Slow burn, p.3
Slow Burn, page 3
April is lying on her back, reading a battered secondhand copy of The Bell Jar. I’m lying on my front, wearing my heart-shaped sunglasses and consuming the panels of The Diary of a Teenage Girl. Eventually I put it down, roll over, and just let the sun warm me. The grass is tickling the backs of my thighs in my cutoff denim shorts, but there’s something so deliciously summery about the feeling that I don’t want to move.
After a silence, I take a deep breath. I may not be able to speak to my mum about what I saw last night, but I can definitely check in with my best friend, however reluctant she is to talk. “I know you don’t like talking about your feelings but . . . humor me. Are you doing OK?”
April growls like a dog and rolls over onto her front. “Yes and no,” she says finally.
“Tell me more.”
“Yes in that I will live and no in that I wish Juliet and I were still together.”
I sigh. “I’m sorry. I wish there was something I could do to make you feel better. What’s the point of a best friend if I can’t do that?”
“Yeah!” April says, flicking my arm and grinning. “What’s even the point of you?”
Our discussion is cut short by the sight of a moving van pulling up outside my house. It gives me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. A repetition of a not-very-distant memory. My dad’s slow, morose march to and from the van, which was much smaller than this but still looked half empty with his things inside. No one gets out of the van, which is weird but also means we can resume our chat in the absence of anything more interesting to look at.
“Anyway,” April says, “I heard Juliet is going out with Rosie Wood, so it’s all pointless anyway. I’ve just got to get over it.”
“Poor bro,” I say, stroking her blond pixie cut.
“It’s fine. There are plenty more fish in the sea or whatever,” she says, but I can tell that things not working out with Juliet has wounded her. The roles have never been reversed, though. I’ve never done breakup moping with support from April because I’ve never had a relationship. In fact, I’ve been kind of avoiding it. Not that I haven’t had crushes, but I’ve never felt ready to put myself out there like that. It sounds properly horrible. “Did you tell Jake about that girl from the park?”
“I did, and he barely knew who I was talking about. Pathetic!”
“Is he still being horrible to Sasha?”
“Oh yes, he is. He refused to give her a Malteser on the grounds that she doesn’t exercise. He is an absolute menace to society.”
April is indignant. “She’s ten!”
“I know! He keeps trying to get her to do those computer games that are actually exercise! Like, he’s obsessed. It’s as if he knows he’s not going to win against me, so he’s moved on to terrorizing Sasha.”
Just then, a car pulls up and the doors to the moving van open almost simultaneously. Out of the car come three people, a man and a woman and a younger guy, maybe my age, and the moving crew gets to work, unloading boxes and hauling out a bed frame. As the older man approaches the front door of the house next to ours, examining various keys, the boy is looking around at his new surroundings. Tall, slim but broad-shouldered, in a white T-shirt and black jeans with skate shoes . . . From what I’m able to ascertain from this preliminary spying, he’s actually pretty . . . cute. I catch a glimpse of the woman’s face and wonder where I know her from. Is she a teacher at my school? Maybe she works at Sainsbury’s or something. The recognition is faint, but it’s there.
“I feel weird lying here while those guys are, like, killing themselves hauling that stuff out of the van,” April says, springing to her feet. “Let’s go inside.”
I’m disappointed at the interruption — I want to know more about the boy — but I do what she says. We shout a hello to Sasha, who’s lying in front of the TV, and to Mum, who’s working on some orders in the kitchen. Mum tries to engage us in conversation, but we’re on business. Important spying business. We head up to my room, which is at the front of the house and looks out onto the street. We watch the movers empty the van: a stylish sofa turned on its side to fit through the door, a sturdy-looking chest of drawers — not something flat-pack from IKEA — a bike. And then the boy reappears. He perches on the end of the wall that divides our front garden from theirs, playing on his phone. But the sun is so bright that he swivels around to cast a shadow over the phone, turning toward my house.
