Common People

by Kit de Waal

  Snap back.

  It’s important you understand I’ve got my own two cats. The first is black and white, the second is black. Alice is the black and white, she’s my Lucky Thirteenth. All twelve black and whites were Cindies. All Cindies were killed by idiot lorries on the death road out our front. The cats always wanted to cross; there must have been something very good on the other side. Each time one was lost, my dad bought me another who looked just like her. I crowned her Cindy. Cindy One. Cindy Two, Three, Four, Five…

  He, my dad, has no kind words, and a head-of-bees-wife. He had an old-fashioned mother with cancer in her milk – they say he was a wee Scottish baby, sucking when she died, leaving her kitchen door open wide. To all the cold winds. And for an ugly-apron stepmother to come marching in. Only once he said it – once on a rare day – when his lips just slid open, putting pink heat into the frost – she put him in spider-dark cupboards for all the day if he forgot ‘please’ – so I see, I do see why my dad’s words are always so freezed.

  But. And. I got a pact with me – to love this man over God’s green hills and more – for replacing my Cindies. Every cat-killed day I waited by the back door for my dad to come off his shift with a new kitten in a shoebox. Scrap-of-silk straggler, little pearl, a fluff-dragon; I’d dangle the cutie on the slide of my nose, wipe my tears and snot with her soft little paws.

  After twelve terrible deaths, when cat number thirteen came to me, I decided she had to be called Alice. Though Cindy was my favourite name, I just couldn’t face any more dead Cindies. A new name – and this cat lived and lived – to this lovely purry fatness. I thought, ‘So that’s how it is: names can kill and names can save.’ I was sick, thinking that by trying to keep my Cindies alive I might have killed them, but how could I have known that words did magic?

  Anyway. Snap back. Snap back.

  I didn’t dream much at that time and neither did my Alice – or I think she did, but her dreams were private – so for our school competition I decided to write about our black cat’s dreaming. ‘Two tramp cats,’ my dad had said, when he brought them home in his Old-Spice-smelling holdall one morning. A tramp’s cat had birthed kittens at the side of the Old Bath Road and my dad stopped the man from dumping these two in a sack in a bin.

  We already had my Alice (after Alice in the Owl Service on telly, I think) and our spotted dog, and the miserable rabbit that only sniffed and bit – but Dad still brought one tramp kitten home for me, and one for my little sister Bah. Straight away we named them George and Mildred after the telly that made us laugh. George was mine. He was witch-black wild, full of the suffocating kind of fur, pure rip-you-up fangs; he loved only the sideboard – ’cos he could scrunch up behind its back. George’s fear was something as sharp and fresh as what I carried. So I gave him what I’d seen being called respect. Gentle. Gentle. I’d given the same to Alice, and she came calm-smooth-clever as me, even though they say black-and-whites are usually the most nervy.

  So. There was Alice with her mind-your-own-business-dreams, and my dear George’s twitching sleeps were too street-gutter-beard-tramp-sink-teeth-someone-put-us-in-a-sack-save-me to put in a dance, but my sister’s cat Mildred had these dreams that really flamed me. Mildred, George’s sister, was a short-hair; black as sin, too, but skinny and greedy and honest. And she was lucky: all her days Mildred had been protected by her big-haired brother – so all her days she could be too hunty, too sleepy, too watch-the-street, too whatever-she-damn-well-pleased to be, too scared and nervy like my tremble-wild George. And, all her nights – blimey, that Mildred cat, she could dream!

  Mildred’s dreams were these dazzling, mad things: millions of bright birds like lanterns lighting the sky, curling rivers stuffed to the brim with talking goldfish, giant saucers of milk for her to roll in. Mildred was Fast and Mildred was Free. It was actually weird to see how I could fit her huge dreams into my horrible, dull red schoolbook. Between the pale tight lines. I did it, though, I wrote her dreaming as well as I could, ’cos I hoped – I knew it – in that leotard – I could so easily be Mildred – quick as spit in the wind – it wouldn’t be hard – come on, no one was asking me for maths.

