Accidents Happen A Novel

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX



The next morning, Jack jumped out of bed, almost banging his head on his bookshelf in haste. Ten past nine, his Arsenal clock said. The earliest he’d been up for a long time on a Saturday morning.

He grabbed the curtain and looked outside, squinting.

Sunny.

He frowned.

Ever since the Year Eight boys had been on Gabe’s Facebook again this week, saying they were definitely coming on Saturday night, he’d been hoping for two things: one, that Mum wouldn’t let him go to Gabe’s and he could blame it on her; or two, that it would rain today and they couldn’t sleep on the trampoline.

Rubbing his stomach, Jack picked up the Dr Who books he’d bought for Gabe’s birthday present. Beside them he noticed a paper bag Mum must have put there yesterday. He opened it and found a Dr Who birthday card. Nervously, he pulled out the wrapping paper. Also Dr Who. He sighed. At least she was trying. It was better than last year, when she’d made him give Gabe a card with a pink flower on it that she found in the kitchen drawer because she’d been too lost in her head to remember to buy one.

Jack stood up straight and stretched. He opened his wardrobe to find his jeans.

He stopped.

His trainers were lined up again on the bottom shelf, not how he’d left them. Had Mum been in here, rooting around in his things to see if he had any secrets?

With a gulp, Jack thought about his Facebook page. The last time he’d used it on her laptop when she’d been out, he’d forgotten to remove all traces of it with the laptop’s ‘clear history’ button, and it was just luck she didn’t find it. Jack bit his thumbnail. If she ever found out, he couldn’t bear to think about the worry that would appear on her face. Now he’d glimpsed his old mum again in the kitchen, he wanted her back twice as much.

Feeling a little sick, Jack pulled on his T-shirt.

He padded to the door, and opened it quietly in case Mum was still asleep. Her door, however, was open, her bed already made. He stood there, relieved. The men had come to take away the gate yesterday when he was at school. He ran his eyes over the holes in the ceiling and floor that they had filled in with plaster. He and Mum hadn’t even discussed it at dinner last night. The gate had just gone. There were other things to think about, anyway. The Year Eight boys, obviously, and the roast chicken and rhubarb crumble that Mum had made, which were so delicious that he’d had two portions of each. The film that she’d surprised him with was good too. Not that Mum had watched it properly. It was supposed to be movie night for the two of them, but he’d seen her eyes drift back into her secret place a few times. At least she was trying. Then they’d talked about the film when he was getting ready to go to bed.

Jack was starting to walk across the hall to the bathroom, when he heard Mum’s mobile ring down below in the hall.

‘Oh – hi, Jago,’ she said in this happy voice.

Jack paused mid-step. The action forced him to put more weight back on the foot behind, making the floorboard creak heavily.

‘Oh. Hang on,’ Mum said, lowering her voice. He heard her pace across to the sitting room and shut the door.

Jack tiptoed back into his room. He crouched down, lifted his rug, and lay, his ear to the gap in the stripped floorboards.

‘Uh, eight? That should be OK,’ came a muffled voice from the room below. ‘Should I bring anything?’

There was a pause. Then his mother laughed.

Jack put his hand flat on the floor.

A proper laugh. Like the one in the kitchen when they were talking about Mr Sausage Fingers.

But not with him, with this man called Jago on the phone.

Jack crawled to the bed, retrieved the book that he taken from the shed, and checked the name.

Him.

He flicked to the man’s smiling photo.

Was this the ‘friend’ Mum was out with when Aunt Sass was here the other night?

He skimmed through the pages, reading some of the numbers.

He hesitated, and did a double-take.

That was interesting.

Picking up a red felt-tip that was beside his bed, he marked something in the margin.

‘Jack!’ his mum shouted up. ‘I’m going to head up to London for the evening to see an old friend while you’re at Gabe’s. What time are you going?’

An old friend? Jago wasn’t the name of any of her and dad’s old friends who sent him birthday cards. Why didn’t she just say ‘friend’?

‘Six.’

‘Could we go slightly earlier?’

‘Probably,’ he replied, placing his hand on his stomach as the spasm gripped hard.

