Invisible Girl by Jill Childs

Author:Jill Childs [Childs, Jill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781786819604
Publisher: Bookouture
Published: 2019-05-29T23:00:00+00:00

Eighteen

Maddy

Ella and Rosie. Sweethearts, both of them, in their different ways.

‘Poo poo smelly pants!’ Rosie, eating her fish finger sandwich in the sofa-cushion den, dissolves into giggles.

‘Poo on your head.’ Ella can barely speak for laughing. Their eyes gleam, fixed on each other, happy, daring each other to go further, to be naughtier.

‘Smelly bottoms,’ says Rosie and they collapse again, convulsed with laughter.

I lean forward and straighten Ella’s plate to stop the fish finger taking a nose-dive off the edge.

‘Girls!’ I say mildly. They can’t shock me with their smelly bottoms. I’ve seen it all. The drunken louts who really do piss on your head if you’re sleeping rough. Heaven knows why.

‘Smelly bottoms,’ repeats Ella.

‘Stop copying me!’

‘Stop copying me,’ parrots Ella. That age-old game of annoyance. I imagine long-dead children, in some ancient land, sitting together, annoying each other in the same way in Greek or Latin.

Rosie sits up, cross now. ‘Stop it! I don’t like it.’

Then Ella, of course: ‘Stop it! I don’t like it.’

‘That’s enough, girls. Eat nicely and I’ll tell you a story.’

They both look round, eyes gleaming in the semi-darkness of the den.

‘Do you know the story of Peter Pan, the boy who never grew up?’

They shake their heads, interested now.

‘Well, you eat and I’ll tell you.’

They sit, cross-legged, side by side and munch, dropping crumbs on the carpet, and off we go.

They’re very different girls. Rosie is bold and curious, happy to walk up to a smelly lump of homelessness in the street, as I was, and ask my name. Ella is more reserved. Perhaps more complicated. A deep thinker. Or perhaps I just want her to be that. She has her mother’s brown eyes and she’s turned them on me often today, thoughtful, appraising. Still waters.

I’m careful with them both. Not too affectionate. Not too needy. I don’t take Ella on my lap, as I long to do, and hold her, breathe in her youth, her innocence, her faith in the world. I don’t bombard her with questions about her life, her home, her mother and father. I don’t earnestly ask her if she’s happy, if she’s kindly treated, if she needs anything, anything at all. I do none of these things. I clown about with them like a galumphing nanny and offer snacks and drinks and play raucous games and tell stories.

But beneath it all, as they giggle and play, I quietly learn her. The curve of her jaw, the puppy roundness of her cheeks, her straight dark hair tied into thin plaits, her way of observing, serious eyes and furrowed brow. The way she tilts her head and says solemnly: ‘Let me tell you…’ before she speaks. Her way of being in this world. I may never have this time with her again, I know that. I need to remember so the memory will last.

After dinner, we have another game of Hide and Seek. They dash together to crawl into the den or wrap themselves round with a curtain or crouch behind

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