by Jane Corry
‘It will be all right, Ali.’ Mum came in to hear the tail end of our argument and handed me some kitchen roll in a vain attempt to soak up the coffee. But it was too late. The ink had run. My essay was totally illegible.
‘They’ve got three cars in the drive – three – and they’re building a swimming pool in the garden,’ squealed Kitty. ‘They’ve come from somewhere called Ealing.’
Vanessa interrupted. ‘That’s near London.’
She said the word with reverence.
‘I need that essay,’ I said, trying not to cry.
Mum was looking doubtfully at the sodden pages. ‘Do you have a copy?’
‘NO.’
I wanted to kill my sister. She was still going on about Crispin and London. I’d only been there once. It was for a wedding, when I’d been bridesmaid to one of my mother’s younger cousins. Kitty – always needing to be the centre of attention – had had one of her toddler tantrums because I was following the bride up the aisle and not her. It ruined the whole ceremony.
Last year she and Vanessa had gone on a school trip to see the Houses of Parliament. How I’d have loved that – what an experience! – but they’d slipped off to Oxford Street during Prime Minister’s Questions and bought a pair of jeans each with their emergency money. Not only did they frighten the teachers by disappearing like that but they also delayed the coach back to Devon.
David and Mum actually told them off that time. Not that the girls cared. ‘One day,’ Kitty sniffed, ‘Vanessa and I are going to get out of this dump and find jobs in Knightsbridge. That’s the best bit of London. All the magazines say so.’
The sooner the better, as far as I was concerned. If only David was a bit stricter, Kitty might be better behaved. But his precious daughter – or ‘princess’ as he was always calling her – could do no wrong in his sight. Mum just went along with it because she didn’t want to upset David. She never said as much to me but I could tell. Sometimes, when it was just the two of us together – like it used to be before she met my stepfather – she’d give me a big hug. ‘You know, there’s always something special about a firstborn.’
So she loved me best! It made me feel a whole lot better. For a time. But then Kitty would start to be horrid again and the whole cycle would continue. It might be different if there wasn’t such a big age gap between us, or if we had more in common. Often I thought that she and Vanessa would have made better sisters than Kitty and me.
They got even worse over the following weeks. ‘Crispin is such a cool name,’ Kitty kept saying. She and Vanessa spent hours discussing him. I knew because sometimes I’d listen in at her bedroom door or – on the rare occasion when they left it slightly open – peep in through the gap.
You wouldn’t think those two were only eleven to hear them speak. Sometimes they’d sneak in some of Mum’s high-heeled shoes and strut around, pretending they were grown up. Kitty’s favourite was a shiny red patent pair.
‘I’m in love!’
This was my sister. How ridiculous was that! She barely knew Crispin.
‘How are we going to get him to notice us?’
‘I’ve told you.’ Vanessa’s sharp know-it-all voice cut in. ‘Borrow my make-up and put it on before you get on the bus.’
‘What if he fancies only one of us?’
There’s a short silence.
‘I don’t know. But we’ve got to find a boyfriend soon or everyone will think there’s something wrong with us, like Ali.’
Ouch.
‘Has she still got that weirdo friend of hers, Robin?’
‘Yeah. They play Leonard Cohen in her bedroom with the door open. How sad is that?’
‘The door or the music?’
‘Both.’
There was the sound of giggling. ‘She ought to do something with her hair.’ That was Vanessa. What cheek! ‘That dead-straight fringe doesn’t do anything for her. And her ears stick out because she keeps tucking it behind them.’
‘Just as well she’s blonde like me or she wouldn’t have anything going for her.’
Sometimes I wondered how two sisters – even half-sisters – with broadly similar features – blonde hair and blue eyes – could turn out so differently. It wasn’t just that I was tall. It was also that Kitty’s nose was smaller with a pretty, turned-up bit at the end. ‘Roman noses like yours are a sign of intelligence,’ Mum would say in an attempt to comfort me. Those blue eyes? Mine were set just a tiny bit too close together. Only a fraction but enough to give a slightly intense look. Kitty’s, of course, were perfect, as if measured to scale.
