Clementine and Rudy Read online

  “I don’t have a boyfriend,” I snap as they start sniggering.

  “Now why doesn’t that surprise me?” Vincent mutters.

  My face flushes red. I hate him. I hate him. I hate him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Well, all you feminists hate men, don’t you?”

  “Not at all. We only hate the dickheads.”

  Damon sniggers.

  “Clementine!” Mum looks at me, horrified.

  “What?”

  “No swearing.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “What?” Mum stares at me.

  “Trust me, me saying dickheads should be the least of your worries.” I stare pointedly at Vincent. “I’m going to school.” I stand up.

  Mum looks confused. “But you haven’t had any breakfast.”

  “I’ll get something from the canteen.”

  “But—”

  “Let her go,” Vincent interrupts Mum. He doesn’t look at me when he says it, but his tone has softened – he definitely wants me to leave.

  RUDY

  I race into Kale and Hearty and over to the counter. Tyler is standing with his back to me, putting a load of berries into the juicer.

  “Someone was asking about my picture,” I say excitedly, as I pull up a stool and sit down.

  “What? Who? Hello!” Tyler turns to greet me. He’s wearing his favourite Pink Floyd T-shirt and his hair’s tied up, making his cheekbones look even more pronounced. They’re so striking I instantly want to draw him.

  “Hello. I don’t know. A girl.”

  “OK, rewind.” Tyler puts down the fruit and comes over.

  “I went to see it just now, to check out what it looked like in the daylight, and that guy was there – the one who was sleeping in the doorway last night.”

  “Right.” Tyler nods.

  “So, he came over and said that I wasn’t the first person who’d looked at the picture today; a girl had been there earlier and she’d taken a photo.”

  “That’s awesome.” Tyler grins. “But I’m not surprised. It’s a great piece of art, sis.”

  “She was asking him questions too, about who did it.”

  Tyler frowns, causing his thin eyebrows to meet. “Really? What did he tell her?”

  “Nothing much. He said he couldn’t see who did it because it was so dark and we were covered up. He didn’t realize it was me.” I grin at him. “I think it might have been her – the poet. She accepted my message request so I know she’s read it.”

  “Wow.”

  “I know!”

  “Has she posted a picture of it on her account?”

  “Not the last time I looked.” I take my phone from my pocket. I’ve got a message from Mum: I love you, baby. xxxx. Yeah, whatever. I click onto Instagram and @SpilledInk’s profile. There have been no new photos since yesterday, when she posted a photo of the sea and a quote about hope by someone called Emily Dickinson.

  “I guess she’ll need some time to write her poem.” Tyler goes over to the coffee machine. “Drink?”

  “Please.”

  Tyler looks at his watch. “Shouldn’t you be in school?”

  I shake my head. “I’m off sick.”

  “Why? What’s up?” Tyler looks so concerned it makes me feel warm inside. At least someone genuinely cares about me.

  “Idiot Dave’s moving in.”

  “What?” The fact that Tyler looks so horrified at this news makes the warmth inside me grow.

  “Yep. Mum told me this morning and I’ve been feeling sick ever since.”

  “Oh, sis. I’m sorry.”

  “The thing is, Mum needs the money. I offered to do more shifts here but then she got all militant about me needing to study so I could go to uni. I don’t even want to go to uni.”

  Tyler nods. “I hear you.”

  “Hey, Rudy. No school today?” Sid calls as he comes out from the kitchen.

  I shake my head.

  “She’s had some bad news,” Tyler says.

  “Oh no.” Sid comes over. “No one’s died, have they?”

  “Only all the hope inside me,” I reply.

  Sid gives a relieved laugh. “Oh dear. Sounds like a definite case for banana bread.” He goes over to one of the freshly baked loaves on the counter and cuts me a huge chunk. I go to get my purse out to pay but he shakes his head. “On the house, hun. Sounds like you could do with some comfort food.”

  “Thank you.” As I take a bite of the warm banana bread and the sweet taste of cinnamon melts on my tongue I feel the tiniest flicker of hope splutter back to life. Things might be about to get tragic on the home front but at least I have the café and at least I have Tyler, Jenna and Sid. At least I feel at home in my workplace. I try to ignore how desperate this sounds and take another bite of banana bread.

