The Year of the Rat (20 page)

And then he kisses me.

And the world swoops off into the distance and there’s nothing, nothing except him and me, his lips on mine, his hand on my neck, the warmth of him against me, and I kiss him
back—

‘No!’ I pull away.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘I’ve got to go,’ I say. ‘I’ve got to go.’

And I run up the path towards the house.

‘Pearl!’ he calls after me. But I don’t look back.

I pull the keys out of my pocket as I go and slam the door behind me.

Then I lean against it, breathing hard in the darkness, and I realize I’m crying.

There’s a noise upstairs and the landing light comes on.

‘Pearl? Is that you?’

Granny appears at the top of the stairs. She’s in her 1920s-film-star-style Chinese embroidered silk dressing gown and has cold cream smeared on her face and neck.

‘I was just off to bed when I heard the door go.’ As she comes closer, she realizes I’m crying. ‘Whatever’s the matter, dear? What happened? Did you argue? Did Finn
. . .’

She leaves what he might have done to my imagination.

‘No. Nothing like that.’ I try to wipe the tears away with my sleeve.

‘Then what happened? He obviously upset you in some way.’

‘No,’ I say.

‘So what went wrong?’

‘Nothing,’ I say. ‘Nothing at all.’

She looks at me and her brow creases and she takes my hand.

‘Oh, Pearl,’ she says. ‘You’re allowed to be happy. It’s OK.’

‘No,’ I shake my head. ‘No it’s not.’

And I push her hand away and run upstairs.

I go into the bathroom and splash cold water on my face. Then I look at myself in the mirror. I look tired; bruised under the eyes, pale, thin. But still the same person I was before Mum died.
It doesn’t seem right. I should look different; changed completely. I push my hair back, just as Finn had. What did he see when he looked at me? Did he see someone beautiful?

Mum’s face appears in the mirror behind me. ‘But you
are
beautiful,’ she says. ‘Please, Pearl. Granny’s right. I do want you to be happy.’

‘It’s not up to you,’ I whisper.

There’s a pair of nail scissors lying on the side and, without thinking about what I’m doing, I pick them up and start to cut my hair off. My hair is long and thick and it takes a
long time. When it’s done, I look at myself and the person I see looks more like how I feel on the inside.

‘There,’ I say, turning to Mum. ‘Not so beautiful now.’

But she’s not there.

‘Pearl. Come in, come in.’

Miss Lomax flashes me a self-assured smile as she ushers me into her office.

‘Sit down. Would you like a coffee? I’m just having one myself.’

‘No.’

‘Biscuits? We’ve got some left over from a very boring meeting I’ve just been in.’

I shake my head. Presumably, this whole routine is supposed to put me at ease. She’s pretending we’re going to have a Cosy Chat.

I perch on the edge of my chair.

‘So, Pearl.’ She takes another sip of coffee and smiles sympathetically. ‘How are you doing?’

I shrug.

‘Really,’ she says, pushing her hair back. She’s wearing too much hairspray and it all moves in one solid chunk. ‘Tell me. I’m not just asking to be polite. I
really want to know.’

I look at my hands. They look bony and the nails are bluish.

She sighs. ‘Pearl. I know how tough it must be.’

One of my nails has a jaggedy split in it, low down. I fiddle with it, bending it to and fro, pulling at it. It hurts like hell.

‘Really I do.’

Course you do. But . . .

‘But the thing is, Pearl, there are some things we just can’t turn a blind eye to.’

She waits for me to say something. I don’t.

‘We all understood that in the first few weeks it was hard for you to focus. Of course it was. And you did very well to get through your exams with the results that you did.’

There’s an ugly red smear of lipstick on the rim of her coffee cup. When Molly was in her hardcore vegan phase, she told me lipstick is made from pig fat and ground-up beetles. At the time
I didn’t believe her, but maybe it was true after all.

‘The thing is, Pearl, this can’t go on indefinitely. We’ve shown you understanding and patience for several months. But there comes a point where this sort of behaviour becomes
simply unacceptable. You can’t keep skipping lessons and expect to get away with it.’

