Blood Family

by Anne Fine

  And you’d be sorted for the next couple of days.

  I usually mixed the stuff with orange. Either Natasha’s freshly squeezed juice or, if there was none left, cheap orange fizz. Arif traded that. He nicked it from the back store at his mum’s corner shop, and he’d take anything in return: some old CDs, a couple of sleazy magazines, a bottle of spray perfume Alice had sniffed at once and then chucked in her bin. He even took a ballpoint off me once. ‘It’s a bit chewed at the end. Does it still work? You’re not getting much for that!’

  The first to notice was the dentist. ‘Four fillings, Edward? All out of nowhere. Have you stopped brushing? Or have you started eating sweets all day?’

  I don’t know what possessed me. I thought I’d try to do my teeth a favour and learn to drink the stuff neat. It wasn’t half as hard as you’d imagine. Within a week or so I had begun to enjoy the brutal wash of spirit against my gums, the way it stung the tiny cracks in my lips.

  I never overdid it. I was determined I would not become one of those drunks Natasha so despised, who end up vomiting all over everywhere. So I learned never to go over the top, just let the alcohol ease off the tiresome edges of the day. I think it helped that I wasn’t in a gang, so had no problem when I’d had enough. It was my bottle. I could screw on the top and put it back in its hiding place whenever I wanted, even if there was some left. I think it’s different if you’re out with friends. Perhaps your mates don’t even ask before they slam another glass of what you’re drinking down in front of you.

  Alice could go for days, probably weeks, without even thinking of alcohol. But when the flock were out to celebrate the end of exams, or someone’s birthday, things were quite different. I’d seen her staggering about, presumably after one of the gang who was already in an oiled-up mood had come up with the bright idea of getting one or two more cans or bottles of whatever it was that they’d been sharing. Mostly she made it safely up to her bedroom, after first putting on a pretty impressive show to Nicholas and Natasha. ‘No, I’m not tipsy. I had one glass of wine at Sarah’s, and even then Safira drank most of it. Oh, yes – and then I had a few sips of Jason’s beer. But I’m not tipsy.’

  A fine performance.

  She would pretend to take a brief interest in the news bulletin that they were watching, then yawn a couple of times, and make it to the bottom of the stairs without once swaying. But she would grip the banisters as she came up, and pass me with a conspiratorial wink. Then there’d be phone calls. After that, I’d hear her clean her teeth and run a shower. By then, Nicholas and Natasha were often upstairs as well. But only I would notice the soft click of Alice’s door as, only a few minutes later, she padded hastily along the landing to lock herself in our shared bathroom. It was what she would call ‘the swirling pits’ – a giddy feeling of nausea that took her over the moment she lay down and closed her eyes, making her realize she’d drunk far too much and felt so awful that she wanted to die.

  ‘Why don’t you stop before you reach that stage?’ I’d ask her, perfectly sincerely. ‘Why carry on and have the one that shoves you over the edge?’

  She’d shrug. She didn’t really know. She always regretted it. She vowed she’d be more sensible next time. And never was.

  But Alice only went out now and then. Once a month, maybe?

  I thought myself so much more clever with my own ‘little and often’ habit. Oh, sometimes things panned out so I lost track. Something at school annoyed me, or I got too wrapped up in music I was listening to, and didn’t notice how many times I’d tipped a little of the magic stuff into the plastic beaker that I kept around me. But I was only rumbled once, and that was by Natasha, who fancied that she had an eye for boozers. ‘Edward, have you been drinking?’

  I’d only just that minute brushed my teeth, so I affected outrage. ‘No, I have not! What makes you think that?’

  Her eyes narrowed. ‘It’s the way you’re standing there.’

  ‘How am I standing?’

  ‘Just a bit too steadily.’

  ‘That is because I have two feet, and I’ve been practising for fifteen years.’

  She couldn’t help but laugh. ‘Don’t you get smart with me. There’s something odd about the way you’re standing. And you have that look.’

  ‘What look?’

