What I Did (23 page)

— And this must be Billy! he says, when he arrives at Mum and me. — Now I'm sure Mum has told you, Billy, what today is all about. Everyone here wants what's best for you. That's what we're going to try and work out. It's a
What's Best for Billy Meeting
, do you understand?

I nod. He seems very nicely in charge, this man, with excellent orange wire hairs poking out of his ears, too.

— Good! he says. — Now. I'm sure you also understand that some of the time grown-ups have to talk to other grown-ups about grown-up things, yes?

I nod again. The crane swings back across the window gap.

— And it's not always possible for children to be part of those grown-up chats, is it?

Another nod. Sadly the hooky end is still out of sight: boring!

— Well, today will be a bit like that. I know you've already spoken with most of the people here — Dr. Adebayo, Mrs. Hudson, and your teacher, because I've read about what you said to them in the notes. That's why I'm a little late, in fact: because there was such a lot in that folder to read! And I want to thank you for answering their questions so sensibly. You've been very helpful.

Orange hairs. Yellow crane. Nod, nod, boring nod.

— So . . . he turns to Mum . . . — so I hope that Mum has brought somebody with her to look after Billy while we have our grown-up chat? As we discussed.

Grandma Lynne and Mum turn to each other for a moment: it's obvious that Grandma Lynne would prefer to stay in the grown-up room but in the end she picks up the arctic sticker book and waves it cheerfully instead.

— Great. Thank you. There's a chance we may need to ask Billy a question or two later, but I hope it won't be necessary. You saw the lobby area down the hall? Well, if the two of you could wait there for now, that would be just great.

Orangutan rubs his hands together: there are orange hairs on his knuckles as well. And Grandma Lynne is nodding her head off beside me, hoping to win the best nodding prize perhaps, which is sad, because I've already won it, and the crane is cranking whatever-it-is back across the window again anyway. Imagine if it swung right into the room and lifted one of us up. Me! Yes, I could be a chess piece and the crane arm might swing onto my square. Up I'd swoop. It's for the best. The crane has taken me! With what, though? I feel suddenly sad that I won't ever find out which piece is really on the hook.

— Okay then. No need to look so worried, Billy. You understand what's happening, yes?

Nod, nod, nod. What long arms. Did you know that an orangutan is four times as strong as a man? That's why they don't need cranes, probably: they can reach and lift massive chess pieces on their own.

Mum bends down next to me, very sparkly-eyed. — Billy? Say thank you to Mr. Pearson.

— Thank you, Mr. Pearson, I say.

 

And that's all that happens in the meeting, or at least that's all that happens in the meeting when I'm there. Much more must happen when I'm not because it takes ages! I do every single arctic sticker and complete the word search and drink so many tiny plastic glasses of cold water from a machine with a big glugging jar-bottle thing on top that I have to go to the toilet down the corridor a few times.

The third time makes Grandma Lynne nearly cross. — If you must go yet again, Billy, you know where the toilet is now, so you can go on your own!

She's right. I do know where it is. And I am able to go on my own. But sadly everything is different backward. After I've finished I take a wrong turn and get lost. It's not my fault! The corridors are long and they all look the same because of their chessboard carpet tiles and blue plastic-padded chairs and little low tables with seashell fans of leaflets on them.

Have you ever been lost? Of course, because everyone has, and that includes me. The thing is not to panic, Son. Just retrace your steps if you can, or stay put if you can't. I'll always find you. Always.

I do some tracing but it's no good so I do it faster to cover more ground but sadly all that happens is I end up back by the toilets again with a fluttery feeling in my chest. A man comes out as I'm standing there trying to breathe slowly. He has crispy light brown trousers with oh no a small patch of wet just there, and he's still doing up his belt, and no, no, no, he asks me if I'm all right or need help. No and yes! But I can't say that because you should never go with strangers, particularly when you're lost, because that's when you're at your most venerable. So I turn round and do a sprint of tracing back the way I've come again past the big notice board with the smiling-wheelchair-people pictures and words in capital letters.

