The Illustrated Mum (7 page)

“I
had
a mother. She just didn't want me. I didn't care, though. Know what I really did want?” Marigold looked at me, her green eyes very bright. “A sister. I was desperate for a sister. That's why I'm so glad you and Star have each other.”

“And we've got you too. You're like our big sister,” I said. “Oh, Marigold, you've made such a
lovely
cottage!”

“What about clover leaves for the curtains? They'll look like green velvet, ultrastylish,” said Marigold, making arches over the windows with pieces of jam tart. “Stick the little leafy bits at the edge of the white icing.”

I managed to find a clover patch and pulled up a whole clump. I squatted down and started gently tearing off each separate leaf.

“I wonder who will live in the cottage. A rabbit?” I said.

“Rabbits would be too big and bumbly. No, two teeny tiny dormice are peeping out at us right this minute, noses twitch twitch twitching, looking at their dream house. If we keep
very
quiet’

“Hey, look! look!”

“Dol! That's not quiet! You'll scare them all away.”

“But
look
!” I held out a clover stalk. “It's a four-leaf clover!”

“Wow!” said Marigold. She looked at it carefully. One of the leaves looked as if it
might
just have torn in two. But Marigold held it up proudly. “A genuine four leaf-clover,” she said. “I can feel the luck throbbing through its sap. Lucky lucky lucky Dol.” She went to give it back to me.

“No, lucky lucky lucky Marigold,” I said, pushing her hand away. “It's yours. And you can't refuse it or it'll muck up the luck.”

“Oh well, we can't muck up the luck,” said Marigold, and we both giggled. Marigold twiddled the lucky clover in front of her face, and then carefully wrapped it in a tissue and put it in her shorts pocket. “I should be so lucky lucky lucky lucky,” she sang.

We stuck the clover curtains into the cottage and then sat in front of it, still and silent, waiting for dormice. We sat there a long time. Several flies and beetles showed an interest, and a butterfly momentarily perched on the twisty chimney.

“I think the dormice are shy,” said Marigold.

“They're itching to come and move in, but they can't pluck up the courage to do it while we're watching. So shall we walk on and leave them to it?”

“Right. But what if rabbits come too, or something bigger? A stoat or a fox or something? They'll just knock it flying, won't they?”

“We'll put a hex around it,” said Marigold. “Stones!”

We gathered lots of little stones and arranged them in a ring around the cake cottage, leaving just a little mouse-size gap in front of the door.

“Perfect,” I said.

“Perfectissimo,” said Marigold.

We walked off hand in hand. After ten or twelve paces Marigold looked over her shoulder.

“I saw them! The dormice. They just whisked inside, little paws all scrabbly with excitement,” she said, nudging me.

“Really?”

“Really,” said Marigold firmly.

We walked on, swinging Marigold's shoes in the empty cake bag. After a while the brook got a bit wider, and when we rounded a bend it got wider still, and the wild vegetation was tamed into parkland.

“Ducks!” said Marigold, nudging me.

“They look very fat overweight ducks, like they need to go on a diet. They don't need cakes,” I said.

“And our little dormice needed their home,” said Marigold.

“Are they sisters?”

“Sure. Dora and Daphne. Dora's the eldest.” Marigold glanced at me. “But Daphne's the prettiest. Her eyes are extra big and beady and her ears are particularly exquisite, very soft and downy on the outside and the most beautiful delicate shell pink inside.”

“Daphne sounds lovely. Can she be the cleverest too, even though she's the youngest?”

“You bet. She's the cleverest in the whole class at mouse school. She's very artistic too. She can nibble at a hazelnut, chew chew chew with her sharp teeth and sculpt it into a little statue. She's famous for her wooden cats. She makes them with a roly-poly round base so they tip over with one flick of a paw or tail. All the little mouse babies love to play Tip the Cat.”

Marigold went on and on, talking faster and faster, making it all so real I could
see
the mice scampering in front of me. She could be so magic at making things up, much better than Star. Star would rarely play pretend games nowadays. She said she couldn't do it properly anymore. She'd try to pretend but she'd just feel a fool. She couldn't believe it anymore.

I was glad this new mouse game was just for Marigold and me. I realized how rarely we'd been on our own together. It felt wonderful. Marigold wasn't
sad or scary at all, she was the best fun ever. Star was so critical nowadays sh made Marigold nervous and twitchy. Marigold was just fine with me.