  CLEMENTINE

  When did you forget that you were born to rise –

  Born to blaze a trail, like a star across the skies?

  When did you decide that you were meant to crawl –

  Crawl and shrink and fade, instead of walking tall?

  When will you remember who you were supposed to be?

  When will you wake up and finally be free?

  As I type the poem into an Instagram post I feel a weird jolt of recognition deep inside. I’d started writing about the girl in @FierceUrban’s picture and Mum, but now I realize that I’m writing this for me too. I’m so sick of feeling like I’m an extra in someone else’s movie: someone’s difficult daughter, or annoying big sister, or inconvenient stepdaughter, or the boring wallflower in a high-school drama. Mum isn’t the only one who’s been shrinking and fading away, I have too, trying to fit in at home and at school. School today was really harsh. There was a moment in English when everyone seemed to be in on a joke apart from me and I had to pretend that I didn’t care, fake that I was really engrossed in my book. But what if I’m not supposed to fit in there? What if, instead of trying to fit in to the wrong places, I search for the right place, a place where fitting in comes so naturally it’s not even a thing? Does such a place exist? And how will I find it?

  I double-check that I’m happy with the photo and the filter I’ve chosen. Then I take a deep breath and tag @FierceUrban. It’s the first time I’ve ever tagged an artist directly. As I press SHARE my heart skips a beat. Then I go to my messages and send @FierceUrban a reply: Hope you like it! Over to you…

  RUDY

  “Rudy, I’m in the kitchen,” Mum calls as I shut the front door behind me.

  My heart sinks. No “baby girl” or “honey” or “darling” in her greeting usually means that I’m in trouble or something bad’s happened – or both.

  I check the time on my phone. I was really careful to make sure that I got home at my normal time, even though I haven’t been to school. After breakfast in Kale and Hearty I spent the day trawling Brighton’s backstreets for urban art inspiration. I even went back to the picture of the butt cheeks by LADZ, to see if he’d seen what I’d done and responded in some way but my FIERCE denim shorts were still on full display. Then I sat for hours on a bench on the pier sketching new ideas in my pad. In truth, I was sketching out all of my anger about Idiot Dave moving in and Mum insisting I go to uni; drawing pictures of dumb-looking men and students being churned out of giant sausage machines.

  “Hey, what’s up?” I say as I go into the kitchen. “Oh.” Idiot Dave is what’s up. He’s halfway up a stepladder, fixing our broken cupboard door, to be precise.

  “All right, Rudy?” he says in his South London twang. “Good day at school?”

  For a second I wonder if this is a trick question; if he and Mum know I skived off. I glance at Mum. She’s grinning at Dave like an adoring puppy.

  “Yeah, it was OK.”

  “Dave’s fixing the cupboard door,” Mum says, stating the obvious.

  “Really? I thought he was practising ballet.” Don’t be sarcastic, Rudy.

  “Don’t be sarcastic, Rudy,” Mum s
ays, but she keeps grinning. “We were thinking, maybe we could all go out for something to eat, before I go to work.”

  Two things hit me like a double punch to the gut: Mum and Dave will be “we” now, instead of Mum and me and, when Dave moves in, I’ll no longer have the flat to myself when Mum’s at work.

  “I’m not really that hungry,” I say, in a dramatic understatement. I feel totally sick.

  “Please, Rudy.” Mum turns her puppy-dog eyes on me.

  “Go on, you must fancy something,” Dave says, coming back down the ladder. The sleeves of his checked shirt are rolled up, revealing the silhouettes of tattoos, barely visible on his dark skin. “You pick.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.” He grins at me and a pair of dimples appear on either side of his mouth like a set of speech marks. Yeah, well, your dimples don’t fool me, mister. Your twinkly eyes don’t either.

  “How about Mexican?” I suggest. Ever since Tyler introduced me to the joys of fajitas I’ve been a huge fan of Mexican food. Dave probably hasn’t got a clue what they even eat in Mexico; he was probably hoping I’d say fish and chips or a doner kebab.

