Forever Phoenix

by Cathy Cassidy

‘Hey,’ I say softly. ‘Can you tell fortunes? One for sorrow, two for joy?’

  Pie gives two short cries, which I translate to mean joy. ‘School was OK,’ I tell him. ‘Apart from this horrible girl called Sharleen who tripped me up in the lunch hall. I mean, psycho or what? I was very restrained, though. I didn’t fight back …’

  Pie snuggles in, ruffling his wings in sympathy.

  ‘I met the band properly, and they’re OK. Even Marley, although he’s a bit full of himself. I got asked again to audition – they think I actually can sing, which is clearly not true, so I’d be wasting their time. And only drama queens go into the music business, anyway …’

  Pie gives a loud, raucous caw, as if suggesting that he might audition himself. He’d be OK … he definitely likes the limelight.

  ‘Maybe it’d be fun,’ I consider. ‘To be in a band. In an alternate universe, I mean, one where I can sing and don’t let people down the whole time. I could be famous … the next big thing. Mum’ll see me singing on TV and realize how wrong she was!’

  It worries me slightly just how much I like the idea of showing Mum that I am not a total waste of space, that I can shine at something after all. I’ve waited my whole life for her to see something good in me.

  ‘It probably won’t be music, though,’ I tell Pie. ‘Or poetry, come to that …’

  I take my notebook out of my pocket and sing him the ‘Fireworks’ poem with its newly added sixties melody. I have a good look around first, because after all you never know who might be walking past beneath, but everything is quiet and Pie seems to like the song. This is probably the closest I’ll get to a career in music, but as always it lifts my spirits and puts a smile on my face. After a while, the sound of guitar, violin and drums drifts towards me as the Lost & Found warm up for the auditions, and at midday the first hopeful strides in through the wrought-iron gates, looking nervous and slightly lost. I decide to keep a tally in my notebook.

  1. Male, 17 or 18, longish hair, mirrored sunshades … in November? In there no more than 10 mins, not a good sign.

  2. Male, looks like the kid from the Home Alone movies, maybe ten years old if that. Chance of success, zero.

  3. Female, ancient … is she someone’s mum? Not a chance.

  4. Male, 15ish. Spiked-up hair that looks like it’s been fixed in place with superglue. Audition lasted 15 minutes.

  5. Female, very pretty, came out crying. Not looking hopeful.

  6. Sharleen Scott – she isn’t even meant to be auditioning! After two minutes she came out swearing then sat under my tree smoking a cigarette and wiping her eyes angrily. She didn’t see me, as there is still a good covering of goldy-brown leaves. Felt a bit sorry for her but also kind of wished Pie might choose this moment to do something unspeakable on her head. He didn’t.

  And that’s that … she is the last, and it’s still only half one. I slide down from my branch with Pie fluttering nearby until I’m safely grounded again. In spite of the duffel coat and fingerless gloves, I’m half frozen and my mind is on a hot drink, a warm fire and maybe something cheesy and feel-good on Netflix.

  As I kick my way through the fallen leaves, the Lost & Found appear through the trees.

  ‘I did warn him,’ Bex says, before I can open my mouth. ‘We’ve all warned him. He won’t listen!’

  ‘Phoenix, I’m just asking you to give us a chance,’ Marley argues. ‘No, actually, I’m begging you! Bribing you, even. We have hot chocolate back at the old railway carriage. Biscuits too!’

  ‘Why not come and chill for a bit?’ Lee says, looking rakish today in a battered trilby hat with a feather in it. ‘We can hang out …’

  ‘And you can sing,’ Marley says.

  ‘Or not,’ Lexie adds, rolling her eyes as she beckons them back to the old railway carriage. ‘Singing is optional. But we really do have biscuits, promise! Is that a tame magpie? Cool!’

  ‘His name is Pie,’ I say. ‘I raised him from a chick, kind of.’

  ‘Don’t suppose he can sing, can he?’ Marley says, huffing, and Pie stands tall and treats him to an ear-splitting ‘crrraaaaw’ screech, which goes to prove that he is an excellent judge of character.

  ‘Great, even the magpie hates me,’ Marley grumbles. ‘Think I’m better off digging myself a hole in the ground to hibernate for the winter like Mary Shelley.’

  ‘Hey,’ Lexie says. ‘She’s in a box in the garage, not a hole in the ground …’

  ‘She’s a tortoise,’ Lee tells me, grinning. ‘In case you were wondering.’

