About last night - Chapter 3
"There was something about that pain that would follow me my entire life. I understood in that moment, at twelve years of age, that I had an advantage on most people. I could take a lot of it."
If you missed Chapter 1, catch up here.
If you missed Chapter 2, catch up here.
December, 2017
I have been dodging Amy’s texts, right up until the moment she called me. Horrified, I waited, hoping the phone in my hand would eventually stop ringing. But she rang, and rang, and rang until the only way to make it stop was to pick up. And now we’re sitting opposite each other in a Starbucks clutching mugs of coffee and pretending that whatever it is we’re calling this is perfectly normal.
She looks so much like the girl I used to know and, yet, worlds apart.
When I first met Amy, she was just a scrawny girl. Her fiery red hair tied neatly in a bun, secured with too many bobby pins and a pretty ribbon, her face covered in freckles, her dress… Oh, her dress. She looked like an extra on a period film set in that homemade frock with frills and the longline neck. What was worse, she carried a pile of books around. Not just the school text books, but actual reading books. Jane Eyre, Great Expectations, Wuthering Heights. And these were just the ones I recognised. It didn’t help that she was the new minister’s daughter, but did she really have to dress like that? Advertise her love for reading? Poor kid. She didn’t stand a chance.
It was only a matter of time until the resident bully picked her for target practice. Eleanor, a.k.a. Fierce Ellie. A fat girl with square jaws and a cockney accent. Nobody messed with her. Not even the boys. When Fierce Ellie had a bad day, she distributed misery with generosity, and she had many bad days. She never picked on me though. We crossed paths and eyes a few times and, though her gaze wasn’t kind, it didn’t advertise imminent torture either. There must have been something in me she respected, or maybe something she recognised. Whatever it was, I was Switzerland. It suited me to stay neutral. I didn’t have friends, but I didn’t have enemies either. I liked my own company more than I liked other people’s anyway. But the day Amy walked past Ellie and her minions, cradling her precious books, I knew it was the end of my days as Switzerland.
When one of Ellie’s cronies, extended his leg out in front of Amy, she fell to the floor with a thud. She sounded heavy when she fell, though she was only skin and bones. Her books scattered everywhere. She stayed there terrified, like a wounded deer, surrounded by the things she loved most.
‘What ya reading, love?’ sneered Ellie, picking up one of her books. ‘Lord of the Flies? Is it good, love?’
Amy’s hands started to shake a little, but she remained silent and made herself small on the floor.
‘I said, is it good?’ shouted Ellie.
‘Yes,’ whispered Amy, her gaze stuck to the floor.
‘That’s good, then,’ said Ellie, pulling out a page of the book, scrunching it and throwing it at Amy.
Amy flinched, but still, she didn’t cry.
‘Let’s read some more,’ said Ellie and tore out another page, and another, and another, tossing the book to the ground in a rage. ‘Do you think you’re better than us?’ she screamed.
I could see Amy was suffering with every page torn, but she didn’t want them to see her cry. I admired that.
‘That’s enough,’ I said, stepping out in front of her, knowing it was not going to end well. I don’t know where it came from. Maybe it was inevitable, maybe I’ve always had it in me: the desire to put myself in harm’s way.
‘Move over, Helena,’ said Ellie. ‘Or I’ll break your arm.’
A bunch of kids had gathered around us, attracted by the spectacle. Amy was still on the concrete floor, surrounded by books and scrunched pages, looking down at a trickle of blood dripping from her knee, not making a sound.
That scrawny little girl was strong. But I was stronger. ‘Do your worst,’ I told Ellie.
She took me by the arm and twisted it until I heard it snap. I found out later at the A&E that my wrist was broken in three places. It hurt in ways I could not put into words, but there was something about that pain that would follow me my entire life. I understood in that moment, at twelve years of age, that I had an advantage on most people. I could take a lot of pain.
I lied when then the nurse asked me what had happened. ‘I fell,’ I said and stuck to that story until they had no choice but to file the whole thing away. Which was a good thing, since Ellie and her cronies never picked on Amy or me again.
