Skin Deep (4 page)

‘My mum makes jewellery. I was going to ask if you’d be interested in a sample,’ he said, pulling a pouch out of his pocket. I wondered if I could slip away out of sight or if moving would make him notice me.

‘You’ll have to talk to Clare about that. She’ll be back in twenty minutes if you want to wait. Feel free to browse.’

Urgh!
Now I had to move. I got up as stealthily as I could and ducked into an aisle. I sat down close to the shelf and let my hair fall over my face as I pretended to read.

Footsteps sounded on the cord carpet, the soft pad of trainers coming closer. And then . . .

‘Oh!’ He walked into me as he came round the corner and knocked the book from my hands. It skidded under the shelf.

‘Oh, sorry!’ He crouched down to fish the book out. ‘Didn’t see you there. Are you . . .’ He tailed off and I waited for the shudder.

He grinned at me.

What?

‘Hi again!’ He pulled my book out and handed it back to me. ‘I’m glad I’ve bumped into you . . . well, fallen over you! I wanted to say this morning, only you ran off . . . that . . . your dog . . . it’s fine. Dead friendly, isn’t he? I like dogs. Sorry if I came over as rude.’

I was too shocked to move away or speak. And . . . and he was looking me full in the face . . .

He had nice eyes – a sort of brown colour, warm and smiley. He’d looked at Raggs that way too.

He went on. ‘You surprised me, that’s all. The scar’ – he touched his face – ‘took me by surprise. I didn’t mean to be rude, honest.’

I gaped at him. Nobody ever,
ever
mentioned the scars. Their eyes slid away or they turned aside or they pretended they couldn’t see them at all. But nobody ever acknowledged them directly. Even my own family avoided talking about them in front of me, apart from those humiliating and painful times when Mum felt it was necessary for a serious chat about my progress. But in the way that he’d just done? So blunt? So matter-of-fact? No, nobody did that.

He scratched at his neck. His grin was sort of lopsided this time. ‘What I mean is, sorry if I screwed up.’

Screwed up? Oh yeah, you did that
. For a few minutes in eight horrible months, I’d forgotten my face and enjoyed something as basic as taking the dog out. And then he’d made me feel like an ugly freak. Which I was, but I didn’t want to be reminded of it . . .

I blinked hard and opened my book, hoping he’d go away.

‘Good book? You read any of his before?’

I shrugged, unable to get words out, not knowing what to say if I could. Charlie aside, this was the first boy to talk to me since the accident. I avoided them at school and I’d have been shy of this one even before the accident. Close up, he was even cuter – the kind of boy girls would be drawn to like a magnet. My skin felt scratchy with nerves at having him so close, and having his eyes on my face.

‘I’ve read a couple. Not bad. He goes on a bit though.’ The boy chuckled. ‘So, do you come here often?’

Oh, I got it. That’s why he was talking to me. I was a joke. One big bloody joke. Talk to the freak and laugh behind her back about it later.

I scrambled up. ‘Fuck off!’

‘Hey, what’s wrong? I was –’

‘
Fuck off!
’

People turned to look at us and the shameful tears came again as they stared. As he stared.

I ran to find Mum.

She hurried towards me as I burst into the aisle. ‘Jenna, was that you shouting? What on earth is wrong?’

‘I want to go home! I want to go home
now
!’

‘Calm down. What’s happened?’

‘Now!’

From the corner of my eye, I could see the boy watching us, but he melted away when Mum stuffed her books on to a shelf and shepherded me to the door.

When we reached the car, she hesitated. ‘Are you sure you want to go home?’ she asked. ‘Only . . . well, Dad’s having one of his meetings.’

‘Oh, so that’s why you wanted me out of the house. I should’ve guessed.’

‘Darling, I know it upsets you and –’

‘I want to go home!’

She winced and put the car in reverse. I stared out of the window as we drove home in silence.

Dad’s meetings. His campaign group. The sorest of sore points. He hadn’t even had the courtesy to tell me about it. I’d found out when I came across a discarded newspaper. I came down one morning to find he’d rushed out and left the local rag open on the table by accident. I was folding it up when I saw the headline on the front page:

I frowned and sat down to look at the article, my skin flushing and crawling the more I read:

I was shaking when I stopped reading, and I was shaking again when Dad got home that evening and I confronted him. ‘When were you going to tell me?’ I asked as I threw the paper down on the table.

He sat down wearily. ‘When we thought you were ready.’

‘Horrifically disfigured – you let them print
that
in the newspaper. And down here’ – I prodded the paper – ‘it says a photo of me will be used in your leaflets. You’re going to put my photo in there. Without telling me. Without
asking
me.’ My voice rose to a scream. ‘What the hell gives you the right to do that?’

‘That was taken out of context,’ he protested. ‘It was only a suggestion from Charlotte’s dad. He thought it might help. Your mum said it wasn’t the right time to talk to you about it. We wouldn’t have done it without –’

‘Oh yes, like you told me about this whole campaign?’

‘Jenna, for God’s sake, we have to do
something
. That boy has ruined your life!’

