After Iris: the Diaries of Bluebell Gadsby (12 page)

‘There are burglars in the garden,’ said Jas.

‘Ugh,’ I said.

‘They are throwing pebbles at my window.’ She pulled on my arm. I stopped trying to sleep.

‘Why on earth would burglars throw pebbles at your window?’ I asked.

‘To break in!’ cried Jas.

‘That makes no sense at all,’ I said. ‘And the last time we thought there was a burglar it turned out to be Zoran.’

‘Come and look.’

The flat roof outside my room means that I can’t see down on to the veranda, but the window from the Babes’ room looks straight down on to it. Jas and I crept through their bedroom to look.

‘Don’t let them see you!’ whispered Jas. ‘They might shoot you!’

‘They won’t shoot me,’ I hissed.

‘How do you know?’

‘Because they are not burglars, you idiot!’ I whispered more loudly. ‘They are Joss and Flora, behaving very strangely.’

We peered out, still hiding. Joss and Flora
were
being very peculiar. They were standing by the garden steps, at the bottom of the drainpipe Joss used to get up to my window. Flora kept trying to climb up it, but even though she has done it loads of times as soon as her feet left the ground she slid straight back down again. She gave up in the end and just stood there at the bottom of the drainpipe with her legs crossed like she does when she’s laughing so much it makes her want to pee.

‘What
is
the matter with her?’ asked Jas.

‘She’s drunk.’ We both jumped out of our skins. Twig was standing just behind us, looking at Flora and Joss through his binoculars. I put my hand over Jas’s mouth to stop her from screaming.

‘But Flora never drinks,’ she said when I took my hand away.

‘She is behaving just like Dad did the last time we went to the Batemans’ Christmas party,’ said Twig. ‘When he kept topping up the punch with mini vodka bottles.’

‘Dad did that?’

Twig said Dad won the mini vodka bottles when they did Secret Santa at work and he had no idea what to do with them until he got to the Batemans’ party and decided it was a deserving cause.

‘He danced the polka with Mrs Bateman.’ I shuddered, remembering.

‘And now Flora is dancing with Joss,’ said Twig.

We looked out of the window again. Flora and Joss had given up on the drainpipe and were waltzing across the lawn.

‘Why are they holding their heads like that?’ asked Jas.

‘They are sharing iPod speakers,’ said Twig, who was still using his binoculars.

‘I still don’t like Joss because of what he did to the rats,’ said Jas. ‘But they do look lovely.’

Joss raised an arm, quite gracefully, and Flora twirled slowly beneath it. She kept twirling as they walked back towards the house, until she looked dizzy and fell into his arms, all tangled up in iPod cords. She put her arms around his neck and whispered something in his ear. He threw back his head, laughed and saw us all standing there,
watching
. He waved at us, then pointed at Flora and the window, as if he was saying
what should I do?

‘We have to help them,’ said Jas.

‘Do we?’ I said.

‘Yes, Blue,’ said Jas. ‘We do.’

So we hatched this plan to rescue Flora without attracting Zoran’s attention, which involved Twig pretending he had had a nightmare and luring Zoran into the kitchen to make him some hot milk, while Jas and I dragged Flora round the side of the house to the street, back in through the front door and up to her room.

And it would have worked, except that Flora was giggling so much she crashed into the cherrywood table on the landing and smashed the Chinese bowl full of dried rose petals. And then Zoran arrived and tripped over her with Twig’s hot milk, and then
Dad
came home, also drunk, and thought we were all playing a game, which he tried to join in by shouting
I’m it! I’m it!
and counting to fifty to give us time to hide.

Which we did.

In our beds.

Dad went out early this morning. He said he needed to work. Zoran told him that was all very well but he was due a day off, and he had told Mum who may not have passed the message on to Dad but he was sorry and he really had to get on with some of his own work, in other words his thesis. He said that at the rate he was going he would be lucky to finish it by the time he was thirty. And then Dad said of course, of course and you musn’t change your plans but he couldn’t stay either and then he beamed and said it didn’t matter because Flora was here and she could look after the little ones.

‘Flora?’ we all said.

‘She’s sixteen,’ said Dad. ‘In some countries she would already be married.’

He left before any of us could protest.

‘Unreal,’ I said.

‘You know, Blue, in some countries
you
could be married,’ said Zoran.

