Don't Ask

by Hilary Freeman

  ‘Thanks so much,’ he said, beaming. He lifted me on to his back so that I could see in the mirror too and then he carefully turned me around and kissed me until my jaw ached.

  Can a lie that makes someone that happy really be a bad thing?

  Eric did a good job of ruining our evening together, waking up several times with bad dreams and refusing to go back to sleep until we read him a story. And then read it to him again. Jack was much more patient with him than I was; he always was. Maybe it was because he didn’t have a dad and so he’d had to take on that role with his younger sister. I had a suspicion that Eric liked Jack more than he likes me. Little kids can tell if you’re just going through the motions with them.

  ‘So what do you fancy watching?’ I asked Jack, when we’d finally got Eric to settle. ‘I’ve got a couple of DVDs that I know you’d like. Or we could just listen to some music.’

  Jack widened his eyes. How did he make them twinkle like that, on cue? ‘Well . . . Match of the Day is on soon, you know. And I happen to know the Arsenal game is on first.’

  I froze. Not the match, anything but the match. I thought I’d got away with it. Jack clearly hadn’t spotted me in the crowd when he’d watched the game live that afternoon, but people always notice fresh details the second time around. What if there were different shots, taken from different angles? ‘Oh Jack, do we have to? I whined. ‘I mean, you know I like football now and all, but I’m not in the mood. Haven’t you already seen it once today?’

  ‘Yeah, but my mum kept calling me out to help her carry stuff, so I missed quite a lot. I’d just like to see the goals again. And anyway, it gives me an excuse to wear my new scarf. Hey, we can pretend we’re on the terraces together, watching it for real.’

  It wasn’t much of an imaginative leap for me.

  ‘Oh goody,’ I said, sarcastically. ‘I hope you’ve brought your rattle.’

  ‘Please Lil, just this once, let me . . .’

  I couldn’t think of a good enough excuse to refuse him. ‘Oh go on,’ I said, handing him the remote control. I probably shouldn’t admit this, but there was something a tiny bit thrilling about the risk I was taking. Would I be able to see myself? Would it be as I’d remembered?

  He kissed me. ‘Thanks, Lily. Have I ever told you that you’re the best girlfriend in the world?’

  ‘No I’m not,’ I said, quietly. I don’t think he noticed my change in tone.

  I was lucky; very little of the match was shown and the crowd shots were sparse. If I couldn’t spot myself, I’m certain nobody else could either. The hardest thing was pretending not to know what happened next so I could react with the correct emotion – surprise, awe or anger – when all I felt was familiarity. But it’s always better to be safe than sorry, and so, whenever I thought the camera was panning around to the part of the stadium in which Alex and I had been sitting, I’d simply move in for a snog. If Jack tried to resist, I’d poke him in his side and make him squirm with laughter.

  ‘God, you’re affectionate tonight,’ said Jack, when I allowed him to come up for air. ‘I missed that goal again! Not that I’m complaining or anything. It’s good.’ He hesitated. ‘Really good. You’ve been so distant lately that I thought you were going to finish with me.’

  Like Alex finished with you, I thought. It was still niggling me, however hard I tried to push it to the back of my mind. ‘No, don’t be silly. Of course not. I’ve just been tired and stressed with schoolwork, you know.’

  ‘Course,’ he said, as usual accepting what I said at face value. ‘As if you could get sick of this mug.’ He gurned at me.

  I grabbed hold of both his cheeks and squeezed them hard. ‘Congratulations Jack. You’re still in the running to becoming Britain’s Next Top Gargoyle.’

  He smiled, switched off the television and gently took my hands, then looked at me with real intensity, as if he was trying to decipher my thoughts (and, let’s face it, it’s a very good thing that he couldn’t). ‘You know what, I was being serious,’ he said. ‘I really did think you were going off me. And it was a total bummer, because I realised I was beginning to fall for you in a big way, which I wasn’t expecting to happen.’

  My mouth fell open. I didn’t know what to say. Where was this coming from?

  ‘I thought about it a lot, especially after the other night, and I figured that it was my fault if you were getting fed up with me. I know I probably haven’t been as open with you as I should have been. It’s hard sometimes, when you’ve been hurt before. I don’t find it easy to open up to anyone. I’ve only ever done it once and, well, it didn’t work out.’

