Fairytales for Wilde Girls (2 page)

 

Weddings, Parties, Anything

There was a Big Party happening the last Saturday in August, a welcome round of applause as the gold-dusk curtains closed on another summer's break. It had been a topic of shark-frenzied discussion for weeks, the streets of Avalon brimming with chunks of meaty gossip and excitement, and no-one was sure whether the Reality of the situation would measure up to the Impossible Expectations.

At the party was a boy called Edgar. He had been dragged there by his friend Pip Sutcliffe.

Music blasted from the stereo, and guests haggled to veto the playlist. There was a dry-ice fog machine and blue laser lights, ice cube-cushioned ciders and cranberry vodkas, and stiletto heels sticking to the carpet.

Edgar was standing over the shiny depression of the kitchen sink, rubbing at his curdling stomach. He'd never been much of a drinker, and the cold beer he clutched was little more than a party prop.

A boy wearing obnoxious sunglasses was leaning against the nearby fridge, attempting to chat up a girl who was perched on a stool at the breakfast bar.

‘You smoke?' said the boy.

‘Only passively,' said the girl.

‘I mean dope.'

‘What'd you call me?'

Edgar snorted into the sink, which was already slick with someone else's candy-coloured vomit. The boy slouched off; Edgar caught the girl's eye. She winked.

 

What Edgar Saw in a Vision, as He First Looked at Isola Wilde

Glass heels, glass lips, hands grasping a glass parasol, the draped stiffness of a shatterproof ballgown – a glass Cinderella.

Music thumped through the floor and travelled up Edgar's shoes like an electric current, knotting around his spine. No lyrics or discernible tune; just noise, jungle drumming, an aural extension of Edgar's racing heartbeat.

She had a great mass of wavy hair so blonde it burned Edgar's scalp to think about. Rainbow streaks at the roots, like melted Skittles. Navy-blue lipstick to match an oceanic gush of a party frock. On a chain around her neck was what might have been a minuscule golden carriage.

As the strobes switched back to solid blue jets, and the maybe-chariot turned back into a possible-pumpkin, her gaze held his and something in her face struck twelve; her pupils became the black bells in the clocktower marking midnight.

‘Um, hi,' said Edgar, with a silly sort of wave. The wink had thrown a casual spark in his direction, into the wild grass of his consciousness, and caught ablaze.

She swung slightly on the stool. ‘I don't smoke,' she clarified, ‘but thanks anyway.'

‘Um, no – I don't either,' said Edgar.

She shrugged, lifting her drink – a flute of champagne with a dripping lemon slice bayoneted on the rim. ‘Truth is, I can't. My brother'd kill me.'

‘Ah,' said Edgar, turning to lean his back against the sink. ‘Protective?'

‘Like a bulletproof vest.'

They both looked awkwardly at the floor, taking long slurps of their respective drinks.

‘I'm Edgar.'

‘Aha.' She smiled conspiratorially. ‘Thought you looked familiar.'

What
did
he look like, all clammy and pale? Edgar pressed the cold beer bottle to his sweat-beaded forehead in the most nonchalant way possible. ‘Oh – do I know you?'

‘Nope. But I know you. I've read your work.'

He looked at her blankly as she raised an eyebrow, tracing the rim of her glass as though it were a magic lamp ripe for rubbing. ‘Edgar Allan Poe? Um, you mean, like,
The Raven
?'

‘Sure. Not your best, though.'

He guffawed, then cringed at the sound. ‘I'm just Edgar.'

With a hiss, the fog breathed through the room again, shrouding them in alien-blue mist. Through it, she extended her hand to shake his; a flash of bitten-down, glitter-coated nails.

‘I'm Annabel Lee.'

It wasn't until the party was in its early-morning death throes, after Edgar had stumbled through the maze of entwined legs and deflated balloons to a miraculously free chair, Googling her name on his phone, that he realised.

‘For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride, In the sepulchre there by the sea – In her tomb by the sounding sea.'

 

No Fair

The bathroom was jungle-fogged, flooded with puddles, piled with soaked towels; cakes of soap with long strands of blonde baked in.

