Paper Aeroplanes (20 page)

She empties two plastic bags full of crisps and cakes onto the floor. ‘For a table party. We have enough food to feed everyone in the school and it’s all ours!’

Table parties are a tradition at Tudor Falls. Whenever someone has a birthday during term time everyone at their table brings in as many cakes and sandwiches and crisps as they can. We are even allowed party poppers and hats. For Tudor Falls this really is as wild as it gets.

The dining room is divided into tables of six. At the beginning of every year you choose who you want on your table and that is the way it stays. Margaret, Charlotte, Bethan, Nancy and I always have a spare place at our table because no one else wants to sit with us in case they get into trouble for being too noisy, but a couple of weeks ago Flo asked the teachers if she could move and join us. ‘It’s about you and me now,’ she said as she opened her lunch box. My stomach flipped. I knew I should have taken her outside and told her there and then.

I pick up a packet of Mr Kipling Apple Slices and help myself.

‘Don’t eat it all now. We won’t have any left for lunchtime,’ begs Margaret, like our lunch is the only meal we will ever eat again.

‘Get lost, it’s my birthday. I’m going to eat all day,’ I say.

We all sit on the floor at the back of the classroom and eat cake. Flo gives me some presents all wrapped individually in pink and green paper. There’s a scrunchie, a pencil case with ‘I must, I must, I must improve my maths’ on it, and a rubber in the shape of some fish and chips. I find it hard to look her in the eye as I thank her. I wish she hadn’t done this. I find myself wondering if she has told Julian it’s my birthday, and if he is thinking about me at all. It’s been weeks since that day at the garage. I haven’t dared go back to their house in case he thinks I am stalking him, but not seeing him is making me crazy. I am obsessed with him and tired of making excuses to Flo about why I am being so distant with her. She thinks I am stressed about Pop, and the exams, but I’m not. I’m just hopelessly in love with her brother.

At break time I grab Margaret and try to get out of school and down the lane before anyone else sees us. ‘Come on, let’s go smoke,’ I say, as I drag her by the arm.

‘Renée, wait!’ calls Flo after us. ‘Wait for me.’

I power forward as if I haven’t heard her. Margaret resists me. ‘Renée, stop. Flo wants you. Renée, stop pulling me!’

‘Could you not hear me?’ asks Flo as she catches up. ‘I was calling you. I’ve barely seen you since I told Sally where to go. She really has backed off. It’s good, isn’t it?’

‘Sorry. I just really need a fag,’ I say, looking at the ground.

‘Can I come with you?’ she asks.

‘But you don’t smoke.’

‘I know, but . . .’

I take a deep breath. ‘Flo, you don’t have to follow me everywhere, you know? It’s OK for us to be apart for like, five minutes.’

The world seems to stop moving for a few seconds.

‘OK, fine. I’ll wait here,’ she says, eventually.

‘Good.’

She turns slowly and walks back into school. I watch her, hating myself.

‘What did you do that for?’ asks Margaret.

I gather myself and keep walking. ‘She can be a bit too needy sometimes, that’s all.’

I want the ground to swallow me up.

At lunchtime, the atmosphere is tense.

‘OK, ladies, stand up, please. Let’s say grace.’ It’s Miss Anthony’s day on lunch duty. When everyone has drawn to a silent pause Margaret does her favourite trick of scraping her chair backwards across the shiny floor, making a screeching sound so piercing that everyone puts their hands to their ears.

‘WHEN you are ready, ladies! For what we are about to receive . . .’ continues Miss Anthony.

We all join in, then in unison scrape our chairs as we sit down.

‘Hey,’ says Nancy in a loud whisper. We all lean in. ‘I heard that Becca Stephens lost her virginity at the weekend.’

A brilliant start to the lunchtime conversation, and the perfect ice breaker.

‘Yeah, I heard that too,’ adds Charlotte. ‘To some guy in the year above us at the boys’ school. She isn’t even sixteen yet.’

‘Loads of people have done it before they are sixteen, stupid,’ says Nancy.

‘You haven’t,’ says Margaret in her usual matter-of-fact style.

‘Yeah, well, none of us have!’ says Bethan.

Nancy’s defensiveness is now standard when girls in Year 11 discuss their virginity. I’m not sure when this happened, but suddenly being called a virgin is an insult.