  ‘I was, a bit …’

  ‘All I’m saying is that Mary has the right idea,’ Marley mutters. ‘I want the whole thing to go away. Seriously, I can’t face another round of no-hope auditions like that last lot. And we were so close! The idea of starting all over again is gutting!’

  ‘It’s my fault,’ Sasha says quietly. ‘I’ve ruined everything. I’m so, so sorry!’

  ‘It’s not your fault at all,’ Lexie states. ‘You were brilliant, Sash, but from what you told us you haven’t been happy since the start. You did the right thing to step out of the lead. Absolutely none of this is your fault!’

  Sasha doesn’t seem convinced.

  ‘We were close, like Marley says, but not close enough,’ Bex points out. ‘No good getting all worked up over what might have been. We have to find a new singer and carry on!’

  ‘How, though? It’s driving me nuts!’ Marley says.

  Everyone piles into the old railway carriage, and Pie doesn’t miss a beat as I follow them in. He can definitely be an indoor magpie when he wants to.

  I blink at the transformation. The cold, dusty sixties time-capsule den where I spent endless childhood hours drawing maps of imaginary kingdoms and dressing up in Grandma Lou’s collection of weird vintage dresses is gone, replaced by brightly painted floors and woodwork in rainbow colours, bench seats upholstered in tulip red and sky-blue velvet. A little wood burner ensures the place is toasty warm, and I shrug off my duffel coat and perch on an old-fashioned armchair, while Pie hops up and down along the back of it.

  A drum kit takes pride of place in the middle of the carriage, and Dylan sits behind it, automatically beginning a gentle backbeat. Happi switches on an electric kettle, grabs a jar of instant hot chocolate from the cupboard and passes round a tin of the promised biscuits while the others slump a little, picking at their instruments half-heartedly.

  ‘Was there really nobody suitable?’ I ask politely. ‘At the auditions?’

  ‘No. I mean, they weren’t all totally awful, but they were wrong for us,’ Lexie explains. ‘Still, we’ll find someone!’

  ‘That’s the point – it can’t be just anyone,’ Marley says with a scowl. ‘We have a sound, a style – we need the right person. Someone who fits, someone who gets what we’re trying to do …’

  ‘It’s not me,’ I tell him gently.

  ‘You’ve made that clear,’ he says. ‘Let’s face it, this is an impossible task. We advertised the auditions in Millford and Birmingham, but that’s not enough. We’ve been clutching at straws. The person we need could be in Croydon or Cardiff or Kathmandu! This whole thing is hopeless. Sorry, you lot … I think this is the end of the line for the Lost & Found. I’m done. Over and out.’ He slumps down on the bench beside me, looking broken.

  Lee throws a cushion at Marley’s head and tells him not to be a quitter, and the others chime in their agreement. They seem genuinely upset at the idea that he might leave the band, and I notice that Lexie is fighting back tears as she hands me the promised hot chocolate. It’s all getting a little heavy.

  ‘Is this yours, Phoenix?’ Romy asks, picking up something from the floor. ‘Think it might have dropped out of your coat pocket. Oh … d’you write songs?’

  I make a grab for the notebook, but Marley is faster. He snaps out of his gloom, jumps up and swipes it from Romy’s hand, scanning the open page with interest. A slow smile lights up his face.

  ‘They’re not son
gs,’ I argue. ‘More … poems, maybe. The “Fireworks” one is English homework …’

  ‘It’s a song lyric,’ Marley tells me. ‘Obviously it is. Got a melody yet?’

  ‘Not really,’ I say. ‘I don’t know anything about that kind of thing. I just write stuff sometimes …’

  ‘I’d say it’s a song lyric, too,’ Bex says, raising an eyebrow at the notebook. ‘Look, couldn’t you audition briefly, so we can cross you off the list?’

  ‘I’m not even on the list!’

  ‘Of course you are,’ Marley says. ‘You’re our only chance!’

  ‘Because Jake overheard me singing in a tree?’ I scoff. ‘That’s crazy! You can’t take his word for it!’

  ‘We didn’t,’ Marley says with a shrug. ‘He recorded you on his phone so we could all listen.’

