Kitabı oku: «Paper Butterflies», sayfa 3

‘Megan!’ she exclaims as she drops the basket and scoops her daughter up.

‘What’s going on?’ my dad asks. He’s holding me at arm’s length.

I’m breathing hard. I’ve never laid a finger on Megan before. But, today, fire got into me. I stare back at my dad, bewildered by what I’ve just done.

‘I came back early to surprise you,’ he says, and he looks so confused.

‘I’m sorry,’ I tell him. And I am, because I’ve made him look sad.

‘Why did you do it?’

‘It was just a silly quarrel, Bradley. Don’t be hard on her,’ Kathleen says, putting her hand softly on his arm. ‘It’s over now.’

Megan is still crying slightly. It’s strange to see her curled up there.

‘Fine,’ my dad says. ‘But you’re to go to your room, June. And if I ever see you hurting Megan again, there’ll be hell to pay. Do you understand?’

I nod and run away, leaving them huddled together on the kitchen floor.

The next day after school, I know I can’t stay in the house. I put a note on the kitchen table – ‘I’m going to Jennifer’s. Back later.’ And then I leave it all behind me, the wind rushing past my ears.

I can hear Blister humming to himself from the edge of the path. He’s sitting on the trailer steps and he sees me as I start to climb over the gate. In his hand is a little penknife and it points straight to the sky as he waves.

He grins at me. ‘You came back.’ He puts down the stick that he’s carving and walks through the grassy path.

‘I hoped you’d be here,’ I say, wriggling my arms to get the bag off my back. ‘I brought you something.’ He watches me as I unzip it and pull out the small bottle of orange juice. ‘I thought you’d like this,’ I say. Suddenly, it seems a bit strange. It felt like a good idea earlier, but now I feel awkward as I give it to him. ‘You said orange juice would be better.’

He looks up at me as if I’ve given him a bar of gold.

‘Thanks, June,’ he says. I follow him back to the steps. ‘Look what I did.’ He picks up the stick he’s been carving. It’s a small spear, with a sharp, pointed end. ‘To keep the ghosts away,’ he laughs, and throws it straight into the ground, where it stays, sticking upright. ‘Nothing will get past that.’

We go into the trailer and I watch as he pours the orange juice into two glasses.

‘Presto,’ he says, and clinks my glass.

‘Presto,’ I say, as though it’s our own secret code, the key to our club.

‘Shall we drink it in the art room?’ Blister asks. Before I even nod, he’s off and I’m following him, looking at the muddy streak stretched straight across his arm.

‘After you.’ He bows deeply, one arm swept to the side, the other tilting too much and spilling juice on the steps.

‘Why thank you, sir.’ And I climb up into the second trailer. The smell of glue mixes into the warmth, and I notice that the piles of paper on the floor are stacked with their colours in order.

‘You’re very tidy.’

‘It’s how I like it.’

‘Maybe because your home is so busy?’ I say.

Blister rubs his cheek. ‘Maybe. I hadn’t thought of that.’

We put our glasses next to the cushions. Blister kneels down, picks up a piece of paper from each pile and lays them out in the middle of the floor.

‘So, what do you want to make?’ he asks. I stretch my legs out straight and wriggle my toes in my sandals.

‘I don’t know,’ I say.

Blister crawls over to a tiny table and picks up a tube of glue. I watch as he takes one piece of white paper and one piece of gold. He starts to fold them and it’s as if I disappear. He screws up his nose slightly as he concentrates and it squashes some of his freckles.

His fingers move carefully. He folds and twists and sticks the paper, as though it’s a precious jewel. I’m not really thinking about the shape – I just like watching something beautiful appear out of something so ordinary.

It’s finished and Blister holds it up in front of him.

‘It’s an angel. For your mom,’ he says.

I reach out to touch her wings and the clothes of white and gold. Her face is blank, but I know she’s happy.

‘I didn’t want to make you sad,’ Blister says.

‘I’m not,’ I say quietly. But I am. I’m so sad that I don’t know how my heart carries on beating.

