Lying About Last Summer Read online

  We stare at her.

  “I don’t mean to be funny, but we heard that you had therapy sessions.”

  “It’s a bereavement charity,” says Danielle.

  Rapunzel looks blank.

  “We have issues with death,” says Danielle.

  “What?” says the other girl. She looks at her friend, confused.

  “My nan died on her own birthday,” says Rapunzel. “My dad had to take her present back to the shops.”

  “Thanks for sharing,” says Danielle. “Have you seen how many ants there are here? There must be a nest.”

  “Eugh,” says Rapunzel. “That’s gross.” She and her friend edge away, while the three of us ant-watch in silence.

  Soon there are fifteen of us and an instructor in a red T-shirt. As we have to divide into groups of three, our group comes ready formed.

  “Why did we get here so early?” moans Danielle, as the instructor has to placate a leftover Red who isn’t happy to be teamed up with the two remaining Blues.

  Eventually, we’re given a map, compass, pen and a folded-over sheet of paper printed with instructions and a quiz. The instructor says we have to stay within the activity centre grounds, which includes some farmland that’s rented from Morley Hill. We mustn’t trample any crops or annoy any livestock or farmers.

  There’s a five-minute lag between each group setting off. We’re last, which means by the time we set off, Danielle definitely isn’t feeling the orienteering any more. As we walk within sight of our accommodation block, she peels off and says she’ll see us for cake. She dumps the pen and scrumpled quiz in Brandon’s hands.

  I’d like to peel off too, and go and sunbathe somewhere, but it’s Brandon’s birthday and I can’t leave him on his own. We walk on in silence, past the mini go-karting track and towards the campfire area. There’s no sign of any of the other orienteering groups.

  “Would you rather have the compass and map?” I ask. “I only took them because I’m OK with coordinates and map stuff.”

  “Whatever you want,” he says, stopping at a fork in the path. “I don’t mind.”

  I come to a halt next to him and check the map. “This way.” I point towards the left-hand path, and we walk on in more silence. “Listen. I don’t mind finding short cuts if you want to get back quicker. We don’t have to bother with the quiz either.” I stop. “We don’t have to do any of it. It’s your birthday – your call.”

  Brandon appears defeated by all the options I’ve given him. “I don’t know,” he says. “Let’s get away from here for a bit.”

  “All right.” I remember seeing a locked five-bar gate near the campfire area. The other side of it was a field of wheat. “I know a good escape route.”

  When the gate’s a few metres away, I demonstrate my five-bar-gate vault, including run-up. Brandon gives it a go but screws it up. He lands on the other side of the gate in a heap.

  I can’t help laughing. I haven’t laughed for such a long time. Not out loud.

  Brandon stands up and brushes off the dusty earth. “Thanks for asking if I’m OK.”

  “You can’t be grumpy on your birthday.”

  “I can.”

  “I’ll have to do my impression of a pigeon. It used to make my family laugh.”

  Brandon says, “Go on then.”

  It’s not that funny, and I’m out of practice. I stutter my neck, strut about and roll my Rs to create a curled-up cooing noise.

  He doesn’t laugh, but he smiles. “Interesting talent.”

  “Consider it a birthday present.”

  “Lucky me,” say Brandon. He says it with sarcasm, but not the sharp-edged type.

  There’s a footpath along the edge of the field. We climb over a stile, on to a narrow road that’s more like a tunnel because some of the trees either side have branches that almost meet in the middle. There’s a footpath sign pointing down the road, but Brandon jerks his head towards a field of cows.

  “Let’s go cross-country,” he says.

  “You’re not scared of cows?”

  He frowns. “No. Should I be?”

  “Nope, but let’s walk round them.”

  I follow him over the gate. No vaults this time – I’ve done enough showing off. We go towards the top end of the field, up near a stone wall. There’s a large modern house the other side with a massive climbing frame in the garden. As we go closer, we hear the sounds of people – a family, probably – eating outside, talking, laughing, clinking cutlery and plates about. I see the top of a sunshade at the side of the house.

