V for Violet (7 page)

‘I just went out,’ I mumble. ‘Nothing to get your knickers in a twist about.’

Mum takes a deep breath. She’s trying to keep calm. ‘Out where?’ she says. ‘At this time of night?’

‘None of your business,’ I say. ‘I’m sixteen. I’m not a baby. I’ll go where I like.’

‘Oi!’ Dad shouts, leaning forward across the table. ‘Don’t speak to your mother like that! While you’re living under our roof, we’ve every right to know where you’ve been!’ He sits back in his chair and slides a newspaper towards me. ‘It’s one in the morning, for Christ’s sake,’ he says. ‘And haven’t you seen the paper today? If you’d bothered to read it you’d know why we were so worried about you.’

If I’d
bothered
to read the paper today? I can’t believe he’s just said that. Dad, who’s never read a book in his entire life and only ever usually looks at the sport pages is having a go at me just because, for once, I haven’t seen the paper today! I want to punch him. Right on the end of his ignorant nose. I look at Mum with her face all pink and pinched up with self-righteousness and suddenly I can’t keep it in any longer. If they won’t let me have my own secrets then why should I let them have theirs? Ignoring the newspaper, I turn to Mum.

‘I’ll tell you where I’ve been, if you tell Dad where you went today.’

There’s a horrible silence. Mum opens her mouth and closes it again, like a fish drowning in a bucket of water. The ash that’s trembling at the end of Dad’s cigarette falls on to the table and neither of them move to brush it away. ‘What does she mean?’ Dad says quietly. He’s looking at Mum and I know he means business because without even putting his last cigarette out properly, he’s lighting another one.

I run out of the room, slamming the door behind me, and by the time I’ve got upstairs, they’re already yelling at each other. Mum’s crying. ‘I had to see him, Frank. I had to see him!’

‘You bloody promised me!’ Dad shouts. ‘I told you, just the once and never again! You lied to me! You bloody lied to me!’

‘But, Frank. Please!’

‘Does Violet know? Have you told her? Have you told Norma?’

I shut my bedroom door and throw myself on the bed. The shouting is muffled now, but not muffled enough. I pull a pillow over my head to drown the noise in feathers. Mum’ll hate me now, and Dad probably will too. But I don’t care. It’s their mess, not mine. I don’t want anything more to do with it. I’ve got better things to do. There’s another world out there that I tasted tonight for the first time. And I want more of it. Because it tastes a whole lot better than fish and chips and salt and vinegar.

The newspaper is still spread out on the kitchen table where Dad left it last night.

Police in South London are becoming increasingly concerned over the welfare of a fifteen-year-old girl who was reported missing over a week ago. Joanne Thomas was last seen on the evening of October 15th at approximately 7.30pm at a funfair in Battersea Park, where she was spotted talking to a man. She has since failed to return home.

Officers have described the girl as having shoulder-length blonde hair, blue eyes, of slim build and approximately 5ft 4 inches tall. When last seen she was wearing a white skirt, black jumper and a blue half-length coat.

Joanne Thomas? I recognise that name. A picture comes into my head of a pretty girl in the year below me at school. Not just ordinary pretty, but ‘stare at in complete envy pretty’. The sort of pretty that gets a girl into trouble. And now it looked like she
was
in trouble. Big trouble. I remember she seemed a lot older than me, even though she was a whole year younger. But some girls are like that. Born with boobs, Mum would say.

Poor Joanne, I think. I bet the ‘man’ she was seen talking to was her boyfriend. They probably went too far and she got herself pregnant and now she and her boyfriend have run off together because they don’t know what else to do. They’ll have to come back home and get married though, whether they want to or not. It’s the only way they’ll ever be able to live with the shame of it all.

I’m puzzled. Is this why Mum and Dad sat up waiting for me last night? Because a girl’s run off with her boyfriend and they thought I was out with a fella getting myself into trouble too? I’d be pretty narked if it wasn’t partly true. I
was
out with a boy, but I wasn’t getting myself into trouble. I’d never do that. Did they see Beau, then? Did they see me getting on his bike? I thought I’d been so careful.

Or maybe they think something else has happened to Joanne Thomas. Maybe they think there’s a murderer on the loose. One that’s prowling around the fairground preying on young girls. They’d have to think the worst then, wouldn’t they?