‘Fine,’ I snapped. ‘I’ll look after the Babes. It’s not as if I had anything else to do today.’

‘Tell your sister to call me when she wakes up,’ said Zoran.

I have no idea when Flora woke up. Zoran told me we weren’t to go out further than the park, so as soon as he left I raided the housekeeping jar, bundled the Babes into their coats and took them down to the Electric Cinema where they were showing a rerun of the first
Pirates of the Caribbean
. Jake texted me to say he was bored and what was I doing today. He met us at the cinema, and afterwards we went to Home Sweet Home, where we saw Ash and Pretty and Ash’s boyfriend, who is covered in tattoos and kept taking Pretty outside to show her off to people he knew walking by in the street (and also to lots of people he didn’t know).

We stopped in the park on the way home. Tom and Colin were on the skateboard ramp, and a bunch of older kids I’d never seen before pulled these incredible stunts, turning somersaults in the air and stuff like you see in films. Jake tried but he just sort of fell out of the sky halfway through his turn. I felt sorry for him because I could see he was trying not to cry, but Twig and Jas laughed their heads off and asked him to do it again, which cheered him up a bit. Night was falling by the time we got home. Dad was asleep. Flora and Zoran were out. I made tea and put some toast on, then sat down with the Babes to watch
Pirates of the Caribbean 2
on DVD, and it felt cosy and peaceful.

 I don’t think Dad said anything to Flora about last night, but I know Zoran gave her a lecture. They came back while we were watching the film and I overheard them in the kitchen when I went in to get more toast. Flora was saying,
but it was fun,
almost like she was begging, and Zoran said something completely Zoranish about staying true to yourself and not straying off the rightful path, and then they both stared at me like they were making it clear I had no business listening to their conversation, so I left.

On the way to school today, Dodi told me that she had just seen Joss and Flora snogging under the railway arches.

‘Yuk,’ I said.

Dodi said she thought they looked cute together.

‘Dad’s got an iPhone,’ I told her to change the subject. ‘And long hair, and he has secret meetings in dinner jackets on Friday nights.’

I asked her what she thought it meant. I’d forgotten how serious Dodi can be. She thought about it for quite a long time, then she said that last year her father had spent six weeks in a monastery on a Greek island where they don’t allow any women except chickens, and that her mother had called it his mid-life crisis.

‘Not that chickens are actually women,’ she added. ‘Just, they need them for the eggs.’

I went to the library at lunchtime. I sat in the armchair right at the back, where it’s so dark you can hardly see a thing, and I closed my eyes because I felt so tired and tried to do what Grandma once told me to do, which is imagine my life exactly how I would like it to be. I thought, I’ll imagine Joss, that he loves me. I haven’t done that before, because it felt pointless and also a bit sad, but today my mind had its own ideas. Instead of a happy place with Joss it took me off to Devon, where I was about five years old and hiding on the window seat with Iris, with Twig a fat podgy baby taking his first toddling steps towards Flora, who was holding out her arms and laughing and Jas asleep in a basket. It seemed like a bit of a wasted daydream, when I could have dreamed of anything I wanted, but Dad always says you can’t control how your mind works. He was at home when I got back, drinking tea and reading the paper.

‘Are you having a mid-life crisis?’ I asked him.

Dad spat out his tea. I mean he really did. All over the kitchen table.

‘Well, are you?’ I asked.

‘No,’ he said. ‘At least, I don’t think I am.’

‘Good,’ I said. I told him about Dodi’s dad and the Greek chickens, and he said that didn’t appeal to him at all.

 ‘Though I suppose I have been a bit cryptic lately,’ he added.

‘You’ve been rubbish, Dad,’ I said. ‘And I miss you.’

Zoran came into the kitchen while Dad was hugging me, looking preoccupied, but he smiled back when I smiled at him, and mouthed, should he leave me and Dad alone? I shook my head.

‘I promise I’ll explain soon,’ Dad was burbling. ‘Soon, all will be revealed and hopefully –
hopefully
– you’ll start seeing a lot more of your old dad. But what can I do to make up for things in the meantime?’

Behind him, Zoran opened the fridge and sighed. My brain almost exploded with inspiration.

‘A present!’ cried Dad. ‘A book? A necklace? A dress?’

‘A piano,’ I said.

‘Right,’ said Dad. ‘I was not expecting that.’