  ‘That really still and careful look. As if you have to calculate before you move. You’re standing like a jug that’s worried that it’s way too full and thinks it might slosh over.’

  ‘A worried jug? Now who is sounding like the one who’s had a few?’

  She had to chuckle again. But it was still a warning shot across the bows. And when I checked the cabinet the following day, sure enough she had drawn the tiniest little pencil mark across each bottle’s label at the level at which the contents stood. I knew she would have counted the beers as well.

  And possibly the money in her purse.

  So I nicked something else: a bucket and some washing-up liquid. Telling them I had promised to help paint the back cloth for the next school play, I cycled off to clean cars in a supermarket car park on the other side of town. I didn’t do a brilliant job, and wasn’t paid much. But it was enough to keep me going until Natasha’s worry died away, and she had been distracted again by work.

  It more than once occurred to me that I could go down to the garages and try whatever it was that Troy was pushing now. It would be cheaper, certainly. No doubt about that.

  But then I’d catch myself shuddering. I’d no desire to take that risk again. I felt as nervous about it as when you wake with a start from some appalling dream, swamped with relief that no, you’re not being chased into a pit of snakes, or holding a grey and greasy baby with snapping teeth. You know you’re safe, but still it takes a bit of time for terror to fade. You even force yourself to stay awake an extra minute or two, in case it’s true what all those primitive tribes believe – that the dream world is real, and all that nightmarish stuff is truly happening somewhere, and if you let yourself go back to sleep too fast, you might end up back in the same fix again.

  No. That pop-a-pill-and-send-your-brain-all-haywire stuff was not for me, and I’d stopped dead on it. So I knew I had willpower. Why, I had even earned my racing bike as a reward for stopping gnawing at my nails. The drinking was a choice.

  At first. And then, of course, it practically became a hobby. And then a sort of obsession. I’m telling this, of course, from way, way on. If you had said to me back then that alcohol was taking over my life, I would have snapped your head off. But it was true. I always had the next little top-up in mind. I started keeping bottles in useful places: one on the way to school, hidden behind a rotten strut in the bandstand. One in the cistern of what I had come to think of as my personal lavatory. One under the garden shed, so I could have a swig before I went back in the house.

  I think I thought of them as little staging posts along the day.

  And I stopped going to things – even things I wanted to do. ‘You’re coming on our picnic?’ Melissa’s sister asked. She was already blushing, so I knew what was in her mind.

  It was in my mind too. I’d really taken a shine to Rose, and thought about her a lot. But still I hedged. ‘Picnic?’

  ‘For end of term. We’re going to Harts Park, and just before it closes, we’re going to hide so we can swim in the river.’

  The people at Harts Park might not be brilliant at counting people out at night, but they are good at checking bags on the way in. It is an alcohol-free zone.

  ‘Not sure,’ was all I’d say.

  ‘Oh, come on, Eddie. It’ll be fun.’

  I knew it would be fun. Especially in her company. But not for me, because I also knew I would be thinking only of when I could get back to take a slug or two from one of my bottles. Already I’d begun to feel quite tense and itchy when I was away from all my little stores. I wouldn’t yet admit that I was hooked. But I did know what I’d begun to think of as my ‘time limits’, as if it was a reasonable thing for
someone my age to act like one of those alkies down by the canal who would go crawling after anyone, desperately begging for ‘just a couple of quid, just for a sandwich’ when everyone who passed them knew what they would spend it on.

  I think my problem was that I’d spent so much time praising myself for being far too smart to get addicted to Troy’s drugs that I’d not realized that the other stuff had taken such a grip.

  And, when I say ‘the other stuff’, I do mean anything that had a kick. The preference for clean, pure vodka was long gone. I would drink anything now. Every few days, when Nicholas was busy and Natasha was out, I tiptoed into their room and squeezed a line of their toothpaste out into a little pot. That way I could still clean my teeth a dozen times a day but not have to add another Mintgleam tube onto the shopping list each week, or pay for one myself. I learned to quite like sherry. I learned to quite like cider. In fact, I learned to quite like anything that had the right effect.

