Withering Tights

Chapter 8

I’m not an Irish dancing broom

I’m a human being

Icannot believe that Ruby has got such a gorgeous brother.

Alex.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I thought, I can hardly believe that a whole week has gone by.

A whole week since I first came to Dother Hall and nearly a whole day since I’ve seen Alex.





I have decided to wear my green top and tight zip-sided jeans. And a little cardi. And the flip flops that Dad brought me back from Brazil. They are gold.

My hair is bouncy today. Should I backcomb the top bit to give it a bit more umph?

As I looked in the bathroom mirror, the sun shone and beamed into my eyes. They gave me a bit of a turn. They do look very green indeed today. Funny to look at your own eyes and think, crumbs that’s a bit green.

Hey and hang on a minute, I think, maybe, when I look closely I can see little tiny bumps under my T-shirt. Woo-hoo! At this rate I might even be able to buy a bra by the time I am forty. Just in time for my pension.

Still, it’s a start.

Two starts actually.





I went downstairs to the kitchen to find Dibdobs in ginormous shorts and a cowboy hat with bits of rope on it.

She looked up and gave me a salute. “Dib dib dib, Tallulah.”

She put two boiled eggs on the table for me. They had little bobble hat things to keep them warm. Still, as I now know, we are all eggs deep down. Did that make it cannibalism if I ate them?

I removed an egg hat to smash its head in and Dibdobs said, “Harold made the egg hats. I did tell you we’re going away this weekend. It’s the Brownies camp for me and the boys. It’s the tiddlywinks grand final, so it’s all tension.”

I started to say, “I haven’t got my tiddles, um, or is it winks, so I couldn’t possibly—”

She was smiling, “And Harold is going into the woods with his Iron Man group.”

His what?

I said, “Well that sounds…wizard.”

Dibdobs came and gave me a big hug. “I thought you would like to be with Vaisey, so I’ve arranged for you to stay at The Blind Pig – pop round there after college tonight.”

I was doing secret inward sniggering. And a secret inward voice in my head was saying (in a strange breathy voice…) Yes, yessss, I will pop round to The Blind Pig. I will ‘pop’ round because guess who lives at The Blind Pig? It is not a blind pig, it is Alex. Alex, the best-looking boy in the universe. Alex, who said I had a cool name. Alex who…

And that is when the twins came in, both in huge shorts.

They came and stood an inch away from me to do their silent looking.

But I was too happy to be freaked out by them.

So I smiled at them in between mouthfuls of eggy.

They did what they think is smiling back.

The wobbly teefs have gone, so now when they smile it’s like looking at sock creatures. If you can imagine that.

I left the house a bit earlier than I needed to, so that I could get to the pub and maybe accidentally on purpose bump into Alex. But Vaisey was already sitting on the wall waiting for me. Just as well, really, I would have probably said something insane and fallen over a leaf if I’d seen him.

And to be honest, he only said I had a cool name.

We mooched to Dother Hall and as it loomed into view I remembered that we had Dr Lightowler for two hours. The roof still had its bit of old blanket flapping about. Mrs Rochester is not a highly-skilled worker. I hope for the girls’ sakes it doesn’t rain anytime soon.

After registration we crowded into the studio for Bob’s ‘talk’ on music and music technology.

I couldn’t help noticing that his ponytail, burnt off in the dorm inferno, seems to have grown back. Twice the length.

I whispered to Flossie, “He’s wearing a false ponytail.”

Bob gave us the benefit of his many years ‘on the road’ with bands.

“Listen up, dudes. Yes, I’ve toured with some of the greats. The legends. I’ve done all the big gigs: Wembo, Glasto.”

Glasto? Wembo?

Bob looked at us.

“The Glastonbury.”

Vaisey said, “Which bands did you do?”

Bob was twiddling with knobs and put his feet on the mixing desk. He was wearing leather Cuban-heeled boots. He put on his shades.

“The lot, the big boys – Floyd, Purple, Zep, Heap.”

We looked at him. Who were Zep Heap? Or did he mean Purple Zep?

He let us bang a drum and rattle some maracas. It was exciting when he showed us the sound booths and asked if anyone wanted a go. Vaisey and Jo sang a bit from Grease and Flossie and Honey did “Oo-oo-oooos” in the background.

“You’re the one that I want…”

“Oo-oo-oooo.”

They were good, actually.

Jo had to stand on a little box to reach the mike and Vaisey was moving her bottom around in time to the music.

