Wishbones

by Virginia MacGregor

  ‘I was scared.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Of how people would react if they found out. And I was scared of my feelings for him, whether I could trust him.’ He pauses. ‘I was scared about losing you.’

  ‘Me?’

  He nods.

  ‘You’re my best friend, Jake.’ I look right at him. ‘You’re the brother I was meant to have. And I’ll love you no matter what.’

  He blinks and I can tell he’s trying hard not to cry.

  ‘And at least your taste’s improved!’ I burst out. ‘When you hooked up with Amy, I was starting to get really worried…’

  He laughs and looks up and sniffs back the tears.

  ‘So, you’re…’ I take a breath. ‘You’re gay – or bi?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘But you feel differently about Clay, right? From how you’ve felt about anyone else you’ve been out with?’

  ‘Yeah. But that’s because I’ve never been in love before.’

  Jake sits up and leans against the trunk of the tree. I sit cross-legged in front of him.

  ‘I don’t really understand what this situation is, where these feelings have come from,’ he goes on, ‘but there’s one thing I’ve worked out: I love Clay. I love him, the core of him. I feel like I’ve known him my whole life. Like he’s part of me. And that has nothing to do with being a guy or a girl or me being gay or straight.’

  I nod slowly. ‘I get that.’ I look over to the bit of the Lido where Clay and I sat that first night. ‘What about Clay, has he always fancied guys?’

  Jake nods. ‘He thinks so. He’s been working it out for longer than I have.’

  ‘So he’s never fancied girls?’

  Jake smiles. ‘Afraid not.’

  It’s actually a relief, to know that I wasn’t even in with a chance, that he didn’t reject me because there was something wrong with me.

  ‘Does his mum know?’ I ask.

  ‘Yeah. Which is another reason they don’t get on.’

  ‘Because she’s religious?’

  He nods.

  ‘He’s lucky he’s got you,’ I say. And, despite having felt left out and jealous about Jake and Clay, I mean it. I guess because I realise that we’re not in competition, that Jake’s got enough love for the both of us.

  Jake’s eyes look like pools of water in the night.

  ‘I’m sorry I’ve been such a rubbish friend these past months,’ Jake says. He blinks and a tear drops down his cheek. ‘It’s just that Clay’s so weak. He’s been having heart palpitations at night. He struggles to catch his breath at times. But he doesn’t want any help.’

  I’ve thought that about Mum a million times: that she doesn’t want my help, that she won’t let me make her better. And there’s nothing worse in the world than not being able to help the person you love.

  I lean forward and take both of Jake’s hands in mine.

  ‘You love him,’ I say. ‘You’ll find a way.’

  1 June

  Willingdon Day

  37

  I stare up at the wall next to my bed. Dad painted it a sky-blue so that, when I wake up in the morning and go to sleep at night, I can pretend I’m floating in the sky or in the water. He explained how this was Max’s room and how he and Mum painted the fish and the boats and the waves onto the walls.

  ‘Where did I sleep?’ I asked Mum in one of the splinters of conversation we’ve had about how things were before Max died.

  ‘With us, in a Moses basket. Then, when you were six months old, we moved you in with Max.’

  So I was right, we would have shared a bedroom.

  ‘He must have hated that,’ I said. ‘Having his little sister invading his space.’

  Mum shook her head. ‘He loved it. He loved you.’

  I asked her too, whether I really made her sad when I was born, and she shook her head and smiled and cried and said, ‘You were my angel, my perfect little girl. Nothing about you has ever made me sad.’

  I understand then that it was her way of avoiding having to tell me the harder truth, that what really broke her heart, what made her push the world away, was losing her little boy.

  Dad said they wallpapered over the seaside scene when I was five. So I guess it took them four years to get their heads round the fact that Max wasn’t coming back.

  Happy Birthday, Max, I whisper.

  Because that’s another thing I have to get my head round – we were born two years apart on the exact same day: Willingdon Day.

  I close my eyes and imagine him saying it back to me.

  Happy Birthday, little sister.