  “Mexican would be great,” Dave replies. “We can go to Dos Sombreros.”

  “Cool,” Mum says, like an excited kid.

  I’m not sure what to make of this latest development. “OK, I’ll get changed then.”

  “Sure.” Dave grins. Dimple, dimple. Twinkle, twinkle. I fight the instinct to smile back. I mustn’t let his cheeriness fool me. One of us needs to stay on our guard around here.

  As soon as I get to my bedroom I fling my bag on the floor and myself on the bed. I know what’s going on. Dave is embarking on a charm offensive so I’ll be chill about him moving in. But what he doesn’t realize is that I’m not stupid. I learned long ago that you can’t trust anyone – especially men. With the exception of Tyler of course. And Sid.

  I take my phone from my bag to text Tyler this latest development and I see that I have a notification from Instagram. I hardly ever get notifications from Instagram, due to the whole carefully-curated-social-media thing. A shiver runs up my spine. @SpilledInk has sent me a message.

  Hope you like it. Over to you…

  Like what? I see from my notifications that she’s also tagged me in a post so I click on the link. I see a photo of my picture and next to it the first line of the description reads: When did you forget that…? I click through to read the full post. As the words work their way from the screen into my brain my body fizzes with excitement. It’s like she’s written a rallying call just for me.

  I quickly text Tyler. Spilled Ink has posted my picture and written a poem!

  Almost instantly my phone starts to ring: Tyler.

  “What does it say?” he asks breathlessly.

  “You all right, mate? You sound like you’re having trouble breathing.”

  “Yeah. Just had to lug all the shopping up the stairs. Lift’s broken again. But there was one silver lining…”

  “Oh yeah? What’s that?”

  “I saw your latest So Dark Fairy in the stairwell. Is it me?”

  “Yep.”

  “Sis, you have no idea how much this means to me.” Tyler’s been begging me for ages to make a So Dark Fairy in his image, it’s great to hear the genuine excitement in his voice. “I even took a photo of it to have as my screensaver. I love it! But never mind that, read me the poem.”

  I read it to him. There’s a moment’s silence and then…

  “Wow!”

  “I know, right? She really seems to get what I’m trying to say.”

  “Absolutely. It makes me think…”

  “What?”

  “Well, maybe you guys should do some kind of collaboration.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “What if you did a piece of art and included one of her poems, like a poem she’d written about your picture?”

  I think of my hero Miss.Tic and how she combines art with words and how I’d recently been wishing I could do the same. “But I don’t even know her.”

  “Yet,” Tyler replies, all enigmatically. “Why don’t you message her? Suggest meeting.”

  “Hmm. I’ll think about it.”

  “Do it.” I hear Tyler taking a swig of his drink. “You OK, sis, about Dave moving in?”

  “Yeah. He’s here now. We’re going out for dinner. Some kind of cheesy Mexican bonding thing – although the only thing I’m going to be bonding with is my fajita.”

  “You’re going for a Mexican?” I can practically hear Tyler drooling.

  “Yeah. Idiot Dave let me choose where to go. That’s how cheesy he’s being.”

  “Being taken for a Mexican is a pretty cool silver lining though.”

  “I suppose.”

  “Good luck!”

  “Thanks, bruv.”

  I end the call and, before I have time to talk myself out of it, I type a reply to @SpilledInk’s message. Love it. Thank you. Do you want to meet?

  CLEMENTINE

  Apparently, my favourite poet, Emily Dickinson, became a recluse in her later life, to the point where she refused even to leave her bedroom. I stare at my bedroom ceiling, seriously considering this option. After the day I’ve had, I can see how a person might give up on the outside world but I’m not sure I’m quite that desperate yet. Maybe … if my bedroom was more to my taste – but the thought of staying trapped in this bland white cube is even more depressing. I sit up. I am going to take the advice of my poem and I’m going to rise out of my bed, out of this room and out of this house. But where am I going to rise to? I decide to go flâneuring.