  Sorry. OK. Just snap back.

  You should know that I was the eldest. Really, my sister Bah was still too young and too upset to care for pets, that’s how I knew the Mildred facts – it was me, really, who looked after the animals. My sister Bah was amazing, though, she could leap and twist mid-air like the craziest of young ferals. Once I saw her throw herself down the stairs, and even though she wanted to go stiff, fall splat – she didn’t, she won’t ever. She’s a rubber girl, a flying brown tabby – I could never move like that. My sister’s cunning is all in her legs and her bend – I have to turn things over inside my head first: my boogie-rhythm will come, but only after I think it.

  Neither of us can use out-words – not to our mother when she hurts – or before – or after. So we can – what we can do – and it’s a warm game – is we stick to each other like sticking plaster to a scab; and, together we make our mark on the wall next to our bunks. Not for my stories, or her lies, or her drawings of gymnastics – at both of them Bah’s bloody fantastic – no, this bed area and this wall is where we tell the truth – record it all. Mum is a fucking bitch, I hate Mum, and more. And on. We go to sleep with our cheeks pressed to the writing on the wall. I’ve gotta say we take some pride, we own it, and though Dad is ordered on bank holidays to paint over it – pink or mauve – we just start our writing over again. Never heard of graffiti or street art. But. This. Is. Where. The. Truth. Starts. This scribbling makes us daring. And this daring gets us dancing – and when I see my little Bah shakin-it I damn well know it’s a good thing.

  So. So, snap back.

  ‘Dream of the Black Cat’ won. Sameera’s ‘Robot Nan’, and Tracey’s ‘Lonely Christmas Tree’ dream (I don’t believe she really dreamt that, I saw the book in the library) were the runners-up.

  And the first rehearsal was on a Friday afternoon, the happiest school time in winter.

  ‘Well, young lady! And you are such a quiet girl! We are all impressed by your very imaginative and interesting dream. So. When Mildred comes down from your back wall at midnight and starts to dance – we thought you might like to try that?’

  ‘Yes, that’s why I brought my black leotard. I have black plimsolls, but bare feet are better for a cat.’

  I knew they’d like Mildred’s dance. I quickly go and change, all cocky, thinking about how they’ll let me make a pink nose for myself, probably give me soft black triangle ears. (Last year Simon P., a lowly stable donkey in the Bible play, got floppy ears made by retired Miss Platt; he got to keep them, his sister told me. I said she was lying, but I knew she wasn’t. I just didn’t like her. The size of her smile. The way it went up.)

  It’s comin-up-to-Christmas-cold-school-hall cold. They’ve rolled up the gym mats, an ice-shine fairy wood reflects in the lake of what’s called the parquet floor.

  ‘Ah, there you are. It’s a bit chilly in here, you don’t have to wear your leotard if—’

  ‘No,’ I say, ‘I’m warm.’ The teacher ladies all smile; they have a way of standing straight and thick and slightly waving, in clumps, like long grasses on cliff tops. When they nod with their specs on their heads, their clever eye-wrinkles all alert, I begin to dance my dream scene.

  Mildred comes down from the wall – and since our Creative Dancing class at school, I’ve understood this way to talk. Mildred swirls in her dream. In her dream, giant blood-toothed mice parade the alley behind our house. Mildred is damn fearless. Her pine-needle eyes drop and explode in the long-secret night. She goes prancing between rats, mice and foxes, dodging whiskers sharp as my mum’s carving knife. With a click of pink tongue Mildred teases them all, no fleas on her, no worries. No sticking-up hair. She rolls smooth as a marble beneath the full-moon spotlight. When the sharptooths circle her, she cartwheels, back-flips, tail-whips, yeowls her war cry. And then. Mildred flies.
She is a bat and a golden bird, and she is her magical Mildred self. She flies to a palace on a green and silver hill. She lands on a throne and grows long princess hair. She turns into a bright, clean girl. She stays living there…

  I’m just finishing up my dance-dreaming, when I open one eye, see three teachers leaning in, squinting at something, their long strings of beads dangling. The square old one who smells of numbers and wears small adding-box clothes, she almost scratches the back of my thigh with her nose.

