Waving Not Drowning 15: Filet-O-Fish Salvation

The black spray paint was still sticky as I turned the key in the door. Stephen was close behind and pushed it shut behind us.
‘What was written on the door?’ I asked looking into his eyes which were darting about the place as if any moment he expected a welcoming party to spring out.
‘I’m not saying nothing,’ he said shaking his head.
‘Go down and give the driver this,’ I said passing him about forty quid that I’d got out of one of the bags lying on the floor, ‘I’m going to start packing up some stuff then we’re going on a little holiday.’
‘Cool! Where are we going?’
‘Somewhere where we can think straight,’ I replied.
Stephen opened the door and ran downstairs. I lurched towards the fridge on the hunt for anything drinkable. My body had turned into a rebellious toddler and was now having a fully fledged tantrum, throwing itself on the floor screaming and shouting. I couldn’t do anything until I’d dealt with its demands.

The fridge was completely empty aside from one half bottle of clear liquid, I held the top up to my nose, it was lemonade, not even a whiff of alcohol. I tried not to panic and went into the front room which I could now see was like a scene from one of those documentaries where the council go round and find piled up newspapers and decaying plates of food everywhere and usually discover a toilet dyed brown with crap and then a small bearded man with long fingernails crawls out of a corner looking bewildered. But at this stage mess was pretty much irrelevant, I wasn’t expecting any guests, not yet. I had a few hours until Shady Sands discovered me missing and by then I’d be far away. Somewhere, anywhere where I could drink as much as I wanted everyday, didn’t have to think about rehab, my family or the increasingly menacing Danny who had no doubt scrawled something awful on the door and was now on his way to burn me to death, starting with my rope like hair which would go up Whoooshhhh! like a piece of dry tinder.

I shuddered, then located a small glass bottle of vodka, not my usual tipple but it would do so I raised the bottle to my lips and drank it straight. If I’d been Wonder woman this would have been the part where I whirled round and round growing faster and faster with every turn, quickly transforming into a spectacular super hero with amazing strength and the ability to fly. Instead I simply sighed, a sigh of immense relief because now at least I could perform simple actions. I started looking for another bag, something to put all my precious bits and bobs in or at least some pants, a toothbrush and all my bank and credit cards. The truth was I was getting a bit worried about money because I’d had no income for a while and the diet of booze, expensive video games, take-aways and other treats was using up all my savings. But that was the genius of credit cards. If I added them all together I had at least four thousand pounds to spend and by the time it came to pay them back, well I’d like to say I was thinking that far ahead but I wasn’t.

Stephen appeared next to me, he was panting. He looked even more unhealthy than five minutes earlier and I was reminded that I was supposed to be looking after him, my teenage mutant ninja turtle so I offered to make him a sandwich. The only problem was I quickly discovered that the bread was finished and there were only two stale Crispbreads (leftover from a life when I’d given a hoot about having a healthy diet). I put some marge and a smidge of Marmite on top and handed them to Stephen.
‘You look too skinny,’ I said to him as he declined my kind offer.
‘You don’t look hot yourself,’ he replied.
I was in no position to disagree seeing as I was still wearing my loony pyjama top and not much else and my hair hadn’t seen water or even a brush for a very long time.
‘I’m going to have a quick shower, get your stuff together and we’ll leave in about half an hour.’
‘How long are we going to be away for?’ Stephen asked.
I went into the bathroom and started the shower.
‘Who cares? Maybe we’ll never come back,’ I shouted.
‘Where are we going?’ Stephen asked.
‘Why so many questions?’ I said climbing into the shower and enjoying the feeling of nice clean water raining down on my neck.

I couldn’t make out what he said next so simply got on with showering, lathering up my rope hair with nice shampoo and then watching all the dirt swirling down the plug along with all the nightmares of charred goldfish. The towels were dirty, it looked like someone had blown their nose on one but eventually I found one which was going to dry rather than distribute dirt and I wrapped it round my shoulders. I then assessed my face in the bathroom mirror. The previous forty eight hours hadn’t been kind. For the first time I truly looked my age and then some. I was like one of those women who get wheeled into the street by some overenthusiastic beauty Nazi and are forced to face up to the fact they need immediate plastic surgery if they ever want to step out of the house again without a bag over their head. More worryingly I had what looked like broken veins on the end of my nose and tip of my chin like someone had dipped my extremities in blackcurrant jam. I tried to apply some rudimentary first aid on my face using a cover up stick and a bit of talcum powder.

