Tao (11 page)

Mimi said, “You think she stole your daddy away, don’t you?”

“She did,” I said. “We were fine, me and Dad and Kate, before Jo came along.”

“You can’t just blame Jo,” argued Mimi, flinging another fat stone into the sea with a splash. “ How do you make those stones hop?”

“You have to use flat ones,” I explained, skimming another stone for about five hops. “I blame Jo because it was all her fault. If she hadn’t got a job in Dad’s office, he would still live with us.”

Mimi didn’t answer. She was looking for a flat stone, but I knew she didn’t agree with me.

“I’d love it if my dad married Kate,” she said, “because she’s really nice, you know.”

Well, I did know that, but it gave me a warm feeling when Mimi said it.

“I miss having a mammy,” she said sadly. She threw her stone, but it just sank like all the others. She sighed loudly.

“You couldn’t dig all the way to China anyway,” I told her, because I wanted to change the subject.

“No, s’pose not,” agreed Mimi, but she didn’t sound convinced. “Anyway, if you did you would fall out of the sky when you got there and probably die.”

“No, you wouldn’t.” I couldn’t help laughing. “You’d come out on the ground even on the bottom of the world.”

Mimi bit her lip while she thought about that. Then she shook her head and giggled. “Then everyone in China would be walking around upside down!”

Now I was confused. So we tried to walk upside down on our hands, the Chinese way, but neither of us were very good at it and in the end we just lay flat on our backs on the sand and laughed and tried to stop Sparkler from licking our faces until Paul and Kate arrived to call us giddy-goats in for dinner. Kate had her arm linked in Paul’s.

The next day, it rained cats and dogs.

“I’m bored! There is nothing to do here,” said Sally. “There’s not even a telly.”

“Relax, Sally,” said Paul. “Why don’t you all play a big game of Monopoly?”

“Yes!” said Mimi. “I’ll get it.” And she ran off to her bedroom.

I liked the sound of that, too. I’m a champion at Monopoly.

“I don’t want to play bloody Monopoly!” shouted Sally. “I’m going for a walk.”

“Well, take your coat,” said Kate.

“You are not my mother!” snapped back Sally and stormed out the door, slamming it so hard behind her that the whole house shook.

“Sally!” shouted Paul, jumping up and marching towards the door. He looked really cross.

“Leave it, Paul,” Kate called after him. “She’s right. I shouldn’t have opened my big mouth.”

Paul stopped and stood still for a few moments.

“It’s not acceptable behaviour,” he said. “I’ll be having a strong word with that young madam when she gets back.”

Conor looked at me and rolled his eyes.

“Looks like World War III has just broken out,” he said and grinned.

But Paul wasn’t laughing. And neither was Kate. Her face was bright red. She bit into the toast she was holding and that’s when her filling fell out.

“Ow!” she moaned.

Paul insisted on driving Kate to a dentist even though she said that there was no need, that she’d pop a painkiller and she’d be fine, but he didn’t want it to spoil her holiday so off they went. Conor and Mimi and I played Monopoly because there was no point in everybody going. Sally still wasn’t back and Kate was worried that she might be completely soaked, but Paul said that it was her own fault and served her right for being so rude.

Sometimes it seems to me that every house has different rules for Monopoly. If we had played Kate and my rules I would probably have won, but Mimi and Conor had some rules all of their own. So I lost … for the first time ever.

Firstly, their board had Dublin streets, not London streets.

Secondly, Mimi bagsed the racing car first, which is my lucky piece that Kate always lets me use, so I got stuck with the top hat, which turned out to be a very unlucky piece.

Thirdly, Conor and Mimi didn’t let you take loans from the bank when you needed money, even if you promised you would pay it back when you passed Go.

Fourthly, they showed no mercy. If you couldn’t pay the amount, they NEVER let you off.

No wonder I was first out. I was really fed up about that.

“I don’t like your rules,” I said and threw my unlucky top hat back in the box with a clatter.

“So who do you normally play against, Tao?” asked Conor as he sorted all the money and the houses and the hotels that I had just given him. I had nothing at all left.

“Kate,” I said.

“And does she always let you win?” He laughed, throwing the dice.