Behind Dad’s back, Zoran smiled.

I grinned back. Poor Dad just looked baffled.

Sometimes when I think of Joss it makes me cross, but then he does something nice and it’s almost worse.

My timing was off this morning and I couldn’t avoid leaving with them. Joss was waiting at the gate. He beamed at both of us, then slung his arm round Flora. She nestled into him and gazed into his eyes like she never wanted to stop. He rubbed her nose with his and kissed her on the lips. She giggled and nuzzled his neck. I looked away and tried not to be sick.

Obviously, that wasn’t the nice bit. The nice bit came later, after their argument. I was walking ahead of them so I didn’t hear it all, but basically it involved Joss accusing Flora of behaving like a prima-donna because she doesn’t want his friends to come and see the show,
presumably
because she wants to make a good impression on them and doesn’t think she is likely to do that in a play involving the nation’s favourite fairy-tale characters eating each other for breakfast.

‘It’ll be a laugh,’ Joss said. ‘We’ll see the play then we’ll have a few beers and go to a club. Just because you’re not . . .’

Flora told him to shut up. Joss started to laugh and said, ‘Bluebird, you think my friends should come and see your sister’s show, don’t you?’ and I said, ‘Of course I do’, and he said, ‘There, you see? Blue agrees with me,’ and then he put his arm round me.

It lasted all of three seconds and I KNOW I’m pathetic, but still.

It was almost a hug.

‘Promise you’ll tell them not to come,’ said Flora.

Joss laughed and pulled her into his arms. It was just like in a film, where the actress says
no, I hate you
and the leading man says
but I love you so much
and the actress goes
oh all right then
. Nauseating, but Joss winked at me as he was kissing Flora and I couldn’t help grinning back at him because he looked so wicked.

‘Do those two ever stop?’ Dodi joined us at the traffic lights and stared at Flora and Joss wrapped around each other, pressed up against the railings.

‘They have to drink each other’s saliva to stay alive,’ I tried to joke. Dodi narrowed her eyes.

‘He’s an idiot,’ she announced. ‘Jake’s way nicer.’

‘Jake’s a bit young for Flora,’ I said.

‘I wasn’t thinking about Flora,’ said Dodi.

We all have different reasons for going to the
Christmas
extravaganza. Twig is desperate to see the burning slippers and the Three Little Pigs. Zoran says he has always been fascinated by fairy tales, and Jas doesn’t want to feel left out. Dad says we have to go because it’s culture of a kind, and Mum (who is in Buenos Aires) says we have to go because it’s Flora. Even Grandma is coming up from Devon.

Me, I just want to be in the same room as Joss.  It’s sad, I know, but I just can’t help it.

I don’t know what to think.

Or rather, I do, but I can’t believe it. And I don’t know how I feel about it. I was right when I wrote that something was up but I never in a million years would have guessed what it was.

I went to the park after school again today with Dodi and the boys. When I came home, the Babes were sitting on their own in the living room with all the lights turned off, eating crisps and watching
Twilight
.

‘Zoran put
Madagascar
on,’ said Jas. ‘But this is way better.’

‘He won’t mind,’ said Twig. ‘Not a single person has died yet.’

‘Where
is
Zoran?’ I asked.

‘With Flora,’ said Jas.

‘She’s crying,’ said Twig. ‘She didn’t want to talk to him but he said he wasn’t leaving until she told him what was wrong.’

‘We’re not supposed to know,’ said Jas.

I didn’t mean to eavesdrop. It just sort of happened, because even though Flora’s bedroom door was closed I could hear her inside, sobbing. And then I heard Zoran say things like in the kitchen on Sunday night, like
take responsibility for your actions
, and
it would be best if you came clean and told them
and Flora sobbing and saying
please don’t tell my parents, please don’t, please
! And then Zoran saying, really quite passionately,
I will kill that boy with my bare hands
, and Flora crying more quietly and saying
no, Zoran, don’t be cross with him, it’s my fault.

My heart was beating like crazy when I looked through the keyhole. Flora was on her beanbag and Zoran was sitting at her desk. I couldn’t see his face but I heard him ask her ‘How are you feeling?’
and she
started
to cry again and said ‘I’m so scared and I feel sick all the time’
,
and then she threw herself into his arms and he hugged her and she sniffed and said she would be fine and I tiptoed away.