My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece (3 page)

Footsteps in the hall. Mum’s voice again, quiet, just outside Jas’s door.
I can’t do this any more
she repeated, sounding a thousand years old. Jas grabbed my hand.
I think it’s better if I go
. My fingers ached as Jas squeezed them.
Better for who
Dad asked.
Better for everyone
Mum replied.

It was Dad’s turn to cry. He begged Mum to stay. Apologised. He blocked the front door but Mum said
Move out of my way
. Dad asked for one more chance. He promised to try harder, to put the photos away, to get a job. He said
I lost Rose and I can’t lose you
as Mum walked out onto the street. Dad shouted
We need you
and Mum said
Not as much as I need Nigel
. And then she left so Dad thumped the wall and broke his finger and he had to wear a bandage for four weeks and three days.

T
HE POST HASN’T
arrived. It is thirteen minutes past ten and I have been in double figures for one hundred and ninety seven minutes. I heard something at the door a second ago but it was just the milkman. We had to get our own milk in London. We’d always run out ’cos the supermarket was a fifteen minute drive away and Dad refused to go down the road to the shop owned by Muslims. I got used to having dry cereal but Mum moaned when she couldn’t have a cup of tea.

So far my presents haven’t been that great. Dad gave me football boots that are one and a half sizes too small. I’m wearing them now and my toes feel as though they’re in a mousetrap. First time he’s smiled for ages when I put them on. I didn’t want to say I needed bigger ones ’cos he probably chucked the receipt. I just pretended that they fit. I never get on football teams anyway so I won’t have to wear them that much. In my school in London I tried out every single year but I was never picked, except for once when the keeper was ill and Mr Jackson put me in goal. I asked Dad to come and he rubbed my head like he was proud. We lost thirteen-nil, but only six of the goals were my fault. When the match started, I was gutted Dad hadn’t turned up. By the end, I was relieved.

Rose bought me a book. Like always, her present was by the urn when I went into the lounge. I got this strong urge to laugh when I saw it there, and imagined the urn sprouting legs and arms and a head and walking to the shop to buy a present. Dad was watching me with his serious eyes though so I tore off the paper and tried not to look disappointed when I realised I’d already read it. I read a lot. I used to go to the school library at lunchtime in London.
Books are better friends than people
the librarian said. I don’t think that’s true. Luke Branston was my friend for four days when he fell out with Dillon Sykes for breaking his Arsenal ruler. He sat with me in the dining hall and we played Top Trumps in the playground and no one called me
Maggot Dick
for almost a whole week.

Jas is waiting for me downstairs. We’re going to the park to play football in a second. She asked Dad too.
Come and watch Jamie try out his new boots
she said, but Dad just grunted and turned on the TV. He looked hung-over. Sure enough, I found another empty vodka bottle in the bin when I checked. Jas whispered
We don’t need him anyway
and then shouted
Let’s go and play
as if it was the most exciting thing in the world.

Jas just yelled up the stairs to see if I’m ready. I shouted
Nearly
but I didn’t move from the windowsill. I want to wait for the post. It normally comes between ten and eleven. I don’t think Mum will forget. Important birthdays feel like they’re written on my brain in that permanent ink teachers sometimes use on whiteboards by mistake. But maybe Mum is different now she lives with Nigel. Maybe Nigel has children of his own and Mum remembers their birthdays instead.

I’ll definitely get something from Granny even if I don’t get anything from Mum. Granny lives in Scotland, which is where Dad is from, and she never forgets anything even though she is eighty one. I wish I could see her more often ’cos she is the only person Dad is scared of and I reckon she is the only one who could make him stop drinking. Dad never takes us to see her and she is too old to drive so she can’t visit us. I think I am a lot like Granny. She has ginger hair and freckles and I have ginger hair and freckles and she is tough like me. At Rose’s funeral, she was the only other person in the whole church who didn’t cry. That’s what Jas told me anyway.

The park is a mile away and we almost sprinted there. I could tell Jas was trying to burn calories. Sometimes when we watch TV, she jiggles her leg up and down for no reason and she does hundreds of sit-ups every day after school. She looked funny in her long dark coat with her bright pink hair, speeding past loads of sheep that stared and said
Baaa
. I kept looking for the postman ’cos it was almost eleven and he hadn’t arrived by the time we left the cottage.

There were three girls on the swings when we got to the park and they stared at us as we walked in. Their eyes were like nettles, all full of sting, and my face went red as I paused by the gate. Jas wasn’t bothered. She ran right up to them and climbed on one of the swings, standing on the seat in her jet black boots. The girls looked at her as though she was a freak, but Jas swung really high and really fast and smiled at the sky like nothing in the world could frighten her.

Music’s more Jas’s thing so I beat her easily, seven-two. My best goal was a volley with my left foot. Jas reckons I’ll get on the team this year. She said my boots are enchanted so they’ll make me as good as Wayne Rooney. My toes tingled as if there was magic inside them, and for a second I thought Jas was right until I realised my blood supply had been cut off and my feet had turned blue. Jas said
Are your boots too small
and I said
No they are perfect
.