  Brandon flops with his back against the stone wall. I think he’s about to get his phone out and take a photo of the cows, but he just stares down the field at them. “Want to hear my cow impression?”

  “OK.”

  “Get ready. This is going to be good.” He opens his mouth and makes a loud, bellowing moooo sound. The family stop making quite so much noise. Brandon moos again, even louder.

  “What is that?” we hear someone say.

  Another moo, but this one is less convincing because Brandon is laughing. I’m laughing too. Birds fly up from the trees in the lane behind us, and we sense that some of the family are no longer at the table, and are walking towards the wall.

  Brandon touches my arm and indicates that we’d better go. We start running.

  nine

  We run towards a thick clump of trees at the edge of the field. It’s the most obvious place to run to so there’s no discussion. It just makes sense. Some of the cows run too, after us, which makes Brandon scream. When we reach the gate to the wooded area, we hurdle over it and for a few seconds all we can do is gasp as much oxygen into our lungs as we can. After I’ve studied the map, I tell him that we can go one more field over and join a road that will take us through the village back to the activity centre. My heart’s returned to its usual rate but I’m feeling pumped up. Alive.

  Brandon’s still too puffed to talk but he nods.

  We walk through the trees, and out into another wheat field and sunshine. I look ahead for a gap in the thick hedgerow so we can squeeze through.

  “No cows, that’s good,” says Brandon. “Let’s stop for a moment.”

  “Here?”

  “Yeah. I’ve got a stitch.” He sits down in a shadowy patch of thin grass, and I settle myself down too, a little apart from him, as if we’re about to lay out food for a picnic. I really wish we had a cool bag full of drinks.

  “Knackered and thirsty in a field in the middle of nowhere. Not how you thought you’d be spending your birthday, then,” I say.

  “I don’t mind,” he says.

  “Seriously? You wouldn’t rather be with your family or your friends?”

  All I know about Brandon is that he lives in London – which could mean relatively near my house or ages away by car or public transport – and that his mum made him go on this holiday. And that he likes designer shirts.

  “To be honest, it would make me miss my brother more.”

  “He’s why you’re here?” Code for Your brother’s dead?

  “Yeah. He was a couple of years older than me. You?”

  “My sister. Four years older than me, but…”

  “You were close?”

  I nod.

  “Are you parents still together?”

  I was expecting the how-did-it-happen question, not that. “Yes.” Some days, though, they can’t talk to each other or they snap, both grey with exhaustion, worry and sadness.

  “Mine divorced,” says Brandon. “They told me my dad’s work had asked him to go to the States but it was obvious he’d asked for a transfer. He couldn’t hack it at home any more.”

  I pick the grass in front of me, and make a little pile of it.

  “They did so much lying, my parents,” says Brandon. “They lied to my brother. Told him that the doctors thought there was still a chance he’d get better. They told me not to worry, that everything would work out OK when they knew it wouldn’t. There’s a
difference between hoping and lying. They lied.”

  “I guess they thought they were doing the right thing,” I say.

  “My mum hooked up with this guy soon after.” He has a slow, clear way of talking, as if he might be reading an autocue. “A white guy this time. Like her. My dad and my brother got airbrushed out of history.” He pauses, and I wait. I know not to jump in with my big feet. Too many people have done it to me this past year. “So they had a baby, yeah. My sister. Half-sister. She’s white too.” He pauses. “So now I’m the only black kid – the only black person – in my family. It happened fast.”

  I feel different from the rest of my family too. I just don’t know how to say it in words.

  “It used to be my mum who looked like the odd one out,” says Brandon. “Now it’s me.”

  “Why did she make you come on this holiday?”

  He rolls his eyes. “She says I’m angry. Oh, and I’m failing my brother by not working hard enough at school – how does she work that one out?” He looks at me. “Sorry, I’ve gone on too much. Tell me about you and your sister.”

  Brandon’s easier to talk to than I thought, but I’m not about to make the same mistake with him as I did with Joe. Everything’s simpler when people don’t know too much about me and Luisa, whoever they are. “You don’t want to be depressed on your birthday.”