There’s no point in saying anything to them this morning though. They’re not talking to each other and they’re ignoring me too. Like it’s my fault that Mum’s got herself another fella. They’ve both got faces like statues. If they smiled or spoke the stone would crack and crumble and their heads might fall off.

Breakfast this morning is a bundle of laughs. It’s like being at a funeral. Dad’s all ashen-faced. He doesn’t touch his eggs. He just slurps his tea and smokes his fags. There’s so much smoke wafting around the kitchen, I wouldn’t be surprised if a passing neighbour doesn’t call out the fire brigade. And as for Mum – she takes one bite of her toast, bursts into tears and runs from the room.

And they’re meant to be the adults.

I’ve still got to peel the potatoes though. Life goes on. The world still needs chips. Apparently. I imagine I’m cutting every chip for Beau. I have to make them perfect. No trace of skin and all of them an even length and thickness. I don’t know when he’ll come again and it doesn’t really matter. Because I know he
will
come again, in his own time.

I counted out all my savings earlier this morning. I’ve got almost ten pounds. More than enough for a leather jacket. First thing Saturday, I’m getting the bus to Shepherd’s Bush market. I’m going to buy some eyeliner too and some tight denim jeans. I want to look like the girl on Chelsea Bridge. I want to drape myself against Beau and look like I really belong.

I wonder what Jackie would make of Beau. Not that I care what she thinks. He’s not the clean and tidy sort, that’s for sure. Not like the fellas that work at Garton’s. Beau wouldn’t get all dressed up in a tie and suit to go to a dance.

Fellas like Beau make old women tut and shake their heads and cross the road to avoid them. That’s why I like him, I think. He’s not like most fellas. Just like I’m not like most girls. I pick out another potato from the sack next to me. Mum and Dad can’t have seen me with Beau last night. Mum would have had a fit if she had. She’d think Beau was a bad sort straight away, just because he rides a motorcycle. But I don’t care what Mum thinks either. Why should I? After what she’s done.

Speak of the devil. Mum comes into the room and puts her hand on my shoulder. I stiffen and carry on peeling the potato in my hand. ‘Violet, love,’ she says. ‘There’s some things you need to know … obviously … after last night.’ She sniffs and blows her nose.

‘Uh huh,’ I murmur, like I really don’t care one way or the other. I concentrate on the potato. I’m trying to peel the skin so it stays all in one piece. I used to peel apples like this, with Jackie. If we managed to get the skin off all in one piece we would drop them on the floor. However they landed would spell out the initials of our future husbands. At least that’s what Brenda would tell us. I’m thinking it would be quite difficult to get a spiral of potato peeling to land on the floor in the shape of the letter B.

‘We need to talk, Violet,’ Mum continues. ‘I don’t know what you know already … or what you think you know. But … well, it’s only fair that Norma is told the truth the same time as you. She’s coming here after she’s finished work, and your dad and me have decided not to open the shop tonight, so … there’ll be plenty of time for us to … sort everything out.’

My heart sinks. Shut the shop! Mum and Dad have never shut the shop. Dad’s favourite boast is how he kept the shop going all through the war. Fish and potatoes were one of the few things not rationed. ‘Did my bit to keep the country going,’ he always says. ‘Would’ve been a rum do if folks couldn’t have had their fish suppers.’

If a war and even the Blitz couldn’t shut the shop but Mum’s announcement can, it’s got to be really, really bad. It’s got to be the worst thing ever.

Divorce.

The dirtiest word of all. A word that makes Mum’s lips pucker like a prune. A word that’s only ever whispered. I can’t believe Mum would even consider talking about it, let alone do it! Sally Hayes was the only girl at school who came from a broken home. The only girl whose parents had actually
divorced.
Nobody was allowed to go to her house to play and she was never invited anywhere. It was like she had the measles or fleas or something else catching. Would Mum really do that to us? And would Dad really let her?

‘So …’ says Mum. ‘You can have the afternoon off now. But don’t go off anywhere, will you? Or, at least make sure you’re back by five. I won’t ask where you were last night. Just be careful though. Won’t you?’

I drop the half-peeled potato back into the bucket. Splashes of cold muddy water land on my legs.
Just be careful.
Did she mean be careful of fairground murderers or be careful of something else? Be careful of boys who might want to take advantage of me? Or be careful of spotting your own mother in Battersea Park canoodling with another man?