Before, he’d just been scared of the Year Eight boys, but now he was worried about this Jago man too.

Jack rubbed his stomach to soothe it, trying not to cry.

He didn’t want Mum to go.

By the time five o’clock came round, the cramp in Jack’s stomach was so bad that he had been to the bathroom three times and thought he might be sick.

Mum came downstairs, wearing black jeans and her old black leather jacket with a hoodie underneath. She had that black stuff on her eyes again, and her lips were, for once, not stuck inside her mouth, and had something shiny on them. She smiled that nice sparkly-eyed smile again.

‘Do you need any help?’ she asked, pointing at Gabe’s books, which he was trying to wrap.

‘No, thanks,’ he muttered, even though he’d had to rip off the sticky tape twice because it kept wrinkling up.

‘Right, we’d better get going,’ she said, pulling on her ankle boots.

Jack surveyed her from under her fringe.

He wanted to tell her so badly about the Year Eight boys.

Yes, Gabe would be furious at him, but anything right now was better than knowing that the Year Eight boys were coming in the middle of the night, when all the adults were asleep.

Could he tell her? She had been better recently. Maybe she wouldn’t panic. Maybe she’d just be calm and talk to Gabe’s mum about it and it would be OK.

Jack opened his mouth.

‘Mum?’ he started.

‘What the hell is this?’ she exclaimed.

She was staring at her ankle boot, turning it sideways.

‘What?’

‘The heel’s too short. Has he given me the wrong ones back?’

Kate whipped off the boot and looked inside. ‘That’s so weird. They’re definitely my boots but that old man’s chopped about an inch and a half off the heel. What the hell is going on?’

‘What do you mean?’ Jack said, starting to feel cross with her. He was trying to tell her something important and all she was thinking about was boots and dressing up to see Jago Martin.

‘Nothing. It’s just strange.’

‘Can you still wear them?’

‘Good question, Captain,’ she winked at him, pulling on both boots. He hated it when she called him that. It was a stupid word that she used, he suspected, because she didn’t know what else really to call him. His mum stood up, flexing her toes inside the black leather, and moved from foot to foot. ‘They actually still work because the leather’s so soft. It’s odd, though. Maybe the old heel was so worn down he had to make them shorter. Never mind.’

She picked up her bag, and put her hand on the door.

‘Right – sorry, Jack, what were you saying?’

Even though they had been shortened, the heels still made her taller. She looked pretty again, Jack thought. Damon’s big brother Robbie had said she was ‘hot’ the other day, and he supposed that’s what he meant too. Her eyes were not made of glass, today, anyway. They looked as if the sun had shone so hard into them that they had burst into flames.

Jack bit his fingernail. How come this man Jago could make her look happy like this, but he couldn’t?

He tried to think. If he did tell her about the Year Eight boys now, her eyes might glaze over again. Her skin would go tight and white and her shiny lip would disappear back inside her mouth.

He realized she was regarding him closely. ‘Jack? Are you OK? If you don’t want me to go to London, I won’t.’

He forced himself to smile. ‘I’m fine.’

‘Sure?’

‘Uhuh.’

‘OK. Got your stuff?’

She was really looking at him. Right into his eyes.

He nodded.

Then, without warning, she pulled him in for a hug. Not an anxious, sweaty hug, but the type of kind cuddle Nana gave him – soft and reassuring, where the adult was in charge of the hug. As he pulled away from her awkwardly, she caught him on the side of the face with an unexpected kiss.

He guessed she was trying to find the right words.

‘Jack, please, tonight, be sensible. And if you’re worried about anything – and I mean anything – call me, OK. I’ll come straight back.’

He went to pick up his bag. She carried on talking as she opened the front door.

‘You know what, Jack? After what’s happened to you, I think it’s amazing how well you do at so many things and you have good friends, too. Dad would be so proud of you. And when I get back I want to tell you about two more nice things I’ve got planned. I really enjoyed movie night last night. I think it’s time we had a bit more fun. OK?’

He walked through, hiding his face, feeling tears spring back into his eyes. Desperate for her not to go.