I throw the phone down on my bed and stand up to look in my wardrobe, hoping vainly that something that will make me look awesome will have appeared in it. There hasn’t, of course. I open the wardrobe door wide so I can look in the mirror on the inside of the door and critique myself for a bit. I realise that looking like an average person can be useful, but I think there might be even more benefits to being really attractive, like Molly. She could get anything or anyone she wanted, just with a look. That’s power.
The wardrobe door shuts with a creak, my reflection banished, and I pull on a vest top and shorts from the drawers before going out to the garden to find Mum. I creep up on her quietly because it’s funny making her jump.
‘Hi, Vi,’ she says, before I can even poke her.
‘How did you know I was here?’
‘The birds stopped singing,’ she replies, freaking me out, ‘and I saw your reflection in the glass.’ She laughs. ‘What do you think of these ones?’ She puts her arm around my shoulders and I lean in for a second because I know she likes it and I need to keep her sweet, before wriggling away and looking through her pictures.
‘Ooh, moody,’ I say of a boy with bird wings sulking on a beach, ignoring the small poke of jealousy at how amazing she is at drawing. ‘What’s the book like?’
‘I don’t think you’d enjoy it,’ she says, with a light laugh. ‘You’d have to use your imagination – it’s about love and fairies and magic.’
‘Ugh!’
‘You can give it a try, if you like. Though no blabbing about it online – it’s not being published until next year.’
As if I would admit to reading online. I can’t stand those sorts of books. I don’t really like fiction at all: what’s the point? Better to learn proper facts about things that might come in useful, like how to fix the car for when we break down again on the way to bloody Dorset, or anything but fairies. I’m going to have a swing in the hammock instead, try and get some colour on me for once.
I end up falling asleep in the hammock because it’s so warm and I’m having a really weird dream about Newboy – we’re in London for some reason – when Mum wakes me up on her way to make dinner.
‘C’mon, sleepy,’ she says, with a laugh. ‘I assume you’re all off out later to terrorise the wildlife?’
‘Ha ha,’ I reply, rubbing my eyes, feeling little balls of sweat and dirt pile up under my fingertips because it’s so hot. ‘We’re going to go to Molly’s and sit in her garden, but I need a shower first, yuck.’
I follow her down the paved path and into the house, where it is much cooler and breathing is distinctly easier. After I’ve had a quick shower and got changed into my skinny-jean shorts and a vest top I run downstairs and sit at the scruffy old kitchen table and watch Mum getting out bowls and chopping boards. I hurry her up mentally because if I say it out loud, she will be annoying and even slower on purpose.
‘I thought a salad might be nice tonight.’ She leans into the fridge. ‘I can use this chicken up.’
I briefly think of Tristan fondling chickens and bite my lip. I hope it’s not one of his. I don’t think I’d like to eat a chicken that he had been fingering. She gets some jars out of the cupboard and whisks up a dressing with oil and mustard and vinegar, which has a sharp smell that I can feel in my nose.
‘Sounds good. It’s too hot for cooking.’
I eat quickly and I deliberately have an extra piece of bread because I want to line my stomach. Tilly spent all last Friday night with her head down the toilet after drinking on an empty stomach and I don’t want that to be me. I can’t not be in control of myself, but I don’t want to be the weird non-drinker when everyone else does it.
‘Abigail called me,’ Mum says. ‘I want you and Molly back here for twelve, please, and make sure you lock up properly. You aren’t having a party, are you?’
‘No, of course not,’ I lie. ‘Molly’s garden is just the best because it’s got all the furniture and stuff.’
‘Mm. Well, best you don’t – I doubt Abi and Gavin would be very pleased to get back to a trashed house.’
‘As if we would.’
‘Are there any boys going?’
‘Mum!’
‘Vivian, I mean it. You know we have to talk about these things, don’t you? You know we agreed, when we moved here? You have to tell me what’s going on with you.’
‘Yes, Mother,’ I sigh. ‘And no, no stupid boys. Just us.’ She’s so easy to lie to. Six years she’s been banging on about this; you’d think she’d have got bored of it but, alas, no. ‘Right, better be off – see you in the morning, don’t wait up!’ I tell her this, even though I know that she will. I steel myself to drop her a quick kiss on the cheek and then I’m out of the door and running across the field, free.
Rachel
Vivian bolted down her dinner and I wondered where she put it all. She looked like a little bird fluttering around, but her appetite was healthy enough. As soon as she finished she ran out of the door to Molly’s; I remembered doing the exact same thing when I was her age. I only hoped she wasn’t making the same mistakes that I had, or worse, of her own. When she left I made
