Carry You

by Beth Thomas

  ‘He’s called Barry,’ Millie shouts to me over the din, giggling. ‘Can you believe it? Barry the barman! It’s hilarious! Like Mr Bun the baker!’

  It isn’t anything like Mr Bun the baker but I nod and grin anyway. I need her on my side. ‘Ha ha, yeah, fantastic!’ I call back, then turn back to the throng at the bar and wonder if any of these tee-shirt-clad kids did their GCSE coursework before coming out. ‘What can I get you?’ I ask the least spotty one.

  ‘Four Malibu and Cokes please, darling,’ he says, exaggeratedly nodding and trying very hard to look like he’s on the electoral roll.

  I tilt my head. ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah, if it’s not too much trouble, babe.’

  ‘Um, well, only slightly. How old are you?’

  ‘I’m eighteen, innit.’

  ‘Right. Of course you are. So you’ve got some ID?’

  ‘Course I ’ave.’ He reaches behind him and pulls a wallet out of his jeans pocket, then opens it and a condom falls out onto the bar. ‘Oops!’ he says, picking it up. ‘How embarrassing.’ I don’t look at it. He waves it around a bit to make sure I’ve seen it, but I’m staring blankly at his face. ‘Probably shouldn’t keep it in there, should I? Awkward!’ My face is immobile. ‘Better keep it safe, eh? Might need it later.’

  ‘Excuse me!’ a voice cuts in from the side and I turn slightly to look. ‘Can I have two pints of lager please?’

  ‘All right, mate,’ Condom says, turning to him. ‘I was first.’

  ‘Yeah,’ says Lager, ‘but I’m not waiting another eighteen months for you to get yours.’

  At quarter to one we’re all done and I drag my coat down from its peg by the crisp boxes. My feet are hurting, my face is still red and my new work clothes are soaked in alcohol. At least they’ll last. Ha ha. I pull my coat on and trudge to the door.

  ‘Oh, Daisy,’ Alex says, coming up behind me. Here we go. He’s going to tell me not to bother coming back. And frankly, who can blame him? No doubt I won’t even get paid for tonight as I wasted so much booze. I turn and face him with a tired smile.

  ‘I’m so sorry about that, Alex,’ I start. ‘I was completely useless, I know. And mental arithmetic was never my strong point. Who knew that stuff was ever going to be useful in real life? If they’d only told me I’d need it one day, I might have paid more attention.’

  He puts his hand on my arm. ‘You were fine, love. Honestly. You coped very well, seeing it was your first night, and a Friday. Can you come back tomorrow at six?’

  I jolt backwards, as if someone has just let off a party popper in my face. ‘Seriously?’

  He nods. ‘Yeah, you did well. Better than a lot of newbies I’ve seen.’

  ‘Wow.’ I don’t speak for a moment, not quite able to believe what he’s saying. My hand fingers my phone in my coat pocket. Must update my status: I want to celebrate! Eventually I nod. ‘Yes, I will. Thanks, Alex. See you tomorrow.’

  In the car park, I tap it in quickly, eager to get some virtual pats on the back for my achievement.

  Daisy Mack

  has got a situation here.

  Stupid really. No one will be up at this time.

  Abby Marcus You got it then? Brilliant. Where are you now? Waiting up for you. Need to know how it went.

  Nat ‘Wiggy’ Nicholson Does that mean you’ve got a job, Daze? Thrilled for you

  Suzanne Allen At last! This can only be a good thing, Daze. Well done you, really pleased xx

  Rachel Pimms Excellent! xoxoxo

  Georgia Ling Omg what r u on about pmsl xx

  Jenny Martin Houston we have a problem.

  Daisy Mack On way, Abs. Discuss at home. x

  Jenny Martin likes this.

  Apparently lots of people are up at this time. And their responses are exactly what I wanted. Although the fact that they’re up at this time and sat staring into Facebook kind of calls their judgement into question a bit.

  God knows why Abby is waiting up for me. If she was that bothered about finding out how it went, why didn’t she come into the pub and see me? And why is she asking me about it on my wall like that? I never discuss private things on my wall. That’s what private messaging is for. Or texting. Not that she ever texts me though. She really needs to sort out her mobile contract. Or read the instruction manual.

