Читать книгу The Colour of Bee Larkham’s Murder - Sarah J. Harris - Страница 14

I LINE UP MY BRUSHES by the bathroom sink. I don’t want to alert Dad to the fact that I’m up at 11.47 p.m. I turn on the tap slowly, making a trickle of water.

Small circular clouds of kingfisher blue.

I love this colour. It’s happy, without a care in the world.

Shivers of excitement play trick or treat up my back, the way they do whenever I open a fresh tube of paint. I love gently squeezing the smooth tube. Too hard and the paint spurts out, wasting it; too little and it’s impossible to tell a proper story from beginning to end.

A small dot of paint is always the best place to start. I can add to the splash of colour and make it grow in size until it becomes the perfect amount. I’ve remembered enough for one night – how excited I was about seeing the mystery woman for the first time and how I longed for the right moment to meet her in person.

When the music eventually stopped that night, after a visit lasting three minutes and thirteen seconds from David Gilbert, I began planning for the day when I could meet our new neighbour. I had to memorize what she looked like (long, blonde hair, not many clothes) and come up with the perfect introduction.

Both these things were important. I didn’t want her to think I was a stupid weirdo, like everyone else.

I had hope: a tomato ketchup coloured word.

Hope she would get me. How couldn’t she? She loved loud Martian music and dancing wildly. The only difference between us was I didn’t like the cold and still don’t. I only ever dance with my clothes on.

The same scarlet-in-a-squeezy-bottle colour embraces me as I tiptoe back to my bedroom with damp paintbrushes, dabbed dry on an old hand towel. The TV in Dad’s bedroom buzzes grey, grainy lines, but tomato ketchup’s in my head.

As soon as I climb into bed, I remember it’s school tomorrow and popcorn yellow dread crawls under the duvet with me. It rudely refuses to budge, however hard I try to kick it out and replace it with tomato ketchup.

Dread’s my usual unwelcome bed guest on Sunday nights, reminding me of the break-time gauntlet – waves of anonymous faces surging towards me along the corridors.

Some could turn out to be friendly, others will not. Good and bad aren’t stamped on pupils’ foreheads to help me sift through their identical uniforms.

This time it’s different. Tomorrow’s Wednesday (toothpaste white) and dread is a far harsher colour because I have to face Lucas Drury again, for the first time since IT happened.

He was mad at me last week for my Big, Dumb Mistake. He’s going to be even madder now the police are involved.

He’ll yell shades of thorny peacock blue at me.

I jump out of bed and pull the curtains tighter together to get rid of the crack of light and the blurry purply black lines of a passing motorbike.

The windows of Bee Larkham’s house stare reproachfully at me through the duck egg blue curtain fabric.

However many times I apologize, the panes of glass will never forgive me.

Lucas Drury won’t either, if he finds out what I’ve done to Bee Larkham. I wish I could avoid him at school tomorrow, but I can’t.

It’s impossible to hide from someone you don’t recognize.