  I blink and shift my head and look at what used to be my investigation wall. I’m going to put new photos up – there are two up there already: the one of me and Max we found on the garage floor and another one of Max standing in our front garden in a red jumper, leaning into my pram. Mum’s standing behind him, pointing at me and smiling. Max is grinning too and you can see my little hand poking up, reaching for his face. Dad took it.

  Soon after the newspaper article came out, Dad gave me the box of photos I found in the garage in January. I’m going to put them up on the wall, one by one, and then I’m going to put other photos up too, from how things are now, starting with pictures of Willingdon Day. Dad’s got his old camera out again and he’s going to take photos today.

  The past is part of our present, wasn’t that what Miss Pierce taught us? And she’s right, but I also know that we have to allow the past to make our present better, that we can’t be locked in by it, like Mum was.

  My legs feel heavy and tired. I haven’t slept much, probably because I’m too excited about today and because the diggers woke me up early as they left the village. They’ve been working right up to the last minute to get the Lido ready.

  I stuff my towel, my swimming costume and my goggles into my bag. I want to do a few laps before the competition later this afternoon. I want to do a few laps before the competition later this afternoon. I need to float around for a bit and clear my head. Steph’s been coaching me again; she’s going to join me at the pool.

  Dad said he would drive me, so I knock on his bedroom door, but he doesn’t answer. When I walk into the room, it’s empty.

  When I get to the kitchen, I hear a ‘shushing’ behind the closed door and footsteps, and something clatters to the floor, and then there’s another, ‘Shush!’

  ‘Dad?’ I open the kitchen door.

  ‘Happy Birthday!’ Mum and Dad blurt out at the same time.

  They’re standing in the middle of the kitchen with party hats on. Dad blows through a paper party horn. There are balloons everywhere. And Mum’s holding a cake with fifteen candles.

  ‘You made a cake?’ I ask.

  Mum and Dad nod and grin.

  ‘We made it together,’ Dad says.

  ‘From your recipe book,’ Mum chips in.

  ‘It’s got bananas and avocado in it…’ Dad says proudly.

  ‘Blow the candles and make a wish,’ Mum says, ‘quick, before the wax drips.’

  I close my eyes and my mind reels off a list of wishes. And then I think about how I don’t need to wish for anything right now, I just need to open my eyes wide and take everything in – that wishing will just make me focus on what’s not here yet, and I don’t want to do that any more. So I take a breath, fill my cheeks and blow as hard as I can, and I don’t make a single wish. Instead, I let myself feel the moment: the glow of candles against my face, the smoke, the smell of chocolate and banana, the sound of Mum and Dad breathing and then clapping when all the candles are out.

  ‘I’ll have the cake when I get back from practice,’ I say. ‘Can you still take me to the pool, Dad?’

  I know you’re not meant to train too hard just before a race but I need to feel the water on my skin, to tune in.

  Mum and Dad exchange a glance. I’ve tried really hard not to talk about swimming in front of Mum. I get it now, how hard it must be for her, l
istening to me going on and on about how much I love swimming when all it does is remind her of how Max died.

  Dad nods. ‘Of course.’

  But at just that moment, the doorbell goes.

  ‘Who’s that?’ I ask.

  ‘Go and see, my love,’ Mum says.

  I open the door and find Steph and Jake standing at the top of the ramp. They wave balloons and chant, ‘Happy Birthday, Feather’, and I stretch out my arms and we have a massive group hug.

  ‘We thought we should take you for your last practice,’ Steph says. ‘Like old times.’

  ‘Thanks, Steph,’ I say.

  Then I give Jake a massive hug of his own.

  As I step out of the house I look across The Green. The whole village got together last night to decorate The Green and the park and the new Lido – balloons and streamers and banners in fire-engine red, Max’s favourite colour.

  As I get into the car, I notice Jake looking over to the rectory.

  ‘He’s coming today, right?’ I ask him.

  Jake shrugs. ‘Maybe.’

  Whenever I ask about whether I can come with him to see Clay, Jake says that Clay’s not feeling well or that he’s too tired to talk. Clay’s got worse over the last few weeks. He’s basically stopped eating.

