Shining On Page 5

  I pushed the gate open. “Ready?” I said, the same way she always used to say it to me when I was starting at a new school or a new club.

  “I suppose so,” she muttered, exactly the same way I must have said it to her so many times before.

  On our way up the path, she suddenly stopped and hurled herself into one of my shopping bags. Scattering socks and lightbulbs, she dragged out Telling Your Parents: A Teenager's Guide, and hurried off round the side of the house.

  I set off in pursuit. “What are you doing?”

  “Stuffing this in the dustbin.”

  “What, my book?”

  But it was already gone, deep under tea leaves and old carrot peelings.

  “It's not your book,” she said, slamming the lid down over the horrid mess. “It's my book. I'm the one who paid for it.” She brushed tea leaves off her hands and added bitterly, “Though I can't think why. You seem to be managing perfectly well without it.”

  “But why shove it in the dustbin?”

  “Listen, young man,” she warned me dangerously. “Don't push your luck. If you're planning on making me live the bloody book, I'll be damned if I'll dust it.”

  I know when a job's done. I just picked up the shopping and followed her in to face more of the music.

  Sue Limb

  “I'm sorry, Jess—I've got a migraine. You'll have to go on your own.”

  “NO! No way, Mum!” Jess glared at her mum's rumpled bed. “I am NOT going on my own! I've been totally dreading it anyway. We can go next weekend instead.”

  “No, we can't,” croaked Mum in her headache voice, rasping like something from a horror film. “I've got a librarians' conference next weekend.”

  “Well, the weekend after, then.”

  “Daddy's coming to visit then. And we can't keep putting it off. Granny's desperate to get it all sorted. It has to be now. Get me a glass of water, would you please, darling?”

  Jess fetched the glass of water. She knew the migraine routine by heart. Her mum would be out of action for twenty-four hours minimum—possibly the whole weekend. She sat down on the bed.

  “Thanks,” said Mum, sipping the water gratefully. Then she seized Jess's hand in tragic deathbed style. “All you have to do is get the number seventy-three bus to the station, then the Bristol train,” she said. “It's the second stop, I think—or, wait, no …”

  “I know how to get there!” snapped Jess. “I've been there before on my own. Loads of times.”

  “Right. Of course you have. Sorry,” said Mum. “I'm really sorry, Jess. I know it isn't going to be easy, but I'll make it up to you. I promise.”

  Jess got up off the bed grumpily and slouched off down-stairs. How could her mum possibly make it up to her? She was a poverty-stricken librarian. She simply didn't have ac-cess to the Hollywood lifestyle Jess craved.

  The phone rang. Jess grabbed it. Please, God, she thought, make it Granny phoning to cancel because she's ill too. Instantly she felt guilty at the thought of her beloved Granny being ill. No, wait, God, let's rethink this. Jess whizzed off another prayer. Let Granny cancel because she's feeling well. So well she's off on a fabulous date with a groovy old guy called Max.

  “Hello?” said Jess, picking up.

  “Hi, Jess! This is Jodie. I'm having a spur-of-the-moment party tonight. In my uncle's huge garage out at Meadway. Whizzer's DJing. Can you come?”

  “No,” Jess said, sighing. “This sucks, but I have to do something else.”

  “What could be more fun than my party?” complained Jodie in her usual bulldozing style.

  “I'll tell you what could be more fun,” said Jess, letting rip some pent-up aggravation. “Going to stay with my granny all weekend in her grim old house that smells weird, in order to help her sort through my dead grandpa's clothes and stuff. We're going to take it all to the charity shop whilst weeping copiously in stereo. Beat that, you sad disco addict.”

  Jodie was silent for a moment.

  “OK, right,” she said eventually. “I'm really, like, sorry and stuff. Hope it goes OK. See you on Monday.” She rang off.

  Jess slammed down the phone and heaved such a huge sigh that the windows almost rattled. OK, she loved Granny. But it wasn't her job to help sad, old people through all this grieving stuff. She ought to be over at Jodie's party tonight, blinded and deafened by Whizzer's lights and sounds. She was a teenager, for God's sake, not some kind of care worker.

