Never Close Your Eyes (9 page)

want me 2 come round?
Lucy asked.

nah, im all right
, Freya lied.
thanks anyway.

She sniffed, wiping her eyes and nose on the sleeve of her school blouse. Life was shit. She picked up the compact mirror on her desk and stared into it. Her face was all red and blotchy and she had a huge zit on her chin. She never knew she could be so unhappy.

She put in her earphones and switched on her iPod. The first track was Funeral for a Friend's ‘Red is the New Black'. It seemed appropriate. She wondered what Cal was doing. It was past nine so she wouldn't look too keen if she messaged him. She started to type:
crap day. wubu2
? (What have you been up to?) She hoped he was online.

‘Can I come in?'

She looked up. Michael, her brother, had poked his head round the door. He didn't wait for an answer. She could see that he'd been crying, too. They were a right pair. And Mum had been weeping. They were a right family. His cheeks were red and his eyes looked puffy. She turned off the music and took out her earphones. She felt all mother hen-ish.

‘Hey, bruv,' she said. ‘You should be in bed. What's the matter?'

He slumped on to her bed, elbows resting on his knees, his head bowed. He didn't even notice the new black and white poster on the wall of the man with a dagger in his heart. Normally he'd have said ‘Gross!' or something like that.

‘I miss Dad,' he said. His straight brown hair hung down, covering his face.

Freya left her desk and sat beside her younger brother on the purple duvet, putting her arm round his thin shoulders. ‘I know,' she said. ‘I do too.'

‘But I wish he wouldn't keep coming round because it upsets Mum,' Michael said fiercely. ‘He pretends it's to see us but I don't believe it. It's like he doesn't want her but he won't let her go either.'

Freya felt a lump in her throat. Michael was so young yet he understood everything. ‘He still loves you, you know,' she said, trying to sound comforting like Mum. ‘Just because he's left doesn't mean he doesn't love you any more.'

Michael growled. He must be sick of hearing it. He started jiggling his leg up and down. Something flashed in the corner of Freya's screen. Cal?

‘Why don't you get us a biscuit?' she said brightly. ‘There're chocolate ones in the cupboard.'

Michael frowned. ‘Mum's downstairs with Bill. She won't let me.'

‘Tell her they're for me,' Freya suggested. ‘I need them to help me concentrate on my homework.'

Michael perked up. ‘I'll get the packet.'

‘Good idea.' Food always worked with him.

She waited until he'd left the room to check her laptop. ‘Cal Barton' it said in the little box in the corner. Her heart fluttered.

hey, it's me
, she read.
why was yr day crap?

She sighed with pleasure. Thank God she had Cal. Every day she worried that he'd go off her like the others and every evening he came back to her. She could tell him everything and he never took the piss. Most of the boys she hung out with hated talking about feelings and stuff like that, but not Cal.

She'd never met him but she felt as if she had. He was the same age as her, but he didn't live in London and knew nothing about her school or friends, which was a good thing. Funny that his parents were separated, too. And his dad kept coming round making his mum upset so he knew exactly what Freya was going on about. She began to tell him all about Gemma and Abigail.

fucking losers
, he wrote.
ur so much better than them. u shouldnt let them get to u then they'll have won.

She talked a bit about Mum and Dad, too. Then they got on to music and clothes.

wot u wearing?
he asked.
bet u look buff?
(Sexy.)

She smiled.
sorry, just my school uniform
, she replied.
wot bout u?

school uniform
, he wrote back.
gonna get a new haircut at the weekend. shorter on the sides and sort of spikey on top
.

cool
, she said. It sounded nice. She wished she could see it.

got to go
, he said.
Pir.
(Parent in room.)

ok
, she said,
hak.
(Hugs and kisses.)

hak. cul8r.
(See you later), he replied.

Nic plodded upstairs, spilling tea as she went. ‘Bugger.'

She knew that she was drunk again and wished she'd never opened that second bottle of wine. Or the first, for that matter. She knocked on Alan's door.

‘Come in.' He sounded distracted, nose buried in some tedious spreadsheet or other, no doubt.

She turned the knob and pushed open the door with her foot. ‘Whoops!' Brown tea sploshed on to the cream carpet. ‘I brought you some tea,' she said. ‘I'll clean it up.' She bent down and dabbed at the wet stain with the corner of her skirt.

Alan looked irritated. ‘Just put it there,' he said, pointing to the top of the grey filing cabinet beside his desk. She rose carefully, using her hands to steady herself. He didn't seem to notice that she was having trouble getting from one side of the room to the other without tripping.

‘There,' she said, pleased that the mug was still half full. She turned and smiled at him, willing him to speak to her. ‘What are you doing?'

She peered over his shoulder. He seemed to be writing an email or something. She noticed he'd typed something weird. She caught sight of the letters c and u and the number 8.

‘What does that mean?' she asked.

‘Nothing. Accountancy-speak,' he said vaguely, pressing ‘send'. He logged off. ‘I'm finished for the night,' he sighed, sitting back in his seat and stretching. ‘Think I'll watch TV for a bit downstairs to unwind. You go to bed.'

Her shoulders drooped. ‘You're always working.'

He got up and turned his laptop off, winding up the leads and putting the whole thing into its case, ready for the morning. Then he pecked her on the cheek, smiling. ‘I'm sorry, we're having a particularly busy patch at the moment.'

‘You're always having a busy patch,' she replied.

Chapter Nine

‘Who's a beautiful girl then?'

