Step by Wicked Step Page 5

  ‘ “Who’s going to have the flat after us?”

  ‘And one of the men helping her snorted and said, “Well, not Jack, anyway, unless he finds himself a job pretty sharpish.”

  ‘And Mum said, “Ssh!” to him, and gave me a funny little sideways look. Then the van swung round the next bend, and I saw this huge sign saying MOTORWAY NORTH, and suddenly I felt sick.

  ‘ “Where are we going?”

  ‘ “Somewhere nice,” Mum said.

  ‘But she was wrong. It wasn’t nice for me. For one thing, I had to start at another school, where everyone had friends already. Nobody bothered with me, except to snigger when I didn’t understand all the stuff they’d been doing. Then Mum found a job in a canteen, and when she came home she was always too busy doing things like making toast and finding clothes for the next day to listen to anything I said about school, and too tired to talk about much herself, except how the noise in the canteen had given her a headache, and how much her legs ached from being on her feet all day. It wasn’t how it used to be with Dad. The thing about Dad is, you can talk to him. And he remembers what you say. He’d know the names of all my friends, and if I’d quarrelled with them. He knew my favourite animals, and what I’d call my dog if I had one. He knew which teachers I liked, and which I didn’t, and what size batteries went in my favourite games, and what I worried about sometimes late at night, and which jokes he couldn’t tell me because he had heard them from me in the first place.’

  ‘He sounds really nice,’ Pixie said dreamily.

  ‘He is really nice,’ said Colin. ‘He’s my dad.’

  ‘Step-dad, really,’ Ralph couldn’t help correcting him.

  ‘Dad,’ Colin said stubbornly.

  ‘Go on with the story, Colin,’ said Claudia. There was a hint of warning in her voice, but it was clear to everyone that this was meant for Ralph, not for Colin.

  ‘There isn’t a story,’ said Colin. ‘I just kept on at her. “When’s Dad coming?” “When will he be here?” “Will he be here for my birthday?” And she always came out with the same old things. “Soon.” “When he’s ready.” “When he can.” But I knew there was something wrong, because she said other things, too. “It was all right for you,” she kept telling me. “You only saw his good side. You didn’t know the half of it.” Things like that. Then she’d go on about him never having a proper job. And if I stuck up for him, she’d just get crosser and crosser. So I shut up.’

  His black eyes glittered as he turned his face away.

  ‘And I was stupid,’ he said. ‘Really stupid. It took me ages to realize he wasn’t following, and ages more to work out why. He couldn’t. Mum hadn’t left him any clues. But one day I padded in the kitchen in my socks, and heard her on the phone. “Just keep your beak buttoned,” she was telling someone. Then she looked up and saw me. And I knew.’

  He turned back, his dark hair glimmering silver in the moonlight.

  ‘And then I realized it was up to me.’

  ‘What did you do?’ asked Pixie.

  ‘I wrote a letter.’ He paused, inspecting his fingers on the coverlet. ‘It must have been dreadful. My writing’s bad enough now, but it was even worse back then. And there was no one I could ask for help, because it had to be secret. I didn’t dare tell Mum, in case –’

  He broke off.

  ‘In case she was furious with you,’ Pixie suggested.

  But it was Claudia who guessed.

  ‘No,’ she corrected Pixie. ‘In case she offered to post it, and then threw it away.’

  Colin busied himself with a loose thread on his pyjama sleeve.

  ‘It didn’t matter, anyway,’ he said defensively. ‘There was no answer. He must have left the flat ages before. Maybe it was empty, and the letter just lay on the doormat. Or maybe the family who moved in after us just weren’t the sort to bother with other people’s letters.’

  ‘Listen,’ said Robbo. ‘He can’t just have disappeared. He was your dad.’

  ‘Step-dad,’ Ralph repeated.

  ‘Dad,’ Colin corrected him again. ‘And you don’t understand. It wasn’t him who disappeared. It was us.’

  ‘But, surely, when your mum realized how upset –’

  Robbo broke off. Colin was glaring at him.