  On the train, she closed her eyes, and had a daydream about a poet who had recently come to school to give a talk about his work. His name was Eddie Sadat and he had dark, smoldering eyes, thick, black shiny hair and a cute little mustache. Jess imagined a life with Eddie. They lived in New York, dressed in black and even had matching black Labradors called Darkness and Night.

  Eventually, as the train began to slow towards Granny's station, Jess opened her eyes and stared at her reflection in the train window. She had to accept that her glamorous life with Eddie was never going to happen. The nearest she was going to get to Eddie was growing a similar mustache. In fact, judging by her reflection, that little project was already under way.

  However, the daydream did give Jess an idea for getting through this weekend. In every little spare bit of time, she'd design a whole new look for herself. Her normal jeans and trainers outfit was so utterly boring. The idea of slouching stylishly around New York dressed entirely in black had taken her fancy. She had to invent a new look that was cool and wild.

  The train stopped. Jess got off and met Granny by the ticket barrier. She seemed smaller than ever and smelled faintly of lavender.

  “The taxi driver looks a bit like a mass murderer,” whis-pered Granny excitedly. This was reassuring. They climbed in. The taxi driver seemed a perfectly pleasant fellow with a big smile and crinkly laugh lines round his eyes. But maybe Granny was right; she'd had a lifelong interest in homicide.

  The taxi deposited them at Granny's house. Granny seemed a bit disappointed not to have been murdered, but gave the guy a massive tip anyway.

  “He knows where we live now,” whispered Granny as she unlocked the door and the cab sped away. “I expect he'll be back tonight with his hammer.” Not many grannies were so hooked on thrillers. Most other grans tended to be reassuring; Jess's granny was downright irresponsible at times.

  “A hammer? Hmm, so crude,” said Jess. “I'd rather be shot. Much more stylish.”

  “Oh, I do agree, dear,” said Granny, as they took their coats off. “Now, how about a hot chocolate? I've got one of those pizzas you like—the one with garlic mushrooms and marzipanone.”

  “Mascarpone,” corrected Jess.

  “Oh, I love that word!” said Granny. “It sounds like a gangster, doesn't it? Al Mascarpone.”

  They sat down to lunch and Jess consumed approximately ten thousand calories, after which she began to feel a bit better. But after the washing-up, Granny's mood changed.

  “I suppose we'd better start on it,” she said with a sigh. “What do you think? We could go at it for a couple of hours, then watch Pulp Fiction for a bit of light relief.”

  “OK, fine,” said Jess, though her heart was sinking fast. She'd been dreading this moment. Absolutely dreading it. Maybe Granny would burst into tears. What then? Granny led the way upstairs and into her bedroom. Then she sat down on the bed and sighed.

  “Open his wardrobe, dear,” she said. Beside the big wardrobe was a much smaller one, which Jess towered over. And this tiny but sinister cupboard was where Jess's grandpa had kept all his clothes. He had died six months ago and Granny had told Mum she hadn't been able to open the cupboard since.

  Glamorous way to spend the weekend, thought Jess. She hesitated for a moment and then opened the cupboard. Thank God it was daylight. If it had been dark, Grandpa's ghost might have come swooping out like a sudden gust of dark, tobacco-scented air.

  Nothing like that happened. There were just some suits hanging there, and an old camel-colored jacket. It all smelled a bit fus
ty.

  “So all this is going to the charity shop, right, Granny?” asked Jess. She was poised to sweep the whole lot off their hangers and into bin liners.

  “Yes—no, wait!” said Granny, looking a bit emotional. Her lip quivered. “That jacket—give it here a minute.” Jess passed the camel-colored jacket to her, and Granny sort of fondled it tenderly for a minute.

  Please, God, thought Jess urgently, make her not hug or kiss it. Please! Granny went through the pockets. She found a couple of coins, a hankie and a lottery ticket. The hankie was crumpled and definitely not clean. Jess wondered if there were any of Grandpa's old bogies hiding within it and if so, whether Granny would put them in a locket and wear them round her neck. A huge bubble of emotion swelled up behind Jess's throat. She was moments away from uttering a tortured scream—or maybe a hysterical laugh.

  “Do you think that's a winning lottery ticket?” said Jess. “Grandpa's last stroke of genius.” Immediately she wished she hadn't used the word stroke. It was a stroke that had caused Grandpa's death.

