Still, I was glad of her presence for less obvious reasons, reassuring though it wasn’t – all the time she was out of the house, I found myself dying to dissect the situation with my brothers. And in retrospect? That was probably getting a little annoying for Zak. According to him, you could count the reasons women wear makeup on one finger (“to look nicer, duh!”), and he easily tired of my million motivation mutterings.
Weirdly, a nice, normal dinner at dinnertime set my mind at rest when it really should’ve been whirring with wariness. I needed a break from the spying and speculating so badly that relaxation just sort of kicked in without permission, right up until afterwards when I overheard hushed tones in the hallway.
I ran the tap thinner and muffled it by scrubbing a plate, though my mind wasn’t on it – Mum was on the phone! Not now! my overstressed brain squealed. It’s not fair! The car-pool for Guides will be here any second!
“Yeah… yeah, of course. I know… I will be. Tomorrow. No, I promise. It’s been hectic at home, and the children…”
After that she said something I couldn’t make out, but I was already off on another train of thought. What cheek! Things were hectic at home for whom exactly? I was the one sorting out spelling homework and fixing feet around here! I picked my little sister up from school when Zak was too busy to drop her home. I did emergency laundry and replaced the batteries in the remotes and read Kit’s bedtime story, and until very recently I’d been pretty certain I was the only one who even remembered her birthday!
If Mum thought it was such hard work being a mum that she wanted to hide sometimes, then I could kinda understand that – but using us as an excuse when something else made her busy? My lungs felt hard boiled, like I was drowning in injustice. If it turned out she’d been lumping me in as a “child” all along, I felt ready to be emancipated. And then who would look after Kitty?
The more I thought, the more sickened I became. I’d never had her down as a liar – well, except white lies. She’d told me I was pretty enough times, and it wasn’t like many other people ever had. All through Primary school and so far into Secondary, I’d felt super, super lucky to have a mum who didn’t laugh at my embarrassment or bitch about my friends or say things she didn’t mean just to get us off her back. Was this maybe not true? Was she just great at hiding it?
Chantalle’s mum once told her that the internet doesn’t work at night, and then when Chan found out that wasn’t true, she tried telling her that it’s more dangerous at night. (I suppose that makes some sense – after all if perverts come out at night, it’s always night somewhere. The internet’s just bringing people together.) Chantalle has the kind of mum who won’t just lie, but dig herself into a bigger hole all the time. And Dani’s mum – she always has catty things to say about people; celebrities and neighbours alike. Then she’s friendly to their faces, which is also a lie. It’s not like it stops there, because apart from Mum I’ve never been able to think of a grown up who doesn’t lie constantly.
I remember how our Year 1 teacher actually told us that you cannot take away five from two, because five is bigger and you can’t work it out with cubes. Obviously, a few years later our minds were blown when the concept of negative numbers was introduced. What with all the horoscopes and invisible boyfriends going around, it felt a bit like that now, realising that there were other things than God that people argued over because they couldn’t see them.
As I finished the dishes, it was becoming clear to me that nothing had ever been clear at all. I wondered if it was OK that I sort-of didn’t like the person my mum was acting like since Auntie Sharon had announced her disappearance, even if I more than liked her on a normal day. She wasn’t my perfectly typical mumsy mum with the odd soap opera or vase of flowers – it was more like “living with” someone else’s fascinatingly absent, glamorous, minor celebrity mystery mum who you’d eventually forget was missing until she next headlined a tabloid miles and miles away.
Miles and miles and miles…
#16 Puke Of Edinburgh
The last place I wanted to be on Friday evening was Guides.
While my stomach rumbled regretfully and I thought about how I wouldn’t even be able to manage any Tuck, younger girls darted around the room making the most of muck-about time while Karen Kestrel and Mrs Lilley were in the supply room.
It seemed like we’d had about eight new Guides since maybe May, the most obnoxious of whom was this week’s new arrival Shannon, who was a bit young to be a Guide yet and mouthy as anything. We were going to have to put up with her all the same, because she’s Karen’s daughter, worse luck.
Just like at Drama Club, it really felt as if I was outnumbered by rowdy little kids.
Karen reappeared and made a beeline for me. She even looked a little like a bee – sort of round and short-ish with a stripy brown cardigan slung over the shoulders of her blue Guiding sweatshirt.
“Harley, I’ve been meaning to ask – since you’re one of the older Guides now-”
Uh-oh.
