Another Life Altogether (11 page)

Tracey was remarkably thin, but, unlike me, her body curved from waist to hip, and her breasts strained against the tight fabric of her T-shirt.

“When’s your birthday?” she asked. “March.”

“I’m going to be fourteen in September, so I’m older than you, but we’ll still be in the same year. It’s not fair, but it works out that way. We’ll be third years. That means we’ll get to go first for school dinner twice a week. When I was a second year, we only went in first once.”

She seemed to think this was an important distinction, and it made me wonder what I should expect of the school dinners at my new school. At my old school, Knox Vale, where Spam fritters, liver and onions, and spotted dick were considered the menu’s delicacies, I’d never been in a hurry to get to the dining hall.

“I can’t wait to leave school,” Tracey continued. “I want to be a secretary. I’m going to take shorthand and typing. You can earn good money being a secretary, you know.”

I nodded in hearty agreement, though I’d always thought that typing and answering phones all day would be downright boring. I could think of a hundred jobs I’d rather do.

“Of course, that’ll only be until I get married. Then I’m going to have three kids. A girl and two boys. What do you want to do when you leave school?”

“I want to go to university.”

“Oh. A brainbox, then, are you?” She fixed me with a narrow-eyed stare.

“No,” I said, immediately regretting this confession. “Why do you want to go to university, then?”

“I want to go to London.” For a long time now, I’d known that I wanted to live in London. It was where all the famous people lived, where anything important happened. All the headline events on the news took place in London—Princess Anne’s wedding, peace demonstrations, Wimbledon, IRA bombs. And London was always on the television, on programs about history and current affairs, and in films where red double-decker buses rode by landmarks like Tower Bridge, the Houses of Parliament, Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square. I’d never been to London, but I was sure I’d be happy if I lived there, pulled into that vortex of busyness and bustle, no longer someone who sat in our living room to watch the world’s critical happenings.

“I went to London once,” said Tracey.

“You did?”

“Yeah,” she said, spitting out her gum. It landed in a tight gray ball, barely missing my right shoe. I wondered if she had been trying to hit it. “My mum is president of the Bleakwick Young Wives Club. She organized the trip. We all went shopping down Oxford Street.”

“What was it like?”

“I didn’t like it. We got lost on the tube, ended up getting off at the wrong stop and walking for miles. My feet were killing me. But we did see Big Ben.”

“You did?”

“Yeah, and heard it as well.
Doing. Doing. Doing.”
She imitated a loud clock chime. “Just like on the News at Ten. Didn’t see the Queen, though.”

“I did,” I chirped. “I saw the Queen.”

“No, you never.”

“I did. When she came to open Hull Royal Infirmary.”

“What, you really saw her?” Tracey’s tone softened and her eyes grew wide. Finally, I’d found something that seemed to impress her.

“Yes, I saw her. About as close as you are to me now.”

It was almost true. I’d been six at the time, and the whole city was abuzz with the excitement of the Queen’s visit. There were Union Jack streamers hung from all the lampposts, and the neighbors had put pictures of the Queen in their windows. (Mrs. Brockett had put up five.) My mother had been too preoccupied with installing a new water heater to pay much attention to anything beyond our front door, and I’d begged my father to take me to see the parade. But my entreaties were useless and seemed only to increase his fury at the event. The way he slammed about the house, kicking chairs and clattering crockery, anyone would have thought the whole thing had been planned not as a public celebration but as a carefully orchestrated personal insult.

Finally, Auntie Mabel appeared, a little paper Union Jack flag in her hand. “What, you can’t take your own daughter to see Her Royal Highness on the one day she comes to Hull?” she’d said, looking at my father with utter contempt.

“It’s against my principles,” my father answered, puffing out his chest. “I’m an ardent socialist.”

“More like an armchair socialist,” Mabel replied. Then she turned to me. “Come on, darling, let’s you and me go and enjoy our national heritage, shall we?”