  ‘Listen,’ he said. ‘She didn’t mean it to turn out like this. It’s just that, because she’d had to run away before, to stay safe, she thought it was better that way.’ He turned back to the window and stared out across the moonbleached lawns. ‘And I did try to explain. I tried a lot. But in the end she’d just get cross with me. She couldn’t help it. “Well, he’s not with us any more,” she’d say. “So that’s that. And one day you’ll understand it’s for the best.”’

  Pixie was scornful.

  ‘Her best, maybe. Not yours.’

  But Colin just carried on staring out into the night, as though pretending that he hadn’t heard.

  Pixie persisted.

  ‘I mean, to pack him off in a puff of smoke like that! Your own dad!’

  ‘Step-dad,’ corrected Ralph, for the third time. And when Colin failed to turn round and argue, he went a little further. ‘Not even step-dad, really. Unless they were married. Or he’d gone to the trouble of adopting you.’

  Still Colin kept his back turned.

  ‘What I don’t understand,’ Pixie said stubbornly, ‘is why just because his mother had finished with Colin’s dad, Colin had to finish with him too.’

  Colin spun round.

  ‘I never finished with him! It wasn’t like that! You don’t know.’

  ‘You said –’

  Claudia gave Pixie’s bedrail a sharp tap.

  ‘Ssh!’ she said sternly. ‘Just let Colin explain. Let him get on with his story.’

  ‘There isn’t a story,’ said Colin. ‘We just went on.’ He glared at Pixie. ‘But I hadn’t finished with him. I’d –’ He stopped. ‘What I did –’

  He spread his hands, stared down at them, and tried again.

  ‘I didn’t finish with him. I pretended. Each night I took the tobacco tin out of the toe of my boot, where I kept it hidden, and put it under my pillow. Then, very softly, so Mum wouldn’t hear, I’d hum our favourite song. And, when I was ready, I unscrewed the lid. There were only a few old shreds of tobacco in there, but still –’

  Again he stopped, and glanced around at them. They were all staring back. Claudia was even biting her lip. But no one was laughing at him.

  So, bravely, he went on.

  ‘But still, it smelled the same. It was like burying your head in his woolly. Or squashing up in the chair, to watch telly. And I’d pretend that he was there with me. And I could talk to him, just like before.’

  He took a deep breath.

  ‘I stayed awake for hours and hours and hours, talking to him, although he wasn’t there.’

  Pale silver tears spilled from his eyes and splashed on the coverlet.

  ‘I pretend like that sometimes,’ Claudia comforted him.

  ‘Everyone does,’ Ralph said impatiently. ‘Get on with the story, Colin.’

  But Colin had been distracted.

  ‘Do they?’ He brushed the tears from his cheeks, and turned to Pixie. ‘Do they? Do you?’

  ‘Of course I do,’ Pixie told him. ‘Ralph’s right. Everyone does it.’

  Colin turned to Robbo.

  ‘What about you? Do you do it?’

  Robbo was clearly deeply embarrassed.

  ‘Not with my dad.’

  ‘But you do it?’

  Robbo hesitated.

  ‘Of course he does it,’ Ralph said irritably. ‘Stop wasting time, Colin. Just get on with the story.’

  ‘I’ve told you,’ said Colin. ‘There isn’t any story. It’s just that, as we went on, I started getting into trouble at school from being half asleep. I was sent to see someone because I was doing so badly. But she said there was nothing at all wrong with my brains, and someone else would have to deal with me. So this
man came round and talked to Mum, and Mum agreed that I was a bit upset at first, after the move, but I had soon got over it.’

  ‘Oh, yes!’ scoffed Pixie.

  ‘Settled down in no time!’ Ralph echoed scornfully.

  ‘Almost forgotten how things were before,’ Robbo muttered in turn.

  ‘Perfectly happy now,’ sighed Claudia.

  ‘I’m sure she didn’t mean to tell lies,’ Colin defended his mother. ‘It’s just that what she said wasn’t the truth. This man sat through three cups of coffee, and Mum didn’t even tell him about Dad. Once, when he asked, she just pretended that he meant the other one. “Oh,” she said. “Colin hasn’t seen his father since he was a baby.” I was standing there listening. And that’s what she said.’

