by Kevin Brooks
Easier than saying no.
And, besides, it's not that hard to just sit here on the bed, drinking this fruity-flavoured fizzy drink, getting into the music while Taylor and Mel fuss about with my hair and my face. In fact, it kind of feels OK.
‘Keep still,’ Taylor tells me.
She's doing something to my eyes – brushing some stuff on them, making them up (she's already lipsticked my lips and put some stuff on my cheeks). Mel is behind me, crouched down on the bed, fiddling around with my hair. I don't know what she's doing, but it feels quite nice. And I can see her reflection in the mirror on the opposite wall, and she looks like she's enjoying herself, and that makes me feel kind of all right too.
It's still raining hard outside, and it sounds cold and nasty, and I'm glad I'm in here, in the rainless comfort of my room. I have a nice warm feeling in my belly.
‘You should do this all the time,’ Mel says.
‘Do what?’
‘Look after yourself.’ She runs a brush through my hair. ‘All it takes is a little bit of effort, and it makes so much difference. You'd be amazed how much better you feel when you look nice.’
I start to shake my head.
‘Will you keep still?’ Taylor snaps at me.
‘Sorry.’ I look in the mirror at Mel. ‘It's a waste of time.’
‘What is?’
‘Trying to make myself look nice – it's pointless.’
‘Why?’
‘You know why. I mean, look at me…’ I look distastefully at my reflection in the mirror, and despite my newly modelled hair and my lippied-up lips and my (frankly) quite delectable-looking eyes (which I have to admit look pretty stunning), I can still only see myself for what I am – a round-shouldered lump in baggy black clothes. Round head, dumpyish legs, dumpyish arms, lumpyish lumps…
That's me, that is.
That's me.
‘Don't put yourself down,’ Mel says.
‘I'm not –’
‘Yeah, you are. I mean, all right, so you're not exactly Kylie Minogue, but you've still got a lot going for you.’
‘Yeah?’ I laugh. ‘Like what?’
She sits back and studies me in the mirror. ‘You've got a pretty face, nice eyes, your skin's OK…’
‘Yeah,’ Taylor agrees, still concentrating on my eyes. ‘Her skin's surprisingly good, actually.’
‘Same as her hair,’ says Mel. ‘All it needs is a decent cut.’ She smiles at me. ‘And as for the rest of you…’
‘Yeah, right,’ I say. ‘The rest of me. Exactly.’
‘What do you mean?’ says Mel.
‘What do you think I mean?’
‘She thinks she's fat,’ Taylor says matter-of-factly to Mel.
Mel scowls at me. ‘You're not fat, for Christ's sake.’
‘No?’
‘No.’
‘Yeah, well, I'm not skinny, am I?’
‘So what? Just because you're not skinny doesn't mean you're fat. I mean, look at you…’ She puts her hands on my shoulders and gently pulls me back, so I'm sitting up straight, then she runs her hands down my back, kind of gathering up the cloth of my baggy old Jesus and Mary Chain T-shirt as she goes, so it tightens against my body. ‘There,’ she says, looking (almost triumphantly) at me in the mirror. ‘See? I mean, look at those curves… I know girls who'd die for a body like that. You've just got to stop hiding it away, that's all.’
As I stare at myself in the mirror, studying the shape of my body – the roundness of my belly, the unfamiliar outline of my breasts – I can't help questioning everything. I mean, curves? Is that really what they are? Or am I being taken for a ride here? Are Taylor and Mel just taking the piss? Suckering me with their sweet words and their fake flattery? Making me think that I don't look as bad as I think?
Q. Why would they do that?
A. Why would they not?
But if that's what they are doing, if they really are just taking the piss, then:
Q. How come you're feeling OK? I mean, how come you're actually enjoying this? How come you like sitting here, looking at yourself in the mirror, while Mel sits behind you pulling your T-shirt tight?
A. I don't know. I don't know why I'm feeling OK.
But maybe it's just that sometimes, like now (as the guitars ring out and the drums beat hard and Mel lets go of my T-shirt and Taylor stands up and lights another cigarette and refills my glass)… maybe, sometimes, I just need to feel OK.