Five hours is a long time to wait. It’s a long time to wait for anything, but it’s especially long if you’re waiting to find out what your future might be. What will happen to the shop? Will Mum move out? Will I have to stay and look after Dad? Will I be stuck there for ever now? What will happen if the shop closes? Will I ever see Beau again? Will I have to go and live with Norma and Raymond and live on a diet of frozen fish fingers? Five hours is a long time to wait for all hell to break loose.

I take back my copy of
The Country Girls
to the library. Miss Read raises her eyebrows as I pass the book back to her over the desk. ‘You should read it,’ I say to her. ‘It’s brilliant.’

She sniffs and colours slightly and I know instantly that she already has read it. I smile to myself as I think of her tucked up in bed with her hair in rollers, a cup of cocoa at her side, a cat asleep at her feet and a copy of
The Country Girls
in her hands. I wonder if she blushed when she read the rude bits. Perhaps she’s not such a stick-in-the-mud after all.

The hush and warmth of the library helps to quiet the thoughts that have been banging around in my head like flies trapped in a jar. I go to the Family Health section first, and after flicking past
Bringing up Baby
,
Life Saving and Water Safety
and
First Aid for Beginners
, I pull out a book called
The Good Housekeeping Marriage Book (Twelve Steps to a Happy Marriage)
. It’s all about courtship, getting engaged, the Wedding, working wives, having children, managing money … there’s nothing about the twelve steps to a happy divorce though. Not even one step to a happy divorce. It’s such a terrible word it can’t even be written down. I consider for a moment asking Miss Read if she knows of any good books on the subject of divorce. But I think she might throw me out. It would be like asking her if she knows any good books on the subject of

S. E. X
!

I go to the reference section instead and run my fingers along the spines of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. I find VAN–VIR, and turn the pages until I find the entry, VIOLET. It says that there are over two hundred species of violets but that the flowers of the violet are solitary and irregular in form. That sounds about right. Next, I find BAR–BEC and read that BEAU as a name means beautiful, admirer or sweetheart, and that Beau Wilkes was a character in the book
Gone with the Wind.
I picture Beau on his motorcycle flying into the wind across Chelsea Bridge and I think that his mum must have known something about her son when she gave him the name Beau. She must have seen the spark of something in his baby-blue eyes and felt the stirrings of adventure in his tiny limbs.

I carry on pulling volumes of encyclopaedias off the shelf. I find DIO–DRO and read under DIVORCE that in the old days a wife could only divorce a husband for three reasons.

But a husband could divorce a wife for loads of reasons. He could even divorce her if she went to a fair or the theatre without his permission. I presume going to a park with a fair
in it
counted as the same thing. Hard luck, Mum. Dad could divorce you with just one click of his fingers. I pile the books on the table next to me. Miss Read looks across and frowns. She likes everything neat and in its place, but she can’t say anything to me because even though she thinks the books belong to her, they don’t. They belong to everybody.

Under SOU–STE, I learn that Steatopygia is the name for a really fat bottom. There’s a certain tribe in Africa called the Hottentots who are famous for the size of their behinds. I laugh to myself when I think about Mrs Robinson and her five fish suppers. She’s definitely got Steatopygia and she doesn’t even know it. Miss Read sidles up to me. She’s got the opposite of Steatopygia, whatever that is. She’s got no bottom at all; her back just joins her legs in one long straight line. I wonder how she gets her knickers to stay up. ‘Closing in five minutes,’ she whispers, even though I’m the only person left in the whole library. She begins to pick up the encyclopaedias and slots them back in place on the shelf with efficient little thuds.

I wish I had thought to hide. I wish that earlier, when Miss Read had been busy stamping books, I’d crawled under the bottom shelf of the history section, tucked my arms and legs tight to my sides and made myself as small as possible until the last person had left and Miss Read had turned off the lights and locked the library doors. I could have stayed here all night then. I could have pushed some chairs together to make a bed and found an old coat in the lost property box to keep me warm. I could have gone into Miss Read’s little room at the back where she makes herself hot drinks and eaten her packet of Lemon Puff biscuits for my tea. If I’d done all that, I wouldn’t have to go home now and listen to Mum make a confession that will change all our lives for ever. I want to stay in this ‘before’ place for a while longer, because I’ll never be able to come back to it again.