by Judi Curtin
‘I never get sick, and school’s not for ages and ages. I’m resourceful. When the time comes, I’ll think of something.’
Another horrible picture forced its way into my head. I could see Martha never getting better. I could see Kate never going back to school. I could see her living like a hermit in that small cottage. I could see her growing older and weirder and sadder as the months and years passed slowly by.
There were a million things wrong with Kate’s plan.
How could I find the words to describe them all?
And if I did, what were the chances of her listening?’
She smiled brightly at me. ‘So tell me, Eva, what have you been doing since your last email?’
After the conversation we’d just had, it felt totally weird talking about normal stuff, but Kate insisted. So I told her all the things I’d done with my friends. I told her about Ruby and our planned trip to London.
She told me about all the new friends she’d made at school that year. She told me how she’d given a talk to her class about stars and planets. And for a while it felt almost normal – like we weren’t huddled in a darkened room, hiding from the world.
Then I looked at my watch, squinting to read the numbers in the half-darkness.
‘Sorry, but I’ve got to go,’ I said. ‘It’s time for my lunch.’
Kate walked me to the door. ‘Promise you won’t tell anyone that you’ve seen me,’ she said. ‘No one must know I’m here. If Nicola finds out that I’m living on my own, Martha and I are in a lot of trouble. So you can’t tell Lily or—’
Then I remembered something. ‘Lily said you were …’
Even in the poor light, I could see Kate’s face going red, ‘… kind of mean to her?’
I nodded, ‘Actually very mean is what it sounded like to me.’
‘I feel so bad about that,’ said Kate. ‘When Lily heard that Martha was sick, she was extra-nice to me, but she kept asking awkward questions.’
‘She was trying to be kind,’ I said.
‘I know that. But Lily’s smart, and I knew it wouldn’t take long for her to figure out the truth. So I didn’t really have any choice – I had to be mean – just to make her go away. That way it was easier for everyone.’
I knew what Kate was trying to say, but it all sounded too lonely and scary to me.
‘You should have trusted her. She’s your friend – just like I am.’
‘Lily’s really nice, but she’s not like you. You’re different.’
I wasn’t sure I liked the responsibility of being different.
I took another step towards the door.
‘So anyway, you mustn’t tell Lily, or your parents – or anyone at all,’ said Kate. ‘You have to promise, Eva.’
‘I won’t tell anyone,’ I said. But even as the words came from my mouth, I had a horrible feeling that I shouldn’t be saying them.
Surely supporting your friend’s crazy plan is more stupid than loyal?
But already Kate was hugging me. ‘Thank you so, so much, Eva. You’re the best friend any girl could ever hope to have,’ she said, making me feel really, really bad.
Kate was edging the door open, when I suddenly thought of something else.
‘I called over yesterday, as soon as we arrived here. Why didn’t you let me in then?’
‘Because …’
‘Because?’
Then she spoke in a rush. ‘I knew you were coming this weekend. I’ve had the date written down for months. But I’d made my mind up that I wasn’t going to talk to you – I wasn’t going to let you know that I was here. I’d told myself that it would be easier that way. And yesterday …’
She hesitated and I had to help her along. ‘And yesterday?’
‘Yesterday I saw you coming, and I so, so badly wanted to talk to you, but I managed to resist. And when I saw you walking away, I felt like crying, but still I didn’t call out to you. I was sure that staying away from you was the best thing.
‘So what changed?’
‘Nothing. But when you came back today, I couldn’t resist any more. I watched from the window, and as soon as I saw Joey going away, I knew I had to talk to you. I knew I couldn’t do this without you.’
The sadness and loneliness of it all was suddenly too much for me. I gave Kate a quick hug, and then turned away before she could see the tears in my eyes.
‘I’ll call over tomorrow,’ I said, as I stepped into the bright, airy outside world.
‘I’ll be here,’ said Kate.
Then she closed the door and I walked slowly away.
‘Where were you all this time?’ asked Mum when I got home.
I hesitated.
I hate telling lies to Mum. Firstly, I know it’s wrong, and secondly, it’s like she’s got magic powers that let her see right through me. Sometimes I think that when I’m not telling the truth she can see a huge banner waving over my head, saying EVA’S LYING in huge black letters.
‘Oh,’ I said in the end. ‘I walked with Joey for a bit, and after that I just kind of hung out for a while.’
It wasn’t exactly a lie, but I knew it wasn’t the truth either. Luckily Mum was busy ladling out the soup, so she didn’t notice anything strange.
‘That’s good,’ she said absently. ‘Now can you please call your dad and Joey for their lunch?’
That night I pretended I was tired and went to bed early. Mum felt my forehead when I went to kiss her goodnight.
‘Are you sick, Eva?’ she asked. ‘You never volunteer to go to bed early.’ Then she gave me one of her look-right-through-you stares. ‘Is there something going on that I should know about?’ she asked.
I smiled vaguely and tried to look sick enough so she’d stop asking questions, but not so sick that she’d actually worry and think about calling a doctor.
‘Oh, you know,’ I said, ‘I’m probably not used to the sea air yet.’