  ‘And what did you say?’ asked Robbo.

  Colin shifted uneasily.

  ‘It was difficult,’ he told them. ‘You see, the thing about my mum –’

  He took a deep breath, and tried again.

  ‘Don’t get me wrong. I love her, and everything. It’s just that sometimes I get the feeling that Mum thinks the things that are happening to both of us are only really happening to her. As if how I feel doesn’t matter quite so much.’

  Pixie reached under her pillow and drew out the album. Holding it up to catch the shaft of pale light pouring over the window ledge, she rustled backwards through the pages.

  ‘ “But what of me?”’ she read aloud again. ‘ “I wish my mother well. Of course I do. But does my happiness not matter? Do I count for less? Am I supposed to nod and smile, and be a brave lad for ever, while everything changes round me, and everything I loved is different? No, not just different. I will say it –”’

  But it was Colin who said it.

  ‘ “Worse!”’

  They sat in silence, until Robbo said:

  ‘Some things don’t change much, do they?’

  Ralph waved the observation away.

  ‘Go on,’ he said to Colin. ‘What happened then?’

  ‘Nothing happened,’ said Colin. ‘I keep telling you. It isn’t a story. Mum and I just went on, except that one day I came home from school and Mum had thrown away my boots.’

  Pixie was horrified.

  ‘With the tobacco tin? How could she do that?’

  ‘It wasn’t her fault,’ Colin said. ‘I’d had them for years, and they were far too small. She didn’t know that there was something hidden in the toe.’

  ‘Couldn’t you tell her? Couldn’t you get them back?’

  ‘You don’t understand,’ said Colin. ‘It was a secret, the tobacco tin. I don’t think she’d have liked it if she’d known.’ He walked his fingers through the strip of moonlight falling across the bed. ‘And it didn’t make any difference. I still lay awake for hours every night. I was still hopeless in school.’ He walked his fingers back. ‘I still am, even at this school. I still get in trouble with teachers. Everyone always seems to be at me. Even my mum. But what’s the point in trying to explain how you feel? You know what happens. Everyone acts as if they’re listening properly; but really all they’re doing is softening you up, so you’ll listen to what they’re planning to say to you after. And that’s always: “Well, Colin, that’s how things are now and I’m sure you’ll soon get used to it.”’

  His dark eyes flashed.

  ‘But I haven’t got used to it! And I never will! I think about him every single day. I try to get on with school and everything, but it’s like something waiting around a corner. It keeps rushing out and hitting me. I hear the name “Jack”, or walk past someone in a jacket just like his. Or I’ll be buying gum and see the cigarette papers he used to buy.’

  He lifted his chin defensively.

  ‘Last week I saw a birthday card he’d really like. It was a picture of a man being followed by a gang of scruffy dogs. I took it off the shelf, and carried it round the shop for ages.’

  Everyone waited.

  ‘Then I put it back.’

  ‘Colin,’ said Pixie, after a few uneasy moments. ‘How long is it since you’ve seen him?’

  Colin turned to the window.

  ‘Five years.’

  ‘Five years?’

  He kept his back to them.

  ‘Five years, eight months and seven days,’ he said.

  Flattening his palms on the sill, he leaned forward till his forehead touched the glass.

  ‘I think Mum thinks that I’ve forgotten him,’ he told them. ‘I never mention him at home. But even though I know he can’t still be living there, I always secretly sneak his name and our old address on all the forms that Mum’s filled in for school, to show he still matters and he’s still my dad.’

  He stood a little straighter.

  ‘But I never talk about him to her any more. Never. It’s part of my plan. You see, I’m saving up now. I save a lot. I keep practically every penny that comes my way. I even do three paper rounds. And I keep the money safe, somewhere a whole lot safer than in my boots. And one day soon, I’m going to have enough.’

  ‘Enough?’

  ‘Enough to go back and find him.’

  He turned. With the moonlight behind him, the shadows fell more deeply on his face, making him look years older.