  As I come up to the front door of the flat, it’s yanked open from inside before I manage to get my key in, and there stands Abs, in her PJs, glaring at me. ‘Come on, come on, get inside,’ she says, stage-whispery, then grabs my coat and pulls me over the threshold. She even does a furtive glance behind me, as if she’s checking to make sure I wasn’t followed, before quietly closing the door.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ I ask her, as I go through the internal door into her hallway.

  ‘Nothing. Come and tell me all about it.’

  She scuttles ahead of me off towards the living room where she tucks herself under a blanket that’s lying on the sofa. The flat is freezing, as it would be at … I glance at my watch. Half past one in the morning.

  ‘Sit,’ Abby commands. I sit. ‘So what happened? Tell me everything. In great detail. Leave nothing out.’

  ‘Do we have to do this now?’ I venture in a quite frankly death-defying move. ‘I’m shattered to be honest …’

  She stares at me a moment, then opens her mouth to say something, but doesn’t say it. Then does. ‘But I want to know,’ she says. Not petulantly. Not sulkily. More … furtively. If that’s even possible. I narrow my eyes. She’s in her PJs, ostensibly ready for bed, but there’s something odd about her appearance, something that doesn’t quite add up. As I peer, I realise eventually what it is. She’s still wearing a full face of make-up. Why would she get her pyjamas on, but not take her make-up off?

  ‘Is something wrong, Abs?’ Not that wearing make-up with PJs is particularly odd, but added to the other oddities it does seem a bit … well, odd.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  I pause. My bed is calling to me. I can hear its voice, floating on the frigid air. It’s telling me what the temperature difference is between it, and the air around it. It’s not Winnipeg, but it’s close. ‘Nothing. No. Just … could we leave this ’til tomorrow?’

  ‘Of course I wasn’t,’ she says. Stops. Gives a tiny shake of her head. Then continues. ‘Of course there’s nothing wrong, why do you think that? Just because I’ve been waiting up for you all this time automatically means something must be wrong? Can’t I just take an interest in what you’ve been doing? Can’t I just care about you, and how you’re doing in your life? Is that such a big problem for you?’

  I shake my head. ‘No, no, of course not. I didn’t mean that. I was just thinking that … Never mind. It’s OK. I’ll tell you.’ So I tell her quickly about Millie, and Alex, and Barry the barman, and the smashed glasses; I tell her about the banter, and the cheers, and the sarcastic stomping, and the children smoking just outside the door and Millie chasing them away; and I know as I’m saying it all that I had a fantastic time and talking about it all now is making me grin. Abs is hunched over on the sofa, nodding and saying ‘Mm-hmm’ and ‘Right’ a lot. She glances at her watch a few times too, and rocks a bit in her seat. She so wants to go to bed.

  ‘So, all in all, a pretty successful night, then?’ she says, when I finally stop talking.

  ‘Yes, I suppose it was. I mean, it certainly didn’t feel like it at the time, but now, looking back …’ There’s a sudden soft click from the hallway, and I stop talking. Abby flinches when she hears it; it sounds like someone in sports socks trying to close the door really, really quietly. Abs glances quickly towards the door, then back at me. Her expression is unreadable. It’s as unreadable as a blank page. She has apparently erased every hint of expression from her face. Nothing wrinkles, twitches or moves, up or down. She looks like a doll.

  ‘Abs …?’ I start to say, but there’s no time as in that second, Tom’s head comes into the room.

  ‘Oh,’ he sa
ys, freezing as soon as he sees us. ‘Abby. I thought you said you were going to your mum’s tonight?’

  I jerk my head. Last I heard she was going to veg out in front of the telly.

  ‘Changed my mind,’ Abby says dully. ‘Wanted to see how Daisy was getting on at work.’

  The head nods, then moves forward a bit and the rest of Tom follows it into the room. Abs is staring at him with her smooth doll face and, as I look from her to him, I notice that his expression is different from usual too. His usual expression is expressionless, and he now definitely has one. It’s difficult to tell because not much has changed, but his eyes are fractionally wider and there’s a tiny crease in the skin between his eyebrows. Good God. He’s panicking. The man’s so panicked, he’s practically hyperventilating.

