The Yearbook, page 17
“And, instant karma. Oh God, the carpet. Great, thanks, Neo, you furry maniac.”
It was funny enough to yank me out of my spiral and we both howled with laughter. Polly collected my plate and returned with a cloth. She squeezed my shoulders then she sat across from me again.
“Okay, so here is how it’s going to go, if that’s alright with you?” She sounded together and businesslike again. “You’re going to stay here tonight, because I’m not feeling so great, and I’d like some company.”
“What?!…Oh, I get it.”
“You may have to stay for two nights. I mean, I really am quite upset. You know how dramatic I can get, what with my chronic loneliness and all. If only I wasn’t such a weird dyke, I wouldn’t have to pull your family into this.”
“I…” It was so surreal. It was like she was saying Dad’s words – telling his stories. But he’d never said any of this sort of stuff in front of her. How did she know?
“Meanwhile Adam can’t believe the stupid university won’t let him log in from his home computer. It’s disgraceful, really, that he has to travel all the way back to Bristol, just to finish this essay. He’s gutted to be missing the last week of winter break.”
She explained the rest of the necessary lies to get through the pinch point. It was very strange, having an adult tell you to lie, but Polly’s stories were perfectly structured, with the ideal reader – my dad – very much catered for. There was nothing about these lies that cast him in any blame, or my mother. In fact, they gave him just what he needed. Smugness – about the mess of Polly’s life. Anger – but a manageable amount, safely directed towards Adam’s university and their IT incompetence. He could even play the hero with this story – Dad’s favourite game to play. How generous of him to let his precious daughter stay with her crazy aunt. I drooped with relief.
“Right, I don’t know about you, but I need another drink.” She screeched her chair back. “I think you’re old enough for a small glass of wine. Medicinal. What do you say to wine and a movie?”
“Yes please.”
I took my stuff upstairs to her tiny spare room, that had actual commissioned oil paintings of all the cats she’d ever owned on the walls. I changed into my pyjamas and, waiting for me downstairs, was a tiny measure of red wine poured into a glass.
“Bill and Ted?” Polly asked.
“That would be most excellent.”
The night wound itself in. The stars came out. Polly’s whole body shook as she laughed at the movie. No messages from my family, but that was expected. Elijah was still sending messages, and at least I felt safe. That counted for something. My lungs were filling properly, relaxing my muscles as they deflated.
I hadn’t felt safe. Then I told my story, and now I did.
That was worth noting, I thought, as my eyelids tugged themselves down, drawing the curtains on my very bad day. I fell asleep to the noise of Polly’s giggles, and a cat purring lightly on the rug.
Year Ten is usually pretty quiet. Or maybe it just feels quiet compared to the horror of Year Nine. I mean, if someone shat on you every day for a week it would be terrible… Then, if someone came along and pissed on you every day instead, you’d be thinking, Well, at least it’s not shit. Maybe that’s what Year Ten is…piss instead of shit.
Let’s not lie. School is still terrible. And exams crop up and tap you on the shoulder and say, Oh I’m sorry, were you having an awful time? Sorry to hear about that. Here. Could you hold my bag for me while I punch you in the face?
If Year Nine is where the battles are fought, then Year Ten is where everyone takes a breather to lick their wounds and count their winnings. Friendship groups ever so slightly calcify. People sort of know where they stand in the grand hierarchical mess and keep their heads down, not wanting to rock the boat or be horrifically bullied any more.
The bullying is a quieter, more sophisticated whisper, so you really notice the people who are still total twats. Who are still ruining lives needlessly, because they’re right at the top of the food chain.
Don’t pretend you don’t know who they are…
I woke in an unfamiliar bed. I was greeted with an unfamiliar “Good morning” from someone who loved me, and walked an unfamiliar way to school.
“Are you okay?” Elijah asked when I met him in the library that lunchtime. It was way too freezing to go to our usual bench. “No offence, but you look very tired.”
“I’m fine. Just, well, tired.”
“I hope you’re not too tired to go sift-hunting with me?”