I pull the broken bit of nail so hard it tears right off. The skin underneath it is raw and red and agonizing.

‘I don’t expect anything,’ I say.

‘Look. You’re a clever girl, Pearl. But if you don’t get your act together soon,’ – she pauses for dramatic effect and gives me a look to emphasize how serious she
is – ‘you could find yourself seriously behind. You could even risk failing your A levels.’

I burst out laughing. I can’t help it. A levels! The causes of the Second World War and
Pride and Prejudice.
She actually expects me to care about it all.

She bristles. She doesn’t like being laughed at so I try to stop.

‘It’s no laughing matter, Pearl. University. Your career. It could all depend on this. Your whole future.’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

‘What doesn’t matter?’

I almost feel sorry for her. She really doesn’t know. Where do I begin? How can I tell her that all of it – not just A levels and university, but all of it: watching TV and plucking
your eyebrows and friendship and ambitions and
love
–
it’s all just stuff we surround ourselves with to distract ourselves from the fact that anything could happen at
any time. Swine flu. Nuclear war. Being struck by lightning. Asteroids hitting the earth and wiping us all out like the dinosaurs.

None of it matters.

‘No, forget it,’ I say. I feel old.

She purses her lips till they’re just a thin scarlet line. I wonder what the name of her lipstick is.
Passione.
Something pretentious and sexy, that’s what she’d go
for. I reckon she thinks she’s pretty hot, Miss Lomax, with her high heels and her blouse you can see her bra through.

‘Look, Pearl. I think we’ve been more than understanding, but I’m beginning to feel that you’re abusing that understanding. There comes a point where it stops being about
bereavement and starts being about behaviour. If your attitude doesn’t change, Pearl, I’m going to have no option but to call your father in. And we may have to take more serious
action.’

Now we’re getting to it. So much for the Cosy Chat. Suddenly I don’t feel sorry for her any more.

‘Do you really think I care?’ I say. ‘Do you really think anything you do actually matters?’

She doesn’t like that. She’s used to getting her own way.

‘Don’t be childish, Pearl,’ she snaps. ‘This immature, attention-seeking behaviour is exactly what I’m talking about. I’m sure this isn’t what your
mother would want.’

My breath catches in my throat. ‘You don’t know my mother,’ I blurt, then blush stupidly. ‘Didn’t.’

‘No. But I
know
this isn’t what she would want. She wouldn’t want you to wallow in self-pity. She’d want you to get on with your life.’

I look at her face closely as she’s talking, hardly hearing the words. Her stupid, smug mouth daubed in pig fat and beetles.

‘Well, Pearl, is there anything you’d like to say?’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘You’ve got lipstick on your teeth. And everyone knows you’re shagging Mr Jackson.’

She stares at me, her face turning red.

‘Right. I’ve had enough of this,’ she says. ‘Get out of my office.’

‘With pleasure,’ I say. I grab my bag and head for the door.

My heart’s pumping; it’s a good feeling.

‘I will be arranging a meeting with your father as soon as possible.’

I decide against slamming the door. I leave it wide open instead.

There’s a knock on my bedroom door.

‘Can I come in?’ Dad’s trying to make peace. ‘I’ve brought you a cup of tea.’

We had a massive row last week about school. Miss Lomax called us both in to talk about my ‘behaviour’. Dad went. I didn’t.

When he got back, he’d sighed and said, ‘Well, I’ve done my best, Pearl. I told Miss Lomax you were a good girl really and you’d been through a lot. I said that when
you’d had time to think I was sure you’d come to your senses and apologize.’

‘I’m not apologizing,’ I told him. ‘And I’m not going back. I’ll get a job.’

‘I don’t know why I bother,’ he said.

And I said, ‘I don’t know either.’ And we haven’t spoken to each other since.

Now he sits down beside me on the bed. ‘You can’t just hide away up here. I don’t want us to fight,’ he sighs. ‘Forget about school and all that. We can talk about
it later, when we’ve had time to think and calm down a bit.’

