Skippy Dies (47 page)

In the beginning he has to keep pinching himself to remind himself this is actually happening: it seems unreal, like one of
those Kinder ads where everyone’s been dubbed into another language.

‘You’re here!’ she exclaims, holding her arms out to him. Her eye catches on the bruise on his temple as she leans in to kiss
him, but she doesn’t say anything about it. ‘My parents are
dying
to meet you,’ she says instead, and taking his hand she leads him inside. They go down a hall full of paintings to an airy
kitchen with a huge domed skylight, where a tall, slightly fierce-looking woman in a black dress is chopping courgettes. Skippy
wipes his palms on his trousers, ready to shake hands, but Lori breezes right by her, through a glass door: ‘Hey, Mom, look
who’s here!’

The woman stretched out on the divan is the image of Lori: the same magnetic green eyes, the same carbon-black hair. ‘Oh my
goodness!’ she lays down her magazine and swings her bare feet onto the tiles. ‘So this is the boy! This is the famous –’

‘Daniel,’ Lori says.

‘Daniel,’ Lori’s mum repeats. ‘Well, you’re very welcome to our home, Daniel.’

‘Thank you for having me,’ Skippy mumbles, and then, remembering, ‘I brought some chocolates.’ He hands Lori the box, which
in the cathedral-like conservatory looks downright microscopic; nevertheless, both women make exactly the same
Ohhhh
sound.

‘He’s ad
or
able,’ Lori’s mum pronounces, skating her fingertips over Skippy’s cheeks.

‘Can we have some OJ?’ Lori asks.

‘Of course, sweetie,’ her mum says, and calls through the door to the other woman, ‘Lilya, fetch the kids some juice, would
you?’
then kneels down on the floor in front of Skippy so her perfume swims up his nose and it becomes nearly impossible not to
look down her top. ‘It’s nice to finally meet you,’ she says in a fake whisper. ‘I knew there had to be a boy on the scene.
Though Lori’d deny it till the cows came home.’

‘
Mom
,’ Lori groans.

‘You may find it hard to believe, young lady, but I was actually a girl myself once. I know the tricks.’

‘Mom, go and do some Pilates or something,’ Lori pleads, moving towards the kitchen.

‘All right, all right…’ She resists her daughter for long enough to fix Skippy with an appraising eye and declare again, ‘Oh
he’s just
too
adorable,’ before disappearing, laughing, back to her divan.

‘Sorry, I should have warned you,’ Lori says. ‘My mom is like the world’s biggest flirt.’ She reaches for one of two glasses
of Sunny D that have appeared on the counter along with a big plate of chocolate-chip cookies, and shines Skippy a lighthouse-beam
smile. ‘Come on, I’ll give you the tour.’

The house is endless. Every room gives way to another even bigger, each one an Aladdin’s cave of screens and sculptures and
stereo equipment. Following after Lori, half-listening to her chatter, Skippy feels happy but strange, like a shadow that’s
won some competition and been invited for one day to be an actual person and not just a fuzzy shape on the ground – ‘And this
is my room,’ she says.

He snaps out of his reverie. Holy shit! It’s true! They’re in her bedroom! The walls are pink and covered with girl-type posters
– two horses nuzzling each other, the Sad Sam dog, a boy-cherub stealing a kiss from a girl-cherub,
BETHani
in an almost-but-not-completely-see-through swimsuit, and again, in a picture cut out of a magazine, hand in hand with her
boyfriend, the guy from Four to the Floor. On the dresser is a photograph of Lori, the beautiful mother and a man who must
be Lori’s dad, kind of like if GI Joe was made of wood and wore a suit, the three of them
looking so perfect together, like the example picture that comes with the frame.

‘Let’s watch TV!’ she says. There’s a television in here but she’s already going down the stairs to one of the living rooms,
where she sits on the sofa about two feet away from him, the cat cradled in her lap and her pop-socked feet dug comfortably
under a cushion.
The Simpsons
is on. Skippy wonders if he was supposed to have kissed her upstairs. She didn’t act like she was expecting him to. So should
he kiss her now? She does seem quite interested in the programme. Bollocks, maybe it’s not a date! Maybe they are friends!

‘So are you still swimming?’ she asks him during the ad break.

He tells her about the swim meet coming up this weekend.

‘Wow, that’s so exciting,’ she says.

‘Yeah,’ he says, nodding. (Hit by runaway hotdog cart, trip over cat, catch chickenpox, water shortage → all pools empty everywhere.)
‘It’s the semi-finals?’

‘Cool.’ She scratches her nose thoughtfully. ‘So you didn’t quit?’

‘Quit?’

