The Illustrated Mum (23 page)

I wondered whether to cry too. I felt like Dorothy. I'd stepped into Oz.

“Now, where are we going to put you?” said Aunty
Jane. “I don't think we can cram you into a crib! You'd better have Mark's room.”

Mark was her youngest son, away at university. His room was still childish, with football and rock stars blue-tacked onto his walls and a faded Pamela Anderson poster above his bed.

“Not a girly room, I'm afraid,” said Aunty Jane, puffing up the duvet, which was patterned all over with dinosaurs.

I suddenly felt so tired that all I wanted to do was crawl under that duvet and sleep but there was all sorts of other stuff I had to do first. I had to eat egg and chips for my tea and help Aunty Jane spoon runny boiled egg into two gaping toddler mouths and give the baby its bottle. I had to meet Uncle Eddie, who was old and gray like Aunty Jane. He called me Dolly Daydream. I had to have a bath and have my hair washed and my nails cut. I felt very scrubbed and scraped by the time Aunty Jane tucked me up into bed.

I went to sleep straightaway. But then I started dreaming. It was as if all the dinosaurs jumped straight off the duvet down my ear into my brain.

I had a beautiful sleek special dinosaur friend but she suddenly bounded away into the woods and I couldn't find her anymore. I was so lonely without her. I listened hard for her own special roar but I never heard it. So I made friends with some of the small
dinosaurs. They were meek and friendly and grazed on grass and let me pet them but there were big ones too, huge and wild with great scaly tails and teeth that could tear me apart in one bite.

There was one with great glittering eyes and I thought at first it was gentle and grass-eating but when I tried to pet its long neck it snapped at me. I ran away from it, and then I got lost and I couldn't see where I was going. I was stumbling through this dark wood and I was so frightened.

I could hear the pounding of hard reptile feet running after me, the rasp of sharp claws and the thump of those terrible tails. They were getting nearer and nearer and then I was out of the forest but there was a vast black lake in front of me. I could see some creature swimming way out at the other side of the water. I wondered if I could reach it and whether it might tow me along. I knew I couldn't swim, but the fierce dinosaurs were there at my back, clawing at my dress, ripping it right off me, so I leapt into the lake. It was strangely warm and so wet, wet all over me. …

I woke up and realized what had happened. I lay there, sodden, my face screwed up with the shame. Then I got up, pulled the dripping sheet off the bed, bundled it up and crept to the bathroom. I ran cold water in the bath and steeped the sheet, wondering how I was ever going to get it dry. Then I heard footsteps.

“Dolphin? Dolphin, are you all right, sweetie? Are you just having a wee?”

I mumbled something and prayed she'd go away. She didn't. She waited outside the door a minute and then she said, “I'm coming in now, poppet.”

She came in. She saw me in my wet nightie. She saw the sheet in the bath. She came over and hugged me.

“Never mind, little darling. It happens to the best of us. We'll pop you in the bath too‘a
hot
one‘and then we'll find you a nice clean nightie. It might have to be one of mine. It'll swamp you so you'll look a bit comic but never mind, eh?”

“You're not cross,” I said.

“I'm not the littlest weeniest bit cross,” she said.

When I was washed she wrapped me up in a big towel. She put the lid down on the lavatory and sat on it, with me on her lap, cuddled in close as if I were one of the babies.

I thought she'd let me off school the next morning but she said I should go.

“I'll take you, dear. It's all for the best. It'll take your mind off things.”

“You don't know what it's like, Aunty Jane. It'll make everything much much worse.”

“Nonsense.”

“It's
sense
. I'm not going to school. And you can't make me.”

She laughed. “Stop being such a saucy baggage!”

I sat down in her vast nightie and said I wasn't going to get washed or dressed.

She laughed again. “You'll look a right sight with me dragging you to school in that nightie! Still, it's raining, so we can spread it out, and all the babies can shelter underneath.”

“That's silly.”

“So are you. Now get washed and put on your dress. It's had a wash and all.”

I nearly had another tantrum when I went to put on my poor witch frock. Its whirl in the washing machine had faded its bold black to dirty gray and it didn't have its own comforting smell anymore. All its remaining witchly powers had seeped away.