  Thankfully, Vincent has taken Damon to football training, so I only have to get past Mum. I find her in the bathroom of the guestroom, cleaning the already sparkling tiles.

  “Hey, Mum, I’m just going to pop round to Becky’s for a bit.” I hold my breath, hoping that Mum won’t find this suspicious, as I haven’t been round to Becky’s since Christmas. But thankfully she’s way too engrossed in her cleaning, rubbing the tiles like her life depends on it.

  “OK. Don’t be too late, though. You’ve got school in the morning.”

  She seems so weird and distracted. A horrible thought occurs to me. What if the “darling” Vincent was talking to this morning on the phone is someone he’s having an affair with? And what if Mum knows, or suspects at least? Is that why she’s been acting so strange lately?

  “Are you OK?” I ask.

  “Yes, of course.” She carries on cleaning.

  “All right. I’ll see you later then.”

  “Yes, see you later.”

  I head downstairs feeling so helpless. I wish there was something I could do. I wish I knew what was going on inside Mum’s head.

  It’s not until I’m outside and heading along the main road into Brighton that I start to relax. It’s impossible for me not to feel happy in this city, its energy seeps into me like some kind of weird osmosis. Even though flâneuring was invented in Paris, I feel pretty certain that Brighton has to be the second-best place in the world to wander with no purpose other than to drink it all in. I soak in the sounds – the pounding music from a pub, the laughter from a group of skater boys, the hiss of a passing bus, the call of a Big Issue seller. I breathe in the smells – petrol, fruity vape fumes, perfume and pizza. And I allow my imagination to add to the sights – my imaginary boyfriend Luc meandering along beside me, his dark hair flopping down over his eyes. I picture him holding my hand, squeezing it tightly, whispering in my ear, “Shall we go down to the sea?” My phone vibrates in my pocket, interrupting me from my daydream. I stop in the doorway of the Pound Shop and check my messages. There’s one from Becky. My heart pounds. Why is she messaging me? Did Mum call her?

  Hey, Clem. Hope you’re good. I was just wondering if you had time for a chat? Justin’s away at cadet camp and I’m SO BORED. xxx

  There would have been a time, a couple of months ago, when I would have been so happy to have received t
his message, but not any more. Now all it makes me feel is angry. The only reason Becky’s messaging me is because Justin’s away – and because she’s SO BORED. Clearly I’m just her good old reliable back-up friend. Or at least that’s what she thinks. I click out of my messages, and see an Instagram notification. My anger instantly turns to excitement when I see that @FierceUrban has contacted me. I practically drop the phone in surprise when I read her message. Not only did she “love” my poem but she wants to meet!

  RUDY

  There are many things in life that are guaranteed to kill your appetite stone dead. Fungus. The smell of rotten eggs. Slimy seaweed. And high up on the list is the sight of your mum and her idiot boyfriend smooching ACROSS THE TABLE FROM YOU. I hold up my menu like it’s a shield and pretend to read. If only they served a dish called Parental Passion Killer. I’d order it for Mum and Dave with an extra side helping. Their PDAs are seriously unnecessary. They’re both way too old to be carrying on like this. Mum is going to be forty in a couple of months and Dave is almost fifty. That’s, like, half a century! I sneak a peek over the menu. Thankfully they’ve stopped kissing, but Dave’s now stroking Mum’s hand and gazing at her in a seriously sappy way.

  “Do you know what you want, Rudy?” Dave asks, nodding at my menu.

  Yeah, I want you to put my mum down, I think. “The vegetable fajita please,” I say.

  “Good choice,” Dave says. Like I need his approval.

  “So, what did you do in school today?” Mum asks.

  “Just the usual,” I mutter.

  “Did you have art?” Dave asks.

  “Yeah, why?”

  “I know how much you like art,” he says. “So it can’t have been that bad.”

  Ha! If only he knew. But the mention of art makes my fingers itch to be drawing.

  “Oh, trust me, it was bad,” I mutter, mentally composing a comic-style picture of Dave being swallowed whole by a giant taco shell.

  Mum gives me one of her stares. When I was little these stares had the power to silence me instantly. But I’m not little any more.