  ‘Oh, great,’ he says, nodding slowly. ‘So, er, what time did you get in?’

  I’m not sure whether this is directed at me or Abs, but she resolves my dilemma by answering in a flat monotone. ‘About fifteen minutes ago. We’ve just been talking about it. Haven’t we, Daze?’

  I start in horror. Why have I been brought into this? Both heads swivel on their necks and two sets of eyes turn on me expectantly. Well, no, more imploringly, in fact. It’s the weirdest feeling, as if both people are silently pleading with me to say … What? I don’t know.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say eventually, with a little nod. Abs and Tom both release a long breath and sag a little when I say it.

  ‘Great,’ says Tom.

  ‘Uh-huh,’ says the doll sitting where Abs used to be, in a ‘told you so’ tone. ‘So where have you been?’

  Tom’s face, already alabaster pale, turns a whiter shade, as whatever blood usually trickles round it drains rapidly away. He looks down at the floor, fidgets with his trousers, looks up again, rubs his head, then says, ‘I, um, went to the pictures.’

  ‘Right,’ Abs says without hesitating, then rapidly stands up and strides over to him at the door. ‘Well, I’m off to bed. Night, Daze.’ And she leaves the room. Tom presses his lips together at me, says, ‘Nnurr’, and follows her.

  I think about this very uncomfortable and seemingly meaningless conversation for a few minutes while I get ready for bed, then exhaustion takes over and I fall asleep almost as soon as I put my head on my pillow. It’s a deep satisfied sleep, the sort that gets earned by a hard day’s work, and for the first time in months I sleep uninterrupted the whole night.

  When I wake up in the morning the first thing I see is Abby’s giant ‘TO DO’ list. It leaps into the frame like an accusation, and I reseal my eyelids quickly. If I’m going to sleep as deeply as that again, I’ll have to stop going off staring at The List. A huge inventory of my failings is not the best thing to see first on waking up, before I’ve even had a chance to acknowledge that yet again I am continuing to be alive.

  Then my eyes fly open. Wide open. Oh my God. Oh my God oh my God oh my God. I leap out of bed towards The List and stand and stare at it properly for the first time in ages. Or, let’s face it, ever. My eyes actually feel a bit weird, staying looking at it, and they try to look away a few times to start with, like a hesitant lover. But this time it’s easy to keep looking. It’s great to keep looking. I feel myself start to smile as I’m looking, and then I’m grinning and moving towards the dressing table where I know my handbag is. I don’t take my eyes off the list the whole time as I rummage blindly around in my bag, right to the bottom, until I find what I’m looking for, produce it, then stare at it in glee. It’s a pen. It’s a beautiful, glorious, perfect black pen, designed at this moment for one fabulous thing only. I stride back over to the ‘TO DO’ list, holding the pen up above my shoulder like a javelin, and bend slightly at the middle to find the item I’m looking for.

  ‘So long, ssssssucker,’ I say out loud. I don’t know why I did that. Then slowly and carefully I draw a single straight line through the words ‘Get a job’. I have officially crossed something off The List, and it feels fantastic. It feels better than fantastic. I stare at the words a few moments, now with a thin black line through them, and I cross them out again. Then again; and then a fourth time. Then I re-cross out the ‘Open the envelope’ entry at the bottom that Abs has already crossed out for me. Oh yes, crossing things out on here feels good.

  A few minutes later I’ve wolfed down a bowl of Shreddies standing tapping a foot in the kitchen, and am hurrying to the hallway to get my trainers on. This crossing items off The List activity is addictive. I want more. But I can’t keep re-crossing out the same two things: it wasn’t nearly satisfying enough. So I have decided to tackle a couple of others as soon as I get back from my walk today. The sooner I get the walking done, the sooner I can crack on with them. Felix isn’t meeting me until ten but I can easily text him and get him to be there earlier. Or if he won’t or can’t I will simply wander around on my own for a while until he is ready.

  ‘Bye, Daisy,’ says a voice and I stall in the hall. Glancing sideways, I notice for the first time that Tom is sitting bent over on the armchair by the door in the living room. He’s still in his dressing gown, although it’s gone nine o’clock, and something about his demeanour is suggesting he hasn’t shaved yet. I think it’s the hunchedness of him.