When we arrived, the crowd that lined the parade route was at least ten deep, and even when Mabel lifted me onto her shoulders I still couldn’t see over the rows of excited, bobbing heads. “I tell you what,” she said. “Why don’t you squeeze your little self to the front. I’ll wait for you here. Go on. Then you’ll get the best view.”

I eased my way to the steel barriers to push my face into the cold metal, the weight of the crowd swaying against my back. It seemed to take forever for the Queen to arrive, and I felt my heart racing with the anticipation around me. Then suddenly the crowd surged with excitement
as her massive Rolls-Royce came into view. I pushed my hand through the metal barrier, waving the little paper Union Jack flag that Mabel had given me. The car pulled alongside us and then, just as quickly, it was gone. All I saw of the Queen was a white gloved hand waving genteelly and a flash of frosted hair. “What did she look like?” Tracey asked.

“Very …” I searched for the right word. “Regal. She looked very regal.”

“What’s that?”

“Royal,” I answered.

“Well, yeah, she would, wouldn’t she, her being the Queen?” Tracey shook her head slowly, as if I were the stupidest person she’d had the misfortune of laying eyes on. I could feel any hope of making her like me slip away. I could already envision her taunting me in the corridors of my new school, egged on by a gang of sneering kids. “Anyway,” she continued, “I don’t know why you’d want to live in London. It wasn’t up to much, far as I’m concerned. This year the Young Wives did a trip to Whitby, and that was a lot better. I won two pounds on the amusements.”

“You did?” It wasn’t as much as some of my mother’s bingo wins, but two pounds was still a lot of money.

“Yeah, on one of them one-arm bandits. But then I lost it all on one of those Penny Falls machines. They’re a bloody rip-off, if you ask me.” She let out a weary sigh. “Listen, I’m going to get some goodies. They’ve got a sale on sweets at the Co-op.” She eased herself off the fence. “You coming?”

“Me?”

“Yeah, who else do you think I’m talking to?” I was astonished at the invitation. I felt a sudden, hopeful thrill. Then the thrill abruptly abated. “I can’t.”

“Why not?”

My cheeks began to burn. “I’m banned. They banned me from the
Co-op.” Surely now she’d think me far worse than an interloper who lurked around her neat little housing estate. I was a teenage vandal. A newcomer who was already the scourge of the village.

“They banned you?” she asked. I was surprised when the flat tone of her voice brightened and she looked at me with undisguised delight.

“Yes. This big ugly woman with black hair told me I wasn’t allowed in anymore.”

“Oh, you mean Mrs. Franklin. I call her Frankenstein ’cause she’s such a bloody monster.” Tracey laughed. “So, what happened?”

I gazed into her excitement and felt overpowered by its draw, giddy with the possibilities it promised. “She tried to overcharge me,” I said, folding my arms across my chest as if still outraged by the idea. “So I got into an argument with her, but she wouldn’t listen. Then I got so mad I kicked over this display they had of Mr. Kipling’s cakes. And then I just stormed out of the shop.”

Tracey’s mouth gaped. “That was you?”

I nodded.

“Bloody hell. My mum heard about that. Her friend Doris was in there when it happened. Said there was boxes of chocolate cakes all over the floor. Said Frankenstein was bloody livid. So you’re not one of those boring brainboxes, then?”

I shrugged, trying to look casual, but I couldn’t help smiling. If only I could extend this moment, make Tracey want to be my friend, I knew I could leave the past behind. The taunting in the cloakroom, the hiding in the caretaker’s cupboard, the school dinners spent alone—they’d be experiences I could look back on the way a traveler would regard a difficult journey in a foreign land.

“Well, then,” Tracey announced, “I say bugger Frankenstein. Let’s go get our goodies over at the newsagent’s instead.” She began clunking unsteadily in her platform sandals toward the entrance of Marigold Court.

“But I haven’t got any money.”

Tracey turned back toward me. “That’s all right, I’ll buy you something. I’ve got loads.” She stuck a hand into one of her pockets to jangle what sounded like a handful of coins.

“Thanks, Tracey.”