Blister puts the angel in my hands. I want her to be big, so I can hug her.

‘Was your mom nice?’ Blister asks.

‘Yes,’ I say, and I pull my knees up tight into my chest and look down, so he can’t see my eyes.

‘I don’t mind if you cry,’ he says. He puts his hand on my shoulder. ‘It’s not fair that she died.’

But I press my head into my knees, until I know the tears have stopped.

When I look up, Blister is sitting with a little rag in his hand.

‘It’s the cleanest I’ve got,’ he says.

I take it from him. It feels rough against my eyes, but I don’t mind.

‘Thanks,’ I say.

A silence now sits between us and I don’t know how to fill it.

‘What’s your stepmother like?’ Blister finally asks.

‘She’s OK,’ I lie, holding my angel tightly. Blister looks at me as though I should say some more. ‘I’d better go. She’ll be worried about where I’ve got to.’

‘Oh.’

‘Sorry. I’ll come again, I promise.’ I stand up and Blister gets up too.

‘Can I keep my angel?’ I ask.

‘Of course. I made her for you.’ Blister smiles and his dimples dip in. He pushes his glasses up a bit on his nose.

‘Thanks,’ I say.

I put her carefully into my bag, worried that I might hurt her. I don’t want her to get crumpled. I want to get her to the house safely, where I’ll tuck her away in a secret box.

My very own angel.

AFTER

Mickey and I walk side by side. The sun is warm on my face and there’s not a cloud in the sky.

‘Where shall we go today?’ I ask.

‘The fields at the back of my house?’ she replies.

‘I’d like that.’

We walk slowly – Mickey’s hip makes her seem older than she is. She shuffles slightly, the dry dust lifting around her ankles.

High above us, two birds swoop and twist before they disappear from view.

‘Birds are like memories,’ I say. Mickey chuckles. She’s used to my thoughts by now. ‘They are,’ I insist. ‘How sometimes they’re close enough to see clearly, but at other times they fly just out of reach.’

‘You’ve been reading too many books again.’

‘I can’t work out whether memories are good or bad,’ I say.

‘I suppose it depends which ones they are.’ Mickey sounds tired now. ‘Maybe you should try to remember the good and forget the bad.’

‘But sometimes even the good ones hurt,’ I tell her.

Mickey nods as she puts her hand gently on my arm.

‘Let’s make happy memories for today, then,’ she smiles.

‘How?’

‘You see those horses over there?’ She points into the distance. At first they’re difficult to see, but then the herd of them becomes clearer. ‘How about we go and ride them?’

‘They’re not ours,’ I laugh.

‘They could be if we take them.’ Mickey is laughing so hard that we have to stop walking. She leans into me as she starts to cough, but they’re happy tears in her eyes.

And I laugh with her too, the sound sweeping up to the wide blue above us.

‘It’s good to be alive,’ she says. But this time the coughing pulls at her body and I know she’s hurting. ‘Let’s go back, June,’ she says.

BEFORE
twelve years old

‘You’re worth a million of those kids from school, June,’ Blister tells me.

‘I’m not.’

‘You are.’ He pokes a tiny stick into the brace stuck like train tracks on his teeth.

The grass is warm and prickly under my tummy. Our field feels like an oven, but it’s better than the cold in winter, when Blister and I wrap up in virtually all the clothes we own, but it’s still so freezing in our trailers that we can barely move.

‘I don’t know how you do it every day.’ Blister has his angry face back and I know that beneath his lips, his teeth are clamped tightly shut. His eyes look fiery.

‘I just do.’

‘But you shouldn’t have to.’

‘I have to go to school. And it’s not so bad.’ I shrug.

‘It is. And you know it. It’s not right that some human beings treat others like that. What gives them the right?’

‘They seem to like it.’

‘I bet they don’t. I bet when they’re at home on their own they feel terrible about themselves.’

‘Do you think?’ I ask.

‘It’s impossible to be so mean to someone and not feel bad somewhere. Deep down, right inside them, I bet they wish they didn’t do it.’

‘Even Ryan?’

‘Even Ryan.’

