Читать книгу Reversed Forecast / Small Holdings - Nicola Barker - Страница 9

Sam was peering through the kitchen window, trying to see if Steven was outside yet and what kind of car he drove. Brera was clearing the table. Sam said, ‘He drives an old Jag. I wonder what that means.’

Brera piled a cup on to a plate, a cup on to a plate, a cup on to a plate. Spinal column, she thought, vertebra, disc, vertebra, disc. She carried them carefully over to the sink, slipped them into the soapy water and then peered out too. ‘Your problem,’ she said curtly, ‘is that everything always has to mean something. I like him.’

‘That’s simple enough,’ Sam said, wondering what Brera meant exactly.

Steven was debating whether it would be possible to get an old girlfriend of his to do some promotional shots of the Goldhawk Girls. (Bad name, he thought. That’ll be the first thing to go.) She wasn’t professional, but she was cheap.

As he drew closer to his car, he noticed that the side mirrors had been pulled off and that the aerial had been twisted into a heart shape. ‘Curse the bastard,’ he muttered. ‘Curse the bastard that did this.’ He grabbed the aerial and tried to straighten it.

Sylvia walked out of her room and into the kitchen. ‘He makes me want to spew,’ she announced.

Sam and Brera were doing the washing up. They both turned to look at her.

‘He liked your songs,’ Sam lied. ‘You should’ve come in and said hello.’

Sylvia removed a strand of her hair from the confines of the pony-tail she was wearing and twisted it around her finger. ‘He hated the songs. I heard him.’

Brera pulled out a chair and sat down. ‘He thought they were good but unusual.’

‘Don’t make me laugh.’

Brera crossed her arms and stared at Sylvia as she stood in the doorway. ‘Grow up.’

‘I’m nineteen. That’s old enough.’

For what? She didn’t look nineteen. She looked twelve. Like a scruffy, ill-adapted pre-teen.

‘And by the way,’ she added, ‘I vandalized his car.’

Brera continued to stare at her. ‘You appal me.’

Sam leaned on the window-sill and peered out again. Steven was still there, yanking at his aerial.

‘It’s only the aerial,’ she said. ‘Anyway, it’s an old car.’

Sylvia glared at her. ‘Who asked you?’

Brera threw herself forward on to the table and banged her forehead against it. Thump. She did it again. Thump.

Sylvia was furious. ‘Stop it!’

Brera stopped and straightened up. ‘Are you happy now?’

‘Yes!’ Sylvia shouted, and the shout turned instantly into a cough, into several coughs, whooping coughs.

She couldn’t breathe. She clutched her stomach and leaned against the side of the door, bent double.

Good, she thought. Punishment for everybody.

She coughed carelessly, loosely, so that the unrestrained force of her hacking might rip up her throat and bring out blood. She visualized the cough as two tiny beings playing volleyball inside her throat, passing the tickle back and forth, catching it, returning it, blocking it, holding it. If only, she thought desperately, seeing their impassive faces through her streaming eyes, if only they could enjoy my illness as much as I do.

She turned, still coughing, and staggered back down the corridor.

‘Go!’ Brera shouted after her. ‘I’m sick of the sight of you!’

Sam began washing up again. After a minute or so she said, ‘I think she feels left out.’

Brera rubbed her eyes. ‘She’s such a little bitch. She never does anything for herself and she resents everything we do.’

Sam ran a finger across the bubbles in the sink, watched them burst on her skin. ‘She’s bound to feel threatened by Steven. She might feel like she’s losing us. Losing something.’

Brera’s lips tightened. To hell with what she thinks.’

Sam glanced towards the open door and then walked over to shut it. As she turned back she said, ‘Perhaps we should’ve explained about her to Steven. I’m sure he would’ve understood, and if he hadn’t, then we wouldn’t have wanted anything to do with him anyway.’

‘You think I’m ashamed of her?’

Brera’s eyes filled. Sam found the sight of her mother’s imminent tears disagreeable and unsettling. I shouldn’t feel that way though, she decided, and tried not to. She pulled off a piece of kitchen roll and handed it to her. Brera blew her nose and then looked up. Her eyes were bloodshot.

‘I’m frightened, that’s all. I want to protect her.’ Her eyes exuded tears: large, fat tears like transparent slugs, slithering down her face. ‘She’s such a little shit.’

Sam watched the tears. If I taste one, she thought, then everything will be all right. She put out her hand and brushed a tear from Brera’s chin on to her finger, then let it fall from her finger on to the end of her tongue.

‘She’ll be fine,’ she said.