“Eeeww,” shouts Nish, waving his arms around. “They eat little pigeons.”
“They’re not made of pigeons,” says Tiny Eric, looking around the classroom. “They’re cabbage stuffed with meat cooked in tomato sauce and spices. My babcia makes gołąbki. I’ll be having some soon.” He pauses. “Very soon.” The words drift away and Mrs Chatterjee thanks Tiny Eric for his enlightening talk about Poland. As he sits down he says, “I don’t like little pigeons.”
“I don’t like cabbage either,” I whisper back.
“No, I just don’t like little pigeons,” says Tiny Eric, folding his arms.
I look at Tiny Eric but he turns his back on me. I don’t think he remembers he’s talking to a proper superhero now. No one would turn their back on a superhero, would they?
Later that same afternoon I’m in ICT and I have this bright idea about how to find my real mother, Rose. So when Mrs Chatterjee tells us to use the computers to research designs for water bottles, I search the name Rose Walker instead. While Mrs Chatterjee is going on about style and convenience, I’m looking at three people by the name R Walker who mention they live in the Pegasus Park area. When I squint at the photos on the Internet I know the first R Walker can’t possibly be Rose, because it’s a man and he’s aged about eighty. He lives on the outskirts of Pegasus Park with his wife, Mabel, and twenty cats. I couldn’t live with twenty cats, not after what that cat did to me when I tried to help it. I’ve still got the scars. The second woman is about twenty and is waterskiing (not in Pegasus Park because we’re not near a beach). Too young, I tell myself. The third woman looks about the right age and there’s a photo of her wearing a pink vest saying Lettuce Eat, which is a grocery shop in the precinct. She could be my mother, I think.
As Mrs Chatterjee begins a circuit of the room, I quickly close down the pages I’ve been looking at and pretend to be interested in a water bottle design, but all the time I’m thinking I might have seen my real mother in that picture. But there’s only one way to be sure, and that’s to go to Lettuce Eat and see this R Walker lady face-to-face. If she is my real mother, it’ll be amazing. I’ll tell her who I am, she’ll hug me and I’ll ask if I can live with her. Of course, she’ll say yes. This couldn’t have worked out better if the four-leaf clover had arranged it for me.
As soon as the bell rings for the end of the day, I’m up and ready to rush out the door, when Mrs Chatterjee hands each of us a white card. I glance at it and put it in my school bag, then I’m out and running towards the school gate. I’m going to visit the precinct on the way home. Excitement builds up inside me as I run down Agamemnon Road and take a right into Primrose Grove. As I near Lettuce Eat, I keep telling myself that I might be five minutes away from meeting my mother. Four minutes. Three minutes. Two minutes. In fact, I’ve been in Lettuce Eat a few times with Mum recently when she was buying vegetables and I might have passed my real mother and not realized.
When I reach Lettuce Eat, I decide to press my face against the glass and look in first. Unfortunately it’s one of those doors that opens automatically when you get close enough…
After picking myself up off the floor I wander around, pretending to be interested in watermelons, but the whole time I’m looking out for R Walker. As I’m walking past the fish counter I’m stopped in my tracks and it’s nothing to do with a giant cod eyeballing me. Someone is standing behind the counter with their back to me, wearing a bright pink tabard, their long hair pulled back in a ponytail. I can see the rainbow glint of scales as they lean over a fish, and I think, This could be Rose. My stomach somersaults, flips and rotates so much I imagine it winning its own Olympic gold medal.
I look down and see a crab in the glass cabinet with a label that says it’s dressed, and it’s really expensive, and my mouth suddenly goes off on its own, squealing, “Holy doughnuts, what’s that crab dressed in? A golden cape with diamond pants?”
My stomach is still doing gymnastics and then it falls flat on the floor with a splat as the person behind the counter turns around. “What’s that you said about diamond pants?” the man says in a deep voice. He blinks and his ponytail swings gently like a horse’s tail flicking flies on a lazy summer’s day. There’s so much shock on my face, the man asks if I’ve seen a ghost. “No, no,” I say as I shuffle away. “You’ve got to be squidding. I mean kidding.”
I’m in the frozen potato aisle looking at the potato shapes, when I hear a voice over the tannoy saying:
“Could Mrs Walker please come to the till?
