Lilah May's Manic Days Read online

  Mum stares out at the garden for a moment, as if she’s looking to the robin for an answer.

  I bet that robin wishes he hadn’t landed in our garden this morning. Too much stress for a little feathered thing.

  Mum turns to look at me. Her eyes are frightened, just as I predicted. Her mouth is smiling, though – or trying to.

  ‘I don’t know, love,’ she says. ‘We mustn’t push him on his first day back. He’s been through so much.’

  ‘We all have,’ I mutter.

  She pretends not to hear me and starts messing around getting eggs and bacon out of the fridge. When she turns around again her voice is calm and careful.

  ‘And now he’s back,’ she says. ‘This is the best present we ever could have wished for. So you’re not to go upsetting him, OK?’

  I brush past her and storm upstairs.

  Me upsetting him? What about the two years of upset he’s caused to us? All the crying and screaming and arguments and bad times at school and the anger that consumed me for all that time and still seems not to be letting up much now.

  As I go past his door I do what I used to do in the early days after he disappeared.

  I give it a good swift hard kick. I don’t care about waking him up now.

  Groo.

  I forgot I was wearing slippers.

  I hop into my bedroom and lie on the bed in agony and then the bad night catches up with me and I start falling asleep.

  The next thing I know it’s three hours later and when I stagger back into the hallway Jay’s bedroom door is open and the curtains thrown back.

  I go back downstairs and there are the remains of breakfast on the table but Jay’s nowhere to be seen.

  ‘He’s gone with Mum to the chemist to get some more bandages and stuff,’ says Dad. He looks white around the eyes and he’s moving very slowly, like a lion that’s been shot in the leg with a dart and might collapse at any moment. ‘Sit down and I’ll get you some breakfast.’

  I sit at the table and push the dirty plates away.

  ‘It’s not a hotel,’ snaps Dad. ‘You could put them in the sink if they bother you that much.’

  Great. So now Dad is having a go at me too.

  But even as tears well up in my eyes I can see that he’s not really cross with me. He’s feeling as though he can’t control the situation. Dad’s brilliant around lions because he knows exactly how to handle them. If they roar, he calms them down. If they play, he joins in. If they’re hurt, he gets the vet in to sort them out.

  It’s hard to believe that a big man like my dad could feel uncertain or unsure about anything.

  That makes me more scared than anything.

  Dad doesn’t know how to handle his own son.

  So how will I cope with having my brother back?

  LILAH’S ANGER DIARY OCTOBER 12TH, 4.00 P.M.

  ANGER LEVELS: 8/10

  I haven’t written in my Anger Diary properly for over two months. Last time I wrote was to say that things were getting better with Mum and Dad and that somehow we’ve managed to become a family unit again, even without Jay. Ha! That’s a bit rubbish now, isn’t it?

  It’s weird – I’d actually stopped being angry about Jay, at last, and Dad hadn’t had to have one of his Taming Lilah sessions for ages, even though the situation with Bindi and Adam has been rumbling on underneath all this time and I have to take deep calming breaths like Dad showed me last year. I’m more just sick and tired of it these days.

  But now Jay is home and I feel the exact opposite of how I always thought I would do when he finally came through that front door. I thought it would be like the missing piece of a jigsaw puzzle being plopped into place and completing the picture of blue sky and yellow sun and a peaceful scene on a river with boats going up and down and red buses trundling by on the road. But I didn’t reckon on the rest of the jigsaw puzzle having gone a bit warped and mouldy over the last two years and the other pieces all having changed in shape and size and colour. That’s me, Mum and Dad, see? We’re the rest of the puzzle. And we’ve changed over the last two years. A lot. We’ve had to. And the missing piece doesn’t really fit any more.

  Jay’s been home for nearly a week now.

  He’s spent most of his time shut upstairs in his bedroom muttering into his mobile phone. Mum had to buy him a new phone and I can see she wasn’t exactly happy about encouraging him to spend yet more time closeted away in private speaking to people she doesn’t know, but he got so agitated about not having a phone that she caved in.