The words were out there, though he looked like he could have bitten his tongue off for saying them. I got up and ran blindly to the door. He followed me up the stairs, putting his foot in my bedroom door as I tried to slam it.

‘Jenna, I didn’t mean that your life is over. Of course not, it’s all ahead of you. But look what he’s put you through, the pain, the operations. You could have died too!’

‘You didn’t even wait until the mask is off.’ I tore at the plastic mould on my face, but he grabbed my hands to stop me. ‘It’s me who has to wear this. Me!’

He hung on to my wrists. ‘Don’t. You’ll hurt yourself. It’ll be off soon. You’ll get back to normal then, see your friends.’

‘Oh yes, except my best friend is dead! It won’t be back to normal for her, will it? It won’t ever be normal.’ I hated Dad then. I’d heard him talk to Mum about how Lindz changed after her mum left and seen the frown crease his forehead when we went out together. He thought she was a bad influence. He couldn’t see her the way I did. How she glowed brighter than other people and that I wanted to sparkle like her.

‘But you’re alive, Jenna. Thank God, you’re alive.’

‘Yes, and I wish I wasn’t!’

Dad let me go and backed away. Mum came running upstairs and pushed him aside and he left me for her to deal with.

What he said stayed with me. There was no way out of this. I couldn’t go running to my parents and have them make it better like when I cut my knee playing with Charlie when we were little, or when I got stuck on my maths homework. This was never, ever going to go away. Like the man on the market stall, I’d be stared at. I’d be
wrong
all my life. No going back. No making me right.

Too soon we pulled into the drive. Mum had to park on the lawn because there were so many other cars there.

‘Why is he having it here?’ I muttered, wanting to know, but not wanting to speak to her either.

She hesitated before she answered. ‘Last time they met at the village hall, but the cars were vandalised. Paintwork keyed and the tyres let down.’

And I knew who’d have done that. We all knew.

‘They’ll be in the kitchen,’ Mum said. ‘Go in through the front door and straight upstairs if you don’t want to see them. I’ll bring you a hot chocolate.’

Charlie was doing trumpet practice in his room so I lay on my bed with my iPod turned up high to drown him out. Sometimes now I scared myself. Sometimes I couldn’t hold it in and go back to being Mum and Dad’s normal Jenna, even in the safety of my home. I wasn’t sure if any of that girl was still left. Perhaps the thing inside me had eaten her all away. Maybe I only acted at being her now.

Before the accident, I used to daydream about meeting a boy who didn’t want Lindsay or a Lindsay wannabe. He only wanted me. That was crazy thinking because Lindz was catnip for boys. She could get anyone she wanted. I’d watch her go into action, torn between admiration and jealousy, knowing I could never be like that. When she wanted the rich and unattainable Steven Carlisle, she’d even hooked him. But this dream boy would only be interested in me. We’d do regular things like go to the cinema, bowling with friends, hold hands, kiss eventually. Things I was ready for. Things Mum and Dad would be happy with. Things Lindz would laugh at as babyish.

And sometimes, after the accident, I used to dream it could still be possible. That someone would see past the scars and not care about them. Hopeless dreams. Stupid little girl dreams.

Dad sat on my bed and I jumped. With my headphones on I hadn’t heard him come in.

‘We’re having coffee and cakes. Come down and say hello.’

I turned the iPod off. ‘Why? So you can exhibit your freak to the crowd?’

His eyes registered his hurt and disappointment. ‘Where did that come from? Have some manners. Those people down there care about you. You’ve known most of them since you were a little girl. They’re doing this for you.’

‘If they care then they should leave me alone, like I want.’ I reached to turn my iPod on again, but he snatched it away.

‘Don’t be so selfish and rude. I want you down there in five minutes.’

So five minutes later, I went down to play the part of Daddy’s good, tragic little daughter. I smiled at the people while they smiled at my left ear. Mrs Crombie from the village shop cut me an enormous piece of chocolate cake and pressed me to eat it. Charlotte’s dad asked me heartily how school was going, which was brave of him, I guess, considering. Mrs Atkins from Belle Vue Cottage told me about her new kittens.

‘Does it make you sick to look at me?’ I wanted to ask. But Mum and Dad would never have forgiven me if I did, so I put the old Jenna on for them until I could escape back to my room.

Later, when they’d all left and the coast was clear, I crept down to the kitchen for a glass of milk. Mum and Dad were in the sitting room whispering to each other. I paused at the half-closed door to listen.

‘I’m worried, Tanya. She hardly comes out of her room. She won’t talk to people unless we make her. She never sees her friends. You said it would be different once she took the mask off.’

‘It’s only been a few weeks. She needs time to readjust. She’s gone back to school. That’s a start.’

‘But it seems as though she’s getting worse, not better. And what was all that about in the library today?’

‘I don’t know. She wouldn’t tell me.’

‘I know you’re worried too. I can see it in your face. She’s shutting herself off from everyone. I don’t want her getting like that poor bastard next door. He’s practically a hermit since Lindsay died.’

And I couldn’t stand to hear any more after that. I slunk back upstairs, the milk forgotten. Back to the safety of my room where I could lock the door on them all.