Even from a distance, I can tell that my initial assessment of cute was not wrong. Now that I can look at him for longer, I take him in. Thick, messy dark red hair. Full lips. A face that’s got a touch of sweetness mixed in with the overall hot. I feel that light bubbling sensation in my chest. That inconvenience of a crush announcing itself. But amid the fizzing excitement, there’s some strand of familiarity there too.
“Hey,” says April, her elbows resting on the windowsill, her chin on her upturned palms. “I think I know him.”
“That guy?”
“Yeah. Oliver, I think. Oliver Cowan.”
“Where from?”
“I think maybe, like, Scouts?”
“Oooh, like, back in the day. Tell me all!”
But then, before she can answer, Oliver glances up at the window. No! Pure horror! Maybe our surveillance tactics need a little bit of work. He squints up for a split second, like he isn’t sure we’re really there. “Get down!” I hiss, pulling April to the floor where we dissolve into giggles. When our laughter subsides, my curiosity does not.
“Hey, doofus,” I say, nudging her from our slumped position. “What’s the intel on him?”
“I dunno. Can’t tell you much. All I remember is he went to St. Alfred’s Prep.” She sits up, leaning against the bed frame. “Why? You got a lil crush? You got a lil thing for gingers?”
“Not now that I know he went to St. Alfred’s.” I mime puking, trying to throw her off the subject.
“Why so interested, then?” She raises her eyebrows in a gotcha face.
“No reason,” I say as casually as I can affect.
“You know, you’re allowed to fancy people,” April says.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I’m a little taken aback because . . . well, I’m just a bit surprised that she’s managed to read me like this.
“Whenever you have a crush, it’s like . . .” She gestures in her black-lace fingerless gloves, trying to find the right words. “It’s like you’re all guilty and embarrassed about it, even though it’s, like, totally normal. It’s as if you think there’s something shameful about it, for you in particular.”
I feel my face go red. “No . . . it’s . . . not . . .” I begin, but I don’t really know how I plan to continue. Because I know she’s right. Ugh, the mortifying ordeal of being known!
“It’s OK,” she says breezily. “I just don’t think you need to feel like that.”
“It’s just very cringe and demoralizing, you know,” I say, realizing it’s OK to talk about this with April. “I feel weird about fancying people because I’m like . . . why would they ever be interested in me? So it becomes all one-sided and weird.”
“They would be interested in you because you’re bitchin’,” she reassures me. “But I get it. I mean, I don’t exactly get it, but I know what you’re saying.”
“It’s, like, I’m pretty chill about my body, but there are just these little things that are poking at me and stressing me out. And I don’t want them to! I just want to live in peace! Live my fully glorious life!”
“I hear you. For what it’s worth, I think maybe you do yourself down. Like, remember when you fancied that guy in your history class?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” I say grimly, remembering Angus Moore.
“See! You’re always so negative about this stuff, but I think he really did like you! Remember when he asked you if you were going to Harry’s party?”
I shrug. “Yeah, well, I wasn’t. I was hanging out with you and Salma.”
“The fact is, he did still ask! But you’re just so convinced that no one will like you that you couldn’t even contemplate it.”
“You really thought Angus liked me?” I remain unconvinced but am at least a little interested in her hypothesis.
“I don’t know — I can’t read his mind! But all I know is that there was no evidence that he definitely didn’t like you, but you seemed to think it was a foregone conclusion. You sabotage! So if you do like Oliver Cowan, then you’re allowed to admit it! I promise you.”
I exhale loudly. “Fine. I think he’s cute,” I mumble. “I’m not, like, in love with him, though! I only just saw him! All I’m saying is that he’s cute.”
“And that’s enough for me,” April says, clapping her hands together. “Oliver Cowan is your new crush. I’m certifying it.” She mimes stamping a piece of paper.
That familiarity again. I concentrate really hard, saying his name aloud.
“What, is that like a spell? Are you doing some kind of love spell? I didn’t think you were into witchy shit.” April is eyeing me with suspicion.
