The Summer of Secrets (21 page)

Helen crouched down until her head was under the table. Victoria reached to pull at her arm, and she fell sideways, landing with her face next to the amputated hair. She felt it twitch against her skin and pushed it away with a squeal.

‘Get it off me! I’ll be having dreams about it as it is.’

‘Yeah, it’ll be crawling up the bed.’ Victoria wiggled it. ‘And up your pillow …’ A snort of laughter stopped her from saying what it would do next.

Helen grabbed for Victoria’s remaining plait and tried to say something, but already she was giggling too much to get the words out. She waved it, struggling to breathe, feeling Victoria’s shoulders shake beside her. She’d never felt this happy before, never.

The second plait also came off in one piece. Helen stood and examined what was left, scissors held at a professional angle. She was beginning to enjoy herself.

‘And what would madam like me to do with what we have left?’

Victoria was holding a hand mirror, tilting her head from side to side with a thoughtful expression.

‘I think,’ and now she sounded quite serious, ‘you’re going to cut it all off up here,’ she ran a hand along her head from her left temple and down to the nape of her neck, ‘and carry on round the back, and then make what’s left hang over the other side and be kind of shaggy.’

‘You’re sure about this?’ Helen couldn’t quite believe that they wouldn’t get into massive trouble at some stage. But then, she reasoned, who was there to care? Piet and Seth had other things to worry about, and Alice – well, would she even notice? Victoria obviously didn’t think so.
And
, her mind was whispering,
there’s no one to stop you cutting yours off either
.

‘Yes, I’m sure.’ Victoria looked up. ‘Do it.’

The hair kept slithering out from between the blades without warning, leaving an erratic line across the back of Victoria’s head, and there were patches of scalp showing through in the odd place. But Helen worked out a bit of a strategy along the way, so it wasn’t exactly disastrous. More … asymmetric.

Victoria held up the mirror to inspect. ‘A bit more here.’ She pointed to a point above her left ear.

Helen had the feel of it now, sliding the scissors back at the moment the blades started biting into the hair. She made a circuit of Victoria’s head once more, nicking off the bits that stuck out the most.

‘That’s enough. I can’t stand the tickling any more!’ Victoria wrenched the tea towel away from her shoulders, and tipped her head over, rubbing at her scalp with her fingertips.

‘Go outside! You’re getting it everywhere!’

Victoria stood back up.

‘No, it’s all right now.’ She ducked down to see herself again in the front of the oven, and pulled at the hair to spike it out. ‘How is it?’

‘Hmm. Interesting.’

Victoria crossed to the sink and ran some water into her hand, wetting the hair over her ears and pulling more strands forward over her eyes. She looked, thought Helen, like a wild thing, a feral child pulled from the jungle. And, no doubt about it, it suited her.

‘Sure you don’t want yours done?’

Helen felt herself wobble. The hair massed against her neck was so hot. And Victoria looked amazing.

‘You could look like that French film star.’ Victoria waved the scissors in front of her, using her most coaxing tone. ‘Come on! Be free!’

‘I don’t know …’ Helen could hear herself giving in. ‘OK …’

But as Victoria began to saw at the first chunk of hair, Helen pulled away.

‘No, I don’t know!’ She grabbed at her head with both hands. ‘I can’t do it!’

Victoria chucked the scissors on the table.

‘If you say so.’

Helen crossed over to the door and reached for the brush.

‘Let me think about it—’

But Victoria shrugged and slid off the edge of the stool, placing it carefully back under the table.

‘It’s up to you, Helen. It’s your hair.’ She pushed past her towards the door. ‘You never do anything, anyway.’

And she was gone.

Helen stood, frozen, holding the broom in front of her. Victoria was so … But no, she wasn’t going to let her walk away from it this time. She let the handle fall, and slammed out of the door.

‘Yes, it is my hair!’ She yelled down the path, only to find Victoria in the other direction, towards the garden, watching her with an amused expression.

‘All right, all right, no one’s saying anything else.’

‘You … you…’ It was no good. Helen let out a laugh. ‘Well, you got one bit.’ She put up a hand to find the place with the chunk missing.

‘Go on, let me balance it out. I’ll make a good job of it, honest!’ Victoria was smiling as well now. ‘You can do it with a ponytail, it works every time.’ She drove in on her advantage. ‘You want to, I can tell. And it’s not true you never do anything. Feel the fear. Remember the greenhouses!’