‘And Cherry?’

‘Yes. And Lauren. And they better watch out, because karma will be waiting for them.’

‘Who’s Karma?’

‘My mom told me about it.’ Blister sits up and crosses his legs. The anger has left him and his face looks serious. ‘She says that the bad things you do will always come back to you. Even if it’s years in the future. That’s why you’ve got to be nice.’

I think of karma, waiting like a black shadow for Kathleen. I imagine it just round the corner, sharpening its nails.

‘Will it come to Kathleen and Megan?’ I ask Blister. He looks up at me quickly.

‘Are they being horrible to you again?’

‘A bit,’ I say.

‘What are they doing?’ I know he cares, that he really wants to know, but I don’t want to bring their badness here now.

‘They just say nasty things,’ I say.

‘Then they’ll pay too, June.’

And it makes me feel good. Because I’ve got someone else on my side.

‘Karma is powerful stuff,’ he says.

‘I wish I could keep it in a bottle and use it when I need it,’ I say.

Blister laughs. ‘Don’t worry. It’ll be there.’

I look up at the bright blue sky.

You won’t catch me, Karma, I think. I won’t do anything bad.

And I close my eyes and breathe in the dry smell of our field and the muddy smell of Blister and I know that I’m happy.

‘Do you reckon the rabbit has been buried long enough?’ Blister asks. I open my eyes and sit up to face him.

‘How long’s it been?’

‘Three months,’ he says. Three months since we found the rabbit dead in the forest, when we’d buried it properly and I’d said a prayer.

‘Is that enough time?’ I ask.

‘It normally is.’

Blister stands up quickly. He’s always the most excited about this bit, as though he’s digging up treasure. He doesn’t like to leave the animals alone in the ground, when he can find them and make them beautiful again.

We walk quickly through the grass and Blister goes into our Bones Trailer to get a bag and two trowels. He passes one to me and we climb through the fence at the back of our field and into the cool of our forest.

We follow the path in silence. Blister likes this bit to be quite solemn. Out of respect, he says.

It isn’t difficult to find the little cross. He always buries the animals in the same place. If there’s more than one at a time, he buries them side by side.

‘Are you sure it’s been long enough?’ I ask as we start to dig. I don’t want it to be like the last time, when there were sticky tendons still stuck to the bird’s bones.

‘I think so,’ Blister says, and he picks up the earth in his trowel and trickles it gently next to us. ‘Be careful,’ he reminds me.

We dig more slowly as we get deeper.

I see it first, a dusty white colour sticking up through the brown.

‘Stop,’ I say, and push Blister’s arm away from the hole. I press my fingers into the earth and gently prise the first bone loose.

‘Wow, that’s a beauty,’ Blister says, and I smile with pride, as though this is all my work. He unzips the bag and I place the bone gently inside.

Blister pushes the crumbled earth aside until he reaches the next one. He rubs it slightly and pushes up his glasses with his muddy finger.

‘Tibia, I reckon,’ he says.

‘Is that the leg bone?’ I ask, and he nods his head.

I let him dig with his fingers until he finds the skull. He cups it in both his hands and holds it up.

‘Look at that,’ he says. I nod and try not to think of my mom.

We collect the rest of the bones and when we’re sure we’ve got them all, we push the earth back into its hole and I flatten the top with the palm of my hand. Blister puts the little cross at the top of his bag and we walk in silence back to our trailers.

‘Blister, do you think I’m fat?’

He’s laying the rabbit bones out on the table in height order. They’re washed clean and he’s dried each one of them carefully. He stops what he’s doing and looks at me.

‘A bit,’ he says. ‘Do you think I am?’

‘A bit,’ I say, and smile, but inside, my heart is hammering, because I know I’m going to tell him.

‘What?’ he says, laughing as I stare at him.

‘Kathleen makes me eat too much,’ I say quickly. ‘She wants me to be fat.’

I don’t know what I expect him to say. I don’t even know if I want him to say anything. Maybe I should try to swallow the words right back up and we can both forget that they ever hung in the air.

