by Jean Ure
Just cos it’s not the sort of illness you can see, like when people have flu or something, doesn’t mean it’s not real.
“Let’s go and get something to eat,” I said. “We’ve got to eat properly! For Mum’s sake. Let’s d—” I broke off, as Tizz suddenly launched herself across the room. “What are you doing?”
“I want to hear Mum’s message again!”
Tizz pressed the button on the phone and Mum’s voice filled the room. Light, and bright, almost dizzy with excitement.
“Darlings, darlings! Love you, darlings!”
I couldn’t bear to listen. It simply wasn’t Mum. That is, it was Mum, but it was Mum teetering on the edge. I felt like any minute she was going to lose her balance and go plunging into a big black hole.
Determinedly, I went through to the kitchen and began unpacking the bags. I prepared what I thought was a really good meal. I mean, considering.
I opened a tin of meatballs, put out a loaf of bread with the marge and the jam, plus three glasses of orange squash. Absolutely nothing to complain about. But they were both of them just totally ungrateful.
“Is this all we get?” said Tizz.
“For the moment,” I said.
“What’s it supposed to be? Dinner?”
“Sunday lunch,” I said.
“Tastes like sick,” said Tizz.
“Sick!” Sammy banged her fork down on top of her meatballs and sent one of them flying across the table. I caught it, and put it back on her plate. “Don’t want it!” she shrieked. She banged again with her fork. “I want lemonade pie!”
“Sky,” snapped Tizz.
I said, “Just shut up, the pair of you, and get on with it!”
Sammy stabbed at a meatball and missed. Tizz said, “You chose this muck! Not me.”
She had been so good in Tesco! I might have known it wouldn’t last. Tizz is one of those people, she has these mood swings. A bit like Mum, I suppose. She doesn’t look like Mum, apart from the red hair and the freckles. But Mum’s hair is golden red; Tizz’s hair is more like carrots. And Mum is pretty. Tizz is very small and spiky with little sharp features.
I am just the opposite. Not that I am large, but I am not small, either. And not ‘specially slim. Just ordinary, really. I don’t look a bit like Mum! I wish I did.
Sammy is the only one that looks like her. She doesn’t have Mum’s red hair – Sammy’s hair is coal-black, very sleek and shiny. But she has Mum’s blue eyes and heart-shaped face. Quite different from me and Tizz, just like me and Tizz are different from each other. Nobody would ever guess that we are sisters.
I suppose the reason we are different is that we all have different dads. I don’t remember my dad cos he left when I was a baby. Just walked out, Mum says. She says that he was never really there in the first place, but he obviously must have been there some of the time or what about me? Where did I come from? When I ask her Mum explains that they were only together for a few short months.
“We were just students. Far too young to have a baby.”
Then she hugs me and says, “But I’m very glad we did!”
I do remember Tizz’s dad. He was called Andy, and he was small and thin, like Tizz, and had a nasty temper. He wasn’t there for very long, either. Tizz feels really bitter that I can remember her dad but she can’t, just like we can both remember Sammy’s dad but Sammy can’t. Not that it seems to bother Sammy, though it probably will when she is older.
Sammy’s dad was OK, I guess. At least he didn’t just walk out. He got killed in a fight, which in some ways is even worse. Mum was really upset as she always thought that he was The One. The one that was going to last. Poor Mum! She hasn’t had much luck with her boyfriends. I think maybe she hasn’t always chosen them very well.
Apart from Cal. Cal was different. He was lovely! We always wished that he could have stayed, but unfortunately he had itchy feet. Least that’s what Mum told us. Couldn’t bear to be tied down. We missed him horribly after he’d gone.
But Cal was the only one. The rest were all total rubbish. Tizz’s dad used to throw things and shout, and Sammy’s was too handsome for his own good. That is what Mum’s friend Nikki always said. Mum’s so-called friend. The friend that egged her on to spend money she didn’t have. That took her clubbing and didn’t even bother to ring and find out if she’d got home safely. Cos she must have seen that Mum was hyper. She knows Mum has bipolar. She knows what it does to her!