I told myself that Kitty was just jealous because I was the brighter one. But, to be honest, I’d swap that in a heartbeat to look as pretty as her. And although I was fond of Robin, it was purely in a platonic sense. I didn’t like to admit it, but Crispin did something to my insides that I’d never felt before.
‘Show off,’ said Robin quietly the other day on the bus when Crispin was boasting about going to the Radiohead concert in London. I nodded as if to agree. Robin was my best friend. I wouldn’t have minded a girl best friend – Kitty was so lucky to have Vanessa – but it had never happened. Instead, Robin had plonked himself down next to me in our first year at secondary school when I was struggling with a maths sum. ‘Let me help you with that,’ he said. Then he added, ‘I’ve seen you swimming off the west bay in the morning.’
I’d seen him too. There weren’t many of us about at that time. I liked to go early at weekends while the rest of the house was sleeping in. I swam through the year, regardless of the month, as long as the sea wasn’t too rough. I loved the way the freezing waves hit me; washing away Kitty’s continuing hostility and David’s favouritism.
‘Nothing like that brace of cold when you get in, is there?’ he said quietly, before explaining why I needed to move the figure in the bracket to the other side of the equation.
In return, I helped him with a history essay. I was the only one in class who didn’t tease him for that weird patchwork red and blue jacket he wore after school, summer and winter. Neither of us were part of the ‘in’ crowd, or, indeed, wanted to be. Just as I got ribbed for my height, so he was taunted for his surname, Wood, which led to stupid jokes about Robin Hood, as well as his deep voice, which broke long before any other boy’s in the year. Later, when we started to swim together, he proved to be a good listener to my moans and groans about my sister.
The ruined French essay was just the latest in a line of insults and spitefulness which had been going on for years. If Kitty left muddy footprints on the carpet, she blamed me. When we had to sit next to each other in the car, she’d make a fuss and say I was ‘taking up too much room’. And when she was watching one of her stupid programmes on television, she always had the sound up high so I couldn’t concentrate on my homework in my bedroom above.
‘Turn it down,’ I’d complain. ‘I can’t concentrate.’
Mum did her best. But it was my stepfather who was in charge.
‘Alison is far too serious,’ he was fond of saying.
‘That’s not quite fair,’ Mum would reply. ‘The two of them are just different.’
How true. All I wanted was to go to university and read history. But I knew, through listening in to those conversations through my sister’s door, that her eye was set on becoming a famous fashion designer. ‘When we get to London,’ my sister would say, ‘we’ll have a flat of our own.’
‘And,’ interrupted Vanessa, ‘we’ll go clubbing every night. We might even get to sing on the stage too.’
I didn’t like Vanessa. And I don’t think Mum did either. ‘She’s rather spoilt,’ she confided in me once over the washing-up. (Kitty, needless to say, had got out of clearing away because she had a ‘headache’ and was recuperating on the sofa watching television.) ‘It can happen when you’re an only child and don’t have to share.’ Then she gave me a cuddle. ‘That’s why I’m so glad you have a sister. I know Kitty might not show it. But she loves you ve
ry much too.’
Hah! I knew better.
Often I wished it was just me and Mum again. No David. No Kitty. I’d looked after Mum in those early days after Dad died. Brought her loo paper when she cried. Pretended I hadn’t been hungry when the cereal packet was empty.
Maybe it would have been different if my sister was … well, more sisterly. But instead, Kitty was constantly scratchy or downright hostile. It was like living with the school bully but never being able to swap classes.
It wasn’t Mum’s fault. She didn’t, as she explained to me, want to ‘upset’ David. ‘I’m lucky to have found another husband,’ I once heard her say to one of her friends.
Meanwhile, my stepfather spoilt Kitty rotten. Another pair of jeans. A locket for ‘being good’ – Vanessa had an identical one. Violin lessons because – that’s right – Vanessa had them. Ballet classes too. Nothing was too much for his princess. Whatever Vanessa got, Kitty wanted.
