Kitabı oku: «The Glitter Collection», sayfa 9
Chapter 20
henmoore prison…
Awhole week has passed and I still haven’t written back to my mum. Auntie Cass is putting major pressure on me.
“Just write and tell her what you’ve been up to,” she says. “She must be missing you loads, Tiff, and wondering how you are.”
“She should have thought of that first,” I spit, “before she got herself into all this trouble and wrote me the most stupid letter ever in the world. It’s like I’ve just popped to the shops or something. She didn’t even ask how I was. She’s pathetic!”
“I know, sweetheart, it’s hard, but sometimes we do things without thinking and then it’s not until afterwards that we realise the hurt we’ve caused.”
“But she still doesn’t realise that she’s done anything wrong,” I say. “She didn’t even say sorry in her letter, she just went on about having a laugh and learning to cook.”
“Just have a go,” she sighs, handing me a freshly baked chocolate brownie. “Do your best.”
I take a second chocolate brownie up to my room and some special notepaper that has the name of the hotel on the top, with a little picture of a black rock in the corner. The page is staring at me waiting for words, but I don’t even know where to start. I’d quite like to begin the letter with something like, Dear Mum, Thanks for ruining my life, or Dear Mum, I’m glad you’re having a nice time without me. Or maybe, Dear Mum, how could you be so selfish and hurt your family so much by running away and then hurt me by being so stupid? But I don’t think that’s the kind of letter that Auntie Cass has in mind.
It’s already ten thirty and I’m supposed to be meeting Isla and Max in his dumb tree house at eleven, so I don’t have a lot of time left. Chelsea would laugh at me if she could see the kind of people I hang out with now, but I don’t have a lot of choice, do I? It’s either hanging out with them, or sitting on my own in a boring white room with no TV. It sounds like my mum is having a better time in prison. I pick up my pen, take a deep breath and begin.
Dear Mum,
I’m sitting at a little desk in the bedroom that you used to have when you were my age. Uncle Dan painted the whole room boring white for me and left me a mini chocolate on my pillow. It’s so bright it makes my eyes go funny. School is so lame. It’s a school for babies, which means I’m not learning anything at all. Which is fine by me. I know what you’ve done, Mum. I know our life was a lie. I have two boring friends. I have to hang out with them because there’s nothing else to do. Isla has a pony and Max’s family has loads of horses, but he likes insects and drawing. I have one enemy called Holly. In fact I have two enemies. Her mum, Mandy, doesn’t like me either. Or you. What did you do to her, Mum? Well, whatever it was she’s still pretty angry about it all. I have a cousin who is five and she’s called Indigo, she likes it when I paint her nails pink for her. I’ve stopped painting my nails. Soon I’m going to be in a dumb school concert and I have to read a poem and you’ll miss it. I have a red bike and have to wear pathetic wellies because it rains so much. Why didn’t you ever teach me how to ride a bike? It’s stupid. I’m earning my own money by collecting glasses and cleaning tables in the bar for Uncle Dan, which means I have to put up with his jokes.
Anyway, bye then.
From Tiffany x
It’s a stupid letter but I don’t care. I’m more worried about getting the letter safely in the letterbox without anyone seeing it’s addressed to a prison, than what’s in the actual letter itself. I stuff it in the envelope and call goodbye to Auntie Cass. When I’m on my bike I zip it safely in my jacket pocket and speed off toward the post office. I need a stamp, so I have to go inside and buy one.
“I need a stamp for a letter to England,” I say.
“Give it here, pet,” says the post office lady, “I’ll stick it on for you and pop it in the sack.”
“Er, no, it’s all right, I’ll just take the stamp and, er, these.” I say picking up three chocolate bars and thrusting some money into her hand. My heart is thumping in my chest. I mustn’t let her see the letter.
“Suit yourself, pet,” she says, handing me my change.
