Billy and the Golden Gate (10 page)

The sun is low; it sits a few inches above the horizon, gleaming a cold hard yellow gold and it's not shedding much light now.

“We're not far from Mr Sharpie's cottage. I wonder what it's like?” Peter says.

“Oh I dunno,” says Rufus. “I'm not that bothered.”

“Me neither,” says Billy.

“Me neither,” says Daisy.

Rex pauses for a second and cocks his leg.

Peter says, “Yeah, me neither.”

Miss Beetle looks at the four children and says, “You might not be bothered in seeing his house and that's fair enough. I'm not sure there would be much to see anyway, but I figure somewhere he's trying to find his place in a new home, if he would just turn to the light.”

“Don't understand you much there, Miss,” Rufus says.

Miss Beetle smiles, “Yes I see what you mean. Well, how about just wishing him well, in spite of all that he did.”

“Hmmm,” Daisy replies with a sceptical look on her face. “Easier said than done.”

“Now, Daisy, who – with a splink of sense – ever said this life was meant to be easy? If everything was easy, what on earth would we ever learn?” Jasmine Beetle says gently.

Daisy looks at Miss Beetle. After a moment, she nods her head.

Miss Beetle looks ahead, “Not far now.” She points to their little village, lots of houses have their fires lit; the smoke billows and forms funny shapes in the darkening sky.

“I'm hungry,” says Rufus.

Daisy rolls her eyes, “Rufus, when are you ever not hungry? Seriously.”

“Never,” he replies simply, honestly.

“This is me,” says Miss Beetle. “You lot mind yourselves on the road. Rufus, keep a good eye on Rex; you've no lead. Daisy, the book please.”

Daisy reluctantly hands her the book. Miss Beetle then hands the book to Billy.

“I'll expect that back in prime condition,” she points at the spine of the book, “by the weekend, OK?”

“Yes, Miss,” Billy says.

Miss Beetle opens her gate. Rex whines pitifully but stays at Rufus's side.

Rufus says, “Miss, can I bring Rex to school tomorrow?”

Jasmine turns slightly and looks at Rex.

“Inside, no peeing, no pooing, no getting sick and no eating my lunch, understand?”

Rex rolls out his tongue, panting happily, and barks.

“OK,” she says. “See you in the morning.”

Miss Beetle walks up her path, opens her front door, steps into her little house and closes the front door behind her.

The children walk on. Rex stays close to Rufus. Soon, they reach his house. The lights are on and the car is parked in the driveway; his dad is home. Rufus's face falls; he says goodbye to his friends. When he gets to the front door, he pushes the doorbell.

His dad opens the door, his dad looks like he doesn't know what he wants to do, cry or yell. He says, “Where the hell have you been Rufus?” gruffly.

Rufus looks up at his dad, confused.

“You've been gone all day. Your dinner's stone cold.” His dad looks at Rex. Rex sits and looks back, his face is inscrutable.

“Oh and Rex, you've destroyed the back seat of the car you know, should've known better, fish never did agree with you,” his dad says. He pats Rex on the head, but Rex now just looks grumpy.

“Rufus, don't do that again,” his dad says sternly. As he talks, he wraps his arms around his son and, for a moment, holds him so tightly that Rufus's big open face turns a bit purple.

“Let's heat up that dinner for you, you must be starving.”

Rufus nods. He glances back at his friends and gives them a shy smile.

*

Daisy, Peter and Billy walk past the tearoom – there's Missus Furnish, she is sitting at a table. There's a big pot of tea and one of those three-tier cake stands; the cake stand is half empty. Missus Furnish sees the children and glares at them; she tilts her nose upwards, showing a huge blob of cream at the corner of her mouth.

Next is Peter's house. There's a pile of rubbish on the front lawn and it smells foul.

“I'm going to talk to Jenny about vampires,” Peter says deliberately and seriously.

“Proper order,” Daisy says.

He walks up to his front door and when he opens it, loud music belts out. Daisy sees Jenny in the background. She is wearing a lot of black; she looks like she is sulking and trying hard to be misunderstood.

Daisy rolls her eyes. “Some girls will never learn,” she whispers to Billy. “Peter has his work cut out for him.”

*

A few hundred yards later, they are outside Daisy's home. There's a fire burning. The curtains aren't drawn yet, so Billy can see Daisy's mum – she's holding a screwdriver, her tongue is sticking out a bit, and she's fiddling with a socket. Her dad is upstairs. One of those green reading lamps is on; he must be reading something.

