Withering Tights

Chapter 7

He had everything a dream boy should have

Back, front, sides, a head

Ambling to the village on Thursday with Jo and Flossie and Vaisey – Honey has a singing lesson so she is off to the music studio – we were, of course, talking about the boys. Phil and Charlie.

Vaisey said, “I thought they were both quite cute. And friendly. And funny. How can we see them again? Should we go and hang around the tree every day?”

Jo said, “Phil was cute, wasn’t he? But he’s a bit short.”

I said to her, “Jo, you know that saying ‘it’s like the pot calling the kettle black’? Well, you saying that Phil is a bit short, is like a tiny, tiny, black pot calling a tiny kettle black.”

Flossie said, “What pot? Who’s got a pot? Where’s my pot? I want a pot!”





When we reached Heckmondwhite, Flossie and Jo went into the village shop to get emergency supplies to stave off night starvation. Fun-sized Mars bars mainly. And Vaisey and I did hanging about duties.

As we lolled on the wall, Ruby came out of The Blind Pig. I hadn’t seen her since Sunday and it was nice to see her little face.

She called out, “Nah then!”

What did that mean?

Ruby asked us what we had beeen doing at college.

I told her, “In a nutshell, I did some Irish knee dancing, Vaisey trotted about pretending to be Black Beauty…and then we met some boys from Woolfe Academy, lurking in the undergrowth.”

Ruby said, “Why were you lurking in the undergrowth?”

Vaisey said, “Not us, them. Boys. They were quite cute, weren’t they, Lullah? But…anyway, you are too young for this sort of talk, Ruby. Did you play skipping and stuff today?”

Ruby just looked at her. “I’ve kissed boys, tha knows.”

What?

She said, “There’s nowt to it. It’s natural, like cows and that.”

Do cows kiss? I didn’t know anything about anything.

Vaisey was amazed. “You’ve kissed boys?”

Ruby went on, “They allus want to kiss you. You have to shape them up a bit, some of them don’t even know to take their chewing gum out.”

I couldn’t think of one single thing to say.





The others came out with their provisions and Ruby said, “I’ve found some owl eggs, do you want to see them?”

Jo and Flossie said they had to go, because they had a lot of provisions to get through and Vaisey wanted to go and read Wuthering Heights. We have Dr Lightowler tomorrow. Oh good. Or goooooooood as she might say. But probably not to me.

Vaisey toddled off. Her perky little bottom sticking out in a friendly way.

I really like her.

She’s my new hair-hat friend.

And Rubes?

She’s…well, what would you call her? Too little for a proper friend. A friendster? A mini friendster? A fun-sized friend?

She and I went down the side path that ran along the back of the Dobbins’ house. We bobbed down because I could see Dibdobs in the kitchen and I didn’t want to have the staring brothers following us. As we passed my bedroom window at the back, I looked up to see what you could see. Quite a lot is what you could see. For instance, if someone had been, say, standing in the window in their pyjamas, spying on you snogging. You could have seen that.

I said casually to Ruby, “Um, do you know a boy called…Cain?”

Ruby laughed. “Who doesn’t know Cain? Who doesn’t know the Hinchcliffs? Ruben and Seth are bad enough, but Cain…”

Oh, this was worse than I thought.

I said nervously, “What is this Cain…um…what does he, why is he, um…”

Ruby said, “He’s alright really, but he’s as much use as a chocolate teapot. The girls go mad for him, though. He’s good-looking, I’ll say that fer him, but the way he…well.”

I couldn’t help myself. “The way he…what?”

“Well, he goes out wi’ girls and snogs ‘em and then he dumps ‘em. And gets another one, and then he goes back t’first and gets ‘er again and then dumps ‘er again. The amount of crying about that lad.”

I said, “Well…I mean, more fool the girls for going out with him.”

Ruby said, “Oh, he nivver takes ‘em out anywhere. They just turn up to see his gigs.”

I said, “What do you mean, ‘they just turn up to see his gigs’?”

Ruby sighed, “The Hinchcliff boys formed a band called The Jones. They’re right boring, they just moan on about stuff.”

I said, “Like what?”

Ruby crinkled her nose up. “You know, stuff like…‘Girlfriend in the river, I know, I know it’s really serious’ is one of their tunes. They’ve got one that Cain wrote about his girlfriend at the time. It’s called ‘Shut up, mardy bum.’





