Snowflake

by Heide Goody

  “I have one job with a million facets. I am a diamond.”

  “Sure. Do you ever get any spare jobs? Ones I could do.”

  “It happens sometimes. You know, when I can’t be in two places at once, although I’m working on that. Thought I’d cracked it but the strain was too much, I pulled a muscle in my foo-foo and couldn’t sit down for a week.”

  “Anyway, the jobs…” I said.

  “You want me to keep a look out and rope you in?”

  Well, let me know what comes up. And it’s okay if they got me instead of you?”

  “Most people have no idea who I am. They book me and I turn up. If someone else turns up and does the job, why would they care?”

  A small part of me thought that perhaps people would care, but Cookie’s word was good enough for me.

  As I ended the call I realised that I had not specified what kind of job I was prepared to do. Cookie invents new jobs every week, so I might find myself being paid to wait in a queue or stand under someone’s window singing Happy Birthday or Ave Maria to them (that one’s quite popular, apparently). Not to worry: I could handle any of them, given my bold new foray into adulting.

  I had a quick review of my finances. Beardy Rex at the museum had made it clear that I wouldn’t be getting any wages until next Friday. I had never heard of a ‘week in hand’, but apparently it was a thing. I set aside twenty-five pounds for my driving lesson and looked at what was left. Twenty pounds. That wasn’t going to buy food and a terrarium. I’d have to tighten my belt. Of course, I could reduce the food bill on weekdays when I could eat leftovers in the cafe at work, but what was I going to do for the rest of the weekend? I thought hard and came up with a solution that seemed to have no immediate drawbacks: I could tighten Adam’s belt! He was sure to have things around the place that he didn’t need any more. I went around the flat collecting things into a carrier bag.

  “Going to the shops!” I called to Ashbert and went out.

  My first stop was Marks and Spencer. I went to the customer service counter and pulled out three of Adam’s jumpers and a thermal vest.

  “I’d like to return these please,” I said.

  “Do you have the receipt?” asked the man, as he looked at the jumpers.

  “No,” I said.

  He handed the vest back to me. “I’m afraid you can’t return underwear.”

  I shrugged and put it back in the bag.

  He found labels in each of the jumpers and scanned them. The last one made him frown. “This one hasn’t been stocked for the last six years,” he said.

  I nodded sadly. “No, it’s taken me a while to realise that it isn’t for me,” I said. “It’s too big you see. And I seem to have bought a man’s jumper by mistake.”

  I shut my mouth at that point before I made the fatal mistake of talking too much, which is often my downfall.

  He pressed buttons on the till and made me fill out a form, but at the end of a few more minutes he handed me some vouchers. “We can only issue vouchers as you no longer have the receipt.”

  I looked at them and smiled up at him. “Thank you!” I said. This was going very well.

  I went to Boots next and passed a pile of razor blades across the counter at customer services. Have you seen the price of razor blades? My hopes were high that this could be lucrative. I told the assistant that I wanted to return them. She was one of those women who I reckon dip their faces into honey-coloured plaster every morning, so their face is set in a pristine cast of immovable perfection. She glanced up at me. Her eyebrows were as dark and thick as Cadbury’s chocolate fingers and one of them crept up her face by a millimetre. I think this might have been an expression of extreme shock.

  “You want to return these? Are they faulty?”

  “No,” I said, “they’re not suitable.”

  “The pack has been opened,” she said, pointing with a crimson talon.

  “Just a little bit,” I admitted.

  “And there are bits of hair stuck between the blades.”

  I looked. There were. I held her gaze for a few seconds longer. It was like having a staring competition with a cat, there was no possible way of winning. Her face was an impenetrable barrier of Max Factor. I cracked and swept the razor blades back into the carrier bag and made my way out of the shop.

  Just outside the door was a man in a pea green hoodie. He was leaning against the wall, but I felt sure that he was watching me. I couldn’t see his face because the hood was up, but I felt his gaze tracking me as I went past. The world was judging me for trying to return second-hand razor blades.