“-Mrs Lilley and I have been thinking maybe you’d like to … become a Patrol Leader? It’s just, Kim’s moving on in a couple of weeks, and you wouldn’t want to miss out. I know there’s another year before you’re fourteen and all.”
“I… uh…” I tried to respond, I really did, but for non-brace-related reasons, no words would leave my mouth in this awkward situation. I knew I was the sixth-oldest Guide now you’d gone, and that we had five Patrols and if someone left I’d be expected to step up. I also knew that if you were here, you’d have loved to take the role.
I didn’t love the idea. I wasn’t even sure I loved Guides particularly, now that there was no one there that I truly wanted to know.
“Well, here’s a booklet about the responsibilities you’d have!” smiled Karen. “And here’s one to take home to Shell. I know how excited she is to be a Patrol leader!”
“Wellll…” I began. “Yeah, she was excited. But then her parents made her move away to Australia because of Uncle Peter’s work, and she didn’t get a chance to tell you.”
We both know that was a fib. We’d been so desperate for it not to be true that we made a pact not to tell anyone at all, and as stupid as that sounds in retrospect, I ached terribly in the awkward silence with a fresh wave of wishing that babyish, pathetic, superstitious games could really change facts as if by magic.
It looked like it was taking Karen a moment or so to process what I was saying – especially, whether it was the truth. When she’d decided that I wouldn’t lie and it wasn’t a joke and she had lost one of her best Guides to the outback, her face fell.
“Oh,” she said. She glanced around the hall wearily, taking in the loud ex-Brownies, who, contrary to my expectations, hadn’t even decided to shut up when she entered the room. Then she looked back at me, as if although she didn’t doubt my sensibleness, a small part of her doubted my ability to control four or six little terrors during game time.
We exchanged a look which (I think) said we were both slightly shocked that none of them had been ejected from Brownies before they made it here.
It was one of the most difficult moments of my life. Did I have the guts to let down Karen and Mrs Lilley and tell them that I was leaving for the selfish reason that now you were gone, I’d rather hang out at my friends’ houses on a Friday night than slave towards my Duke of Edinburgh with a group of girls in my charge who were evidently even less mature than my ten-year-old brother?
A normal person would’ve come out with it no sooner than they’d set foot in the hall. Hey, maybe a truly normal person would just step up and take on the challenge like a true Girl Guide. I knew you would’ve found some bubbly and non-threatening way to suggest they kick out the girls who weren’t actually interested in earning badges and ging-gang-goolying around the campfire each summer. (Maybe I was even one of them.)
I didn’t know how to say any of those things. I wanted to lie and say I’d pulled an Andy and dropped out to go to Cade
ts. (Every bit as believable as moving to the other side of the world all of a sudden!) I wanted to throw my Subs in the money-jar and high-tail it out of there and home, to die alone in my room of the shame of being too dithery to Lead a Patrol.
Instead, I said, “I’m very sorry, Karen, but I won’t be able to come to Guides anymore. My responsibilities at home have changed.”
And Karen nodded and smiled at me understandingly, as if the few nights on dinner duty I had in mind were subject to some military level of accountability. She patted me on the arm and went to badger the next-oldest girl about running the jigs around there.
The ten-year-old members of our Patrol were ungraciously watching Jess explain how to fold a flag (using a kitchen towel). Some of the other Patrol Leaders hadn’t even got their younger Guides to sit down. It was then that I knew my decision was right – I already had enough childminding to do at home.
#17 You Live In A Zoo
I’d woken up with a tufty German Shepherd tail tickling my nose as Toots slept on beside me. We’d had to put the babygates back up at night in fear of having Kit’s party decorations ruined by the doglets, and Hendy was probably somewhere in the boys’ room on a cloud of destroyed electronics and shoes.
So I was up and dressed way earlier than I like to be on a Saturday, and staggered downstairs. An amazing sight met my eyes. Mum was in the kitchen making everyone their favourite breakfasts.
Three things about this surprised me:
1) Mum’s usually shocking about getting up in the mornings.
2) Everyone else was already downstairs, when I’d expected to be one of the first.
3) Everyone had a friend round. Charlie had Andy. (Jordy was probably scared away for good.) Zak had his little mate Ryan. All of Kitty’s friends were due to turn up soon. Mum had invited Fern for me; I started wondering if she did have Kenneth’s number after all…
“Hi, Fern,” I grinned, going to help serve. “I’m so glad you came.”