  “It’s all right. I’ve postponed it until I’m home.” He blows at the grass cuttings in front of me, so they disappear, as if he’s blowing out candles on a cake. “Anyway, this bit of my birthday’s not bad. You know, sitting in a field with you.” He gives me a lopsided smile. I can’t tell if he’s making a joke.

  “Yeah. Londoners don’t often get to sit in fields. Exciting,” I say.

  We look round us. At the pale crop, the blue sky and the drifting clouds. The gap between the two of us seems smaller. Touching distance. I stand up and say, “Let’s do a wheat angel. Like a snow angel.”

  He’s no idea what I’m talking about.

  “You’ve never done a snow angel? It’s what you do when it snows.” I push away the memory of doing snow angels with Toby in the garden of Yew Tree House, of feeling safe in bed with Luisa.

  He shakes his head.

  “You lie on the ground and move your arms up and down to make wings, and shift your legs from side to side for the long skirty bit.” I dump the map and compass on the ground and wade out into the field. “I don’t know if it will work with wheat but we should try it. Come on.”

  Brandon chucks the pen next to the map and compass, folds up the quiz and pushes it into the pocket of his shorts, and follows. I move faster, towards the exact spot that I want to fall backwards on to. The farmer will go berserk if he sees us. “Here,” I say. “Here’s good.”

  I don’t quite fall back like I would on snow, but I let my limbs go loose and do a controlled descent. The wheat is scratchy on the bare skin of my arms and legs as I flatten it. Some of the stems poke me quite hard. I picture myself from above. A wheat angel. A fallen angel.

  “This is mad,” says Brandon. He’s beside me, lying down, moving his arms. He looks different. Happy. He laughs and turns his head to make eye contact through the spiky stalks between us.

  “There are probably snakes and mice living in here, aren’t there?” I say.

  “What?” He leaps up. “Whoa. You didn’t have to say that.”

  I stand up more sedately, squinting at the flattened shapes, to see if there’s anything angel-like about them. They don’t look like much at all, and now I feel a bit bad about flattening the wheat. I say, “We’d better go back. There must be a place we can squeeze through on to the road.”

  Walking out of the wheat is harder work than going the other way. I can hear the hum of insects, and bits of rustling that might be me, or might be animals moving through the stalks. Once I’m free, I brush off the little pieces that are all over me, and pull at the stubborn pieces in my hair. I pick up the map, compass and pen and check out a section of hedge that’s thinner than the rest, while Brandon is still de-stalking himself.

  “Here,” I call. I push the thorny hedgerow as far back as I can and move sideways into the small gap. A couple of thorns grasp my T-shirt. Brandon comes over and helps to release me.

  “Thanks.” Freed, I shimmy further through the gap. “Watch out!” I shout as I realize I can’t hold the hedge any more, and it pings back.

  Brandon ducks. “That nearly blinded me. You owe me now.”

  I step down into the lane. “What do I owe you?” I call.

  There’s a pause before the answer comes back: “You have to subscribe to my blog. I need more followers.”

  “What do you blog about?” I ask as I look around. I’m surrounded by hedges and lanky stemmed flowers. One way there’s nothing but fields. In the other direction there are roofs and a church spire.

  Brandon emerges under thorny branches, part sliding on his back, part limbo dancing, and I grapple with the hedge once more to help him through.

  “Trailers. Film trailers, book trailers. Not the sort with wheels.”

  “Oh.” I think about this. “Right. Trailers.”

  “It’s niche.”

  “I’ll check it out.”

  “Yeah, you have to.” He gives a final shake of his hair to rid it of wheat.

  We walk along the road, and as it curves round, we see a large red-brick house, and behind a wall we hear the splashing, shrieking sounds of kids in a pool.

  “Can you imagine having your own pool?” says Brandon.

  “We used to have one,” I say. “Until we moved.”

  “You must have been sad to leave that pool.”

  “No. I wasn’t.” I say it too sharply.

  I can tell he’s working up to say something. It takes him several seconds.

