by Claire Davis
“I’ve thrown up on that bit.”
Bear stood up again, fast. “I just wanted you to know, I understand. OK?”
“Beaut. Now can we have that coffee?”
****
Someone brought a blanket and wrapped it round his shoulders. “Thank you,” he whispered weakly. “I’m so very cold. My bones are cracking.” The girls made sympathetic noises which swam over and through him like a lovely hot bath.
“You’ve got to keep your strength up.” Pink-and-White made endless cups of tea and toast as the group congregated to talk about who’d got most wasted. “You look terrible.”
“Urghff,” he offered. “My constitution isn’t strong.” Not exactly true. Oskar had been the only pupil at Brontë Community Academy to fight off swine flu within a week. While the whole school lay languishing at home, he’d worked hard organising revision timetables. In ten years of education, he’d only missed three days actually sick, though there were a good few spent watching Jeremy Kyle. Truthfully, the endless summer holidays were a struggle. At school, you got free dinner and no mum shouting.
“See you in a bit. Just call if you need me?” Bear slunk off as soon as the others appeared, clearly not able to cope with having to share the son of Simon Le Bon. Under what circumstances Oskar would ever need him was hard to imagine except maybe a zombie apocalypse. Thank god there was no sign of Stella-Artois.
“Where’s Cruella?” Oskar croaked.
“Stella’s got a boyfriend,” Paula Pink-and-White confided. “They’re getting engaged after she finishes here.” The air in the room vanished in the wake of such pathetic enormity. Of course Stella-Artois had a boyfriend, who no doubt sent presents and cards filled with lovey-dovey sentiments.
Oskar sneered. Who needed a boyfriend/weight around the neck? “Loser,” he muttered.
“A boyfriend?” Carol Headscarf said reverently. “Oh!”
“Called Josh. Doing an apprenticeship and saving up for them to get a flat. Stella says he worships her, drives her mad following her round. Says her body sets him on fire but he is prepared to wait,” Pink-and-White finished with a gulp.
“Wait? Wait until she gets rich?” Oskar sniggered. “Or until she has a boob job?”
“Oh! So romantic,” Moira Ears sighed. “Has she got a picture?”
“Yeah. Shall I ask her to show you? He’s really fit.”
“Fit?” Moira Ears was getting on Oskar’s nerves. They were all getting on his nerves, staring at Pink-and-White instead of him.
“I’m not really meant to drink,” he said ruefully, “on account of the muscular problems.”
“Muscular problems?” Pink-and-White looked briefly his way, but her heart wasn’t in it. “Yeah, so Josh is over six feet tall.” They gasped collectively. Oskar sneered from both sides of his mouth.
“That’s right, yes.” He began, ready to explain about his ‘condition’, based entirely on an article he’d read yesterday on the train about environmental factors leading to muscle problems. “Nothing to worry about. Only…”
“Morning.” Stella-Artois stuck her annoying head in the door. “A little worse for wear, are we?”
“Stella! Have you got a picture of Josh to show Carol and Moira?”
“Oh, please, Stella!”
“Cool!”
They were over her like a rash. She strutted, giving Oskar a withering glance. “Sure. There’s one in my purse.” Totally sickening, the way they smothered her. Stella smiled smugly and waved her narcissistic hand around with the picture of the dumb boyfriend. He couldn’t compete with that, at least, not with remnants of sick in his hair.
“He is gorgeous.”
Oskar was out of there, too proud to watch such a shameful show of vanity. Some people needed to grow up and learn what really mattered in life, instead of following idle pursuits of appearance and falseness. For a while, he lay down within the safety of the posters, and tried to force away the pounding hangover by mind over matter. He didn’t want to listen to boyfriend-associated shrieking, but stupid ears wouldn’t switch off. “I miss you, Dad,” he told Simon, but that only led to uncomfortable acid sensations he couldn’t place. It was probably the hangover, or gross influx of toast. Pink-and-White talked about home.
Home.
“No. Not doing it.” Oskar struggled off the bed, ignoring the many aches and pains assaulting his body. Every step was torture. “Bear? You in?” He banged loudly on his neighbour’s door then opened it.
