‘Kevin. A boy in my class. He threw a ball at me.’
Carla nuzzled Charlie’s fur. It felt warm and cosy against her skin. She glanced around the flat. It was the same shape as theirs but there were more pictures on the walls. Untidier, too, with pieces of paper on the kitchen table and a pair of brown shoes underneath, suggesting that someone had forgotten them. They looked like they belonged to a man, with those thick soles and laces. Shoes, Mamma always said, were one of the most important weapons in a woman’s wardrobe. When Carla said she didn’t understand, Mamma just laughed.
‘If your mother isn’t at work, where do you think she might be?’
Carla shrugged. ‘Maybe with Larry, her friend. Sometimes he takes her out for lunch near the shop. She sells nice things to make women beautiful.’
‘And where is this shop?’
‘A place called Night Bridge.’
There was a smile as if she’d said something funny. ‘Do you mean Knightsbridge?’
‘Non lo so.’ When she was tired, she always lapsed into Italian, even though she tried to make Mamma speak English at home.
‘Well, we’ve left her a note to say where we are. The taxi will be here in a minute.’
Carla was still stroking the soft green fur. ‘Can Charlie come too?’
‘Of course it can.’
‘He can. Charlie’s a he.’
The woman smiled. ‘That’s nice.’
See, whispered Charlie. Told you we’d find a way.
They were nice to her at the hospital. One of the smiley nurses gave her a barley sugar that stuck to the roof of her mouth. Carla had to put her finger in to poke it out. Mamma didn’t allow her to have sweets at home unless Larry gave them to her. They made you fat like cakes and then you wouldn’t get a boyfriend to pay the rent.
She hoped the golden-haired woman wouldn’t tell.
‘Think of something nice and it won’t hurt as much,’ her new friend said, holding her hand as the nurse put something stingy on her eyebrow.
So Carla thought of her new friend’s name. Lily! So pretty! When Larry came to visit, he sometimes brought lilies. Once, her mother and Larry had danced so hard when she was in bed that the lilies fell on to the ground and stained the carpet bright yellow. When she’d come out to see what had happened, Larry said it was ‘nothing’. He’d arrange for it to be cleaned. Maybe he’d arrange for Mamma’s blouse to be mended too. The top three buttons had lain scattered by her feet like little red sweets.
She told Lily this story as they got into the taxi to go home. They went a long way back because the driver said there was something called a diversion.
Lily was quiet for a while. ‘Do you ever see your daddy?’ she asked.
Carla shrugged. ‘He died when I was a baby. Mamma cries if we talk about him.’ Then she looked out of the window at the flashing lights. Wow!
‘That’s called Piccadilly Circus,’ said Lily.
‘Really?’ Carla pressed her nose against the window. It was beginning to drizzle. She could pretend that her nose was running with rain. ‘Where are the lions?’
‘Lions?’
‘You said it was a circus. I can’t see any lions or ladies in skirts walking on wires.’
There was a muffled sound of laughter. It was like the noise that Mamma made when Larry visited. Carla always heard it through the wall that divided her bedroom from Mamma’s.
‘Don’t laugh like that! It’s true. I know what circuses look like. I’ve seen pictures in books.’
Maybe she shouldn’t have shouted. Lily’s smile had become a straight line now. But instead of being cross, like Mamma when Carla did something she shouldn’t, she looked kind and gentle and nice.
‘I’m sorry, but you reminded me of someone.’
Instantly Carla’s curiosity was aroused. ‘Who?’
Then Lily turned away. ‘Someone I used to know.’
They were going under a bridge now. The taxi grew dark inside. Carla could hear Lily blowing her nose. When they came out the other side, her eyes were very bright. ‘I like your pencil case.’
‘It’s not a pencil case. He’s a caterpillar.’ Carla stroked the green fur lovingly; first one way and then the other. ‘Charlie can understand every word you are saying.’
‘I used to feel that way about a doll I had once. She was called Amelia.’
‘Do you still have her?’
The face turned away again. ‘No. I don’t.’
Lily used exactly the same tone of voice that Mamma used when she said that there was only enough dinner for one and that it didn’t matter because she wasn’t hungry. And just as she did with Mamma, Carla stayed silent because sometimes adults didn’t want you to ask any more questions.
Meanwhile, the taxi was jolting along through big wide streets with pretty shops and then smaller ones with wooden boxes of fruit outside. Eventually, they passed a park she recognized and then they turned into their road. Charlie’s fur stood up on end. Carla felt her chest beating at the same time. Mamma might be home now. What would she say?
Never talk to strangers. How often had she told her that? Yet Carla had not only gone off with a stranger, she had also stolen Charlie.
‘I’ll explain everything to your mother,’ said golden-haired Lily, as if she could see what Carla was thinking. Then she handed over two real paper notes for the taxi ride to the driver. How rich she must be! ‘Do you think she’ll be home yet? If not, you can …’
‘Piccola mia!’
She smelled Mamma’s rich perfume swooping out of the block before she saw her. ‘Where have you been? I am out of my mind with worry.’ Then she glared at Lily, black eyes flashing. ‘How dare you take my daughter away? And what have you done to her eye? I will report you to the police. I will …’
It suddenly occurred to Carla that Lily wouldn’t understand what Mamma was saying because she was speaking in their own language. Italian! What Mamma called ‘the tongue of the poets and the artists and the great thinkers’. Whatever that meant. Certainly Lily had looked very confused until the word polizia. Then her face grew red and cross.
‘Your daughter got hit by a ball at school.’ She was speaking very slowly, as if making a big effort to stay calm. But Carla could see that her throat had gone all blotchy. ‘One of the staff took her home but you weren’t in. She was going to have to go back to school but it just happened that I came back from work early and offered to take Carla to hospital for that eye.’
‘The teacher, why did she not do this?’
Mamma was speaking in English now. It worried Carla when she did this because she sometimes got the words in the wrong order. Then people would laugh or try to correct her. She didn’t want Mamma feeling hurt.
‘She had to get back to her own children, apparently.’
‘They rang your work from school,’ Carla butted in. ‘But they said you weren’t there today.’
Mamma’s eyes widened. ‘Of course I was. My manager had sent me on a training course. Someone should have known where to get me. Mi dispiace.’ Mamma was almost suffocating her with a big hug. ‘I am so sorry. Thank you for looking after my little one.’
Together, she and Mamma rocked back and forth on the dirty steps. Even though the grip was uncomfortable, Carla’s heart soared. This is what it had been like before the man with the shiny car had come into their lives. Just her and Mamma. No laughter through the walls that shut her out and danced up and down in her nightmares.
‘You are Italian?’ Lily’s soft voice released Mamma’s grip and the old emptiness dived back in. ‘My husband and I spent our honeymoon in Italy. Sicily. We loved it.’
Mamma’s eyes were wet with tears. Real tears, Carla observed. Not the kind of tears she practised in front of the mirror. ‘My daughter’s father, he came from there …’
Carla’s skin began to prickle. She had not known that.
‘But now … now …’
Poor Mamma. Her voice was coming out in big gulps. She needed help.
Carla heard her own voice piping up. ‘Now it is just Mamma and me.’