It sounded like something a demented granny would say, but it was the best I could do under pressure.
She hugged me. ‘Well, goodnight then, darling, and sleep tight. And remember, Eva, you know you can talk to me and Dad about anything – anything at all.’
I escaped from her arms and ran up to my room. Usually I could talk to Mum and Dad about stuff, but this time, I wasn’t so sure. If I mentioned one single word of what was going on, they’d be over to Kate’s house within five minutes, and shortly afterwards, an army of social workers and police would appear, and Kate’s dream of coping alone would be over forever. And one thing I knew for certain sure – if that happened, Kate would never, ever, ever speak to me again. She would hate me for the rest of our lives.
I climbed into bed and lay there, looking at the ceiling. Maybe I was just being selfish. After all, it wasn’t really about me. Maybe falling out with Kate was what I had to do to help her. Maybe for her sake, I had to tell an adult what was going on.
And if I did that, maybe one day, in about a thousand years, she’d find it possible to forgive me.
I climbed out of bed again and went to the window. I could see Kate’s house outlined against the dark sky. There were no lights on, and it looked eerie and sad. I thought of Kate all alone, inside.
Downstairs, I could hear Mum and Dad and Joey laughing. In Kate’s house, the only sound would be the creak of floorboards and the scrape of branches against the windows.
Was she lonely?
Was she scared?
A draught of cold air blew in through the window and I shivered.
One more night, I thought. One more night, and then I’ll have to do something to sort this out forever.
Chapter Six
Next morning I called over to Kate’s house again.
‘I’ve got great news,’ she said as she pulled me inside. ‘I got a letter from Martha. She’s had her operation and everything’s fine.’
I’d been so caught up in the weirdness of Kate living on her own that until then, I hadn’t stopped to think about how worried
she must have been about Martha.
‘That is great news,’ I said. ‘And if she’s well enough to write letters already, I bet she’ll be better in no time.’
Kate’s smile faded slightly. ‘Well, she didn’t exactly write the letter herself. She dictated it, and a nurse wrote it down for her.’
‘But you’re supposed to be in Cork.’
‘And?’
‘The nurse addressed the letter to here. Won’t she be suspicious? What if that nurse cops on that you’re home alone?’
‘Martha and I thought of that.’
Kate held the first page of the letter towards me.
I read the first line – My dear Cousin Gertrude …
‘Who on earth is Cousin Gertrude?’ I asked.
Kate grinned. ‘Martha and I agreed that would be our secret code. Any letters she writes will be addressed to her devoted, but non-existent Cousin Gertrude, who just happens to live in Seacove.’
I giggled as I remembered Martha’s quirky sense of humour.
‘You must miss Martha,’ I said.
Kate nodded. ‘Of course I do, and she misses me – she’s the only one of my family who cared enough not to abandon me.’
‘I don’t think your parents left because they didn’t love you enough,’ I said, but we’d had this conversation a hundred times before, and once again, I wasn’t sure that Kate was listening.
‘Anyway,’ she said. ‘I hate not being able to visit Martha now that she’s so sick – but we both know that this is the way things have to be.’
I knew she was wrong. There had to be another way – only trouble was, I didn’t know what that other way was. I had no real idea what happens to kids who don’t have anyone to take care of them. All my experience was from TV and films, which wasn’t much help. If adults found out that Kate was living alone, would she end up like Little Orphan Annie, in a home run by an evil witch, or would she end up in a wonderful family with heaps of children and pets and a mansion by the sea?
For the hundredth time, I wished I had a computer so I could look it all up on the internet. All through breakfast, I had struggled, trying to find a casual way of asking Mum and Dad about abandoned children, but I knew they wouldn’t be fooled for a second, and so, I’d said nothing.
Kate led the way into the kitchen. I sat at the table, but Kate paced up and down the small room, reminding me of a caged polar bear I’d seen once at the zoo.
‘This isn’t right, Kate,’ I said. ‘You love the outdoors so much. You love walking and climbing and running. How can you bear to be locked up inside here all the time? How can you bear not walking on the beach? How can you bear not seeing Jeremy, and the Island of Dreams?’
Kate grinned at the mention of the special tree and the beautiful field that meant so much to her.
‘I’m not exactly locked up all the time,’ she said.
‘What do you mean?’
Her eyes sparkled in the gloom, and for a second I could see the happy girl I’d known the year before.
‘Late at night, when everyone else is in bed, I go for long walks. I go to the beach. I go to the Island of Dreams, and I climb Jeremy. I just lie there and look at the sea and the stars. Everything’s so peaceful in the dark. I feel safe there. When I’m curled up on Jeremy’s branches, I know that everything’s going to turn out all right.’
I felt like grabbing her and shouting in her ear – This can’t turn out right. It’s all too crazy and wrong. This is like something out of a movie – and I’m not sure it’s a movie that’s going to end well. Someone around here is going to have to sort this mess out – and I have a horrible feeling that it’s going to have to be me.
But Kate was still smiling happily, and I couldn’t bring myself to say the words that would have to change that. So I tried to smile too.