Bipolar is what Mum’s illness is called. It’s the thing that makes her seesaw up and down. One minute over the moon, the next sunk in depression. I don’t think Tizz has it, in spite of her mood swings. I think Tizz is the sort of person that is just naturally impatient. It doesn’t take much to get her going. Like she’d been OK in Tesco, just for a short while, but then she’d convinced herself that she was going to find Mum waiting for us when we got home and when Mum wasn’t there it flipped her back into her normal aggression. Rather like her dad, come to think of it. Not like Mum! Mum is never aggressive. She is never impatient, either. Not even when she’s super-hyped and is zipping about at a thousand miles per hour while the rest of us are all moving like slugs.
“Hey! Hey!”
I suddenly became aware that Tizz was leaning across the table, poking at me.
“What?” I said. “What?”
“She’s not eating anything.”
I looked at Sammy. She had taken one bite out of her bread and jam, chewed it to a pulp, and spat it out again on her plate.
“Don’t want it,” she said.
She was just playing up. Seeing how far she could go. I knew it was frightening for her, Mum disappearing, but I was just so sick of having to make excuses for them both. Her and Tizz. It was frightening for all of us!
“If you don‘t want it,” I said, “then don’t eat it. Go hungry.”
I could see she was a bit thrown by that. She’d obviously thought I was going to plead with her.
“She’ll get faint if she doesn’t eat,” said Tizz.
“So what?” I turned on her, angrily. “What am I supposed to do about it?”
“You’re supposed to be looking after her!”
I said, “Why me?”
“Cos you’re the oldest,” said Tizz. “And this is all your fault! You’re the one that’s responsible for making sure Mum takes her meds!”
I could have come back at her. I could have said that we were both responsible. But deep inside me there was this nagging voice that said it was my fault. I couldn’t put all the blame on Nikki. Or Tizz. Suddenly I just felt really tired.
“If she wants something else you’d better go and find something,” I said.
“Like what?” said Tizz.
“I don’t know! Anything.”
Tizz narrowed her eyes. “We can’t just eat anything,” she said. “We’ve got to make sure there’s enough for ten days.” She turned, sternly, to Sammy. “If you don’t eat what’s given to you I’ll go and tell Her Upstairs that Mum’s not here and then we’ll all be taken away and split up!”
I know it isn’t good to threaten children but at least it got Sammy to eat. She stuffed her bread and jam into her mouth so fast I hardly saw it leave the plate. Tizz nodded.
“That’s better,” she said. “Now just drink your orange squash. We don’t want any more complaining!”
The next day was Monday, and we had to go to school. I set Mum’s alarm clock so as to be sure to wake up in time for getting Sammy ready and giving her some breakfast. I was used to doing it cos sometimes when Mum was depressed she wouldn’t have the energy to get out of bed and she’d beg me to, “Be a darling and see to Sammy for me.” If Tizz was in a good mood she’d help; if she wasn’t, she’d just be a nuisance. That morning she was definitely a nuisance.
“I don’t think we ought to go to school.” She sat up in bed, hugging her knees and giving me this challenging look, like ‘Just try making me!’
I said, “Don’t be silly, we’ve
got to.”
“Why?”
“Why?” Sammy took up the cry, chanting it as she bounced up and down in her bunk. “Why we got to? Why?”
I snapped, “Cos I say so and I’m in charge! Just get up and get dressed.”
“Shan’t,” said Sammy.
“Shan’t,” said Tizz.
Omigod, she was behaving like a five-year-old. There is some excuse when you are five years old. Not when you’re ten. When I was ten I was already helping Mum on days when she wasn’t up to it. I’d been helping her as long as I could remember. Tizz had never taken her fair share of the responsibility.
“GET UP!” I yelled. I really wasn’t prepared to stand any nonsense. There are times when you just have to be a bit stern. “Get up, both of you!”
“Shan’t.”
“Shan’t!”
Sammy burrowed back deep into her duvet. Tizz continued with her challenging stare. I wasn’t sure what to do. I couldn’t make them obey me.