And I do.
But then Taylor hands me the drink and says, ‘OK, get that down your neck and then get your clothes off,’ and as she stands there grinning down at me, the world seems to stop for a moment (at least, my world seems to stop), and suddenly I don't feel quite so OK any more, and all I can do is stare back up at Taylor, my eyes unblinking and my mouth hanging open in stunned disbelief.
Am I imagining things?
Or did she really just tell me to take off my clothes?
‘It's all right,’ Mel says, laughing quietly at the look on my face. ‘Don't look so worried.’ She scoops up the pink T-shirt and the denim skirt and drops them into my lap. ‘Go on,’ she says. ‘Try them on.’
I glance down for a moment, staring stupidly at the flimsy clothes, then I look up at Taylor. She's smirking at me, enjoying my embarrassment, and I know there's nothing for me to be embarrassed about… I mean, it's not as if I misunderstood or misinterpreted her when she told me to take my clothes off. I didn't jump to the wrong conclusion or anything. All I did was get confused. And Taylor knows that, and she knows that I know it. And that makes me feel even more embarrassed.
‘What's the matter?’ she asks innocently.
‘Nothing,’ I tell her (with as much unembarrassment as I can manage).
She smirks again. ‘Right.’
For want of anything better to do, I take a fairly big gulp of my drink. It tastes kind of different now – a bit less fruity, maybe, a bit more… I don't know. A bit more something-elsey. And I'm tempted to say something – like, Is this the same stuff I was drinking before? – but Taylor is still looking down at me (literally and figuratively), and I don't want to give her anything else to sneer about. And I'm probably just being over-sensitive to the taste of the drink anyway – my taste buds hyped up with embarrassmentized adrenalin. So I don't say anything, I just swallow the drink and stare at the clothes in my lap.
They're far too small for me.
They look like something a Bratz doll would wear.
‘Go on then,’ says Taylor, jutting her chin at the clothes. ‘What are you waiting for?’
I shake my head. ‘I don't think they'll fit me.’
‘Yeah, they will,’ Mel says. ‘They're just a bit closer-fitting than the stuff you usually wear, that's all.’
Taylor laughs. ‘A bit closer-fitting?’ She reaches down and tugs dismissively at the front of my T-shirt. ‘I mean, shit, a tent's closer-fitting than this.’
‘It's supposed to be baggy,’ I protest.
‘That's not baggy,’ she says. ‘That's sacky. And these…’ She flicks her hand at my faded old combat pants. ‘These are the fattest pants I've ever seen. They'd look big on Biggie Smalls.’ She shakes her head. ‘Who the fuck's going to want to find out what you've got in there?’
‘I don't want anyone to find out what I've got in there,’ I tell her. ‘I wear these because I like them. They're comfortable –’
‘Comfortable?’ Taylor sneers. ‘Clothes aren't meant to be comfortable. They're not fucking armchairs.’
‘Yeah, well…’ I say.
And I'm kind of annoyed with myself now, because I sound so sulky, as if all this stupidity really bothers me. Which it doesn't, of course.
Of course.
‘Come on, Dawn,’ Mel says, smiling at me as she scooches round and sits down next to me. ‘Just give it a go. Try the clothes on. You'll look great in them.’
I drink some more of my slightly-odd-but-actually-quite-nice-tasting drink. ‘I don't want to look great,�
�� I tell her.
‘Yeah, you do. Everyone wants to look great.’ She puts her hand on my knee. ‘I mean, we all want to be looked at, don't we?’
I stare at her hand.
It's small, smaller than I would have imagined (if, that is, I'd ever imagined the size of her hand, which I haven't).
She has badly chewed fingernails.
A plain silver ring on her middle finger.
She has faded white scars on her forearm.
‘Look,’ says Taylor (a bit less sneery now). ‘We're just trying to help you out here. I mean, the thing is, if you carry on dressing like you do… you know, like some dowdy old bag lady, the only interest you're ever going to get is from desperate boys with white sticks and guide dogs.’ She grins at me. ‘Is that what you want?’
