Nick wandered from room to room in confusion and despair. His house was no longer his.
He began to search through the house. He went through the kitchen first, looking inside the cupboards and shelves, sorting through the stacks of postcards, letters, bills and other bits and pieces that had gathered over the years. He poked inside cups where old buttons, corks, brass hooks, nails, twine and other bits and pieces that might one day come in useful had been stored. It just got weirder and weirder, because it was all in the wrong order even on that level - the buttons in different mugs, the papers in different stacks. It was as if some evil pixie had taken hold of his life, shuffled it up, dropped it on the floor, rearranged it and handed it back to him in some kind of odd disguise.
What was he looking for? He had no idea. His mother hiding in the cupboard, perhaps, or some reminder of the life that had so recently been his. Clues - information about who his mother really was - a needle, a packet of white powder, the address of the dealer who had killed her. Instructions from her about what to do next. Dear Nick, go to this address where you’ll find money, a home and a spare mother. I love you, Mum.
But Muriel’s words had stopped forever. No more nagging, no more begging, no more love.
He tore through the house, searching, searching, searching. He wanted to find a million pounds, a magic wand, a ring with three wishes attached, a spell, a dream come true. He wanted to find some way out of the nightmare that was rapidly closing over his head. From room to room he ran, from his bedroom, to his mother’s, to the kitchen, to the sitting room and back again and over and over, all so tidily disordered, all so familiar and twisted out of shape. He looked everywhere, but there was nothing there to find.
At last he stopped in the middle of his mum’s room, seething in rage. What was the point? What did it matter? In a fury he kicked out as hard as he could, straight into the door of the wardrobe. There was a crash as the wood splintered under the blow. What did it matter now? There was no one to care.
He stood and stared at the splintered wood.
‘Sorry, Mum,’ he said. Could she hear him? Was she watching still - seeing him, hearing him, unable to reach him? He caught sight of himself in the dressing table mirror.
‘Nicholas Dane,’ he said. ‘Nicholas Dane.’ Even his own name sounded fake. Everything he did was fake.
The place was a mess, he couldn’t bear it any longer. He left, and went to catch the bus back to Jen’s. There was nowhere else to go.
4
Dinner
Jenny was hoping that Nick had just popped out for sweets or a magazine or something, but by the time Mrs Batts came round at two, he was still gone and they had to discuss his future in his absence.
Mrs Batts was not happy when she heard about the money.
‘Stealing soo sooon,’ she said. She shook her head sadly.
‘It’s not exactly stealing,’ said Jen defensively. ‘It was just the spare change pot.’
‘He knooos better and you knooo he knooos better,’ scolded Mrs Batts. ‘If any of mine had done that, they’d have what for.’
‘Have you got teenagers, then?’
‘Ah don’t actually have any of my own.’
‘I see,’ said Jen pointedly.
Mrs Batts looked sideways at her. ‘But Ah’ve got a huuuuge experience of young people in the course of my work. That’s why Ah have the responsibility of having to make recommendations about the welfare of young people in the position of Mr Nicholas Dane.’
Jen looked closely back. ‘As I said, he can stay here for as long as necessary. Muriel was my best friend.’
‘Of course you’re involved in the decision-making process - that’s why Ah’m here. But you not being family, like, we ’ave to decide what’s best for you, a single mother...’ Mrs Batts paused to let that sink in. ‘With two young children on a low income... ’ She paused again. ‘And what’s best for Mr Nick himself. A fourteen-year-old boy, with a record of non-attendance at school, in the event of his mother dying of a heroin ooverdose. Do you see, dear? What’s best for you aaall.’ With a sharp pang, Jenny realised that Little Mrs Batty Batts, with her long strung-out funny voice and her neat little smile, was a wolf in sheep’s clothes. ‘You could make my life a total misery,’ thought Jenny. She’d think twice about telling tales on Nick in future.
‘In that case I’d like it down on record right now that I want Nick here. I’m the closest thing he has to family. I have a job. I have a good attendance record, even if he doesn’t, and excellent references. Just for the record.’
