Withering Tights (16 page)

Alex whispered, “Are you afraid of the dark?”

And as I said, “No,” he lifted up his arms and went, “WaaaaaaAAAAA!”

And I leapt on to his back. Once my heart had stopped racing, it was quite funny. I laughed and laughed. It was probably relief from not being pecked to death by owls.

He gave me a piggyback for a bit, and then I got down.

I looked up at him and he looked back at me. And just for a tiny heart-stopping moment, I thought he was about to kiss me.

But he ruffled my hair and said, “Let’s get you home, green-eyes.”

Doesn’t anyone besides the lunatic twins want to kiss me?

When I woke up on Saturday morning, I wrote in my performance art notebook a dream I had about Alex:

Alex came striding up to the Dobbin’s house, dressed in a white shirt and riding boots (and trousers).

He said he was going to take me out for a picnic on the moors.

I
noticed my knees were at a normal height.

Lullah and Ruby the owlets came with us.

When we had our picnic, the owls had mouse sandwiches. We had pies.

Afterwards, the owlets had a little sleep and I was running across the moors, laughing with Alex.

I
put my foot down a rabbit-hole and tripped over.

Alex picked me up and said, “You are so mature.”

I looked up at him and raised my bottom eyelids.

And he changed into Charlie.

And then, as I slowly blinked, he turned into Cain.

He was singing, “She’s got the corker-rubbing blues.”

When I went down to breakfast, Dibdobs was sitting at the kitchen table with the lunatic brothers. She said, “Say good morning to Tallulah, boys!”

Sam and Max looked at me, and they both smiled at the same time.

They’ve got part of a proper tooth each!

I said, “You’ve got teeth, boys!!!”

Max said, “Did you hear me cleanin’ my teef ?”

Hang on, this is where I came in. Will I wake up and be back in my room at home, with Connor talking about poo? And Dother Hall was all a dream?

Dibdobs was smiling proudly like she had grown the ‘teef’ herself.

I
rushed off to Dother Hall because I was worried about Vaisey, and I thought I should tell her what Alex had said about the status boy stuff. I went up to the dorm and all the others were in there, talking on their beds. But there was no sign of Vaisey.

I said, “She’s not still on the roof, is she?”

Ten minutes later, Vaisey came down. She is very pale but not crying.

I said, “Oh my little friend, look at your sad hair.”

I gave her a cuddle, but it made the tears come out of her again, so I thought I would do that thing that adults do to crying children. I went and got a big
handkerchief from Milly, and then I got hold of Vaisey’s nose with it and said, “Blow!”

It worked a little bit because she half-smiled and said, “I’ve got a song to sing at the performance lunchtime.”

She didn’t come to any of the classes in the morning. Sidone has given her special permission to practise her song. If this is the state that you get in when you get a note from a boy, what is it like to have a real boyfriend?

We went into the theatre for the lunchtime stuff.

Lavinia did a piece of
avant garde
dance. With a beach ball. And Sidone complimented her on her ‘jazz hands’.

I don’t know what it was about, we were all so tense. And waiting to see whether Vaisey would sing or not. There was a long pause.

But then Sidone, in a chiffon hat, came back onstage and said, “Today, you are going to see live theatre. Someone who is paying their dues. She didn’t want to perform today because she has been very upset. But I told her, this is it, this is what
Dother Hall is about. Show us your bleeding feet. Your bleeding heart.”

And she went off, beckoning Vaisey out from the wings.

It was hard watching her walk on. Her hair looked so sad. Everyone was very quiet and still. And she was so pale. Where was the jolly red person?

Vaisey said to us, “I am going to sing a soul-music classic. It’s quite old, but it doesn’t seem old when you feel the same way. I suppose some things are said so well that they can’t be said any better.”

And she stepped forward, into a single hard spotlight. There was no accompaniment.

And she started to sing so beautifully:

You looked at me

It shook me

You tore me apart.

You’ve broken my

Tender, tender heart.

I woke up

We’d broke up

Before we could start.

I’ll never forget you

Because I am so…

Bluuuuuueeeee

(Ooh-oooh-oooh)

Blimey, we were all wailing by the time she’d finished.

We gave her a big hug at the end and Blaise Fox said, “That’s it, that’s your big song for Cathy in
Wuthering Heights
. Marvellous, you’ll have them weeping in the aisles! Keep the crying up, you’ll look like a wreck by Friday.”

We’ve been rehearsing
Wuthering Heights
for most of the day.

I think I am really getting into character.

I made Flossie laugh with my Yorkshire accent.

Even Vaisey giggled when I did my big ‘song’ for her, which was mostly growling and kicking things.