  ‘Bye!’ I call out, leaving my laces undone in my rush to get outside. I’ll tie them later, when there’s no threat of listless lovers looming up.

  I set myself a new personal best getting to the canal bank and quickly fire off a text to Felix. While I wait for him to answer I walk briskly up and down with my hands on my hips, picturing myself at the starting line of the women’s hundred metres final. I jog a little bit on the spot and roll my shoulders back a few times, then tip my head energetically from side to side, blowing breaths out of my puffed cheeks. Something makes a loud cracking noise in one of my ears so I stop doing that. Instead I spend some time stretching. Not really sure how to do this properly but I saw them do it on the telly once years ago. One leg straight out in front, toes up, then bend the standing leg as I lower my bottom towards the ground. Then swap legs. Very good. Now thighs.

  ‘Daisy Duck, are you prevaricating?’

  It’s my mum’s voice, coming back to me from the time, years ago, when I really ought to have been hunting for a job – my first job – and didn’t want to. Well no, not just didn’t want to – was determined not to. Was actively finding a multitude of other things to do to avoid it. Suddenly my room needed a thorough clean out; my clothes needed sorting and donating to charity; there were some books I desperately wanted to read. But what I’m doing now is nothing like that situation. In fact it’s the absolute opposite. I am right in the middle of preparing myself for a major challenge, there’s nothing to avoid, and even if there were, I’m not. I stop stretching while I think about this, then shake my head and do a few lunges. At least, I hope I do.

  ‘Only, you seem to be doing a lot of things other than the thing you ought really to be doing.’

  ‘No, Mum,’ I reply in my head. Still not sure what she’s on about. I’m training hard and I’ve crossed two things off The List already. And am doing a third later.

  ‘Are you sure you haven’t overlooked something?’

  Well that’s one thing I am absolutely sure of. I know I have definitely overlooked lots of things these past few months, but how can I possibly identify what I haven’t noticed?

  ‘Well you could go back over it and look again,’ says a third voice suddenly. Or more accurately, a second. Actually, let’s face it, it’s the first voice, seeing as neither of the other two in this conversation has actually spoken up to now.

  ‘Pardon?’ I say, realising as I look up that Felix has arrived, and it was him who spoke. Which means he has no doubt been wryly observing me warming up like a medal winner as he approached along the canal bank. Great.

  ‘To identify what you haven’t noticed,’ he says in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘You would have to go back over what you have noticed, and think about it all again.’

&nbs
p; I gawp at him open mouthed for a few seconds as the startling realisation of what he’s just said ignites in my mind. It seems that apparently I was answering all my mum’s questions out loud, and Felix saw and heard the whole thing. Oh hell.

  ‘Right,’ I say, wondering frantically how mad I must have looked. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Glad to help. Shall we go?’ He turns and strides off along the canal bank. I hesitate only a second or two and in that time he seems to cover half a mile. I trot to catch up with him.

  ‘You didn’t help actually,’ I say quickly. ‘I mean, I wasn’t really … I wasn’t … It’s not as if …’

  He puts up a hand. ‘Hey, it’s fine. I’m not freaked out, don’t worry.’

  I eye him sceptically. ‘Why would you be freaked out?’

  ‘No reason, because I wasn’t. It’s perfectly normal.’

  ‘What is?’

  He turns and faces me as he continues striding forwards. ‘Reasoning things out aloud. I do it all the time. Helps get things a bit clearer in my head.’

  I glance at him quickly, eyes narrowed, sure that he’s mocking me; but he’s smiling at me frankly and nods a little as we make eye contact. His eyes, I realise, are a deep, shiny brown. Never noticed that before. And that shark tooth is there, lying in the hollow of his throat. My foot snags suddenly on a tree root and I stumble, flailing my arms. Felix’s hand shoots out towards me and grabs my elbow as my body gracefully lurches forward and my legs take three giant ungainly steps to try and catch up with it.

  ‘Whoa, you all right?’

  His arm feels like iron as it takes my weight and I almost stumble again, although there are no tree roots at my feet this time. I shake him off. ‘Yes, yes, fine thanks.’ I close my eyes briefly, feeling very gauche. ‘Right. OK. So I’m not a fruit loop, then. According to you, anyway.’