  As I sit next to Jake in the back seat of Steph’s people carrier, I whisper, ‘He’ll come, you’ll see.’

  If necessary, I’ll march right over to the vicarage and drag Clay out.

  By two o’clock, the whole of Willingdon and Newton and, from the looks of it, the rest of the county, are gathered around the Lido. Everyone except Mum. I didn’t even ask Mum to come and watch me this time; I know that she doesn’t have to be in the middle of the crowd for it to feel like she’s with me.

  I stand in my swimming costume at one end of the stage they’ve put up at the far end of the pool, alongside the other competitors. I thought that maybe they’d change the Lido, make it look modern and fancy, but it’s exactly the same as in the picture Mum showed me. I feel like I’ve travelled back in time: whenever I look around the park, I expect to see Max and Clay chasing each other around, too close to the edge.

  ‘Hey.’ I hear Jake’s voice behind me. ‘Just came to wish you luck.’ He jumps onto the back of the stage and gives me a hug. ‘You’re a hero, Feather Tucker, never forget that.’

  I watch him run across the park and that’s when I see Clay sitting on a bench a little way off from the Lido, a shadow, his head bowed. He’s not even paying attention to anything going on around him and he doesn’t lift his head when Jake sits down next to him. But at least he came.

  The Mayor of Newton taps the microphone. He’s standing on a platform they’ve put up specially for the ceremony, resplendent in his fancy robes and chains, in front of a big blue ribbon that stretches across the pool. In a few moments, the new Lido will be open.

  ‘Good afternoon…’ he starts.

  A murmur spreads through the crowd. People turn their heads and look around them.

  ‘This is a very special day for our community…’ he goes on.

  I expect the crowd to shush when the mayor keeps talking but the whispering gets louder. Then someone gasps and people start moving to one side, until a long path opens up from the park gate all the way to the Lido.

  I crane my neck to see what’s going on.

  Someone starts clapping – I turn to see Rev Cootes holding his arms in the air, smacking his hands together. Houdini does pirouettes behind him and Mrs Zas, who’s standing next to Rev Cootes, joins in the clapping too. And then the clapping spreads, rippling through the crowd.

  People are pressing into each other now and shouting things and elbowing each other to move out of the way.

  It’s her hair I see first – the sun bounces off it like it did in that photo from fourteen years ago. And then I recognise her walk, wobbly as a toddler. With each step, she presses her palms into her canes. Her eyes are fixed ahead in concentration.

  The clapping gets louder, like a wave of thunder rumbling through the park.

  By the time Mum gets to the stage, the front of her dress is drenched and her forehead is covered in beads of sweat and her face is so red it looks sunburnt.

  She scans the swimmers and then spots me. Our eyes lock and then her face breaks into a smile and she holds up her thumbs.

  ‘You can do it, Feather,’ she mouths.

  A balloon of light explodes in my chest and every bit of me feels alive.

  The mayor, who’s been the Mayor of Newton for so long that he was probably there for the opening of the first Lido, gathers up his robes, climbs down the stage steps, goes over to Mum and gives her a kiss on each cheek.

  The crowd is still and silent.

  The microphone catches his voice.

  ‘It’s good to see you back, Josephine,’ he says, loud enough for everyone to hear.

  He proffers her his oversized ribbon-cutting scissors. And that makes me panic. It’s one thing Mum coming to see me swim – opening the Lido where her little boy drowned, that’s something else altogether.

  But Mum keeps smiling and she puts down her canes and takes the scissors. Then she lifts one of her massive legs onto the stage steps. The mayor offers her a hand but she bats him away and gets up on her own. It should have been embarrassing, watching this big, sweaty woman clambering onto a stage, but no one laughs or smirks, because Mum doesn’t look embarrassing: she looks strong and determined and brave. The crowd watches her really quietly, but once she’s up there, standing straight in front of the microphone, they clap again, even louder than before.

  I run across to Mum and throw my arms around her.