A girl in pieces: Barbie-thin ankles, a shaving cut on her knee; hipbones she could stab you with; white hands gelled with strawberry body lotion.

Isola Wilde turbaned her head in a towel and raised a hand to clear the fog from the mirror. She paused, squinting at her cloudy reflection in the glass, and for a moment she felt like a blurred-out identity, a shadow half-glimpsed on a wall. Anonymous Wilde.

‘Mirror, mirror, on the wall,' she breathed around the sticky air in her lungs, ‘who's the fairest of them all?'

Words appeared in the fog, letters traced in the mirror by the clever fingers of some old magic trapped in the walls:

TEENAGE GIRLS ARE ALL UNFAIR

‘Dressed or not, I'm coming in, Isola.'

Isola quickly wiped the mirror as Mother Wilde pushed open the door. The mirror should have named her mother Best and Fairest; even this ill, even practically bed-ridden, with her hair a nest to nurse long-flown dreams, crop circles under her eyes. She still held vestiges of beauty, a sort of glamour gone to seed – like an ageing Monroe might have looked if they'd pumped her guts in time.

But still, all Isola's favourite pictures of Mother were from before the diagnosis. Blurry in Polaroid, smattered with freckles, lying on a bed in the late eighties and twisted up in a curly phone cord with no pill bottles on the bedside table.

‘Oh good, you're not naked,' said Mother. ‘Here, let me help get that hair under control.'

Isola obediently lowered her hands. Mother gave a wry apple-peel smile. She pulled down Isola's makeshift turban and started rubbing her daughter's hair dry, combing her fingers through the bedraggled knots. ‘Did you get in a fight again? Your eyes are all black,' Mother noted.

Isola scrubbed at her eyes with the heels of her hands. ‘No, I slept in my make-up,' she replied.

In truth, she'd hardly count
that
as sleeping. She'd left the party early but lingered late in the woods, and afterwards her sleep had been disrupted by hazy little dreamscapes of carnivals and boys perched to fly, arms outstretched over glittering heights . . .

‘That late, huh?' Mother sounded amused, twisting Isola's hair off her wet neck. ‘Don't let your dad know. He still thinks you're asleep before the a.m., bless. He doesn't know you saw that dreadful thing on the Friday night news, either.'

Isola's eyes widened minutely, and Mother's fingers stilled mid-braid. Their reflections' gazes met, and Isola knew it was written plainly on her face as though etched by the magic mirror.

‘It's all right. Just don't tell your father,' said Mother, untangling her hands. She leaned close and thumbed a few flakes of mascara from her daughter's lower lashes. ‘You know how . . .
touchy
he is about stuff like that.'

 

Mother beat Isola downstairs and stood over the stove, appearing fluffy in her dressing gown, peering into the oven as something baked inside. ‘Afternoon,' said Mother slyly, winking at the clock.

‘Hi,' replied Isola.

Father's face was hidden behind the newspaper, ink-obscured by screaming headlines: odd celebrity baby names and world tragedies. Without looking up, he kicked out a chair at the kitchen table with his dirty boot. ‘Have some breakfast.'

‘Want some eggs, Isola?' asked Mother.

‘No thanks.'

At this, Father peered over the top of his paper, suspicion furrowing his brow. ‘Anything happen last night?'

‘Nothing news-worthy,' said Isola, plopping down on the chair.

‘He wants to hear about any special
boys
,' said Mother in a stage-whisper. ‘So he can drive around their neighbourhoods and glare, y'know.'

Isola smiled mischievously. ‘Dad? Didn't you meet Mum at a party when you were my age?'

Father Wilde grumbled but said nothing intelligible.

Mother's face fell slightly. She turned back to the eggs, popping the yolks with the spatula.

Isola tried to burn holes in her father's paper with her stare, urging him telepathically:
Acknowledge Mum. Just talk to her
.

‘School starts back tomorrow,' he said abruptly. ‘Gotta get used to sleeping with the sun, Isola.' He slapped the newspaper down on the table and downed the last of his coffee before climbing to his feet.

Isola heard the tell-tale thunk of his workboots and creased her forehead. ‘You're not going to work, are you? It's Sunday.'