The next day, Amy came knocking at my door. She held her mother’s blueberry pie in one hand and a book, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain, in the other.
‘What’s this?’ I said.
‘It’s thank you. For yesterday.’
‘I don’t like to read,’ I said, trying to shut down any attempt at friendship.
‘That’s a shame,’ she said, putting the book and the pie dish on the stairs. ‘You would have really liked this one,’ she said and turned on her heels, skipping steps on her way down. She ran until she was out of sight, wild strands of hair escaping from her bun. I picked up the pie right there, on the steps, shoving it in my mouth with my good hand, and sat down to read.
There is a Chinese proverb that says when you save someone’s life, you are responsible for them forever. I guess I knew that much. That no matter what life brought, I would always be responsible for Amy. Forever torn between her safety or her happiness, not always capable of telling the difference between the two. That’s how she got to me agree to going to that damn festival.
It was the summer of 1997, the air thick with hope, insects and seeds. I waded through the field towards the oak tree, the foxtail ticklish against my knees. When I say an oak tree, it isn’t strictly true. They were two oak trees, joined at the root, sharing the thick beginning of a trunk, before jutting out into two different directions. One was bigger, straighter, more visible and reaching towards the sky; the other a little angled, holding on to their shared trunk in an askew, gravity-defying way, fighting for its place in the world. It was hard to tell if the bigger, straighter tree was propping the smaller one or was trying to get rid of it. I like to think it was helping it out, like an older brother, or sister, but I guess everything is a matter of interpretation.
I loved to come here in the afternoons, sit in its shade and read. I was hiding from Amy who didn’t approve of my reading choices. I was half-way through a pulp fiction novel, when she materialised behind me, all huffing and puffing. Her face flustered like a tomato, her hair stuck to her forehead, her barely there bosom inflating and deflating like a bag pipe. She should have been ugly, with that pale freckled skin, skinny frame and frizzy red hair, but she was the opposite, her unusual beauty a bit of a surprise. She held on to my shoulder, while she steadied her breathing.
‘All right,’ I said, putting the book away as quickly as I could. ‘No need for dramatics.’
‘Helena,’ she said, between gulps of air. She never was an athlete. ‘I found something. I gotta show you,’ she said and dropped onto the grass as we reached the shade of the oak trees, rummaging through her satchel. ‘Here,’ she said, handing me what appeared to be a crumpled flyer.
‘What’s this?’ I said, pretending I wasn’t curious.
‘Read it,’ she said, but she didn’t let me read it. ‘There’s this festival. In the woods. Tomorrow night. We must go. Please tell me we’ll go.’
I burst into a laugh. ‘You are joking, aren’t you?’ I said, but Amy looked at me wounded.
‘What makes you think I’m joking?’ she said, a familiar sadness beginning to press itself onto her face. I didn’t like to see that sadness.
I nudged her gently. ‘You shouldn’t sit directly on the grass. Your dress will get stained.’
‘I don’t care,’ she said and turned her face away.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, trying a different tactic. ‘But how in the world do you think we’ll be able to escape your dad’s supervision and go to a festival? In the woods? Miles from here. Do we even know where it is?’
She turned towards me, smiling. ‘Epping Forest. There’s a map on the flyer. And my dad is out of town for the weekend. Please, Helena. I will never get another chance like this. We’ll tell my mother we’re having a sleepover at Clara Ridge.’
‘Clara Ridge? Hello? She doesn’t even speak to us.’
‘My mother doesn’t know that.’
‘Why don’t you tell her we’re having a sleepover at mine?’
‘She’ll know we’re up to something. But if I mention Clara Ridge, she’ll be too excited to suspect us. She wets herself every time the Ridges are mentioned.’
‘Amy,’ I say, surprised. ‘You never talk about your mother like that.’
‘She won’t know, will she? Besides, I always get punished, no matter what I do.’