And now they wanted Crispin.
6 April 2001
We’ve got a new boy at school. Crispin. I’m in love!!!
If only he’d notice me! I’ve tried hitching up my skirt as soon as I get out of Mum’s sight. After that, I put on loads of mascara and lip gloss. And I always try to sit near to him on the bus.
But it’s like I don’t exist.
What am I going to do?
28
February 2017
Alison
I still can’t believe that Kitty is getting married. A dark part of me, which I try to push away, bridles with jealousy because she’s got what I always wanted. A sparkling diamond ring which once belonged to Johnny’s grandmother. A baby on the way. How is this possible?
But then again, doesn’t she deserve everything she can get after what happened to her?
‘They’re going to live in the home,’ Mum told me the other day. ‘The supervisor is being very accommodating. I think it’s because she feels guilty it happened in the first place.’
I have to admit to feeling a sense of relief that I don’t have to carry through my offer to look after them – at least, not now.
‘Johnny’s mother wanted them to live with her,’ continues Mum, ‘but they don’t have the facilities. Besides, I gather, reading between the lines, that her husband isn’t so keen. Personally I thought they should stay where they are and so does David.’
My stepfather’s name, jumping suddenly into the conversation like this, makes me shudder. Come out in goosebumps.
‘What do you think?’ persists Mum.
Me? I just want the whole thing to be over and done with.
‘I’m not sure,’ I murmur.
She squeezes my hand. ‘I know. It’s not easy for any of us. Anyway, I thought you might like to help me find her a wedding dress.’
It’s what a good sister would do, isn’t it?
‘We’ll have to choose one without her,’ continues Mum. ‘It will be easier than getting her round the shops.’ She gives a little sigh. ‘I have to say, it’s not how I imagined it. But then again life has a strange way of turning out. Doesn’t it?’
To my relief, David doesn’t come to the wedding. ‘He doesn’t approve,’ says Mum shortly.
I don’t want to press her further. The least said about him the better, as far as I’m concerned. The ceremony takes place at the local register office. Most of the people around me have tears in their eyes when Kitty is wheeled in, grinning and banging her good arm, which is now out of plaster. Not me. If I did cry, it would be for another reason. One I must keep to myself.
Afterwards there is a small reception in the home’s community lounge. All the other residents have turned up. ‘Not missing out on free cake,’ I hear someone say.
There’s a woman called Margaret who tells me, in between long, drawn-out gaps, that she’s my sister’s best friend but that she’s ‘extremely disappointed’ that Kitty doesn’t have a matron of honour. I get the feeling she’d expected to fill that role.
There’s a man who is grumpy because he wants the television on instead. And there is a woman who leaves puddles of urine on the floor wherever she goes. The smell makes me retch.
Kitty is radiant. It’s amazing what happiness can do to a face. She is actually beaming. Of course, I know why. She is queen for the day. Kitty always loved being the centre of attention.
I stand to one side, observing as Kitty stuffs herself with scones, grinning with her mouth wide open to reveal a congealed mess of crumbs. Johnny has a hand on her shoulder. I wonder what will happen next. There’ll be no honeymoon. That would be too difficult to arrange, apparently, ‘given the circumstances’. Instead, they will spend the evening here with the other residents. Watching TV perhaps. But then what? Like the prison, this is a whole new world. Without the threatening messages.
‘I’m still worried about how this is all going to work,’ Mum says to the supervisor as we stand there, nibbling sandwiches and making small talk while an elderly man and a young girl – both in wheelchairs – squabble loudly over the remains of the cheese straws. I don’t really like this place but it’s close to Mum. Besides, Kitty’s been here for years. She’s used to it.
‘How it’s going to work?’ repeats the supervisor. ‘What do you mean?’
‘We were thinking about the physical side,’ I say, taking a deep breath.
There is a snort. ‘I think those two have already proved that this sort of thing can be achieved.’