Bob recorded it and then he did ‘multi-tracking’ so it sounded like fourteen people singing. This is more like it.

I said to the girls, “I feel like part of this great big crazy world of showbiz, now!”

Bob said as we left, “The Jones are coming in to lay down a few tracks. It’s not my sort of stuff, not heavy, just more indie landfill, but they’re local so…you might want to come on down, chill out and get your ears on.”

Get our ears on?

I said, “Did he say ‘chill out’? It doesn’t seem right coming from a man with a false ponytail.”

Anyway, I will not be going to see The Jones for love or money. In fact, if it is at all possible, I will never see any of the Hinchcliffs again.

Cain in particular.





We walked along to the small theatre space for the dreaded Dr Lightowler experience.





Dr Lightowler swished in in her cloak. I wonder if she has a summer cloak and a winter cloak?

As part of the background for our end of summer school performance of Wuthering Heights, Cloakwoman was telling us about the appalling life of the Brontës.

She said, “It’s hard for you spoiled modern girls to imagine the evenings in that forsaken place, Haworth Vicarage…Cooped up, imprisoned by the forces of nature, no escape, because of the weather, but also because they were women.”

Dr Lightowler was going on and on, swishing her cloak about as she talked. I wonder if she goes to bed in it?

“Now, girls, get up and start moving about in the space. Imagine that you are the Brontës. It’s a dark winter afternoon…” She snapped off all the lights and said, “I’ve got some torches here, girls, some of you come and take one and shine them in an improvised way.”

She put on a torch in the dark and handed more to Honey and Vaisey and some others I couldn’t see. She held a torch under her chin so it lit her up really weirdly.

She said in a spooky, guttural voice, “The light is gone by three, and the wind howls around the draughty cold house, making the candles gutter and cast strange shadowy shapes on the wall. Could some of you howl a bit?”

We howled like mad and she had to shout over the top of us.

“Girls, just light howling, please.”

I said, “Okey dokey, Dr Light-howler.”

Which Vaisey thought was funny, but fortunately the Doctor didn’t hear.

We toned the howling down.

Dr Lightowler went on. “Flossie, perhaps you are Emily huddling by the fire and trying to entertain your sisters. To take their minds off their bodies racked with consumption.”

Two of the girls formed a fire with their torches, and Flossie huddled by it, shivering and coughing. She said in a Texan drawl, “Now y’all girls, come here a cotton-pickin’ moment.”

Dr Lightowler said, “Emily is from Yorkshire, Flossie.”

Flossie tried again, “Ay up, lasses, come around t’fire and we’ll sing a song.”

Dr Lightowler came forward. “Milly, Tilly, be Anne and Charlotte.”

Milly and Tilly came and huddled alongside Flossie, warming their hands at the torch fire.

Dr Lightowler said to us in a hushed voice, “Perhaps they might make up little stories about the shadows? The rest of you girls be imaginary shapes guttering across the room. Girls with the torches, flicker them everywhere.”

Be an imaginary shape?

Honey and the rest started swooping and fluttering about.

Tilly cried, “Oh, Emily, Charlotte, what is that? Over there by the fire extinguisher…um, by the…loom…Why, is that an eagle? Er…hunting?”

And Flossie said, “Nay, lass, I think it’s a witch, high on a broomstick.”

I tried to join in, but I just felt like a twerp. Especially as when I did attempt to flutter about I caught myself in the midriff with the fire extinguisher. It crashed to the floor and Dr Lightowler gave me a foul look. I tried to get it to stand up again, but it was making a hell of a noise clanking about.

The ‘Brontës’ were excitedly saying, “I think I can see, I can hear…a little hand tapping at the window, is it Cathy out on the moors looking for Heathcliff????”

Then Flossie said, “Yes, yes, I can hear it, what is that over there?”

And she pointed at me. And everyone stopped and shone their torches on me.

So I put my arms down by my side and bobbed about.

I don’t know why I do Riverdance when I’m in the spotlight. I must have an inner Irish dancer trying to get out.

Everyone started laughing.

Apart from Dr Lightowler who said, “What are you doing, Tallulah Casey?”

I said, “Um, I’m sweeping up. I’m an Irish broomstick.”

I could see Flossie put her fist into her mouth and Jo had a coughing fit.

Dr Lightowler just looked at me.

I can see that inwardly she’s ticking me off her list of people for next year’s places.