‘I guess it isn’t when you lose it, it’s who you lose it to that matters,’ says Flo. All the girls nod in agreement. I sit back and stuff as much cake into my mouth as possible. I don’t want to say anything that might later be used in evidence against me.

As we plough through our feast a loud screech comes from the other side of the dining room, then the sound of a chair falling over, and then a loud scream for help. I look up and see a crowd gathering and Miss Anthony calling to the caretaker, ‘Ambulance, call an ambulance!’

‘Renée, Renée! Quick, get over here!’ a girl from the year below us is calling me. I’m not sure what I am expected to do in an emergency. I lied about passing my St John’s Ambulance First Aid course last year as it seemed like such a waste of a Saturday morning.

‘Quick, Renée! QUICK!’ says the girl.

The crowd parts to let me through. What’s going on? There is mayhem all of a sudden. And then I see her – my sister, lying in the arms of one of her classmates. Her head flopped right back, her long thin body limp, her eyes and her mouth half open.

‘NELL!’

I take her into my arms and shake her. She is so bony she could rattle.

‘NELL!’

‘OK, girls, give them some space. The ambulance is on its way,’ says Miss Anthony.

Flo is behind me, her hands holding onto my shoulders. I twist awkwardly until she lets go, and feel her hurt as she backs away from me.

Nell,
I think.
Just focus on Nell
.

At the hospital I’m told to wait in the hall. ‘We will come and tell you when you can come in and see your sister,’ says a nurse.

‘Will she be OK?’ I ask, frightened.

‘She is very weak, but it’s nothing some fluids can’t treat for now. Your sister is going to need a lot of help to get well again though; a lot of help,’ says the nurse.

I watch her scuttle back down the corridor, her big bottom moving as two halves. I grip my knees with my hands and wait.

‘Renée!’ The double doors open slowly and Nana and Pop come towards me. I am shocked by how they look. When did they get so old? Nana used to be tall and slim, now she is little and round, her body moving differently. She looks in pain. And Pop, he was tall and handsome but now he is stooped over and his face looks like it’s melting. How had I not noticed this change?

‘Where is she? Nurse, we are here to see Nell Sargent,’ says Nana.

‘We can’t go in yet, Pop,’ I tell him. ‘They say she will be OK after some fluids but that we have to wait here until she is ready to see us.’

Pop sits robotically on a bench, Nana next to him. I sit opposite them, my mind still battered by how old they look.

‘What happened? Did she fall?‘ Nana asks.

‘She fainted.’

‘Fainted? It’s so hot in that school. Haven’t I always said it is too hot in that school?’ grumbles Pop.

‘She didn’t faint because it was hot, Derek,’ Nana says firmly.

‘I’ll write to that caretaker again. He should know better than to keep the school so hot.’

We all stand up when a doctor walks over to us.

‘Mr and Mrs Fletcher? Hello, I’m Dr Brehaut. Nell is ready to see you now.’

We follow Dr Brehaut down the hall. She opens the door to Nell’s room and I go straight over to where she is lying.

‘Nell, I’m so glad you are OK,’ I say frantically. ‘You fainted and your eyes were rolling. I thought you . . .’

She has a hospital gown on and a drip in the back of her hand. She is awake and the relief I feel when I see her makes me start crying, which is embarrassing for me and clearly awkward for everyone else.

‘Sorry to drag you away from the party of the century. I could hear that Margaret Cooper weirdo singing Happy Birthday to you from my table. She is so loud,’ Nell says, still managing to be sarcastic even in her state.

‘Renée, your birthday?’ says Nana as she puts her hands to her face.

‘Don’t worry, Nana, it’s OK.’

‘No, no, it’s not OK.’ She lowers her voice and looks really sad. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Now, now. Let’s not overblow this. Your nana and I are very sorry we forgot your birthday, Renée,’ says Pop, rubbing his forehead.

‘It’s fine, honestly,’ I say. ‘I think we should all just focus on Nell. My birthday isn’t important.’

Nana takes Nell’s hand in hers. She looks guilty. ‘How are you feeling, darling? I know you have been unwell.’

Nell doesn’t offer Nana any words of reassurance. I think she’s enjoying the impact she is having on us all.

‘Mr and Mrs Fletcher, can I ask you to step outside with me for a moment?’ says Dr Brehaut.

They all leave the room and stand just outside. I can see them through the window in the door. Dr Brehaut looks serious, and as she talks to them they both drop their heads at exactly the same moment. Nana starts to cry.