“Yeah, come in.” He was sitting at the desk, reading. “You OK?”
“Not really.” Oskar plonked himself on Bear’s bed, trying not to think of the foetal stain. “That bitch Stella is picking on me again.”
“It’s probably just her way. Some people are very abrupt, aren’t they?” Bear smiled; the shyness in his eyes almost made Oskar stare. “You want to listen to music or something? I’m really enjoying having a room to myself.” His t-shirt revealed a toned body, not that Oskar cared about such frivolities. Not that he cared about anything. Boyfriends were people who tricked and cheated, and were generally to be avoided at all costs. “Or we could go out for a walk to see the town centre?”
“Actually, that might be fun. You think the shops are open on a Sunday?” Oskar thought through the alcohol and bitter vindictiveness of the morning. “Coffee! Oh my god, you are a genius! We could have a coffee.” Suddenly, everything seemed better. Marc Almond would never let Stella-Artois and her followers get him down. He had to remember to keep aloof, because someone like him could never stoop so low as the level of the general populace. “Coffee is the cure for almost anything.”
Bear shrugged and tried to look like he didn’t care. “Yeah, love to. I mean—if you want?”
“Let’s get out of here. Gimme ten minutes to have a quick shower. Meet me in the lounge. I might dress up. Nothing too snazzy.” An image of his make-up box flashed. “Could be more than ten.”
“Great. Be as long as you like. I’ll wait for you outside on the bench. Looks like the sun’s coming out.”
“That’s ’cause I’m here, baby.”
****
Wearing face paints for an entrepreneurial debut into Bangor town centre was a risk. “What do you think, Simon? Yes or no?”
He could be beaten up, or laughed at, surrounded by jeering and violence. “Happened before, Simon. Didn’t it?” Happened before, and then it happened again. At first, Mum had laughed at the make-up, then shouted and after that it had been a slippery slope of the worst Brinsted Gardens kind.
And again.
Families.
He was glad to leave all that behind; so glad that during the first hour of the train journey, Oskar locked the toilet door and sobbed. If it hadn’t been for the ticket official banging on the door, he might still be there now, with smudged mascara and voices taunting out of your depth. Two days ago, his decision had been not to come to college despite working his arse off on exams and revision. Oskar Braithwaite was the first person to have gained A-grade A’ Levels from the local college, just as he’d been the first to apply to university.
Some things weren’t meant to be.
There weren’t any choices, not really. His miserable lot was to stay at home and work full-time in the café, keep up the payments on the flat he’d lived in all his life. It wouldn’t be forever; just until Mum came home to help. All this was obvious, yet somehow, he’d got the train, and several hours later found himself in North Wales.
“Simon.” A sob escaped, bursting through. Sometimes it was better to get the fight over early on because the pain made you stronger. Not at first, and not without losses. “Simon,” he whispered again.
The voice was clear as birds singing outside. “Start as you mean to go on. Face paints and lipstick. You deserve this, my child. For too long you have been living under the cloud of your mother and the sofa-in-the-garden mentality of Brinsted Gardens.”
“OK, Dad. You know best. I’ll make you proud.” When it came to
appearances, Oskar was a freaking perfectionist—as perfect as anyone could be when banned from so much as considering wearing any. No, he hadn’t yet ventured outside sporting his face art. Even Van Gogh had a first time.
Simon was right. He deserved this… Make-up, hair, heels and a plethora of accessories because there’d been no adoring parents and there never would be. He blinked away red eyes, shook his shoulders and began to dress—red lizard Lycra leggings, tight top and red heel boots—hidden under the bed for two years. “Are you sure about the face paints, Simon?” Make-up was the last bastion which Mum had refused to concede. Occasionally she’d allowed heels and sequins—only at home—but lipstick and mascara had led to mind-boggling rants. He froze with one hand hovering above his make-up box.
“You ready?” Bear suddenly knocked at the door. “Thought I’d come and find you.”
“Nope, but you may enter and watch.” Oskar grandly opened the door, glad of an audience before changing his mind.