“If you don’t get up right now…” I said.
“What?” said Tizz.
“What?” shrieked Sammy, from inside her duvet.
“You’ll be late,” I bawled, “that’s what!”
“Can’t be late if we’re not going,” said Tizz.
“Can’t be late if we’re not going,” echoed the thing in its duvet.
Tizz looked at me, smugly. She knew I was at a loss.
“You’re not being fair,” I said. “You know you wouldn’t behave like this if Mum was here.”
“Yeah, well, she’s not,” said Tizz, “is she?”
“Doesn’t mean you can just do what you like.”
But it seemed that it did. I stood, uncertainly, in the doorway. Now what was I supposed to do? Threatening them obviously wasn’t going to get me anywhere. They weren’t scared enough of me.
“Why don’t you want to go?” I said.
Tizz shrugged. “Just don’t.”
“But why not? You’ve got to have a reason!”
I thought she was going to go off into a sulk, but Tizz isn’t really a sulking sort of person. She’s a flaring-up-quickly sort of person. And to be fair, her bad temper never lasts. She muttered something which I didn’t catch.
I said, “You what?”
Reluctantly, she muttered it again. “Mum might come back.”
“Mum!” Sammy shot out of the duvet like a cork out of a bottle.
“We ought to be here,” said Tizz.
I couldn’t immediately think what to say to that. It was a huge temptation just to give in and agree that we should all stay home. I didn’t want to go to school any more than Tizz or Sammy, cos suppose Mum did turn up? She might be confused. She might not realise how long she’d been gone, or what day of the week it was. Then she’d wonder where we were, and she’d get in a panic thinking something had happened. Thinking that we’d been taken away again and she wouldn’t be allowed to have us back. And if she’d come down from her high and was feeling depressed, she’d need someone there to look after her.
Tizz could see that I was dithering.
“There’s no point going to school, we break up next week.”
I said, “Yes, I know, but…”
“Not like we’re going to miss anything.”
“But they’d notice if we don’t turn up. They’d try calling Mum.”
“What, on her mobile?” said Tizz. “Cos that’s the number they’ve got. And Mum’s mobile isn’t working!”
She said it triumphantly, like that settled the matter. But I knew I had to be strong. I couldn’t let her talk me into it.
“If they kept ringing and she never answered they’d get suspicious. They might send someone to check. Like last term there was this boy in my class that didn’t come to school for days? Know what they did? They got the police to go round. The police!”
Tizz bit her lip. I could see that I had shaken her, but Tizz is not a person to give in easily.
“So what happened?” she said.
“They found the family wasn’t there any more.”
“Why?” said Tizz. “Where’d they gone?”
“Dunno, it didn’t say. I read it in the paper. But we don’t want the police coming round!”
Tizz didn’t say anything to this.
“So can we please just get dressed?” I said. “I’m going to go and do breakfast.”
I did toast and jam and a glass of milk each. It wasn’t a lot, but we never had big breakfasts, even when Mum was feeling well. When she was really down we didn’t have breakfast at all, unless we got it for ourselves. I was a bit alarmed, though, to see how quickly you could get through a carton of milk. I mean milk is, like, basic. You can’t live without milk! I was just glad we had our emergency fund.
I was also glad that both Tizz and Sammy ate their breakfast without any whining. I wasn’t in a mood to tolerate whining. I’d had enough of them both and I think they knew it.
“We’ll leave a note for Mum,” I said. “Just in case.”
I printed it out in big letters on the back of an old envelope – DEAR MUM WE HAVE GONE TO SCHOOL WE ARE ALL RIGHT – and propped it up against the radio on the kitchen table where she couldn’t miss it.
I said, “First thing she’ll see!”
We all left for school together, but Tizz and Sammy could walk to theirs. I had to catch the bus. I gave Tizz strict instructions to pick Sammy up at the end of the day, and gave Sammy instructions not to tell anyone about Mum.
“Not anyone! OK?”
Sammy put her finger in her mouth and nodded. She seemed a bit uncertain.