  That would have to do for returning Adam’s things. It wasn’t going to buy a fish tank. I needed to do some research on that, so I hopped on a train and went to an out-of-town retail park by the university to look around the DIY superstore. I wandered about and picked up some of those cards that help you select paint colours. If Lexi said I needed to learn basic household maintenance, then maybe I should start by fixing Adam’s flat where I’d created those unfortunate scorch marks up the walls and across the ceiling. If I applied my artist’s skills to a spot of redecorating then he was sure to forgive me for melting the fire, as I had no clue how to go about fixing that. I took loads of cards as I couldn’t decide whether to go with a bright accent colour, or something subtly toning. I knew that Adam wouldn’t approve of the bright option, but sometimes you need to drag people out of their comfort zone to help them see what’s possible. That’s what Cookie says, anyway.

  I went over to the pet care section. The fish tanks were quite expensive. It would take me weeks to save up enough to get one of these. I couldn’t leave the trilobites in the bath for that long. I went to find an assistant. A gangly youth was restocking shelves with mysterious bits of bent metal.

  “I’m looking for something to keep... terrapins in,” I said. I’d learned from the experience with the vet. A terrapin was about the same size as a trilobite, I hazarded. “I can’t afford a fish tank, can you suggest something cheaper? Much cheaper.”

  The youth paused wordlessly for a few long moments before turning on his heel and disappearing. He came back with a woman who looked like Marge Simpson. The youth still hadn’t spoken a word and he disappeared, clearly relieved to have found someone else to deal with me. If only he had my adulting skills! I made a mental note to come back here and suggest he read my blog, once I’d got a couple of Florrie Does Adulting posts up there.

  I repeated my request to Marge and she nodded thoughtfully for a moment.

  “So, would I be right in assuming that your ideal budget is zero?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  “But if I sorted you out with something then you’d be happy to put a pound in the collecting tin for deranged cats?”

  I nodded again. Deranged cats?

  She led me to a massive door that she said I wasn’t allowed to come through. She disappeared for a few minutes and then came back towing one of those trucks that holds a pallet. On top of it was a weird looking plastic thing.

  “Have a look at this,” she said. “It’s a walk-in sit-up bath. It’s meant for old people who can’t get into a regular bath. We got this one in on a special order but the top got broken, see? It’s going in the skip, but you can have it if you want.”

  I peered inside. It was like a luxury apartment designed especially for trilobites. It had a deep bit and a seat, I could see it working perfectly if I put soil in the bottom and then water on top, so that they could climb up and enjoy it like a beach if they felt like it.

  “It’s perfect!” I breathed. “But how on earth am I going to get it back to my place?”

  The woman produced a clipboard. “Put your details on there. I’ll get Tony to drop it round when he does the deliveries. I want to see an extra pound go in that tin for deranged cats, mind.”

  I nodded eagerly. Always happy to help out with the deranged cats.

  Tony came round with the trilobite enclosure that afternoon. He’d managed
to get it right to the front door of the flat with the help of a wheeled trolley, and he hauled it into the lounge. It looked truly enormous in a domestic setting, but then if you’re going to look after a pet, you need to give it plenty of space, so I knew I was doing the right thing.

  “Let’s put it in Adam’s bedroom,” I said, and Tony obliged by manoeuvring it expertly through the flat, while Ashbert looked on, slightly confused.

  “Tell you what,” said Tony, “this was a godsend. We got quotas now. We get penalised for excess waste if we have to scrap too much stuff, and this would have scuppered us for a month or more, size of the thing. Fibre glass, can’t be recycled either.”

  “Happy to help,” I said, regretting my earlier generosity towards the collection tin. “If you have any more stuff you need to get rid of, just run it by me!”

  “Got five hundred match pots on the van. Past their sell-by date, but they’re probably fine.”

  “Match pots?”

  “Yeah, little sample pots of paint. All different colours.”

  “I’ll take them!” I said. There were sure to be some that I could use in my search for the right colour for the decorating.