“Watch? Oh, you look good! Really good—just wow!” The admiration was more than gratifying. Oskar pointed at the bed, where Bear would have a full-on frontal view.
“Please, do not speak until I am complete.”
Bear sat, eyes wide, making Oskar bolder with the paint than he might otherwise have been. Was Bangor ready for a red cheek zigzag reminiscent of David Bowie and perhaps Boy George? Would Bear’s eyes pop if he applied more lash? Was scarlet lippy inclined to make him look cheap? He slipped easily into a dream-like state of artistic freedom.
“Finished,” he finally announced grandly. “I’m ready.” He gathered his furry coat and shiny bag and glared at Bear. “Come on. We haven’t got all day.”
“I—Wow. You look…” Bear stood and waved his arms, clearly at a loss for words in the face of such extraordinary beauty. Oskar shrugged. Their eyes met. All the trains and rivers of two heads collided.
“Come on.”
As Oskar teetered down the corridor past the lounge, Bear and several girls shamelessly stared; in turn, this set off a chain reaction affecting his hips and arse profusely.
“Oskar!” Pink screamed. “Oh my god!”
“You look amazing. What have you done with your face?”
“Can I come?”
“D’ja know?”
They rushed to the doorway to witness the catwalk spectacular, but he would not grace them with acknowledgement after being so cruelly ditched for Stella-Artois. “I will see you later,” he announced formally. If they were lucky, they’d see him later. “So irritating,” he confessed, once outside.
“I guess they’re not used to seeing someone like you. People always think being around fame is so cool, but you know different.” Bear shook his head morosely. “We’re all just flesh and bones.”
“People are easily fooled by the trappings of superficiality. You like my boots?”
“They can’t be good for your feet.” Obviously, Bear wore trainers. “But yeah, they look great. How do you feel now?”
“I will have to adjust to existence amongst the populace, I suppose.” The place was a shithole, worse than Brinsted Gardens. Row upon row of grey houses and front gardens filled with rubbish and old sofas. “Jeez. They sure didn’t put this in the brochures.”
“I meant the hangover?”
“Not too bad. Are we getting the bus?” Oskar looked nervously back and to the side. He couldn’t run fast in heels. There didn’t seem to be anyone around but he knew from experience how much of a target anyone could be if you didn’t know the best routes and hiding places. “We need to get a timetable.” Back at home, he knew the bus routes off by heart. Being out in the open like this wasn’t wise. “Maybe we should turn back?”
“There’s a bus stop just down the street. I noticed it yesterday. Did you know the countryside around here is meant to be beautiful? You can go trekking and climbing nearby. There’s a mountaineering club, too.” Bear spoke in fits and starts, as if he didn’t do it very often. Oskar noticed on the minibus ride he had moments of enthusiasm which would end abruptly. “Are you OK? You look nervous.” They stood by the bus stop in the middle of the wasteland.
“Yeah.”
“Do you get a lot of bother? You know—for the make-up and stuff.”
“I’m normally more careful. Much more careful.” About everything. During the last year doing A’ Levels, Oskar had concocted nineteen potential routes to get from home to college. Only some of them used the front door. Hidden under the bed, pages of notes and timings compiled copiously in the middle of the night. Never the same route two days running and always prepared. “Aren’t you going to ask why I wear it?” Everyone always did.
“No,” Bear said immediately. “It’s obvious why.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Because it looks awesome—so awesome I can’t look away.”
Oskar tripped on his heels with shock that anyone else understood. “Oh. Yeah.” He glared at Bear suspiciously, not sure if, after all this time, he even wanted admiration. “Really?”
“Yeah! You look like one of the pop stars on your wall. Who wouldn’t think you look great? And don’t worry. We’re not doing anything wrong.”
Oskar almost-laughed. “You don’t have to be doing anything wrong.”
“What are you looking forward to about uni? I’m going to join a few clubs but mainly work hard, get my degree. Four years isn’t long. Then I want to find a really good career with animals. Maybe in a zoo setting? But I’m not sure. It’s hard to imagine four years away. Right?”
“And I thought you’d say sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll!”
Bear stared a bit, and then eventually smiled. “Sounds terrifying.”