  “He was hopeless at the lottery,” said Granny, smoothing the ticket out. “This ticket's past its cut-off date, any-way. And in any case, I'd rather have him back here for just five minutes than all the money in the world.”

  Suddenly, disastrously, a tear burst from Granny's right eye and ran down her withered old cheek. Jess felt an un-bearable urge to run away. She so didn't want to get old like Granny. The wrinkles, the funny little bits of skin hanging down below her chin, and the awful sadness …

  At this most tactless moment, her mobile phone played a vulgar little pinging riff to indicate a text message had arrived.

  “Excuse me a minute, Granny,” said Jess, diving for the phone. The text was from her best mate, Flora. SO WISH U WERE COMING 2 JODIE S PARTY, said the text. CAN T DECIDE WHAT 2 WEAR. WHADDAYA FINK? TART OR GYPSY?

  TART EVERY TIME, Jess texted back.

  Within seconds Flora had replied to her reply. BTW, TIFFANY SAID HER BRO JACK ASKED IF YOU D BE THERE! Hastily Jess composed a reply. THANK GOD I'M GLAMOR-OUSLY ABSENT THEN. GOTTA GO—GRANNY IN TEARS.

  She whizzed off the text and switched off her mobile, though it was agonizing to sever her link with her world of tarty togs and torrid parties. Now she had to sink back into the gray and weary world of old age and bereavement. She sat down on the bed and put her arm round Granny. She really did love her. She just wished she wasn't a sad old lady.

  Granny blew her nose loudly on Grandpa's hankie, then tucked it away in her sleeve.

  “Sorry, dear,” she said. “That sounded a bit like an ele-phant. I've reached a decision. I can't bear to part with all this stuff yet after all. I'm not quite ready. But I do want it out of sight. I'd like to put it all in bags and take it upstairs to the loft. Could you manage to climb up there with the stepladder?”

  “Of course!” said Jess. She was relieved that Granny had decided to shelve this project. Quickly she bundled all Grandpa's old clothes into the bin liners. Then she fetched the stepladder from downstairs. It hardly weighed anything at all. Granny kind of faffed around saying things like “Oh, you're so strong, lovey, you're so wonderful,” which made Jess feel like some kind of Olympic athlete (for the one and only time in her life, no doubt).

  They set up the stepladder under the access to the loft space—a sort of hatch thing in the landing ceiling. Jess reached up and gingerly raised the cover, then climbed up to the very top of the ladder and groped around in the dark. Her head and shoulders were now actually in the attic.

  “There's a light switch somewhere on your left,” said Granny. Jess found it and switched on the light. The attic was full of stuff: books, cardboard boxes, old toys, china, general junk … and clothes.

  “This is amazing!” Jess called down to Granny. “I haven't been up here since I was little.”

  “If you come back down, dear,” said Granny, “I'll pass these bags up to you.”

  Jess descended a few steps down the ladder, took the bin liners from Granny and hauled them one by one into the attic.

  Then Jess looked around more carefully. Some dress-up clothes were hanging from a rail. She remembered them from when she was little. Psychedelic sixties dresses, suede jackets with cowboy fringe … all sorts of weird stuff.

  “Do you mind if I stay up here for five minutes, Granny?” called Jess. “It's like Aladdin's cave up here and I might find some treasures.”

  “OK, dear,” called Granny. “I'll go and put the kettle on. Be very careful when you come back down.”

  Jess looked at the clothes again. Was there anything here that could inspire her new wild look? There was a Chinese dressing gown with embroidered dragons on it. Jess tried it on. Unfortunately there wasn't a mirror in the attic, but Jess could tell that she looked fabulously charis-matic and could probably charge ten quid for a tarot reading in this gear. However, it wasn't exactly what she was looking for.

  She tried on the fringed suede jacket. She felt a bit like an idiot cowgirl and besides, it had started to smell rather manky. In fact, as Jess went through all the other clothes, she noticed that a lot of stuff had been nibbled by mice and moths. And so much of it was in fabrics that were too flashy: gold lurex and pink Lycra. It was a shame.