‘Picked up a few shifts.'

The school year hadn't started yet and already he was making arrangements that would take him out of the house; devising ways to stay out as long as Mother was home with him. Longer hours were usually the beginning, then increasingly distant jobs that took days to travel to. Now that Isola's summer break was over, he didn't want to be trapped in this house with Mother, not without Isola there to cut through the sad black air.

Mother was holding her hand over the pan now, flexing her fingers as though trying to catch the rising heat. Something sore and unsaid seemed to hang over the room.

Isola lowered her eyes to the table as Father packed his lunch; she recognised the front-page photograph on the paper. The great black expanse of night, the winking ring of coloured lights and iron, the blurry, lonesome figure perched atop like a little foundling-bird, still uncertain to test his wings . . .

The family cat, Morris, wound between her legs under the table, and the sudden brush of whiskers startled Isola out of her reverie. Morris mewled, and Mother coaxed him through to the next room and into the laundry, where his food was waiting. Father plunked his cereal bowl in the sink. The unattended eggs began to sizzle evilly.

‘Dad? Eggs.'

Father Wilde jumped and hurried to the stove. ‘Scatterbrained,' he muttered under his breath, scraping the blackened eggs into the rubbish bin.

Isola scowled. She hated the way he spoke about Mother. At least she was up today, out of bed, trying to make conversation. That was more than Isola could say for
him
.

 

Body Parts

The plum tree in the Wildes' front garden was dying.

It had been doing so for three years now; occasionally, Lazarus-like, it would groan out of its grave-state and fruit would drip like juice prisms from its boughs, purple crystals. Then the plums would wither and parachute down, and the tree would sink a little deeper into the earth, its branches turning the faded grey of moor mist; the wind no longer whistling joyfully about it, but murmuring, as though it knew it danced at a deathbed.

The afternoon stretched out before Isola, a last day of freedom. Father had driven off and Mother had slumped upstairs and now the house stood like an Amityville Horror, somehow so empty even with Mother bundled back into her bed.

Isola closed her eyes and crossed her legs, assuming a yoga position her mother had taught her (when yoga had briefly been the new acupuncture, had been the new Zoloft); always something else to try, a new cure-all in her manic stages. The faux-goddess grew sharper in her mind: roots dragging through her hair, sunbaked skin, earth under her fingernails.

Sensing the familiar rustle of clothing above her, Isola opened her eyes, blinking out the sunlight, which had collected like rainwater in the sockets.

Alejandro stood in the poor shade the tree cast, offering her his saddest smile.

‘It's really going to die this time,' Isola said softly.

‘Yes, I believe so,' he mused, then added, almost hesitantly, ‘whenever my mama was ill, she always sat up in bed to fix her hair. She said pains portend guests, and she wanted to be prepared to receive them.'

Isola peeked up at him, surprised. She didn't know much about his family, his Life Before; she was familiar with the skeleton of the story, but not the meat.

Alejandro crouched down beside Isola, too proper to sit himself in the dirt. ‘When my sisters were struck down, she would always rouse them to rag-curl their hair.'

‘That can't have gone down well.'

‘Oh, they
loathed
it.' He paused. ‘But dressing properly always made Mama feel better, I believe.'

Uncrossing her legs, Isola said, ‘Well, if you reckon it'll help . . .'

‘What will?
Querida
?'

But Isola had already taken off into the house, answering his question when she emerged with an armful of plastic bags bulging with Christmas trinkets from the attic.

Alejandro and Isola strung lights around the tree, hoping for a pretty effect of sun spotting through coloured glass in lieu of electrical effects. They tied baubles where the plums should have grown. Gaudy tinsel looped the boughs like feather boas on a drag queen.

‘Perhaps an angel for the top, too,' suggested Alejandro.

‘No way!' She shook her head. ‘We don't need to remind it of its impending death with religious iconography.'

‘Christmas
is
religious iconography, Isola.'

‘Besides,' she said cheerfully, ‘it's not going to die.'

‘But you just said –' Her dress pocket buzzed, and Alejandro asked, ‘Bee?'

