by Glass, Lisa
I knew it was stupid but I did it anyway. I took my body board that I loved more than all my other stuff put together, held it up against a kitchen chair and stamped it in half. I crossed my fingers that it would be enough, and then hid the pieces in the bottom of my wardrobe under a load of junk.
I sent text after text to Han but he didn’t text me back. I could see him in my mind’s eye curled up on his gran’s fancy new sofa with that Cleopatra girl, comforting her as she cried on his shoulder.
When night came I couldn’t sleep and I was too distracted to read, so I sat on my bed watching my lava lamp and listening to the sirens that had been going all day. A couple of hours after I went to my bedroom, I heard a cough outside. Someone knocked on my window. I opened it for Han.
‘I can’t believe it,’ I said to him. ‘A plane crashing on Hayle? It’s mad.’
‘I know.’
‘Where were you? You didn’t answer my messages.’
‘Can I come in?’
‘My bedroom?’
‘My gran’s snoring the roof off our place.’
‘Thought you’d be with Cleopatra.’
‘What?’
He had a sad look on his face, like a dog that had been tethered to a tree and abandoned by its owners.
‘Wait a minute,’ I said.
A man was coming along one of the site paths, walking in our direction.
‘Mr Hitchcock,’ I said to Han, who turned to look at him.
‘Never heard of the bloke.’
‘Yeah, I guess he wasn’t around when you was. He lives over in Buoyed Up. He’s just a friend of mine.’
‘”Buoyed Up”? Sounds well dodgy, and he’s a bit old, isn’t he?’
‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘but he’s sound.’
Mr Hitchcock strolled up to my window and nodded to Han.
‘Just wanted to check on you. Must’ve been a horrible thing to see that yesterday.’
‘It weren’t great,’ I said. ‘Did you go over and have a look?’
‘No, my brain has enough nightmare fodder as it is, dear. I’ll save the rubbernecking for the ghouls down the town. I see you’re in fine fettle and in fine company, so I won’t keep you any longer. Goodnight.’
‘You don’t have to go. Look, have a sweet,’ I said, fishing a bag of Maltesers out of my dressing gown pocket. Mr Hitchcock always robbed my sweets.
‘No, thank you. It’s a funny thing but I cannot abide a Malteser. I really should go. I don’t like to leave the dog on her own for too long,’ he said. ‘Not at the moment.’
‘Give Lizzie a pat from me,’ I said, wishing she was mine. She was a brilliant dog and I loved walking her after a long day at school. I quite often thought about asking Mr Hitchcock if he’d consider putting my name next to Lizzie’s in his will, but it seemed a bit tactless.
‘Will do,’ he said. ‘And you know you’re welcome to come and see her whenever you fancy it. I think she might be in the family way.’
‘Eh?’
‘There was an incident with a Beagle from Bognor, over on the Haven caravan site. So we might have pups soon. An enjoyable nuisance if ever there was such a thing.’
‘Cool. Let me know if she drops,’ I said, trying to hide my excitement from Han. ‘And thanks for checking on me.’
‘He’s a bit weird,’ Han said, watching Mr Hitchcock walk away.
‘He’s just different,’ I said. ‘But he’s alright.’
‘He doesn’t like Maltesers. Literally everyone I’ve ever met likes Maltesers. It’s universal.’
‘Well, he doesn’t. Maybe they get stuck in his teeth or something. Anyway, how’s your gran’s hand?’
‘Fine. Take it you didn’t find the thing?’
‘Nah, sorry. I looked for hours as well. Then I saw that plane coming in, so I kind of got distracted.’
‘Thanks for looking anyway. Not that it matters now.’
‘Won’t your gran wonder where you are if you don’t go home tonight?’
‘She took so many sleeping pills that she’ll be out for ages. She said smelling that burning plane took her back to carpet bombing or something. Said the Dresden bombing was worse than the Blitz. I dunno. She weren’t really with it.’
‘Must be hard being German.’
Han nodded. ‘It is. Can I come in then or not?’
‘Alright. But we have to be quiet. My parents will go bananas if they find you in here.’
I stepped back so he could jump through the window.
‘I’ve only got a single bed,’ I said.
‘That’s alright. I’ll sleep on the floor.’
‘I only have one pillow,’ I said.
‘I can use my jacket.’
‘You can share with me if you want,’ I said.
‘If you’re sure.'
I nodded and lay down in the bed, leaving the quilt open for him to get in beside me.
‘I’m glad you came,’ I said.
‘Me too.’
Chapter 7The flames didn’t die down for days. The blue skies were marred by ash and smoke and thoughts of dead people. The streets went quiet apart from suited-up journalists with notepads and coffee breath. The tourists wouldn’t come back for a long while. Who’d want to visit a seaside town that stank of burning and had a big smoking plane carcass in the middle of it? One day we were the nice picture on a postcard and the next day we were one of those depressing scenes from the News. My mum said she hadn’t seen people like this since Diana died.
Sammy next door stopped talking. Not a word. Not even nods and frowns. Like a zombie he was.