‘One of the staff has just said that Kitty is still going to be in her old room with Margaret,’ pitches in Mum.
‘There’s no option at the moment because of the layout of the building and the residents’ individual requirements and financial constraints.’ The supervisor sighs. ‘This is causing us a great deal of bother, I can tell you. If it doesn’t work, we’ll have to look at the alternatives. We also need to take Kitty’s behaviour into account. She has been getting increasingly aggressive over the last few months.’
Sounds like my sister is on a final warning.
‘Of course, it will be a different matter when the baby is born,’ adds the supervisor. ‘We’re simply not equipped to deal with that kind of situation.’
‘So what are we meant to do?’ asks my mother with a hint of alarm in her voice.
‘If I were you, I’d speak to the care providers.’
Suddenly, my sister’s marriage seems much more complicated than we’d realized. I want it to be a success. I really do. It’s about time something good happened. But is marriage really going to work for her?
Meanwhile, it is time for us to go. Kitty waves us off even though it should be the other way round. ‘Throw your bouquet, love,’ urges Mum. ‘Use your good hand.’
My stepsister looks at me. For a second, I swear I see the old Kitty. Smiling sarcastically. Almost hear the unspoken words. ‘If you think I’m going to throw it at you, you’ve got another thought coming.’ Then it passes. In its place is that happy grin again. Everyone claps as she throws the bunch of roses so high that it swoops in the air. A thorny gift. It falls directly at my feet. ‘You next, darling,’ laughs Mum delightedly.
When I get home after the wedding, I place the roses in a pretty jug which I’d painted myself. I feel positive now. Excited, almost. My sister has a new chance to make something of her life. Maybe, with our help, it will all work out.
Then I realize I’ve had my phone on silent all day. Fishing it out of my bag, I find a text from the college. Asking me to ring one of my students. Clive Black. There are also several more missed calls from the number I don’t recognize.
This is silly, I tell myself. Maybe it’s just a sales scam. Forcing myself to face my fears, I call the number.
A gruff voice answers. ‘Hello?’
‘Hello? Did you call me just now?’
‘Not me, love.’ There’s a throaty laugh. ‘Not unless my missus has gone all posh.’ There’s noise in the background. Some shouting. Maybe a television.
‘Well, someone ran
g me from this number,’ I say, more firmly this time.
‘There’s a lot of people what use this phone, love. Could be any of us.’
‘Is this a pub?’
There’s a loud chortle. ‘Wish it were. This is a call phone in prison. D Hut, HMP Archville, to be precise. Tell you what, you sound like a nice kind of girl. Why don’t you come round and we’ll give you a good time.’
I slam down the phone. The prefix code is clear enough. I don’t know why it hadn’t registered before. It’s my prison.
My stalker – whoever it is – has got hold of my number.
29
June 2001
Ali
‘South-west set for heatwave,’ declared the headlines.
Vanessa and Kitty had been spending hours in Kitty’s bedroom, their noses pressed against the window, watching Crispin swimming in his heated pool after school. I could just about see him from mine, too.
Sometimes, I fleetingly wondered what it would be like to swim next to him in the sea instead of Robin, whose white gangly body was almost girl-like. Why was I drawn to Crispin, I asked myself, when he was clearly not my type? Then again, what was my type? I needed to work hard. Boys could come later. That’s what Mum had always said.
Then one Saturday afternoon, Kitty came running in, her face flushed and her long hair untied and blowing all over the place. She was closely followed by Vanessa. ‘Have you heard? Crispin’s parents are having a party! There’s going to be cocktails and a real disco. He’s being allowed to ask some friends. Vanessa’s mother says that most of the road is going. Are you and Mum? Can you take us too?’
David laughed. ‘We’re not part of their social group.’ He and Mum were both teachers. (She taught art; he taught maths.) It was how they’d met. It had been two years after my father died, and Mum had then married David a year after that. Crispin’s mother didn’t work. His dad was ‘something in advertising’.
‘But we want to go, we want to go,’ chanted Kitty and Vanessa.