Isola shook her head again, extracting her vibrating mobile phone. ‘Grape.'

I TOTLLY HAVE CARPET BURN ON MY KNEES FRM THE PARTY LAST NITE
, Grape complained.

THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID
, Isola texted back.

Grape sent an icon of a laughing face, adding,
CARPET BURN COZ I FELL DOWN THE STAIRS AND IT WAS SPECTCULR SO I HAD 2 PRETEND I DID IT ON PURPOSE. MY HAND LOOKS LIKE A MANGO (SIZE AND COLOUR) COZ I LANDED ON IT AND YOU TOTALY MISSED IT, WHY DID U LEAVE SO ERLY?

‘CARPET BURN' SOUNDS LIKE AN STI
, Isola replied.

LOL FINE, BE MYSTERIOUS. U MISSD A BRILLIANT NITE.

AND YOU'LL BE MISSING SCHOOL TOMORROW, I'M SURE.

PROBBLY. MUM JUST SAID SHE THINKS MY WRIST IS BROKEN?!! HAHAHAHA LOL

Alejandro peeked over Isola's shoulder on the pretext of reaching for Santa-shaped baubles. ‘You left early?' he enquired.

Isola pocketed the phone. ‘I shouldn't have gone.'

‘Why ever not?'

‘Because –' she waved a frustrated hand to the upstairs window and the conspicuously closed curtain ‘– Mum got herself in a state and now Dad's taken off.'

‘All this because of a social event?' He raised a dark eyebrow.

‘Social event . . . You make me sound like a debutante,' she said mockingly, curtseying and making a rather ugly face.

‘Well, how else will the suitors know to come calling?'

‘That's why Dad's in a foul mood, apparently. Suitors, you know.' She rolled her eyes. ‘Cause there's such an abundance after me.'

‘Fathers can be foul when it comes to such matters,' said Alejandro fondly. ‘Releasing the child's hand to allow another to take it in marriage.'

‘Marriage?' spluttered Isola.

She'd only made an appearance at the party because she knew she'd be noticed more if she wasn't there. Alejandro had told her that, in his experience, people were all about the empty spaces; the things they don't have, the words that aren't said. In Avalon, it was all about who
wasn't
touching who, who
hadn't
shown up to the party.

‘I didn't even stay long,' Isola admitted, scratching at the sap bleeding along the boughs of the dying tree. ‘I was in the woods, mostly. Grandpa says the herd's got a beautiful new foal.'

‘And did you find the creature?'

Isola shook her head. ‘No. It was weirdly quiet in there, though. Like there wasn't a single animal ali–'

She jumped as a flock of finches bulleted from the treetops, carolling shrieks of terror, sensing – before Isola and Alejandro heard it – a rumble that became a roar.

From around the edge of the woods, a moving van burping black exhaust fumes came trundling up the street. Its howling engine cut in front of the house opposite. Two cars followed in its wake: a modest station wagon with a sofa tied to the roof, and a sleek city car.

‘New neighbours,' Alejandro commented, watching with keen interest as the furniture-Tetris got under way. A bed frame was dropped in the driveway, and a clumsy mover knocked down the letterbox with a dining table.

Isola shrugged. ‘Pass me those reindeer antlers.' She continued bedecking the tree, disguising its bald patches, its rapidly browning leaves. Isola tried her best not to watch. She knew how it felt to be stared at. But she was only human, and when she did finally peek between the gaudy-bright branches, she saw:

A boy with black hair and a hangover slouch.

A boy she'd only seen through blue mist.

He was moving things from the station wagon into the house. Boxes of worldly possessions. Hidden things.

The boy retrieved another armful from the boot. He headed towards his house but turned suddenly, perhaps spying the peripheral glitter of sun on the plum tree. He looked straight through the thinning branches at her.

He didn't see Alejandro. Nobody ever did.

The boy waved without raising his arms – only wiggling his fingers. He had a pink skateboard under one arm and a box marked ‘BODY PARTS' under the other. He walked to the end of his driveway. Isola mirrored him, the asphalt between them suddenly uncrossable, a tarry River Styx.