183 Times a Year (41 page)

Chapter 39

KNOCKIN' ON HEAVEN'S DOOR

CASSIE

Oh god I can't do this, not today. No one can deny Dylan's
Knockin' on Heaven's Door
is like an ammmmazing song and Honey's rendition is hauntingly beautiful but Luke will have to play keyboards for the upcoming gig coz every time I play it I literally feel myself falling apart. It's been months now since Mum's attack and she's
still
in a coma and of course the longer it goes on the less chance there is of her ever waking up.

I could swear Mum moved her eyes that day I went to visit her when Simon was there and had gone off to get coffee. The Doctors said it was just an involuntary spasm or something, but I swear it wasn't. I think Mum heard me talking to her.

I'm fine most of the time and the rota system we've got going seems to work. Basically Simon is back at work, sort of part-time for now and Maisy has put off going to Oz – she said she won't go until Mum wakes up. Crazee said he'd wait for her, which is like well sweet. So Maisy is still working and Connor's still going to school and I'm trying to keep going to college as well as still working part-time in the lingerie department. So between us lot, Nan and Grandad, Ruby and Andy, Jodi and her brood (god knows how Mum doesn't wake up with those bloody twins running around – noisy little buggers!) we all take it in turns to visit and talk with Mum each day. Uncle Sean travels up to visit when he can.

Sometimes
we – me and Maisy and Nan – help the nurses wash Mum. I don't mind washing her, even though it can be a bit intimate sometimes coz her boobs and wanny have to be washed (I usually get the nurse to do those bits). It's strange though coz it feels like our roles have reversed and now I'm the one taking care of Mum, which is like so weird and just goes against the natural order of things.

Nan says as long as Mum is still alive there's hope. Nan also said we mustn't get down and always remember that hope is the Aunt Hissy Fit of despair – I didn't have a bloody clue what that was supposed to mean until Maisy explained that Nan had said antithesis. Antithesis – Aunt Hissy Fit – all sounds the bloody same to me. At least I made everyone laugh though. Grandad says laughter is the best medicine.

Nan is right though; we do have to have hope. I try to, and I try and carry that hope with me every single day. But sometimes my heart is so full of the stuff it's just too heavy to carry. Today is one of those days. I want to be numb, to not feel, to not think. To wake up one morning without desperately searching for my hope that I know I lose during the night; especially during the small, dark hours after midnight. That's the time Grandad calls the witching hour, when witches, ghosts and demons are at their most powerful and black magic at its most effective. I don't know how he knows all this stuff – read too many books I think – but there are definitely demons playing with my head in the middle of the night sometimes.

People are cruel too. I'm not sure they actually mean to be but everyone stares at me in the college corridors. I've taken to wearing sunglasses all the time but as a music student they don't actually look too out of place. People whisper too, in their little groups and I hear them. My ears are so sensitive they twitch and swivel like Romeow's, detecting every word they think I can't hear.
Sucker punch
and
king hit
are the worst. My stomach
physically
flips when I hear those words. And sometimes – I'm a bit ashamed to say – my stomach isn't the only thing to flip. Sometimes I do too.

‘It wasn't a fucking King hit,' I shout. ‘It was a huge, fucked-up COWARD punch. Only a fucking COWARD would throw a punch like that. Not Sucker, not King but COWARD!!!!!'

Without a word Luke takes my place at the keyboard. He knows my struggle with this song and once again he comes to my rescue. Luke always seems to be there just when I need it. Useless watches me move discreetly away from the keyboard. He places his guitar back in its case and sidles up to me.

‘Lap?' he says.

‘Yeah lap,' I reply.

I walk over to Marcus, our tutor, who is helping Louisa with her arpeggios. ‘Going on a loo brake Marcus,' I say. He smiles, nods at me and turns his attention back to Louisa.

I wander along the corridor, away from the Music Department. The sounds of rehearsal grow faint and I'm swallowed up by the eerie quiet of the college as life inside this huge warren continues behind its many closed doors. Even before I reach the exit I'm already fumbling for the fags and lighter in my bag. I swipe my ID card in front of the electronic thingy whatsit and wait as the double doors slowly open.

