How Not to Disappear Read online

  ‘Hattie?’

  ‘Sorry, what?’

  ‘Is Carl getting the twins to bed?’

  ‘No, he’s already gone out.’

  She gets a bottle of wine out of the fridge and pours herself a glass as she sits down at the table and eases her feet out of her work shoes.

  ‘Sorry, Hats, you’ve been left in charge again. You’re too reliable, that’s your problem. We take you for granted.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ I say. ‘It’s not like I’ve got anything better to do.’

  ‘Poor Hattie,’ Mum says. ‘Are you missing Kat?’

  I am. I haven’t even spoken to her since she went to Edinburgh so she doesn’t know I’m pregnant yet. I arranged to meet up with her at the pub before she left so that I could tell her I was worried. It was before I’d done the first test and I suppose I just wanted her to be reassuring and tell me I was being silly and I’d probably just got my dates wrong. I hadn’t even told her about me and Reuben (partly because she was never around and partly because I knew she’d give me a hard time about it) but I decided it was time to fess up and talk it all through. Kat always makes me feel better, despite her brutal honesty. She always makes everything seem simple somehow. And then Zoe-from-Kettering and the trees turned up too, so I couldn’t tell her. And now she’s hundreds of miles away. I sent her a text yesterday morning saying: Hope you’re having an amazing time. Call me when you can. I’ve got something important to tell you xxx. I got a reply saying: Love u Hats, speak soon xxxxxxxx but I haven’t heard any more from her. I’m sure it’s Zoe’s fault. She’s quite a lot older than us and very possessive and doesn’t like Kat having other friends.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say to Mum. ‘She’s not going to be back for ages. It’s not the same without her and Reuben around. And for all I know, Reuben might never come back.’

  ‘Hmmm.’

  Mum avoids talking about Reuben if she can help it. I don’t think she even realizes she’s doing it; she just sort of edits him out whenever she’s talking about my friends. I asked her once why she doesn’t like him and she’d looked at me, surprised. ‘I don’t not like him,’ she said. ‘I like him very much. He’s charming. And he’s always very sweet with the twins. It’s just . . . Reuben always makes me think of that Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times. Reuben is “interesting times” in teenage boy form. Which is why you like him, of course. I get that.’ She’d smiled and cupped my face in her hand for a moment. Thinking about that moment now, I’m overwhelmed by the urge to tell her I’m pregnant, to share the burden of it.

  ‘Mum,’ I say, not looking at her, ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’ My heart pounds at the thought of just saying the words to her. Just two words . . .

  ‘Oww!’ she yelps. ‘Dammit!’ I look up to see that she’s stepped barefoot on a Lego space ship that Alice has left abandoned in the middle of the floor.

  ‘You okay?’

  ‘No,’ she says, sitting down and rubbing her foot. ‘Why does Carl never get them to tidy up? Where is he anyway? It’s not Hips, Bums ’n’ Tums at the Leisure Centre is it? Or has he got a session at the new place?’

  I grin. ‘You mean “Pecs Appeal”?’

  Mum grimaces. ‘No,’ I say. ‘Some wedding thing. He was meeting with the florist. Or was it the caterers? I dunno. He said you knew about it. Think he was hoping you’d be there, whatever it was.’

  ‘Oh God, I completely forgot,’ she says, sighing. ‘Honestly, this wretched wedding is turning into a full-time job.’

  ‘You do want to get married, don’t you? I mean, you’re not having second thoughts?’

  ‘No,’ Mum says, a bit too quickly, not meeting my eye. ‘No, of course not! Why would I?’

  ‘I dunno,’ I say. ‘You don’t exactly seem enthusiastic about the whole choosing the flowers and dress and stuff.’

  There’s a tiny, guilty bit of me that almost hopes she might call it off, just so I can get out of the peach-bridesmaid-dress horror. But I don’t really want her to. Poor Carl. He and Mum have been together four years now, and he’s wanted to marry her all that time. Mum finally gave in last Christmas after his billionth proposal. He’d be devastated if she called it off and I don’t want that. I enjoy winding Carl up, and he may be a bit of an idiot, but he’s all right really, and he adores Mum.