“I love you, Marigold,” I said, putting my arm round her slim waist.

“I love you too, Dolly Dolphin,” she said, and she hugged me close.

I could feel all the delicate bones of her rib cage through her smooth skin. I carefully patted her long thin arm with the new tattoo etched into her sharply pointed elbow. She seemed too lightly linked together, almost as fragile as the daisy chain round her ankle. Though that wasn't real. It was dyed into her skin forever. I liked the idea of it lasting.

We walked on until the brook became a park stream and we were picking our way through formal gardens. We were miles away from home. Marigold was still engrossed in telling her mouse saga. I didn't want to spoil things by reminding her of the time. Marigold always lived in the moment. She wasn't thinking about Star.

Star would have wondered why I hadn't met her after school. She'd have hung around awhile, then gone home. She'd be there now, wondering what had happened to Marigold and me, waiting and worrying. I knew how awful that was.

I tried hard to think about Dora and Daphne, laughing as Marigold became more outrageous, acting
being a mouse herself, her nose twitching, teeth tucked over her lip, her hands curled into mouse paws‘but the thought of Star wouldn't go away.

“Star will be wondering where we are,” I said at last.

Marigold looked surprised. “I thought she had net-ball practice.”

“Yes, but it's nearly half past five now.”

“It's not!”

“And it'll take us hours to walk home.”

“We'll get a bus,” said Marigold, feeling in her pocket for change. She brought out the tissue containing the four-leaf clover and smiled.

The bus shelter was covered in posters for rock bands. Marigold was in the middle of describing Daphne's summer and winter outfits but she stopped short, distracted.

“What?” I said.

“Emerald City are doing a reunion gig! Oh God. Emerald City! I went to two of their concerts back in the eighties. They were Micky's favorite band.”

My tummy tightened. It was usually a danger sign if Marigold started talking about Micky. But she stared at the poster, dazzled. She had the clover in her hand, twirling it round and round in her fingers.

Star didn't speak to either of us when we got back. I knew she'd been frightened. Her eyes looked pink as if she might have been crying. I felt bad but I'd done my best to keep Marigold away so that Star wouldn't be embarrassed in front of her friends.

I whispered this plaintively in bed at night, but Star simply turned over with a contemptuous sniff. I couldn't stand it when she wouldn't speak to me. It made me feel as if I weren't there. I felt my cold skinny body under the grubby sheet, reassuring myself. I smoothed my silk scarf over my face, snuffling in its soft smell, blowing it gently up and down with each breath. But no matter how I tried to lull myself, I couldn't sleep. I told myself I'd had a lovely time with Marigold and she was fine, but I still felt jangled and
tense. I could hear her in the kitchen, wandering restlessly, humming old rock songs, clinking her glass.

I huddled further under the covers and eventually I must have slept because I dreamt I was in the cake cottage with my mouse sister. We sat at our fairy-cake table and nibbled the thick icing with our sharp teeth but it tasted sickly sweet. We washed our paws and whiskers at the cupcake kitchen sink but golden syrup poured out of the taps and we were coated in sweet yellow slime. We crawled stickily up the sponge stairs and curled up in our jam-roll beds but the fruitcake walls all around us started crumbling and the marzipan ceiling suddenly caved in. A huge red vixen was up above us, eyes glinting. She opened her jaws wide and I screamed and screamed.

“Stop it, Dol! You're dreaming,” said Star, shaking me.

“Oh, I had such a horrible nightmare! It was so awful.” I clutched Star for comfort.

“Don't! You're digging your fingernails right in. They need cutting.”

“Can I come into bed with you?”

“No. I'm not talking to you.”

“But you are! Oh Star,
please
.”

“No! Now shut up and go back to sleep.”

“I'm going to Marigold,” I said, climbing out of bed. “We had such a great time today. You just wind her up and make her worse. She's fine with me.”

Star said nothing. I was forced to pad on out of the bedroom. I went very slowly along the hall, putting the heel of my foot in front of my toes so that I only moved one foot length at a time.

The kitchen light was still on so I went very slowly toward it. Marigold was sitting at the table in her T-shirt and jeans but she was fast asleep, her head slumped, her mouth slightly open. She still had her hand cupped round her glass but it was empty. So was the bottle.