  Jake has the grace to look guilty. ‘You weren’t supposed to tell her that …’

  I’m almost speechless – but not quite. ‘You’ve been spying on me!’ I protest. ‘Sneaking round, recording me in the dark! Unreal!’

  ‘The point is, you’ve got an amazing voice,’ Bex cuts in. ‘We’ve heard it. Go on, Phoenix – give it a try!’

  ‘You’re meant to be on my side!’ I say to Bex.

  ‘I sort of am,’ she says. ‘But I’m on the band’s side too. Why can’t it be the same side?’

  ‘It can’t,’ I snap. ‘Singing when you’re on your own is not the same as singing in public. OK, so I like singing. It doesn’t mean I’m any good at it. And I can’t sing in front of people …’ I say.

  ‘Can’t or won’t?’ Marley taunts. ‘C’mon – we’re desperate! This is an emergency, and all we’re asking is for is one tiny audition, three minutes of your time. Jake, can you play that rough cut of “Watch Me Disappear”, so Phoenix can get a feel for what we do?’

  Jake slots a smartphone into a small speaker unit and presses play. I sip my hot chocolate as a sad, soulful song unfurls, and, although this song is not really my style, the tiniest shiver slides down my spine at the sound of it. Marley is right – the Lost & Found do have something. There’s an energy, a rawness in their sound that makes my heart jump.

  ‘It’s great,’ I say when the track is over. ‘Really, really good. But I can’t sing that … No way would I remember the words or the tune!’

  ‘We wouldn’t expect you to,’ Marley says, his eyes blazing now with sudden hope. ‘Try. Please. Or sing a song you know – whatever you want! Give us a chance!’

  I shake my head. ‘No, no, I can’t …’

  In my head, I can hear Mum’s voice telling me again and again that music is for losers. I do my best to shake it off.

  ‘Please?’ Lexie asks, passing me the written lyrics of the song I’ve just listened to. ‘Try?’

  ‘For me?’ Sasha adds. ‘So I don’t go to my grave carrying all this guilt and regret? Please?’

  ‘A lead singer with a pet magpie could be kind of cool,’ Lee adds, reeling me in with his laughing eyes. ‘Give it a go? We need you!’

  It’s a very long time since anyone wanted me on their side, on their team. At Bellvale, I was always the troublemaker, the outsider. I was useful for shaking things up a bit, pushing the boundaries, taking the flak, but nobody actually needed me. I’d probably have let them down anyway, knowing me. I am a disaster waiting to happen – Mum’s always said so.

  But, in spite of my doubts, I find myself listening to the track again, clutching the lyrics, my guts a tangle of terror and panic. The band set up and play the tune without the words, and then they’re ready to go again – with me.

  ‘This is stupid … how many times do I have to tell you? No! No way!’ I argue, but nobody’s even listening except for Lee, who leans forward, takes my hand and gently pulls me over towards the mic. Pie, back on my shoulder in a gesture of solidarity, leans in to chitter encouragingly in my ear.

  ‘Sing,’ Lee says, his eyes on mine, smiling as if he knows how scared I am inside. ‘Just sing.’

  So I do. I open my mouth and the words tumble out. My voice starts out small and unsure, but it builds until the song is big and loud and angry, even though the original was wistful and sad and soft. I sing with everything I have, and the others come in around me with drums, bass, guitar, violin, cello and trumpet. The song builds into something different, something bolder than the original version, and I’m hanging on to the mic and pouring everything I have into it.

  When the song is over, Marley runs across and hugs me, which is seriously alarming. Bex and Lee are laughing and the others look slightly stunned.

  ‘Keep going,’ Marley says. ‘This is awesome. Epic! Incredible! Don’t stop, Phoenix, please!’

  He throws me the little notebook with the ‘Fireworks’ song in it, and I sing that to the sixties melody from this morning, with no accompaniment, only a tentative drum beat and a wisp of violin. The others are just staring, grinning, wide-eyed.

  I sing some of Grandma Lou’s favourite sixties songs, including the Ked Wilder hit ‘Phoenix’ I loved so much as a little girl, and Marley hands me the lyrics of a few more Lost & Found tracks, and I try those too. They come out differently to the way they are supposed to sound, but nobody seems to mind.

  ‘There is no wrong way to do it,’ Marley insists. ‘Do it your way, Phoenix. Just sing – we’ll fit round you! Keep going! Please!’