“Oh,” she said with a shrug, “you can call me Trace.”

W
HEN I RETURNED HOME LATER THAT AFTERNOON, THE DOOR OF
the downstairs toilet was open and I could see my mother, a pair of blue nylon knickers draped around her ankles, reading the same battered copy of
Woman’s Realm
she’d thrown at me the other day. Without looking up, she called to me as I walked past. “I’m not talking to you.” I said nothing.

She called again, this time louder. “I’m not talking to you.”

“Yes, you are,” I answered, continuing down the hall. “No, I’m not.”

“Well, then, what are you doing right now?”

“You know what I’m talking about, young lady.”

“How can I know what you’re talking about if you’re not talking to me?” I stood at the kitchen door, calling back to her.

“Sometimes you’re too bloody clever for your own good.” She began pulling toilet paper off the roll. The holder had been there when we moved in; it was rusty and squealed like unoiled brakes with each turn. “If I’d talked to my mother like you talk to me, I would have got a good clip around the ear. Do you hear me?”

“How can I hear you if you’re not talking to me?” I asked, and pushed open the kitchen door.

“Look, miss!” she yelled after me as the door shut behind me. “You’d better not start getting clever with me!”

I recalled my promise to my father that morning and cringed. This was an agreement that was going to be even harder to honor than I’d anticipated. I sighed and began searching the cupboards for some food with which to make the evening meal. It was a quarter past five, and my father would be home from work soon.

I heard the toilet flush, and the shuddering rattle of the pipes all through the house. Seconds later, my mother joined me in the kitchen. “You know, we need a towel in that toilet,” she said, shaking water from her hands and spattering me with cold droplets.

“Maybe if you’d helped me unpack the towels, we’d know where to find them.” I was talking back again. I wanted to stop myself, but it was just so difficult. There was something inside me that resisted silence, like a bird caught in a room battering relentlessly against the illusory freedom of glass.

My mother snorted, pulled the two sides of her dressing gown tight across her chest, and sat down in one of the chairs next to the kitchen table. “There you go again, accusing me of things I haven’t done. I’ll tell your father when he gets home, and we’ll see what he has to say about that.”

“No, Mum, don’t do that. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. After I’ve made the tea, I’ll put a towel in there.”

“I wasn’t asking you to do it,” she said, huffing. “I’m perfectly capable of doing it myself, you know. I was just pointing out that it’s something we need, that’s all. And where have you been, anyway?”

“Out. In the village. I made a friend. Her name’s Tracey.”

I was still giddy from my recent encounter. After buying an enormous haul of Mars Bars, Milky Ways, and Cadbury’s chocolate Buttons, Tracey had shown me around the village to get “the lay of the land”—a term she’d continued to tease me about for the rest of the day. After wandering the village’s limited network of narrow streets and walking out as far as one of the surrounding farms, we’d made our way to the
churchyard. There, beneath the weathered stone tower of the squat little church, we’d stretched out on a big stone slab that covered one of the graves, while we munched on the remaining sweets and got to know each other. Tracey had done most of the talking. She told me about what would soon be my new school, Liston Comprehensive, which stood in the village of Liston six miles from Midham, the teachers she liked (her French teacher and her science teacher, who was leaving) and those she didn’t like (everybody else). She told me about her friends—all three of whom were called Deborah, and whom Tracey never seemed to talk about as individuals but simply referred to collectively as “the Debbies.” The Debbies, whom I’d visualized as identical triplets with matching outfits and black hair worn in ribboned plaits, all lived in Liston. Tracey told me she didn’t see much of them during the summer holidays. “So it’s great you moved here,” she added. “I won’t be as bored now.”

She’d gone on to talk at length about some of the boys she knew at school—a jumble of Petes, Mikes, Tonys, and Andys, who were alternately “gorgeous,” “dishy,” or “drop-dead bloody gorgeous.” When she asked me if I’d had a boyfriend in Hull, I thought for a moment of making one up, but somehow I couldn’t work up the enthusiasm for this particular lie.