‘I have had time to think,’ I say. ‘I am calm.’ Through the window the sky is heavy and tinged yellow. They say it’s going to snow.

‘Please, Pearl. It’s only a couple of weeks till Christmas. Let’s just try to enjoy it, shall we? Together. As a family.’

But how can we?

‘We’re going to decorate the tree in a minute. Will you come and help us?’

That was always Mum’s job. She only ever let me help under sufferance. She loved Christmas, all of it, the carols and presents and wrapping. We always had to have an advent calendar. She
was like a big kid.

Dad waits for me to answer. Eventually, he says, ‘We can’t go on like this, Pearl.’ He’s not angry; it’s just a statement of fact.

‘No.’ For once we agree.

I hear the door close behind him.

The garden is winter bare now. Just a few months ago it was like a jungle. Finn transformed it, cutting back, weeding, mowing, planting. But now the trees are stark and
leafless, the earth dark. I think of the seeds he planted, shoots growing under the surface. It’s hard to believe they’re still there. Even if they are, he won’t be here to see
them. There’s a big SALE AGREED sign in Dulcie’s front garden. The house has been empty since she went into hospital. It’ll be someone else’s soon. I look at the roses Finn
gave me, dried out now, but still vivid red on my desk. He’s back at college. I’ll never see him again, I suppose. Probably just as well. He must hate me.

I think about calling for Mum, but what’s the point? She won’t come. She only turns up when she feels like it.

I realize with a shock that I don’t want to see her. I’m tired of lying, pretending things are OK with Dad and The Rat. I’m tired of her nagging me about school and Molly.
I’m sick of her avoiding my questions about James.

I remember the Christmas card I was going to send him, with the letter inside. It’s too late now. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve; it’ll never get there in time even if I send it today. I
go and pick it up, looking at his name written in my best, most ornate handwriting, whispering it under my breath, even now trying to conjure him up from the sound of it. And, as I look at the
envelope, suddenly a terrifying, wonderful idea slips into my head: I don’t have to spend Christmas here. There is somewhere else I can go. I read his address. Hastings isn’t that far.
I looked it up. It’s just down on the south coast, through Kent down into Sussex. I could be there in a few hours. My heart beats fast. Could I do it? Am I brave enough just to turn up on his
doorstep?

Yes. I’m his daughter. He couldn’t turn away his own daughter at Christmas. It’s a time for family. He’ll be pleased, I know he will. More than pleased. He’ll say,
‘I’ve imagined this moment for so long . . .’

Or maybe he won’t. But, whatever, it’s better than sitting around here.

I know that if I think about it for too long I might lose my nerve. So I don’t. I check the train times on my phone. I haul the trolley case that Mum got me last year for the school ski
trip from under my bed and I throw in as many clothes as I can fit. Who knows how long I’ll stay? Maybe forever. I think about bringing the card and letter to give to him. But what’s
the point? I can say it all myself.

I pause in the hall. Dad and Granny are laughing and chatting in the sitting room, carols playing on the radio. I think about just leaving, sneaking out without telling them.
But I want to see the look on their faces when I say I’m going.

I push the door open and step far enough into the room so that they’ll see the rucksack on my back and the trolley case. But no one looks up. Dad’s fiddling with the Christmas
lights, twisting the bulbs and muttering. Granny’s pulling tangles of tinsel out of the decorations box, covered in festive paper, that we’ve had as long as I can remember. The Rat is
watching from her chair, her wide eyes following the sparkly decorations. And it hits me that they don’t need me at all. I’m always lurking unnoticed in the doorway, on the fringes of
whatever they’re doing. Well, good. It proves I’m right to go.

‘Right,’ I say breezily. ‘I’m going. Bye.’

‘Oh,’ Dad says, looking up, pushing his reading glasses back on to his head. ‘I hadn’t realized you were going out.’

Granny tuts. ‘But you were going to help me ice the Christmas cake.’

‘No I wasn’t.’

‘Where is it you’re going?’ Dad says, his eyes pausing uncertainly on my suitcase. ‘Staying round at Molly’s?’