  Adam’s room was filling up. There were boxes full of condoms and match pots pushed up against the wall, but in pride of place was the walk-in bath.

  “Right,” I said to Ashbert, after Tony had left. “We just need to prepare this for the trilobites. Come with me.”

  We went downstairs and explored the equipment bunker at the back of the flats. I found a couple of spades and a bucket.

  “We need some soil for the bottom of their enclosure,” I said.

  We went out into the carefully cultivated garden. We’d need to tread carefully here. I could already see a face at a window above us.

  “I don’t think we can take any from here,” I hissed at Ashbert, “we’ll have the residents’ association down on us like a ton of bricks if we mess up the flower beds.”

  “What about over there?” said Ashbert, pointing across the road. At the edge of the car park was a scrubby bit of waste ground littered with lumps of concrete and beer cans. We went over and poked around experimentally with our spades. It was hard to imagine that there might be soil underneath all of the mess, but we did eventually find some. We filled the mop bucket halfway and lugged it back to the flat. It was nowhere near enough when we got it in there, so we had to make another five journeys, by which time it was dark and we were exhausted, but our hard work paid off in the end. We used the same bucket to add water to the soil, until it lapped gently up onto the beach. There was a glorious deep mud pool and a shallow sloping beach. It couldn’t have been more perfect.

  “That was fun,” I said, wiping sweat and muck from my brow.

  “I can think of better things for us to do,” said Ashbert.

  “What are you talking about?” I said. “Nothing better than a bit of a dirty fun and getting hot and sweaty. Isn’t that what you said?”

  Chapter 14

  We left the habitat to settle overnight. In the morning, the murky soup had settled down and there was a layer of relatively clear water on top of the silty soil in the lower part. It was time to move our honoured guests into their new home. I told Ashbert that it was our task for the morning and he suggested that perhaps we might just go for a nice walk or something instead. I suggested that the best way to overcome his fears would be to confront them. He pouted and fetched the oven gloves to protect his hands. I could tell it was going to be down to me to do all the work, as he’d have absolutely no dexterity with those things on.

  “Should I get the bin?” he asked.

  “Hmmm, I think that might be tricky now they’re in the bath,” I said.

  I went into the kitchen to see what might be more suitable. I opened cupboards until I found something that looked as though it would do the job. It was a device for steaming vegetables, I think. It had a base with a wire to plug it in, but the bit that I was interested in was what went on top: a big metal basket with a lid.

  “This should do the trick,” I said, holding it up. “The water will drain out the bottom and I can pop the lid on to stop them escaping.”

  Ashbert nodded, looking afraid or cynical – I couldn’t tell.

  I went to the bathroom and greeted the trilobites by name. Soon they would start to respond to my voice, I was sure of it.

  “Morning Dougie! Morning Danny! Tom, you’re keen this morning! Harry’s only just waking up by the looks of it.”

  Tom was scrabbling at the side of the bath. I positioned the basket below him and scooped him gently upwards. It worked perfectly. I popped the lid on top, took him through into Adam’s bedroom and gently tipped him out into the new habitat.

  “Off you go Tom, you can be the first to explore. Doesn’t he look at home, Ashbert?”

  I repeated the exercise with Harry and Danny without a hitch. I was the trilobite whisperer! I dipped the basket into the water for Dougie, expecting him to scud his way agreeably into scooping range. Instead he shot forward and nipped my hand, just on the fleshy part of my thumb.

  “Ow! Jesus, Dougie!” I exclaimed, hurt in more ways than one.

  Ashbert whipped open the bathroom cabinet and cleaned my wound with an antiseptic wipe before putting on a plaster. He was an absolute dear but then sort of spoiled it by saying “should have worn the gloves” as he turned away.

  I managed to get Dougie into the basket second time around. While they explored their new home, I magically rustled up some worms so they wouldn’t go hungry. I couldn’t help the feeling that something was missing. Maybe it was because a decent habitat always has something more in it. Even the crappiest goldfish bowl has a castle or something for the fish to look at as it swims around. I’d need to get my thinking cap on about that.