  I shook my head. ‘I probably ask too many questions,’ I said, ever the mistress of understatement. ‘I can’t help it. You know me, I’m not exactly Little Miss Patient.’

  ‘You’re fine,’ he said. ‘It’s me. I’ve been too cagey. I needed to be sure of you before I told you. Now I think I am.’

  ‘Told me what?’ I asked. I was aware that he was still holding my hands and that my palms were hot and sweaty. I tried to let go, but he only clung on more tightly.

  ‘I want to tell you about my dad,’ he said. ‘I think I should.’

  I gasped and choked at the same time, swallowing so much air that I felt dizzy. Was this some sort of cosmic joke? On the same day that I’d crossed – more like pole-vaulted over – the line of no return by going to meet Alex, Jack had finally decided to open up to me. Thanks very much, Universe. You’re good, I’ll give you that.

  ‘You don’t have to,’ I said. It was the polite thing to say, but I didn’t mean it. No one ever does, do they?

  ‘I want to.’ He let go of my hands. ‘But you’ve got to promise me you’ll try to understand why I lied, and not hate me for it.’

  I nodded. What did he mean, he’d lied? About what?

  ‘I don’t really know where to start,’ he said. The sparkle in his eyes was gone; they looked steely grey. ‘I’m just going to come straight out with it . . . Lily, my dad isn’t dead.’

  Chapter 12

  Katie said her mum knew that her dad was having an affair because he kept buying her flowers and gifts. She called them guilt tokens. I think I understand why he did it. Giving Jack the scarf and seeing his reaction made me feel better about everything I’d done. It eased my conscience. So does that mean I’m like Katie’s dad? Does it mean I was unfaithful to Jack? I don’t think you could call what I did cheating; there was no other guy. You could call it enterprising. You could call it sneaky, even dodgy. But not unfaithful. I had Jack’s best interests at heart all the way along. And what he didn’t know couldn’t hurt him, right?

  ‘My dad isn’t dead,’ Jack repeated. ‘At least, not as far as I know. I mean, he might be. I haven’t spoken to him for five years. But he didn’t die when I was twelve.’

  Jack stopped, as if to check whether I’d understood what he’d said. I think he’d expected some sort of reaction, something more vocal than me just sitting there with my mouth hanging open. But I was so stunned that I didn’t have a clue what I could say.

  ‘We left him then,’ he continued, ‘and we haven’t seen him since. We don’t want to, either.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ I said, softly, finding my voice. ‘What happened? You only have to tell me if you want to.’

  ‘He wasn’t a good dad, Lily, or a good man.’ He laughed. ‘That’s way too kind. He was a piece of shit. He treated my mum like he owned her. He hurt her – physically, I mean. He used to beat her and kick her and throw things at her. It went on for years, from when I was little. Nobody outside had a clue what he was doing. He wasn’t some drunken yob. He was a teacher, believe it or not: Mr Respectable. He was very clever about it. He’d never hit her in the face or anywhere it might show. There was this one time when he broke her rib and she could hardly breathe properly, and the next night they had to go to some school function, and she put on her lipstick and did her hair and went, like nothing was wrong. I really hated him for that.’

&n
bsp; I thought of Jack’s mum. I liked her. She seemed strong and in control, not the terrified, meek woman he was describing. ‘Why didn’t she leave him?’ I asked.

  ‘I don’t know, why do people do anything? Why did he hit her? I think at first she still really loved him and hoped he’d stop. He promised he would; every time he did it he said he was sorry and it was the last time. Yeah, until the next time. Maybe she thought it was her fault. He said she deserved it because she was stupid and she got things wrong. Like using the wrong plates or putting too much pepper in the soup – if he was in that mood, it could be anything. Everyone else thought he was so wonderful, she probably thought it was her. She didn’t think anyone would believe her if she told on him. He knew that; he told her people would laugh at her or think she was mad. And it probably had to do with money too: she was looking after me and Ruth and not working, and she didn’t want us to lose our home and our friends.’

  ‘Oh my God, Jack,’ I said. I stroked his arm, uselessly, hoping it would be some comfort.