“No . . . I’m just trying to place it. It’s like I knew that name a long time ago, but I can’t think why . . .” I scrunch up my face trying to mine my memories. And there it is! “Ollie Cowan! He was my little mate in nursery school! Even before I met you.”
“Huh!” April says. “But you didn’t recognize him?”
“Oddly enough, he’s changed a bit since he was four . . .”
“How does this affect the crush situation? Positively? Negatively?”
“Neutral, I think? It’s not really anything, is it?”
She shrugs. “Not really.”
We play cards on my bedroom floor for an hour before she heads home, but the whole time I’m running over what she said. Fine, I can admit that I think Ollie is cute, but I also don’t think I would ever stand a chance with him. Clearly this isn’t something I’m going to fix overnight.
Mum’s peering into the fridge. Her big blond topknot is providing a buffer against the top of the fridge, and she’s very clearly stressed out. She’s rummaging furiously among the glass jars on the top shelf. “God!” she exclaims.
“What’s up?” I’m not convinced whatever the answer is will match her level of anxiety.
“I thought we had pickled jalapeños and now I find we have none! How am I meant to make quesadillas without them?” She looks bereft. Little things seem to be piling on top of her these days. “They have four ingredients! And we don’t have one of them! That’s a quarter of the ingredients, Roo! Twenty-five percent!”
I shrug, attempting to downgrade the seriousness of this dilemma from “life-threatening” to “minor inconvenience.”
“I can go and get us some.”
Relief floods her face. “Would you?”
“Yeah, it’s fine. I’m not even doing anything.” When am I ever?
She looks at the clock on the oven. “Can you go now, please? I don’t want us to be eating dinner really late,” Mum pleads.
“All right, all right, since you’re desperate,” I say, shoving my feet into some flip-flops and grabbing a shopping bag out of the shopping bag that’s overflowing with shopping bags. I hold out my hand for some cash, and she duly drops a few pounds into my chubby palm. “They’re not going to have them in the dinky little Sainsbury’s by the station, so I’ll walk to the big one.”
“You’re a good girl.” Yes, Mum. Yes I am. “And if you do that, I’ll have time to give the new neighbors a box of my brownies as a welcome gift. I just baked some when I saw the moving van. Thought it would be nice, you know.”
“Do you remember my little ginger friend Ollie from nursery school?”
She thinks for a minute, twitching her nose in concentration. “Yes!” she says finally. “God, I had completely forgotten about him! Oh, you two were so sweet. I would have to drag you out of nursery school because you wanted to keep playing with him.”
“Well, he and his parents are the ones who moved in next door,” I say.
“How funny! Did you recognize him? After all this time?”
“No. April said she had been in Scouts with him, but it was only when she said his name that I remembered.”
She shakes her head. “Oliver Cowan. Well, I can’t remember if he likes brownies, but I’ve got to go around there either way.”
“And it’s always nice to source potential new customers.”
“That’s the last thing I need right now! I can barely keep up with the customers I have already!” She sighs. It’s another one of the many things that are stressing her out. She got fed up with paying fees to have a stall at the market in Crystal Palace Park, so she decided to go out on her own and just sell through Instagram a few months ago. Things are going just as well, and she doesn’t have to contend with the elements and having enough cash for the change float and all these other things she learned you have to think about when you’re doing a market. I much prefer it like this because I used to get roped in to helping her and I hated standing around in the cold, hoping that one day I would regain the feeling in my hands. But I do like helping her. I’m proud of her running her own business, whether that’s in real life or online.
“Maybe I can help you if you need it? Oh, and maybe when I get back we can talk about the bedroom situation . . . ?” I say over my shoulder as I leave.
When I head out into the evening air, it’s still light out and there are children playing on the estate across the road from our house. Everything feels peaceful. I start walking to the main road, trying to inject a little urgency into my pace.