We’d reached an old barn and Ruby stopped her tale of Cain the Cad to say, “The eggs are in here at the far end. I’ll just make sure Connie’s not around or she’ll attack our heads.”

Connie? Attack our heads?

I said, “Does Connie own the barn?”

Ruby said, “No, tha great Jessie, Connie’s the big mother owl.”

Now I remembered Connie, snoozing as she ate the mouse.

I pulled my hat down.

We went further into the dark barn and over to some hay bales. And there they were, the eggs, two of them. Glowing sort of whitely. We looked at them for a bit. It’s quite fascinating, but, um, boring. I said, “When will they, you know, come out?”

She said, “Dust tha mean hatch?”

I nodded.

She said, “Abaht three to four weeks, I reckon.”

We looked at them again.

Ruby said, “They’re nice eggs, aren’t they?”

I said to Ruby, “Ruby, do you think that we all have egginess in common?”

She looked at me. “Dad said this would happen. He said that you were all barmy and that if I hung around with you it would only be a matter of time before I was prancing around like a tit.”

I said, “It’s not me. This posh girl called Lavinia did an eggy performance. She said that she became more egg-shaped as she did it. I only did my accidental comedy version of Irish dancing.”

Ruby said, “Go on then, do it for me.”

I said, “I feel a bit shy.”

Ruby just looked at me. “That’ll be a help when your on’t stage in front of folk.”

I said, “Alright I will…I’ll do it, I’ll just get in the mood by doing the intro music first.”

Ruby sat on a hay bale and I got up on another one.

I started singing, “Well, hiddly diddly diddly dee. We’re all off to Dublin in the green, in the green, hiddly diddly diddle dee…” And went into my dance. Arms by the side and leaping, leaping, leap. High kick, high kick, twirly ankle, twirly ankle.

Ruby was laughing like a drain when I heard the barn door creak open and a deep voice said, “Ruby, are you in here?”

Cain!

I tried to get behind the hay bale and promptly fell over it. Nearly smashing the owl eggs as well. As I was lying in the hay, the best-looking boy I have ever seen loomed over me. He was tall and long-limbed with a cool Fred Perry shirt on. I could see he had longish, thick hair and a lovely broad mouth. He smiled at me and held out a hand to pull me up.

“Hello, I’m Alex, Ruby’s brother.”

I said, “Hello, I’m…um…”

And I’d forgotten my own name.

Ruby seemed unfazed by this. She said, “She’s called Tallulah and she goes to that bonkers school.”

Alex laughed. “Rubes thinks that anyone who prats around on stage is mad.”

I said, “Heehee, your dad said me and my friends were breeding.”

Were you supposed to say ‘breeding’ in front of best-looking boys?

To cover it up I said, “I nearly smashed up the owl eggs, but I didn’t and I’m glad because we…we’re all like eggs…in a way.”

Ruby said, “Dunt start that bloody egg business agin.”





It turns out that Alex is going to go to performing arts college in Liverpool! As we walked back from the barn I said, “Wow…um…oh, wow. Liverpool. That’s, well, that’s not…here, is it?”

He laughed again. “Nope.”

He was sooooo lovely. And, well, gorgeous. He had everything a dream boy should have. Back, front, sides. Everything. A head. And all in a boy shape.

When we got to the Dobbins’ gate, I said, “Buenos Noches!” and giggled like a nitwit.

Ruby looked at me and rolled her eyes and then said, “I’m off.”

As Ruby ran on home, Alex said, “Well, nice to meet you. Yeah, actually I’m coming up to the college some time soon, doing some work with Monty.”

I said, “Monty?”

“Monty de Courcy.”

I said, “Oh, that Monty…hmm.”

I nodded.

He said, “Nice to meet you, Tallulah. That must be one of the coolest names. Bye.”





In my squirrel room.

I have met a dream boy, in boy form. He said I had a cool name.

He said nothing against my knees.

He couldn’t actually see my knees, but…

I realise that in one day I’ve had more boy fun than I have had in fourteen and a half years. Today has made the bottom-touching kitbag incident fade into insignificance.

I LOVE Yorkshire. I do. I really do.