The Book of Lies (12 page)

‘Fine!' I choked. ‘Do that.'

But he let me go, throwing my knife onto the paving stones.

‘You're wasting my time!'

I was sick of Ray and his swaggering ways and his motley crew of no-goods. What made them think they were better than me? I picked the knife off the ground and, without even thinking, pressed the blade to my arm.

‘Tu cré chuq t áeme à créer! But I'll show you the colour of my blood and prove it's not yellow.'

I dug in deep and the blood ran to my wrist.

‘You got a screw loose?' Ray spluttered.

Tears had sprung up in my eyes.

‘You won't think that when I'm gone.'

I met his gaze. He cocked his big head slightly. It was like the world had stopped turning on its axis.

‘Eh? Oueq vas-tu, man amie?'

I waited a good few seconds before answering.

‘Why do you care? I'm the big liar, remember? So I must be just imagining that boat that I'll soon be away on. Think what you like,
man amie
, but I'll be leaving you to rot!'

Mais vère dja donc, Emile, and so it is with that boy who cries wolf: he lies once, he lies twice, but when he finally tells the truth he'll get the punishment he deserves.

16TH DECEMBER 1985
,
11
.
56
a.m.

[Unit
4
b, King's Mills. (Mum is making me sit in the office because she doesn't trust me to be in the house on my own.)]

‘Doctor, doctor, everyone thinks I'm a liar.' ‘I find that hard to believe.'

It being a Monday I was supposed to be going to school, but then I nearly lost a finger. I was washing up the breakfast things and smashed a glass beaker in the sink. There was blood everywhere so Mum took me to Grange End surgery.

‘You should've been more careful,' she said, bundling me into the car. ‘And after our conversation last night I can't help but wonder if you did this on purpose.'

Perhaps I should mention that last night I told Mum I was too sick to go to school. Trouble is, I've been (ab)using that excuse a bit too much just recently.

‘You should see Roger,' said Mum, as she pulled out of the driveway.

(‘Roger' is Dr Senner, by the way.)

I wrapped the tea towel tighter round my finger. ‘Maybe I'm anaemic – I felt dizzy before it happened.'

The windscreen was all frosted up so Mum leaned forward, frowning over the steering wheel.

‘Maybe. But last week you said you had glandular fever. I don't know, Cathy. You're not eating properly, so perhaps that's it. And it doesn't help that you're always locked in your room, scribbling away. I don't know what you find to write about.'

I stared out the car window. Guernsey's so small but everyone drives everywhere.

‘There's only a week of term left, so no one will be doing any work,' I said. ‘Can't I just stay off until next term?'

Mum watched me out of the corner of her eye. ‘I know you're upset about what happened to Nicolette but I don't think you should get special treatment. You weren't even that close to her.'

(That's excellent proof how little Mum knows.)

Perhaps if I stop eating I'll get certifiably sick. During the Occupation a lot of people had weak immune systems because they were so undernourished, and once they got sick there weren't any drugs left to fix them. There were outbreaks of Diphtheria, Scarlet Fever, Typhus, worms, and all sorts of yucky things. When the insulin ran out Diabetics died, and without disinfectant even the smallest of cuts would get infected and couldn't heal. They became known as Occupation Ulcers and sometimes proved fatal. But, on the bright side, there were noticeably fewer cases of depression. Presumably this was because people had real problems to worry about and no real time to obsess. (Although they had multiple, massive nervous breakdowns once they were liberated instead.)

Whatever the medical facts are, it would be best not to trust Dr Senner with them. He is The Most Crap Doctor in the Whole World (or Guernsey). I don't know why Mum thought he could help me since it's not like he helped Dad. The one time he came round to our house to see Dad they had a big argument and Dad was Horrified-and-Humiliated-of-St-Peter-Port (and went storming off). Dr Senner was useless then, and I don't think much has changed. Besides, he's already decided I'm trouble(d). He didn't want Mum to leave us alone together, in case I accused him of sexual molestation.

‘There's nothing physically wrong with you,' he said, staying firmly behind his desk. ‘But obviously the mind is a powerful organ.'

I shrugged. ‘Mum insisted I see you. She's obviously worried because of what happened with Dad. You should do some blood tests, or something. I think that'd keep her happy.'

