Seeing Red Read online

  Seeing Red

  PETER LANCETT

  Contents

  Title Page

  CHAPTER 1 My best friend’s sister

  CHAPTER 2 Looking sharp, Tom

  CHAPTER 3 Who’s that girl?

  CHAPTER 4 Carve his name with pride

  CHAPTER 5 What moms can be

  CHAPTER 6 Hanging on the telephone

  CHAPTER 7 I’d rather be dreaming…

  CHAPTER 8 No one to talk to

  CHAPTER 9 You can’t compete with a movie star

  CHAPTER 10 Why can’t life be simple?

  CHAPTER 11 My funny valentine

  CHAPTER 12 A weight off my mind

  CHAPTER 13 I can’t be responsible

  CHAPTER 14 Making allowances

  CHAPTER 15 Mondrian, Kandinsky and Rive Gauche in the clinic

  CHAPTER 16 I want my mom

  CHAPTER 17 New shoes

  About the Author

  In the Same Series

  Copyright

  CHAPTER 1

  My best friend’s sister

  I was out with Eddie last night. Eddie’s my best friend, though I guess that’s not saying much; I don’t really have friends. Just a few people I say ‘hi’ to now and then. I say ‘hi’ to Eddie more often than anyone else and I suppose that makes him my best friend, but we’re certainly not close in the way that you are with your best friend. Phew – I should have taken a breath there!

  Anyway, like I was saying, I was out with Eddie last night. We’re not doing much, just hanging around on the street corners. We kinda like it that people cross the streets to avoid us and nobody wants to look us in the eye. Just what they think we are or what we’ll do I can’t imagine. Well actually, I can; they think that we’re going to vandalise the neighbourhood and maybe trash their cars after dark when they’re safe behind their curtains. Eddie wears a hoodie and never smiles when there are people around. He likes how that freaks them out. I like it too, if I’m honest. The thing is, you’d think that people would know that we’re not out for trouble just by looking at me.

  You see, while Eddie likes to think he’s cool – he always wears the latest stuff – I don’t go in for it. Even just hanging around on the streets with Eddie I’m wearing penny loafers by Prada and Ralph Lauren casual pants, a two-button jacket by Sean John and an open-collar Pierre Cardin shirt. And if other kids laugh at me and sneer – and they do – I take comfort in the knowledge that my shoes cost more than their entire wardrobes. In some cases, that would go for my haircut too. What? So I have parents who can afford it and like to indulge me. So what? Saves them ever having to listen to me.

  So where was I? Oh, that’s right; I’m hanging out with Eddie last night. We’re sitting in the bus shelter across from the playground. Eddie is chain-smoking as he sometimes does. French cigarettes that give off an awful smell. We are waiting for his bus – Eddie lives a couple of miles away – and Eddie starts talking about girls. Eddie says that most people at school think that I’m queer because of the way I dress. As if I don’t know that already.

  ‘So are you?’

  ‘Am I what?’

  ‘You know… queer.’

  There, see. I told you we’re not really close.

  ‘Well, if it puts your mind at ease, no. No I’m not.’

  It crosses my mind that Eddie might not believe me. We sit in silence for a moment, with him drawing slowly on his cigarette while I wait in vain for him to erupt in spasms of uncontrolled coughing.

  ‘Who do you fancy out of our class?’

  A trail of vacant faces passes before me. The girls in our class. What a carnival. I won’t describe them now; maybe later.

  ‘None of them, really.’

  ‘Then you are queer. Not even Joanna Stevens?’

  Actually I don’t fancy Joanna Stevens, but that’s because I’ve heard her speak. I can see where Eddie is coming from though. If it came down to just looks and nothing more than that, you’d have to hand it to Joanna Stevens. Even wearing nothing better than off-the-peg ‘High Street chic’ I have to admit that she is a superior class of slut.

  ‘No, not even her. I’ve seen trees with more brains.’

  Eddie doesn’t look at me. He blows a long plume of blue-grey smoke out between his lips as he flips the glowing cigarette butt into the gutter.

  ‘Brains? We’re not talking about picking a debating team here!’