  Jay and I haven’t exchanged more than about three words. If I see him coming downstairs I usually rush out the front door and go down to the precinct. If I hear him coming upstairs I put music on and shut my door.

  The only time we all sit together as a family is at breakfast and I bolt my cereal as fast as possible so that I can take Benjie for his walk in the park if it’s a weekend or else get off to school for another depressing day of watching Bindi and Adam whispering together at break time and wandering about school together, lost in their own little world.

  Mum’s finally got Jay to have a bath. He smelled so bad that I sometimes thought I was going to faint when I was in the same room.

  ‘Lilah, he has been living on the streets for two years,’ whispers Mum to me. ‘What did you think he was going to smell like? Roses and fabric conditioner?’

  Mum has got very sarcastic over the last week. I think it’s her way of coping with Jay being back. She’s put all her clown commissions on hold and got her deputy to do the parties so that she can concentrate on trying to make Jay feel at home again. She spent about three hundred pounds at the supermarket buying all his favourite foods and loads of stuff to ‘build him up’ because he’s come home even skinnier than he was when he left two years ago.

  Dad is still working at Morley Zoo but he gets home earlier than usual and attempts to have ‘man to man’ conversations with Jay at the kitchen table.

  I don’t think that this is working.

  Sometimes I creep downstairs when they’re having one of their ‘chats’ and I sit on the bottom step in the hall in the dark, hug my knees to my chest and listen.

  Jay just sits with his head bowed, fiddling with the black leather bands on his skinny wrist and dipping his long dirty-brown hair down over his face so that Dad can’t see what he’s thinking.

  ‘So how about we go to a game on Saturday?’ Dad says. He’s always suggesting things like this now. I don’t know why – Jay never liked football in the first place. The only thing that he was passionate about was music. And now he never listens to that, either.

  Dad gets fed up of asking questions that don’t receive answers after a while and wanders outside to sow some seeds for winter vegetables. I scurry back upstairs again so that Jay can’t see me.

  It’s the half-term holidays in a week. I’m dreading them.

  Groo.

  There won’t be school to escape to, the weather will probably be bad and I’ve got two weeks stuck in the house with a brother I can’t talk to any more and two stressed-out, edgy and desperate parents who have forgotten that I exist.

  Oh, and an ex-best-friend who is expecting the baby of my favourite ever boy. Did I mention that bit? Yeah – Bindi’s got herself pregnant. By Adam, my one true love.

  Bombutts!

  At this rate, Dad might have to start taming me again.

  The last week before half-term is rubbish.

  We get one day when we can wear our own clothes so I go all-out to express how I’m feeling inside. Bindi comes in wearing one of her beautiful pink silk saris, with a gold ring through her nose and a little red dot on her forehead, and I am guessing that Adam’s dribbling with admiration for her. It makes me feel sick so I try not to look, but it’s hard. Adam’s wearing a white T-shirt and black jeans and black converse trainers and he’s gelled his blonde hair up a bit so that he looks exactly like a rock star. They make a weird couple, Bindi all shy and girly and feminine and Adam all sha
rp angles and tight clothes, but somehow it kind of works and I have to admit that they look good together.

  Groo.

  This is what I wear to own-clothes day:

  Black biker jacket.

  Stud in my nose.

  Black and white striped top.

  Ripped black jeans.

  Black studded biker boots.

  I can see Miss Gorman nearly having a heart attack when she sees all my piercings, but as it’s the only day when teachers are not allowed to tell us off about clothing and jewellery, she clamps her lips together and gives me a tight little smile with about as much warmth as an icicle in it and then passes by.

  We don’t have many lessons as it’s the last day before the holidays and then we all pile into the canteen for the usual Jamie Oliver healthy-style lunch but there’s a buzz in the air, anyway. I’m chatting in a vague fashion to Amelie Warner, who was my enemy last year, but we’ve forgotten about all that and she’s giving me advice on lip glosses and I’m trying to look interested, and then I catch something weird out of the corner of my eye.

  Adam Carter is looking at me.

  Only because he thinks I can’t see.

  But I can.