It was irritating. Bear’s honesty and admiring glances seemed to mess with Oskar’s innards; particularly those between his legs. He glared. “Here’s the bus.” They climbed on. The driver’s eyebrows shot up into a receding hairline.
“You running away to the circus, boy?” Obviously the wittiest thing Oskar had ever heard in his whole life.
“Life is a circus,” he told the driver frostily. “The only difference is in the size of the cages.”
“You’re a one.”
“Indeed I am.” He snatched his ticket and settled in beside Bear. The bus rattled and bumped through street after street of pebble-dashed houses and garden sofas before finally heading down the main street into the town centre. “Look, that’s one of the halls of residence.” Groups of young men hung around outside the gates swapping cigarettes. “That’s where we should’ve ended up.” But as he stared at the matching jeans and jackets, the jealousy faded. Oskar wanted to be in that spacious café and luxury bar instead of riding the bus from the Wild West, but then again he didn’t.
“Never felt the need myself.” Bear stared out of the window biting his lip. Oskar choked.
“The need?” For boys?
“Cigarettes. They stink.”
“Oh!” Oskar sniggered at unhelpful images of Bear and other boys which he’d be re-visiting later. “I’ve had one or two dabbles.” He nudged Bear sharply, but adventure types weren’t known for having appreciation of wit, and after a few seconds of lone chuckling, he gave up. “What you into, then?”
“Working hard and clean living,” Bear said firmly.
The bus coughed to a stop at an abandoned bus station reminiscent of the end of time. Oskar’s heart shot down through his skin-tight Lycra. “This cannot be the town centre? Please tell me it’s not? Where’s the shops?” he asked the driver as they climbed out, followed by a man wearing a distinctive green leather coat. Oskar did a double take to get a closer look, sure the coat was somehow familiar. “Nice coat, mate.” The man winked.
“Straight on ahead. You might be more at home in the exotic gardens,” the driver chortled. Oskar threw him a withering look—not entirely successful—and struggled to catch up with Bear and his long legs.
“Pretty here, isn’t it? I prefer smaller towns than the big cities. I’m fe
eling very positive about this year.”
“Will you slow down? I can’t run in these heels.”
“Sorry. I forget I’m a very fast walker. I normally walk everywhere.” Bear stopped to wait. “Look at the fountain!” As Oskar turned to look, he noticed the man with the coat a few steps behind, tying his lace. It was probably inconsequential, and unlikely anyone else would have noticed, but two years dodging the council officials had taught him a thing or two; the man had no need to tie laces because he wore Velcro trainers.
An uneasy niggle began in his stomach. He was never wrong. “Oh, yeah, that fountain’s great. Is it meant to have rubbish in the bottom?” The man was following, and not for the first time. Oskar was almost certain he’d seen the distinctive coat lurking outside the hostel earlier that morning when he leaned out of the window to vomit. “Bear?” Oskar took his arm firmly to stop the shaking. “Whatever you do, don’t look behind. Just keep walking. We’re being followed.”
Chapter 4: To the Max
Gareth
Dear Dad,
I hope you’re well and taking those vitamins we bought last summer from the chemist in the village. How are your eyes? And are you remembering to feed Bubble and get him the packets he likes—the ones with the cat licking his lips on the box? Please don’t get him the rubbish ones because he won’t eat. Is he OK? Does he miss me? Does anyone miss me? Hello?
Mr. Johnson says if I keep improving like this, I will be ready to do my math and English exams, though I am still very behind. The worst kid here, by a mile. The only kid who hasn’t got any exams at all.
I work as hard as I can. I don’t mind as it gives me something to do when all the others have visitors. Some boys even have family nearby and go home at weekends. I like to get away when all the people come at weekends.
There’s an old part to the library where nobody goes except me. I take my books and a drink and try to read everything I missed the other years when I should have been learning. Exams are only a year away now. I’ve also started researching outdoor pursuits, like camping and walking. Sometimes I use my compass around school. A few times it stopped other kids pushing me around because they wanted to see. Can you believe they’ve never heard of a compass? I guess maybe they were messing with me?