“It's come up a treat, your special frock,” Aunty Jane said eagerly. “And look, I've found an old pair of Mark's socks‘they'll be just the ticket.”

They were long black socks. I found a pair of black Doc Martens at the back of his wardrobe. I tried them on. They looked incredible even if they were much too big. I wouldn't
need
witchly powers with big butch boots like them‘one quick kick and old Ronnie Churley would go flying.

Aunty Jane fell about laughing when she saw what I'd put on.

“You can't wear them, sweetheart. They're a good six sizes too big for you.”

“We could stuff them with socks.”

“You've always got an answer for everything. Still, it makes a change from all my little kiddies. I like a good argument.”

Aunty Jane won the argument too. I had to pad along to school in my own shabby sneakers. Uncle Eddie had to be off early in the car for his work so it was a problem getting all the babies ready and in the big buggy.

“I can go to school by myself, easy peasy,” I said, but she wouldn't hear of it.

It was weird going to school from the other side of town. When we turned into the school road some of the kids started staring. Yvonne got out of her car at the school gates and looked at the babies openmouthed.

“Bye-bye, Dolphin. We'll come and collect you at twenty past three,” said Aunty Jane, giving my dress a little tug straight.

“Who's she?” Yvonne demanded rudely.

“I'm Dolphin's Aunty Jane,” said Aunty Jane. She gave me a quick kiss on the cheek and then set off homeward, clucking to the children.

“Are all them babies
hers
?” said Yvonne.

“Yes, she's a miracle of modern science,” I said.

I pushed past her because I'd spotted Oliver in the playground. It was too far away for him to see me at first, but then he must have twigged that the black dot moving toward him was me. He started rushing
toward me. It was like one of those silly romantic scenes in films. We even had our arms outstretched. But then we stopped at the last moment and stood still, grinning foolishly. We certainly weren't going to embrace in front of all the other kids in the school playground.

“Are you all right, Dolphin? I've been so worried! Where did you stay the night?”

“In a foster home. But it's OK,” I said. “There are babies. Three of them.”

“I like babies,” said Oliver.

“Well, maybe you can come round and play with them. Aunty Jane won't mind.”

“So she's an
aunty
?”

“Not a real one. But she's as good as.”

“Oh, I'm so pleased! So can you stay with her?”

“I don't know. For a bit. Until … until my mum's better.”

I didn't even want to say Marigold's name because that made it all too real and painful. I couldn't help thinking about her when lessons started. I kept seeing her lying in that bed drawing all over herself. I wanted to curl up round her and take her pen away and put my hands tight over hers to stop her hurting herself.

When it was playtime Miss Hill called me over to her desk.

“How are you today, Dolphin?” she said, her voice
all sweet and sticky as if she'd swallowed a tin of golden syrup.

I stared at her.

“You come and have a little chat with me if things are troubling you, dear.”

Dear???

Mrs. Dunstan nodded at me in a weirdly matey way when she saw me in the corridor and I suddenly twigged. Lizzie must have phoned the school and told them what was going on, so now all the staff were being kind to the poor little kid who'd been taken into care.

I don't know if Mr. Harrison knew or not. He acted just the way he always did at lunchtime in the library. He gave Oliver and me a little wave when we walked in but didn't make a big deal of it. We sat together with our dolphin book. Mr. Harrison started rootling in his briefcase. We heard a promising rustle. He was unwrapping one of those wonderful giant bars of Cadbury's chocolate.

“It's magic munchie time!” he said, and he gave Oliver and me a third each.

School was certainly looking up. At this rate Ronnie Churley would blow kisses at me and Yvonne and Kayleigh would fashion me friendship bracelets and Tasha would beg me to stay over at her house and be her best friend forever.

Ronnie and Yvonne and Kayleigh and Tasha stayed their usual spiteful selves but the teachers were certainly trying hard. Especially Miss Hill.

It was story writing in the afternoon. Miss Hill said we had to pretend to be journalists. One of us would tell a story and the other would write it down. She told us to pair up.

Ronnie Churley groaned.

“It's not fair! I'm stuck with stupid old Dolphin who can't write for toffee.”

“No, you're not,” I said, and I darted across the room and bagged Oliver for my partner.