Meanwhile things had gone strangely quiet with no video games, no sounds of packing. I quickly pulled the T-shirt back over my head. Stephen was sitting on the end of the bed clutching his head in his hands. ‘What’s wrong?’ I said sitting down next to him.
‘It’s all fucked up,’ he said rubbing his eyes angrily.
‘I know it is. That’s why we’re going away for a bit. We need some space.’
‘No this is fucked up!’ he said standing up.
As I tried to get him to calm down, he pushed me back onto the bed. I was shocked at first, completely taken aback because he was much stronger than I imagined for a little person. And also I didn’t like this side of him. Grey had come back.
‘What’s wrong with you?’ I said pulling myself up and hooking my T-shirt over my knees.
I reached under the bed for a bottle, if he went for me again I’d hit him over the head. As ‘Grey’ I could distance myself enough to cause him damage. But then I saw his face was red whereas Grey had always been pale and he actually didn’t look like Grey at all. He looked small, upset, confused, like the small boy that I’d shot in the leg (why was I thinking about that now? Was this all misplaced guilt?) He wasn’t crying in fact if he’d been crying it would have been a lot easier and less disorientating.
‘You’re mad,’ he said shaking his head.
Where had this sudden change in mood come from? A few minutes earlier he’d been excited at the prospect of running away together, ready to embrace whatever adventure unfolded next.
‘Don’t you want to go away for a bit?’ I asked standing up and carefully putting the empty bottle on top of the chest of drawers.
‘There’s no point,’ he said.
I decided to carry on packing. I’d seen a programme about bringing up children, apparently when they do something that you don’t like, you simply ignore them. I picked out a couple of pairs of pants, a clean top, a cardigan and two pair of socks. I found one of the roomier looking stolen bags and pushed this ball of clothes into the corner. I then rummaged around under the bed looking for shoes. It was difficult knowing what exactly to pack when you didn’t have a clear idea of where you were going. Would I need some heels at some stage? Would there be nice restaurants? Or would we need to run? Stephen meanwhile had slumped back on the bed and was tearing a strip of cardboard into tiny pieces.
‘You can just stay here if you’re going to behave like that,’ I said, quickly realising that I sounded exactly like my Mum.
‘Danny is going to get you anyway,’ he said coldly.
I stopped, a Converse trainer in one hand.
‘What do you mean he’s going to get me? Why would he get me?’
I didn’t need him to say anymore because I knew one of the big reasons Danny wanted to get me. But at the same time I wanted to find out how much Stephen really knew and what he was going to do about it. It would possibly signal the exit of Stephen and the permanent return of Grey.
‘Because he thinks you’re trying to be my girlfriend,’ Stephen said.
‘Jesus we’ve been through this before haven’t we?’ I said a sudden rush of relief coming over me.
That was it! Danny was protecting his friend from a ‘cradle snatcher’. Once I explained things it would all be alright.
‘And do you still think I want to be your girlfriend?’ I asked.
‘Yes…no…I don’t know,’ he said.
‘What can I do to prove to you that it’s not like that? We’re friends right? We play video games together, we eat Pringles, we watch crap TV, we make cheese on toast. That’s as far as it goes. If I wanted a boyfriend I would get one my own age!’
Stephen looked at the floor. He still had his back to me.
‘I know,’ he said quietly.
‘Right get your stuff packed up. If you shove the Playstation in a carrier bag we can take that with us. I imagine they’ll have a TV where we’re going.’
He nodded and went into the front room.
We were back to Stephen and Jess again. The tension had diffused. I pulled on clean pants and jeans, then a nice blue top that I’d never worn before because it had always been a bit tight round the middle but was now perfect as I hadn’t been eating solids. I looked in the full length mirror, took a deep breath and tried to convince myself everything was okay.
But all I felt was a terrible dread that ate away at my stomach.