‘Yeah, when I was talking to you the night of the dance, you said you wanted to quit it.’

‘Oh –’
when I was talking to you the night of the dance??!!
‘– um, well, it’s quite hard work, I suppose. Like, we have to get up at half six to train, and stuff. So it’s hard work,
that’s what I meant.’

‘You told me you hated it,’ she says.

‘I hated it?’

She nods, her eyes fixed on his.

‘Yeah…’ he says vaguely. ‘Yeah, sometimes I feel a bit like that.’

‘Why would you do something you hate?’

‘Well, I suppose my parents are excited about it, so…’

‘They don’t want you to do something you hate, do they?’

‘No, but…’ The Game, even here! It rises up monolithic out of the floor like a staring tombstone: caught in its shadow he
trails off, sitting there dumbly, miserably, wishing she’d stop looking
at him – then the door opens and the tall man from the photograph comes in.

‘Daddy!’ Lori cries, and leaps up from the couch.

‘There’s my princess!’ The man puts down his shopping bags so he can lift her up and swing her. ‘And who do we have here?’
he says, looking at Skippy scrunched up on the couch.

‘This is my friend Daniel,’ Lori says.

‘Aha… so this is the man who’s been keeping you out till all hours,’ her dad says. ‘Well, well. Gavin Wakeham.’ He lopes round
to crush Skippy’s hand in his and peer at him interrogatively.

‘Daniel’s in Seabrook,’ Lori tells her dad.

‘Is he?’ The man brightens at this. ‘I’m an old Blue-and-Gold myself! Class of ’82. Tell me, Daniel, how’s Des Furlong? He
back yet?’

‘No, he’s still sick,’ Skippy says. ‘Mr Costigan is in charge.’

‘Greg Costigan! I was in school with that bastard. What do you make of him, Daniel? Talks a lot of shite, doesn’t he? Actually,
tell him I said that, will you? Tell him Gavin Wakeham says he talks a lot of shite, will you do that for me?’ His big face
looks down at Skippy avariciously, like a hungry monster that has discovered a plate of bonbons. Skippy doesn’t know what
to say. ‘Good man, he’s true to his school!’ Lori’s dad guffaws, slapping his back. ‘Matter of fact, Greg is a good friend
of mine. Still see him for the odd pint up at the rugby club. You play yourself, Dan?’

‘Daniel’s on the swimming team,’ Lori says, snuggled under his arm. ‘They’ve got a big race coming up. They’re in the semi-finals.’

‘Is that so? And who’s coaching you? It’s not still Brother Connolly, is it? Brother Fondle-me, we used to call him.’

‘Mr Roche does it now,’ Skippy says.

‘Ah yes, Tom Roche, of course. Tragic story. You know it?’

‘Yes,’ Skippy says, but Lori’s dad starts telling him anyway. ‘Probably the best winger of his generation. Could have walked
on to the international team. Walked on to it, if it wasn’t for what
happened. And now I hear the other fellow’s back in Seabrook too, the one who let him take the drop for him, what’s his name
again…?’

‘Daddy, what did you buy?’ Lori tugs at his elbow.

Gazing into her upturned face, he brightens again. ‘Just some bits and pieces for the gym.’

‘
More
stuff for the gym?’

‘Just a couple of things.’

‘Mom’s going to kill you.’

‘Aha,’ smugly, ‘not so, because I’ve already taken care of that.’ He draws a smaller bag out of the larger and shakes it at
her.

‘And what about me?’

‘What about you?’

‘It wouldn’t be fair if everyone got something except me.’

‘Well, I’m sorry, in that case.’

‘Let me look in the bag.’

‘I think not.’

‘Let me look – Daddy!’ She lunges for the bag, he hoists it out of her reach, matador-style, and Skippy takes a step backwards
as the two of them become one giggling, wrestling mess. The woman from the kitchen appears in the doorway. She pauses there
a moment, shooting a brief, expressionless glance at Skippy on the far side of the tussling couple; then, in a vampiric monotone,
she announces, ‘Dinner is served.’ Lori’s dad and Lori split, gasping and emitting little leftover fragments of laughter.

‘Okay, Lilya, thank you,’ her dad says. ‘There, you little madam, though you don’t deserve it…’

He tosses Lori a shopping bag with a pair of lips on the side, and she lights up as she takes out a plastic case. ‘Oh, thank
you, Daddy!’

‘Without make-up she looks like the back end of a bus,’ her dad winks at Skippy; and then sternly, to Lori, ‘But you can only
wear it on special occasions, when your mum and I say you can, okay?’

‘Yes, Daddy.’ She nods earnestly, taking his hand and trotting alongside him into the dining room, with Skippy following behind.

