Violet Ink (9 page)

I race through the front door of our house, half desperate to see Alex and half terrified about what state she might be in. As the day has gone on, I've been imagining worse and worse things, and now I'm about ready to call 999 again and get Alex the medical attention she so obviously needs.

‘Alex?' I call, throwing my bag into the corner. Homework is going to have to wait today.

A grunting sound comes from the living room and, with my heart in my mouth, I tiptoe towards the door. The TV is on and Alex is lying on the
sofa, looking bored. I walk over to her and squeeze on to the edge of the sofa so that I can look at her properly.

‘Are you OK?' I ask her.

‘Uhhm,' she says, which doesn't tell me very much. She reaches down and takes a handful of crisps out of the king-size packet lying on the sofa. I sniff and wrinkle my nose in disgust. Cheese and onion? Alex and I have always been in perfect agreement that cheese and onion flavour crisps are the work of the devil and not fit for human consumption. We even play a game called ‘Cheese and Onion Snog' where one of us will suggest a name and the other has to decide if they would kiss that person EVEN if they'd been eating cheese and onion crisps. So far, we've not found a single boy we'd want to kiss – although I haven't asked her about Charlie yet.

I try to focus and put crisp flavours out of my mind. They're not important at the moment. I need Alex to confess to her addiction and then we can work out how to tell Mum.

‘It's OK, Alex,' I tell her, rubbing her leg in what I hope is a relaxing way.

She ignores me, although she shifts her leg away from my hand.

‘You can talk to me, you know,' I say.

Alex is still staring at the rubbish daytime talk show on the TV and I wonder if she's had some kind of mental breakdown. I think hard about what to say. I need to get it right – let her know that she can trust me.

‘I know what's going on,' I say. ‘I know why you felt sick this morning.'

This finally gets her attention. She sits up so quickly that the packet of crisps falls off the sofa and spills foul crumbs all over the carpet. Bet Alex won't clean that up and I'll end up doing it.

‘What are you on about?' she snaps, glaring at me.

I sit up a bit straighter and try to look mature and trustworthy.

‘You can talk to me about what's going on. I can help you.'

Alex laughs, a hard, short laugh that has nothing funny about it.

‘How can YOU help ME? You're just a kid. You can't do anything.'

This hurts. I've spent all day worrying myself silly about Alex and the least she can do is be civil to me. She doesn't actually have to be rude.

‘You've got to tell Mum, Alex. You need help.'

Alex grabs my arm so hard that I wince.

‘Don't you dare say a thing to Mum,' she snarls. ‘I mean it, Izzy – I'll never forgive you if you tell her.'

I'm too shocked to say anything so I just look at Alex. Her eyes look tired, but they still have enough energy to scowl at me, making it clear that she means what she says. Suddenly I feel frightened – I don't recognize this Alex.

‘It's got nothing to do with you,' she says, letting go of me and slumping back against the cushions. She closes her eyes and I feel a rush of anger buzzing through me. Standing up, I lean over her and let the anger out.

‘How can you say that?' I shout at her and Alex opens her eyes, shock registering on her face. ‘It's got everything to do with me! This is my house too and if you're bringing that stuff here then you're making it something to do with me.'

Alex opens her mouth as if she's going to ask me a question, but I race on, desperate to tell her how I feel.

‘You're my sister, Alex, and I'll always love you, no matter what you do. But please, please stop doing this to yourself. It's too dangerous. I know you think that I don't know anything, but we've
learnt all about it in citizenship and drugs can hurt you, Alex. They can kill you. And I don't want you to die!'

Having made my point, I burst into tears, and I stand there feeling furious with myself for acting like a child, but unable to stop the tsunami of tears that are overwhelming me.

Alex stands up and wraps her arms round me.

‘What did you just say?' she whispers in my ear.

‘I know you're taking drugs,' I sob back, gulping in huge breaths in between each word. I sound pathetic, but I don't care now – Alex is hugging me. I did it; she can admit her problem and we can solve it together. Alex needs me and she knows I'm here for her.

I feel her body start to shake and I stop crying, holding on to her tightly.

‘It's OK,' I tell her. ‘It's going to be OK.'

For one moment I feel totally powerful. I hold Alex in my arms and imagine her confiding in me. Then I hear a completely unexpected sound – the sound of Alex laughing. Properly laughing. And I realize that her shaking is not a result of her being overcome with emotion, but a result of her being unable to stop sniggering hysterically.