  She kisses my cheek and whispers, ‘Fly, my little Feather, fly…’

  ‘I love you, Mum,’ I say and then go back to the other swimmers.

  The Willingdon Marching Band starts up. I notice Mr Ding crashing his cymbals, his eyes fixed on Mum like he’s doing it for her.

  And Mum takes a deep breath and opens the oversized scissors and slices through the big blue ribbon.

  ‘I declare the Lido officially re-open!’ she says, her voice low and rumbling and beautiful.

  There’s more clapping and Mum climbs down off the stage and goes to sit on one the spectator benches they’ve put up around the Lido, then the Willingdon Band starts playing one of those jolly, bouncy tunes.

  When it’s my turn to race, I feel as light as a soap bubble. For once, there’s no strain. I just swim. I feel like I did this morning when I blew the candles out on the cake. I don’t want to think about what’s coming next, about winning, I want to enjoy it. I want to feel the sun and the water, to hear the crowd shouting, to know that the loudest shout of all comes from Mum, standing at the end of the pool, waiting for me to finish:

  ‘Feather! Feather! Feather!’ I hear every time my head shoots out of the water.

  And, like at the regionals, I do feel I’m flying, flying free this time, flying through water.

  I don’t come first, or I don’t come first on the clock or the competition charts, but as I climb out of the pool, and give Mum a big, soggy hug and feel her chest heaving as she laughs about getting drenched, I know that I’ve got the only prize I ever wanted: Mum right here with me. After the races we go and have a massive picnic on The Green. Along with his Chinese food, Mr Ding’s selling ice creams out of his van and Dad’s manning the BBQ with some help from Rev Cootes, and Mum’s pouring drinks.

  I grab a tray of noodles and spring rolls and go to sit with Clay and Jake. Jake bites into a burger. Clay pulls at bits of grass. He goes moody whenever we mention food, just like Mum used to when I’d talk about swimming, so we don’t even ask him to join us any more. I wonder when he actually last swallowed a proper mouthful of food; I wonder how long his body can keep going on air.

  Clay stands up and brushes the bits of grass off his jeans. ‘I’m going back to the house for a bit.’

  Jake scrunches up his burger in its wrapper and hands it
to me.

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ he says.

  I know he has to be there for Clay, but I still feel a pinch.

  Clay shakes his head. ‘It’s okay, I’m just going to sleep.’

  These days, Clay spends more time sleeping than awake. ‘You’ll come out for the waltz though?’ I ask him.

  He looks at me blankly.

  ‘It’s important,’ I say. ‘For the village. For your grandpa.’

  Mrs Zas has decided that this year it’s not going to be a competition. She wants everyone in the village to enjoy the dance floor, for it to be a celebration. Mrs Zas has made dresses for all the women in the village, including one for me. Mum probably put me in dresses when I was a baby but this is the first dress I actually remember wearing. It’s pale blue, like the sky.

  I look over at the boards that make up the dance floor – they’re all set up in the middle of The Green, surrounded by coloured lanterns and loudspeakers.

  I can’t wait for tonight.

  ‘It’ll be fun,’ I say to Clay.

  Clay shrugs and starts walking back to the rectory. And then, halfway across The Green, he stops dead.

  A cab pulls up outside St Mary’s. And cabs never come through Willingdon.

  I crane my neck to see who it could be.

  Clay’s body has seized up.

  It’s the heels I see first: navy, shiny and really high. And then a pair of long legs with those shimmery, flesh-coloured tights. And then the navy suit. And then the blonde hair, tamed into a straight bob.

  She looks like a celebrity. Tall and sparkly and nothing like anyone in Willingdon.

  The driver takes the woman’s small wheelie suitcase out of the boot, shakes her hand and then leaves again.

  ‘Come on.’ I grab Jake’s hand and yank him towards Clay.

  The woman scans The Green and then her eyes settle on Clay.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Rev Cootes striding across from the BBQ. When he gets close to Clay, Clay points at him and yells:

  ‘You called her?’

  And that’s when it clicks: it’s Clay’s mum.

  Mum and Dad look across at her from the BBQ.