Helen put a hand up level with her chin.

‘No further than this.’

It worked quite well in the end. Victoria had her gather a bunch of hair together and hold it over her head as she attacked it with the scissors. She did look sort of French, Helen thought to herself, checking in the hand mirror and seeing the short, shaggy layers fall down around her face. She turned, making her lips pout. Victoria pushed her on the shoulder.

‘All you need’s a beret.’ She cocked her head to one side. ‘Is that what I think it is?’

Through the open door came the sound of an ice-cream van. Helen held a finger up. One came by on its regular route around the villages, occasionally pulling in at the end of the lane for a rest before carrying on. The chimes came to a halt.

‘Have you got any money?’ Victoria was already feeling in her pocket. She pulled out some coins and counted them up.

‘Dad’s usually got a bit in here.’ Helen checked in the cup on the fridge top. ‘Yep. Quick! Let’s run!’

It felt good to be running in the toasted air of the afternoon, the ends of her hair just tickling her neck.

Victoria gave her a grin as they reached the van. ‘Good feeling?’

Helen grinned back and turned to the window, where the man was standing with a resigned expression.

‘Icepops. Give us icepops.’

They walked back down the lane, holding the frozen tubes by the ends so the top bit would start to melt. Helen held the coolness against her cheek.

‘What we need …’ Victoria paused to suck up the mouthful of the cold liquid pooling at the bottom of her tube ‘… what we need now is a lot of black eyeliner.’ She stuck her tongue out as far as it would go, squinting down to see the colour. The violent blue of the icepop had already left a streak down the centre. ‘I’ve got some in my room, come on.’

‘In a minute.’ Helen’s tongue was green, the colour draining at every suck from the remaining ice.

A car came up behind them and beeped for them to get out of the way. As it drew level, it slowed down, and the window rolled down. A woman with careful makeup and a padded neckbrace leaned out.

‘Helen.’ Her voice was treacly. ‘How are you? Mr Weaver and I only came back from Spain this week.’ She indicated her neck. ‘I’ve been having terrible trouble with my cervicalgia.’ She paused to smooth her already immaculate hair. ‘How are you and your father doing? I bumped into your mother when we were over in Southport, she said she hasn’t seen much of you this summer.’

The Weavers’ bungalow had been built facing the main road, but the entrance and sweep of gravel drive was some way down the lane. Helen could make out the fancy arches which ran all the way along the house front, as if it was a toy ranch. She could hear her father’s voice,
Paid a nice sweetener to the planning to get that through
, and she had a vision of the Weavers as plastic dolls being positioned in their world by a cosmic child playing a game of pretend. That would explain Mrs Weaver’s stiff neck. A cough made her realize everyone was waiting for her to reply. What had the question been? She forced herself to concentrate. Something about her dad.

‘He’s fine.’ Helen kept her eyes fixed on the corner of their windscreen. A dribble of cool liquid came up and over the side of the icepop, and she darted at it with her tongue. At the same time, she glanced round at Victoria, who, lightning fast, stuck a vivid blue tongue out at her. A huge giggle began to force its way up into her chest.

‘And this must be your friend from the cottages.’ Mrs Weaver turned herself round. ‘Now, then, is it your father who’s driving that van around the place?’

Victoria copied her tone, managing to give her voice an even more patronizing edge but with such a straight face that the older woman looked unsure of herself.

‘No, it isn’t.’

Mrs Weaver waited for more, and then carried on: ‘Well, whoever it is, Mr Weaver’s Rover was almost scratched very badly yesterday, from having to drive so near to the hedge.’

‘That is terrible,’ Victoria agreed. ‘I’ve never heard of anything so awful in my whole life.’

Helen had to start walking away, her shoulders heaving. She heard Victoria finish.

‘Perhaps if Mr Weaver would like to pass on his driving schedule to us, we can make sure the road is kept quite clear for him in the future?’

‘There is no need to be cheeky, young lady!’ The window buzzed up and the car completed the short journey to the Weavers’ driveway.

They laughed all the way to the canal, leaning against each other helplessly, repeating fragments of the conversation. Finally, breathless, they sat on the bank with their feet dangling above the water and sucked up the last of the melted ice.