“No, she does not!” I answered crossly, and I was glad to see him land on Shrewsbury Road (which is the Irish version of Oxford Street), which Mimi owned and had a hotel on.

“Yes!” she cried, punching the air. She was the luckiest player I’ve ever seen. She owned about three-quarters of the board and had a big messy mountain of money in a heap in front of her.

“Cough up the cash, loser,” she said. Conor sighed.

It was clear that he was going to lose, but it was going to take a while yet. I wandered out into the garden. The rain had stopped and there was even a bit of blue sky opening up. Sally had come back. I had heard her having a shower. Sparkler was asleep in her basket in the kitchen. I walked down to the lake, where the boat was tied up.

Paul said that he’d take us out fishing in the boat when the rain stopped. Well, the rain had stopped, but he wasn’t here. What was taking them so long anyway, I wondered.

“They’ve probably gone off and got married,” I said out loud into the wind. Which was a really stupid thing to say, but I didn’t care.

I climbed into the boat and sat in the middle seat. I wasn’t going to go anywhere – anyway, there were no oars. I just wanted to be on my own for a bit and be grouchy and I liked the way the boat bobbed gently up and down on the water. There was nobody about, so I could talk away out loud to myself.

“How dare Conor say that Kate lets me win,” I told the lake. “What does he know, anyway? He’s not so good himself. Mimi is going to whup his ass!”

I liked saying that. “Whup his ass.” I repeated it in my American accent that David says sounds like a drunk Eskimo. As if he knows what a drunk Eskimo sounds like. Anyway, Kalem says they are called Inuits now.

“And another thing,” I told the sky, “Sally’s right – Kate is not her mother. She’s my mother. But if Kate and Paul want to get married, well, I don’t care. I can just go and live with Dad and Jo and the twins, can’t I?”

“And Mimi can come and live with us if she likes,” I continued. The wind was strong and there was no one about to hear me. “Or maybe we can go back to China. Even if we have to dig all the way.” Which even though I was cross made me smile as I thought of us popping out of a hole in the middle of China all covered in dirt and all these Chinese people standing on their heads with their mouths dropping open.

In fact, I wasn’t really as cross as I was trying to be, but it felt good to be complaining out loud.

Maybe if I hadn’t been complaining so much, I would have noticed that the rope had come loose and the boat was drifting away from the bank.

That’s when I really should have started shouting properly, but at first, it didn’t seem so serious. I probably could have stepped out of the boat and paddled to the edge but I hesitated because I didn’t want to get my feet wet and, before I knew it the boat had drifted way out onto the lake.

Now I shouted for help as loud as I could but the wind blew my voice away and pushed the boat further and further from the shore. The boat had no oars and kept turning in circles and the little bobbing waves were a lot choppier out here. I hadn’t even got a life jacket on. I sat frozen to the spot on the middle seat, holding tightly to the sides as the boat drifted across the grey lake.

Where was everybody? Why wasn’t the boat properly tied up? Why was I finding it hard to breathe? I thought I might jump in and swim to the shore but I was too afraid.

“Help! Help!” I screamed. I tried to stand up but the boat wobbled so much I had to sit back down or fall in. I tried to keep my head and stay calm but it’s hard to keep your head when you are going to drown!

“Help!” I screamed, and tears started pouring down my face. Where was everybody? Was there nobody left in the world to save me? I could see my mobile phone on the floor beside my bed – why hadn’t I taken it with me?

I tried to think what Dad would do. He always kept his cool in a crisis. I took a deep breath and told myself to calm down. Relax. But it was easier said than done and the stupid boat just went round and round although at least it wasn’t sinking. Someone will come soon, I told myself. Just stay in the boat. And yell!

“Help! Help!” But the wind just blew my yells up into the sky, even if there had been someone about to hear me.

After what seemed like ages, the boat drifted right across the lake, which wasn’t very big, and thumped into the bank on the far side. Which meant I was safe. I climbed out and stood on the soft mossy bank and looked back across at our house. My legs felt wobbly, but I didn’t care. I was still alive. All I had to do was walk back around the lake and think up a good excuse for what happened. The sun had come out and it was already hard to remember why I had felt so frightened.