  ‘There’s more,’ he said. ‘When I got older, like nine or ten, and I was a bit taller and stronger, I’d try to protect Mum. I could tell when he was going to lose it – you pick up on these things after a while – and I’d get in between them so he couldn’t hurt her. Sometimes it would work and he’d storm off, other times he’d just push me out of the way. And then, one day, when I’d just turned twelve, he went for me too. I was up in my room and I could hear him screaming at Mum, and Ruth was crying next door, and I just lost it. I’d had enough of him, you know?’

  Breathlessly, he paused, looking to me for approval. I nodded.

  ‘So I went downstairs and picked up the hammer from his tool box, which was out because he’d been putting up some shelves, I think. I wasn’t planning to bash his brains in, or anything like that, although there were many times I could have done. It was just the first thing I found. I don’t know what I was going to do with it, I think I was just going to threaten him with it so he’d leave Mum alone. Anyway, I went into the living room where they were and I held up the hammer and shouted, ‘If you touch my mum again I’ll hit you with this!’ and he looked at me for a moment in shock, and I thought he was just going to walk out and . . .’ His voice tailed off.

  He appeared white, shrunken, as if he was twelve again and back in that room.

  ‘It’s OK,’ I said. He didn’t look at me, his eyes were downcast.

  ‘So he’s staring at me, like he can’t believe what he’s seeing, and then he laughs and he walked towards me, really calmly, and wrestles the hammer out of my hand. I crouch down, with my hands on my head, because I think he’s going to go for me with it, but he drops it and instead gives me a really hard punch in the stomach. And I’m lying on the floor, I can’t breathe properly – I’m winded, you know – and he starts on Mum and there’s nothing I can do to help her. After that, it was like I’d unlocked something in him. A few days later, I said something he didn’t like and he hit me again, on my arm this time, so it was black and blue for days. That’s when Mum had enough. I can’t remember how long it took – a couple of weeks, maybe, she must have been sorting things out – but that’s when she took me and Ruth and we left Milton Keynes. Just got up one morning, packed our bags and left. So there you go, now you know about my dad.’

  He looked up at me and the light seemed to swim back into his eyes. ‘Do you see why I didn’t tell you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. I smiled sympathetically, and hugged him. I was still unable to come up with any words that wouldn’t sound trite or plain stupid. ‘It’s OK, Jack,’ I said. ‘It’s OK.’ But inside my head, I was talking ten to the dozen. No wonder Jack never let himself get wound up, I thought. No wonder he seemed older than his age. No wonder he hated fighting and would rather walk away and be called a chicken than be provoked. No wonder he did that martial art, which he explained was all about self-control and not lashing out. No wonder he’d got so weirdly upset when Eric was misbehaving and I threatened to smack him, even though I hadn’t meant it. No wonder he seemed so perfect, because he’d made himself perfect, so nothing could get to him, and so he wasn’t anything like his father.

  ‘It’s not something I like talking about,’ he said, although now he’d started he seemed unable to stop. ‘And for a while I couldn’t talk about it because Mum was scared Dad would find us, so I didn’t even tell anyone who I really was or where I’d really come from. There’s something else I should tell you. My real name’s not Jack Parmiter, that’s an old family name from way back that Mum picked. I’m Jack Mullins, which probably sounds better, but it’s his name, so he can keep it. We moved around a lot at first, I had to keep going to different schools, making new friends, starting all over again. It was really hard. The reason we came here was partly because of Mum’s job and because we’ve got some family here in north London, but also because he tracked us down again and started making trouble. There’s not a lot he can do now that I’m seventeen and Ruthie’s fourteen. We don’t have to see him any more, like we did at first. He just likes to make us all feel uncomfortable. He thinks we belong to him. He’s like a stalker.’

  Jack looked exhausted, but lighter somehow, as if he’d put down a heavy backpack that he’d been dragging around with him for months. ‘So now you know everything,’ he said. ‘You’re not saying anything, which isn’t like you. Are you OK? What are you thinking?’

  What was I thinking? I wasn’t sure: all the thoughts in my head were jumbled up and knotted together. People say they collect their thoughts, as if they’re collecting stamps, but for me it’s always more like trying to sort a jar of hundreds and thousands into its constituent colours.