“Right, I'm not that fond of goodbyes,” Daisy says. “Either way, I'll see you in the morning – plus, we have that maths test.” Daisy is the only one of Billy's friends that sounds excited when she talks about maths tests.

“Do you want me to mind the book for you?” she asks innocently.

“Nah, you're grand, see you in the morning,” Billy says.

Daisy gently punches his arm and skips inside.

*

Billy walks; his lace has come undone. He looks down, sighs. He kneels and ties it back up.
There,
he says to himself.

Finally, Billy reaches his front door. He lifts the knocker; it's in the shape of a horseshoe on its side. He cracks the knocker against the wooden door a couple of times. Billy's mum opens the door. She has tied her hair up and put on some nice clothes; a glittery grey scarf, bright blue, round-neck jumper and a grey wool shirt. She's wearing smart black zip-up boots and tights and makeup.

“Good day, Billy?”

“Was OK, I guess, interesting.” Billy pauses. “You look lovely, Mum.”

“It's high time I started making an effort,” she says simply. “It's good to have you home. I was worried about you, you know?”

Billy hangs his head.

“Now, don't start trying any of that nonsense on me either though,” she says seriously.

Billy looks up at her and smiles, “No, Mum.”

“You hungry?” she closes the front door behind Billy.

Billy shakes his head, “Not much really.”

Billy's mum glances at him.

“Well, I have some rice pudding with sultanas, but if you're not bothered…”

“Oh, OK then,” he replies immediately.

“Missus Furnish called,” Billy's mum says. “Said you were being troublesome, scattering rubbish all over the place – that true?”

Billy breathes in, “Well, I did throw a Curly Wurly wrapper on the ground, but then she took it off me.”

“Now you know better, Billy Spade. What did your dad always say?”

“Least said, soonest mended.”

“Not that, you cheeky monkey.
Apart from that,
your Dad always said ‘don't litter' and then he would talk about our beautiful earth and how God expected us to cherish it,” Billy's mum finishes.

“It was just a Curly Wurly wrapper, Mum,” Billy replies, exasperated.

“Same difference, young man, and you do know better.”

Billy nods.

“Either way, you'll have to do something nice for Missus Furnish. She means well, you know.”

Billy looks at his mum. Missus Furnish is one of the most annoying women in the village.

“But Mum–”

Billy's mum says, “She's carrying a little extra weight and trying so hard to get rid of it, and her Jim isn't long gone, and she's all alone in the big house with the big garden, and she spends her time organising and everything so that she doesn't dwell on things too much – so, what are you going to do?”

Billy sighs. “OK, I'll go over to her house tomorrow, after school, see if she wants any help with the weeding and stuff,” he says.

Billy's mum dishes out a generous helping of rice pudding for her son and pops it on the kitchen table. Billy fetches a spoon and sits down. The pudding is steaming hot and smells delicious. He lays the book down on the table and shuffles off his backpack. Billy's mum sees the book. A look of surprise flits across her face, but she doesn't say anything.

After a few mouthfuls, Billy's cheeks have turned a slight pink colour. It is the best pudding ever. When he is finished, he brings his bowl over to the sink and rinses it, leaving it to dry on the draining board.

“I have a maths test tomorrow. I'm going to do a bit of homework,” he says.

“Good lad, I'm here if you need me, OK?”

Billy slouches up to his room with his backpack and the book.

*

Daisy is sitting in her bedroom. It is pink, pink, pink. There's a poster of
My
Little
Pony
on the wall; the poster is pink. In fact, the only things that aren't pink are Daisy's books, her favourite teddy Barrels (shaped like a… barrel) and her reading lamp which is green, like her dad's – it clashes terribly with the room.

Daisy is sitting at her desk, her ankles crossed. She has a pencil in her right hand and she is doing sums, furiously – practice makes perfect. It's funny, all of her friends assume she is just really clever, but the truth is Daisy is about five percent clever and ninety five percent character; the character being stubbornness, resilience and plain old hard work.

Her bedroom door opens; her mum is standing there with a mug of warm milk and a small plate of iced pink biscuits. Her mum walks over to Daisy's desk, puts the plate and mug down and plants a small peck on her head.

“Don't stay up too late, sweetheart, school tomorrow. You will do fine in the test.”

“Thanks, Mum, I won't.”

“Won't stay up too late?”

“No, I won't stay up too late,” Daisy reaches across to the plate, takes one of the pink biscuits and nibbles delicately at it.