I pull away from her and watch as she wipes her eyes.

‘Oh, Izzy, you are funny,' she says, straightening her shirt and turning back to the sofa. This is not what I expected.

‘I'm not funny. This isn't funny,' I tell her. ‘You need to admit it, Alex.'

She flops back on to the sofa again.

‘I'm not on drugs, Izzy,' she says.

‘You ARE!' I say, a little bit louder than I meant to, but I'm feeling desperate. ‘You must be. It explains everything.'

‘Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I'm really not. So if that's all you've got to tell me then I'll get back to my afternoon.'

I stamp my foot in frustration before realizing that Alex is not going to take me seriously and confide in me if I behave like a toddler.

‘Well, you can talk to me when you're ready,' I say, but she doesn't look away from the TV. ‘Alex? Did you hear me?'

‘It's hard not to hear you,' she mutters. ‘Are there any other revelations you've had about me and would like to share?'

‘No,' I whisper.

‘Then, in that case, please leave me in peace. I
can totally reassure you that I will not be taking drugs of any kind while you do your homework.' She turns up the volume on the TV and I give up.

I walk into the hall and retrieve my bag and then sit down at the kitchen table, but I'm too upset to think about my history homework. Life in Victorian Britain might have been grim, but life in the Stone house is no picnic right now. Alex is obviously in denial and I'm just going to have to find hard evidence and confront her with it. I will not let her destroy her life. This is all Cheese-and-Onion Charlie's fault, I bet. There wasn't a problem until he came along. Maybe he's the one who has introduced Alex to drugs, just like he must have encouraged her to eat those disgusting crisps. I just need to find proof, and then I can show Mum and we can help Alex do the right thing.

‘Izzy, have you seen Alex?' asks Mum, running into the kitchen. ‘And where's my bag?'

I put down my science book (all I ever seem to do these days is schoolwork) and look blearily up at Mum. I don't know why she's asking me. She knows I've been sitting here for the last hour.

‘No,' I tell her.

‘No to which one?' she says, bending down and dragging her bag out from under the kitchen table. ‘How on earth did it get there?'

‘No to both. I haven't seen Alex and I didn't know where your bag was until you just found it.'

‘You were virtually sitting on top of it,' mutters Mum, sounding grumpy. ‘Are you sure you haven't seen Alex?'

‘Yes, Mum,' I say, closing my book. I'm feeling
completely distracted now and I've done enough for today anyway. Hannah's coming over in a while and we're going to start working on our history assignment.

‘What time's Hannah getting here?' asks Mum, looking at her watch. ‘Will you be OK on your own until she arrives?'

‘Mum! Stop worrying. She'll be here in about half an hour. I'm going to read my book while I wait for her.'

I give Mum a quick hug and head upstairs.

‘Tell Alex to hurry up if she's up there,' Mum calls after me. ‘Mr Fanley won't wait if we're late.'

Alex hates going to the orthodontist. She calls him ‘Mr Fanger' and moans like mad when she's got an appointment. She says it's embarrassing and that she's the only girl in her year with braces (except she calls them train tracks). Mum tells her that she'll be glad she had the chance to make her teeth perfect and that she wishes she'd had this opportunity when she was younger. I think Alex has got lovely teeth, even with the braces. They're sparkling white and all neat and even. She's got film-star teeth.

Not like me – mine are all clumped together in a muddly crowd, some hiding behind the others.
Mum says not to worry and that I'm still growing. She says that my mouth is too small for my teeth at the moment, but that it'll grow. Alex moans when she hears Mum say that and says that I talk too much as it is. I'm on the waiting list to see Mr Fanley, but I'm not sure that's a good thing. Alex always makes such a fuss about it that maybe I'd be better off with crooked teeth.

I walk into my bedroom and pick up my notebook from the window ledge. Glancing out of the window, I see Alex, sitting on her swing and swaying to and fro in the April sunshine. I'm about to bang on the window to get her attention, but stop when she pulls her mobile out of her pocket. She reads something on the screen and then her face screws up. For a second she looks angry and I watch as she throws her phone across the flower beds and towards the garden shed, as if it's said something nasty. The angry look disappears and is replaced by a different emotion – maybe sadness or worry or fear. I'm too far away to tell and, before I can decide whether to call to her, I see Mum appear on the lawn below me. She shouts to Alex and then goes back into the house.