Nell and I sit awkwardly together.

‘Hopefully now they’ll understand that they can’t keep me away from my dad.’

‘
Now?
’

‘Now that it’s come to this,’ she says, gesturing towards the drip in her hand.

‘Nell, you could have died.’

‘I know. But I didn’t. So they should listen to me now. They can’t keep me away from my own dad any more. It isn’t fair.’

I think back to the time I tried to speak to Nana, when I’d been so determined to sort all of this out but didn’t see it through. I’d let Pop intimidate me and I let the moment pass. I could have stopped this happening but instead I let it carry on and now my little sister is committing a long slow suicide to try and make them notice how much she is hurting. Nell was right, this is all my fault. Everything is.

When Nana and Pop come in again, Pop stands at the back of the room while Nana goes over to Nell.

‘We will help you get through this, Nell. As a family. We can help you. Just tell us what we need to do. What do you need?’ Nana says, crying.

‘Dad, Nana. I need my dad,’ says Nell.

Pop leaves the room, making sure the door slams shut behind him. But she is right – this time he has to listen.

Later that night, as I face the first night alone in our bedroom since Mum died in it, I wonder how it would be if Nell was to go and live with Dad. What would happen to me? Terrible as my relationship with her is, I don’t want to sleep in this room on my own.

I don’t feel in control of anything. It’s all such a mess. I think back to what Miss Anthony suggested, to write a letter to the person who is hurting me the most. I never have to give it to them; it’s just for me. I have to clear up this mess. This is where it starts. I begin to write.

Dear Julian . . .

I think Renée has gone off me and it’s horrible. I don’t know what I’ve done wrong but I’ve obviously really annoyed her. Did I go on about my dad too much? Was I too boring? Did I say something mean? I’ve read through every note she ever wrote to me and I don’t see anything that has been said that should make her change her mind about being my friend, but it’s so obvious she doesn’t want to be around me and I feel like such a fool. Now I’ve dumped Sally and Renée has dumped me, I am left totally friendless. I feel so unhappy, my tummy is in knots, and the last thing I want is to go into town with my mother to buy some short-sleeved school shirts.

‘You don’t have to come with me. If you give me the money I can just buy the shirts myself,’ I say as she storms into the uniform shop.

‘And let you loose with my money?’ my mum says, as if she has reason to think I am untrustworthy.

‘I’ve never used your money for anything other than what you’ve told me to use it for,’ I say.

‘That’s because I would never give you the chance. Not like that father of yours, throwing cash at you like it grows on trees. Like that school he put you in, leaving me behind to pay the ridiculous fees.’

‘Well, Mother, I am very grateful to you for giving me the chance to have an education.’

‘You’re not grateful. Why can’t you be more like her? At least she has a job.’ My mum points at the rotund girl behind the counter who is wearing elasticated jeans, an apron, and a name badge that says ‘Jenny’.

Jenny has worked in Hemans – the uniform shop – for as long as I can remember. Every year I’ve watched her large bottom disappear up a ladder to get the uniform in my size down from the top shelf, and every year she looks the same – around seventeen years old and hauntingly miserable. Dad and I always presumed that she is part of the family who own the shop, because she is as much a part of it as the shelves that fill it.

‘You wish I was more like Jenny?’ I ask sarcastically.

‘At least she pays her way.’

How Mum thinks I could have a job, as well as study and look after Abi, is beyond me. I bite my tongue and ask Jenny to get me some shirts.

‘The size 40 is best. I like them a bit loose,’ I say. I’m two sizes bigger than last year, not because I am fat, but because my boobs are huge. I hand three shirts to Jenny at the till, and she starts to put them in a bag. Mum gets some cash out of her purse and hands it to Jenny.

‘Get the change and be quick. I’ll wait outside,’ she snaps as she leaves.

Jenny and I stand quietly as she opens the till and works out the change.

‘There you go, £5.01,’ she says, handing me the money.

‘Thanks.’ I go to leave.

‘Flo? Your name is Flo, isn’t it?’

I look at the money in my hand. Has she miscalculated the change? It doesn’t look like it.

‘I’ve worked in here every Saturday since I was twelve and as soon as I turned sixteen my mum made me leave school and go full time,’ she tells me. ‘You’re lucky you get to go to school, and have lots of friends. I don’t have any friends. I’d love your life.’