Cold Boy's Wood by Carol Birch (if you liked this book TXT) 📗

they cared about was getting high and noodling away in their own thick heads while Rome burned. You couldn’t just be silly with Maurice. Or am I remembering this wrong? I think somewhere there’s a trace memory of the three of us, me and him and Johnny, having fun once or twice. Yes, we must sometimes have laughed. But mostly what I remember is how serious everything was all the time, because it really was true, everything really was a horrible mess, and the rich got richer and the poor got poorer and we were ruled by idiots. Maurice didn’t drink or take drugs like everyone else, and neither did Johnny, never touched a drop, never smoked, never lost control. Pure as a baby. You’d never have seen Maurice dance or bop. Well, I never did. In my mind, he stands looking solemn before a wall of books, a weighty one balanced open on one hand, the index finger of the other hand pointing down at a silky page. He’s fooling around for a photograph, but this is really how he is, the antithesis of frivolity.

‘And who’s this lot?’ she asked.

‘This,’ said Maurice, ‘is Pedro.’

‘Hi.’ Pedro waved his fingers.

‘You look like Lil’ Abner,’ she said.

Pedro had never heard of Lil’ Abner, so encyclopaedic Maurice started telling him about the old cartoons and Dogpatch USA and all the socio-economic factors of it. I went into our bedroom to see if I could find some old tent for her. What does she think I am, a dress shop? I dragged out an old smock dress I hadn’t worn in years. I’d never get it back. Didn’t get the last one back, a dark blue thing, still, easy come, easy go. It had a plunging neckline, couldn’t wear that now, my tits are too big. I went back in and Maurice was telling everyone to drink up their coffee and get out there.

‘This any good?’ I asked Eve.

She took it from me like a duchess in a high-end couturier. Johnny was getting his coat on and everyone was standing up. Shiv wore too-tight jeans and they looked funny underneath her enormous square-shouldered jacket. Els shook out her curly red hair.

‘Where you off?’ asked Eve.

‘Demo.’

‘Ah.’

‘You know about the demo?’ said Maurice.

‘Course I do. Watch yourselves.’ She relit her roll-up with someone’s lighter. ‘Things get nasty. Them police don’t care what they do. Bastards!’

Maurice chuckled. ‘I’m with you there,’ he said, patting Eve’s cold naked shoulder.

‘They’re all fucking corrupt.’ She took a long frowning pull on her roll-up and sneezed.

‘Damn right,’ said Polly.

Lily’s door opened. ‘I’m going out now,’ she said, mincing towards the door.

‘Oh Lily, for God’s sake!’ I said. ‘Please!’

‘You’re not, Lily,’ Johnny said, stepping in front of her nimbly and placing himself in front of the door.

‘You can’t stop me, I’ll just wait till you’re gone and then I’ll go.’

‘Enough!’

She started pulling at his folded arms, scratching the backs of his hands with her sharp nails.

‘Ow! Fuck off!’ he said. ‘I’m not moving.’

‘Lily, will you please—’

‘You don’t know a thing,’ she said, ‘you think you know everything but you don’t. You’re just stupid. I know things too.’

‘What?’ asked Johnny. ‘What do you know, Lily?’

‘I know life’s not just about reading books and saying clever things. It’s not. It’s about trying to be nice to people.’

‘Oh, very profound,’ Johnny said and Maurice said something about the harm principle, and she screamed and turned round with her face ablaze and tears starting from her eyes.

‘You think I’m stupid but I’m not,’ she said.

‘No one thinks you’re stupid, love.’ I got up and went towards her but she flounced away.

‘Stupid!’ she said.

‘You’ve just said stupid three times,’ said Johnny. ‘Try and vary your language a bit more, Lily.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Eve, opening her eyes and looking sadly round at everyone as if she was about to say something wise. The hard white belly with its straining navel rested on her wide-apart thighs. ‘I don’t think this baby wants to be born.’

‘Oh please,’ I said, I’m not sure to whom.

‘Oh for God’s sake, Lily,’ Johnny said, ‘go and blow your nose.’

‘You,’ she said. ‘You’re never wrong, are you?’

‘Of course I am.’

I actually wanted to laugh. Johnny was never wrong. Upon this his identity teetered.

‘I’m wrong very often, I’m sure. And I’m not afraid to admit it.’

That was even funnier.

‘Well, you never do,’ she said.

‘If there’s even a possibility of trouble…’ I said. I don’t know why I bothered, they never let me get a word in anyway.

‘Exactly!’ said Johnny.

Lily suddenly deflated. ‘I can’t go out now anyway,’ she said, wiping her cheeks with her hands. ‘My makeup’s ruined. Everything’s ruined.’

‘Oh, come on, Lily!’ I couldn’t bear them all standing around with their half-embarrassed faces.

‘Oh, come on, Lily!’ She screwed up her face like a gargoyle, shot a look of pure hatred at me and then another around the room, one that took in everyone. Then she walked proudly into her bedroom and slammed the door hard. Harriet jumped up and ran after her.

‘Oh dear,’ said Maurice drily, ‘the Great Refusal. Ha ha.’ His eyes betraying nothing because they never did. He took a last noisy swig of coffee.

‘Oh God.’ Johnny stooped to pick up a book from the floor. ‘Can’t we send her to stay with her dad for a bit? Look what she’s done to my hands. Claws.’

At last they were gone, thank God, and it was just me and Eve, who just sat there on the hard chair with her eyes closed and the crappy old smock dress draped over her belly, nodding out like an old person in a care home. Harriet came quietly out of the girls’ room and sprawled next to me. ‘She’s been crying,’ she said.

‘Oh dear. Is she feeling better now?’

She nodded.

‘Should I go and see her, do you think?’

Another nod.

I tapped on her door and went in. Lily was on her bed, reading. The room was a pigsty. She’d redone her makeup, paint thick round her bloodshot