Miss Hill looked up … and said nothing at all! She let me stay with Oliver. So he got to be the reporter interviewing me. All the other kids pretended to be famous actors or football stars and just showed off about how much money they made.
I
decided to be the only survivor of a tragic accident at sea. I made out I was in hospital and talked about all my horrendous injuries, and how I felt so lonely and guilty being the only one on the ship left living. Oliver scribbled it all down, pages of it.

The reporters had to read out their interviews. Oliver got picked. Yvonne and Kayleigh started giggling at first when he started talking about this tragic shipwreck and everyone drowning but me, and how my lungs were so damaged I could barely whisper to tell him my dramatic true story but guess what! Miss Hill said it was excellent and gave us both a gold star!

It was the first time I'd ever been given a star for anything at school.

“That's just because she's being so creepy about you today,” Kayleigh hissed. “What's up, Bottle Nose? Is it your mum? She hasn't died, has she?”

I suddenly saw Marigold flipped over on her back in bed in her strange white nightie, her hands clasped on her chest, her face a mask. I felt my eyes fill with tears.

“Oh, Kayleigh, that's an
awful
thing to say,” said Yvonne. “Is it true, Dolphin?”

“I'm sorry, Dolphin. Don't cry,” said Kayleigh.

They both looked anxiously at Miss Hill. If she saw I was crying they knew they'd be in for it.

I rubbed my eyes.

“She's not dead. But she's very ill. In hospital,” I whispered.

They stared at me, their eyes round. Then Yvonne reached out. I thought she might be going to pinch me but she patted me on the shoulder instead.

“I hope she gets better soon,” she said.

“Yes, so do I. I didn't mean what I said. I wasn't thinking,” said Kayleigh.

It was great to have them desperate to make up to me but I couldn't get the image of Marigold dead out of my head.

I knew she'd tried to kill herself once when she was younger. She had two scars across her wrist. You could still feel them if you touched her, but you couldn't see
them. She had twin tattoos covering them up, two horizontal lozenge-shaped diamonds with rays radiating out to show just how much they sparkled. She always said Star and I were her diamonds. But now Star had left her and I had put her in hospital.

I ran out of school the moment the bell went. I didn't even wait for Oliver. I thought I'd run right to the hospital but Aunty Jane was waiting for me at the gate with the baby buggy.

“Slow down, slow down, little Miss Speedy,” she said. “Where are you off to? Not running away?”

“Not running away. Running
to
someplace. The hospital.”

“Yes, poppet, you need to see your mum. Well, your dad's been in touch. He's coming to take you himself, after tea.”

I was impressed by this but I argued all the same.

“I've got to see her now, Aunty Jane. You don't understand.”

“I do, sweetheart, but the thing is, I can't let you skedaddle off to the hospital by yourself. I know you're a clever girl and could get there no problem at all, but I'm supposed to look after you and that means I'd have to tag along with you. How am I going to do that with a buggy full of babies who are going to start bawling for their tea any second now? Do you see my point?”

I had to see.

“Well, do you promise I can go to the hospital later? Even if my dad doesn't come for me?”

“If he doesn't come Uncle Eddie will take you. But your dad seems a man you can rely on.”

Oliver came hurrying up then, a little wounded that I'd abandoned him but very eager to meet Aunty Jane and the babies. He didn't just treat them as babies either. He sorted out the difference between Celine and Martin and baby Daryl and shook each one by the small sticky fist. Martin was fussing by this time but became fascinated by Oliver's glasses and Daryl chuckled when Oliver gently tickled him under his damp chin.

“You're very good with the babies, darling,” said Aunty Jane. “I think you'd better come home with us. You can keep them all amused while I put my feet up.”

“Can Oliver really come, Aunty Jane? Can he come to tea?”

“Of course he can, so long as his mum doesn't mind.”

“She will mind,” said Oliver, sighing. “She got ever so upset about the other day. I'm in the doghouse at the moment.”

He trotted off like a little spaniel, his long hair tufting in two clumps either side of his face like ears.

“He's a nice boy,” said Aunty Jane. “Is he your special friend?”

“Yes, he is. Do you know what? I'm going to give him a haircut.”

“Are you, dearie?”