  Eddie laughs and turns to me, smiling.

  ‘Really though; wouldn’t you just like to get her in the dark and run your hands all over her?’

  I smile back and shake my head.

  ‘No, no I wouldn’t…’ There is a pause. ‘Well, OK, maybe that does sound good. But then I’d have to speak to her the next day. It just wouldn’t be worth it.’

  Eddie laughs and shoves me playfully.

  ‘Oh it would be worth it alright, trust me. That’s a small price to pay.’

  I raise my eyebrows quizzically.

  ‘Trust me, it is. At least we know that you’re not queer.’

  ‘I’ve always known.’

  Eddie looks at me.

  ‘Go on then, who do you fancy?’

  For a moment a face flickers at the front of my mind. A girl from school and she’s in our year but not in our class. I find myself looking at her whenever she’s out and about at the same time that we are. I can’t tell Eddie this though; word would get out, and that would mean hassle for me. And perhaps for this girl. She doesn’t deserve that.

  ‘There is somebody, I can tell.’

  Eddie. So perceptive he should be a hostage negotiator or a forensic psychiatrist for the FBI.

  ‘Eddie, I can’t tell you. It would be embarrassing.’

  ‘Only for you, jerk-off. Go on, who is it? Not that brainiac woman from that TV show is it? Well, is it?’

  Eddie keeps pushing and pushing and he’s joking and teasing but he won’t stop. And another face comes to mind. Another girl I find attractive, no doubt about it. But this is forbidden fruit.

  ‘No, it’s not the woman from TV, Eddie. Christ, she must be a hundred years old!’

  The woman is probably in her thirties but that’s how we see her. It’s the way we speak and we can’t help it. Thirties is ancient to us. Then I realise what I’ve said, and Eddie is sharp enough to pick up on it too. His dad is a lawyer and some of that sharpness must have been passed down.

  ‘So there is an it, a somebody. Come on, I won’t tell anyone. And you know that I’d bite my own arm off to get my hands on Joanna Stevens. So tell.’

  ‘Hand.’

  Eddie looks puzzled.

  ‘Hand. If you bite off an arm you’ll only have one hand to get all over Joanna Stevens.’

  ‘Oh very smart… asshole! Now come on. Tell.’

  The face again – the forbidden face, not the girl from school, although this girl does go to our school – it’s there floating past me. And not just the face, the whole package; a provocative teenage minx.

  ‘Can’t we just talk about something else?’

  Stupid question, but I have to try.

  ‘No, no we can’t! Who is it? What do you want to do with her? Do you see yourself with her, getting jiggy? Do you imagine yourself with her and you’re both really hot for each other?’

  Eddie is on a roll and it’s almost like I’m not there at all.

  ‘What’s it feel like when you have your hands inside her top, eh? Don’t pretend you don’t have these thoughts. We all do. Who is she? C’mon – you gotta tell. Perhaps I can set you up.’

  ‘It’s Helen.’

  I say the words and realise what I’ve done and I know that I can’t take them back and I so wish that I could but it’s too late.

  ‘See, that
was easy. Helen…’ Eddie is searching his mind’s rolodex to find an appropriate Helen and he’s struggling. I try to appear cool in the hope that he’ll run out of ideas and it can remain my secret. I look down at my shoes.

  ‘I only know one Helen. And I think we can count her out.’

  I’m still looking at my shoes and I can feel Eddie’s eyes on me. The atmosphere has changed, just like that. I should smile and come back with a sharp remark; easy to say, but it’s too late. I make matters worse by shrugging, and as I turn to Eddie to explain that’s it’s all innocent, I’m just in time to see the punch that Eddie’s swinging. Instinctively I roll away and off the seat. Eddie still catches me though, and I feel a thud to my cheek, but there is no pain. Adrenaline I guess.

  ‘My Helen? You just stay away from her, you dirty bastard!’

  I’m rolling away and catch a hefty kick in the ribs, but I manage to get up and start running. It’s only when I realise that I can’t hear footsteps pounding after me that I stop and turn.