Back outside, I hide behind the large blue postbox, away from the Saturday shoppers, and shove the stamp on the right hand corner of the envelope. It feels like I have a bomb in my hand that’s waiting to explode. My face is hot, my hands are shaking and I feel all guilty, like I’ve done something wrong. I want to get rid of it quick so I take a good look around to make sure no one’s looking and dart round to the front of the postbox. Just as I’m about to throw the letter into its mouth, the door of the shop opposite opens wide and Holly steps outside.
“Ah, it’s Tiffany Morris. Writing a love letter are we?” she sneers.
“Er, no.” My letter is trembling in midair. I feel like all the oxygen has been sucked from my lungs and my legs have turned to jelly.
“Yes it is! It’s a love letter. How sweet. What’s your boyfriend’s name?” She’s coming close.
I can’t speak and I’m willing my hand to put the letter in the box.
“Well, let’s have a look at it then, maybe I would like to have his address so I can write too!” she sneers. Then before I can stop her she’s snatched the letter from my hand and is staring at the address.
“No way!” she shrieks. “Carla Morris is in prison! Just as my mum predicted,” she spits, “she’s in big trouble again.”
All of a sudden, my strength comes back. “Give it to me,” I hiss. “It’s none of your business.” I snatch the letter back and throw it in the postbox. “I don’t know what happened between your mum and mine but it’s nothing to do with us.”
“I disagree, Tiffany Morris, it appears it has everything to do with us. And if we really want to keep this little secret between ourselves I think maybe we’ll start with my maths homework. What do you reckon?”
I can see that I’m cornered. How can this be happening? Everything will be even worse if the whole of Sark finds out my mum’s a criminal!
“I’ll do it,” I say quietly. “Just don’t tell anyone, OK. Please?”
Chapter 21
grown-ups make mistakes too…
I head off to the tree house to meet Max and Isla and hope they’ll be able to take my mind off Holly. Despite the fact I’ve hardly been friendly since I arrived, Max and Isla seem to like me for some weird reason. I hand everyone a chocolate bar, as a kind of peace offering, my hands still trembling. I hope the sugar might calm me down. Holly is evil, but worse than that, I’m furious with myself for getting caught out. I’m stupid. Why didn’t I ask Auntie Cass to post it for me, or why couldn’t I have been more careful, like a normal person? I just stood there like a dummy, frozen to the spot, virtually waiting for Holly to take the letter from me. I might as well have wrapped it up in sparkly paper and ribbons and popped it through her letter box so she could read the whole thing. I’d like to tell someone what happened, but I can’t.
Instead I ask Max and Isla if either of them know anything about what happened between my mum and Mandy years ago. The whole thing is bugging me and I just need to know the truth. I need to get to the bottom of it and try to sort it out. Otherwise I’ll be doing Holly’s homework for the rest of my life, and she might not stop there. But they just shrug their shoulders and shake their heads. Max says his mum isn’t into island gossip.
“My mum’s not interested in anything,” he says, “unless it’s a horse. And that includes me. I sometimes think it would’ve been better if I’d been born with four legs and a mane.”
Isla says her family has only been on the island for the past six years so they hadn’t even heard of my mum and me before I arrived.
“I did ask Holly,” she says, “but she wouldn’t tell. She told me not to get involved. And anyway, I’ve got my own problems to be worrying about. My parents have just told me that they want me to go to boarding school back in England next year. They’ve got it all planned out.”
“Why do they want to send you off?” I ask, forgetting my own troubles for a moment.
“They think our school is too small,” she says, “and lots of kids go off-island to do GCSEs and things. But I don’t want to go,” she sniffs. “I like it here. And anyway you can get GCSEs here, it’s not impossible.”
“Why are you worrying about GCSEs?” I ask. “We’re only twelve. We haven’t got exams and stuff like that to worry about for years. This place is so weird.”
Max is busy with his sketchbook drawing an army of disgusting stick insects. “She’s right you know, Isla, why can’t you just tell them?” he says. “Just say you like it here and you don’t want to go. It’s your life.”