“Marigold?” I whispered. “Marigold, I've had a bad dream.”

I took hold of her by the arm. She was very cold.

“Marigold, come to bed. Please.”

Marigold groaned but didn't answer. Her eyes were half open and not focusing. I knew there was no point persisting. I went and got her quilt and wrapped it round her. Then I patted her icy hand.

“Night-night, sleep tight, make sure the bugs don't bite,” I whispered, and went back to my own bed.

Star still said nothing, but as I felt my way in the dark she reached out and pulled me in with her. She cuddled me close, her lap warm, her arms soft.

She still didn't talk to me the next morning but it didn't matter so much. Marigold was locked in the bathroom being sick so we couldn't have a proper wash and I had to walk to school clenching hard, a pain
in my tummy I needed to pee so badly. I was terrified I wouldn't make it, especially the last few seconds as I dashed to the girls' toilets and got the cubicle open and my knickers down‘but I was just about OK.

Afterward I had a quick wash in the sink to get the sleep out of my eyes. Kayleigh and Yvonne came in and saw what I was doing.

“Yuck, you're not supposed to wash your face in the school sinks. Here, you haven't been washing your filthy feet in them too, have you, Bottle Nose?” said Kayleigh.

Yvonne giggled at this new nickname for me.

“It's because Bottle Nose lives in a squat. I bet they haven't even
got
a sink at home.”

“I do
not
live in a squat, Monkey Bum,” I said fiercely, although we'd lived in several squats in the past. One of them didn't have a sink. Someone had smashed it up, and the toilet too, so we had to use a portable potty. That was the squat where Marigold had the worst boyfriend of all …

“She's
crying
!” said Kayleigh.

“I am
not
crying, I've got soap in my eyes, so shut up, Camel Breath,” I said, wiping my face quick with the back of my hand.

“Bottle Nose lives in a squat!” Yvonne repeated, and another girl came out of a toilet and started joining in, and another silly little kid not even in our year.

“Shut
up
. I do
not
. I live in a dead posh Edwardian house in Beacon Road, so you're totally stupidly moronically mistaken,” I said, flicking my limp hair behind my ears and squaring up to them.

“You can't afford to live in a place like Beacon Road,” said Kayleigh. “You're a liar, Bottle Nose.”

“Well, try following me home and see for yourself,” I said.

“
I
don't want to go home with
you
, thanks very much. You're pathetic, asking everyone home with you all the time. I heard your mum ask Tasha to go home with you!” said Kayleigh.

“Her
mum
!” said Yvonne.

They all sniggered. My fists clenched.

“Did you see her tattoos?” said Kayleigh.

“All over her! My mum says tattoos are dead common,” said Yvonne.

“Your mum's just jealous of my mum because she's a great fat lump like you,” I said, and I shoved her hard in her wobbly stomach.

“Um, you punched her!” said Kayleigh.

“Yeah, and I'll punch you too,” I said, and I hit her hard, right on the chin.

Then I marched out of the toilets, the other girls scattering in alarm. Kayleigh and Yvonne told on me. Miss Hill told me off for fighting in front of the whole class.

“It's bad enough when the boys fight but it's appalling when a girl starts using her fists,” she said.

“That's sexist,” I said, accurately but unwisely.

“Don't be impertinent, Dolphin,” she said. She always gave this really hateful sneer when she said my name. Then she went on lecturing me, rolling the words round her mouth as if they were extra-delicious sweets. She loved it when she got an excuse to lay into me. “You must never ever hit anyone, do you understand, Dolphin? It can be very dangerous. You could have done Kayleigh and Yvonne serious harm.”

I blinked my witch eyes and inflicted further ultra-serious harm upon them. My fist became iron. It smashed into Yvonne's stomach so hard her intestines spurted out and dangled in the air like a string of sausages. My iron fist punched Kayleigh's jaw so that she swallowed every one of her pearly white teeth and choked. My fist was flexed for serious action now. One blink of my witch eyes and Miss Hill became a giant punch bag. Bam! Pow! Batter! Crunch!

“I hope you're taking this seriously, Dolphin,” said Miss Hill.

“Oh yes, I am, Miss Hill,” I said.

Zap! Rip! Clunk! Crush!