The fluttering is a crashing feeling now. It makes my head swivel like a meerkat's. And there's the fat-water-bottle glugging machine, but no, no, no: it's not the right one because it doesn't have a torn label! Somebody else is walking round the corner up ahead with a Tesco bag, so I run past with my head turned the other way and start to cry. What if everyone goes home without me? They wouldn't do that but then again that could be what they think is best for me. What's best for Billy? Billy who? He's not here anymore because he ran away. It's probably for the best. Let's all go home. My legs are itchy and they use horrible soap on the walls or carpets or door windows here: the whole place smells like a cross between the lavender plant in our garden and petrol from when Dad overfilled the tank. Just calm down, Son. Where's Mum? Door window. Door win . . . yes, yes, yes. Just like at school, you can see through the door windows here, so I have a peep straight back into this one and the next and round the corner there's another and . . .

Yes, yes, yes.

Big room. Mum. With her back to me: pale neck. Mum, Mum, Mum.

Starling Jean is speaking, flapping her wings at Giraffe, who shakes her long head and looks sideways at Butterfly, which makes Butterfly do a sadly-I-agree nod. Orangutan spreads his long arms hold-on-now wide, but his hands turn palm upward, very what-can-we-do? The woman with the chessboard hat is reading something boring and the magpie doctor is looking out of the window, at something shiny, probably. I can't tell you much about Mum because as I've said she's sitting with her back to the door and anyway her head is dipped forward in her hands, very weary: even prairie dogs tire out eventually.

There's a skittery noise in the corridor then, and Grandma Lynne is suddenly right next to me with puffing cheeks. — Oh thank goodness, she says.

I look down at my shoes. My feet are in them. They do a little jump.

Grandma Lynne says, — But where have you been?

— I don't know.

— You don't know? I've been running around like a . . . She shakes her head. — Not to worry. It's okay. Just . . . don't go off on your own again, promise. She takes my hand. Under her breath she continues, — Particularly not today, of all days.

— But you told me to go on my own.

Grandma Lynne doesn't reply to that because she's looking over my head through the door window. I turn to have another look, too. Mum's head is bent farther forward and her shoulders are quivering, but it's okay because Starling Jean has a wing around her.

— Come on, Grandma Lynne murmurs. — Let's go and wait where we were told to wait.

 

Mum and Grandma Lynne don't talk much on the journey back home. Mum is so incredibly tired her eyes have gone night-shifting puffy: to begin with she has to blink a lot and take deep breaths to make the car go. But Grandma Lynne's hands won't sit still in her lap. They're itchy. They make her lean across the front seat before Mum has gone over the humps where the road goes narrow and loud-whisper, — Well?

— Not now, Mum.

And do you know what? I can tell, when Mum says
not now
, that it's all an act. Keeping quiet for the journey has nothing to do with being tired. It's to do with keeping something quiet from me! The meeting was all about what was best for me, after all: they must have come up with something so important Mum has decided to keep it a secret, for now.

I decide not to pester. It doesn't work anyway, Son, ever. Instead I form a plan. As soon as we're inside I go up to my bedroom and put the microphone bit of the old baby monitor inside my school book bag. Idiot! I take it out again and switch it onto green lights and put it back in again. Very stealthy, I carry the bag into the kitchen and hook it on the back of the spare chair; it often hangs there: nice camouflage! Not long afterward Mum says — Why not go up to play in your room until tea, and I knew she would, and when it happens I just smile and quite loudly ask Grandma Lynne for my excellent new pencils and arctic activity book and say what a good idea, I'm off upstairs to color in the picture of the northern lights. I'm in genius.

I don't actually color in the picture to begin with.