‘It all goes down on the record,’ smiled Mrs Batts. She paused to make a note in her notebook, while Jenny cast her mind back. What had she said to Mrs Batts yesterday? How much had she told her about her worries about Joe? She’d been so upset...she couldn’t really remember what she’d said.
‘How did little Joe react to Nick last night?’ asked Mrs Batts, as if she’d read her mind.
‘Oh, it was great. Nick played cards with him for over an hour,’ lied Jenny serenely. She had her own weapons up her sleeve.
Mrs Batts nodded. ‘That’s good,’ she said. ‘I just want to be shewure that your desire to look after Nick isn’t just an initial reaction. It’s the soort of thing people do when someone near and dear paasses away. They say what seems to be the right thing and then when it comes to it...ooh dee-ar! Commitment, you see - it’s half the struggle. Whoever takes Nick on, they may have to be in it for the loong teerm, if no one else comes forward.’
Jenny quailed inwardly. ‘That’s me,’ she said, firmly.
Having shown her teeth, Mrs Batts got back to being friendly.
‘Don’t get me wrong, Jenny,’ she said. ‘ Ah’m not at all against Nick living here with you and yours. A family is always the best option - so long as it works. Ah’ve been in touch with his school and, ooooh, he’s an ’andful by all accounts. Ah need to be sure that you knooo what you’re taking on before considering aaaall the options very carefully. What if it didn’t work out? That would be the very worst thing for Nick himself. He needs something staable now more than ever. The last thing we want is it not working ’ere for him and then he has to go to the Home anyway, when it’ll be more like a failure than if he goes straight away. Now, ’ave you told him how she died yet? How did he react?’
‘I haven’t had a chance to tell him yet,’ confessed Jenny.
‘But he’ll find out at school, won’t he?’
‘He’s not actually at school.’
‘Where is ’e, then?’
‘I’m not sure just at the moment,’ said Jenny through gritted teeth.
‘Oh dear!’ said Mrs Batts. ‘Jenny, it’s not a good start. You ’ave to be firm with him. It would be better if there was a man about the ’ouse to help out, of course. I mentioned Anthony Creal at Meadow Hill, didn’t Ah? A lot of the boys do very well under him. Very caring -but firm. There’s no mucking around at Meadow Hill.’ She nodded at Jenny, trying to impress on her how very good Meadow Hill and Mr Creal were. ‘What do you think? I could pull a few strings, if you like,’ she smiled.
‘I’m sure Nick would be better with me,’ said Jenny firmly. ‘He’s used to a single mother situation. And you know what men are like, Mrs Batts. You can’t trust any of the bastards, can you?’
Jenny grinned, although it was only half a joke. But she’d said the wrong thing again. Mrs Batts looked horrified.
‘Oooooh, nooo, not all of them, Ah can assure you. No, no. If that’s your experience, Jenny, it’s not the usual one, that’s all Ah can say. Anthony Creal. My own husband. Oh, no, they’re not all like that.’
Jenny groaned to herself. She wasn’t doing very well. ‘Just a figure of speech,’ she apologised.
A little more conversation revealed that Mrs Batts was going to be writing up her report and her recommendations the next day. In an attempt to rescue the situation, Jenny invited her round for a family meal that evening.
‘You can see for yourself,’
she told Mrs Batts. ‘I’m not saying it’ll be perfect - Joe will take a while to get used to things, and as a family of course we have the usual little difficulties that other people have... ’ She tossed her head and laughed to indicate how fond she was of life’s little trials... ‘But we are a safe house, and we care, Mrs Batts. That’s the main thing, isn’t it?’
Mrs Batts was delighted to accept. There was nothing like a look at the inner workings of a prospective family to give you an idea of what was what.
Jen planned her dinner for six-thirty that evening. A proper meal at the table was an unusual event in her house. Feeding time, as she normally called it, tended to be sandwiches or fish fingers, that sort of thing, eaten on laps in front of the TV. Not the sort of thing Mrs Batts would consider proper, she was sure. Not the sort of thing a proper family did.