‘Does she do it to Megan?’ he asks quietly.

‘No. She gives her a little. She gives me a lot.’

‘I thought she just said nasty things to you,’ he says.

‘And this as well,’ I say, and hold my breath.

‘Can you ask her not to?’ he asks.

It feels like the world is beginning to crumble under me.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ I say. I want to look at him and smile. To pretend that I haven’t wanted to tell him for forever and now his answer is all wrong.

Blister shivers, as if he’s cold, and starts to rearrange the rabbit shapes slightly. I know I can’t let Kathleen darken his life too.

‘What are we doing with these?’ I ask, pushing her far away from here.

‘I want to give this to Tom for his birthday,’ he says. ‘Do you want to hold, or glue?’

‘I’ll glue,’ I say.

Blister picks up two bones. ‘Just here,’ he says, and points clumsily with his thumb.

I squirt some glue on to the plate, dip in the plastic brush and sweep it over the hard top of the rabbit’s leg. Blister pushes it into the femur.

‘I’ll hold too,’ I say as I put the glue on the other leg. ‘What happened to your glasses?’ There’s sticky tape wrapped round the arm and rim, and it makes them slant slightly.

‘Eddie sat on them.’

‘Does it make everything wonky?’

‘It’s fine,’ he says, scrunching up his nose. ‘Do you know what my favourite colour is today?’

‘Green?’

‘No.’

‘Black?’

‘Nope. Orange. I love that colour.’

‘Today, mine’s turquoise,’ I say.

‘Turquoise?’

‘It’s pretty,’ I say.

‘Like you,’ Blister smiles. He’ll look strange when the train tracks are taken off and all his toothy gaps have gone.

‘Like you too,’ I say.

‘Can I be handsome instead?’

‘You can be that too.’

Blister moves his hand very slowly from the rabbit’s leg. The bone holds.

‘Ta-da,’ he says proudly, but the bone slips down and crashes to the table. ‘Tom better appreciate this,’ he mumbles, pushing the bone back into place. ‘It’s going to take us forever.’

‘I’ve got forever,’ I say.

The skull is the difficult part. Blister puts a stick through the holes, to help it stay in place. We take it in turns to hold it.

‘Are you going to paint it?’ I ask, my arms beginning to ache a bit.

‘I might. Maybe black?’ Blister thinks. Black bones. I wonder if anyone has ever had black bones.

‘Tom’d like that,’ I say. He hands the small skeleton to me. It feels heavy, but I know it’s not. I imagine it with fur, with eyes looking at me. With a little heart beating and blood being where it’s meant to be. Instead of this, all gone.

‘Blister?’ I ask.

‘Mm.’ He’s looking in the cupboard. There’s a small line of his skin showing under his T-shirt as he reaches up.

‘What do you think happens to us when we die?’

He puts a tub of black paint on the table, but then he stops and looks at me.

‘Do you think there’s a heaven?’ I ask.

‘I know there is,’ he says. He’s so sure. ‘Otherwise, what would be the point?’

‘To life?’

‘Yeah. And it wouldn’t be fair, otherwise. Some people die as babies, others live to a hundred. It wouldn’t be fair if that was it. You’ve got to have somewhere to go on to.’

‘Is my mom there?’

‘Definitely,’ Blister says.

He gets up to pick a paintbrush from the bucket and scoops a mug of water from the bowl. He has to work the spoon all the way round the lid of the paint tin until it gives way and lifts off.

‘Will the black stay on?’ I ask.

‘I think I’ll have to go over it a few times.’

The smell of paint fills the trailer, even with the door hooked open.

‘Do you ever go to church?’ I ask him.

‘Only at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Mom finds it a bit stressful, though, with half of us crawling round the floor, the other half laughing in the wrong bits.’

‘I don’t find it stressful. I like it.’

‘I didn’t know you went.’

‘I used to, sometimes. With my mom. We’d dress up a bit and go to the church over near Neville’s creek. We’d drive there together, just me and her.’ It felt like the sun was always shining on those days. Mom would hold my hand and we’d sing so our songs wove in and out of the rafters.