I'm relieved to feel fresh air on my face. I lean against the brick wall next to the door and light the fag in my hand. I suck on it hard. I look up and close my eyes blowing smoke through the triangular shape I've made at the corner of my mouth. Mum would hate to see me smoking. I keep my eyes closed but I'm aware someone is now standing next to me and I know it's Useless.

Useless takes the fag from my hand and also inhales deeply before exhaling through his nostrils. Ever since Mum was admitted into hospital me and Useless have got into this routine
of
sneaking out whenever I've had enough and walking a complete lap of the college. We smoke, talk shit or sometimes just don't talk at all. That's the great thing about Useless. There's nothing sexual about our relationship. He just gets me. We get each other.

‘How iz your Mum?' Useless asks, his polish accent as strong as ever.

‘Still breathing – just,' I reply laughing.

I tell him about our recent police visit.

‘They got him,' I tell Useless. ‘They got the scumbag that attacked my Mum.'

I'm glad they've found him. I've been like dead frightened he might come back for the rest of us, which I know is really selfish of me. Sometimes though, late at night, when I'm in bed and can stop pretending to be okay in front of everyone – especially Connor – I imagine Mum's attacker coming to the house and me shooting him. I don't know how I'd shoot him coz we don't have a gun but I want him to die for killing me, little by little, every day.

“To be, or not to be: that is the question”.
I get that now. Mum loves Shakespeare and I always said I didn't understand what the hell Shakespeare was going on about in most of his plays but now I see it all so clearly. Well, I see Hamlet's grief anyway and it matches mine perfectly …

“Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of Outrageous fortune,

Or take arms against a sea

Of troubles,

And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;

No more; and by a sleep to Say we end

The heart-ache and the Thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to”

‘
Apparently Mum's attacker was connected with that bloody Amber girl who came into the Library a lot,' I continue explaining to Useless. ‘The one Mum actually helped well loads.'

Useless shakes his head but says nothing. Which is fine, no words are needed.

Useless lights another fag and passes it to me, and yeah I know they could give me cancer one day but right now I don't give a shit. For now, these cancer sticks are helping me through this. Even John Lennon said,
Whatever Gets You Through The Night.

I take another long drag and exhale, really slowly. It makes me feel kind of woozy. Mum would hate it if she knew I was smoking. Maybe that's why I'm doing it, hoping in some stupid way she'll know and be so angry she'll wake up.

Dad hates me smoking too. Maybe that's the real reason I'm doing it, to piss him off. To push him and test his new found interest in me and Connor. To be fair though he has been quite good with us since Simon beat him up. He's changed a bit. Nothing drastic though. It's not like some fairy-tale ending to our dire situation with Mum. We still don't have a room at his house and Sharon still doesn't really like us going there. She says what she thinks people expect her to say to us but she doesn't really mean it, there's no warmth in her words. It's all for show, especially if she has guests – then we really see the actress in her come alive. That's when the hugs and the crocodile tear good advice and words of comfort are dished out, but it's all an act. A huge, big, fat fucking lie. I want to scream at her, ‘STOP IT YOU LYING BITCH,' but I don't want to jeopardise what little bit of something we have with Dad right now, coz I don't know if it'll last.

Over the last few weeks Dad's got into the habit of taking me and Connor out instead of meeting at his house. I know its coz Sharon doesn't want us there but that's fine by me coz I don't
want
to be anywhere I'm not wanted anyway. We only meet Dad for a coffee (or milkshake for Connor) and a chat but he tries to do it once a week. So things are slightly better, I suppose.

Sometimes Dad brings Harriet with him. Harriet is 4 years old and despite being half Sharon is actually dead cute. Well, most of the time. We had one meeting the other week that did like really upset me. I was talking to Dad and obviously calling him Dad. The more I talked to Dad the more I noticed Harriet's face become all twisted up, like she was confused. She watched me for a while then suddenly started screaming,

‘He's not
your
Daddy, he's
mine.'

