Blueeyedboy (29 page)

And so on. Finally, following heated discussions between Dr Peacock and Catherine,
Boy X
ceased his visits to the Fireplace House, never to return.

Catherine was magnanimous in victory.
Boy X
had been a mistake, she said. Paid handsomely for his cooperation in Dr Peacock’s experiments, it was only natural that a person of his type should try to exploit the situation. But now here was the real thing, that rarest of phenomena: a blind-from-birth true synaesthete, reborn to sight again through music. It was a fabulous story, and deserved to stand alone. There was to be no one to undermine the uniqueness of the Emily White Phenomenon. 215

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:

blueeyedboy
:
Ouch! That was rather below the belt
–

Albertine
:
I’ll stop whenever you’ve had enough . . .

blueeyedboy
:
Do you really think you can?

Albertine
:
I don’t know,
blueeyedboy
.
The question is: can you?

12

You are viewing the webjournal of
blueeyedboy
posting on:
[email protected]

Posted at
:
01.56 on Tuesday, February 12

Status
:
public

Mood
:
sorry

Listening to
:
Mark Knopfler
: ‘The Last Laugh’

That marked the end for Benjamin. He’d sensed it almost immediately, that subtle shift in emphasis, and though it took some time to die, like a flower in a vase, he knew that something had ended for him that night in St Oswald’s Chapel. The shadow of little Emily White had eclipsed him almost from the start: from her story, which was sensational, to the undeniable media appeal of the blind girl, whose super-sense was to make her a national superstar.

Now Ben’s long days at the Mansion dwindled to an hourly session; time that he shared with Emily, sitting quietly on the couch while Dr Peacock showed her off as if she were some collector’s piece – a moth, perhaps, or a figurine – expecting Ben to admire her, to share in his enthusiasm. Worse still, Brendan was there again (to keep an eye on him, Ma said, while she went to work at the market); his gawping, grinning brother in brown with his greasy hair and hangdog look, who rarely spoke, but sat and stared, filling Ben with such hate and shame that sometimes he wanted nothing more than to run away and to leave Bren alone – awkward, boorish, out of place – in that house of delicate things.

Catherine White put a stop to that. It wasn’t right for those boys to be there, not without supervision. There were too many valuable things in that house; too many temptations. Benjamin’s visits dwindled once again, so that now he dropped by just once a month, and waited with Bren on the front steps until Mrs White was ready to leave, hearing piano music drift out across the lawn, laden with the scent of paint, so that every time
blueeyedboy
hears that sound – be it a Rachmaninoff prelude or the intro to ‘Hey Jude’ – it brings back the memory of those days and the sorry little lurch of the heart that he felt when he glanced through the parlour window and saw Emily sitting on the swing, pendulum-ing back and forth like a happy little bird –

At first, all he did was watch her. Like everyone else, he was dazzled by her, content to simply admire her ascent, much as Dr Peacock must have watched the Luna moth as she struggled out of the chrysalis, in awe and admiration, coloured, perhaps, with a little regret. She was so pretty, even then. So effortlessly lovable. There was something about the trusting way in which she held her father’s hand, face turned up towards him like a flower to the sun; or the monkeyish way in which she would scramble on to the piano stool, one leg tucked in, a sock at half-mast, half-eerie, half-enchanting. She was like a doll that had come to life, all porcelain and ivory, so that Mrs White, who had always liked dolls, could dress her daughter all year round in bright little outfits and matching shoes right out of an old-fashioned storybook.

As for our hero,
blueeyedboy
–

Puberty had hit him hard, with pimples on his back and face, and a half-broken voice that, even now, retains a slightly uneven tone. His childhood stammer had got worse. He lost it later, but that year it got so bad that on some days he could hardly speak. Smells and colours intensified, bringing with them migraines that the doctor promised would fade with time. They never did. He has them still, although his coping strategies have become somewhat more sophisticated.