  ‘As soon as I’m tall enough, I’m off. There’s no point trying yet. They’d only fetch me back, and it would lead to trouble. So I’m just waiting now. Waiting and hoping.’

  ‘And listening to the music down at the rink,’ said Claudia.

  He grinned.

  ‘Mum thinks I’m mad,’ he said. ‘She doesn’t understand at all. She asks me every birthday and every Christmas. “Wouldn’t you like a cassette player? Wouldn’t you even like a radio?” But I always say no, and take the money. And it sounds better, anyway, down at the rink. They play it loud. It bounces off the walls. It sounds so strong and cheerful, so like him, that when I shut my eyes, I can believe that he is still out there somewhere, sitting on a park bench, rolling his cigarettes and singing at the top of his voice.’

  He turned to the window again, and started humming softly.

  ‘Go on,’ said Claudia. ‘Sing the words.’

  Colin broke off humming long enough to say:

  ‘I’m saving the words till I find him.’

  ‘What words?’ Ralph demanded of Claudia. ‘Words to what?’

  ‘Their favourite song,’ said Claudia. ‘The Bluebird of Happiness. It’s on the skating rink’s tape, and comes round every hour or so.’

  The humming stopped again.

  ‘Every forty-five minutes,’ Colin corrected her, before picking up the tune where he left off.

  Claudia ignored him.

  ‘It’s about following the bluebird round the world, but finding happiness where you began.’

  They listened till the end. Then Robbo said:

  ‘I’m sure you’ll find him, Colin. It’s like one of those stories where you just have to keep going to reach the happy ending.’

  ‘Fingers crossed,’ Ralph said.

  The others echoed him. ‘Fingers crossed.’

  ‘And there you’ll be,’ Robbo finished up triumphantly. ‘Together again, you and your dad! End of story!’

  And in the general passing around and unwrapping of sandwiches which then took place, only Claudia noticed that, this time, Ralph hadn’t argued that Colin’s father was a stepdad, and Colin had forgotten to insist that the tale he had told was not really a story.

  RALPH’S STORY:

  A Tale of Three Stepmothers

  Ralph reached above his head to switch on the light. ‘Mine’s not a tale of woe,’ he said, peeling the top slice of bread back from his sandwich to peer suspiciously at the filling. ‘But it is complicated, so you have to pay attention.’ He laid down his sandwich and started to count on his fingers. ‘I have two brothers, two half-brothers, one half-sister, three stepbrothers, one stepsister, three stepmothers – that’s two old ones and one at the moment – one stepfather, two stepgrannies and one stepgra
ndpa that I know, and some more that I don’t know. And, any day now, when Flora has her baby, I’m going to have another half-sister.’

  He paused, looking puzzled, as if he’d surprised himself by ending up on the wrong finger.

  ‘Oh, yes!’ he said. ‘And I have a mum and dad.’

  Satisfied, he carried on.

  ‘On Mondays and Thursdays I go directly to Dad’s place after school. And every other weekend Mum drives me there, unless it’s the third Saturday in the month, when she has her hair trimmed. On that day my stepdad drives me. He’s called Howard.’

  He looked round, as if to check they were still paying attention.

  ‘On Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays, on the other hand, I go straight home to Mum’s, unless my dad can’t manage the following weekend (if it’s his). Then I’m supposed to go to his house to make up, unless it’s Wednesday. You see, I have orchestra on Thursday morning, and my horn’s never at Dad’s house unless we’re close to a concert, with Sunday rehearsals, and I was at Dad’s house on the Sunday before.’

  ‘Stop there,’ said Pixie. ‘I’m already lost.’

  ‘How can you ever remember where you’re going?’ demanded Claudia. ‘You’d have to be a genius to work it out.’

  ‘I used to get it wrong a lot,’ Ralph told them cheerfully. ‘I’d keep arriving at one house or the other and find no one there. I wouldn’t know whether to sit on the doorstep and wait, or go back to the other house. But then they bought me new lunchboxes: two with Mickey Mouse on the side, and two more with Dumbo.’

  ‘How did that help?’