‘You do know this isn’t a treasure hunt?’ I smiled, but she was looking at the leaflet and couldn’t see me smiling.
When she turned to face me, her mouth was scrunched in a frustrated gesture. ‘I’m not twelve,’ she said, picking at a scab on her knee and proving the exact opposite.
I knew it was a bad idea, but I loved my friend more than I feared the consequences.
‘All right, all right, you’re not twelve. But you’re a sixteen year old with scraped knees and I’m not breaking any more bones for you. If we do this, we do it my way. You listen to me and never, under any circumstances, leave my side. Is that understood?’
Amy gave me a hug so tight, it almost emptied the air from my lungs.
‘Thank you, thank you, thank you,’ she said, her mouth turned upwards into a wide grin. ‘Now, I need to borrow some clothes. What’s the shortest skirt in your closet?’
Of course I knew better, but I did it anyway. And now here we are.
The Starbucks has that festive feel I hate so much: a new menu containing words like nutmeg and gingerbread, jolly Christmas songs and chatty, happy people. I thought Christmas was over when Christmas was actually over, but I am obviously wrong. I spent the whole blasted day in bed, drinking red wine and watching The Sopranos until I passed out, hoping I’d wake up to a world without Christmas. If only. That’s another reason why I dislike Christmas in Britain so much. It starts in October and it doesn’t finish until January. I mean, what a way to build up something that only ends up in heartburn?
‘Are you doing anything for New Year?’ says Amy, for lack of anything else to say, I imagine.
‘No,’ I say. ‘I don’t usually bother with Christmas and New Year and whatnot.’
‘That’s so sad.’
I shrug. ‘I just don’t like Christmas.’
‘Rubbish,’ she says. ‘You forgot how excited you got? How you and your mum decorated every inch of the house?’
I clench my jaws at her mentioning Ma and my knuckles whiten on my mug. I don’t have to speak for her to know that the reason I hate Christmas now is because it died along with Ma a long time ago.
She picks a bit of cupcake crumb from the table and places it on her empty plate.
‘How is your mother?’ I ask, to change the subject.
‘She died,’ she said, a bitterness in her voice. I may be wrong but I feel as if it’s angled at me. ‘Soon after you ran off.’
‘Amy, I’m so sorry,’ I said, in disbelief. ‘How?’
‘It doesn’t matter now, does it?’ she cuts me off. I know that I can’t push this further.
‘And your father?’ I barely dare to say the words out-loud. How scared she must have felt alone in the house with him.
‘I wish he was dead,’ she says with steel in her voice. ‘But no, he is very much alive and still threatening people with eternal damnation from the pulpit, as far as I know. We don’t talk. We haven’t spoken in years.’
When I left that day, I thought I did Amy a favour. That by distancing myself and my crazy from her, I would keep her safe. But now I realise my logic was wrong. We should have done all this together, not apart. Is it too late?
‘Christopher asked me to invite you to our New Year’s Eve party,’ she says, her tone changed, restored.
‘Christopher?’
‘My fiancée?’
‘Yes, sorry. The social worker. But he doesn’t even know me.’ I am surprisingly moved by this. ‘Why would he want to invite me?’
‘I told him about you, how we ran into each other by accident, how close we were in school and, well… he’s that kind of guy.’
I should say no. I really should. ‘I don’t want to intrude.’
‘It will be a quiet affair,’ she continues, ignoring my protest. ‘Just a few friends and some champagne at midnight at Christopher’s flat. Why be alone when you can be with friends?’ She laughs a little fake laugh.
I know accepting Amy’s invitation is a bad idea, but something strange has been happening to me after the night with Sigfrid. It’s not that I’m scared I might do something I will regret. It’s that I might not do it right.
‘It’s settled then. I won’t take no for an answer,’ she continues in that tone of hers she always got me to agree to everything.
‘You never did,’ I say, but not out-loud.
Stay tuned for Chapter 4 next week. Please let me know if you like what you read and don’t forget to share!