  ‘I’m just snowed under at work that’s all,’ Mum says. ‘And the whole big Hello! magazine wedding thing . . . I don’t know. It’s not really me. But it’s what Carl wants.’ She smiles. ‘I’m tired, that’s all. And hungry.’

  ‘We saved you some pizza,’ I say. ‘Might be a bit cold, though.’

  She pads across the kitchen and nukes the leftover pizza in the microwave.

  ‘How have things been here?’ she says. ‘You look tired too. Pale. Not coming down with something, are you?’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘What were you going to say before? You said you had something to tell me?’ My heart thuds. Perhaps I should tell her . . . But I can’t. She’s just got in. She’s tired. The twins are charging about like rocket-fuelled maniacs upstairs. I can’t just blurt it out. And I need to work out how I feel about it, what I want to do. It’s my problem, my mess. I have to sort it out.

  ‘A woman phoned earlier,’ I say instead.

  ‘Hmmm?’ Mum sits back down and looks at the unappetizing blob of soggy dough and rubbery cheese on her plate.

  ‘It was kind of weird, actually.’

  ‘Was it?’ she says vaguely, as she chews her pizza and flicks through the post, sifting out the bills and junk mail and takeaway leaflets.

  ‘Her name was Peggy.’

  There’s a loud shout of ‘GERONIMO!’ from upstairs (Alice) and then ‘Watch out!’ (Ollie) followed by a very loud crash. Mum sighs. ‘Have the twins had a bath?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘This week?’

  ‘Yes. Ish. Probably.’

  ‘Are you two going to be ready for bed when I come up?’ Mum calls upstairs.

  ‘Mummyyyyyyy! You’re back!’

  ‘Did you bring Jaffa Cakes?’

  ‘Pyjamas on,’ she calls up to them. ‘Or no bedtime story.’

  ‘Did you ever meet any of Dad’s family apart from Nan? Or did he ever talk about them?’

  She looks up sharply at the mention of Dad. We never really talk about him. It’s not that we can’t. We just don’t. There’s no reason to. Even when he first died we didn’t talk about him that much. He’d been away so much when he was alive that he hadn’t really been part of the day-to-day, so things didn’t really change when he died. Not in a way I could explain anyway. And I knew somehow, like you do when you’re a kid even though no one tells you stuff, that although Mum would have talked about him if I’d wanted to, she didn’t really want to.

  ‘Why do you ask?’ she says.

  ‘The phone call.’ Mum looks blank. ‘The one I just told you about?’ She hasn’t heard a word I’ve said. ‘The woman I spoke to – Peggy – was the neighbour of someone called Gloria. Dad’s aunt, supposedly.’

  ‘His aunt?’ Mum pulls a face. ‘I don’t remember him ever mentioning anything about an aunt. Or about any family other than his mother. He didn’t really talk about that kind of stuff. I always got the impression they were a bit . . . dysfunctional. But who knows?’ She shrugs. ‘Family wasn’t really his thing.’

  It’s an innocent-sounding comment but there’s an edge to her voice as she says it. I know she’s not just talking about long-lost relatives.

  ‘Well,’ I say, defensive, ‘maybe he didn’t get on with them. Anyway, he was hardly ever here, was he? He could hardly be popping round to see his aunty every weekend if he was in Iraq or Bosnia or wherever, could he?’

  Even we didn’t see much of him, except on TV, reporting from faraway places I knew nothing about except that there were wars going on there. I didn’t mind. I was used to it. I loved it when he was on the news, looking all brave and blond, sometimes
in a flak jacket. My dad on telly. When I was little, Mum would call me in to see when he was on. But then, when I was a bit older, she wouldn’t watch. Sometimes you’d hear explosions in the background or gunfire, but I knew it couldn’t hurt him. He’d told me it couldn’t and I’d believed him. He was invincible.

  ‘What on earth did she want anyway? This aunt?’

  ‘It wasn’t her, it was her neighbour. Apparently the aunt – Gloria – she’s not very well. Sounded serious. She was worried. Peggy, the neighbour, I mean. She thought maybe you’d want to know.’

  ‘Why would I want to know? Given that I’ve never heard of her before today?’

  I stare at her. ‘She doesn’t have any other family.’

  ‘Sorry,’ she says, rubbing her head as though it’s aching. ‘That came out wrong. Of course I’m very sorry that she’s ill, but we’re hardly family, are we?’