  Eddie is not pursuing me and he’s walking backwards towards the bus stop. He seems to be looking not at me but down the road beyond me, so that I turn to look too. Now I see why he is not racing after me. A bus is coming towards us. Eddie’s bus.

  ‘You’re a filthy perv,’ Eddie shouts for all the world to hear. Thankfully the streets are deserted. ‘You just stay the hell away from Helen!’

  The bus has swept past me. It is pulling up at the stop as Eddie points at me and makes a throat-slitting gesture with his fingers, before turning and boarding.

  I catch my breath and shake my head as I watch the bus pull away. I’ve never seen Eddie turn like that. Obviously he was shocked to hear that I found Helen attractive. But she is a fox, and she knows it too, and surely Eddie can see it.

  And I can’t believe that Eddie would attack me like that, no matter what. It’s not like I’d been talking about getting my hands all over her – those were Eddie’s own words, not mine, and Eddie’s thoughts too, come to that, not mine. What did he mean, calling me a perv? It’s not like I’m some kind of paedophile is it? So what if I’m sixteen and Helen is thirteen? If I was twenty-five and she was twenty-two, would it matter to anyone? And anyway, I never said I wanted to do anything with her, anything at all.

  I wonder if Eddie is still my best friend? After all, it’s not my fault that Eddie has a really hot kid sister.

  CHAPTER 2

  Looking sharp, Tom

  I don’t have a black eye, and that’s amazing. I’m looking in the bathroom mirror. It’s morning and the cheekbone under my left eye is a little swollen and a little red. But there’s no bruising. I doubt that anyone would ever notice. I’m guessing that I only notice because I’m so familiar with my own face. It hurts though. Not a raging pain, just a presence. It sits like a coiled snake, waiting to strike, waiting for a wrong move. So I make the wrong move by poking at it. The pain is immediate, spreads all down my face and even spills out into my shoulder. And although it’s pain, it’s strangely addictive so that I can’t help poking it a couple of times more. It’s like how you can’t help poking a mouth ulcer with the tip of your tongue. Like that, but much more intense.

  There is a bruise on my ribs though. It’s blue in the middle and red at the edges. It doesn’t hurt at all until I move. Then I feel it, sharp and shrill. I’ll just have to live with it, I guess, until it fades away. I certainly don’t have any desire to poke at it, that’s for sure.

  A banging at the bathroom door. Every morning it’s the same.

  ‘Are you finished in there? Come on, I’m gonna be late!’

  I so want to tell you that the voice is harsh and obnoxious, but you can hear it for yourself and clearly that is not the case. The diction is perfect, disguising even the tiny lapse into slang. And the sounds are sweet. Like the tinkling of angel bells or the lazy babbling of a gentle brook. Not that I’d ever tell Madeleine any of this; she has a high enough opinion of herself already, does my darling sister.

  No, really; she is a darling. And I love her to bits, even if she is three years older than me and we sometimes find ourselves squabbling. There’s quite a bond between us, to tell the truth. We just do a good job of disguising it sometimes.

  ‘Mom –’

  Here we go again…

  ‘Tom’s hogging the bathroom and I’m gonna be late!’

  Late for what, I wonder? But this is a ritual, so I check on the towel around my waist and open the door ready to play my part.

  Madeleine is standing just beyond the frame. She’s wearing these great pyjamas – Tiffany Blues from Bedhead – and her blonde hair is only slightly dishevelled. It’s still obvious why boys are always swarming around her.

  ‘God, what’s happened to you?’

  No ritual banter this morning then. I brush past her.

  ‘Nice PJs.’

  I don’t look back but I know that she’ll be glowing inside from the compliment. For Madeleine, nothing on Earth is more important than fashion. She’s the reason that I like fine clothes myself. I guess you could say that she trained me. Over the years, I’d hate to guess how many hours I’ve spent in her room, watching her try on clothes. And no, I don’t actually watch her getting dressed and undressed, sicko; she has a walk-in. My job is always to say what I think goes and what doesn’t. I’d have to say that Madeleine has trained me well, because I do have a very good eye. I really do.

