Brave New Girl (15 page)

“Oh, Seren, love!” Mum said. She almost sounded hurt herself. “What happened?” She lowered her voice, but everyone on the bus could still hear. “Have you been crying?”

“No! No, I haven't. S'all right, Mum.” I wiped at my face some more. I swiped my card and walked to the back of the bus, like normal, but the bus didn't move.

“Seren!” Mum called out to me.

The whole bus was staring now and I felt my face heat up. I walked back to the front of the bus, squeezing past the buggy, almost tripping over a man with an umbrella.

Mrs Gold smiled at me from the priority seats as I passed. “Darling, you go and talk to your mum, there's a good girl,” she said.

I bit my tongue. “Mum!” I said. “Really, I'm fine. Drive the bus!” I tried to keep my voice as low as I could.

Mum sighed and the bus began to move off.

“Thank you,” I said, and started to move back to my seat.

“No, love, stay put. Please! I can see something's wrong.” She said it loud and the whole bus was listening.

I said nothing. If my mum had driven the big buses, the proper double-deckers or the massive bendy ones, I would have been able to get out of earshot.

“You can't hide it, love,” Mum called out again as two new passengers got on. “You need to talk to me, Seren.”

I made a face. This was mad.

The boys in the seats near the front were giggling. I folded my arms. I wished I had my MP3 player so I could put my earphones in and block everything out.

“I am fine!” I shouted back. I stared out of the window hard, as if the
Perfect Fried Chicken
and the betting shop we were passing were fantastically interesting. I knew the whole bus was looking at me. Mrs Gold, the boys, a woman with shopping, an old man with a stick. I felt them all staring. I felt hotter and redder
every second. I should never have got on the bus.

“Seren? Please!”

The boys burst out laughing.

Mum yelled, real anger in her voice. “And you two can shut up!”

The boys just laughed more and louder.

Mum said my name again and I realised she wasn't going to give up, I got out of my seat and stood next to her driver's cab. “Mum, don't shout!” I hissed. “You're embarassing me.”

Mum had her eyes on the road, concentrating on the traffic, but she was flicking little sideways looks at me. What if she crashed and that was all my fault too? Although I couldn't help thinking that those boys laughing at me probably deserved to die.

“We need to talk,” Mum said. The dashboard was covered with photos of me and Sash and the boys, all grinning away in our various school uniforms. I thought if she was more honest there ought to be a bigger picture of Jenny Darling.

“Look, Mum,” I said quietly. “I am fine. Completely, totally fine! If you want to talk, why don't we do this at home? Oh, wait, I forgot, you're either not there or you're buried in a bloody book!”

We were at the traffic lights across from the high
street and the bus's engine was chugging away. She looked at me as if she might burst into tears. She took one hand off the steering wheel and reached across. I moved away.

“Oooo-ooo,” went the boys, all together.

The lights turned green and the bus lurched forward.

“Right!” Mum said, and she steered the bus against the kerb and slammed on the brakes. I nearly fell into Mrs Gold's lap. “We're talking now!” She pulled on the handbrake. “Right now.”

“Mum!” I said. “What are you doing?”

There was a low, upset mumbling from the passengers.

Mum turned round and spoke to them. “You lot! You lot especially!” She looked at the boys and they laughed, but this time it was nervous laughter. “You can get off my bus!” She came out from her driver's seat and opened the doors, and started shoo-ing the passengers off, like they were sheep. “Go on! Go! Out!”

“You can't do this!” said walking-stick man, waving his stick.

“You're having a laugh! I paid my ticket!” said shopping-bag woman.

The boys swore at her and said she was mad.

Mrs Gold said, “Linda, are you all right?”

“Fine, Eva. It's just I need to talk to my Seren. And I think I've let a couple of things get in the way.” She went back to the driver's seat, and while the passengers muttered and moaned she radioed the bus garage and asked for another bus to pick up her passengers.

“Mum, you can't! What if you get the sack? Mum! This is mad!”

But Mum said nothing. She flicked on the bus's hazard lights and the bus was filled with a reflected orange, on-off glow.

The passengers grumped off the bus. The boys swore even more. The woman with the shopping was on about writing a letter of complaint. The man with the stick said this was exactly the reason why women shouldn't be allowed to drive buses as they let their families get in the way of everything. Then the woman with the shopping started a row with him and I wouldn't have been surprised if she ended up knocking his stick away.

Mrs Gold pushed herself up off her seat,

“Eva, you stay put,” Mum said, and closed the doors on the empty bus. “I'll run you home after.” Mrs Gold smiled and sat back down.

“Don't mind me,” she said. “I'm practically deaf.”

Mum turned the sign that normally read Homerton Hospital and set it to something else. I couldn't see what but I expect it said, Not in Service.

“Come and sit down, love.” She sat down at the back of the bus where the blow heater was still blowing, and patted the seat next to her.

“Mum, this is bonkers! You'll get the sack! Why don't you just talk to me at home like normal people?”

“Guess I'm not normal then,” she said.

“No,” I said. “No.” I was still trying to whisper. Mrs Gold was pretending not to listen but I bet that woman could read lips ten miles away, old-lady glasses or not. “You're not normal! Our family's not normal, our family's rubbish!” I was so angry I wouldn't have been surprised if steam was coming out of my ears.

Mum reached for me and I pulled away.

“You think you're going to make it better like this?” I said. “Well, it's already ruined, everything is ruined.”

“It's all right, love....”

“No, it's not!” I wasn't going to cry. “It's not!”

“I'm sorry, love,” Mum said. “I've been on a bit of
another planet. But we're not rubbish... I'm so proud of you.”

