Which probably means he’s up to something. Ha! Hannah was here today and I discussed my lack of interest with her. She says it’s because my head’s so full of other things. She said, “I hope you won’t hate me for saying this, but it’s because you’re growing up, and you’ve got a whole new world to think about.” I liked how she said that, it didn’t make me want to burn people’s houses down like if Auntie Angie had said it. Oh well, Lanchester Estates isn’t going anywhere, and I can learn all about it when I leave school. It’ll make more sense when I’m actually there. I hope J.Dud and Superboy won’t totally muck it up for me. The first thing I’m going to do is get Uncle Ned back to help me run it, but he’ll have to learn to wheel and deal a bit better.
I could hold a gun to J.Dud’s head and make him teach Uncle how to be a sharp businessman, and tell him that unless he does he will not leave the building alive.
I was going to make jokes about Harry Potter and Professor Lupin finally slaughtering Voldemort but I think all that’s a bit kiddish now. Although still funny.
July 2nd, 2010
Exams over. Huzzah! Going over Zach’s tomorrow—him and me and India and a few others are going on a bike ride. The weather’s awesome right now, should be good. I am so going to cop off with India! Maybe things will start to get a bit better soon—this is the first day I’ve actually felt happy for ages. I’m going over to Will’s tonight, he’s got some new DVDs in for me and Phoebe. Hope they’re not too girly. Will’s not usually too bad like that. Not like Uncle Ned, he was still getting me Finding Nemo when I was twelve.
Well, I’m just going outside for a quick fag before Rosie comes to pick me up! Suppose I’ll get in trouble for that soon, too.
This was the last entry Jasper made in his Dictaphone diary.
Chapter Three
Hannah
July—August 2010
I keep thinking of Jaz throwing his arms around my waist and saying, ‘I love you, Mummy’.
I think of our holiday in Great Yarmouth, just me, him and Erin, when they were children and their father was in the Maldives with his new wife. Two rich kids playing in the sand dunes, eating fish and chips and wasting their money in amusement arcades, and they loved every minute of it.
I think of him knocking at my door, all grown-up, and so like his dad.
I don’t know how we’re ever going to get over this.
Haven’t the Lanchesters known enough tragedy?
My first thought was of Erin, who’d lost her mother, then her father—and now her brother, our dearest, beloved Jasper, whose life was just beginning.
I feared for her sanity when we told her. The family doctor had to sedate her, and I stayed with her for two days, after which she came to me for the rest of the week so I could look after her. Comforting her had never been such an impossible task before, not at any time during her childhood. Mostly, I just sat with her while she cried, and listened to her when she talked, odd thoughts that wandered in and out of her head, some of them about how she was feeling, others brief flashes from the past.
After a few days, though, I realised Erin was not the one I should worry about; she was simply grieving, her reaction to bereavement normal, to be expected, and I knew she would suffer intensely then carry on with her life as best she could. Isabella, however, was a different matter. She ranted about her family being cursed; crazy stuff. Her tears were of rage, rather than sorrow, and she rejected all help.
One thought went round and round in my head: another day, a step to the right, and our world would be a different place. Jaz would still be with us now, up there in his room playing his adventure video games and sulking because he’d been grounded. Some people think that when your number’s up, it’s up, and there is nothing you can do about it. I don’t know. I don’t know what I think.
It was so stupid, such a ridiculous accident that could just as easily not have happened. When I took the phone call, his poor little shocked friend Zach said, “One minute he was alive, and the next minute he wasn’t. Fuck, I mean, Hannah, it was just completely—random.” And for once that favourite word of teenagers was absolutely the right one.
He’d been drinking, of course, though I don’t believe Jaz had the drinking problem Ned suspected; yes, it was a problem but I think it would have sorted itself out. He and his friends were just teenagers doing what teenagers do. I’ve led a less sheltered life than the Seymour family, and I know what substance-addicted youths are like, believe me. I think Jaz only ever drank because he was restless and adventurous, like his father; he wanted to get pissed because it was a laugh, that’s all.
They’d stopped on that secluded bit of riverbank out at Weldon, where the bridge goes over the Colne. There they settled in for the afternoon, along with a litre of vodka and three bottles of that disgusting strong cider. White Shock, nine and a half percent alcohol. People drink it to get drunk on the cheap, not because of its delicate bouquet. White Shock empties are part of the landscape on Fuller Estate.
Jaz bought the cider, while the vodka was stolen from Zach’s father. Oh yes, we found out how they came by every drop. Ned got to the bottom of that straight away; poor man, he needed someone to blame. The cider was sold to Jaz by a kid of eighteen who hadn’t liked to ask his age; scrawny fella, shorter than Jaz, only looked about fifteen himself. As for the vodka, Zach’s father thought he could trust his son. He kept his wine cellar locked to deter burglars, but had no idea Zach would steal from his study; he thought they had a mature and honest relationship, he said. Ned charged in, demanding answers, determined someone should pay for what happened, and maybe he will carry out his threats, but, really, what’s the point? The boy shouldn’t have sold Jaz the cider, and he’s been sacked, but the shop isn’t at fault. Ned blames Zach, of course, but where will that get him? The lad didn’t force it on Jaz. He blames himself enough, as does his father, even though I’ve stressed to both of them that it’s not their fault. All that booze might just as easily have come from somewhere else. There could be another young shop assistant getting the sack, another father feeling responsible. There’s a well-stocked drinks cabinet at Lanchester Hall; Jaz knew it was policed by Pat, but on another day
he might have thrown caution to the wind and decided the telling off would be worth it.
We all left Ned to do what he felt he had to; none of it will bring our boy back, but I suppose it made him feel that he was doing something.
There’s a photo of Jaz leaning over the bridge, waving to the others on the bank. Zach’s little sister, India, took it; she’d zoomed in so you can see his happy face so clearly even though he was, she said, at least thirty yards away from him. She printed it out and gave it to Erin. We could hardly bear to look at it, the last picture of Jaz, taken five minutes before he died. If only she’d been zooming in five minutes later, she would have seen what happened.
After he waved to them, he climbed up onto the narrow wall of the bridge and started prancing along it, the sort of thing daredevil kids do all the time. He was acting the clown and doing a silly walk, they said, pretending to be more tipsy than he was, waving his half-drunk bottle of White Shock around. Then he lost his balance. Fell.
Nobody knows what happened in his last moments, under that cold, dark water. Maybe he got cramp or sprained his ankle as he fell, maybe he was overcome by the strong alcohol in his system, maybe his feet got caught in some weeds, or he panicked and took one gulp of water too many. His friends were too busy laughing and whooping as he splashed around to realise that something was wrong. They thought the flailing of arms was just typical Jaz theatrics, like the pretend drunken walk on the wall. They didn’t think the water was that deep; it’s actually about twenty feet to the bottom at that point, though.
Maybe if they hadn’t been drunk (or hadn’t been carefree, irresponsible teenagers out on a summer afternoon having fun) one of them would have dived in to help him, but as it was they all sat there and laughed, until the flow of the river closed over his head. Even then, a couple of them thought it was just good old Jaz having a laugh. He would appear at the other side in a moment, giving them all the finger, wouldn’t he? He would take the piss out of them because they thought he’d drowned. India told me it was she who said, but what if he’s in trouble? They brushed off her fears because things like that only happen to other people, don’t they?