Being Emily. Anne Donovan
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… passion for it.
Silence. Jas looked at his watch. I assumed he was fed up wi me, that whatever had attracted him had fizzled out in the reality of talking to me. I was used tae that. No one ever thought I was interesting.
I’m sorry, Fiona. I’d like to go on talking but I have to get to work.
You have a job?
I work in the pharmacy, my family’s shop.
He climbed doon fae the stool, stood next tae me, looking smaller fae my perch.
You know I think we should work together sometimes – talking about stuff could really help.
Cool.
And that was us.
After school we’d go for coffee, sit on the high stools, then I’d go hame and Jas would go tae work. Later we’d talk on the phone or go out thegether. At first I said I was meeting Mon and Jemma but after a few weeks it felt daft tae pretend. Jas and me were real.
I’d never been in love afore, never even had a crush on anyone really. The rest of the lassies were aye fancying guys or gaun mad over the latest popstar but I never had. When I was aboot fourteen I started tae wonder if there was something wrang wi me, did I have a bit missing? I knew I didnae fancy girls but I didnae recognise the stuff I read in the magazines, the heart stopping, the churning in the stomach. I went out wi boys a few times, usually to make up numbers on a double date, but I never felt anything. When they kissed me goodnight it was less exciting than getting licked by the Jacksons’ cat.
The first time Jas kissed me was three weeks after that first coffee. We’d went tae study in the library after school, sitting side by side at the tables near the reference section. We were baith working on dissertations for English. I was poring over Wuthering Heights, writing out quotes about nature and he’d Shelley’s poetry open in fronty him. I wish someone had taken a photie of us that day; two heids, his hair dark and shiny and straight, mines tangled curls the colour of tea. Notepads and paper spread out in fronty us, his neat spiky writing and mines bigger, looped and flowing. Just happy to sit thegether, every noo and again feeling his elbow nudge against mines as he wrote. Then the moment when we baith turnt to one another and him bending towards me, the soft feel of his lips against mines. Big smiles spreading across wur faces.
That night he put his airm round me as we walked up the road, and he kissed me again in the park, haudin me close this time, tongue in ma mouth and the wee jaggy edge of his teeth on my lip. He wasnae tall, Jas, only three or four inches mair than me, and we fitted that neatly thegether. Then we broke apart and held haunds, walking alang the path while the early evening light faded tae a gash of salmon pink behind the trees.
IT’S THE FRAMING that makes it.
Jas taught me about framing. Hours spent in the park taking photies for Art till I knew every leaf, every bud, every change fae moment tae moment.
It started one November Tuesday – my phone went at seven thirty when I was still hauf-dozing under the covers.
Fiona, look out the windae. I drew the curtain and there was a white wilderness where the back court had been.
It’ll no last, he said. Meet me at the front gate of the Botanics in hauf an hour. Bring your camera.
I gulped doon some orange juice, splashed cauld watter on my face and was at the gate five minutes early, cocooned in a fleece and wellies wi a pair of Da’s auld socks stuffed in them. Jas was waiting at the locked gate, stamping his feet and blowing on his haunds.
Nae gloves?
Couldnae find them – anyhow, nae use wi the camera.
A guy in a green council jacket undid the big padlock and as the gate creaked open Jas grabbed ma haund and the two of us sped intae the park.
At first we ran, giggling and shouting at the sight of the whiteness, desperate tae leave footprints on the frozen grass. We ran round in circles, hopped on wan leg, high on being the first folk, the only folk in the park. Jas even tried tae dae a cartwheel but leapt up screamin when he put his haunds on the ice.
We walked by the glasshouses towards the path to the river, starting tae notice the detail; an icing sugar bush wi wan red berry left on it, a swept-up pile of November leaves, salt-crusted wi frost. At first I snapped everything – I’d nae idea how they’d turn out so I took the same ice-veined leaf, over and over fae slightly different distances and angles. Then I slowed doon, started to take my time as Jas done, really look; working out the best angle, the best composition. Sometimes I manipulated the image, moved a brightly coloured leaf intae the centre of a collage of white mulch. Even the dirt looked beautiful, solid brown traced wi ice crystals.
Jas was right but, it wouldnae last. Even afore the trail of students shuffled its way tae nine o’clock lectures, there was a subtle shift; droplets of water appeared, as if the bushes grat for their lost beauty. In an hour it would be gone. I stood in front of an ivy growing fae a sheltered wall; the plant was still green except for wan leaf, which was perfect white. As I looked through the viewfinder, a droplet of water appeared in the centre of the white leaf, like a teardrop.
A great pain welled up inside me, though nae tears broke ma frost.
Everyone kept saying how bad it was for the twins. At their age. In first year at secondary, the age of transition, girls needed their mammy tae help them through all they mysterious womanly secrets. Somehow there was less sympathy for me and Patrick. Folk’d come in the living room efter the rosary, look at Mona and Rona on the settee, hair tied back in matching pink scrunchies, and say, Just when they need their mammy the maist.
Barely turning tae take the cuppa tea out ma haund, they’d lift two custard creams fae the plate, shake their heids and sigh.
Ach, lossing yer mammy is a terrible thing.
Lossing yer mammy. That’s what everybody said. I’m so sorry for your loss.
As if you just went out tae the shops and dropped her somewhere.
I’ve went back tae every shop but I just cannae think where I left her. Was it in Debenhams or H&M? Still, mibbe someone will find her and return her to me. She has this special identification mark, just at the side of her neck. And when you look in her eyes it’s hard tae see if they’re blue or green, wee flecks through them.
Naw, she wasnae lost, my mammy, she died. It’s us that are lost.
Mammy wasnae a great one for reading stories, usually she left that to my da, but she loved Peter Pan. And in Peter Pan there are the lost boys, the ones that have nae mothers. Peter went back tae his house and looked through the windae and his mother had forgotten about him, put another boy in his bed. When she got to that bit Mammy always said, Of course that’s no true. No real mammy would ever stop looking for her child if they were lost.
I imagine her, looking doon on us fae her windae in heaven.
All of us, lost.
Da the maist obvious, fallen apart. Dry cracks seemed tae appear in his face, craggy and dark like a rock cliff. Sat there on the couch, had tae be forced tae even have a cuppa tea, couldnae eat for greetin. But then this was the man who sat through This is Your Life wi tears streaming doon his face as some second-rate magician was reunited with his ninety-five-year-auld primary teacher. This was the man who wept buckets at Uncle Pete’s version of ‘And I Love You So’ on the karaoke.
Falling apart has advantages. Everybody tiptoes round, looks efter you.
Patrick came back and stayed while the funeral was on, done all the practical things, the organising, him and Janice between them. So the twins were petted and ma da was nursed and Patrick was respected. And somehow I fell through a crack and became invisible. Made cupsa tea, done the hoovering, the washing, made sure the twins had clean claes and there was enough tea and coffee and biscuits in the hoose for the endless