“Yeh, right,” she sighs, “like they’ll listen to me! I always have to go along with what they want. I suppose I don’t want to upset them or disappoint them or something.”
“Well, you can’t be as much of a disappointment to your parents as I am to mine,” Max says. “My dad has great plans for me being some kind of zoologist or something, but I’m too stupid, I have trouble even reading a whole book. I’d be no use at a smart school. I’m better off sticking to my drawing.”
“I didn’t know you have trouble reading,” I say. “You should get tested for dyslexia, Max. My best friend Chelsea’s dyslexic, but it doesn’t mean she’s stupid. She’s got a really high IQ. Why don’t you get tested?”
“Nah,” he says, “sounds like too much trouble to me.”
I turn to Isla. “I’ve had enough of grown-ups always telling me what to do all the time. And it’s not as if they always get it right, anyway. Grown-ups make mistakes too. I’m just going to do what I want from now on. You should too.”
“Hm,” says Isla, but she doesn’t look convinced. “Anyway, I have to go now. I promised I’d meet Holly and go for a ride.”
I leave Max to his drawing and while Isla and Holly are out horse riding I get busy doing two lots of maths homework. The first bit of Holly’s grand plan is that I work out all the answers on the sheet then give her a copy so she can fill it in in her own writing. The second bit is that I have to make a couple of mistakes on my sheet so Mrs Davies won’t get suspicious. It’s rubbish. My marks are going to dive downhill, but I don’t exactly have a choice, do I?
I sneak out of the house just before bedtime to meet Holly in the lane. The moon is only a tiny sliver in the sky, and my torch makes dark shadows hang in the trees.
“Well done, Tiffany,” she sneers. “And I’ve been thinking about that boring Christmas project we have to do. I’m so tired I was wondering if you’d like to do it for me?”
“No way,” I say. “Nothing else.”
“Shame,” she threatens. “Well, if you’re only going to do the maths then I won’t be able to guarantee that certain important addresses and certain important information about your precious mother don’t get shared around the island, will I?”
My fists curl and my teeth grind against each other. And even though I want to push her into a dark corner in the shadows and make her feel scared, I somehow find myself agreeing to her plan. I feel like my prison walls are growing taller and thicker all around me. Holly is the warden who is holding the key, and I’m the prisoner left feeling helpless and alone.
Chapter 22
sure you’ve remembered to pay…?
It’s nearly Christmas. Last week we did our school carol-concert and I had to stand up and read out my poem in front of everyone. I felt like a kid at primary school again. The whole thing was ridiculous. Max had to sing a solo and Isla and Holly played a recorder duet of “Away in a Manger”. Uncle Dan recorded the whole cheesy thing on his camcorder and says we have to send it to Mum as part of her Christmas present. I think it’s a stupid idea. She won’t be interested in watching me, anyway. In my London school she always arrived at things like concerts and parents’ evenings at least half an hour late. She said it was important to make a good entrance, to get noticed. She got noticed, all right, but not because she looked great, more because she was always such a mess. She’d clip clop noisily in on her stupid pointy heels, smelling of wine and make too-loud ‘shushing’ noises while she was trying to find her seat in the dark. She was so embarrassing. But Uncle Dan and Auntie Cass were completely well-behaved. They arrived early to get the best seats and didn’t make a fuss.
Indigo is mega-hyped about Christmas. She’s taken to wearing a Santa hat most of the time and nearly burst with excitement when the real Santa came to visit us at school. Yesterday we picked up our tree from the Gallery Stores and spent the evening rummaging through boxes and boxes of old decorations from the loft. Auntie Cass rooted out a couple of wobbly cotton-wool snowmen that she and Mum had made when they were small. I held them in the palm of my hand and gazed at them. My mum’s hands have actually touched them, actually made them, and Auntie Cass has kept them safe. I’ve never had a family history before; it’s always just been Mum and me.