‘How come she drowned, June?’ Blister doesn’t look at me as he speaks. Instead, he concentrates on making the white bones black. I move my fingers slightly so they don’t get covered in paint. ‘You don’t have to say.’

‘It’s OK,’ I tell him, although it’s not. ‘It was the river by our house. She went for a swim and got caught in the weeds.’

Blister sucks the air in through his teeth.

‘That’s horrible,’ he says.

‘I think she must have been frightened,’ I say quietly. It’s difficult to get the words out. I’ve thought them so many times, but I’ve never actually said it. Blister puts the paintbrush down.

‘Yes. She would have been. But only for a bit, June. I’ve read that it’s a peaceful way to die.’

I can’t answer him. Nothing makes it better.

‘I wish it hadn’t happened to you,’ Blister says. I nod and touch the wet paint gently with my fingertips. It’s darker than my skin. I hold the bones still and wait for it to dry.

I’m happy when I walk into our house. I’ve got better at keeping hold of my good times with Blister and carrying them with me through the front door.

But Kathleen grabs me. She yanks my ribbon from my hair. Terror swoops into me as she drags me into the kitchen, where Megan stands silently in the corner.

Kathleen holds my arms tight by my side as she pushes me into a chair. She’s somehow managed to grab my head too and she tips it back, forcing my mouth open wide.

‘Quickly,’ she says. I can’t see Megan now, but I can hear her scuttling closer.

Megan’s face is expressionless as she lowers my red ribbon until it sits at the back of my throat. I start to gag, but it only makes it go down further.

‘Twist it round,’ Kathleen tells her. Megan looks at her, as though she doesn’t understand. But when Kathleen nods she slowly begins to turn the ribbon stuck in my throat. I writhe to get away, but Kathleen is too strong. She’s always too strong.

‘Put your hand over her mouth,’ Kathleen tells her. Megan pauses. Fear creeps into her eyes. ‘Do it now,’ Kathleen says. Megan’s hand feels small and she doesn’t press down hard, but my throat tightens and I retch.

I can’t breathe.

I’m going to die.

I’m coughing and the ribbon is sticking and building in my throat. I know Kathleen is laughing, but all I can hear is the blood thumping in my ears and my legs stamping on the floor.

My dad will come back and then he’ll know. I’ll lie bloated on his kitchen floor and they won’t escape this time.

Megan lets go of my mouth and backs away as I gasp for air, but the ribbon sticks so far down my throat that I can’t stop myself vomiting. Kathleen holds my head back tight and the vomit is gurgling like lumps of acid.

My dad will find me too late.

She throws my head forward and I’m sick all over my lap. I’m breathing so hard, trying to get enough air into me. Trying not to die.

‘You’re disgusting, just like your mom,’ I hear Kathleen say. ‘Clean up this mess. I don’t want black girl’s vomit on my floor.’

In my bedroom, I can still smell the sharp smell. I’ve washed my clothes in the bath and scrubbed my hands, but it seems to have found a way into me and I can’t get it out.

Quietly, I open my bottom drawer. I take out the top two sweaters and find my shoebox underneath. I lift it out, put it on the floor in front of me and take off the lid.

All my most precious things fill it. Memories of my mom, and Blister’s paper shapes. I find my white angel and hold her to me. She’ll be able to hear my heartbeat. She lets me cry, quietly, so they can’t hear.

The pain of needing my mom is like burning coal inside me. I want her to come back. I want her here, in my bedroom now, holding my hand and braiding my hair.

I’m crushing my angel too tight. I don’t want to damage her. She tells me to cry until there’s nothing left and the feeling in my chest becomes more like an ache.

Carefully, I put her back amongst my paper castle and my tulip and all the other things that Blister’s made for me. I put the lid back on, to keep them safe, put the box back in the drawer with the sweaters on top and silently push the drawer closed.

Miss Sykes touches my arm as I’m about to walk out of the classroom the next day.

‘June, can I have a word?’ she asks.

I stand by her desk and watch the rest of the children go. Miss Sykes sits down and takes off her half-moon glasses. They hang from blue string round her neck.