Could Mrs Walker please come to the till?”
It feels like all the potato shapes have exploded from the freezer and have spelled out THIS IS IT in the sky. My real mother is in this shop. And I can see a woman walking towards the till and she’s in a pink Lettuce Eat vest and she’s smiling and, oh, she’s got the loveliest smile. My heart is ping-ponging inside my ribcage and I’m skidding towards the tills like I’ve got banana skins on my shoes. R Walker is taking a seat and turning a key and smiling at a customer in front of me, who incidentally must be like Old Mother Hubbard who had nothing in the cupboard, because her trolley is piled so high.
Ten minutes later when I’ve nearly lost the will to live and I’m slumped against the energy drinks, I hear R Walker say, “Thank you,” and watch as the receipt spills from the till. Suddenly I spring up and face her.
“Rose.” The word is soft on my tongue.
“You’d like some roses?” The woman looks around and is about to press a buzzer when I say it’s a pretty name. “Oh, yes, it is.” She looks a bit confused and now I’m confused, because I thought she’d say she was called Rose and I’d say I was Ace. And then it would be like fireworks going off in my head. “Do you know anyone called Rose?” I blink.
“I don’t,” she replies. “Do you?” At that moment I see she’s wearing a name badge and it says RAMONA WALKER. I’m so deflated I feel like a whoopee cushion that just had a giant bum sit on it.
I am not her son.
Today is not the day I find my real mother.
When I get home, Mum and Dad are sitting at the kitchen table and there’s a piece of paper in front of them. I get a glimpse of what they’ve written: THINGS WE NEED – BED, BLANKET, TOYS… When they see me standing in the doorway, Mum quickly puts her hand over the paper and her cheeks go as pink as a flamingo’s bum. She asks me how my day was. I tell her gołąbki means “little pigeons”, and Mum says she’s never heard baby pigeons called that. Then she says she’s never actually seen a baby pigeon.
“It’s a Polish dish,” I say, looking away, swallowed up by hurt. My stomach feels like there’s a bowling ball in it but when I hear Mum sigh softly I remind myself how superheroes want what’s best for others. But deep down I still can’t help how I feel. It was bad enough not finding my real mother today, but seeing the list of things they need for the jelly bean has made it one billion times worse. I glance at Mum saying, “Tiny Eric was talking about it. It’s not baby pigeon pie though, it’s got cabbage in it.” Mum’s hand doesn’t move and there’s a strange atmosphere in the kitchen and I feel like it’s somehow my fault for interrupting their talk about the new baby. Slowly I turn and slouch away to SPAM HQ, muttering that I’ve got homework to do.
I can almost hear Mum’s sigh of relief from my bedroom.
When I pull my notebook out of my school bag, the invitation Mrs Chatterjee gave us to the Forest For Ever exhibition falls out too.
I’m not telling Mum and Dad about the exhibition. It would be too awkward now and anyway, I don’t want to upset Mum by telling her I was snooping. As it is she’s like the human equivalent of Atlas (who Mrs Chatterjee says is a titan who carries the weight of the world on his shoulders). I’ve decided I’m just going to invite my real mother, once I’ve found her. Anyway, Mum and Dad will be too busy buying toys and baby blankets for the jelly bean to worry about it. I push the invite back into my bag and slide off the bed, then grab a torch and make my way to the window. Outside I ca
n see cars whizzing past. I switch my torch on and off. “If you’re out there, Rose,” I whisper, “I’m sending you a sign, so we can connect. I want to live with you and have a future with you. I can’t stay here any more because everything is changing around me. I don’t want it to change but I can’t stop it. Thing is, I’m trying to be a superhero about the whole situation – I want others to be happy.” I pause. “Even if I’m not. So, like I said, I’m sending you a sign because you’re my future now.” To be honest, I don’t know what the signal is supposed to be, but I’m sure my heart is sending a message out into the world.
Unfortunately no message comes back.
At six thirty precisely (because my stomach is rumbling and telling me it’s dinner time), Mum announces she’s going out to her first Bellybusters weight-watching class in the Pegasus Park Parish Hall. She’s wearing a slouchy grey tracksuit and a zip-up hoodie. To Minnie’s disgust, Mum says she’s going to go from a couch potato to a goddess in a few weeks. From the look on Minnie’s face, there’s only room for one goddess in this flat and it’s Minnie herself. Mum says she’s going to learn about how to take care of her body both inside and out. I swallow and look at Mum’s belly. It doesn’t look any bigger. Not yet anyway. “There’s a quinoa, lentil and sweet potato stew in the oven,” says Mum, throwing her bag over her shoulder and making for the front door. “Help yourself.”