  We practise until the light falls into inky darkness and Grandma Lou knocks on the railway carriage door to see if I’m there because tea is ready and she hasn’t seen me since breakfast.

  ‘I knew you’d do it!’ she says, laughing, shaking her head. ‘I knew it!’

  The band make me promise to come back tomorrow, make me promise I’ll stick with them, be one of them, and Pie flies up from my shoulder and does a circuit of the railway carriage, shrieking and swooping in and out of the band members.

  I’m high on hot chocolate and happiness and song, and I can’t stop smiling.

  8

  Different

  On Sunday morning I’m up early, making pancakes for Grandma Lou. I can’t remember when I last felt so happy. Yesterday afternoon nobody laughed at my singing. Nobody said I was out of tune or flat or squeaky. Nobody said I was an embarrassment. They hugged me and told me I was awesome, and even though I got some of the words wrong and changed the melodies and timings by accident, nobody seemed to care.

  My head whirls with ideas and plans – I want to make pancakes and write songs and sing my heart out, all at once. My face hurts from smiling so much. I turn three cartwheels in a row down the hallway, and come to a halt right in front of the big old mirror that hangs beside the coat stand. My reflection looks surprised, sassy, pink-cheeked. My hair looks like I’ve just clambered through a holly bush and my green eyes are wide and shining.

  I can almost hear Mum’s voice telling me I look like a wild thing, and today that makes me smile. So what? When I was little, Mum liked me to keep my hair short. She said it was easier to look after that way, and old photos show me as a freckled kid with bright auburn curls chopped into an awkward bob. I had to keep my hair back with slides and clips to stop it falling into my eyes.

  When I started at Bellvale, I refused to have it cut again and over three years it’s grown almost to waist length. I hated every tug of the brush or comb when it was short, but these days my hair is my trademark and I look after it properly with conditioner and serum and mousse. The way I see it, people are always going to notice you if you have auburn hair. You might as well give them something to look at, right?

  Today, though, I am my true through-a-hedge-backwards self. I stick my tongue out at my reflection, laughing.

  I don’t look anything like as sad or as angry as the girl who used to look back at me in the mirror at Bellvale. Have I left her behind? Can I be different here, happier? I really hope so.

  I trail a fingertip over the mirror’s surface, studying the crazed and darkened surface round the edges. Who else has gazed into this glass? Did Grandma
Lou ever study her reflection as a teen and wonder how her life would unfold? Could she see adventure, fame and heartache waiting for her? Did my mum stare at her own pinched and frowny face, dreaming of boarding school and Latin lessons and being captain of the hockey team? Probably.

  I wonder what the future holds for me. A few days ago I’d have seen nothing but trouble, but now I feel the faintest stirrings of hope.

  The kitchen smells of pancakes and coffee by the time Grandma Lou comes down. I sweep her up in a waltz around the room, me in my slipper socks and Grandma Lou in her clunky green suede clogs, before dishing up the pancakes, complete with sugar and lemon juice, the way she always used to do them for me.

  ‘It was the weirdest thing,’ I tell her, for something like the seventieth time. ‘Yesterday. They actually liked my voice, even though I don’t sound anything like Sasha. I got things wrong and sang things too fast or too slow, or got the words all upside down – but everyone liked it! They even liked the song I wrote that isn’t even a real song. And they totally loved Pie!

  ‘I don’t get it, Grandma Lou. I keep thinking it’s a mistake. They’ll wake up this morning and worry about how to break the news to me that I’m not right after all …’

  My mobile, which has been buzzing all night with messages from the band, bleeps with yet another. This time it’s from Lee, telling me he’ll see me at rehearsals at eleven, that he’s glad I’m the new singer, that I’m cool and brilliant.

  I think Lee likes me, and there is definitely something about him that draws me in … the cheekbones and the cheeky grin are almost irresistible, but I can’t let myself get involved. I’ve had a few boyfriends – it goes with the bad-girl territory – but it never ends well. They either dump me, because they’re trouble and I’m not reckless enough for their tastes, or I dump them because I’m trouble and they’re too nice, too kind. I’m pretty sure Lee falls into the second category – too nice, too kind.

  I can’t get involved, because things will fall apart no matter what I do … I always get scared, back off. I don’t know if I’m scared of hurting them or scared they might hurt me, but I know I’d mess up and finish things, and then we’d be stuck in the band together and it would be beyond awkward. No, better not to get involved.