‘You shouldn’t have took him to that crash site,’ my mum told me. ‘Kids his age don’t need to see things like that.’
‘I didn’t know it was a crash site, did I? Could’ve been a meteorite.’
‘And you don’t want to go listening to that old lady. Honestly, Jen, I thought you had more sense than that. A black stone and she’s seen a meteorite. A good rain and I suppose it’s the tears of Jesus. Going on about her thumb when good people were about to go up in flames on an aeroplane.’
‘I thought you believed her.’
‘Whatever gave you that idea? I don’t even believe an animal bit her. She probably did it herself with an oyster shucker. These old people can get terrible lonely.’
‘Mum.’
‘The days are very long when you’re that age, Jen, with nowhere to go and nothing to do. She probably couldn’t help herself. Make a bit of drama. Be the centre of attention. You know the Germans.’
‘Not really. She’s the only one I’ve ever met.’
‘Germans are clever people, I’ll give them that, but they’re also very good at lying.’
‘You can’t say that. It’s xenophobic.’
‘Not if it’s true.’
‘You don’t know anything about German people. They had it harder than us in the War.’
‘I know plenty.’
‘How?’
‘I just do.’
‘You’re making it up.’
‘I am not. I once had a love affair with a handsome German lad. It didn’t last long and it didn’t get very far, but it was love.’
‘Does Dad know?’
‘It was before his time and no he does not know, and I’ll thank you for not telling him.’
‘You shouldn’t have told me then.’
‘You wheedled it out of me, like you always do.’
We bickered, but really I was grateful for my mum distracting me with her chatter, because things were getting a bit heavy.
Han took off the morning after sleeping over and I hadn’t heard from him since. So that left a big hole in my brain with nothing but a black question mark.
Plus Nathan didn’t look at me when he walked past my bedroom windo
w, even though he must’ve known I was there. Probably blamed me for scarring Sammy. My dad opened a fresh bottle of whisky that was left over from one of the neighbours and went about in his pyjamas and slippers. My mum baked. We didn’t have many ingredients in the kitchen so she baked Rice Crispie treats with coffee topping. And she talked. She talked about everything and anything. One minute her mood would seem light as a feather and the next minute she’d be crying.
I tried to go out to get some fresh air, even if it did smell of fire.
‘Don’t you go anywhere,’ my mum shouted at me, when she saw me putting on my shoes.
‘I can’t stay in this chalet forever. I’m going round the bend stuck in here.’
‘We’re a family. We’re staying together through this.’
‘We didn’t even know anyone on the plane.’
She grabbed me hold and I thought she was going to hit me.
‘You are lucky to be alive. What if that plane crash had killed you? What would I do then, without my little girl? I couldn’t go on. Do you understand that? I would die without you. I would die.’
‘Well, it didn’t hit me and it never would have because I don’t go to church and it hit the church.’
‘It could have hit anywhere. It could have hit the dunes. It could have hit the school. I need you here. I need for us all to be together.’
‘Dad’s not here.’
‘Dad’s in the front room.’
‘That’s not Dad. That’s Drunken Dad. Different person altogether.’
‘Oh shut up, Jenny, will you? Just shut up. I can’t go over all that again. Not now.’
‘Fine. Well, I’ll just do nothing then, how about that? I’ll just sit and think about dead people and I’ll do nothing.’
‘Go and watch the telly.’
‘I don’t want to watch the telly. It’s depressing. Nothing but footage of the crash. If I want to see smoke, I’ll look out of the window.’
‘Just be grateful that it wasn’t our family on that plane.’
‘Why would we be on a private plane? In what universe? You’ve never even been on a plane and you’re over thirty.’
‘Thanks very much. I meant you be glad it didn’t land on Sunny Daze. That is what I meant.’
‘Well that is not what you said.’
‘Jenny. For heaven’s sake. I really can’t take much more of this. You’re always on at me. I thought at a time like this you could maybe hold your tongue for five minutes, give your poor mother a bit of peace and quiet. Worst days of my life these are. I never thought I’d see something like this happen in Hayle. In our town. Our own town. It’s all I can think about.’
‘Maybe you should leave the house then. Find something to do.’
‘Right. Out in the garden. You’re doing my bleeding head in.’
I slammed the front door, took out my mobile and called Han. The phone rang and rang but he didn’t answer, so I sat down on the big rock in the middle of my mum’s flowerbed. It got horrible hot inside Sunny Daze in the summer so I often went and sat there, enjoying the breeze in the little front garden we had staked out with white painted stones and clam shells. It was mine. No one in my family sat on that rock except me; my mum had got my dad and his mates from the pub to roll it in, to make a nice garden feature. It was flattish on the top, so it made a good bench. Originally it had stood on the green outside our chalet and people had used it for disposable barbecues so it was a bit charred, but I didn’t mind.
Some of the best times I ever had was on that rock. It was where Han had once shown me the constellations, which he knew about because his dad had a telescope. He told me that if you was ever lost you could use the front two stars of The Plough as ‘pointer stars’ to find the North Star. He said it could save your life in an emergency, knowing things like that. Then he came at me and kissed me bang on the mouth, but he made his mouth gentle and it wasn’t too bad. He had really soft lips, I remember thinking, softer than mine, which were chapped and scabby from biting them. Then it all went wrong that night at the school. Then he left.