We scanned through the fiction shelves for a book to sift through together. Elijah’s enthusiasm more than made up for my emotionally drained energy. He bounded over to copies of The Great Gatsby and started telling me about how the author, F. Scott Fitzgerald, died before he could see how hugely popular it became.
I yawned while he yabbered on, and pulled out a copy at random, opening a page right at the end. Then I smiled the first smile of that day. I held up the page to him, which was covered in red pen.
“Looks like some dickhead has already sifted this.” Elijah went as red as his penmanship, but still looked proud. “Disgusting! Who would do such a thing?”
I turned the page back around to see what he’d underlined.
They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness…and let other people clean up the mess they had made.
I felt Elijah’s breath on the back of my neck as he read over my shoulder, and closed my eyes a second to savour the sensation.
“What a quote,” he said. “There’s no point us reading this. I’ve already picked the best part. It’s hard being such a genius.” He took the book off me, inserted it back into the shelf and ran further down the aisle. In the space his body left, something caught my attention. There, sitting in my old nook, was Laura Goddard. It was like seeing a giraffe in Antarctica or something, though she had camouflaged herself to fit in. She wore not a scrap of make-up, her hair hung unstyled around her shoulders, and she was reading a book with her knees pulled up to her chest. How the mighty had fallen… A tingle of fear fizzled down my spine as I remembered my altercation with Grace and the other Awfuls the day before. Would they bother punishing me like they had Laura? I didn’t really have the strength for that, not with everything going on at home. Everything I wasn’t telling Elijah.
“So, Paige, would you rather write the world’s most admired novel but die before it became admired, or enjoy moderate success while still alive?” he asked, bounding up to me like a puppy injected with coffee. Then he paused. “Are you absolutely sure you’re okay?”
“Huh?” I turned away from the ghost of Laura Goddard.
“I said, are you sure you’re alright?”
I smiled. And imagined saying the words, “No, I’m not actually. I stayed at my aunt’s house last night because I’m so scared of my dad.” I imagined how that would change how he saw me.
I smiled even wider.
“I’m good, just tired,” I replied. Determined not to ruin one of the only good things I had left in my life.
Polly picked me up from school that day and took me to Pizza Express before dropping me back home. It was just as well we had a coupon because we were both so nervous we hardly ate our dough balls. She stood next to me on the doorstep. My entire body quivered as I rummaged for my keys. One, two, three, four… But Dad opened the door wide, grinning.
“Polly,” he boomed, like the jolly ghost of Christmas Present. “Welcome.” He stepped back, warm and friendly, signalling the start of a new honeymoon period.
“Hi, Glynn,” Polly said. “Thanks again for letting Paige stay. I really needed the company.”
Polly had hunched her shoulders and spoke meekly, pulling her sleeves over her hands.
“It’s totally fine. I can’t imagine how lonely it must get sometimes. I can’t go a night without missing Jane.”
The house was inviting and central-heated. Hoovered, sparkling and fresh. Mum greeted us in the hall, also looking warm and hoovered, sparkling and fresh. She’d overheard his compliment and came up to hug him from behind.
“You’re such a dope,” she said, burying herself into his back.
“It’s true though, my darling.”
I watched Polly watch Mum but she stayed in complete character as hapless aunt.
“Aww, you guys. I don’t know what’s got into me recently. It’s just like all my life decisions caught up on me.” She shook her head. “Sorry, it’s not appropriate to talk like this in front of Paige.”
“Paige is a grown-up, isn’t she?” Dad’s glee was evident. I could sense his need to whisper in my ear, “See, I told you so.”
“Maybe you should go upstairs, Paige?” Mum said. “Let the adults talk.”
I nodded to Polly, who nodded back. I climbed the stairs, passed the monument of Adam’s empty room, and fell onto my bed face first. I listened to murmured voices, discussing things on my behalf, then was summoned back down to the living-room.
“Paige, honey?” Dad said, clearly loving every second. “Your aunty has been a bit low recently. How would you feel about staying at hers over the weekends? Keeping her company for a while?”
Polly’s eyes met mine and she blasted a silent warning to me. I knew not to react enthusiastically.