‘Is everything all right with you at the moment, June?’

‘Yes, Miss Sykes.’

‘Are any of the children still upsetting you?’

I look at the floor. ‘No, Miss Sykes.’

‘I heard Kelly making a jibe about your weight,’ she says. I bite the inside of my cheek.

‘It’s not bad,’ I say.

‘Any name-calling is bad.’

I look up at the clock and then at the door.

‘And how about at home? Is everything all right at home?’ I stare at her. Is this a trap? Is Kathleen hiding somewhere, ready to pounce? ‘June?’

‘I’m going to be late for lunch, Miss Sykes,’ I say.

She looks at me and sighs deeply. ‘All right, but promise me you’ll talk to me if you need to.’

I nod. But I know she’d never believe me. They never do. And before she can ask any more I’m gone.

It’s been a week since Blister and I made Tom’s birthday present and the rain soaks me as I pedal fast to his house. I’m wearing my raincoat, so my arms and back are dry, but my legs are shiny with wet. The hood keeps my hair dry, but it can’t keep the rain out of my eyes.

The track leading up to their house is always littered with things that should be inside. Clothes, or a chair, or a boot. They’re like secret signs to follow, to get to the front door. Someone must pick them up eventually, as they change every time.

Today, there’s a sweater left in the rain. A bit further on, there’s a toy oven, puddles gathering on the plastic. A teddy bear lies face down in the water.

I leave my bike leaning against the hedge and go up the path. I don’t knock on their front door. No one would answer in any case.

The door handle is dented and I don’t even have to turn it. I just push the door open and poke my head round. There’s no one here.

‘Hello?’ I call. There are sounds coming from all over the house.

Mr Wick walks out of the kitchen, a dishcloth slung over his shoulder, icing on his chin.

‘June!’ he says. He comes over and hugs me, even though I’m soaking wet. He smells of flour and wood-chips. ‘Blister!’ he yells up the stairs. He looks back at me. ‘Come in and close the door.’

I shut the rain out, but I know it’ll take ages for my shoes to dry.

‘I’ll put your raincoat by the stove,’ Mr Wick says. I’m dripping all over his floor, but he doesn’t seem to notice. ‘Blister!’ He leaves me standing in the hall as he disappears into the kitchen.

‘Hi, June,’ Mrs Wick calls from the kitchen. I go through the big, white door, to find her stacking cookies on to a plate. She stops what she’s doing, just to come to see me.

‘Your hair looks lovely like that,’ she tells me, and she kisses me once on one cheek and once on the other. I spent a long time deciding on my hair this morning and it’s in two buns, high up on my head. ‘Come and stand where it’s warm.’

She’s fussing me over to the stove when Blister comes in.

‘Hiya,’ he says. He’s always a bit different with me when we’re here, as though we need our trailers to really be us. He reaches out for a biscuit.

‘Uh-uh,’ Mrs Wick says, and swipes his hand away.

‘Have you given Tom his present?’ I ask him.

‘Not yet. I was waiting for you to get here.’

He disappears into the room next door and comes back with a parcel wrapped in newspaper. It’s covered in tiny paper ladybirds.

‘Where is he, Mom?’

‘He could be anywhere,’ she laughs, filling a jug of water.

Blister sticks his head out of the kitchen door.

‘Tom!’ he yells.

‘You could try looking,’ Mr Wick says as he rinses the empty sieve.

‘Come on,’ Blister says to me.

We find Tom in the study with Mil. Blankets drape across their dad’s desk and hang down either side. We can hear them, chattering away from inside.

‘Can we come in?’ Blister asks.

‘Password?’ Tom asks.

‘Horse.’

‘No.’

‘Feet?’

‘Nope,’ Mil giggles.

‘Well, if you don’t want your present,’ Blister laughs and stomps loudly back to the door.

The blanket whips aside.

‘June!’ Mil smiles at me. She has a streak of jam across her cheek.

‘You can come in,’ Tom says. So I wriggle in beside them, pushing the plate of half-eaten sandwiches out of the way.