I still hadn’t made up my mind where we were going when we arrived at Liverpool Street two hours later. It was lunchtime and all the coffee loving worker bees were buzzing about. I recognised all the different types and wondered how I had been one of them for so long. Now I felt superior. It’s odd how that can happen, even an unemployed alcoholic can look down on you. I felt like I was going on an adventure and didn’t know where I was going to be in a few hours. I was mistress of my own destiny. In retrospect this was far from the truth. Stephen was helping me stand up straight, for some reason the vodka had made me throw up violently at the side of the platform and I’d had to send him off to the off licence to buy some beer which was a bit gentler on the stomach. I was sipping at my third beer as he steadied me along.
‘I want to go to the sea,’ I said.
I still felt a bit nauseous so the idea of the sea felt right, it would do me a world of good. On a more profound note, the sea was where things happened, life changing events, it was where couples ran hand in hand into the sand dunes, into a bright future.
‘Ipswich? Is that sea?’ Stephen asked looking up at the departures board.
I burped, a small burp like a delicate sea anemone.
‘No silly, look I’m going to ask at information, why don’t you go and get us a snack and some refreshments?’
‘You’ll have to get the beer,’ he said.
‘I know, I’ll get those after. Can I borrow your mobile for a sec?’ I asked.
I needed to text Ruth, just so she could let my family know that I hadn't drowned or something(not yet anyway but this came later of course). Stephen’s eyes went off to the side then, like he was avoiding my gaze and if I hadn’t known him better I wouldn’t have noticed it but he really was a dreadful liar.
‘Why can’t I have your mobile?’ I repeated pouring a trickle of beer down my neck.
Each trickle brought the life back into my veins. Made my blood pump round and round and round. Filled my heart up. Made me want to launch myself across the station singing. Next time you see a wino singing, remember that. He’s not drunk. His heart is just full.
Stephen begrudgingly handed the mobile over and then disappeared into the crowd direction McDonalds.

As I shuffled towards the information centre, each step becoming steadier, more confident I tried to compose a short text which was sober, authoritative and loving. I needed Ruth to be convinced that wherever I was headed it was for the best.
‘I love you Ruthie Rabbit,’ I texted then paused leaning up against a ticket machine.
‘Am in a good place and will be seeing you all soon,’ I concluded.

Except the last word didn’t come out as ‘soon’ but as ‘sun’ and the text had already been sent before I realised it. Oh well. At least I’d done the decent thing. Now roll on seaside silver girl! Was that a song? Oh no it was ‘Sail on Silver Girl’? Wasn’t it? I waited in a queue which seemed to go on forever and was made up of suited drones all frantically tapping away into their tiny screens, too scared to put them into their bags in case they missed the latest update on whether the printer was fixed yet.

I emptied the beer and put the empty can back into the bag. Then I looked down at Stephen’s phone. Would it be dishonest to look at some of his messages? I wrestled for this for all of about three seconds and then thought I’d just have a small look, just at one, just because he was like my son after all and I was fully justified in looking at his texts, didn’t all mothers do that anyway? Just to check he wasn’t up to any monkey business? I moved forward in the queue slightly, one less suit to go and then tapped up his message box. The first thing that surprised me was that almost all of the mails were from someone called ‘Bozzo,’ who I’d never heard of before. Was this a secret girlfriend? Was it perhaps verucca death girl? And then as I tried to read the messages, I realised they were all in some sort of code which I couldn’t understand. Like abbreviations but taken several steps further so letters just represented whole words and then most of the words seemed to be slang or youth-speak, whatever you wanted to call it. Then I felt Stephen up by my shoulder and it was too late to pretend I hadn’t been looking.
‘I was just texting someone and I opened these messages by mistake,’ I said imaginatively.
He was holding a paper bag full of McDonalds.
‘What did they say?’ he said angrily.
‘Sorry look I didn’t understand anything anyway. I was just curious.’
He snatched the phone off me and for a second I thought he was growing back into Grey again, the colour draining from his face, his eyes getting pale and distant but then he quickly thrust a Fillet-O-Fish in my face and we were friends again.

We ended up heading towards Ipswich. Except it wasn’t our end destination. We couldn’t get a direct train to Southwold which was the place the ticket seller had recommended. ‘It’s nice there, really posh like,’ he’d said. Which had sounded good. Especially as the four thousand pounds that was lying dormant on my various credit cards was creating a stir in my stomach, making me want to spend, spend, spend. Because even then I knew our time was running out. I knew we couldn’t make a go of it. At least first we’d have a proper adventure that did not involve running through a wasted cityscape, crashing cars and blowing people’s heads off.

I wanted to take Stephen to the sea. He’d never seen the sea before.
We tucked into our McDonalds on the train and washed it down with beer purchased at the Whistlestop, immune to the stares of our fellow passengers.

We were mother bird and baby bird off to find our new nest.

As the urban grey gave way to green fields and trees, we smiled at each other.

This was what up until now I’d only found in The Wombles.
Life.
Adventure.
Hope.