Alex gets off the swing and walks towards the
back door. She looks slow and ill, like something is really wrong.

Mum calls goodbye to me and then I hear the front door slam as they leave. This is it: my chance to find the evidence I need to confront Alex. She's not OK, that's really obvious. I'm just surprised that Mum hasn't spotted that there's a problem. If I can find proof that Alex is taking drugs then I can show Mum and she can deal with it.

I throw my notebook on my bed, race out of my room and then stop, my hand on the handle of Alex's door. It feels wrong, like snooping. I know she'd hate the idea of me spying on her things, but I have to do this. It's for her own good. Taking a deep breath, I open the door and walk inside, closing it quietly behind me.

It's hard to know where to start. Alex's room is a mess as usual. My other
slight
problem is that I don't really know what I'm looking for. Drug stuff. That's what they said in that citizenship lesson. Finding drug stuff in their bag or bedroom. I know that some people use needles to take drugs, but I can't really imagine Alex doing that. She hates needles. She makes a really big fuss if she ever has to have an injection and once she even fainted. Also, she cares a lot about her appearance
and I don't think she'd like having lots of little holes in her arms.

So I'm going to have to keep an open mind. I'm looking for anything suspicious – anything that shouldn't be here. I start under Alex's bed, but I'm sneezing so much after thirty seconds that I have to stop. It doesn't look like anything's been moved under here since the last millennium so I don't think her secret stash can be kept here. Next I try the bottom of her wardrobe; that doesn't take long because most of her clothes are on the floor. Nothing in there.

I stand in the middle of her room and look around. If I was Alex, where would I put something that I didn't want anyone else to find? I close my eyes and try to think like her, but it's no good. I'm nothing like Alex and I just can't imagine things like she does. I wouldn't be any good at hiding something secret, not like her. I suddenly feel really stupid. What was I thinking, imagining that I could second-guess Alex? Imagining that I could help her, be cleverer than her. She's always going to be older and more exciting and more
everything
than me. If Alex doesn't want me to know something then I won't know it – not until she decides to tell me.

The
thought makes me feel pathetic and small. It also makes me feel like I have no control: I just have to wait until other people choose to fill me in. I'm suddenly angry. It's totally unfair. I'm a part of this family too and I should be listened to. I kick something lying on the floor by my foot and watch as it sails across the room, landing behind the empty laundry basket. Mr Cuddles!

Hurrying across the room, I pull the basket out a bit further and reach down behind it to retrieve poor Mr Cuddles.

‘I'm sorry,' I tell him as I stretch my arm down into the gap. ‘It's not you I'm mad at.'

My hand brushes against his soft, furry head and I pull him out. As I do, I catch sight of Alex's T-shirt lying in a crumpled heap on the floor and, in an attempt to make up for invading her privacy, I pick it up and open the lid of the laundry basket. But there, at the bottom of the very empty basket, is something that doesn't belong there. I reach down and pull out a wooden box.

Heart racing, I drop Mr Cuddles on the floor and sink down next to him. Could this be it? The evidence I'm looking for? Now it's in my hands I'm not sure if I actually want to open it, but then I remember Alex, sitting on the swing and looking
so utterly unhappy. I can do this for her. I can show her that I'm here for her – that she can rely on me, even if I am only twelve.

The box is really beautiful. I've never seen it before. It's got swirly silver patterns across the top and it latches shut with a tiny little clasp on the front. It's the right size to rest on my knees as I kneel on the floor, and it smells like Alex's favourite patchouli incense sticks.

As my fingers fumble with the clasp, I have a sudden moment of wondering. I wonder if I'll always remember this second – if I'll be glad that I opened the box or if I'll forever regret finding it. I think about a Greek myth that we heard at school, about a girl called Pandora and a box that she was given by Zeus, the King of the Gods. He told her to look after the box and to never, ever open it. In my opinion, that was a stupid thing to say to her. It's like telling someone NOT to think about elephants or NOT to look behind them: it's virtually impossible not to do it. If Zeus didn't want the box opened then he shouldn't have made such a big deal about it – he just made Pandora curious. Anyway, she opened the box (no surprises there) and inside were all the evils of the world. They all flew out and spread round the world and it's why
bad things happen now apparently. The only thing left inside the box was hope, which I suppose means that, even when awful things are going on, good stuff can still happen. Or something.