As I was walking home, practising my bad temper and surliness, and also trying to walk like Cain, Phil
popped out from behind a tree and went, “Pssssst.”

He said, “Tell the Tree Sisters, to come to a late night bonanza at the tree tonight, before we all go home.”

I said, “What do you mean?”

He said, “I’ll tell you what I mean, tell Jo, Flossie, Honey and Vaisey, and, of course, your good self, to come to the tree at eight o’clock. We will bring stuff.”

So I went all the way back to Dother Hall and told them.

Vaisey said she didn’t want to go. But we persuaded her that it was probably one of the last times we would see the lads. In the end, she said she would. She is very brave, I think. Especially as Jack is going to be there. I wanted to say goodbye to Phil, and maybe Charlie would be there. My sort of friend.

That night, at about half-past seven, I set off up the path to Dother Hall for the final farewell tree fest. I waited by the back entrance whilst the girls crept out. They all had make-up on and had done their hair. I said to Vaisey, “You look lovely.”

And she did. She looked pale but determined.

I had gone wild and put my Barely Pink lipstick on and some mascara, and also I had borrowed a dress from Vaisey. It was time to grow into my knees.

We went off to our tree. And the boys were there already lying around under it.

Phil got hold of Jo and lifted her up. He said, “Whey hey hey!!”

Jo has told me that they are going to write to each other over the next few weeks. She biffed him on his arms, which is her way of being affectionate and he kissed her on the mouth. That left the rest of us feeling a bit awkward for a minute. Especially Jack, who looked like he was going to bite his lips off. Charlie wasn’t there, but Ben was.

Oh dear.

Ben flopped over to me and held out his hand.

Again.

I said, “Hello, Ben.”

And then he spotted Honey. She smiled and said, “Thatth a nithe name, Ben.” And he fell into her honey-trap like a hypnotised bee. They were talking and laughing, and he played with her hair.

Oh, well. I sat down with Flossie and we opened
some of the crisps that the boys had brought. They had a guitar as well and Jack started playing a little tune on it. He looked up at Vaisey and said to her, “Vaisey, will you come and sit and sing with me?”

And Vaisey said, “I’m not, feeling very well.”

Jack said, “Is that…because…Please come and talk to me, Vaisey.”

Flossie and I didn’t know what to do, so we just started talking loudly together.

Flossie said, “I quite like that Seth boy.”

What???

I said, “He’s a Hinchcliff, they are like wild animals.”

Flossie started singing in a Southern accent, “Wild Seth, you make my heart sing…you make everything…Sethy!!!”

Then Charlie arrived.

I tried to pretend that I hadn’t seen him.

He said, “Hellloooooo, Tree Sisters! It’s me!”

It was really good fun being in the woods at night with people singing and laughing and talking. Jack and Vaisey were half-singing and half-talking. I looked across at her and she smiled back at me.

Hoooray!!! Lawks-a-mercy and splice the mainbrace!!!

After about half an hour, Jo and Phil went off into the woods together.

Charlie was being very funny about Woolfe Academy – he’s back there for another term. He said, “The headmaster says that he thinks a bit of responsibility will be the making of me. So he has made me team-leader in the Army corp.”

And he winked at me and said, “Happy days.”

Phil and Jo came dashing back.

Jo said, “Sidone and Monty are headed this way!!”

We said goodnight quietly and everyone hugged. Then the dorm girls headed back to Dother Hall and the boys went off to Woolfe. I looked after Charlie; this was probably the last time I would ever see him. As he disappeared into the trees, he did this really nice thing.

He blew a kiss to me.

How lovely was that?

I crept around the trees to get back to the road. I could see Monty and Sidone.

Sidone was doing a little dance with her scarf and
I could hear Monty saying, “Marvellous, marvellous.”

It was a soft night and I could hear owls hooting. I wonder if it is Connie out there with her friends. I would even miss Connie. And I couldn’t bear to think of not seeing Lullah and Ruby. I must get big Ruby to send me notes and photos of them when I’ve left here.

As I was walking along, I heard something in the trees.

I hope it wasn’t a bat.

A vampire bat.

Charlie stepped out. And said, “Yoo hoo.”

I looked at him and smiled.

He smiled back.

“I thought I would walk you back to Heckmondwhite.”

I said, “What, in case I need to walk up some stairs and fall over?”

He said to me, “Lullah, that is a very random thing to say.”

And I remembered that he had not been on the ‘date’.

Which also reminded me that he had said it
would have been ‘stupid’ if he had been.

And that’s when I thought I would show him the Northern grit I’d learned whilst I’ve been here. My inner Emily Brontë.