‘How does it feel to be six?’ I ask.

‘Good,’ Tom says, smiling, although his breath is wheezy.

‘How are you feeling?’

‘OK.’

‘Blister says the new medicine is yuck,’ I say. Tom nods his head and screws up his nose.

Blister comes in and pulls the blanket closed behind him. It’s darker, but not pitch black. Light scoots in round the edges.

‘This is for you.’ Blister passes the present to Tom. ‘It’s from me and June.’

Tom smiles. ‘Thanks.’ He picks off every one of the ladybirds and lines them up in a row at the edge of the hideout.

‘Careful opening it,’ Blister tells him.

Tom rips back the newspaper, until he’s holding the rabbit’s black skeleton. Even in the dim light, I can see happiness in his eyes.

‘Wow,’ he says.

‘We spent ages making it,’ Blister says, and I think of the furry animal I laid in the hole, all those months ago.

‘Thanks,’ Tom says. ‘I love it. Thanks, June.’ His big smile has his top two teeth missing.

‘You’re welcome,’ I say, hugging him.

And I wish we could all stay in here forever.

I’ve never sat with the whole of Blister’s family at the table before. Blister says it doesn’t happen often, because no one is ever completely sure where everyone else is.

We somehow fit. Eddie sits on an old oil drum, Chubbers is in the high chair and the rest of us have managed to find a chair from those scattered around the house.

Tom has a paper crown pushed tight upon his head and Maggie sits grumpy at the edge of the table.

She never says much to me, but I wish she was my sister. She’d do my hair and teach me about make-up. Even though my skin is a different colour to hers, she’d experiment on what looked best and find colours that suited me. She’d tell me I look pretty and that she’s proud I’m her sister.

Eddie is yelling and Mr Wick is bellowing at him to be quiet. Chubbers throws his food on the floor and Mil is crying because of something Eddie said, but Tom sits happily, sucking his drink loudly through a straw.

I look at Mrs Wick and for the first time I see how tired she is.

‘How are your parents?’ she asks me when she sees me watching her.

‘My dad’s fine,’ I say. ‘He’s very busy.’ Too busy to notice. Too busy to save me.

‘And Megan must be nine, or ten now?’

‘She’s just eleven,’ I say.

She raises her eyebrows. ‘Where does the time go?’

‘No, Chubs!’ Maggie shouts at the baby. He looks at her in surprise and I watch as his face screws up slowly, turning from white to red. He can yell like no one else.

Si screams and covers his ears.

‘Enough,’ Mrs Wick says. Her dress looks heavy as she gets up, weighing down her shoulders. She takes the shrieking Chubbers out of his highchair and he jerks his legs straight as she cuddles him into her neck.

Blister looks at Tom, who’s still sitting beaming in his crooked paper hat.

‘Happy birthday,’ he laughs.

Maggie gets up and marches out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

I have to leave Tom’s birthday early to get home in time for supper. My dad insists that Saturday evening is the one meal every week we all eat together.

‘A bit less for June,’ I hear him say quietly to Kathleen as she piles up my plate.

‘She likes it like this, Bradley,’ she replies in an overemphasised whisper.

Liar, I want to say to her.

‘She needs to cut back a bit,’ my dad says, as though I can’t hear. As though I’m not in the room.

‘OK.’ Kathleen takes a spoonful of mash away. She puts the plate in front of me on the table and in full view of my dad she cuts some butter and drops it on the top, where it instantly starts to melt. She looks at me with a smile that says to Dad that she’s on my side. That she did it because she loves me.

I want to take the boiling potato and throw it at her.

‘You OK, honey?’ She reaches over and pats my hand.

‘Yes,’ I say, and pick up my fork and begin to eat.

‘How was Jennifer today, June?’ my dad asks.

‘She’s good,’ I lie.

‘You should invite her over here again one day. You don’t always have to go there.’

‘She’s teaching me violin,’ I lie again. ‘It’s not so easy for her to bring it here.’

‘We’ll have to come over one day and hear a recital,’ Kathleen says.