At the end of the street, I have two options: one, walk along the main road and around the bend until I get to the supermarket, which is longer; two, walk up Round Hill and down the other side, which is shorter. Obviously I would rather not walk up the hill, but Mum did seem pretty stressed out about dinner. Hill it is.
I embark on my quest. Now, Round Hill isn’t a gentle incline. It’s steep. So steep I don’t think I’ve ever even seen anyone cycling down it for fear of getting catapulted into oncoming traffic when they get to the bottom.
Every step feels like a punishment, pain searing through my legs and my lungs burning with the effort. Jesus Christ, what planet was I even on when I said I could win the Dawson Dash? Planet Delusional. I love moving my cute little bod with some roller-skating, but this is very much something else. My calves are about to give out by the time I get to the top and I’m properly gasping for air.
But I made it. I made it. I’m panting and leaning against a letter box when a little white Scottie dog comes sniffing at my ankles. I bend to greet it, my breath still ragged, when its owner appears, looming above me. Mr. Pearce. The demon PE teacher. What’s a demon doing with such a cute dog? Shouldn’t be allowed.
“Hello, Ruby,” he says, surveying me disdainfully as usual. It’s weird he even remembers my name since there’s no way I was what you could call a star pupil in his lessons. Even though it’s summer and decidedly not sweatshirt weather, he’s still wearing his classic uniform of a sweatshirt over a polo shirt with shorts and trainers, socks pulled up for maximum visibility. A PE-teacher look for all seasons — are they issued with this when they emerge from the womb fully formed as PE teachers?
“Hi, Mr. Pearce,” I say reluctantly, still panting a little. Or a lot. The hill is no joke!
“Are you . . . all right?”
“Yes, fine. Just stomped up the hill a bit too fast. Just trying to catch my breath.”
He looks at me for a moment, like he’s contemplating whether to speak. “You know, if you didn’t have quite so much meat on your bones, it wouldn’t be so difficult for you to get from A to B.”
I glare at him. I was quite used to all his fat-shaming in PE classes, but I shouldn’t have to listen to it in the summer holidays. “Wow, what an insightful tip. I’ll bear that in mind,” I say, cocking my head sarcastically. It reminds me of when he used to shout “Come on, slowpoke!” at me from the other end of the gym when we would do the bleep test or basically anything that required me to move with any haste. Ugh! I can still hear it echoing around my skull! Horrible.
“You don’t need to take that tone with me, Ruby Morgan.” And then, as if saying my name brought something back to him: “You should take a leaf out of your brother’s book. Now, there’s a real athlete — I heard he’s rowing at Oxford now, hmmm?”
Ah, I see. That’s why he remembers me. The great mystery: how Jake and Ruby Morgan share any genetic material at all.
“You heard right,” I say, shrugging. “Well, I’ve got to go now.” I stomp off in the direction of Sainsbury’s before he fawns over Jake more. It’s like Jake’s brainwashed everyone into thinking he’s great! He’s not great! He’s a dick!
Under a cloud of irritation, I complete my task. The jalapeños are bought, and dinner is saved! On the way home, I don’t go back via Round Hill. Instead I take the longer route along the main road so as not to stand any chance of bumping into Mr. Pearce again. I’ve never really understood why people have to be quite brazen with their opinions about my body: what’s wrong with it, how they propose to fix it. I’ve never asked for them. In fact, I’m just trying to merrily live my life and do what I want against a tidal wave of shit. It shouldn’t be this hard! The closer I get to home, the more annoyed I feel by it all. Why does Jake get to be the golden child while he’s effectively terrorizing his sister? Not me — I’m fine — but Sasha! What about her?
Screw it. If Jake thinks the idea of me running the race is a big joke, I’ll show him just how wrong he is. If Mr. Pearce thinks I need to lose some of the “meat on my bones” in order to “get from A to B,” then I’ll show him that me and my meaty bones are capable of not just getting from A to B but winning the Dawson Dash. If Sasha is ten years old and already worrying about her sweet, perfect body, then I’m going to show her she can do anything she wants, on her own terms, in the body she has.