“Oh,” I said. “Umm…really?”
“She needs you,” Mum said, holding Dad’s hand over the gap between their chairs.
“I guess…Every weekend?”
“Polly, sorry I don’t know why she’s being so rude.”
Polly almost broke and smiled, but saved it just in time. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. I’m pathetic…sorry.”
“Maybe for a while?” I tried out my own acting muscles, sounding reluctant. “If you really need me to.”
A ray of light was opening in my life. An oxygen hole punched into my coffin. I didn’t dare believe it, I didn’t dare hope. Every weekend. Me, not in this house. A gasp of life. A snatch of my stomach not hurting. Oh God, if Dad knew how much I wanted this, he would never let me go. I was auditioning for my own happiness.
“Good girl. Let’s see how it goes.” Positively hyper from Polly’s great downfall, he stood and wrapped me in a rare hug and, despite everything, I clung to him, wanting it to last longer than it did. I suddenly didn’t want to go anywhere. I wanted to stay there and be perfect like Adam and try and make Dad like me. Sensing this, he broke the hug off first.
“Thanks so much, Glynn,” Polly said. “I’ll sort myself out soon. I promise.”
“Take as much time as you need. Paigey doesn’t mind.”
I winced to show I did a bit, even though I really truly didn’t. But I was happy to tell whatever story I needed to escape Dad, despite wishing he was still hugging me.
My life changed drastically for the better, with weekends opened up with Polly, and lunchtimes spent laughing and reading with Elijah. Snowdrops pushed themselves eagerly through the frozen earth. Tiny burgeoning buds appeared on the tree branches. Grace and co didn’t end up punishing me for my impassioned yearbook interruption, apart from the odd dirty look. Their hatred was still saved for Laura, who now had full-time residence in my old library spot.
“What are you doing tomorrow?” Elijah asked, near the end of the half-term break, as we played cards in his bedroom while rain splattered his windows.
“Nothing, why?”
“Do you want to go on an excursion? It being the last day of the holidays and all?”
I was exceedingly grateful that he was so engrossed in gin rummy that he didn’t see my ginormous grin.
“An excursion where? Why?”
“To London. To see things. To do things. To live. Shall we meet around ten? Get the train up to London Bridge?”
I nodded, trying to hide my excitement. We only lived an hour away from London on the train but I rarely went. Maybe once a year if Polly got tickets to some weird feminist play. “Perfect. And what’s the plan? Just mooch?”
“What a word. Mooch! Mooch. Yes, yes, let’s mooch. Let’s not do anything other than mooch. Oh, Paige. Your lexicon is exceedingly impressive.”
“Listen back to that last sentence, you literary show-off.”
He laughed as he played a card. “I have no idea what you mean.”
I couldn’t sleep that night, in my tiny room in Polly’s house. The anticipation of the next day’s mooching fluttered in my stomach, like a tsunami of butterflies. One of her cats mewed in the corridor while I placed my hand on my tummy to calm myself with my breath.
My stomach hadn’t felt nervous with good nerves for so long.
It knew what it felt like to twist into knots with anticipation, but that was often associated with bad nerves. Not giddiness. Not counting down the clock because you couldn’t wait to see a person, rather than staring at the whirring minute hand, wishing it would slow, because you don’t want them back yet.
The last time I’d been this giddy-nervous was the night before I saw Ruby for the last time…
I blinked into the dark.
I dared wonder if he was excited about seeing me. About mooching with me. I smiled as I imagined the answer was yes, then the self-doubt kicked in.
Wait…maybe he isn’t? Maybe he’s only been hanging out with you because he feels sorry for you? It’s a miracle he’s spent this much time with you already. Maybe it’s a charity thing? Remember what happened with Ruby. Remember how much that hurt. What if it happens again?
A cat meowed again as I crammed my face into the pillow. It always struck me as hugely unfair that you could never take your head off at the end of the day, like an uncomfortable underwired bra, and have a little break from it for a while. I tried not to press the play button of my Ruby memory tape, but I was flooded with bittersweet hauntings of our childhood together. The feel of her hand in mine on the first day of secondary school. Telling her about my dad under the duvet at her house and her reaching over and hugging me and telling me she would always be here for me…
…and then…
The feeling in my stomach when I heard her in my hallway. The searing pain. Humiliation. Betrayal…
“Alexa, how do you know if someone likes you?” I whispered into the darkness.