‘The family that eats together, stays together,’ she’d explained to the podgy social worker as she let her out of the door. She’d heard someone say that once. Say what you like about Jen - she was an accomplished liar. Mrs Batts was completely taken in.
Jen spent the rest of the afternoon running about trying to get things in order. She borrowed a cook book from Hilary down the road, who was known to cook meals. As she flicked through it, she rang Ray, her latest, and commandeered him as Man about the House.
‘The children are very fond of him, in an uncle-ey kind of way,’ she’d told Mrs Batts earlier. ‘He can’t do enough for them. He does DIY as well,’ she promised, getting carried away. In fact, Ray just about passed the basic test for a man, which she had formulated long ago; a knob, a job, and a hobby. (He collected First World War medals and worked as a clerk in the same office as Jenny.) At most other things, he was pretty useless.
‘He’s not the man of my dreams,’ Jen had once explained when Muriel expressed doubts about Ray’s general manliness. ‘But at least he’s not the man of nightmares, either.’
Ray was delighted. It was the first time she’d ever invited him round for a family meal.
‘Are you grinning?’ she asked him suspiciously.
‘No,’ insisted Ray. In fact, his face was riven in two by his happy lips.
‘The thing is to be firm. She wants a man about the house. That’s you.’
‘Man about the House,’ whispered Ray to himself.
‘What? Are you whispering to yourself again?’ asked Jenny suspiciously.
‘No!’
‘Remember, Nick is upset,’ cautioned Jenny. ‘His mother’s died. He’s a teenager.’
‘A teenager, yes.’ That was bad news. Teenagers were scary, especially the boys. They hung around in gangs on the streets trying to intimidate you. There were angry, hormonal, aggressive and unpredictable. Like an old woman having a three-year-long period, as his mother had once explained to him. Nasty.
Ray gathered himself up. ‘You can count on me, Jenny,’ he told her firmly.
He put down the phone and did a dance around the flat. He hadn’t had a girlfriend since he was sixteen, when Teresa Downey had let him take her out to the pictures three weeks in a row. He’d hardly been able to believe his luck when Jen, lovely Jen - not the most gorgeous but certainly one of the most lively girls in the office - had agreed to an after work drink, and then dinner. Things had been on the up and up ever since. And now - round for a family dinner! It would be Meet the Parents next. Before long, she’d be asking him to move in. Man about the House! Yes, yes, yes! He was on his way to getting a life at last.
Ray rushed upstairs to get changed. He’d promised to go round early to help Jenny with the dinner. He knew very well that he represented the safety option for her -nothing wrong with that. It was up to him to show that safe could be sexy as well. As he dressed, he thought about what she’d asked him to do.
‘Be firm,’ she’d said. He could do firm. He’d seen other people doing it all his life. You had to refuse to back down and interrupt people. Easy.
Still...a teenager! He found that very intimidating. This was one occasion when he needed all the help he could get. Which is why he popped into the pub on his way round, for a swift half and maybe a scotch to toughen him up for the test ahead. He wasn’t a drinker - never had been. But a little Dutch courage surely wouldn’t go amiss.
Ray might not always rise to the occasion, but at least she could rely on him not to start a fight, reflected Jen. Her main worry was little Joe, still shaken up from the traumas of the last man who’d been a regular at the house. She was somewhat relieved when she picked him up from school. He was strutting about like a little cockerel and perfectly full of himself about having a big boy staying at his house. What had happened was, he’d started talking about it at school. It could have gone either way - his mates were half inclined to tell him horror stories about being bullied by their own big brothers, but in the end, they settled down into a good bout of boasting. How their brothers played football like gods, had loads of mates, helped them with their homework, even.
Jumping on the bandwagon, and with nothing true to say, Joe started inventing boasts about the things Nick did with him. They played football together. Nick told him jokes and offered to beat people up for him. Then, the killer-Nick’s mother had just died. Wow! How cool was that? For a while, Joe was the centre of attention. Maybe Nick wasn’t such a bad thing after all.
