Stuck on Me (16 page)

don’t think I’ve ever felt so down. Every morning, when I wake up, I feel OK for about three short
seconds, until I remember again that Rich has dumped me and that I’m going to have to face him across the classroom at school. He’s blanking me, just as I predicted he would, acting
like he can’t see me when I pass him in the corridor, treating me like a stranger – and, worse, one with some horrible, infectious disease – pretending the six months we shared
never happened. Yesterday, I’m sure I caught him laughing about me with his mates, drawing pictures of girls with big noses and passing them around. I pretended I hadn’t noticed, then
went to the toilets to cry. But crying only makes me feel worse – it makes my eyes look small and puffy and my nose bigger and shinier and redder. I am ugly. I am hideous.

Mum is worried about me, because I’m crying all the time and hardly eating anything, but not worried enough to let me have a day off school. She says I need to be brave and strong and stop
caring what other people think. She also says that now Rich has revealed his true colours, I should be thankful I’m not with him any more. According to her, I deserve better. But she would
say that. She never liked him.

I’m finding it hard to talk to her, or to Ocean or Grass, even to be around them, especially when they’re being sweet to me. Grass made me cupcakes the other day, to try to cheer me
up and make me eat something, but that just made me cry more. It feels like my big secret – meeting Dad – is wedging itself between us, pushing me apart from them. I want to tell Mum
I’ve found him and talked to him, I really do, and once or twice the words have been on the tip of my tongue, but I know she’ll be hurt and angry and that she won’t understand.
And so every time she hugs me, I feel guilty and two-faced, and push her away.

I’ve been thinking about Dad a lot. I tried to call him yesterday, just for a chat, but he didn’t pick up his phone. He can’t have known it was me, he doesn’t have my
number. The call went to voicemail, one of those generic prerecorded messages that could belong to anyone. I didn’t leave a message. I didn’t know what to say. A tiny part of me even
wondered if he’d given me the right number, or just made one up. He wouldn’t have done that, would he? I guess I’ll just have to wait until I see him at his next gig.

I do know what would make me feel heaps better about everything: a new nose. At lunchtime today, I rang the clinic and asked if I could schedule my operation, but they wanted a payment up front.
I’ve been saving my allowance (not buying drinks and muffins after school helps) but at this rate it’s going to take me until I’m a hundred and fifty before I’ve saved
enough. I’ve tried getting a part-time job – I asked at Dot’s Music Shop – with no luck. Nobody wants to employ a fourteen year old. It’s so unfair: I’m not even
old enough to buy a lottery ticket. My only option is a loan. From someone, somewhere. Maybe Dad will know where I can get one.

And if that doesn’t work? Rob a bank? Sit outside the NatWest on Camden High Street with the homeless people and beg? Change my religion so I have to wear a burkha, which covers my whole
face? Maybe I should just cut my nose off myself. Then they’d have to give me an operation to repair it. Who am I kidding? I tried waxing my legs once, with some strips from Boots, and it
hurt so much I had to stop in the middle.

No, there’s only one thing for it: I think I’ll just stay in my room for the rest of my life, with the blind firmly down.

t’s Sunday afternoon. It’s been a week now, but I’m not feeling any better. If anything, I
feel worse. I hate my life. I hate my nose. I hate my dad for not caring more. I hate Rich too, except I love him. And I hate myself for that. I can’t face doing anything: I haven’t
washed my hair; I’m wearing my pyjamas; I can’t even be bothered to put make-up on to disguise my nose, which makes me hate it even more. I hate EVERYONE and EVERYTHING. Especially
MYSELF. I wrote that on a piece of paper earlier and it made me feel better for a minute or two, until I hated those stupid words and my horrible, slanted handwriting, and tore the paper into
little pieces.

I’m lazing around on my bed now, wondering whether I should climb back in and have a doze, when the doorbell rings. I ignore it. I don’t want to see anybody, not even my friends.
That’s why I haven’t been out since I came home from school on Friday and why I’ve been ignoring their texts. I’ve even logged out of instant messaging and signed off
Facebook. They’ll only go on at me about how Rich was a waste of space and how I’m better off without him, and how I’ll start to feel happier soon because ‘time heals all
wounds’, and all the other clichés. I don’t want to hear it. Why shouldn’t I be allowed to feel sorry for myself if I want to?

The doorbell rings again. Longer, this time. It’s probably Jehovah’s Witnesses. There seem to be an awful lot of them in Camden, and they’re very persistent. They must think
it’s an area where people need extra saving.

‘Go away,’ I say under my breath. ‘Leave me alone.’ But the doorbell doesn’t listen. I tut. I can hear the hum of the vacuum cleaner from the living room.
‘Mum, will you get the door,’ I mutter, aware that she won’t hear me. I can’t even be bothered to raise my voice. Communicating is too much effort.

Mum must have stopped vacuuming because I hear muffled voices and then the buzz of the intercom.

‘Sky, will you get out here!’ she shouts. She sounds annoyed. ‘It’s for you. It’s
your
friends.’ The vacuuming begins again.

I ignore her. I’m going to ignore them too. If they come into my room I’m going to pretend they don’t exist. Because I don’t exist.

My bedroom door bursts open. No knock. How rude. I turn over and face the wall.

Rosie clambers onto my bed beside me. ‘Get up, Sky!’

I ignore her, which is hard, as she’s bellowing in my ear.