  ‘Well, Dad was,’ I say. ‘So I am, even if you’re not.’

  ‘They can’t exactly have been close, Hats. I don’t remember her sending us any Christmas cards or inviting us round for Sunday lunch, do you? And now she’s ill she wants to play happy families? It’s a bit weird, isn’t it?’

  ‘I really don’t think—’

  ‘I mean, as far as I know she wasn’t even at Nan’s funeral. Her own sister. Perhaps they didn’t get on. How did she know how to get hold of us anyway? How did she have our phone number?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ I hadn’t thought of this. ‘I didn’t ask. Phone book? Internet. I dunno. It’s not hard to find people, is it? She knew about us, though. She knew my name.’

  ‘Did it sound as though she wanted money? Do you think that was it?’

  ‘No! I’m sure that’s not what she meant. Peggy’s just worried about this woman. Gloria. I think she just thought maybe we’d like to see her. And maybe it would help her to have some family around. She’s an old lady and she hasn’t got anyone else. Peggy didn’t ask for anything. She just made it sound as though she was lonely.’ I edit out the bit about Gloria being ‘a bit of a character’.

  Mum sits down and sighs, topping up her glass of wine.

  ‘I don’t mean to be unkind, Hats. It’s just I’ve got enough on my plate what with work and the twins and Carl’s wedding-planning frenzy without long-lost relatives who aren’t even my relatives turning up and needing my help. There must be someone else who can help. Some real family.’ She shakes her head and picks the pepperoni off her pizza. ‘Typical of Dominic that he can still manage to cause me problems even now,’ she mutters.

  Which really winds me up. How dare she criticize Dad?

  ‘Well, she’s my real family even if she’s not yours. And Alice and Ollie’s too. If you can’t be bothered to go and see her I’ll go on my own.’

  ‘Fine,’ Mum says. ‘You do that, if it’s what you want to do.’

  ‘Good. I will.’

  Mum sighs again and puts her hands over her eyes. Then she pushes her hair back and looks at me. ‘I’m not going to argue about this, Hattie. I haven’t got the energy. If you want to go and see this woman, I’m not going to stop you. But I don’t think it’s a good idea. Perhaps there’s a reason your dad never talked about her. You’ve got to admit it’s pretty strange, isn’t it? That she’s never been mentioned or turned up before now? I mean, even Nan didn’t talk about her. There must have been some kind of family feud. Best not to get mixed up in it, love. You don’t know anything about her.’

  ‘I know she’s a sick, lonely old lady. What else do I need to know?’ I say, piously.

  At which point a fishing net is plunged over my head from behind.

  ‘Gotcha!’ shouts Alice, who STILL hasn’t forgiven me for the Hobnobs thing.

  ‘Ow!’ I snap. ‘Alice that really hurt.’

  ‘And you’re not in your pyjamas,’ Mum says. ‘Horrors.’ Alice is still in her ‘spy outfit’ of wetsuit and night goggles. Ollie is behind her in the Sleeping Beauty dress Alice was given for her birthday and tried to set fire to.

  ‘Don’t be cross with her, Hattie,’ he says. ‘She was just practising stealth. You need it to be a spy.’ It’s true that stealth isn’t Alice’s usual tactic and it could certainly do with a bit of practice.

  ‘Okay,’ I say, still annoyed with Alice, but knowing that Ollie hates her being told off.

  ‘Come on,’ Mum says, shepherding Alice upstairs. ‘If you’re really quick, there might still be time for a story.’

  When I look up Ollie’s hovering, watching me.

  ‘Are you okay, Hattie?’

  ‘I’m fine, Ols. Never better.’

  ‘You don’t seem like it. You seem a bit sad.’

  ‘Do I?’ Ollie notices everything about everyone. He’d make a much better spy than Alice, for all her night-vision goggles and invisible ink pens.

  ‘Is it because Reuben’s not here?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘I’d be very sad if Alice was in another country.’

  ‘Yes, but Ollie, Reuben isn’t my twin, is he? He’s just my friend.’

  ‘He’s your best friend. Alice is my best friend.’

  ‘It’s different, Ols.’ I look at my little brother, his serious face frowning as he thinks, completely at odds with the garish pink dress. ‘But yeah, I do miss him. He’d only be getting on my nerves if he was here, though. Now go and get your jammies on.’