  Except for beer. I wouldn’t go near that. Even the smell of it reminded me of Harris, and made me nervous. Since I had seen his face in mine, I couldn’t even walk past beery-smelling pubs without it coming painfully to mind that he was my blood family.

  And then, of course, I’d need another drink.

  I am astonished that I kept my secret so long. Mind you, I was cunning. ‘How did you get that bruise?’ someone would ask, and even before I had inspected the vivid purple mottling I hadn’t even known was there, out came the answer, glib as anything. ‘Tripped on some stupid wire.’

  ‘What are you up to?’ one of the teachers asked when she caught me in one of the cloakrooms during lesson time, rooting through pockets. ‘Forgot my antibiotics,’ I answered, quick as a flash.

  It couldn’t last, of course. I started being late for school, or bunking off early. Often I didn’t go at all. I did a lot of sneaking about by then, no longer confident that I could get past Natasha’s watchful eye. During the rush of breakfast, I’d casually set the scene for my delayed return, talking about an extra football practice, or bragging about being asked to supervise junior detention. But still, when I came home, I’d watch the shadows on the window blinds till I was sure Natasha had moved into the living room, or Nicholas was in his study on a call.

  That’s when I’d slip in the house and hope to make it up the stairs before they challenged me.

  Then things got worse, and I became more careless. Right at the start, I had been cautious with the empty bottles. I’d wrap them up and smuggle them out of the house. I would make sure I was at least three streets away before I tipped them into some recycling box left by a gate. And, just in case, I’d never use the same box twice.

  Then I stopped bothering. It all seemed too much effort. Now I would tip the bottles into the first recycling tub I saw on the way from our house to the bandstand. One day a householder rushed out as I was throwing back his lid. He was a tubby, gentle-looking fellow, a bit like Rob Reed. ‘I wouldn’t mind,’ he said. ‘And it sounds really petty of me to say it. I ought to thank you for not littering the streets or leaving broken glass lying about. But, you see, I’m a minister.’

  I hadn’t had the wits to take to my heels. So I just stared.

  ‘Methodist,’ he explained. ‘I am supposed to be teetotal. That means I never drink.’ He smiled. ‘So it’s a bit embarrassing to have your parents’ bottles shoved into my recycling each week, alongside my blameless jam jars.’ He dug in his pocket. ‘Here, tell your mum and dad I’ve written down the council number, and if they phone they’ll get a bin of their own. They’re all delivered free.’

  ‘All right. I’ll tell them.’

  ‘Have a good day at school.’

  I’m sure that I lost track and used his bin again. But by then I was losing track of lots of things, not just how much I drank but sometimes even where I’d been. I’d reach into my pocket and find odd things. I opened up the side flap of my backpack once to see two twenty-pound notes, and I had no idea where I had stolen them. Sometimes at weekends I would lose whole hours, suddenly realizing that I had no memory at all of what had happened between leaving the bandstand and sneaking back in the house.

  The drinking showed as well, not just in my poor schoolwork and ratty temper, but in other ways. I found that I was sweating all the time. My ears buzzed. My eyes twitched. I found that I was picking quarrels and insulting girls. I itched and scratched. ‘Stop doing that!’ Marina said one day when we were paired for biology.

  ‘Stop doing what?’

  ‘That scratching. Stop it! Stop it now!’

  I couldn’t, though. I had to leave the room.

  And all the time I was still congratulating myself for my self-discipline and my good sense. I’m not like that, I thought each time I passed some drunk in a doorway. I started fussing about the oddest things. Once, I remember handing back a sandwich Arif didn’t want because the meat in it was ‘stuffed with additives’. Me, who was hungry, and had been pouring poisonous and brain-deadening liquids down my poor throat for months!

  Till Alice finally laid down her pen after her last exam and looked around her properly for the first time in weeks.

  I heard the back door slam. ‘Natasha! Nicholas!’

  But, rarely as it happened, neither was there. I heard her charging up the stairs and threw myself against my door to bar her way.