‘You know the funniest thing?’

Victoria leaned out to rinse her fingers in the canal. ‘No, what?’

‘Remember the day I met you, when Pippa came round to my garden?’

Victoria nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘I thought you were her grandchildren.’

‘No! Can you imagine?’ Victoria imitated Mrs Weaver’s voice again. ‘Now, children, in bed by nine o’clock, or Mr Weaver and I won’t have time for our after-dinner games. Chop chop.’

She blew up into the hair hanging over her forehead. ‘It feels funny with it all gone. It’s so … short.’ She blew again, her eyes on the canal. When she next spoke, it was a complete non sequitur: ‘You know when Piet was talking about a party for the boat?’

Helen turned to look at her, wondering where she was going with that. ‘Yes?’

Victoria sat up, and hugged her knees in. ‘And we’re going to have a bonfire?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’ve had the best idea.’

‘What?’

‘Can’t tell you yet. But if it works, it’ll be ace.’

The boat wasn’t quite ready on the day it was launched, not in Mick’s eyes anyway. But Piet had a friend with a flatbed trailer, and this was the only day he could bring it over. The boat was on the trailer and endless time had been spent pushing it into the right place for Piet to get his van through ready to reverse it down the lane, and still Mick was trying to delay things. Helen could hear him arguing about it as she stood in the lane. The sun was almost too hot to bear. She was supposed to be watching out for cars or people coming down the lane, though it seemed unlikely that anything would be out and about by choice. She fanned herself with a hand that barely disturbed the weight of warm air around her, letting their voices drift by.

‘If we can have a couple more days in here …’ Her dad sounded stubborn.

‘We can finish up once she’s in the water.’ Piet’s voice was soothing. ‘It’s not as if we’re going to have issues with rain.’

Helen let herself drop back into the meagre shade of the hedge.
Come on
, she thought.
Make your minds up
.

Right on cue, there was the sound of shoulders being slapped and, a few seconds later, Piet’s engine turning over. The boat began to edge out, Piet seeming to have some trouble getting the angle right as he reversed. The shouts of instruction had nothing to do with her, though, and she let them wash around in a meaningless buzz. She was so deep in her abstraction that the boat caught her by surprise as it reared above her. It was taller than ever; oblivious to the raised voices and mayhem below, it inched backwards, its sides crushing into the hedge. To anyone watching from across the fields, Helen thought, the boat would appear to be sailing smoothly down the lane. She heaved herself upright. They were on their way.

It was a tedious process. Piet reversed slowly, with Mick shouting for adjustments in his angle. Seth was walking to one side, watching for any shift in the boat’s balance, and the twins were leaping ahead, their yodelling voices getting in the way of Mick’s directions. Helen saw him glance at them with annoyance.
Don’t say anything
, she begged silently.
Make this a good day
. There had been no sign of Victoria. Helen wondered again what her plan for the launch celebration was.

As the boat reached the water’s edge, the wheels of the van slipped, pulled backwards by the weight of the boat. The van’s engine roared, keeping her steady. They were all cheering her in, everyone except Mick, whose eyes were fixed on the boat’s progress towards the bank. Then a small figure ran out from behind the truck: Will, whooping as he danced down to the point where the wheels of the trailer balanced on the bank’s edge. Seth reacted first, keeping his voice level.

‘Will, you need to get out of the way.’ Will took no notice, and Seth raised his voice. ‘Will, get away, now!’

Will ignored him again, leaning into the trailer, his thin figure braced against the end, his face scarlet with effort. Voices crashed together:

‘Brake! Brake!’

‘Will, stop!’

The boat was pulling at the restraining presence of the van’s engine again, the trailer’s wheels slipping with an awful finality. And Will was there, right in their tracks, about to go under as the boat and trailer crashed over the edge and down into the water. Helen couldn’t look.

Then the engine cut out, and Will’s voice floated up:

‘I stopped it! Did you see, Uncle Piet? I stopped it going in the canal!’

Helen opened her eyes. Piet had stopped in time, with the boat balanced, somehow, right on the edge. She caught sight of her father’s expression. He was pale, his mouth open in mid-yell, sweat pouring down his cheeks. She held her breath for the explosion, but it didn’t come. Instead, he squatted down by the boy and put a hand on his arm.