  Ollie comes over and gives me hug.

  ‘Night,’ I say, kissing him on his freckly nose. ‘Love you.’

  ‘Night, Hattie,’ he says.

  I sit for a minute after he’s gone, trying to imagine how it would feel to have your own kids. How much you’d love them. The thought of it terrifies me. But then what if you didn’t? What if you had a baby and you didn’t love it? What if it just got on your nerves all the time and you were stuck with it for life? People with kids always say you can’t hate your own, but do they just say that because they have to? And anyway, if you never wanted the baby in the first place, wouldn’t it be different?

  I wish I could talk to someone about it all. I wish Kat was here. I don’t want to tell her on the phone. And she’s never exactly been Reuben’s biggest fan. I send her a text. Hey HellKat, you ok? Call me? xx

  But she doesn’t.

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Subject: NOT BEHAVING LIKE A KNOB: A BEGINNER’S GUIDE

  I’ve been ignoring you, Reuben, but a) I don’t suppose you’ve noticed and b) even if you had, I’m resigned to the fact that you wouldn’t even know why. So let me help you out.

  I know you’re *terribly* busy lounging around on beaches and everything but you’re supposed to be my friend and part of what that entails, dearest Reub, is NOT FORGETTING ABOUT ME JUST BECAUSE I’M NOT WHERE YOU ARE.

  So, here is a short guide to not being COMPLETELY CRAP: (YES I KNOW I’M USING TOO MANY CAPITALS BUT I DON’T CARE.)

  1) Open laptop or take phone from pocket*

  2) Write friendly, informative message, featuring amusing anecdotes and asking after the wellbeing of your dearest friend (me)

  3) Send

  4) Go back to whatever more interesting thing you were doing

  *Ideally when sober enough to type

  Not difficult really, is it?

  ANYWAY because I am a generous and forgiving person I am writing to you anyway.

  So, I know you’re probably still getting over the driving test excitement but I have more thrilling news . . . I have discovered a mystery long-lost relative. A great-aunt to be precise. Her neighbour phoned earlier in the week and told me about her. Gloria. She’s my dad’s aunt and she’s not very well so she wants us to go and visit. But the weird thing is, none of us knew anything about her till now. No one ever mentioned her before. Do you think there was some massive family feud? Or maybe she’s got a criminal past or she was locked up in one of those awful lunatic asylums or something? I hope it wasn’t something boring like someone being
left out of someone else’s will or not turning up to someone else’s wedding. Mum’s being funny about it. She says it’s because she’s so stressy about work and Carl’s wedding madness. But also I reckon it’s because this old lady is related to Dad. I don’t know. It’s like she wants to pretend she was never married to him. Anyway, I’ve decided I’m going to go and see the great-aunt – Gloria – on my own. Everyone else is off having an adventure.

  You’re in France (I assume) being an international playboy. Kat’s in Edinburgh being a drama queen. Admittedly, going to see my great-aunt isn’t quite as glamorous as partying in Biarritz or wherever you are but still, it’s better than another day at the Happy Diner. I was having a totally rubbish day at work and I just told Mel that’s it. I’m going. There’s nothing you can do about it.

  Other than that everything’s the same. Of course.

  Hattie x

  PS Please tell me you know really that Jack Kerouac is an American novelist, poet and literary iconoclast and NEVER, under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, played for Chelsea.

  In fact, my conversation with Melanie hadn’t happened quite like that. I’d been on my break and Mack had said, ‘Coming outside? Or have you still “given up”?’, waving a pack of Marlboro Lights at me. And I’d gone, because it was a lovely sunny day and the staff room in the Happy Diner where we have our lunch was hot and airless and full of angry wasps, which are my all-time nemesis. And also because I really, really wanted a cigarette, and because I just wanted everything to be like it always is, and I thought what harm can it do, really? But then outside had been just as hot and everything smelt of traffic fumes and the cigarette had just made me feel sick and dizzy and a bit sad.

  Mack looked at me.

  ‘You all right?’ You seem a bit down.’

  I shrugged, because I didn’t quite trust myself to speak, and Mack said, ‘Hey, what’s up, Hats?’