  Bindi is sitting next to him and she catches him looking over and her bright smile fades just a little bit and she makes a big thing out of reaching over him to get at the water jug so that he turns away again.

  But I saw it.

  He was looking at me.

  For the rest of the afternoon I can’t concentrate on anything at all, even though we’re supposed to be tidying out our lockers and sweeping up the art room. I keep expecting him to look at me again, but he never does.

  As everyone heads for the gates at three I see him and Bindi heading off towards a big blue Range Rover where Mrs Carter is waiting to take her son home.

  ‘Bye,’ I say in a small quiet voice to myself. ‘Have fun.’

  Then I drag my feet towards home and the bleak atmosphere that lives inside it.

  When I get home there’s a weird woman sitting at the kitchen table with Mum and Jay. Dad’s there too, which is unusual as he’s normally not at home this early.

  As soon as I see this I make to head up the stairs and hide away in the nice dark mess of my room, but Mum comes into the hall and grabs my arm.

  ‘Oh no you don’t,’ she says. ‘Come in here. We need to talk to you too.’

  I can see how the children at Mum’s parties could be frightened of her. Even without the scary clown outfit she has a ring of steel to her voice. I roll my eyes but she’s obviously not in the mood for argument so I slope into the kitchen, offer a faint grunt and slump at the table.

  ‘This is Dr Cunningham,’ says Mum. ‘Dr Woodsman has referred us to her. She’s a . . . what did you say you were?’

  The woman smiles. She’s left a rim of pale pink lipstick all round the edge of Mum’s white flower mug.

  ‘I’m a psychologist,’ she says, ‘specialising in teenage behavioural issues and family therapy.’

  For some reason I feel like shrivelling up into a little ball and rolling underneath the kitchen door into the hallway when she says that. The woman is observing me with a calm smile. Her eyes seem to bore through my face, into my brain and right down to my soul where all my anger lies waiting for the next opportunity to burst out.

  ‘Hello, Lilah,’ she says. ‘I’ve heard lots about you.’

  ‘Great,’ I mutter. ‘I’ve actually got a lot of homework to do.’

  Mum and Dad both give a big snort at that. Only Jay doesn’t react. He’s staring down at his lap and I notice that his hands are shaking on the table.

  In the old days he’d have caught my eye and smiled and we’d have been plunged into that deep, comforting world where we lived together and ganged up against the Old Dudes.

  ‘It’s the half-term holidays, Lilah,’ says Dad. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. You don’t have much homework, surely?’

  I mumble something about an exam in November but it’s no good. They’re on to me.

  ‘You don’t have exams in November,’ says Dad.

  ‘Dr Cunningham has come to help Jay get used to being at home again,’ says Mum. ‘And that affects all of us. So you’re jolly well going to take part. OK?’

  ‘OK,’ I say. Inside I feel sick. Some holiday this is going to be.

  Mum takes us all into the lounge where it’s warmer because Dad has put on the gas fire and arranged some chairs around in a circle. Our lounge looks like a waiting room in a doctor’s surgery.

  I glance at Jay. He’s looking even more pissed off than I feel. I keep looking, willing him to catch my eye like he used to do, waiting for some little sign that this terrible barrier between us is going to start crumbling down.

  Nothing. He doesn’t even seem to register that I’m in the room.

  Mum and Dad sit down and gesture for us to follow. Dr Cunningham sits in the middle with a notepad on her knee.

  I see Dad giving her admiring glances when he thinks Mum isn’t looking. He has forgotten that women have a special radar that means that they can see out of the front, side and back of their head without seeming to move their eyes.

  Dr Cunningham is wearing a tight pencil skirt and a glamorous mock-fur wrap. She also has those mad-scientist black glasses on and has fair hair caught in a clip at the back of her head. The only thing that lets the look down is her shoes. They are plain black loafers with no style whatsoever. I suppose she can’t wear silly fashion shoes when she’s going round to people’s houses and dealing with the unknown. Maybe she needs to be able to leg it fast if a client turns out to be a nutter.

  I’m so busy starting at Dr Cunningham’s horrible shoes that I don’t notice she’s addressing a sentence to me until Mum gives me a furious nudge with her elbow and snaps, ‘Lilah!’ with a cross look on her face.