I remember our English teacher telling us that there are only a few different story plots in the whole, entire world – quests and adventures; forbidden love and escape; rescues and riddles; growing up and sacrifice. I wonder if it's true and I wonder if I'll share my story with Pandora. It seems a bit strange that I, a normal, boring girl from England, could have anything in common with a beautiful woman from Greek mythology. I really, really hope that I don't end up like her, with all the evils of the world being unleashed in Alex's bedroom.

The clasp gives way and I lift up the lid. Inside the box is not what I expected. It doesn't look like anything to do with drugs and it doesn't look particularly evil either. It looks like envelopes. Lots of envelopes with my name written on the front in violet ink.

I tip the box upside down and empty the envelopes on to the floor. I don't know what to think about this. I hesitate for only a second
because that's MY name written on the front and if something's addressed to you then it's fine to open it. I'm sure that's the rule at the Royal Mail anyway.

Grabbing the nearest envelope, I carefully ease the flap open, just in case I need to reseal it later. Inside is a letter, written to me.

6th April

Dear Izzy,

I'm sorry I haven't spent much time with you lately. I really want to, but you know now why I've needed to have a bit of space. I just need time to get my head round all of this. I'm sorry if that sounds selfish – I know you're worried about me.

I THINK I'll be fine. I'm not a hundred per cent sure about that, but people usually are fine, aren't they? It's what we always say, ‘Yeah, fine thanks', when someone asks how we are. That's why I don't bother asking. What's the point? Everyone says the same – that they're fine, even when they're shrivelling up and dying on the inside.

I have to believe that I'll be fine. That things can go back to how they were. That my whole world isn't about to cave in. I lie in bed at night and send myself to sleep chanting the same thing over and over again.

This isn't happening. This isn't happening. This isn't happening.

Only it is.

Love you forever,

Alex xx

I put the letter down and then straight away pick it back up and read it again. I don't understand. What's wrong with Alex? What doesn't she want to happen? Why would she say that I know NOW why she needs some space? None of it makes any sense.

Grabbing another envelope, I rip it open, not bothering to try to keep it neat this time. I scan the top for the date and realize that this one was written before the last one. They're not in any kind of order so I'll just need to read them all to work out what's going on.

15th March

Dear Izzy,

Why does everyone assume, just because I've got a big mouth, that it means I've got no feelings? I'm really sick of it – people acting like they can say anything to me and it won't matter.

Stefan really wound me up tonight at band practice. I can't believe he thinks I'm only interested in getting all the attention. I've only ever been interested in what's best for On the Rocks. And, to be honest, I'm totally over being the centre of attention. Which is a shame because, when everyone finds out, I'm going to be the closest thing to a celebrity that anyone has ever seen around here. For all the wrong reasons.

I don't know what's going to happen to the band when I've gone. Maybe they'll replace me. That'd be awful – I don't think I could bear it. What if they got another singer and she's prettier and better than me? Maybe everyone will say that I'd held them all back and they were lucky I was gone. I think that's why I got so upset with Stefan – I just want
it to be perfect while I'm still a part of it. I suppose I'll have to apologize to him.

I'm probably done with the band anyway. I feel so ill right now and I just want to sleep all the time. I'm scared that people are going to start talking about me. Funny – that's never bothered me before.

Love you forever,

Alex xx

The doorbell rings, startling me back into right now. For a minute I panic, thinking that Alex and Mum are back, but then I remember that they've got a key and wouldn't need to ring the doorbell. I look at my watch and realize that it's probably Hannah, come to work on our history assignment. Nothing could be less important to me right now so I stay sitting on the floor, while she rings the doorbell, and then listen as she gives up and walks away.

My legs are aching so I uncurl them and sit down properly, stretching them out and then crossing them in front of me. I sweep the pile of letters on to one side so that I can keep track of which ones I've read. My brain is whirring and I can feel little
prickles of sweat under my armpits. These letters are not good. I'm starting to think that I was wrong about Alex – I don't think she's on drugs at all. I think it's a whole lot worse than that and I'm not sure I've got the strength to read the rest of the letters. But I must. Because Alex is using these letters to tell me something that she just can't tell me in person. Alex had to be strong to write these words and I need to be strong enough to read them.