“She is, you know,” Mrs Gold said. “I've seen you with the boys... you're a diamond.”

“Yes, Seren,” Mum said. “You are.”

“They hate me, they all hate me. Sasha hates me and now Keith hates me... and Christina's hated me for months....” I was breathing fast and shallow and for some reason I couldn't quite work out, my vision was a bit blurry.

“I'm sure they don't, love.” She patted the seat next to her again and I sort of fell into it.

Mum took a deep breath and held my hand. This time I let her. “Last week I saw Christina's mum in the market. I felt such an idiot! I didn't know... I didn't know about you two falling out,” she said. “And so long ago! Oh, Seren, why didn't you say anything? You know you can talk to me....”

“When? When can I talk to you? There was always stuff. Stuff going on.” I shrugged. “And that's been ages. Old news. I am totally over it.” I sniffed.

“I felt so bad... hearing it from her,” Mum said. “And so sad for you, you two were so close. Sisters, I always said, you and Christina, Sash and Fay. Like an extra family. Oh, love, I'm so sorry. People change,
friendships change.” She was quiet for a bit.

“I know that! I know all that about growing up and moving on. I do read magazines, you know.”

“I'm sorry I wasn't there for you, Seren.”

“Well, you never are, you're always off in some dream world. You never notice anything real, not with me or even when it happens to Sasha!”

She held my shoulders and looked at me, suddenly scared. “What's happened to Sasha? Oh my God, what is it?”

“She's not pregnant, Mum. This isn't one of your books, this is real life. Haven't you noticed she's not been around? I mean, she's supposed to be doing her GCSEs but you don't seem to care at all!”

Mum hugged me close, but I pushed her away.

“‘Course I care!” Mum said indignantly. “I just thought... you know, she needed some space. I mean, our house, it's like a bloody tornado goes through every five minutes. I thought she needed some quiet. Everyone needs quiet sometimes.”

“I don't. I want our house full again. I want Sasha talking to me. I want Sasha telling Denny to shut up....”

“Sasha's not talking to you?” There were tears in her eyes and she sniffed.

“You never knew! That's what I've been saying, you don't know anything!” I said, and the tears started. I let Mum hold me close. “You never listen when it's just me. Never. You're always tired, and it's always me sorting the boys. I'm not a childminder, I'm thirteen! It's always me making things nice and smooth, and no trouble, and it's not fair!”

“I'm listening now, love, honest.” She stroked my hair. “I'm here now.”

I put my head against her even though I was as tall as she was, and I breathed in the smell of warm bus, of crisp packets and people and a little bit of petrol and my mum, then I cried some more.

When the tears had stopped a bit I told her all about everything. About Christina who wasn't my friend any more, and Sasha who wasn't my sister, about Denny being too big for his boots and calling me his half-sister, and Arthur playing up because he never got enough attention. About how I had been really worried Dad would go to Cyprus and I'd never see him again, but then I was wrong, about how Nene hated me, about how I wanted to do Drama and Gamze and Ayshe did it but didn't care, and it was not fair. About falling over in front of the whole school and feeling clumsy and useless. And then I told her
about how, just when I thought I was doing something right, I ruined Keith's film and now I had no friends at all.

Mum held me tight and rubbed my back.

When I did open my eyes, Mrs Gold was looking at me from the priority seats. “Oh, you'll be fine, Seren,” she said. “We all mess up, don't we, Linda?”

Mum smiled. I could tell from her eyes that she had been crying too. “I'm sorry, love. Really I am,” she said. “I'll cancel my library ticket. I'll do less hours.”

“No!” I said. “Don't cancel your library ticket. Just put the book down. Sometimes. OK?”

“OK,” Mum said.

It was a long time before we got home, past eleven o'clock. Mum drove Mrs Gold right home to her front door. Mrs Gold promised she'd do anything it took to get my mum out of trouble, even writing a letter saying that it was her fault Mum had stopped the bus because she'd had some sort of funny turn. Mum said thanks and they hugged, and Mrs Gold told me to be good. Then Mum drove us back to the garage.

“Does this count as stealing a bus?” I said. “Do you think you'll really get the sack?”

“I hope not,” Mum said, as she went in to talk to her manager. “Keep your fingers crossed for me. Maybe you should lend me your lucky eye.”

I said I didn't think it would help, so I just gave her a hug and waited. I couldn't hear what they said in the office, but Mum was in there ages, and once or twice there were raised voices. I sat on the plastic seat and thought that nothing much changes really, that even though Mum wasn't at school she still had loads of people telling her this and that, and you just have to take it.

Keith was right, the only thing you can do is be cool.

Keith. I shivered. He hated me. I shut my eyes and turned the lucky eye over and over.

Mum had called Sasha to come home and sit with the boys, and I suppose she thought she was cleverly fixing things so we'd have to talk to each other. Mum didn't say that as we walked home, but I guessed it was what she was thinking. It was good walking with her in the dark, and I couldn't remember when we'd last even been out together, except to see
Spongebob Squarepants
last summer holidays with the boys.

“I know I've been working loads,” Mum said as we turned into our estate. “I thought, no, I
know
it's the
right thing. We need the cash.” She took my hand. “People like us, Seren, don't have a lot of choices. Four kids!” She looked at me. “It's not just hard, it's expensive.”

“I know that!” And I was proud of her. “I know you work hard, Mum. We all do.”

“I couldn't manage without you, you know that.” Her eyes were shiny.

“Stop the love fest now!” I said. “Before one of us starts blubbing all over again!”