“Another thing,” I said. “Make sure you eat up all your dinner.” We got school dinners for free cos of Mum not working. I didn’t want Sammy coming home with her usual tales of ‘It was horrible, I couldn’t eat it!’
“Promise me,” I said.
She nodded again.
“Keep an eye on her,” I told Tizz.
Tizz said, “How can I? They have their dinner before we do.”
Tizz was in Year six, Sammy was still only Year one. I could see that it was difficult.
“Just do your best,” I said. “I don’t want to have to worry about you all day.”
But I did, of course. I worried about Sammy blurting out to someone that Mum wasn’t there. I worried about Tizz forgetting to pick her up, I worried about Sammy wandering off on her own, and most of all I worried about them not being fed properly. How long would our little stock of food last? Had I bought the right stuff? What were we going to do if we ran out?
At lunchtime, as I reached the puddings section, I saw that there were little packets of pink wafer biscuits. The sort that are filled with cream. They were one of Sammy’s favourites. I reached out and took one, intending to put it on my tray and save it for Sammy. Instead, at the last minute, I found myself not putting it on the tray but slipping it into my pocket. I looked round, guiltily, wondering if anyone had noticed. I didn’t think they had. The only person who might have done was Nina Walters, standing next to me, but Nina wouldn’t say anything. Just so long as none of the dinner ladies had seen…
I picked up a pot of strawberry yogurt. I wasn’t sure what the rules were about having two lots of puddings. I mean, nobody had ever said, ‘Only one pudding per person’. Not as far as I knew. But you could just bet there would be a rule about it, ’specially if you were on free school dinners. They would hate anyone that was getting stuff free going and helping themselves to more than they ought to have. I couldn’t stand the shame. Being shown up in front of the whole school! It was bad enough being on free dinners in the first place. People weren’t supposed to know, but they always found out.
I almost put the yogurt back, cos I’d really scared myself. It was the first time in my whole life that I had ever stolen anything. But I did want to be able to give Sammy a treat! At the same time, I knew I had to keep my strength up cos who would take care of her and Tizz if I went and faded away through lack of food?
Me and Nina carried our trays to the same table like we usually did. Nina was my friend. Sort of friend. Well, no, she was my friend. Just not a best friend. We didn’t share secrets or stay over at each other’s houses or anything like that. She’d invited me to tea once or twice, but it’s difficult when you can’t invite someone back. I’d tried that when I was in primary school. I’d brought my best friend Jenny home and it had been just, like, total disaster cos we found Mum in one of her over-the-top moods, tearing about like a hurricane, singing and dancing and laughing in this scary kind of way so that Jenny had got scared and gone running off. She never came round again, and soon after that we’d moved and I stopped trying to be best friends with anyone.
I knew as soon as we sat down that Nina had seen me put the packet of biscuits in my pocket. She wasn’t unkind enough to accuse me of it, but when we came to eat our puddings she said, “Yogurt’s far more healthy.” I could have pretended that I didn’t know what she was talking about, but I could feel my face turning bright red.
“They’re not for me,” I mumbled. “They’re for Sammy. It’s her birthday on Thursday.”
Nina was a really sweet person. She didn’t ask me why I’d had to resort to stealing. She just nodded and said, “A birthday treat.” I guess she’d worked out that we didn’t have much money, like she’d sussed that Mum sometimes wasn’t well. But she never poked or pried. She just seemed to accept that if I felt like telling her I would, and if I didn’t, I wouldn’t, and as far as she was concerned it didn’t make any difference. She would have been a great best friend!
I was almost tempted to confide in her, to tell her about Mum and how we’d been left to fend for ourselves. It would have been such a relief to let it all out instead of having to keep it locked away inside me. It was like a big knot of panic tying itself up in my stomach. What if this time Mum didn’t come back? What if something had happened to her? What if we never saw her again? I couldn’t offload all my fears on to Tizz. I knew that for her and Sammy I had to be brave and make like everything was going to be all right. But I did so need someone to speak to!
Nina was giving me this funny look. She said, “Rubes? You OK?”