When the door closes, Dad looks at me, Minnie and Velvet. “Anyone for keen-wah?” Silence descends like a heavy blanket. “Um…anyone for pizza? We could order a Hawaiian. That’s got pineapple on it and I’m certain pineapple is healthy. It’s got to be one of your five-a-day, along with cheese, tomatoes, bread and thick crust.” Dad is nearly deafened by us screaming, “Yes!” Dad rings up Slice of Heaven and orders a giant Hawaiian and potato wedges (which he says are extra vegetables).
It arrives fifteen minutes later and the kitchen is full of the scent of melting cheese. I ask Dad if I can have some spaghetti hoops with my slice. Since Mum’s been on this health kick, I’ve missed eating spaghetti hoops. I used to eat them from the tin cold, or I’d have them on a jacket potato with cheese, or on toast. Mum used to say I’d turn into a spaghetti hoop one day and we’d all laugh. Dad opens a tin of hoops and heats them in the microwave, then sets the bowl in front of me as everyone helps themselves to slices of pizza.
Hot tomato sauce dribbles down my chin and I wipe it away with my hand. I look around the table. Dad’s laughing and I can see pineapple chunks between his teeth. Minnie’s rolling her piece of pizza up like a carpet and saying the smaller the slice, the fewer the calories. Then I glance at Velvet and she’s stretching a piece of cheese between her fingers like it’s yellow snot. There’s a pebble of sadness lodged in my belly when I think about how soon I won’t be eating at this table. Forcing the thoughts away, I think of my real mother. I’ll be at her table instead and I won’t be living with complete strangers. This is a good thing. I’ll have my own bedroom again and, just like my bedroom here, I can decorate the walls with pages from comics. It’s going to be okay, I tell myself.
I don’t know why, but it feels like there’s an even larger pebble in my stomach now.
As soon as Mum gets back from Bellybusters she sniffs the air. “Can I smell fat?” she asks, her nose twitching like a rabbit’s. “Has someone been eating pizza?” Dad’s shaking his head and wiping a string of cheese off his lip. Mum wanders into the kitchen and sniffs, saying she’s certain it smells of unhealthy food. It’s lucky she hasn’t looked under the table, because that’s where Dad has hidden the boxes. Then Mum launches into this big talk about what she learned at Bellybusters and how she needs to get healthy for the future because the future is important. Her eyes water when she says “future” and suddenly I blurt out that she’d be better seeing a doctor than going to Bellybusters.
I can’t believe my mouth went and said that.
Mum stops and it feels like all the air has been sucked from the room. Dad looks at me, his mouth hanging open. I swear there’s still some pineapple stuck between his molars. Minnie and Velvet look confused, although Velvet usually looks confused anyway. Minnie asks why Mum needs a doctor. I can hear my heart beating and my fingertips tingle. Everyone is waiting for me to speak and when I do my voice is all shaky. “Um…I meant for your eyes. I think you’ve got conjunctivitis ’cause your eyes are always watering. Tiny Eric has conjunctivitis too. You’ve got to look after yourself, Mum.”
Mum relaxes and she rubs away a tear, mumbling that I’m probably right. She promises she’s looking after herself and then offers everyone some pudding she’s left in the fridge. Apparently, it’s called chia pudding. Mum brings out a big bowl and we all look at it in horror.
“Since when did a frog start laying spawn in the fridge?” Dad asks.
I excuse myself, saying I’ve got something important to do. To be honest, I don’t actually have anything to do, but I’m not eating anything that looks like it belongs in a pond, even if it is as healthy as Mum says. When I get to SPAM HQ, I stare at my comic wallpaper. A tiny corner is peeling away. I poke at it. It comes away easily. I’m a superhero. I pull at another bit of paper. Everyone should be happy. A big strip of paper comes away in my hand. Mum will smile any time soon now I’m a hero. There’s a rip as another bit of paper falls away and lands on my foot. I’m even helping Mum get this room ready for the jelly bean by taking down the comics. I feel the wallpaper between my toes. I’ll be okay because I’m invincible. I stop, feeling my nose beginning to run. I’m unstoppable. I swallow. I’m also worried about having a place to call home with someone who loves me. There are lots of curls of wallpaper surrounding my bare toes by now. I’ve helped Mum and Dad start the nursery. It’s a nice thing. Something a superhero would do. But why does it feel so awful?