They sit down at the table while the black-clad woman silently lays plates before them. ‘Isn’t this nice?’ Lori’s mum says.
‘I can’t think of the last time we all sat down for a meal together.’

‘Daddy’s
always
working,’ Lori tells Skippy.

‘Someone has to pay for all this, don’t they?’ Lori’s dad says, through a mouthful of food. ‘You girls seem to think it just
drops out of the sky.’ Lori and her mum make identical eye-rolling motions. ‘So what kind of racket’s your dad in, Daniel?’

‘Pardon?’

‘Your dad, what does he do?’

‘Oh – he’s an engineer.’

‘How about your mum? Is she working too?’ Across the table his tanned arms flex as he saws into his chop,

‘She’s a Montessori teacher. Well, not right now, but…’

‘That’s great. And how are you enjoying school?’

‘It’s okay,’ Skippy says.

‘Daniel’s one of the smartest boys in his year,’ Lori says.

‘Good for you,’ her dad says. ‘So what kind of career do you see yourself in, Daniel?’

Lori’s mum, laughing, lays down her fork with a clink on the plate. ‘Gavin, give the boy a chance to eat his food!’

‘What do you mean?’ Lori’s dad says. ‘We’re simply having a conversation, that’s all.’

‘You’re interrogating him. In a minute he’ll start burning your feet with cigarettes,’ Lori’s mum twinkles at Skippy.

‘I’m simply trying to find out a little bit about him,’ Lori’s dad rejoins. ‘God forbid I should want to try and find out
a little bit about the boy my daughter’s been out roaming the streets with for the last month –’

‘I wasn’t roaming the streets,’ Lori says, flushing.

‘Well, you weren’t watching
Buff y
at Janine’s, were you?’

Wait a second – what?

‘Leave her alone, Gavin,’ her mom reproves.

‘I just think it’d be nice to have some
idea
what your own child –’

‘We’ve been through all this – oh, now look.’

Lori’s head is bowed, and jerks with sobs.

‘Oh sweetheart… sweetie, I didn’t mean…’ He extends his hand across the table, lays it in Lori’s sparkling black hair. She
doesn’t respond; a tear splashes down into her half-eaten meal.

‘Oh God,’ he says heavily. ‘Look, I honestly don’t see what the fuss is about. Myself and Dan are getting along famously,
aren’t we, Dan?’

‘Yes,’ says Skippy. There is a tense silence, filled only by Lori’s snuffles. He clears his throat. ‘Actually, I think I’d
like to design video games. When I grow up?’

‘Video games?’ Lori’s dad says.

‘Or else be a scientist, you know like the kind that discover the cures for diseases?’

‘What kind of console do you have? Nintendo or Xbox?’

Lori’s dad turns out to know quite a lot about video games and they have a good conversation about that. After a little while
Lori stops crying, and the black-clad woman brings in a lemon meringue tart on a tray. ‘So who’s knocking around Seabrook
these days?’ Lori’s dad asks. ‘Is Bugsy O’Flynn still there? How about Big Fat Johnson? And Father Green, is he still dragging
lads out to the ghetto? Ha ha, I remember carrying boxes around some kip, scared the life out of me. Didn’t forget to keep
my arse to the wall, though. Old Père Vert.’

‘You and that school,’ Lori’s mother laughs, and as the woman comes in again to clear the dishes, she says to Lori’s dad,
‘Do you think our daughter could have Daniel back for an hour before she starts her homework?’ Lori’s dad grins and says,
‘I suppose so – okay, scram, you two.’

Lori and Skippy go back into the living room. This time Lori cosies right up next to him on the couch. ‘My parents
love
you.’ She smiles. Her legs are curled up and her toes wiggling against his hip.

‘They’re really nice,’ he says.

An old film is on the TV, the one about the guy in high school in America who finds out he’s a werewolf. Skippy has seen it
before but it doesn’t matter: his hand is in Lori’s and her little finger is absently stroking his little finger and the whole
universe is centred in those two little fingers. On the table her phone starts to ring, but she silences it and turns to him
again and smiles. After a long time debating whether to put his arm over her shoulder he finally decides that he should, and
he is just lifting his elbow onto the top of the couch when the doorbell goes. It makes both of them start. Lori jumps up
on the couch to peek out through the curtain, then – does he hear a little gasp? – she runs to the door, shouting, ‘I’ll get
it!’ down the hallway.

While she is gone, Skippy tries to focus on the film, where the guy is discovering that when he is a werewolf he is really
good at basketball. But although he can’t make out the words, he can hear her voice – muffled, urgent-seeming – in the hall,
as well as whoever is at the gate, the scrambling of the intercom making him sound ragged, angry…