Dr S. nodded absently, like he was playing along with a not-funny joke.

‘And what would you expect me to find?'

‘Hmmm, let me think,' I tapped my chin. ‘Well, obviously not your homebrew since it all got drunk a few weeks back.'

Dr S. pushed his thumb into the top of his pen. He must feel pretty guilty that his homebrew was ‘Exhibit A' after they found Nic's battered remains in the sea.

During the War real alcohol was hard to come by, so people made their own, which was deadly lethal, and Dr Senner's homebrew is no better. It was the first alcohol I ever tasted and I'm amazed anyone else would've willingly drunk it because it honestly tasted like vinegar plus floor cleaner. Dr S. let me try some when I was only
10
because he had this theory it would put me off for life. Dr Suck-It-Up knows alcoholism is a major problem on Guernsey, although Dad said the real problem was in Alderney.
³⁴

Dr S. was watching me through the shrubbery of his eyebrows.

‘So you don't want to go back to school? I know Nicolette was a friend of yours. What you're feeling, we are
all
feeling. Vicky is devastated. You should talk to her. If you sat down with your classmates, you could talk it through together.'

Talk it through with those cretins? I don't think so.

Dr S. twiddled his pen between his fingers. ‘Maybe you feel bad that you weren't at the party, maybe you think you could have stopped Nicolette.'

‘No,' I said firmly, ‘I didn't care whether or not I was invited to the party. I feel sorry for Vicky, that's all. Nic used her like she used me. She called Vicky loads of horrible things, and even made jokes about when she'd have to start shaving.'

Dr S. frowned and I felt bad.

‘Sorry, but it's true. I think it's important to be honest since there's been so much lying already. Nic used to make me lie. She was always egging me on to do bad stuff, and I know she was the same with Vicky.'

Dr S. nodded. ‘You seem angry.'

‘No,' I sighed, ‘I'm disappointed. I'm disappointed that people aren't admitting what Nic was really like. At least now she won't be around to cause more trouble and upset, and I'm just saying what a lot of people are thinking. You mustn't go blaming Vicky for the party getting out-of-hand. It was Nic who invited half the island. And
you
should've guessed how it would end up.
You
are a grown-up, and grown-ups
should
know better.'

Dr S. sniffed in all of his nostril hair and stared at his pens.

‘Does it feel better to get things off your chest?'

I glared at him. ‘There's a lot more I could tell you.'

He opened his palms. ‘By all means. Whatever you tell me is in confidence.'

How interesting. Dr Suck-Eggs-Know-It-All could keep all my secrets, just like he kept Dad's secrets.

It was quite tempting, I'll admit. I could've reached over the desk then and there, grabbed Dr S. by the collar and told him to listen carefully. Then I could've confessed to all sorts of grisly details about my big fight with Nic. I could've said that I'd followed her out of the Village after the party and watched and waited in the bushes. How I'd maybe LURED her away from all her little friends in the woods and made her come to the Batterie, before BLUDGEONING her to death with a bottle of homebrew, and pulling out some hair as a trophy. I could've claimed that I'd pushed her off the cliff on purpose. Yes. I could've invented any old detail knowing he couldn't do a thing about it. Wouldn't that have been something? To spill my guts to Dr Suck Eggs in his joy-of-beige office and then make him respect my privacy.

But I didn't, and actually I didn't need to. After half an hour he was telling Mum it wouldn't be the end of the world if I missed the last week of school. He said Vicky had been sent home twice already.

‘It's nearly Christmas and maybe we should all take some time out,' he smiled. Then he lowered his voice, ‘And I do think Cathy would benefit from some sessions with a counsellor. It would help her process things, most definitely.'

Do you know what that means? I've got to go and see (drum-roll, please) Mrs Senner! Yes, Guernsey's that small: our local loud-mouth is a registered psycho-whatsit and sits in a big room up at the hospital surrounded by abstract art posters and her certificates of depression. I was meant to go there once before to talk about what
did
or
didn't
happen with Mr McCracken. Of course I got out of it, but afterwards Mrs Sigmund Suck Up was always round at our house, pursing her pink lips.

‘If you ask me,' she'd say, ‘there's no smoke without fire . . .'

