Closer (7 page)

He's up early and keen – far too keen for me on a Saturday morning. “Nottingham, yes. The metropolis. We'll go on the tram.” 

Transport's not high on my priority list, but it sounds okay if we can get to the shops. For once Dad's driving. He's a bit nervous about it, and he goes really slowly. It's embarrassing, everybody else passes us. He drives us up to Nottingham on the M1 and as usual I have to follow the road signs and decide which one to go off on. I get confused when it says Nottingham at junction 24 and 25 but we carry on anyway to 26. 

“We need to get to the Park and Ride,” he says, as if I'm supposed to know, “to get the tram.” We stop in this huge car park and the tram's waiting, three long carriages all locked together like a model, with big circles on the floor for when it turns corners and I wonder what happens if you're standing with one foot on each carriage when it turns a corner. There's a conductor with a ticket machine like in the old days on buses. The tram goes fast on the way in until it gets to the houses, then there's loads of signs in the windows saying how much the noise of the trams affects people. I can understand that, but I like the sound and the bell. It's cool. 

We get off in the square, and I'm not sure where to go. Dad's being great, funny like he can be sometimes. For a while I forget I'm supposed to be watching him, and I link my arm under his as we wander round, and he presses it close to his side. 

We do some shopping, and I try on tops. There's a T-shirt that says ‘I don't care', and I'm tempted but why should I give it away? Dad buys me this Animal one I want with his credit card. He buys a cd for himself and we wander through the crowded streets until it's after twelve and time to go home. He wants to stop somewhere for lunch, and I don't want to eat but I go along with it and ask for a diet coke. He has a coffee and a sandwich and offers me some, but I know he wants it all and I'm not eating. If I skip lunch I can eat a bit this evening, when Mum's sure to go on at me. 

We're sitting in the coffee shop and I remember Hannah, and I ask him. 

“What d'you think about Hannah going away?” 

“Well, I suppose you all have to grow up some time. We'll miss her, won't we? As long as it's what she wants, and I've still got my honey bunch. You and I will have more time together, won't we?” He smiles at me and I feel uncomfortable and concentrate on the coke and the straw. 

There was a time when I'd lap up this kind of talk. It made me feel warm inside, wanted. Now I feel empty and trapped, and I want to go. 

Is there something wrong or is Hannah the lying cow I thought she was? I watch him munching away at the sandwich. He's been acting okay, like everything's fine now, but it's only ten days since Granma died. When I look at him closely, there are dark rings under his eyes and he looks tired and sad. 

“How are you feeling now Dad? About Granma and everything?” 

“Do you know, I'd forgotten about that for a while, being here with you?” 

I feel awful, there's a silence between us. He puts the rest of his sandwich down and drains his coffee. Then he gets up. 

“There's a match on at two. Let's go.” 

We walk back to the square and wait for the tram, not talking. I pretend to sleep in the car on the way home, but I'm feeling so guilty, for mentioning Granma, for thinking Dad might be doing something wrong, for living at all and most of all for being so fat.

I know I told Hannah I didn't believe any of it, but her words replay in my head and I feel really confused. I know I feel creepy round Dad now. I used to feel cosy with him, but now I feel scared. I don't want him near me. I thought it was just me, going through a phase or moody or something. I try to pretend I want him around, like I used to, but that's it: pretending. 

I make an excuse when Dad and I get home and I go up to my room. A while later Hannah knocks on my door and I invite her in. This is unusual. 

“How about going down town?” she says, like she's been rehearsing it. She looks nervous. She hasn't wanted to go down town with me for years, ever since Mum wouldn't buy me some jeans I wanted and I caused a scene in Primark. 

“Okay,” I say, and we look at each other. We're both awkward, raw. 

We go for the bus, and it's there as soon as we get to the stop. We don't say much. I thought we'd go round the shops, but Hannah heads for Brucciani's. I never go there now, nor does anyone I know, but we used to go with Dad when we were kids and it was the best treat to have ice cream sodas. And we have ice cream sodas now like we did when we were kids. Hannah orders them from the counter, mine's a raspberry, hers is a banana, and she even pays for both of them. We find a table as far away from anybody else as we can, and luckily it's pretty empty. We're pulling on our straws, and the creamy sweet fizzy taste is hitting that hungry spot I've been fighting. I'll make sure I don't eat tonight, whatever Mum says. 

I'm glad there's nobody I know here, and I know she's thinking the same thing. She breaks the silence. 

“I'm sorry about earlier,” she says. 

“No, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have looked in your journal.” 

This is not like me and Hannah. 

“I've been trying to talk to you for ages. Couldn't find the words. Scared of what you might say.” Her eyes are filling up. 

I feel like crying and I want to wind everything back to before. I know neither of us will cry here, it's too public, so it's easier to stay calm. 

“What d'you mean?” 

“I thought you might hate me. I tried telling Mum once. She didn't want to know. She gave me that look, and asked me what I was trying to do to our family. I shut up then. I even made an appointment to see the counsellor at school, but then I realised she'd have to tell the teachers and it would all come out. 

“Anyway,” she said, looking down at the table, “they'd make me tell them everything that's happened and I can't do that. I'll never do that.” 

She sucks at her soda and it's bizarre, she and I sitting here in Brucciani's like it's any old day and she's telling me something that's so gross, so evil that it would make an episode in any soap. 

And I'm listening and I believe her. She's not making this up. Jigsaw pieces are fitting together all over the place. Dad disappearing into her room to help with her homework. Hannah getting quieter and quieter, dressing in baggy clothes, her hair all over her face. And the way Dad's changed towards me. 

“If they find out, they'll send Dad to prison.” 