  They clap, they clap, then, but their whispering is a tower to me. Now I’m not Mildred, it’s just me; still as a road-dead cat. Still, not dancing. Eyes on and watching, forget dreaming.

  They straighten themselves, put their bosoms back up front of the shop and stroke their necklaces into place. Smiles are strung around me, but it’s like I’m wrapped in pricking tinsel.

  ‘Well done! That was lovely. You – you have left quite an impression on Miss Eve.’ Miss Eve, my class teacher is wiping her cheek with her sleeve. ‘She’s very moved… Quite moved, aren’t you, Miss Eve?’

  No words will jump out of me. What. Did. They. See? What. Have. They. Seen? I do not want to look at my favourite Miss Eve. And she stays being the sun behind a cloud of lace sleeve.

  ‘Dear, can I just ask you? What are those marks?’ Old Square speaks.

  A chill. Someone’s pouring water down my hot danced-off back. Suddenly this is a catch-a-cold-in-your-chest school hall. I need to go change. I sweat-clutch my plimsoll bag. But question marks hang. There’s all of their faces. Old Square’s a hag. Making me look to see what they have. Long red strips on the back of my thighs. Raspberry-lolly-lipstick-burn-red. Tallies like how many cars in half’n’hour of dread maths.

  OK, OK, snap back.

  Truth: I’ve seen marks on my Bah, I just didn’t know – well, of course, I’m not stupid – I could have thought – I just didn’t fancy looking. I suppose I didn’t want to think about my skin; come on, every girl wants to be beautiful, every girl wants to be a clean, pure pedigree-coat thing.

  I answer Old Square in my best I don’t know what on earth you are talking about voice.

  ‘Oh, that’s nothing. Cat scratches, probably. One of my cats is wild – he’s a tramp’s cat.’ If Mum hears about this she will call her a Fuckin’ Nosy Old Crone.

  ‘I see… Can I ask, is your mother picking you up today?’

  ‘No, she’s busy with the baby, Miss,’ I lie. ‘I walk home on my own.’

  After the weekend there is another bloody Monday. I walk to school beneath a grey-beard sky. I’ve got a nasty stomach ache. Truth: won’t even tell it on our pink wall, but I cut up that leotard. It was an embarrassing-small thing, rubbed and dug, probably did my bits lasting damage. Black Cat dance? No thanks. I don’t want to be in their stupid show. Was never really my dream, anyway.

  OK. Snap back for the last time and – well, just scribble this bit out if it’s too ugly.

  Mildred is all black, but I am a little striped. My markings came from a bamboo cane for garden beans – on top of a mother’s handprints, and the flat of a long, bendy knife for roast chicken. Our skin’s patterns and happenings are not for telling, but me and Bah remember them on our pink wall. Over and over go our felt-tip pens, they know it all.

  I tell Bah when we’re older I’ll change our unlucky names, I’ve told her it’s a kind of magic I learned about with my Alice cat. We’ll have Farrah and Jaclyn, or Delilah, which sounds like a beautiful dark foreigner, and Agnetha like the woman in Abba, who sings ‘SOS darling’ like an absolute angel… We’ll be special or famous, or all the men will want us, but we won’t want them, any of them…

  I explain to Bah, ‘We don’t need an idiot school prize, we can dance whenever we want; we’re good dancers, we’re the Top Cats!’

  Snakes and Ladders

  Malorie Blackman

  Were you born on square one?

  Or on square ninety-nine?

  Do you need extra help,

  Or are you doing just fine?

  Do you even make it

  Into the game?

  It’s not about love,

  It’s control, cash and fame.

  Don’t let them convince you

  You’ve got to be playing,

  Make up your own mind

  If the price is worth paying.

  The game? It is rigged,

  And you’re not to blame

  The ladders are broken

  The snakes have your name.

  Stop and listen to what I’m saying

  Don’t throw the dice, cause I ain’t playing.