  Jack had always seemed to me to be an equation which didn’t make sense, like an x without a value. Now he added up. All my questions and frustrations had been justified; he had been hiding something from me, something which was an obstacle to getting to know him properly. What he’d told me wasn’t what I’d been expecting – although I can’t tell you exactly what I had expected. The truth wasn’t glamorous or funny or outrageous, like the possibilities Katie and I had discussed, it was sad and grimy. If only he could have trusted me with it a little sooner, when I was still to be trusted.

  I was also thinking how strong Jack was, and how brave, and how I was so much luckier than him because I’d never had to deal with anything really bad in my life. No one had ever hurt me, not really.

  I was remembering all the times I’d moaned to Jack about my dad because he wouldn’t let me stay out late or because he was a bit of a fusspot, and how he’d sympathised, when inside he must have been thinking I was blessed, and that made me cringe.

  I was thinking how weird it was that I hadn’t known Jack’s real name and had simply accepted that he was called Parmiter, just as Alex hadn’t thought to question whether I was christened Laura. The big difference was, of course, that Jack had changed his name to help keep him safe, while I’d changed mine because I was playing a game, because I was a nosy, impatient sneak.

  And, most of all, I was thinking about confessing every last detail of what I’d done, so that absolutely everything was out in the open, so that there were no more lies and no more secrets. If there was a time for revelations, surely this was it.

  In the end, what I said was: ‘I’m just thinking how amazing you are, Jack’, and the moment, the opportunity to confess, was lost. It was a cop-out, I know, but I didn’t have a clue where to start. Jack seemed so fragile and I couldn’t bear to break him. He didn’t need to know what I’d done. I’d find another way of making things right.

  He held me, tightly. ‘I’m surprised, but I’m actually really glad I told you,’ he said.

  ‘Me too,’ I said.

  He smiled. ‘It’s good that you know. I feel much closer to you now.’

  ‘So do I,’ I said, because I felt it was what he wanted to hear. And I wanted it to be true, I really did. But, if I’m honest, I felt more distant from Jack than ever b
efore. Laura was no longer hovering in the corner of the room, she’d marched over and wedged herself right in between us.

  Chapter 13

  As soon as my parents had arrived home and Jack had left, I went into my bedroom, shut the door and texted Katie, asking her to call urgently. It was after eleven-thirty but I was sure she wouldn’t be asleep. Not on a Saturday night. She’d mentioned something about going to the cinema with one of our friends, although, to be honest, I’d been so caught up in the dramas of my own day that I hadn’t really listened.

  There was a short delay and then my phone began to purr.

  ‘What’s up?’ she slurred, drowsily, when I answered.

  ‘You weren’t asleep, were you?’

  ‘Not really. Not any more,’ she said, irritated. ‘I told you, I decided not to go out tonight because I was feeling a bit dead. Has something happened? Does Jack know you went to the football?’

  ‘No, it’s not that.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, in a voice which suggested I could have waited until the morning.

  ‘Sorry I woke you. But it’s all got so messy and complicated. I think I need to end things with Alex.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said again. ‘So you want to terminate Project Jared, do you?’

  ‘I’m being serious, Katie,’ I said, and told her what had happened, repeating everything that Jack had told me. I’m not sure he meant for me to share the gruesome details about his father with anyone, but he hadn’t actually said, ‘Don’t tell anyone’, and he must realise that girls tell our best friends everything.

  Katie listened, incredulous. When I’d finished, she said simply, ‘Wow.’

  ‘I know. I can’t keep seeing Alex, can I? Not now Jack’s opened up. I feel awful. Poor Jack. And what if he finds out what I’ve been doing? I’m not sure he’d understand.’

  ‘Too right,’ she said. ‘But you weren’t to know that Jack had some serious stuff going on in his past. You’d never have guessed what his dad did in a million years. He said he was dead, didn’t he? So the way I see it, you haven’t really done anything wrong. Jack lied to you, so you lied to him. You’re even. But now you’ve got to stop it. You don’t need Alex any more. You should just dump her. It’s easy. You delete Laura’s account, you don’t reply to Alex’s messages and you don’t answer her calls or her texts. If you really want to make sure she leaves you alone, you can even change your mobile number – you could just tell everyone it was stolen. It’s a hassle, but it would make Laura completely untraceable.’