I said, “Charlie, why did you say it would have been ‘stupid’ to have come to the cinema if I had been going?”

He came and stood near me and looked into my eyes.

I said, “I might be young and immature, but I am quite, you know…”

He said, “Tall?”

I said, “Well, yes, but I’m, well, there is no need for you to be ashamed to be seen with me.”

Charlie looked at me. “Is that what you thought I meant? That I would have been embarrassed about you?”

I nodded.

He stroked my hair.

“Oh, Lullah. I am so sorry you thought that. I hate to think of you being upset. Look at your eyes in this light, they’re like cats’ eyes.”

Was that a good thing?

And then he kissed me.

Softly on the mouth.

It felt really nice.

Then he did it again.

He had a lovely soft mouth.

It wasn’t like the bat thing at all.

It was soft and melty.

Then he did it again, and put his arms around my waist and pulled me to him.

Oh, please Gabriel, don’t let me faint or fall down a rabbit-hole or bang my head on a branch or…

Then he stopped.

He said, “Tallulah, I can’t do this.”

Oh no.

I said, “I could get better at kissing, if someone would help me…It’s just that I haven’t—”

He hugged me to him.

“Lullah, it’s nothing to do with that, it’s nothing to do with you. You mustn’t think that. And it’s not that I don’t want to. I do. But…”

But what?

He said, “I’ve got a girlfriend.”

When I woke up, it was still dark. In my squirrel bed, I dreamt that I was up on the moors with the Brontë sisters. We were having a book club meeting and I said to Emily, “I’ve rewritten
Wuthering Heights
and now it has a happy ending. Heathcliff goes to dog obedience lessons with Matilda and the whole thing ends spiffingly.” Then Heathcliff came striding towards us in his white shirt and breeches, and as he gets nearer I realise it is Charlie.

Charlie just looks at us and pours candle wax over his hands.

How could things go so nearly right all the time? First I’m kissed by Charlie, and then he tells me he has a girlfriend.

I suppose if it had been Cain he wouldn’t have bothered to tell me.

It was a good job I was going home.

But I didn’t want to go home.

Even one of the squirrel slippers has lost its tail. I could get Harold to sew it back on if I was staying here.

I got up and went to look out of the window. There was a big full moon, casting silver shadows amongst the trees and across the fields and moors.

It is the big performance of
Wuthering Heights
tomorrow. The headmaster from Woolfe Academy is coming and some of Monty and Sidone’s ‘theatre dahling’ friends.

I was so restless and upset. I looked at myself in the mirror as the light came up. I don’t mind my face really. Charlie wouldn’t have kissed me at all if he thought I was ugly, would he?

Unless he felt sorry for me.

Would you kiss someone you felt sorry for?

I’d like to think I was a kind person who would.

But maybe I wouldn’t.

In the end I gave up trying to go back to sleep. I thought I would go and see little Lullah and little Ruby. Everyone was still in bed, so I went downstairs and opened the back door quietly. And as I did, I saw Connie swooping off, so the coast was clear.

When I opened the barn door, there was someone in there holding one of the owlets. It was Lullah
because I could see her legs sticking out.

I said, “Um, hello?”

And the figure turned round.

Cain.

Fondling the owls.

He’d better not be hurting them.

He said, “Oh, it’s you. You get around for a lanky girl wi’ nowt to her. Are you off back to your soft Southern gaff?”

I said, “You are a complete bounder!”

He half-smiled at me.

“Bounder? Is tha doing a bloody panto at that Dither Hall?”

I was so angry with him. Especially as I was practising being him.

“You know what I mean, all that rock-star stuff, and Jack. And all those poor girls…You pick them up and put them down like they were toy girls. And then they leap into the river. And you just don’t care, because you’re so selfish.”

He looked at me, with his dark eyes gleaming.

“Why ist tha blaming me? I can’t help it, tha knows.”

“What do you mean, you can’t help it?”

He went and sat down, moodily poking the owlets with a little stick.

I said, “Don’t do that, poking them.”

He said, “They like it.”

“They don’t. Anyway, what do you mean, you can’t help it?”

“I’m just a boy.”

“That’s ridiculous, I might as well say I’m just a girl.”

“Tha can say that. Tha is a girl…”

“I
know
that I’m a girl, thank you.”

“Aye, let’s not get carried away…tha’s nearly a girl.”

Suddenly I felt like I had grown into my knees. I said straight to his face, his black hateful face, “Do you know what, Cain Hinchcliff, I hate you. It’s quite a pleasant feeling.”

He looked at me and said, “No, you dunt really. Tha just don’t know what to mek of me. I make you feel funny.”

I turned and stormed out of the barn.