  Up the ladder, down the snake

  Once on the board, you don’t escape.

  I’m factory fodder

  Well, that’s what they told me.

  But when learning is power,

  No prison can hold me.

  Playing the game,

  But not by my rules

  As players it views us

  As sheeple and fools.

  Reading is knowledge,

  Learning is queen

  My mind is the only thing

  Left sight unseen.

  If life’s big game

  Is ladders and snakes,

  The square you are born on

  Is yours to escape.

  Stop and listen to what I’m slaying

  Don’t throw the dice, cause I ain’t playing.

  Up the ladder, down the snake

  Once on the board, you won’t escape.

  Ladders are smokescreens,

  Safety valves, lies.

  The snakes copulate

  And are breeding like flies.

  If you’re born on square ninety,

  Luck’s on your side.

  Those on square one?

  You may watch with eyes wide.

  When the game is against you?

  And you can’t walk away?

  Your style, your own voice

  Is the way that you play.

  Keep it original,

  Style it unique.

  Your own way of being.

  Your own brand of chic.

  Stop and listen to what I’m praying,

  Don’t throw the dice, I'm no longer playing.

  Up the ladder, down the snake

  Don’t let them tell you, you’ll never escape.

  Detail

  Julie Noble

  So I wanted to ask you, what was real?

  That night I slouched down Phoebe’s garden path in my old clothes and tightly belted jeans, ready to help her as I had promised. We were sorting out the garden for her planned extension. Two weeks earlier, after the first court appearance, the one about the children, I had helped to demolish the old shed.

  I had come straight from court, straight from seeing Him with his New Love. New Love had worn a designer suit more suitable for a wedding than a stuffy city courtroom. Smug and untouchable with her cushion of money, my husband’s lover had crowed in my hearing: ‘I can’t wait to get those children.’

  Him and Her were accompanied by the solicitor, a well-paid figurehead who may not have known she was lying as she delivered false accusations to the judge about me.

  ‘Justice is for the rich,’ a friend had said. It seemed so.

  His solicitor knew tactics, sending a spurious report to the court on the eve of the court date. My ex had ordered a privately contracted ‘processor’ to deliver out of hours a sheaf of already-opened legal papers when he knew I would have the children. The man had blocked my drive and frightened us, but I refused to accept the papers while my kids were present. He had fumed in the street until two neighbours came out to oversee and I got the children out of the way.

  Later the man perjured himself to write the report for the court, saying it was me who wanted the children to know everything.

  It would have been his word against mine – very dangerous as, if true, that would have been classed as emotional abuse – but my older son had warned me to record
any incidents, so I had got the phone out in time. This film proved the man was lying, but left me with a counter-argument to submit. With no legal help that night, I had to prepare my own detailed account.

  Alone and scared, in the early hours I typed up sworn statements, trying to meet the stringent requirements, then printed them in triplicate to hand out myself.

  Which I did later that day in the courtroom.

  Upright I remained, no sign of inner pain. My calmness confused his solicitor but reassured the judge. My children were not removed, though a thorough investigation would ensue.

  Afterwards I sought refuge at Phoebe’s. She took one look at my face and led me down to her unwanted shed. ‘You need to let it out. Here’s a hammer.’

  ‘I don’t need a hammer.’ Part in jest, part using the anger I had repressed, I lifted up one leg and kicked out an entire end panel. Twelve feet long. Gone.

  In that kick was the power I should have used to get him out of my bed. In that collapse was the sense of an ending, though not the triumph of winning. The battle had begun. It would go on for months.

  As Churchill said: not the end, nor the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning.

  Two weeks after that court date, the interview approached. Too much had changed. Too much was the same.

  But I was about to be swept out of all that for five hours of one night.

  Slouching down the path to meet you. Unknowing. No make-up on, no perfume. Tired, polite smile. Hand scraping through my scalp not in a show of sexiness to flirt with you, but because life was challenging and that interview was approaching. The constant stress made me scratch my scalp until it was patched with scabs. It still is.