She didn’t answer because she wasn’t here. She was back in my other room, in my other life. My bedroom haunted by the last time I saw Ruby.
“You look nice.” Polly smiled as I ran down late into the kitchen. I’d overslept, and rushed around the kitchen, grabbing a glass of juice and a banana for a panic breakfast. “Looking forward to your day in London?”
I stuffed the fruit into my coat pocket. “Yes. It looks freezing though.”
Neo twirled around Polly’s feet, expecting a second breakfast. “Well you’ve wrapped up, that will help. And stop to drink a hot chocolate. Hang on…” She rummaged in her bag that was hanging from a kitchen chair and withdrew a twenty-pound note from her purse. “Here, take this.” She held it out. “Treat yourself to some hot chocolates.”
My heart felt like it was hot chocolate when I looked at that note. It wasn’t the money, but the thought behind it. Uncomfortable, I joked it off.
“I mean, London’s expensive I hear, but surely drinks aren’t this much?”
“Well, buy some for Elijah too then.” She wafted the money and I relented. “When do I get to meet this boy, by the way?”
“Polly, it’s not like he’s my boyfriend.”
She grinned. “But you want him to be?”
“Polly!”
She cackled so loudly that Neo jumped into the air and scrambled out of the room in an orbit of fur. “Sorry. I shouldn’t wind you up. I’m being an embarrassing aunty. I truly apologize.”
“It’s fine…thank you for the money.”
“You’re welcome. Are you dropping back here tonight before you head to your parents?” She asked it casually enough but the air ripened with tension. We kept having these lovely moments where I lived at her house at weekends and most of half-term, and we could pretend this was for always. But then reality tapped us on the shoulder, reminding me Polly wasn’t my parent, even though she was the only person who acted like it, and this wasn’t my home, even though it felt like one, and I had to go back to my actual parents and actual home, even though they didn’t want me there. All so we could pretend a pointless story of being a functional family.
“I have to pick up my stuff, if that’s okay? Thanks again for letting me stay.”
She ruffled my hair through my bobble hat. “Don’t be daft. Any time. Now, go buy some overpriced hot chocolates and pretend you don’t fancy this boy.”
“Polly!”
She was already walking away, cackling again, following her cat to apologize.
I stared up at the giant green dome, wrinkling my nose. “Madame Tussauds?” My breath came out in puffs of vapour that floated with disbelief into the cold blue sky.
Elijah grinned like the Cheshire cat with veneers. “Yes! I found a two-for-one coupon online and I think we will learn an important life lesson.”
We were standing outside Baker Street tube station, inhaling huge amounts of carbon monoxide from the traffic slugging past us. A long snake of tourists stood patiently nearby and he was trying to make me join them.
I sighed good-naturedly. “I thought we were going to mooch. Mooch. That is the exact opposite of important life lessons.”
“What can I say, Paige?” he said, in a faux arsehole voice. “I’m so disgustingly, consistently, on-brand.”
I burst out laughing. “I can’t believe you just said the words ‘on-brand’ about yourself.”
“It doesn’t count if you say it ironically.”
“Everyone who says it thinks they’re saying it ironically.”
It felt safer teasing Elijah, deflecting the feelings I didn’t want to feel – the pathetic fantasies that had started playing in my head. When we’d ridden the train up that morning, both of us reading, I’d looked over at him, scribbling in his red biro, and imagined him looking up to smile and leaning over to kiss me. The yearning made my blood thicken. I bathed in the heat of this alternate reality for a second, until shame wriggled in, making me blush, telling me off for thinking such an idea was possible. The whole time, Elijah stayed engrossed in his book, oblivious to what I was thinking about him. Thank God. Our friendship meant too much to risk it on something as cliché as a crush, and he gave me no reason to think this was more than a friendship.
