How long is a daisy chain? It doesn’t matter.
I held mine up and it hung there so delicately. Fragile. Vulnerable. It needed careful handling. I added more and more daisies. Slowly. It grew into a necklace, or something like it. I completed the circle. I finished the chain. Immediately I started another. Shorter this time. Total absorption. Partial amnesia.
Soon Scarlet was lifting her chain over my head. I bobbed down to let it pass over and sit on my shoulders. I put mine onto her head. A crown of flowers. She laughed. The chain broke. A fly got into the corner of my eye. I wiped away the salt water with the back of my hand.
Duty caught up with us. Scarlet felt she ought to go and support her mother. I felt I ought to go home too. Get my stuff ready for the next day.
One day my mother will greet me with a question: about my day or if I feel OK or ask me my news. Any greeting which did not contain the word ‘sandwich’ would do.
‘We’ve eaten, you’ll have to make yourself a sandwich,’ was the greeting waiting for me when I got back from the park.
She was tense, uptight, edgy. And it was contagious.
‘I feel a bit sick.’ (My greetings were no better.)
‘You’ll have to go to the doctor.’
‘I think I’ll go and lie down.’
‘You ought to get your bag ready for tomorrow. It’s bound to be a rush in the morning.’
The snap of the elastic band.
‘Lucky I’ve got you to tell me what to do—have to, ought to, should, that’s all I ever hear.’
I wasn’t looking for an argument, just an outlet. I didn’t want a reply, I didn’t want any interaction, so I turned away quickly and stomped upstairs. I slammed my bedroom door shut. Obligatory for a teenager and I was playing myself as a teenager. I lay on my bed. I stared at the green walls. I had wanted blue. I hated my mother. I loved my mother. I couldn’t do both, surely I couldn’t do both. I was torn between two emotions like they were both grabbing an arm each and ripping me down the middle. So I cried. I cried in blood for being ripped apart by my feelings. By my mother. By my bloody mother. I thought I would run at my pristinely decorated wall and splatter myself across it. Let my guts drip down onto the floor. Then she’d be sorry. If I were in pieces. If I were dead. I opened my mouth to scream but it didn’t come out properly. It was stifled, half-hearted, too quiet. I couldn’t do anger properly. I was a failure at being a failure. She didn’t understand. I wanted her to understand. About school. About me. About eating. And not eating. But my bloody mother didn’t understand. I sobbed. I sobbed with my head down on my arm, stifling the sound. When it was done, I felt better. But bad, too, like I’d done something wrong. And I did love my mother. Underneath all the pain.
I reached for my pad and pen. I needed a new list.
• Don’t forget to take Scarlet’s book in tomorrow.
• Don’t eat too much.
• Don’t wear my new top to school.
• Don’t put myself down for school lunches.
• Don’t gossip about Scarlet’s parents.
• Don’t have a lift with Mum in the morning.
• Don’t get chocolate out of the machine.
• Don’t forget to sign up for aerobics or something.
• Don’t let the work blob me out.
• Don’t talk to Andy tomorrow.
I stared at the last item. Why had I written that? Andy and I had gone out for three months. I’d only had one boyfriend before that. Piers. Lasted for four days. What was good about pulling Andy? Telling my friends, starting sentences with ‘my boyfriend’, borrowing his jumper, writing about it in my diary, being seen in the coffee-bar, being seen in the cinema, being seen in the precinct, being seen in the high street.
Kissing was OK. Holding hands was good. Him telling me I had great breasts was good. And bad. Him wanting sex with me was bad. And good. I dumped him so I didn’t have to say no. The next day he pulled Melissa. A known slapper. Someone who says yes a lot. Now I talked about my ex-boyfriend—my two ex-boyfriends. Some street cred in that.
There was something churning round in my stomach. It wasn’t my period. That heavy, pushing ache you get was gone. This was more like a cement mixer, turning over and over. When I lay down, I got the taste of stale bread in my mouth. When I sat up, I tasted my own sick. Then my mouth suddenly filled up with saliva and I spat down the sink. I felt hot and then cold. I felt weak and dizzy. I was ill, there was no doubt. And I needed to take something. Pills, medicine—something to get this stuff out of my stomach, this stuff that was churning around.
Suddenly I felt drowsy. I could still feel the sun on my face. I had a dull ache at the back of my head, and closed my eyes. I remembered to lie on my right side. Best for dreaming. I willed myself to remember my dream. Daytime sleeping was the best. I could sleep right through till morning—but I had an alarm clock, my mother. My mother would wake me up and tell me to pack my school bag. And eat a sandwich.
As it happened I dreamt the same dream I had dreamt before. The one where I’m trying to get through a house and out the other side. This time I arrive at the house on a bicycle and tie it up to a post like it’s a dog or something. There’s someone there to help me. The person is telling me which way to go but I don’t want to listen. I tell the person to take my bicycle and go back home. Now I can go down into the cellar on my own. Then I realise that I have no bicycle and I know that I have to get another. I feel frustrated that I don’t know where I’m going to get one from. Just as I think I’ve worked it out, I hear my name. I open my eyes and see Mum.
‘Looks like you’ve got sunstroke,’ she said.
Was she sympathetic? Accusing? Then she laughed. ‘Your face is like a raspberry!’
Did she really have to laugh?
‘It’s all right,’ she reassured me. ‘It isn’t really burnt. Only a little bit red. Do you feel all right?’
‘Sick. Dizzy. Tired.’ I was monosyllabic with sleep.
‘Too much sun,’ declared Mum. ‘I’ll get you some water.’
I wanted to ask for orange juice but she was gone.
Time took a leap. In a matter of seconds she was back with a jug of iced water. And a sandwich.
‘I won’t be well enough for school tomorrow,’ I declared.
‘Yes, you will. Then we’ll go to the doctor, just for a checkup. A three-thousand-mile service,’ she said with a laugh.
Mum put her hand on my hot forehead. For a moment she looked at me so kindly, like she was an angel or something. She poured out a glass of water and placed it in my hand. Then she turned briskly and walked out of the door to the sound of Eliza’s call. Like a matron going off duty. End of shift.
I looked at the sandwich. I would weigh myself first, I thought.