I grin back at her, suddenly feeling surprisingly OK again. ‘I went out with a blind boy once,’ I tell her. ‘He was all right, actually. Until he dumped me.’
Taylor looks a bit stunned. ‘You got dumped by a blind guy?’
‘Yeah… but it was my fault, really. I stole his dog.’
‘You what?’
‘I stole his guide dog.’
‘Why?’
‘Well, it was a really nice dog – a black German shepherd – and I really wanted it. And this guy was blind, you know…? I mean, what's a blind guy going to do if you steal his dog? It's not like he can go out looking for it, is it?’
‘So you actually stole his dog?’ Mel says.
‘Yeah.’
‘What did he do?’
‘Who – the dog?’
‘No, the blind guy.’
‘He sent his mum round to my house, and she took the dog back.’ I shrug. ‘I told her I was only borrowing it for a while, but I don't think she believed me.’
‘And that's why he dumped you?’ asks Taylor. ‘Because you stole his guide dog?’
‘Yeah.’
Mel looks at me. ‘Really?’
‘Yeah.’
‘That really happened?’
I look back at her for a moment, smiling at the bemusement on her face, and then I shake my head and say, ‘No, it didn't really happen. I just made it up.’
‘You think that's funny?’ Taylor says to me.
I shrug again. ‘Not really.’
She shakes her head. ‘I don't get you.’
‘There's nothing to get.’
‘No?’
We look at each other.
She lights a cigarette, sips her vodka.
I take a drink from my glass.
And she says, ‘Maybe you don't want guys looking at you.’
‘I don't really care –’
‘Maybe the rumours are true.’
‘What rumours?’
‘You know… the names they call you at school. Dyke, lesbo, todger-dodger –’
‘I've never heard that one.’
She smiles at me. ‘I'm not having a go at you, you know… I'm not judging you or anything. I mean, me and Mel don't give a fuck what you are.’ She grins at Mel. ‘Do we, darling?’
‘No,’ says Mel, smiling at me. ‘We're very open-minded.’
There's a moment's silence then, a strange little moment in which we all just look at each other, and there's a fleeting sense of genuine (and totally non-sexual) intimacy between us, and it feels so good that, just for a second, we all let out little breaths of quiet amusement.
And, with that, the moment's over.
But, still, it happened.
And what's happened can't be unhappened.
‘So,’ says Taylor, puffing (slightly self-consciously) on her cigarette. ‘Are you going to try these clothes on, or what?’
I sigh, already knowing what I'm going to say, because letting it happen is the easiest way out, it is easier than saying no, and besides…
There is no besides.
I look at Mel, and she says, ‘What's the matter? Are you all right?’
‘What?’
‘Are you OK?’
‘Yeah… yeah, I'm fine.’ I smile at her. ‘I'm shy.’
‘Sorry?’
‘You'll have to leave the room. If you want me to try the clothes on, I mean. I don't like getting undressed in front of other people.’
‘What's the matter?’ says Taylor, grinning at me. ‘Do you think we're going to go crazy with lust at the sight of your naked body?’
I look at her, and for a second or two I can't seem to focus my eyes. I close them, open them again, then I try just closing one. And that does the trick. I can see her quite clearly now.
‘What?’ I say to her.
She shakes her head. ‘I said, do you think we're going to go crazy –’
‘Come on, Tay,’ Mel says, getting to her feet. ‘Give the girl some privacy, for Christ's sake. Let her get changed in peace.’ She jerks her head at the door. ‘Come on, I need a piss anyway.’
‘Oh, yeah…’ Taylor says. ‘Right.’
And as the two of them head for the door, I'm wondering if it's just me (in my state of unfocusedness), or was the tone of Taylor's voice – Oh, yeah… right – was that the tone of someone who's just been given a conspiratorial wink?
‘Five minutes all right?’ Taylor asks me.
‘Sorry?’
‘Is five minutes long enough for you to get changed?’
‘Yeah… yeah, fine.’ I look at her. ‘You're just going to the toilet, yeah?’
‘Yeah.’ She gives me a look. ‘Is that a problem?’
