My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece (6 page)

Jas told me the day started off fine and it was sunny but cold and you could see your breath like cigarette smoke. I was throwing bits of bread onto the ground and laughing when the pigeons tried to catch them. Jas and Rose were running through the birds making them twirl into the sky and Mum was laughing but Dad said
Stop that girls
. Mum said
They’re not doing any harm
but Jas ran back to Dad ’cos she hated getting in trouble. Rose was not as good. In fact she was quite bad and according to Jas she was naughty at school, but no one seems to remember that now she is all dead and perfect. Jas held Dad’s hand as he shouted
Rose, get back here
but Mum just said
Oh, leave her be
and giggled when Rose spun on the spot, throwing her head back. Birds swirled all around her and Mum yelled
Spin faster
and then there was a bang and Rose was blown into bits.

Jas said the world went black ’cos there was so much smoke and her ears went funny ’cos the explosion was so loud. But even though she had a burst eardrum, she could still hear Dad scream
Rose Rose Rose
.

They found out later it was a terrorist attack. Bombs had been planted in fifteen bins all around London and they had been fixed to go off at the same time on September 9th. Three of them didn’t work so only twelve bins exploded, but that was enough to kill sixty two people. Rose was the youngest to die. No one knew who had done it until a group of Muslims posted something on the Internet saying that they had done it in the name of Allah, which is the Muslim word for God and rhymes with something I said a lot when I was seven and a half and wanted to be a magician.
Voilà
.

The TV programme made it look like a film. It was a reconstruction of the September 9th bombings. Rose wasn’t in it ’cos they didn’t have Mum or Dad’s permission, but it was interesting to see what happened in the other explosions around the city. One man who died should not have been in London. His train from Euston Station to Manchester Piccadilly had been cancelled due to a signal failure. Rather than wait around for another train, he decided to do a bit of sightseeing in Covent Garden. He was hungry so he bought a sandwich and he put the wrapper in the bin and then he was dead. If the signal hadn’t failed, or if he hadn’t bought a sandwich, or even if he’d eaten it a couple of seconds slower or a couple of seconds faster, then he might not have been putting the wrapper in the bin at the precise moment the bomb exploded. And that made me realise something. If we hadn’t been in Trafalgar Square, or if pigeons didn’t exist, or if Rose had been a good girl instead of a naughty one, then she’d still be alive and my family would be happy.

That made me feel strange so I changed channels. There was nothing on but adverts. Jas came in with her shoulders all slouched and said
Dad’s asleep now
and she sounded relieved and I felt bad. I hadn’t helped her at all. I’d just turned the TV up as loud as it would go so I didn’t have to hear the sick splattering the toilet. Jas said
He’ll be better tomorrow
. I said
Want to play Guess The Advert
, which is a game I invented where you have to shout out what is being advertised before it says it on the TV. She nodded but then an advert we’d never seen came on so we couldn’t play. It showed a big theatre and a man said
Britain’s Biggest Talent Show makes your dreams come true. Ring this number to change your life
and I thought how nice it would be to pick up the phone like a grown up and order a different life as if it was a pizza or something. I’d ask for a dad who didn’t drink and a mum who hadn’t left, but I wouldn’t change Jas one little bit.

You can’t wear that tomorrow
Jas said, nodding at my t-shirt.
We are sprinkling Rose’s ashes and Dad wants us to wear black
. I shouted
Coco Pops
’cos a Kellogg’s advert had just come on the TV.

I must have grown since London. All my clothes are too small. I wore black trousers and a black jumper over the top of my Spider-Man t-shirt but you could still see some red and blue around the collar. When Jas saw me, she rolled her eyes, but Dad didn’t notice. He just stared at the urn, which he’d put on the table in the kitchen while we had breakfast. It looked like a giant salt pot but I don’t think Rose would taste that good on chips.

It took two hours to get to St. Bees and we listened to the same tape we always do on the anniversary. Again and again and again. Play. Stop. Rewind. Play. Stop. Rewind. The tape is going all crackly but you can still hear Mum playing the piano and my sisters singing The Courage To Fly.
Your smile lifts my soul into the sky. Your strength gives me the courage to fly. A kite, I soar so grounded yet free. Your love brings out the best in me
. They recorded it for Dad’s birthday about three months before Rose died.

Perfect
Dad said on Rose’s solo bit, sounding choked.
Voice of an angel
. Anyone with ears can hear that Jas is a better singer and I told her so when we were in the car. Wasn’t hard. We were squashed up in the back. Rose had the front seat. Dad even put a seatbelt around the urn but forgot to tell me about mine.

We came off the motorway and went down a hill and all of a sudden there was the sea, a line of blue all straight and sparkly as though someone had drawn it with a glitter pen and ruler. The line got thicker and thicker as we got closer and closer and Dad’s seatbelt must have been too tight ’cos he started pulling it away from his chest as if it was stopping him from breathing. When we pulled into the car park, Dad tugged at his collar and a button pinged off and hit the exact middle of the steering wheel. I shouted
Bull’s eye
but no one laughed. The tap of Dad’s fingers on the dashboard sounded like a horse galloping.