I felt excited on the way home. Jas was going on and on about getting more piercings but all I could think about was the mat in the hall in the cottage. In my head I saw a parcel on top of it. A fat parcel with a football card taped to the shiny wrapping paper. Nigel wouldn’t have signed it but Mum would have put lots of kisses inside.

When I opened the front door, I knew something was wrong. It swung forward easily. I didn’t dare look down at first and forced myself to remember what Granny always says.
Good things come in small packages
. I tried to imagine all the little presents Mum could have sent that were still nice even if they didn’t block the door. But for some reason the only small thing I could think of was Roger’s dead mouse and it made me feel sick so I stopped.

I looked down at the mat. There was one card. I recognised the loopy handwriting on the envelope as Granny’s. Even though I could tell there was nothing underneath it, I still nudged the card with my toe, in case the present Mum had sent was really really tiny, like a Manchester United badge or a rubber or something.

I could feel Jas watching me. I glanced up at her. Once I saw a dog run into a busy road and my shoulders shot up to my ears and my eyebrows scrunched together as I waited for the collision. That’s how Jas looked when I checked the mat. I bent down quickly and tore open Granny’s card, laughing too loudly when twenty pounds fluttered onto the carpet.
Think of all the cool stuff you can buy with your money
Jas said, and I was glad that she hadn’t asked me a question ’cos I had a lump the size of the world in my throat.

In the lounge we heard the clunk-fizz of a can being opened and Jas coughed to disguise the fact that Dad was drinking on my special day.
Let’s have some cake
she said, pulling me into the kitchen. There weren’t any candles so she stuck a couple of her incense sticks into the sponge. I closed my eyes tight and wished that Mum’s present would arrive soon. I wished for the biggest parcel in the whole world, one that would break the postman’s back. Then I opened my eyes and saw Jas smiling at me. I felt a bit selfish so I added
And please let Jas get her belly button pierced
before taking a deep breath. Smoke went everywhere but it was impossible to blow out the sticks so my wishes won’t work.

I cut the cake as carefully as I could ’cos I didn’t want to spoil it. It tasted like Yorkshire pudding.
This is really nice
I said and Jas laughed. She knew I was lying. She shouted
Dad, do you want some
but there was no reply. Then she said
Do you feel older
and I said
No
’cos nothing has changed. Even though I am in double figures now, I still feel like I did when I was nine. I am the same as I was in London. Jas is the same. And so is Dad. He hasn’t been to the building site even though the man has left him five answerphone messages in two weeks.

Jas nibbled the corner of a tiny slice of cake and asked if I wanted my present. The wind chimes tinkled as we opened her bedroom door. She said
I didn’t wrap it
and handed me a white plastic bag. Inside was a sketchbook and some fancy pencils, the nicest I’ve ever seen.
I’ll draw you first
I said. She stuck out her tongue and went cross-eyed.
Only if you draw me like this
.

After lunch we watched Spider-Man. It is the number one best film of all time and we sat on her bedroom floor with the curtains closed and the duvet wrapped around us, even though it was the middle of the afternoon. Roger curled up on my lap. He’s my cat really. I’m the one who looks after him. He used to be Rose’s. She begged and begged for a pet and, when she was seven, Mum agreed. She put the cat in a box and stuck a bow on top and when Rose opened the present she cried with happiness. Mum’s told me that story about a hundred times. I don’t know if she forgets she’s told it before, or if she just likes telling it again, but it makes her smile so I just bite my tongue and let her finish. I’d love it if Mum sent me an animal for my birthday. A spider would be best ’cos then it might bite me and I’d get special powers like Spider-Man.

When I went downstairs after the film, almost all the cake had gone. There was just one bit on the plate, but it wasn’t a neat triangle like the slices I’d cut. It was all hacked up. I walked into the lounge and found Dad snoring on the sofa with crumbs on his double chin. Three empty beer cans were on the floor and a bottle of vodka was propped against a cushion. He must have been too drunk to realise the cake didn’t taste right. I was about to go back upstairs when I caught sight of my sister on the mantelpiece. Next to the urn was a slice of cake and for some reason it made me really cross. I walked over to Rose and, even though I know she’s dead and can’t hear a word that anyone says, I whispered
It’s my birthday, not yours
and stuffed the cake into my mouth.

Two days later, I was in the back garden sketching a goldfish in the pond and trying not to listen out for the postman. I’d told myself again and again that the present wouldn’t come but, as soon as I heard footsteps on the drive, I ran inside. A few letters flopped onto the mat. Nothing from Mum. But then there was a knock on the door and I opened it so quickly, the postman jumped. He said
Package for James Matthews
and my hands trembled as I took the parcel. The postman said
Sign here
in this bored voice as if he didn’t know that something amazing was happening. Feeling like Wayne Rooney, I signed my name and made it all squiggly like an autograph. Then the postman turned around and walked away, which was a relief. For a second I was worried that, if wishes really do come true, he might have a broken back.