After the Christmas concert, Emily seemed to spend most of her time at the Mansion. But with so many other people there,
blueeyedboy
rarely spoke to her; besides which, his stammer made him self-conscious, and he preferred to remain in the background, unregarded and unheard. Sometimes he would sit on the porch outside with a comic or a Western, content to be in her orbit, quietly, without fuss. Besides, reading was a pleasure seldom allowed Yours Truly at home, where Ma was always in need of help, and his brothers never left him alone. Reading was for sissies, they said, and whatever he chose – be it
Superman
,
Judge Dredd
or even just the
Beano
– would always incur the ridicule of
blueeyedboy
’s brother in black, who would pester him relentlessly –
Look at the pretty pictures! Aww! So what’s your super-power, then?
– until
blueeyedboy
was by turns shamed and coerced into doing something different.

Midweek, between visits to the Mansion, he would sometimes walk past Emily’s house in the hope of seeing her playing outside. Occasionally, he saw her in town, but always with her mother: standing to attention like a good little soldier, sometimes flanked by Dr Peacock, who had become her protector, her mentor, her second father. As if she needed
another
one, as if she didn’t already have everything.

It probably sounds like he envied her. That isn’t altogether true. But somehow he couldn’t stop thinking about her, studying her, watching her. His interest gathered momentum. He stole a camera from a second-hand shop, and taught himself to take pictures. He stole a long lens from the same shop, almost getting caught that time, but managing to get away with his trophy before the fat man at the counter – surprisingly speedy for all his bulk – finally gave up the pursuit.

When his mother told him at last that he was no longer welcome at the Mansion, he didn’t quite believe her. He’d become so accustomed to his routine – sitting quietly on the couch, reading books, drinking Earl Grey tea, listening to Emily’s music – that to be dismissed after all this time felt like an unfair punishment. It wasn’t his fault – he’d done nothing wrong. It was surely a misunderstanding. Dr Peacock had always been so kind; why would he turn against him now?

Later,
blueeyedboy
understood. Dr Peacock, for all his kindness, had been just another version of his mother’s ladies, who’d been so friendly when he was four, but who had so quickly lost interest. Friendless, starved of affection at home, he’d read too much into those affable ways: the walks around the rose garden; the cups of tea; the sympathy. In short, he’d fallen into the trap of mistaking compassion for caring.

Calling round that evening in the hope of finding out the truth, Yours Truly was met, not by Dr Peacock, but by Mrs White, in a black satin dress with a string of pearls round her long neck, who told him that he shouldn’t be there; that he was to leave and never come back, that he was trouble, that she knew his type –

‘Is that what Dr Peacock says?’

Well, that was what he
meant
to say. But his stammer was worse than ever that day, closing his mouth with clumsy stitches, and he found he could hardly say a word.

‘B-but why?’ he asked her.

‘Don’t try to pretend. Don’t think you can get away with it.’

For a moment, shame overwhelmed him. He didn’t know what he had done, but Mrs White seemed so sure of his guilt, and his eyes began to sting with tears, and the stink of Ma’s vitamin drink in his throat was almost enough to make him gag –

Please don’t cry
, he told himself.
Not in front of Mrs White.

She gave him a look of burning contempt. ‘Don’t think you can get around me like that. You ought to be ashamed of yourself.’

Blueeyedboy
was. Ashamed and suddenly angry; and if he could have killed her then, he would have done it without hesitation or remorse. But he was only a schoolboy, and she was from a different sphere, a different class, to be obeyed, no matter what – his mother had trained her sons well – and the sound of her words was like a spike being driven into the side of his head –

‘Please,’ he said, without stammering.

‘Go away,’ said Mrs White.

‘Please. Mrs White. C-can’t we be friends?’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Friends?’ she said. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. Your mother was my cleaner, that’s all. Not even a very good one. And if you think that gives you the right to harass me and my daughter, then think again.’

‘I wasn’t ha-ha—’ he began.

‘And what do you call those photographs?’ she said, looking him straight in the face.

The shock of it dried his tears at once.