Instead I take the other part of the baby monitor and plug it into the socket behind the end of my bed. It's quite tricky to stretch under there. You should never hold the metal bits of a plug: if you do you'll be electrified. Don't worry, though, you can touch a Scalextric track if you want, but not at my house because I don't have one, and anyway, remember never to stick a fork in your toaster. The lights on the monitor thing flash green like a dragon's eyes. They can see all the way downstairs! And David Attenborough would be proud of me because here's some evidence: straightaway Mum and Grandma Lynne are talking under my bed. I lie down next to the monitor and listen carefully for the secret of what's best for me, but sadly all they're talking about is something else quite a lot more boring instead.

— He'll never agree to it.

— He'll have to, Tessa. He has no choice.

— I know what he'll say, though. And you know what, he's right. It's absurd.

— But it's not forever.

— Doesn't matter. A day is too long. It just won't work.

— You've agreed now, though.

— Only because the alternative was worse. If it hadn't been for Jean they'd have gone for a court order.

— And they haven't done that. He'll realize he's had a narrow escape.

— Come on, Mum. You know he won't. And anyway, even if he agrees, how on earth are we supposed to make it happen? He has Billy more than half the time. He takes him to school, collects him . . . My shifts . . .

— This is temporary, though.

— Yes, but so what?

— They'll soon see there's no need . . . on their . . . visits. You've only got to spend ten minutes with Billy and Jim to understand. It's just supervised contact . . .

— Yes, but under a child protection plan.

— Like Jean said, they could have applied for an exclusion order. Everything will be back to normal before you know it.

— They're monitoring us, Mum. My son.

— And they'll stop monitoring you — us — again soon.

— They think Jim hit him with a brick, or dragged him over a wall.

— Well . . . but . . .

— What am I going to tell him?

— He should have been there himself. It's his fault, not yours.

— How has this happened?

— Look. Tessa.

— How?
My son
.

— Darling.

The monitor goes quiet then so I open up the activity book and even though coloring-in is really quite boring unless you're coloring things you've drawn yourself, I find my new pencils and make a start on the northern lights page. You never know, Mum or Grandma Lynne might ask to see the results. If I haven't done what I said I'll look like an idiot, or worse still a liar. At least the colored pencils are sharp. The ones at school are mostly blunt and often don't have lead poking out at all. I decide to overlap the colors in the segments to create interesting effects, because life doesn't come in neat squares, Son. Sooner or later Mum and Grandma Lynne are bound to start talking again and when they do they'll get to the point and give away the secret surprise instead of talking nonsense about super vision.

— What am I going to tell work? Mum asks eventually. —How am I going to get the time off?

— They'll have to give it to you.

— But I'll need to explain. I can't. I just . . . can't.

— I'll help.

— Oh, Mum.

— We'll get through this. I'll take him. Or I'll be here . . . whenever is necessary. I can do that. I want to help.

— No, but, Jim . . .

— If he can think of a better solution, let him. The time off isn't an issue for me: I can work around it. You'll have to take your holiday. For as long as I'm needed, I'll be here. Between us, we'll manage.

After that there's some clattering. When you lie on your stomach for a long time on the floor it's quite funny because it actually feels like there's something heavy on your back, not your front. Eliza in our class can do a cartwheel but I am better than her at forward rolls. The secret is to keep yourself rolled up into a defensive hedgehog ball for ages: don't go straight until everything has stopped. My back feels heavy so I wriggle out from under the end of the bed and do a few practice forward rolls, which turns out to be really stupid of me because after about seven I open my eyes and see Mum in my doorway.

— What's all the banging about?

I try not to glance desperately at the monitor under the bed

— PE. Sorry.

— Ah.

But I can't help looking at the bed-end! Luckily, when I do, I see my northern lights picture just there, so I cunningly pretend I was looking at that by diving on it quickly. I pick it up and start telling Mum all about the cross-patched shading quite loudly. — Let's take it down to show Grandma Lynne, shall we? I say.

Mum's eyes still look puffy tired, but she's definitely narrowing them at me. — Is everything all right, Billy?

— Yes fine brilliant let's go sorry.