Then, the icing on the cake, one of his friends had invented a little rhyme going, ‘What’s the game, Nicholas Dane?’ They’d been repeating it all afternoon, and for some reason, it had got funnier and funnier as going home time approached, until now, it was utterly hilarious. Joe only had to think about it and it made him want to burst out laughing.
He came walking in the house with his hands in his pockets, whistling tunelessly.
‘Where’s old Nick?’ he asked, and giggled to himself.
‘He’ll be here later,’ said Jenny. ‘Why? What’s so funny?’
‘Oh, nothing,’ said Joe airily, and sniggered again. Jenny considered her son as he sat down in front of the TV. She’d been wary of telling him that Nick was coming to live with them, but seeing him now, she was inclined to take a chance. If she could get him on her side, well...
‘Would it be nice having a big brother?’ she asked.
‘Oh, yeah!’ exclaimed Joe enthusiastically, and he almost fell over laughing.
He was in such a good mood, Jenny decided to take the chance, and she explained exactly what was going on to Joe and Grace as they had an early evening sandwich in front of the TV.
‘Why does he have to live here, though, Mummy?’ Grace wanted to know.
‘He has nowhere else to go. He’s my best friend’s son. I’d expect someone to do that for you as well if anything happened to me.’
Grace had a think about it.
‘Does that mean you’re going to be his mum?’
Jenny thought about it and nodded. ‘In a way, yes.’
Grace nodded.
‘Good girl. Joe?’
‘No probs.’ Joe nodded, and got stuck into his sandwich. He finished it, sniggering to himself every now and then. Then he and Grace watched TV for a while, before she sent them upstairs to change, to play, or, in Grace’s case, do her homework.
Jen opened the freezer door and stared at the frozen pies, fish fingers, peas and oven chips that made their usual evening meals, trying to work out exactly what it was Mrs Batts would consider as a proper family meal. It was probably meat and two veg of some sort, or a big salad, but the thought of Joe and Grace’s outrage at having to eat anything healthy made her quail. The only time they ever ate veg willingly was with a roast dinner, when it was all soaked in lashings of gravy.
A roast! That was the answer. OK, it was Wednesday evening, not the day for it really, but it was a big, nourishing meal. With veg.
Jen turned to the cupboards. The house was vegetableless and it was already five o’clock. That left her an hour and a half to make a full roast dinner, including shopping. It could be done, just - if she rushed li
ke a madwoman.
Jenny tore a frozen chicken out of its wrapper, stuck it in a low oven and rushed like a madwoman out of the house and down the road to the local Spar to buy a cabbage. As she ran, she sent up a quick prayer. All this effort depended on one vital ingredient over which she had no control: Nick himself. She’d rung both school and his own house, and had no answer from either. Please God - make him come home!
She was so concerned about making sure she impressed Mrs Batts, she utterly forgot that she still hadn’t got round to telling him how his mother had died.
Upstairs, as Jenny tore down the street like a tornado, Joe played with his transformers and kept his ears out for the front door. Now that he’d got over the initial shock, Joe was looking forward to Nick being here. He wasn’t a man at all, really - he was a kid, like him, only bigger. They could do things together. Best of all, at last he’d have an ally against his evil big sister. It was just so cool.
The door opened and Grace came in. She watched him on the floor turning the transformers inside out and back again for a while, then she went to look out of the window into the garden below. She was nine; she and Joe were the result of two separately failed relationships on Jenny’s part, and she’d been just about Joe’s age when her new baby brother arrived. She got on all right with him now, sort of, but she could still remember her fury at the callous way her new brother had stolen her mother’s attention away from her and had never, to this day, given it properly back.
Grace watched a cat walking along the wall at the end of their yard. She glanced over her shoulder at Joe playing on the floor.
‘Joe? Don’t you mind sharing your mummy with Nick?’