I tried to explain that her Daddy was also mine and Connor's daddy – we just had different Mummies – but she just kept shouting it over and over again. What hurt the most though was the smirk she had on her little face as she said it. Did she know she was hurting me? Dad didn't say much to stop her but he did intervene when I explained to Harriet that I was her sister and Connor was her brother. I said that she was our sister and we were all family but she didn't seem to like me saying that. She just kept screaming and shouting, telling me that I'll never be a part of her family. Dad did actually tell her off then, sort of.

‘Just ignore her,' Dad said. ‘She's only little, she doesn't really know what she's saying.'

‘Really?' I asked. ‘Did she hear that from someone else then?' Dad's cheeks flushed up really red and he seemed embarrassed. ‘Why does Sharon call you Scottie?' I also asked him. ‘It makes you sound more like a dog than a person.'

Dad looked and me and sighed. He seemed tired and – what else? Sad? Yeah I could see something in his eyes and it wasn't happiness. I wanted to grab Dad and shake him, to tell him I felt sorry for him, that I hate the way Sharon orders him around, that he should stand up for himself and tell her his name is Scott not Scottie and also tell her that we are his children as much as
Harriet
is. I wanted to scream at him and tell him he sold out, gave up me and Connor and Mum for money and possessions. All the things that make up life's unnecessities and that while he may have all the lovely playthings any man could want; it came at a price. I decided (in the end) to keep those thoughts to myself though.

Dad squirmed uncomfortably and didn't answer my question and as usual tried to change the subject. He pretended to ask about college and I pretended he cared. Harriet hopped onto Dad's knee and wrapped her arms around his neck, staring at me – all the time smirking and saying,

‘My Daddy,
not
yours.'

I actually hated Harriet at that moment, believed she was some sort of devil child, like
Damien
from
The Omen
. I swore to myself I'd never forgive her – and I meant it – until I found myself doing the same thing to Maisy a week later.

I'd decided to pay Mum a surprise visit at the hospital. It wasn't my turn that day and I couldn't remember whose it was but I'd had a shit day and an overwhelming urge just to be with her. When I walked into her room Maisy was there, sitting on a chair next to Mum's bed. She was reading out loud. Maisy didn't hear me come in and as I got closer I realised Maisy was reading Shakespeare. I know how much Mum loves Shakespeare and out of nowhere my body filled with rage and jealousy. Why hadn't I thought of doing that for Mum? I was her daughter, her
real
daughter and it should have been me reading that crap to her, not Maisy. I'm not really sure what happened next except my angry words quickly turned into an eruption of screaming and yelling followed by a real physical fight. I hadn't had a real fight since I was about 11 years old. I forgot how much it hurts.

‘She's not your Mum,' I'd screamed at Maisy. ‘She's mine. She'll never love you like she loves me. NEVER!'

It was only when we were separated by a couple of nurses
and
I replayed my words back in my head I realised what a bitch I'd been. At least Harriet, at the age of 4 years old, had an excuse – I, now 17 years old, should have known better. The atmosphere at home was horrible for a couple of days. I finally got the guts up to apologise to Maisy then we both collapsed into each other's arms in floods of tears. In a stupid sort of way it's made us closer though.

I ask Useless how things are going with Rae Rae (her real name is Rachel) a girl on the Dance course at college he secretly loves and has done now for the last two years.

‘She doesn't know I exzeest,' he says. ‘Well no, actually that's a lie she does, but only as a friend.'

‘She's friend-zoned you then?'

‘Ahhhh Cazzie, I am so far in the friend zone she actually sends me photos of her in her underwear asking me what I think her boyfriend will think!'

‘Shit, no way?' We both sigh. ‘Unrequited love eh?'

‘Yezzz, obsolutely. Gives me plenty of song writing material though – mostly sad. A bit like Luke with you I think?'

I swing round to look at Useless. ‘You think?'