Later on, as I’m heading to the bathroom before going to bed, I sense a tiny movement to my right. Mum’s bedroom door is open a crack and I see her standing in front of the mirror, wearing the saggy tracksuit from earlier. She’s staring at her reflection and her eyes are misty again. Suddenly she reaches out and grabs the dressing table and her knuckles are white and bloodless. A sob builds up inside her chest and silent tears flood her cheeks.
Ducking into the bathroom without a word, I lift the toilet seat and stare into the water. Mum’s still sad about something and I don’t know why. Why would she be sad when she’s got the jelly bean on the way?
When I get back to my bedroom I pick up my bobblehat-wearing teddy bear. “Second-in-command,” I say, saluting. “You have a mission. Mum has written toys on her list. You are the best toy in this house.” Dad won me this teddy bear years ago when we went to an amusement arcade. Minnie had won a toy on her first try on a claw crane machine, but I hadn’t. I thought I was different and asked Dad why I couldn’t be as good as Minnie. Dad said I wasn’t different, that his children were all as special as each other and he tried the claw crane over and over again until he won a toy for me too. He says he probably spent about fifty pounds to win that bear. I pet the fur on the teddy’s tummy and when the coast is clear I make my way down the hallway. Mum’s not in the bedroom any more. I hate Mum being sad – she’s the best mum ever, and even if I have to leave home, I want her to be happy after I’ve gone. Now I’ve achieved superhero status I’m putting others’ happiness first and I’m not going to stop. I wipe away a small tear as I place the bear on Mum’s pillow.
“Sorry to let you go, little bear,” I whisper. “But you’re going to get a new owner who will love you. They won’t care that you wear a dirty bobble hat and your fur is a bit saggy. They won’t care that you started off with someone else. They will hug you and tell you that you’re amazing every day, I promise. That’s the sort of parents they are.”
I close the door behind me.
The following day, Mrs Chatterjee welcomes us to the class but tells us not to park our bums, as though our bums are types of cars. “We’re going out this fine Tuesday morning,” states Mrs Cha
tterjee, jiggling her foot from side to side. I watch as the tassels on her shoes do a little tango. “Gather together your notebooks and pens, because we’re off to the Pegasus Park Library to do more research on our family trees. There you’ll find out anything you need to know.”
It feels like I’ve swallowed a moth and it’s fluttering inside my belly. My head prickles under my hat and my breath quickens. Find out everything you need to know? Maybe even your real mother’s address? This is going to be epic. I pat the four-leaf clover in my pocket, thinking that it’s bringing me more luck at last.
“The library has access to old newspaper files containing stories of local residents, and they’ve got local notices and electoral rolls,” continues Mrs Chatterjee. “They’ve got shelves of historical documents about Pegasus Park too. They have books on genealogy, so you can look up family names. Plus the librarian can help you with any questions you might have. Everything you need for research on your family and the local area will be at your fingertips. And before you think you could find all this information on the Internet yourself, you can’t. The library has so many more local archives than you’d ever find on the net.” Mrs Chatterjee snaps her fingers and Nish suddenly wakes up. “Gather yourselves together and those of you still half asleep, stop drooling on the table.”
Everyone laughs as Nish wipes his chin.
We line up like ducklings and as we waddle towards the school gates, Mrs Chatterjee says she’s hoping we’ll find out something exciting at the library. “Wouldn’t it be fabulous if you were related to a pirate?” I’m thinking that’s not likely in Pegasus Park. “Or what if you were related to a famous person or an astronaut who walked on the moon?”
Memories stir inside me of how, when I was much younger, I sometimes imagined my real mother was an astronaut or a queen and that I was a prince. I was sure she had to be someone incredible, which would make me incredible too. But I always kept my thoughts to myself, because I worried that they might sound stupid.
Just Call Me Spaghetti-Hoop Boy Page 9