“Prison?” I'd never thought of that. The prison's not far from us. It's like some ogre's castle in a fairy story. Turrets and high walls and everything. I often used to think of it when we used to go to the park, playing in the sunshine and everything and all those men in there locked up in tiny cells. It's only men, Mum told me. I don't know where they send the women. Maybe there aren't as many women. Don't know why. The prisoners can't see out of course, there are no windows. It's like a different world in the middle of the city. 

Hannah's still talking. “Mum won't be able to cope on her own. George will be upset, he's so into Dad. He'll never understand. But I can't go to London and let him do it to you. I'd rather not go at all.” 

“You can't do that, you have to go,” I say, though right now I want her to stay here more than anything. There's no way I can let this carry on. 

“So what should we do?” 

She's asking me what to do? When I feel like a sledgehammer's socked me right in the face and I didn't see it coming? 

“I don't know. We'll think of something.” I don't sound convinced, even to myself. 

“Do you remember, when we used to come here every week?” Hannah smiles for a moment. 

“Yeah, and you used to make fun of how I couldn't reach the straws.” 

“And you used to kick me under the table when Mum and Dad weren't looking.” 

As we grin at each other a tear gets out of my eye and starts going down my cheek. Hannah sees it and finds a tissue in her bag. She stretches over to give it to me and her sweatshirt slides up her arm a few inches. I can see small cuts on her wrist, some of them still new, some almost healed. She sees me looking, and as soon as I've taken the tissue she quickly takes her hand away. The sleeve falls back down over her arm. 

The bottom of the soda is the best, pure melting ice cream that won't go up through the straw, you spoon it out with the long spoon and scrape up every bit. We concentrate on that, and I lick the end of my straw. It's like finally saying goodbye to being a child. I'll never do this again, I know that. 

We don't bother with the shops. I'm shopped out, and it's nearly closing time. The bus is crowded on the way back and we don't talk much. At home Dad and George are playing video games downstairs. Mum's in the kitchen. Hannah and I go off to our separate rooms. 

Everything's changed, but it's still the same. I can't get my head round all this.

We're in the front room eating pizza in front of the TV. Mum calls it her Saturday night treat, something easy. It's disgusting, oozing fat and calories. I'm doing my best not to eat mine. My phone rings. It's Raj. Mum sighs, and I put my pizza down and go out in the hall. Raj is ringing me like he said he would yesterday. It's one of the things I like about him. He does what he says he'll do, and he's straight, no secrets. 

“Hi Raj.” 

“Hi you. What's up?” He reads me so well. 

“Nothing, everyone's stupid round here, that's all.” 

“Come and meet me up the park. I've got something to tell you.” 

“What?” 

“Wait and see – can you be there in five?” 

I'm picking up my jacket and purse and I'm out of there before anyone can ask what I'm doing or where I'm going or tell me to come back and eat my tea. 

It's good to be out in the evening sun, swinging down the street with my denim jacket over my shoulder, one finger hooked into the collar, going to meet Raj. The park's not far, across two side streets. It starts on the corner, with trees and grass and dogs and ducks and a pond and people who look completely normal and ordinary, who like living together and don't hurt each other all the time. 

Raj is standing by the gates, grinning at me as I reach him. 

“Hi there, babe.” 

He's wearing his blue teeshirt and baggy trousers and he's looking fit. 

“Hi you. What's this you've got to say then? Playing for England next week?” 

“I wish. No, something better than that.” 

“Better than England?” I'm teasing him, enjoying his smile and his being there with me. 

“Yeah. I had a letter this morning.” 

“What's with the guessing games? Tell me.” 

“I've got in. The journalism course. In Manchester. They've given me a place in the end.” 

I try to be pleased for him, I do try. Say what you like about me, I do my best to be happy for my friends when things go well for them. And this is what Raj has always wanted, Manchester, journalism. A hundred miles away, when I need him to be here in Leicester with me. So I do what you have to do in these situations. I lie. 

“Hey, that's great. That's cool. Wow. When do you go?” 

I'm making out like I don't care if I never see him again. Like I can't wait for him to leave. 

“Won't you miss me?” 

“Me? No, I never miss people. Easy come, easy go. What's three years?” 

I'm lying through and through, and I can't understand why Raj doesn't see it. 

He's looking uncertain, and I'm angry, angry that he's so sure of me that he thinks I'd want him to stay. 

“Better go, Mum wants me back early. See you.” 

I feel his eyes on my back as I walk away. I seem to be making a habit of walking out on the people I like best. But I don't look back.

I don't want to go in the house. So I'm on the corner sitting on the petrol station wall inhaling exhaust fumes from Welford Road. If I had some money I'd buy something from the shop, but I don't. 

M.
What u doing? 

C.
Not mch. Playng with the kittens. Wtchng crap tv. U? 

M.
Wreckng my life. Raj is going away. I just walked away frm him. 

C.
No! He can't do that! Who shall we lust after if he goes? 

M.
This is serious! He's the only good thng happening. 

C.
What is going on with u? Something's up. I know u. 

Nobody's supposed to notice. I wait for a minute, looking at the phone. Wondering what to say. I'd love to pour it all out to her – Hannah, Dad, Mum. Being sad. Being angry. 

Being scared. Feeling like it's all too much. 

“Nothing, nothing's up.” 

Nothing at all. 

I flip back my mobile, put my hands in my pockets and walk slowly home. 

I never want to get there. 

But of course, I do. 

And I go in. 

And it's all still there, waiting for me. 

A text comes through. 

Remember, I'm here for you. We're best mates. 

Yeah. 

Right. 

I wish it was that simple. 

I head past the living room and up into my room.

Only ten o'clock, but what's to stay up for? They're all down there pigging out in front of the stupid-box. Except for Hannah, who went off hours ago to work on her project. I've never known what her project is. Probably private eating.