In point of fact you can have smoke without fire, although it's more accurate to call it gas. Chlorine gas is greenish in colour and poisons the lungs. It was widely used in the First World War and nearly killed my grandfather. It's a pretty dirty weapon to use, but we all need good weapons.

I had to fight to keep Nic as my special friend, and I had Lisa, Anne-Marie and Shelley all yap-yap-yapping at my heels. Even Vicky wanted in. I always felt out-numbered. After the War was over the Channel Islanders were heavily criticised for not resisting the Germans. The thing is, people never realise how many Germans there were on the Island. In occupied Norway, there were about
1
,
200
Norwegians for every German occupier, and in France there was one German to
120
French people. In Guernsey the ratio was almost one to one! There was nowhere to hide or run to, and who was to know it wouldn't stay like that for ever?

I wanted Nic to stay my friend and I would've done anything for her. I'm not just talking about the shoplifting and the drinking. She said that if I was serious about Mr McCracken then I had to grow up and get some Experience. This meant doing things with boys, more specifically Marc Le Page.

We therefore spent whole days at Pete's house. It seemed so depressing to have the curtains closed in the middle of the day. Pagey and I would sit on the sofa and watch horror films while Nic and Pete disappeared upstairs. I generally liked horror films on account of the large number of cheerleaders who were beheaded. Pagey said he'd never met a girl who enjoyed scenes of dismemberment like I did. I suppose it took my mind off whatever was happening off the screen. I tell you, French kissing just shows what perverts the French are, and as for the rest of it, it was worse than P.E.

I honestly cannot understand why God or Charles Darwin or whoever couldn't have made the penis more attractive. Maybe given it bright feathers that fan out like a peacock, or made it a nice colour and gotten rid of all that hair around it (although in theory the hair helps to hide it). I'm amazed the human race hasn't died out with penises looking how they do. I'm also amazed Marc Le Page doesn't prefer to keep his hidden.

Kissing him was like dunking my head in a puddle of spit. At least the sex part was over quickly, and sex was another reason why I started drinking more. Drinking helped me then like it helps me now, and if ever I drank too much I simply went to the bathroom and made myself sick. It seemed a whole lot easier to throw up and drink more than ever to have to stop. Dad always blamed Mum's cooking when I found him in our downstairs toilet, making himself sick. Mum didn't like being blamed, although she got used to it. She'd crack two eggs into a glass and whisk them with tomato juice, then she'd make him drink it down in one. I presumed that was her most ex-cellent revenge.

Dad wouldn't have liked Pete – he was definitely a bad egg and not one for drinking. I suspected Nic was with him just for show, since the other lads looked up to him and she loved the attention. He did weight-training in his garage and he'd scoop her over his shoulder or twirl her around like a rag doll. He once offered to do the same to me but I promised him I'd crush him, and when I saw him fight with Michael I realised I could've done.

It was at André Duquemin's house one Saturday night. Everyone was there. Michael was sitting by himself in a corner, looking delectable/deranged, and I was drinking everything as per usual and trying to be hilariously funny. Eventually I gave up and went to sit by Michael. I remember he smelt of petrol and had a spot on his chin, but that really didn't matter. He was in a Joy Division T-shirt. I told him they were my favourite band and was keen to discuss their name, but he said they weren't a band anymore, not since their lead singer had killed himself. That didn't sound too joyous. I asked Michael if he'd enjoyed reading the choice selection of Dad's books that I'd dropped round at his house, but all he did was grunt. So I changed tack and complimented him on his careful tending of Donnie's flowerbeds.

Michael's furtive scowl deepened and he sucked on his Marlboro-Red-specially-designed-to-kill-you cigarette.

‘You like Donnie, eh?'

I nodded and said that Donnie and I had become friends on account of our communal love of books. I then described Donnie's large-ish library of Catholic good-taste. I went on and on about Donnie's books, actually, and insisted that they were why I kept visiting him. But that's not strictly true. The real reason I went round to Donnie's was to stand by his kitchen window and watch Michael in the garden. Donnie joked that he could charge me by the hour. I don't know why I liked watching Michael so much. I liked the fact that he was so quiet and careful when he was weeding, and his face became angelic as he pruned. And occasionally he was topless.