  Too late. She burst into my room, punching the air with both fists. ‘Finished! All done! I’m free again! Don’t even care if I have passed or failed! At least it’s over!’

  She didn’t even wait to hear my mumbles of congratulation. We were so close to one another that she sniffed. ‘What’s that weird smell?’ And then she peered at me. ‘Eddie, you look like shit! What is the matter with you?’

  I don’t doubt I responded sourly, ‘Nothing.’

  Her nose was wrinkling again. ‘It’s you. You actually smell.’

  ‘I don’t.’

  ‘You do. You’d better have a shower before you come out.’

  ‘Out?’

  ‘We’re going to celebrate. At Valentine House.’ She saw my puzzled look. ‘You know! The end of my exams. You must remember! Nicholas reminded you this morning.’ Now she was studying me even more closely. ‘What’s wrong with you? Why are you acting funny?’

  ‘I am not.’

  ‘You are.’ She dived towards the bed cover. I lurched to stop her but I lost my balance and fell, hard, on the floor. By the time I had pulled myself into a seated position, Alice was back on her feet again, holding the half-empty bottle.

  ‘You cunning old soak!’

  I tried to make light of it. ‘Oh, come on, Alice. Everyone has a drink now and again.’

  She studied the label. ‘Volkogonova? Forty-two per cent proof! Well, that explains why Nicholas and Natasha aren’t even back yet!’

  She was losing me. ‘Not back from where?’

  ‘Didn’t they tell you? Back from your school, where they’ve been called in to discuss the fact that you skipped half of your mid-terms and failed the rest.’

  That should have made me stop and think. But all I wanted was for her to give me back my precious bottle and leave me alone.

  Natasha

  I hadn’t noticed, you see. For one thing, it was our busiest time of year. All those June weddings. Malcolm and I were trying to decide whether to keep on renting extra marquees or take the plunge and borrow to expand the business.

  And Edward had been so much easier those last few weeks. Much more relaxed. Now and again he’d even followed me around the house, asking about my own childhood. (His foster mother Linda had told me he did that with her, and I remember being disappointed after he came to us that he seemed rather too shy to ask me questions. I worried that I might not seem the motherly type to him. But in my job I have to look smart and professional at all times. There’s no way round that.)

  Nicholas too had just assumed that things were fine again. He was astonished when the phone call came to ask us to come in a second time. />
  I will admit that I was irritated at the thought of yet another meeting. It seemed to me that Edward was doing better all round. He was no trouble at home. He claimed that he was keeping up at school. He went to bed at reasonable hours. What was their worry?

  I reckon half the staff must have been there. I was appalled at what they told us. It was a catalogue of sins. Copying other people’s work (or not even bothering). Failing his mid-term exams. Telling a host of lies. Bunking off school.

  Drinking.

  That came as such a surprise that Nicholas didn’t even grasp what they were saying. ‘What do you mean, drinking? Do you mean mucking about with water bottles in class?’

  ‘No,’ Mrs Miller told us. ‘Drinking alcohol. In school.’

  We sat in silence, both of us, all the way home.

  Edward

  It was a God almighty bollocking. Of course they tried to be reasonable at first: calm looks, soft voices, gentle questioning. (Those therapy sessions with Alice when she went through her rebellious phase had clearly left their mark.) But as my inability to answer properly – or, as Natasha termed it, ‘stubborn refusal to even try to explain’ – began to rattle them, Natasha’s voice became more loud and hectoring, till Nicholas was spending almost as much time trying to calm her down as he was getting at me.

  And he was getting at me. Alice claimed afterwards that they were especially angry because one of the staff implied that people with adopted children lacked the insight of natural parents. (She’d heard Natasha spitting tintacks about that the following day, threatening to write a letter.)

  But I think they were furious because they hadn’t guessed. Now it was pretty obvious to both of them that they’d been blind. The moment they came through the door, Natasha called me down and Nicholas brushed past without a single word as I came in the kitchen.

  Natasha kept her back turned, fiddling with the kettle lid while I stood waiting, not sure what to expect.