  You might wonder why Mom doesn’t spend this kind of time with Madeleine. Well, you should know that Mom and Dad are the kind of people who only had kids to complete the picture. Successful careers – check. Great house in the suburbs – check. Mercedes and BMW in the garage – check. Two beautiful, trouble-free kids – check. At least, that’s what I think. And yeah, come on; just look at us. We’re beautiful alright.

  We are not neglected or mistreated – far from it. There’s always been money. And Madeleine and I have always been able to indulge our love of fashion. But what we’ve never had tons of is time and attention. We’re not alone in this, I know, and I’m not whining. I just want you to know that while our relationship with our parents is not exactly sterile, Madeleine and I have always turned to each other for comfort and advice.

  So I’m not surprised that Madeleine notices the redness on my face. She’s bound to, really. Still, I very much doubt that anyone else will.

  Walking downstairs, I’m dressed and feeling cool and confident. Clothes can do that for me. It’s like I’m a different person, defined by the cut and the cloth. And – I’m only a little ashamed to say – by the labels. This morning I’m wearing black leather lace-up shoes by Santoni, Gene Meyer socks, Hanro boxers, a white cotton shirt by Missoni, and a charcoal-grey two-piece suit by Loro Piana. There’s a Gianfranco Ferre belt around my waist and a white linen Claytons handkerchief in my top pocket. I don’t wear a tie – I’m only going to school, after all.

  Okay, so this outfit is a bit over the top, even for me. But I feel like treating myself. I still feel a bit uncomfortable about what happened with Eddie last night. I can’t believe he attacked me like that. And I didn’t try to protect myself, I just ran. What does that say about me? Well, let’s not go there.

  Why did I say those things last night? Why couldn’t I have just lied and said that I slavered after Joanna Stevens like everyone else? Would that have been so difficult? Even saying nothing would have been better than admitting to finding Helen attractive. And that’s all I had said really. Why had Eddie twisted it? I don’t know.

  But I’m a different person this morning. In Eddie’s eyes at least, I’m a pervert and a coward. I’m avoiding asking myself if that’s how I now see myself too. A coward, I mean. I know that I’m not a pervert. Wonder if Eddie will spread it all around the class?

  I saunter into the kitchen. It’s huge and perfect, as you’d expect, all chrome and bleached wood and Italian tiles on the floor. It’s all Mom’s doing; God, but she does have exquisite taste. It’s where Madeleine gets it from, f
or sure. But it’s icy in the kitchen, even though Mom is there, a picture of Gucci and Prada casuals. It’s too perfect, the kitchen, if you know what I mean. Not even a crumb lying around, not the least indication that any cooking has ever been done in there.

  ‘Hi Mom.’

  She looks up from where she’s sitting at a counter, ingesting rye-toast – as if by osmosis, the feeble nibbles she’s taking. She’s not wearing sunglasses for once and she looks at me as I look back at her.

  ‘God, Tom, what’s happened to your face?’

  She’s genuinely concerned, so the redness and the swelling must be obvious after all, and I’ve been deluding myself that no one will notice it. Sometimes we all do that, don’t we? See things the way we’d like them to be, I mean, rather than seeing them the way they actually, obviously, are.

  ‘It’s nothing, really. Just an accident.’

  This is not a conversation I want to have. In part, I’ve dressed to provoke her. I want her to tell me that I am overdressed for school. She has a way of saying it so that I can tell that she thinks I’m looking sharp. I like the buzz that that gives me, her appreciation of how I look and what I’m wearing. I’m going to be disappointed this morning and I might as well be honest with you; I don’t take disappointment well. I mean, I don’t throw tantrums or anything, but it gets bottled up inside me and it can be days before I’m feeling loose and normal again.

  ‘How did it happen?’

  She’s up off her seat now and I can’t turn around and walk out. She comes towards me with a look of motherly concern on her beautifully made-up face. A hand reaches up as though gently to touch the swelling, but I turn away. The hand goes down but she is still there as I turn back to face her. I notice a slight crumb at the corner of her mouth and I absently brush it away, like I’m the parent somehow and she is the child.

  I can smell her perfume from here; Enigma, by Alexandra de Markoff, all rose and iris and jasmine.

  ‘Leave it Mom, it’s nothing.’