After a while my mum brought me out the brown garden cushion that reeked of onions.
‘You’ll get piles sitting on that rock.’
‘Cheers,’ I said, taking the cushion to be on the safe side.
‘Don’t be long. Tea’ll be on the table in five minutes. Sorry I shouted. It’s a hard time for everyone. I know you’re upset too.’
‘Nah, you’re alright.’
Looking up I could see both the wide sky and the rest of the chalet site, stretching over the grassy slopes. Other dunesiders was walking around with sad faces. I sat up and I nodded to a few of the old ladies; they waved and their husbands doffed their caps.
‘I know we disappoint you. We try our bests but we’re only human and sometimes we get stuff wrong.’
‘At least you’re not divorced,’ I said.
‘You know, your dad used to have a saying about his own father. I’ll always remember it. He used to say, ‘Blood is thicker than water, but it’s a bitter drink to swallow.’ She patted me on the head and looked out towards the horizon where the sun was hanging like a fat dandelion.
‘Probably bitter because there was so much booze in it,’ I said.
She didn’t smile. Something was worrying her. Probably money again.
I was interrupted from these thoughts by my dad shouting that there was no red sauce again because his locust daughter had been at it. Mum went back inside and they started up. A young couple walking their collie puppy up the slope stared over at our chalet and said things to each other in quiet voices.
I stayed out of it. My dad never hit her. But when she got him mad, which wasn’t that often, he loomed over her and shouted in her face. She threw things at him though, and she used whatever she could find. Plates, old records, saucepans, handfuls of coppers and silvers from her apron pocket. But them projectiles never found their mark. She was a rubbish shot.
Suddenly I heard a humungous crash, like a table or the sideboard falling over. It wasn’t my folks though. It came from Nathan’s chalet. Nathan’s place was called Demelza Grey, named that back in the day by some old Cornish dude who missed his dead wife, which seemed a bit creepy to me, but it was against the site rules to change the original names of the chalets, so we was all stuck with ‘em.
Nathan’s folks must have been at the arguing too. Nathan’s cat came trotting out and Nathan wasn’t far behind.
‘Sorry about Sammy,’ I said. ‘How shook up is he?’
He shrugged and I made a space for him next to me. Nathan still had his tea plate in his hand, so I nicked a burnt sausage while we waited for his folks to stop fighting. The cat ignored me and strode to the end of the garden, where it stretched and started licking its white belly.
‘He’ll be alright though, won’t he, in a week or two?’
‘Yeah, I hope so.’
‘Is that why your folks is arguing? Cause of Sammy not talking?’
‘Not just that. We’re really skint at the moment. Mum’s lost her cleaning job and my dad’s job ain’t looking like it’ll last either. No money for nothing.’
‘Us neither,’ I said. ‘Being skint is the story of my life.’
‘Least we don’t live in a stinking city,’ he said, and I nodded my agreement.
‘But one day I’m going to get rich, Nath,’ I said. ‘Stinking rich. Rich enough to sail a yacht right round the world and go swimming on turquoise and white beaches. Maybe we’ll go snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef. I’m going to make us millionaires and take us all off to a happy town. Or at least make enough money to make the people here happy again.’
‘You won’t.’
‘All I need is to work hard and have a bit of luck. If poor people work hard enough they can make themselves rich.’
‘You won’t get n
o luck. That’s what I’m saying.’
‘You don’t know what you’re on about.’
‘Things is different now. God’s sake, we just had a plane crash. It’s obvious. God hates this place.’
‘Shut up. My mum would kill you if she heard you say something like that.’
‘It’s true. We’re cursed.’
‘You’re mad.’ I shook my head and pushed him and his plate off my rock. He landed in the flowers with a thud, his plate cracking in two.
‘Just you wait and see. Things’ll get worse before they get better,’ he said, touching a graze on his shin.
‘Pass me that bit of bacon,’ I said, pointing at a bit that had landed on a dock leaf.
He stuffed it in his gob and gave me the vee-sign. I was still rolling around play fighting with Nathan when I saw Han come around the corner. I walked up to him and hugged him but he pulled away from me and gave Nathan a stinking look. Nathan got the hint and went back into Demelza Grey, taking the bits of his broken plate with him.
‘What’s up?’ I said to Han. ‘Have I done something wrong?’
‘No. But I need you to do something for me.’
‘What?’
‘Tell my gran I was with you last night.’
‘You were with me last night.’
‘Not all night. I didn’t get there until midnight.’
‘Why?’
‘Because she’s on my case about something and I can’t be bothered with it.’
‘Do you want me to go and see her now?’
I checked my watch, wondering if I’d be able to slip away without my parents knowing.
‘She’s going to ring you.’
‘What does she think you’ve done?’
‘Can you just do this for me?’
My phone began to vibrate.
‘What do you want me to say?’