  ‘Sorry, what?’ I mutter.

  ‘That’s all right,’ smiles Dr Cunningham. ‘I was just asking you, Lilah, if you could put into words your feelings about Jay coming home again?’

  Groo.

  Like I can just come out with all that! I can’t even find the right words to put it down in my secret diary, let alone blather it out to four watchful faces. Well, three, because Jay is still staring down at his feet with his hair hanging right over his pale face.

  ‘Erm,’ I start. I look over at Dad for encouragement. He gives me a wink and leans forwards with his elbows on his knees, eyes lit up with determination.

  ‘Go on, Lilah,’ he says. ‘Nobody’s going to get angry if you say how you feel.’

  Except me.

  I’m worried – worried that if I start expressing my innermost feelings I’ll get that familiar rise of hot anger spreading up from my feet through my chest and out of my mouth into a spew of horrible words.

  But Dad looks so anxious and he’s obviously willing me to start speaking, so I clear my throat without looking at Jay and I say, ‘I spent two years wishing he would come back. I wished it every day, even though just before he left he was acting like an idiot. And now he’s back it’s like some stranger is living in our house. And he won’t even look at me. And even if he did, I’m not sure I know who he is.’

  There’s a short silence when I stop speaking. I glance at Mum. She’s trying not to cry. Dad is nodding at me.

  ‘That’s very honest, Lilah,’ says Dr Cunningham. ‘Well done for that. It can’t have been easy to say it.’

  She turns towards Jay who hasn’t moved even an inch since I came into the room.

  ‘And now perhaps you’d like to say something back to your sister?’ she says. ‘Anything? First thing that comes into your head?’

  There’s a sort of heightened hush, like you get at a concert when the orchestra are about to put their bows on their instruments and the conductor has his arms raised ready to bring down his baton and the audience are holding their breaths for that first, powerful sound.

  Except that Jay doesn’t say anything.

&nbs
p; He sits for a few more seconds and then stands up so fast that the chair nearly tips over backwards. He leaves the room almost without sound, as though his feet were made of feathers, even though our floor is hard and wooden and most people sound like elephants on it. There’s the faint slam of his bedroom door shutting upstairs and then silence.

  Jay only listens to his music on headphones now.

  Sometimes he doesn’t listen to it at all.

  I mention this to Dr Cunningham as nobody’s saying anything and it’s all getting a bit awkward.

  ‘That’s quite normal,’ she says. ‘Music can be very emotive. Jay probably doesn’t want to risk re-living all his memories of the time before he ran away. Music can bring lots of feelings back that people often want to shut away.’

  It makes sense so I nod and sit back in my chair. She’s good.

  After that Dr Cunningham talks to Mum and Dad and I settle back and almost fall asleep with the warmth of the fire and their murmuring voices, except I’m looking at them all as they’re talking and I’m comparing Dr Cunningham’s glamorous lipsticked face and smart clothes to Mum’s worn-down, stained tracksuit bottoms and her haggard, creased face.

  I almost miss her clown look. Mum hasn’t been to work since Jay got home. I forgot that underneath her clown make-up she’s got real wrinkles and shadows under her eyes from month after month of broken nights.

  After Dr Cunningham has left, I go up to Mum and do something I haven’t done for about three years.

  I put my arms around her and bury my head in her chest.

  Mum is so surprised that she stands frozen still for a moment with her arms by her sides. Then she hugs me back and cries a bit and then we both laugh.

  ‘Women!’ says Dad. But he’s smiling.

  He heads off into the kitchen and puts a frozen lasagne in the oven for supper.

  Jay comes down for the meal and eats it as if it is the last meal available in the world ever.

  He doesn’t speak, though – just shovels in the food with a fork and no knife.

  He leaves the table before pudding and goes back upstairs so we all just carry on eating lemon meringue pie, which makes me feel sick, but I’m too worn out to argue so I’m swallowing the slimy yellow lumps and sugary chewy topping and trying to look as if I am enjoying it when Mum freezes for the second time that night.