Carol popped the saucer of roast chicken scraps on the yellow lino and ran her hand along Victoria's soft, gingery fur. The cat, purring loudly, sniffed the food, picked up a chunk of white meat and put it on the floor beside the saucer where she began chewing greedily. Albert, who was black and white, was jumping up around Carol's ankles, yowling.

‘All right, all right,' she said, flicking her long grey hair out of her eyes, ‘yours is just coming. I've only got one pair of hands.'

She put another saucer of food beside Victoria's, and Albert set to with gusto. Carol grinned and gave them both another stroke. ‘There now,' she said. ‘Good kitties.'

She turned to the chicken carcass on the white plastic workbench, tore the rest of the meat and jelly off the bones and put the scraps in a big blue plastic dish. Then she went down her narrow hallway to the small sitting room at the back of the house, opened the glass door and placed the bowl on the grass by the compost heap.

She knew that at least two wild cats came to her for food but there might be more. And the foxes and the odd badger would polish off any leftovers. She must remember to leave some broken peanuts out later for the hedgehogs, too.

She sniffed the air. There was a sweet smell coming from the few remaining white roses climbing up the rickety wooden fence to her left. They were very late. It was mid-September now. Carol looked around and thought how lucky she was. The garden was only tiny but it was almost completely secluded, thanks to the tall bushes on either side. And when she looked up all she could see were trees and sky. It was amazingly quiet, too. In Richmond, just up the road, you were bothered by the constant drone of planes overhead. But here, usually the only audible noises were birdsong and the shouts of children in their gardens.

She went back inside and closed the glass door. There was nothing left on the chicken carcass worth keeping, so she wrapped it in a plastic bag and dropped it in the bin in the corner of the kitchen. Then she piled up the various dishes that she'd used, stuck them in the red bowl in the sink and ran cold water over them. She couldn't be bothered to wash them now. They could wait till later, or tomorrow even.

Carol glanced out of her kitchen window. A couple of children were still playing football in the road outside but most had gone in. It was pretty safe on the estate. Few cars passed by and most tended to belong to locals who knew to drive slowly.

It was a lovely place for children to grow up. Quiet streets and lots of trees. Some of the modern houses, including hers, were a bit small and poky, but at least they had decent-sized windows that let in lots of light.

Carol recognised one of the boys from two doors down but the other she'd never seen before. The football rolled on to the pavement in front of her window and the boy she knew ran to fetch it. He stooped to pick it up and as he rose, he caught her eye. She smiled and waved. He waved back shyly before running back to his friend.

He was a nice lad. They mostly were around here, apart from the odd one who could be a bit cheeky. Carol would often stop and chat to them while she was watering her pots by the front door. She liked children.

She sighed and switched the wireless on to Classic FM. She tended to do that in the evenings when it started to get dark. She liked listening to music while she wrote. She was getting on quite well with her novel. It was a bit complicated, though – science fiction. Sometimes she wasn't sure that she understood it herself. She wondered if she should ask someone from the creative writing group to take a look. Not Pamela, obviously. She really was the limit. She'd been so rude to Evie at the last meeting about that line of hers: ‘lips dangling like ripe cherries'. It wasn't that bad and Pamela needn't have been sarky. Carol could have punched her.

She glimpsed the big pile of papers on the worktop in the right-hand corner beside the fridge. It was where she put all the newspaper and magazine clippings she wanted to keep, the recipes, scraps of paper with telephone numbers on, letters that needed answering. The pile just got bigger and bigger.

On top was a letter from the local council, with a form to fill in if she wanted an extra recycling box. She needed one with all those cat food tins she accumulated. She'd better do it now, she'd been putting it off for too long.

She slipped on her specs, which were hanging round her neck on a piece of string, and registered the photo stuck to the side of the old white fridge with Blu-Tack. She peered at it, as she had so many times before. It was a small, square, black and white photo in a white cardboard frame with a picture of a newborn baby wrapped in a white blanket. Carol could still remember the photographer. He'd visited all the mums on the maternity ward that day and asked if they'd like a picture. She'd ordered just one decent-sized print, plus a tiny, passport-sized photo. It was all she could afford. Mother wasn't going to give her any money.

The tiny infant was almost bald, with just a wisp of fair hair on the top of its head. Its little hands were curled up in front, like a squirrel or a rabbit. It had a wrinkled face and its eyes were scarcely open. The photo was faded and the frame was bent at the edges.

Carol smiled at the baby. ‘I'm going to answer a few letters then I'll get down to my writing,' she said. ‘But I think I'll have a nice cup of tea first.'

She picked up the kettle and filled it with water. Victoria and Albert had finished their meal now and were rubbing themselves against her legs, asking for more.

‘You've had your supper,' Carol chided. ‘I'm not giving you any more because you'll get fat.'

The phone rang, making Carol jump. She wasn't used to the phone. People didn't tend to ring that often. It was an old-fashioned one, white and a bit mucky, with a curly cord. Carol picked up the receiver and the main bit fell on the floor because the cord was twisted and too short.

‘Bother.' She had to manoeuvre herself round her bicycle, propped against the kitchen table, to sit down on the other side.

‘Hello,' she said, trying to unwind the cord so that she could relax back in the chair. ‘How nice to hear you!'

She listened while her younger sister gabbled on about this and that. Griselda was getting a bit doo-lally, Carol reflected. Come to think of it, she'd always been a bit doo-lally. But Carol loved her all the same. As children, it had been them against their parents and the world and they'd clung to each other for comfort.

It was a shame Griselda had moved to the other side of London. It meant they saw so little of each other. But they both knew they'd always be there for each other. In an emergency, Griselda would come running and vice versa. Funny how neither of them had ever married. Something to do with their weird upbringing, no doubt.