The sun didn’t stay out for long. I hadn’t got very far when a damp mist came in from the sea and covered it up. I could no longer see the other side of the lake, but I knew if I followed the lake shore I would get back to the house in the end. It was just that the ground was very boggy and my shoes kept sinking into the mud. I tried to step on tufts of grass, but it meant I was taking a long time.

I wondered if they’d noticed that I was gone yet. Was Kate back and going hysterical? Had they seen that the boat was missing? Were there search teams out looking for me yet?

Probably not. Mimi and Conor were probably still playing Monopoly, while Sally sulked in her bedroom and Kate and Paul were still at the dentist. I was all alone in the world and nobody cared.

Then suddenly I was standing at the edge of a river. A fast river flowing into the lake. I hadn’t expected that. It had just appeared out of the mist. I didn’t know what to do. Should I try to cross and maybe drown or walk all the way back around the lake the other way? I was getting cold and my clothes were all wet from the mist and I was sick of walking. I didn’t want to go back all the way that I had come, but I was afraid of the rushing river. I had come too far to drown now. Maybe there were stepping stones further on or somewhere I could cross safely.

I began walking up the side of the river. It was hard going because the ground climbed steeply and soon I was walking through trees. They looked creepy in the grey mist, reaching down their branches to slap my face and tripping me up with their roots. A bird burst out in front of me and my heart nearly jumped out of my chest.

It was getting harder and harder to follow the windy river. There were rocks and brambles along its edge, and the mountain I was climbing, which seemed middle-sized when I looked at it from the house, was getting steeper and steeper. I couldn’t help it. I started to cry.

Maybe I should have tried to go on a bit further, but I was getting panicky. I had to get across that river. Now or never. There were some rocks in it that I could jump onto.

My first jump was nearly my last. I just about reached the edge of a flat rock sticking out of the rushing water but I almost fell backwards. I took a moment to get my nerve back and then jumped onto the next rock. This was a much shorter jump, but there was slimy, green stuff on the rock that was very slippy and my feet slid off it. I had to grab on with both hands, my legs hanging in the river. Frantically, I pulled myself up onto the slippery, green stone. My legs were bleeding and I was soaking.

I made a last big jump for the other side and managed to catch hold of the grassy edge with my hands and dragged myself up out of the river.

I had made it! I was a complete mess, but I was safely across. It was straightforward now. Down the mountain I ran. I couldn’t wait to get home. They must be sick with worry. Kate was probably screaming her head off. Dad says she doesn’t know the meaning of calm. Paul would be beside himself, whatever that means, and Mimi and Conor were probably running around like headless chickens shouting, “Tao Tao!” Sally … well, Sally was probably reading in her bedroom with her headphones on.

You shouldn’t run down a mountain. Even when you can’t wait to get home. Because you can trip and twist your ankle or maybe even break your leg. Without warning, my left foot went into a hole and I tumbled forward and hit my head hard on a rock. I didn’t remember anything after that.

When I woke up, I didn’t know where I was. There was a bad pain shooting all around my head and I closed my eyes again. It wasn’t just my head that ached. My foot was in agony too. Slowly I opened my eyes again and a big fat yellow moon was looking down at me. It was night-time and I was lying on the side of a mountain and I was all on my own. Oh, God!

I tried to stand up, but my foot wouldn’t hold me. I screamed in pain and fell back down again. I was so frightened. My tummy felt like it was being squeezed by giant hands and I thought that I would throw up. Then a cloud covered the moon and I couldn’t even see my own hands.

“Helphelphelp! Someonehelpme!” I screamed and screamed but no one answered. “Help me, please!” I cried and my face was all wet with tears. I felt so little and so lonely. And so scared.

There was a noise in the grass near me. The moon still hadn’t come out, but my eyes were getting a bit used to the blackness – I could just make out the dark shapes of big trees waving their branches in the wind as if they were alive. I never knew that trees could be scary. Then there was that noise in the grass again. A small animal noise. Were there snakes in Ireland? I didn’t know. I stayed dead still. The noise stopped, but what did that mean? Was I about to be bitten by a viper or an anaconda that I couldn’t even see? A long time passed. I was sweating, but I was very cold too. And wet.