  “Did your sister drown? Is that why you’re a swim-squad kid who’s scared of water?”

  I nod. I can’t believe he’s worked it out.

  “Were you there?”

  “No,” I say.

  I hate myself for lying.

  ten

  Brandon and I climb back over the five-bar gate into Morley Hill grounds.

  “Let’s say we got lost,” Brandon says.

  “And that we lost the quiz.”

  Brandon pushes it further down the pocket of his shorts.

  The red T-shirted instructor is sitting on a deckchair next to the main dining area and is too busy texting to ask what happened to us, why Danielle isn’t with us, or to mind that we haven’t done the quiz. He’s happy to tick us off his list, take back the map, compass and pen, and return to his texting. “Well done, guys!” he says as an afterthought when we walk away in the direction of the yellow dining room for cake.

  There’s a self-consciousness between us now. We’ve shared something yet we still hardly know each other. We take a small path off the main one because it cuts off a corner. Much further up the path are two people walking away from us, holding hands.

  At the same moment, Brandon and I realize who it is. Joe and Fay.

  We look at each other and Brandon raises his eyebrows.

  Joe’s stride is long and bouncy compared to Fay’s small steps, and as they reach the top of the small path to join the main one again, Joe pulls his hand away from Fay’s. I slow down, not wanting them to know we were behind them, and Brandon matches my pace.

  “D’you think they make a good couple?” I ask.

  Brandon pulls his head back slightly. Surprised. “Er … yeah. Maybe. I don’t know. What do you think?”

  “I’m not sure,” I say.

  “Sometimes you can’t properly explain why someone fancies someone else,” says Brandon. He sounds as if he knows what he’s talking about.

  As soon as we step into the dining room, we’re greeted with a loud rendition of “Happy Birthday”. I step back and let Brandon cringe alone. The cake is home-made, large and chocolate. Pippa lights the candles and tells him to make a wish. I wonder if it
’s only me who hates wishes. If there are other people who think wishes are thoughts that hurt.

  Pippa cuts the cake up into small pieces and Brandon hands it out on napkins. She announces that tonight’s entertainment will be karaoke and goes on to introduce a man with a closely shaved head. That’s how the workshop on Coping with Difficult Feelings begins, before everyone’s been given cake and before anyone has a chance to leave the dining room. Brandon sends me a that’s-all-I-need-on-my-birthday face, which makes me smile.

  The man tells us he’s worked with lots of kids in our position blah blah, everyone is different blah blah, all feelings after bereavement are normal blah blah. Stages of grief. Blah argh. He holds up a book that a client of his made about their dad. Favourite memories. The usual. Write a letter that you don’t send. I’ve heard all this stuff from the counsellor at my old school already. She wanted me to do a journal of feelings. She even gave me a notebook. I thought about doing it, but then I pictured Mum or Dad or anyone else finding it and seeing my ugly feelings laid bare.

  When we’re all back in our room, I read through Mum’s texts, sent throughout the day. Scintillating snippets of news such as Oscar & I went shopping for new trainers and Back from the park. A smug one from Oscar, sent on Mum’s phone: In Nando’s. In between these are the anxious ones… Watch out for undercooked food (especially chicken). Make sure you lock your bedroom door at night.

  After I’ve texted Mum to tell her nothing bad’s happened and I’m still alive, my fingers hover over the MessageHound app that Luisa and I used to use instead of texting. We had a private group, just her and me. We liked MessageHound because of the logo, a cute cartoon dog with a piece of mail in its mouth and a tail that wagged when you had a message. The dog sat with a dejected face when you hadn’t messaged for seven days or more. There was also the important fact that you had to log in with a username and four-digit passcode so that Mum, who liked to monitor my mobile phone activity when we first set it up, couldn’t see what we were saying about her, Dad and Oscar. Back then, she was under the happy illusion that if she had my phone password, she had access to everything. We texted too, of course, when we couldn’t be bothered to tap in our passcode, but MessageHound was our thing. One day soon, I’m going to delete the app, but I can’t bring myself to do it yet.