‘Come on, this is getting silly now. We’re worried about you.’

I shrug.
Did someone say something?

‘We’re not going anywhere, Sky,’ says Vix. I can sense that she’s standing at the end of the bed. ‘So you might as well give up now.’

I ignore her too.

‘Do you think she’s alive?’ asks Rosie. ‘She’s very quiet. And still. For Sky.’

‘Hard to say,’ says Vix. ‘I think she’s sulking. Still, there’s only one way to find out.’

I hear them giggle, conspiratorially. Then Rosie counts softly, ‘One, two, three,’ and suddenly there are hands upon me, all over me, digging into my ribs, under my arms, poking my
belly and the underside of my chin, even brushing the soles of my feet. I squirm and twist but I can’t escape the tickling hands. They’re everywhere, all at once. They’re
torturing me! I’m trying not to squeal but it’s unbearable . . . I can’t keep it in any more . . . ‘Noooooooo! Aieeee! Hooooo! Heeeeee!’ Now I’m laughing, in
spite of myself, breathing so hard that I’m becoming light-headed. ‘Arghhh! Eeeee! Ohhhh!’ I think I’m going to die if they tickle me any more. Has anybody ever died from
being tickled? ‘Owwww! Ergggg! Oooo!’

They’ve stopped. Oh, the relief. I lie still, catching my breath, waiting for my pulse to slow down. Weirdly, I feel better than I have in days, calmer and more relaxed, although I’m
not ready to let anyone else know that. I turn my face to the wall again.

‘I think she’s definitely alive,’ says Rosie. ‘She made a noise. It didn’t sound like a decomposing body to me. She wriggled a lot. And she feels warm
too.’

Vix giggles. ‘It was a weird noise, though. It sounded more like a creature than a girl. A cat? What do you think, Rosie?’

‘Hmm, maybe we should check to make sure.’

I sense their hands coming closer again. Please, no! I leap up, pushing them away from me. It’s a reflex action – I’m still trying to pretend they’re not there. I
won’t make eye contact with either of them.

Rosie sighs. ‘So, are you going to talk to us now? Because if you don’t we’re going to tickle you until you speak to us, or really do die. Your choice.’

‘Hrmph.’ It’s all I can manage. I can’t endure any more tickling, but speaking actual words would be giving in. ‘Pum.’

‘That’s a start,’ says Vix. At last.’ She sits down beside me on my bed. ‘OK, this is what’s going to happen. We’re going to get you some clothes.
You’re going to put them on. No arguments.’

I pout. Rosie has already walked over to my wardrobe and is now rifling through my clothes. She returns with my favourite pair of skinny jeans and a newish, sparkly blue top I was saving for a
night out. Arguing is futile. I put on the clothes without saying a word. The jeans feel looser than last time I wore them; I guess I must have lost some weight. I haven’t even felt like
eating chocolate. I sit down on the bed again. Being dressed properly makes me feel better too, although again I don’t admit it.

Vix has my hairbrush in her hand. ‘You’ve got such gorgeous hair, Sky,’ she says, ‘even if it could do with a serious wash. Lucky we brought supplies. Rosie?’

Rosie hands her a bottle of dry shampoo, which she shakes over my scalp. It makes me cough. Then Vix brushes my hair, gently. The sensation is comforting and reminds me of being a little kid.
Mum used to do it every night, a hundred strokes. ‘Right, now we’re going to do your make-up.’

They don’t bring me a mirror until they’ve finished. They’ve done a good job, although the result is a little more natural than I’d choose. I look healthier, less
puffy-eyed, more like me. But they haven’t shaded my nose, or put enough powder on it. It shines out at me, beacon-like. Instinctively, I move my hand to cover it.

Vix notices. ‘You don’t need all that crappy dark stuff on your nose, Sky. You look beautiful without it. Trust me. Trust us.’

I nod, resigned.

Vix takes her phone out of her handbag. ‘I’m just going to take a quick snap, OK?’

I nod again, and make an effort at a smile. It’s more a grimace. The flash fires.

‘OK,’ says Rosie. She hands me my bag. ‘Have you got your keys?’

I shake my head.

‘Get them. We’re going out now.’

I must look anxious because she puts her hand on my shoulder, reassuringly. ‘Don’t worry not far. Just to my house. OK?’

I really don’t want to go out. I REALLY don’t want to go out. From somewhere, buried deep inside me, I find my voice. It cracks from lack of use. ‘N-o. P-lease. I don’t
want to.’

‘Hey!’ Rosie laughs. ‘It speaks!’

I pout again.

‘Sorry, Sky,’ says Vix, ‘but you don’t have a choice.’ She takes one of my arms and Rosie takes the other. They drag me up from the bed and lead me to my door.

‘I’ll be really bad company,’ I protest, pulling back. ‘I appreciate you coming round and showing that you care, and I promise I’ll text you later and we can meet
up soon, but I don’t feel like going out now. Just let me be alone.’

‘We’re not listening,’ says Vix, ‘and there’s no point shouting for your mum. She’s in on it too.’

Rosie lets go of me for a second to open my bedroom door. I try to wriggle away. ‘You got her?’ she asks Vix, who nods. ‘Right, let’s go.’

I really don’t like this. I even feel a little bit scared, although Rosie and Vix are my best friends and I know they’d never do anything to hurt me. ‘What are you doing?
What’s going to happen?’