Kate seemed relaxed. ‘I love having a friend like you, Eva,’ she said. ‘You’re not like everyone else.’
‘Er … what exactly do you mean by that?’
‘You don’t look for problems where there are none. You understand that I’m fine here on my own. I know you will never ever, ever tell on me.’
I gulped.
‘I’ve brought you something,’ I said quickly, pulling a crumpled foil package from the pocket of my hoodie.
‘Mum made pancakes for breakfast, and I sneaked one when she wasn’t looking. I hope you like chocolate spread and banana.’
‘I totally love chocolate spread and banana,’ said Kate, taking the package from me.
So I sat down and watched her eat, and wondered how we were going to spend the rest of the morning.
And so the days fell into a weird kind of pattern.
In the mornings I went over to Kate’s place, and we sat around and chatted, and acted like what she was doing wasn’t totally weird and scary.
One morning I was so desperate that I sneaked over Joey’s Monopoly set.
‘Hey,’ said Kate, ‘Monopoly! That should be fun.’
But after three totally boring games, I felt like flinging the whole set across the room, and one look at Kate’s face made me think that she probably felt the same.
In the afternoons I hung out on the beach with Lily, and tried not to accidentally mention the fact that I’d just spent a few hours in a dark room with a girl who was supposed to be friends with both of us.
In the evenings, I played cards with Mum and Dad and Joey, jumping and trying not to go red whenever anyone mentioned Kate, or anything to do with her.
It was totally weird, and totally horrible. I never once told an actual lie to Mum and Dad and Lily, but I never told the full truth either.
And all the time, I knew I was deceiving Kate too. By going along with her crazy plan, I was pretending that what she was doing was right – even though I knew for sure that it was very, very wrong.
Every morning, I woke up and looked in the mirror. I told myself that the girl looking back at me was braver and smarter than I was. I told myself that the girl in the mirror knew what to do. The girl in the mirror knew it was right to tell Mum and Dad what was going on. But as soon as I stepped away from the mirror, the brave, confident girl disappeared and I was stuck with the real me – who was very mixed up and confused.
And all the time, my trip to London with Ruby was getting closer and closer and I knew I had to do something – very soon.
Then one night, I was in the middle of an amazing dream about a holiday in our old house in Italy, when I heard a rattling sound. I was still half-asleep and dreaming about the cute guy who used to clean the leaves out of our swimming pool. Two years ago he’d promised to teach me how to dive backwards, but then we had to sell the house and I never saw him again.
‘Hey, Alessandro, you said you’d …’ I was saying, when the rattling sound came again. This time I woke up properly. I sat up and rubbed my eyes. I wasn’t lying by a pool on a warm and sunny Italian afternoon. I was in bed, in Seacove and it was the middle of the night.
I jumped out of bed, went to the window and pulled back the curtain. The moon was out and I could see Kate below me in the garden. While I watched, she bent down and picked up a pebble. Then she drew her arm back, getting ready to throw it in my direction. I quickly opened the window.
‘I’m awake!’ I hissed. ‘And if you throw any more stones, the whole village will be awake too. What do you want? Is something wrong?’
‘No, nothing’s wrong,’ she said casually, like it was perfectly normal to be wandering around other people’s gardens in the middle of the night, throwing stones at their windows.
‘I’m just going for a walk, and I thought you might like to come with me.’
I only hesitated for a second. I knew Mum and Dad would not be happy about me wandering around the countryside in the middle of the night, but I’d done it a few times the year before, and it had always been kind of cool and nice.
‘I’ll be right there,’ I said, as I closed the window.
A minute later, I’d pulled o
n some clothes, and sneaked out of the house.
Kate hugged me. ‘It’s just like old times,’ she said.
It was a clear, warm night. We walked for ages – through the empty village and along the beach, and then we ended up where I knew we would, next to Jeremy, Kate’s special tree. Kate pointed to a nearly-built house far away at the other side of the field.
‘If it weren’t for you that house would be right here and poor Jeremy would be firewood,’ she said.
I didn’t answer. Somehow, last year’s problems seemed a lot less complicated than the ones Kate was facing now.
Kate spread out the old rug she had brought, and we lay down and looked at the stars. Kate was impressed that I remembered the constellations she’d shown me the year before, and then I watched carefully while she showed me some smaller ones.
After that, we lay in silence for a long time. It was very peaceful lying there, watching as the warm breeze sent occasional rustling shivers through Jeremy’s leaves. It should have been totally perfect – but it wasn’t.
‘Kate,’ I said after a while.
‘What?’ she said without turning her head.
‘You showed me the last letter that Martha sent to Cousin Gertrude.’
‘And?’
‘She said she’s doing well, but even so, it might be months before she’s ready to come home.’
‘And?
‘And you know you can’t stay on your own for all that time, don’t you?’
‘Actually, I can.’
I ignored her. ‘What are you so afraid of? You’re not going to end up living on the street. You’re not going to be sent to a workhouse, or to a horrible orphanage – that kind of thing doesn’t happen in this country any more.’
‘I know that. I’m not stupid.’
‘Then what …?’
She sat up and looked at me with a fierce, cold expression on her face.