I was just wondering if there’d be any donkeys on the beach, when Jas opened the car door. Dad jumped. She walked to the ticket machine and pushed in some coins. By the time the ticket appeared, Dad was standing in the car park, the urn hugged against his chest.
Hurry up
he said and I undid my seat belt and climbed out of the door. St. Bees smelled like fish and chips and my tummy rumbled.

When we walked over the pebbles to the sea, I saw five good skimmers. Skimmers are flat stones that bounce on water if you throw them in the right way. Jas taught me how to do it once. I wanted to pick up the skimmers and play but I was scared of making Dad mad. He slipped on some seaweed and the urn almost ended up on the beach, which would have been bad. Rose’s ashes are as small as sand particles so they would have got all mixed up. I shouldn’t really know this but I had a look inside the urn when I was eight. Wasn’t that exciting. I’d imagined the ashes to be all multi-coloured, beige ones for skin and white ones for bones. I didn’t expect them to look so boring.

It was windy so the waves hit the beach hard and disappeared into froth, like shaken-up Coke. I wanted to take my shoes off and paddle but it didn’t seem like the right thing to do. Dad started to say goodbye. He said the same things he said last year, and the year before that. Stuff about never forgetting her. Stuff about setting her free. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something orange and green swoop through the air. I looked up, squinting into the sun, to see a kite whiz past clouds, turning all the wind into something beautiful.

Say something
Jas said and I lowered my head. Dad was staring at me. I didn’t know how long he had been waiting for me to speak. I put my hand on the urn and made my face go all serious and said
Goodbye Rose
and
You have been a good sister
, which is a lie, and
I will miss you
, which is an even bigger lie. I couldn’t wait to get rid of her.

Dad actually opened the urn. In all the anniversaries that I can remember, we had never got this far before. Jas swallowed hard. I stopped breathing. Everything disappeared except Dad’s fingers, Rose’s ashes and a perfect diamond shape, darting through the sky. I noticed a deep cut on Dad’s middle finger, and I wondered how he’d done it and if it hurt. He tried to push his fingers into the top of the urn but they were too big. He blinked a few times and clenched his jaw. His palm trembled as he held it out. It looked dry, like the hand of an old man. He tilted the urn, then changed his mind. He tilted it a second time, further than before. The top of the urn almost touched his palm. A few grey specks dropped out. He snapped the urn straight back up, breathing hard. I stared at the ashes on his hand, wondering which bit of Rose they were. Skull. Toe. Ribs. They could have been anything. With his thumb, Dad touched them gently, whispering things that I couldn’t hear.

Dad’s fingers curled around the ashes. His knuckles turned white as he squeezed. He looked up at the sky. He looked down at the beach. He turned his head towards me and then stared at Jas. It seemed as though he wanted someone to shout
DON’T DO IT
but we stayed silent. I thought he was going to open his hand and let the ashes flutter away in the breeze, but he gave the urn to Jas and took a step forward. The sea swirled around his shoes. I felt my cheeks go red. Dad looked mental. Even Jas coughed in an embarrassed way. A wave broke on his shins, drenching his jeans. He took another step forward. Salt water fizzed around his kneecaps. Slowly, he lifted his arm into the air and held out his fist. Somewhere behind us a girl cheered as the kite soared.

Just as Dad opened his fingers, there was a strong gust of wind. It ripped the kite from the sky and blew ashes into Dad’s face. As Dad sneezed out Rose, the girl screamed and a man with a strong accent shouted
It’s coming down
. Dad’s head snapped back to the beach. I followed his gaze and saw a big brown hand trying to control the kite string.

Dad swore loudly, shaking his head. The kite hit the ground and the man laughed. He put his arm around a girl and she giggled too. Dad squelched onto the beach and snatched the urn off Jas. Even though she had replaced the lid, he pressed it down hard, glaring at the man as if the wind had been his fault.

You okay
Jas muttered. Tears swelled in Dad’s eyes and made me think of those drops you get from the chemist when you have an infection or hay fever or haven’t eaten enough carrots.

Do you want me to – I mean, I could do it, if you like. I could scatter the
—

But before Jas could finish, Dad turned away. Without a word, he walked back to the car, the urn tucked tightly in his left hand. I quickly picked up a skimmer and threw it into the sea. It bounced five times, which for me is an all-time record.

M
RS FARMER SAT
down on her chair on Monday morning. She read out the announcements. There was one about gardening club and one about recorders and one about the football team. My ears pricked up when she said
The Headmaster’s running trials on Wednesday at 3pm. Meet on the school field and bring your football boots
. Then she did the register. Everyone answered
Yes Miss
, but Daniel said
Yes Mrs Farmer
. I was surprised he didn’t bow. His angel’s on the fifth cloud already. Sunya’s angel is on the fourth and most people’s are on the third. Mine is the only one still on the first cloud.