  I found Ashbert in Adam’s room, looking in the boxes.

  “You’ve got a lot of these paint pots,” he said. “Dragon’s Blood, Flamingo Dream, Regency Decadence. Nice colours.”

  “They were free. I need to decorate the bits of the lounge I’ve messed up.”

  He looked back in the box. “Oh, right. You planning on doing some Jackson Pollock sort of stuff then?”

  I goggled at him. “Eh?”

  “You know, Jackson Pollock?” he said. “Did drip paintings in lots of colours.”

  “Yes, I know that,” I said. “I went to art college. But how do you know?”

  “Maybe you told me?” he ventured.

  “Nope. Definitely not, and I went to art college after I made that scrapbook. Which is your favourite of Pollock’s pieces?”

  “I think his Autumn Rhythm is the most impressive. An almost perfect expression of his work in fractal geometry.”

  “Wow, it’s like you went to art college too,” I said.

  “I didn’t,” he said. “I was interested in the arts but studied English at university.” He sounded surprised at this news.

  I frowned. “You have James Franco’s ears, you know.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No. I mean, literally. I cut them out of a magazine. And he’s an artist, I think. Besides doing the acting thing and the general hotness.”

  “Okay,” said Ashbert. “So, what does that mean?”

  “If nothing else, it means you can help me paint a background for the trilobites.”

  I fetched the shower curtain out of the bathroom. It was large and white and would make a perfect canvas. With my paintbrushes and all of this lovely new paint I passed a happy couple of hours painting a backdrop for the habitat that would remind the trilobites of home. I guessed they’d like to see some dinosaurs, so I included a grazing stegosaurus and a pterodactyl flying above a lush rainforest canopy. As a finishing touch I added Florrie, peeking through the undergrowth.

  I took a photo and uploaded the picture to my blog. I captioned it Florrie relaxes after a hard day’s adulting. It was the last of a series. I’d drawn Florrie washing her towels, Florrie making an entry on her
calendar for the dentist and the final version of Florrie knowing the price of eggs. I wrote some brief paragraphs about the difficulties that she’d faced, but how she’d mastered the basics of adulting, so now she was kicking back with her friends the dinosaurs.

  I uploaded it and then wandered through to the lounge. I contemplated the ruined paintwork and thought about what Ashbert had said. A splashy Jackson Pollock thing might be just the effect to create a striking accent in here. But where to start?

  “Reminder,” said Lexi. “Your driving lesson begins in ten minutes.”

  “Damn. I’d forgotten.”

  I’d done no preparation at all. I checked my watch. Yes, ten minutes. I needed to study a map. Imagine getting lost on your first driving lesson! I called up a map on my phone and it rang while I did.

  I put it on speaker so I could look at the map at the same time.

  “Hi Cookie,” I said.

  “Love your new blog, my friend,” she said. “Very profound.”

  “Cool, thanks,” I said. The world looked a very different place on a map. I tried to trace the route from here to my parents’ old house, but it was just a meaningless set of bends on a diagram. How on earth did people know where to go?

  “Listen, I got a job for you, if you still want it.”

  “Definitely. What and when?”

  “What, babysitting. When, tomorrow night.”

  “Babysitting,” I echoed, not especially thrilled at the thought. “A baby, jeez.”

  “Not a baby. The kid is ten, which is a nice age.”

  “Boy or girl?”

  “Does it matter? Do I detect some nervousness?”

  “No!” I said, then in a slightly smaller voice, “Well, yes. Kids. I always think they’re going to catch me out.”

  “Catch you out?” said Cookie.

  I cast about for the right words. “It’s like they know I’m not properly a grown-up. Adults are mature and wise and know what the right thing to do is and…”

  “You think any of us adults know what we’re doing?”

  “When I said adults, I wasn’t necessarily including you in that category, if I’m honest.”