‘Ph-photographs?’ he said shakily.

Turns out Feather had a friend who worked in the local photo shop. The friend had told Feather, who’d told Mrs White, who’d demanded to see the relevant prints and had taken them straight to the Mansion, where she’d used them to prove her argument that befriending the Winters had been a mistake, one from which Dr Peacock should distance himself without delay –

‘Don’t think you haven’t been seen,’ she said. ‘Creeping around after Emily. Taking pictures of us both—’

That wasn’t true. He never shot
her
. He only ever shot Emily. But he couldn’t say that to Mrs White. Nor could he beg her not to tell Ma –

And so he left, dry-eyed with rage, tongue stapled to the roof of his mouth. And as he looked over his shoulder for one last glimpse of the Mansion, he saw a movement in one of the upper windows. He moved away almost at once; but
blueeyedboy
had had time to see Dr Peacock, watching him, warding him off with a sheepish smile –

That was where it really began. That’s where
blueeyedboy
was born. Later that night he crept back to the house, armed with a can of peacock-blue paint, and, almost paralysed with fear and guilt, he scrawled his rage on the big front door, the door that had been cruelly shut in his face, and then, alone in his room again, he took out the battered Blue Book to draw up another murder. 220

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:

Albertine
:
Oh please, not another murder. I really thought we were getting somewhere.

blueeyedboy
:
All right, but – you owe me one . . .

13

You are viewing the webjournal of
blueeyedboy
posting on:
[email protected]

Posted at
:
02.05 on Tuesday, February 12

Status
:
public

Mood
:
crushed

Listening to
:
Don Henley
: ‘The Boys Of Summer’

It only started out as that. A journal of his fictional life. There is a kind of innocence in those early entries, hidden away between the lines of cramped, obsessive handwriting. Sometimes he remembers the truth: the daily disappointments; the rage; the hurt; the cruelty. The rest of the time he can almost believe that he was really
blueeyedboy
– that what was in the Blue Book was real, and Benjamin Winter and Emily White just figments of some other person’s imagination. The Blue Book helped him stay sane; in it he wrote his fantasies; his secret vengeance against all those who hurt and humiliated him.

As for little Emily –

He watched her more than ever now. In secret, in envy, in longing, in love. Over the months that followed his expulsion from the Peacock house, he followed Emily’s career, her life. He took hundreds of photographs. He collected newspaper clippings of her. He even befriended the little girl who lived next door to Mrs White, giving her sweets and calling on her in the hope of a glimpse of Emily.

For some time Dr Peacock had worked to keep Emily’s identity secret. In his papers she was simply
Girl Y
– a fitting replacement to
Boy X
– until such time as he and her parents chose to launch her into the world. But
blueeyedboy
knew the truth.
Blueeyedboy
knew what she was. A Luna moth in a glass case, just waiting to fly from the chrysalis straight into the killing jar –

He went on taking photographs, though he learnt to do it with greater stealth. He got two after-school jobs – a newspaper round, a couple of nights washing dishes at a local café – and with his wages he bought himself a second-hand enlarger, a stack of photographic paper and some trays and chemicals. Using books from the library, he learnt to develop the photographs himself, eventually converting the cellar, which his mother never used, into a little darkroom.

He felt like someone who had missed the winning lottery number by a single digit – and it didn’t help that Ma never failed to make him feel that somehow it had all been
his
fault, that if he’d been smarter, quicker, better, then it could have been one of her boys scooping up the attention, the praise.

That year, Ma made it clear to her sons that all of them had let her down. Nigel, for failing so miserably to keep the other two in line; Brendan, for his stupidity; but most especially Benjamin, on whom so many hopes had been placed, but who had failed his Ma in every way. At the Mansion; at home; but most of all at St Oswald’s. Ben’s schooling at that exclusive establishment had proved the greatest setback of all, confounding Ma’s expectations that her son was destined for great things. In fact, he’d hated it from the start, and only his relationship with Dr Peacock had prevented him from saying so.