‘No, of course not…’
Which, strictly speaking, is the truth. I don't have a problem with them going to the toilet. But what I do have a problem with is the idea of them talking to Mum. I don't want them to talk to her. But if I tell them not to, they'll probably think that:
1) I'm ashamed of them
or 2) I'm ashamed of Mum.
And I don't want them to think either of those things. Because they're not true.
I just don't want them to talk to Mum because…
Just because.
‘See you in a minute then,’ Taylor says.
She goes out, followed by Mel, and a few seconds later Jesus and Mary hop off the bed and follow them down the stairs. I wonder for a moment if I ought to call out after Taylor and Mel – ‘My mum's not feeling too good at the moment, so it's probably best if you don't disturb her.’ But by the time I've thought about it, they're already downstairs, and they probably wouldn't have taken any notice of me anyway…
So now I'm on my own, staring at a whore-faced Dawn Bundy in the mirror, and for a second or two there's a strangely awkward silence between us. It's the kind of silence you get when you're alone with yourself and you suddenly become intensely aware of the fact that you are you. You are the only conscious entity in the world. You are that awful thing in the mirror.
A sex thing.
A girl.
You are Dawn Bundy.
god help me (3)
My name is Dawn Bundy.
I'm thirteen years old.
My name is Dawn Bundy.
I don't want to drink anything, Dad. Please don't make me. I don't like the taste of it. I don't like what it does to you. I don't want you to be like this – drunk out of your mind, out of body and soul, playing your scary hymn over and over again. Please, Dad, don't cry.
I don't want you to cry.
I can't take it any more.
So, yes, I'll take this glass from your trembling hand and I'll drink what you want me to drink, because letting it happen is the easiest way out.
God help me.
head (2)
I have to turn my back on the Dawn Bundy in the mirror as I get up off the bed and start clambering out of my Biggie-Smalls-sized pants, because whoever that Dawn Bundy is (the one in the mirror) and whatever she thinks she's doing, I don't want to see her watching me. I don't want to be aware of her judgemental looks as I stumble around like a gigantic idiot, trying to get my trousers off without falling over. I don't want to see h
er shaking her head at me, saying – ‘What the hell do you think you're doing?’ – as I begin squeezing myself into a ridiculously short denim skirt.
I don't want to see myself in her eyes.
I don't want to be me.
I can't face it.
(i walk away
from your head)
The skirt, surprisingly, doesn't take all that much effort to get on. It's a bit of a struggle getting it up and over my thighs, but once that's done… well, it's actually not a bad fit. I mean, it's tight – a lot tighter than I'm used to – and it definitely doesn't need the little belt that goes with it to stay up, but it's not painfully tight or anything. It's not cutting into my skin. And, even more surprisingly, it kind of looks (and feels) pretty good. Admittedly, I'm still not facing the mirror, so I'm only seeing things from above, so I'm probably not seeing the full-on reality of my pudgy white legs in a very short and very tight skirt, but even so…
I can't help smiling.
It's a funny-feeling smile though. Kind of loose, like my lips are drooping. And maybe my tongue's hanging out a bit too. And my teeth feel too big.
‘Christ,’ I hear myself say.
And my voice is a little bit slurred.
And I realize that I'm just standing here, staring down at the floor, and everything seems to be moving – my head, the floor, the walls, the music…
And I think…
What's the use?
I don't want to think. I just want to do this, whatever this is. I just want to let it happen. And so that's what I'm doing – letting it happen. I'm doing this thing. I'm standing with my back to the mirror, stripping off my baggy old T-shirt, and I'm just starting to pull the very small bright-pink T-shirt over my head when the bedroom door suddenly swings open and Mel comes breezing back in.
‘Hey, look at you,’ she says, smiling broadly.
And all at once I'm petrified, panicking, my heart beating like crazy, because Mel can see me. She can see my semi-nakedness. And I don't want that. I can't bear it. It kills me. So I have to turn away, hiding myself from her eyes, and I have to try covering my body with one arm while desperately trying to pull down the T-shirt at the same time…