*

Rufus is also in his bedroom. At a cursory glance, it is surprisingly neat; lots of blue, and posters of racing cars and stuff. However, underneath his bed, it is a right tip; odd socks, sweet wrappers, comic magazines with handprints, and at least one mouldy cheese sandwich. It's the one thing Rufus is not that fond of: cheese.

Rex is scratching his back on the floor, making contented moaning sounds. Rufus is sitting on his bed; he has his copybook open on his lap and he is chewing the end of his pencil. The copybook is open on two blank pages, apart from a fingerprint smudge in the bottom left-hand corner. His tummy makes a noise, a low end rumble. He puts his copybook down and gets up. Rex keeps an eye on him but he stays with the scratching. He's doing a right good job.

Rufus opens his bedroom door and runs downstairs; his dad is sitting on the couch in the living room watching a national geographic programme about vintage cars.

“Dad, do you want some toast?”

“Heh? It's nighttime,” his dad replies.

“I know, just a bit you know, just a small snack,” Rufus says. The moaning upstairs has stopped. Rex is mooching down the steps.

“Go on then, I'll have some Nutella on it.”

“OK,” Rufus says.

Rufus digs out some sliced pan
¹³
from the bread bin and sticks it under the grill. There's not much Nutella left in the jar, but there is enough for two fairly generous helpings for the pair of them. It means Rufus will just have to have butter and marmalade for breakfast.

Rex watches him intensely. When the toast is ready, Rufus slathers on the spread. Rex is salivating. Rufus hands his dad one of the slices and keeps one for himself. Rex is now sitting upright on the floor in front of Rufus.

“Dad?”

Between mouthfuls, his dad replies, “Uh huh.”

Rufus breaks off a corner of his piece of toast and hands it to Rex, who gently grabs it with his teeth, careful not to bite Rufus.

“Is Mum ever coming back?”

His dad throws a cold hard look at Rufus. He takes another bite out of his toast and munches on it slowly. Rufus looks at his dad; it seems like forever.

“Good toast,” his dad says.

“Thanks,” Rufus replies quietly.

“I doubt it and if she did, I wouldn't want her here, Rufus. She's hurt us – you, me – enough for a lifetime as far as I'm concerned. Anyway, we're all right,” he finishes sternly.

“You don't forgive her, do you?”

“No, and that's enough of that now, do you hear me?”

“Yes, Dad.” Rufus gives Rex another piece of his toast. Rex grumbles in delight.

“Sorry, Dad,” Rufus says, his lower lip trembling just a bit.

His dad reaches across and firmly pats Rufus's knee.

“Now look here, you don't go apologising to me. You have nothing to be sorry for Rufus. It was never your fault that she left; she just didn't love me anymore.” His dad pauses. “And that's a fact.”

Rufus nods and his lip stops trembling.

“Now, are you going to tell me what on earth you got up to today?”

Rufus smiles, finishes his toast in one quick gulp and nods his head.

“Well…”

Rufus talks non-stop for ages and ages while his dad turns off the telly and listens, properly listens – the kind of listening where his ears seem to grow into bugles he is listening so hard.

*

Peter is in the kitchen, having a hot chocolate that his mum has made for him. It doesn't taste very chocolaty – in fact, it doesn't taste very anything except yeuck. Peter sips it, slowly.

Jenny is standing at the hob, cooking some lentil soup for herself. In her mind, she looks forlorn, grappling with unrequited love, pale and very, very interesting. In reality, she has chubby cheeks and a healthy glow that would put an Olympian to shame.

“Jenny,” Peter starts.

Jenny glares at her brother.

“Don't call me Jenny, my name is Jennifer!” she rasps.

Peter sighs and pushes his glasses back up his nose. There is a loud whacking noise coming from the living room; Peter's mum is working on her installation.

“Mummmm!” Jenny yells. “Quiet down, will you!”

The whacking continues at the same pitch.

Peter says, “Saw wolves and bats today.”

“Oh yeah?” Jenny replies sarcastically.

“Yeah,” Peter says. “The wolves were really friendly, liked a good scratch, just behind their ears, warm, nice.”

Jenny looks at her brother.

“Are you making this up?”

“Nope,” Peter shakes his head.

The lentil soup has started to bubble. Jenny turns off the hob and lets it stand still.

She folds her arms. “Where were they?” she asks.

“In the forest,” Peter says. He puts his mug of hot chocolate back on the table. It's lukewarm now and just tastes plain disgusting.

“Well, wolves and bats are one thing, but werewolves and vampires are another thing entirely. They only make themselves known to certain people,” Jenny says, the clear implication being that she is a ‘certain' person.

“Hmmm,” Peter says.

“And what's that supposed to mean?”