“Your mum’s made us both some breakfast.” She indicated her nearly-finished plate of marmalade toast, and my piled-high one. “Thank you for the breakfast Mrs Hartley, it was lovely!”
It approached ten, and kids began showing up for the party, so Charlie rushed upstairs to chivvy up the birthday girl. I hesitated in the hallway. Mum looked like she was waiting for someone – was it all going to become clear?
Inbetween the rabble, a lone adult man was door-answered to while I was in the loo. Trying so hard to distinguish his voice above departing parents and noisy kids, I failed shockingly to identify someone who should’ve been obvious right away.
“Dad, no one wants your animal jokes,” moaned Ryan, in typical ten-year-old fashion, as I trotted back downstairs.
“They’re six,” chuckled Dr Godfrey, dismissing his adopted son’s chagrin. “Hey, Harley.”
I nodded and smiled. I couldn’t find any words that really suited how glad I was that Mum’s plus one was just our old family friend, the doctor. Andy and Ryan’s father. The only gentleman caller Kitty would be prepared for at her seventh birthday party.
As soon as all the party guests were here, Kitty made her grand appearance at the top of the stairs, sporting some arbitrarily-placed face glitter (it was in her hair, on her skirt, under her arms, and on her lips), and wearing a gorgeous poppy-printed top, denim skirt and long pastel-coloured stripy socks. She reminded me a bit of Fern’s little-girly room.
All the children burst into song:
“Ha-ppy birth-day to you! You live in a zoo! You smell like a cat’s bum, and your name’s like one too!”
Certainly Zak had something to do with orchestrating that.
Charlie, Andy, Zak, Ryan, Fern and I spent a fun-filled day guiding sticky kids around the downstairs for various party games. Then Mum brought out a bunch of face paints and makeup, saying she thought me and Fern could crack on with sorting the kids out for glamour and disguise. (Prying Aussies should note that our mum’s a semi-professional party face-painter and has spent at least the last six years of mine and Charlie’s lives training us to follow in her footsteps.)
As if the house wasn’t packed enough, Keisha, Rachel, Chantalle, Dani and Rindi gatecrashed the party to help us out. (A good job too, since Keisha and Chan knew way more about the girls’ proper grown-up makeup demands each than me and Fern put together.)
And you’ll never guess what we found under the party table! Kitty and Matty in the middle of the most violent, sticky, glittery kiss I’d ever seen. (By violent, I mean there was hair-pulling involved.)
#18 Welcome To Zizz Zone
It’s Sunday now, and I’m still trying to catch up on lost eating and zizzing time – but you could say that I’m pretty happy and content, for the first time since the whole Australia thing came up.
Kitty was so pleased with the money you sent her – in fact, the only thing she was more pleased with was me, for taking her right out after the party to buy new outfits for her Bratz. She’s currently sitting on my feet playing with them, but she’s gonna have to get up soon, ’cause I need to dump this letter / book / journal in the ancient postbox outside our house. (I hope it gets to you alright.)
Though I guess I learned a few good things from all this. The Guiding situation proved that I can stand up and get what I want, even if I do have to act like a conniving grownup and lie a little bit. I’ve also realised that the quietest people are often the kindest, and you can get great birthday prezzies from charity shops for under two quid!
P.S. Fern’s great and all, but there’s no way I’m replacing you in our circle of friends; you’re our first long-distance member!
P.P.S. I will write more to keep you up to date! Though I eventually figured that Mum inviting Fern had been due to our whole family’s propensity to jot phone numbers down on the kitchen notepad the old fashioned way, the one and only thing I’d hoped to find out this week remains well and truly a mystery…
T.T.F.N. Harley & Co – (“Co” stands for “familiar seven year old and her Bratz, squashing my feet”…)
The next book in the recommended reading order is: Double Dates (& Single Raisins)
Connect With Me Online:
Website:
https://www.dilliedorian.co.uk
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https://muzzyheadedme.tumblr.com
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About The Author:
Dillie Dorian is an English author of child and YA realistic fiction. She is notable for offering all fourteen titles in her debut series, A Bended Family, for free online.
Dillie has been “writing” since a very young age, and her mother probably still hoards innumerable sellotape-bound “sequels” to everything from Animal Ark to The Worst Witch.
Her first serious project began in September 2006, with “Oops! Did I Forget I Don’t Know You?”, which sparked countless official sequels of its own within months. Working on this series between the ages of thirteen and fourteen taught her everything she knows about writing, and she hasn’t stopped expanding on the Hartleys’ lives since!
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