  Then she saw a stack of magazines. Wonderful old maga-zines from forty years ago! Jess blew the dust off them and sat down on a little old stool to leaf through them. She found miniskirts galore, men with floral ties and hair down to their shoulders, models wearing purple velvet pants and shiny green platform-heeled boots. It was all quite wonder-ful, but totally useless. Far too pantomime.

  She looked round the dusty loft and sighed. Maybe she should go downstairs now and have a cuppa with Granny. She got up and, as she clambered her way back towards the hatch, something caught her eye. It was the front page of an old newspaper, lying on the floor. The headline was: Mods and rockers clash in Brighton.

  And right below the headline was a photo of a magnificent girl. She was wearing a leather jacket, a denim miniskirt, fishnet tights and motorcycle boots. Her hair was wild and tousled, her lips were set in a sneery pout and her eyes were lined in heavy black.

  “Wow!” said Jess aloud. “Jackpot! This is it!” Carefully she picked up the newspaper and blew the dust off it. Now she could see more detail. The girl was wrestling with police officers. In the background was a rather tasty young man, also in black leather, also oozing sex appeal whilst re-sisting arrest.

  This was it! Jess had found her look. And it was going to be easy. You could pick up a black leather jacket for next to nothing in a charity shop. She already had a denim miniskirt, and black fishnet tights were a brief shopping trip away. OK, she might have to save up for the biker boots, but so what? It was so exactly the look for her: rugged and wild, but immensely cool.

  She tucked the newspaper under her arm, climbed down out of the attic and went downstairs. Granny was sitting watching the TV news, looking rather disappointed.

  “It's all about the economic summit,” she said. “There haven't been any murders at all. There's a cup of tea in the pot, dear. Would you like a piece of toast?”

  “In a minute, Granny,” said Jess. “I just want to show you something I found in the attic.”

  “What, dear?” asked Granny. “A treasure?”

  “Well, yes, in a way,” said Jess. “Do you know, Granny, I've been trying to work out a new look for myself. You know, I look like a hobo most of the time.”

  “I think you look lovely, dear,” said Granny. Well, of course she would. But looking “lovely” according to your granny is hardly going to be cool, is it?

  “Thanks, Granny, but I want a change,” said Jess. “And I found this fantastic photo in an old newspaper up there….” She opened out the folded newspaper and showed Granny the front page. “Look at her!” said Jess. “She's just amazing, isn't she? I mean, not because she's being arrested or any-thing …” (Jess didn't want Granny to panic that she was choosing deviant role models.) “Sh
e's just, well, amazing,” said Jess, leaning back and staring in admiration at the feisty and furious girl rocker. Granny looked at the picture and smiled nostalgically.

  “Ah, yes,” she said. “The Whitsun Weekend, 1964. I remember every minute. Glad you approve.”

  “Approve?” said Jess, not quite following Granny's drift.

  “It's the only time I've ever made the front page,” said Granny with a proud sigh.

  “What?” gasped Jess. “You mean that's you?”

  “I'm afraid so, dear,” said Granny. “I was arrested because I sort of lost it, as they say, when they arrested Grandpa.”

  “They arrested Grandpa?” shrieked Jess.

  “Well, he was attacked by three mods, dear, and he sort of lashed out, you know. We were rockers, you see. We rode about on motorbikes and we liked Elvis. The mods had silly little scooters and they were all a bit soft. Sort of wimps, they seemed like, to us.”

  Jess stared in total astonishment at the photo. So this iconic girl, with the wild hair and the blazing eyes, in the leather and boots, was her Granny? It scarcely seemed possible.

  “How old were you?” she asked.

  “Oh, about nineteen,” said Granny dreamily. “My dad was furious. But although we were arrested, we weren't charged. Ah! Those were the days. Elvis's ‘Jailhouse Rock’ was our tune, but it didn't turn out to be spookily appropriate, thank God!”

  As she stared at the photo of her younger self, Granny's eyes danced at the memory of that seaside punch-up long ago. Jess was amazed. Slowly it was dawning on her. She wasn't spending the weekend with a wrinkly, bereaved old lady. She was spending it with a magnificent girl biker, who rode motorbikes, wrestled with police officers and blazed out triumphantly from the front pages of newspapers.

  “Right,” said Granny briskly. “I'll just make you some toast, and fresh tea, I think, and then, how about Pulp Fiction for the fortieth time?”