“I don’t know why you bother to hang on to those old things. Mum and I always get shiny new decorations every year. We never use the same ones twice.” And I realise that I am the rubbish one who’s talking rubbish. We didn’t go and buy new decorations, did we? My mum just stole them somehow because she was so addicted to having shiny new things.
Today I’m going on the ferry over to Guernsey with Auntie Cass for our grand Christmas shopping expedition. Indigo’s not so happy about it because she has to stay at home with Uncle Dan, who’s trying to tempt her with plans for icing our Christmas cake and making mince pies. I’d quite like to join in with all that stuff too, but I’d never say and anyway, I have some shopping to do myself. I’ve promised Max that he can tag along with us because his mum’s too busy for things like Christmas shopping. Max says his mum does all her shopping on the internet and hardly ever leaves the island, unless it’s to do with horses.
The ferry to Guernsey is crammed full of Christmas shoppers, buzzing with excitement. Isla keeps on flitting backwards and forwards between sitting with us and sitting with Holly and Mandy, who are tucked in the corner at the back. Holly’s eyes are boring into my back, but I don’t care. I got all her maths homework and a whole Christmas project done before school broke up. Now I’m hoping she’ll leave me in peace until next term.
“It’s OK, Isla,” I say. “You can sit with Holly if you like, I don’t mind.”
“Thanks,” she whispers. “It’s just that I’d rather sit with you two, but when I do I always end up feeling guilty. Holly and I have been best friends since I moved here and we started riding together. I feel bad leaving her and—”
“But it’s her that’s the problem,” Max cuts in. “It’s her that thinks I’m weird and that Tiff smells, or whatever stupid thing it is she keeps saying. She could just give up, be friends with us all and join in. Nobody would mind would they?”
Isla and Max look at me waiting for my answer.
“It’s not as if it’s anything to do with me is it? I mean, it’s not as if I’m really friends with any of you.” I say. “I’ve got my own best friend back at home. I’m not going to be hanging around here with you lot for much longer, so do what you want, I don’t care.”
My words sting their cheeks, but they swallow their hurt. Isla heads silently to the back of the ferry and gets all cosy with Holly. And Max turns his back to me and stares out across the sea. My heart is thumping in my chest and my spiteful words are burning my tongue.
It’s the first time I’ve been back to Guernsey since I arrived on Sark, and I’ve almost forgotten what real shops are like. I feel more at home here with cars and streets and hustle and bustle. There are twinkling lights everywhere and huddles of people singing on street corners. Auntie Cass says she has some “top secret” shopping to do, so we plan to meet her for lunch in an hour and Max and I head off alone. I’m surprised he’s still speaking to me after what I said on the ferry.
“What d’you need to get, Max?” I ask.
“Dunno, really,” he says. “Something for my mum and dad, I guess.”
“What about your brother?”
“Nah, my mum sorts all that and wraps it up, and I just have to write the label. Why are you even interested, Tiff, you know, as you’re not even my friend or anything?”
And I want to say I’m sorry for my mean words and that I’d like to be his friend, really, it’s just I can’t let myself get close. But my apology gets stuck in my throat and a sorry silence hangs in the air.
“I’m not really interested in shopping and stuff, anyway,” he says, filling the space. “I just like drawing really.”
And even while we’re walking along he’s got his little sketchbook out and he’s sketching away, drawing everything in sight.
I’m still determined to shop, though, and I treat myself to a new top, a belt and a pair of sparkly earrings. Memories of shopping with my mum float in and out of my mind. Cool memories of us trying stuff on and giggling our heads off weave in and out of the not-so-cool ones – the memories of her taking off security tags in the changing room and stuffing things in my school bag.
Once we’ve done most of our shopping I ask Max to wait while I buy one more present.
“I have a bit of ‘top secret’ shopping to do myself,” I say. “I’ll meet you outside the chemist in fifteen minutes?”
