Daz 4 Zoe Read online

  When I got in, Dad said ‘How was Alice?’

  I had just enough sense left to realise my parents might smell the booze on me and I was heading straight for my room. ‘Fine,’ I said. ‘Sends her love.’ Mum gave me this puzzled look as I breezed by but I didn’t stop.

  I made plenty of noise taking off my shoes and brushing my teeth so they’d think I was going to bed, but I didn’t. Not for ages. By a fantastic coincidence which you won’t believe, my window faces south, and what I did was, I stood for about three hours looking out. You can’t even see the city from my window but I stood there anyway, gazing south and thinking about him.

  You don’t have to tell me. Crazy, right? I didn’t even know his name, but by the time I got into bed one thing had become very clear.

  I had to see him again.

  You have to understand that it was virtually impossible for a surburbanite to fraternise with a Chippy. People lived, worked and played inside their own suburb or moved at speed between suburbs, and from newtown to newtown. The only Chippies we saw were those who had passes to come into a suburb to work. They came in the mornings and left at dusk, and they did all the crummiest jobs – digging holes in the road, collecting trash, cleaning washrooms. A few were servants or gardeners in big houses, but they had to leave in the afternoon like the rest. You let a Chippy stay the night, he’ll rip off all your stuff and maybe cut your throat for an encore. Chippies’re envious, see. Full of hate. Even the lucky ones with jobs in the suburbs. Nobody’d even talk to a Chippy except to tell him what to do, and as kids we’d cross the street whenever we’d see one coming.

  So that was the fix I was in. I couldn’t get this guy out of my mind and I had to see him again, but as far as I knew he didn’t have a pass, and I certainly couldn’t hope to get invited on another chippying expedition for some time. And even if I did, who’s to say they’d choose the Blue Moon? And if they did, why should he be there? He might use a different club every night, for all I knew.

  I moped. I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t concentrate. I started avoiding company, and of course Mum noticed the change in me and mentioned it and I damn near bit her head off.

  Finally I did what I always did when things got rough for me. I went and talked to Grandma.

  She’s one hundred and four years old and she’s still got all her marbles. That’s not all that unusual in the suburbs, of course. If she’d been a Chippy she’d have been dead fifty years. She’s Mum’s grandma, not mine, and she sees things differently. I mean, everybody else I know feels more or less the same about most things. I could tell my parents about some problem I was having, or I could talk to one of the teachers at school or I could go to a preacher, and they’d all say the same things, and I’d know all the things they were going to say before they said them. Like, suppose I told about this Chippy guy, right? How I happened to meet him and how I couldn’t sleep and all that. Well, it wouldn’t matter who I was talking to, they’d start by saying I shouldn’t have been chippying in the first place, and then they’d tell me Chippies’re not like us – they don’t have the same feelings, so it’s a mistake to get emotionally involved with one. They’d say that of course any further contact between this guy and me was out of the question, and finish by telling me I wasn’t really in love anyway – I was too young. Somewhere along the way they’d probably ask me whose idea it was to go chippying, so my original problem would still be there and I’d have a new one because I refused to give them a name.

  So I went to see Grandma. She has an apartment in a senior citizens’ block in another part of Silverdale. Wentworth Apartments. I hope I don’t need to tell you who put it up. This was a Saturday, by the way, two weeks after the fateful trip. I flashed my ID for the guy on the door, rode the elevator up and rang the bell. I had to wait a bit. Grandma has a quick mind but her legs’re slowing down some. She smiled when she opened the door.

  ‘Zoe. How nice.’ She peered at me. ‘Is something the matter, dear?’

  I shrugged and smiled. ‘Nothing much, Grandma. I’ve got to talk to someone, that’s all.’

  ‘Then you’ve picked the right someone.’ She’s terrific, old Grandma. I mean, if I was a hundred and four I’m sure I’d be too busy wondering how much time I had left and what happens after you die to want to be bothered with other people’s problems. Grandma’s not like that. She takes the time to listen. Time’s the one thing I have, she’ll say.

  She put me in a chair and fixed coffee like she was the kid and I was the old lady. When it was done she sat down facing me and said, ‘Now – what’s troubling young Zoe, eh?’

  I told her. When I was through she sat for a long time, gazing into her coffee cup. I sipped from mine, thinking, she’s stumped. First time ever. She doesn’t know what to say to me.

  Then she started talking, very softly. She didn’t look up at me. It was like she was talking to herself. ‘I was sixteen,’ she said, ‘and working in a music shop in Rawhampton city centre. One day a boy came in. A young man, really. Eighteen or nineteen.’ She smiled. ‘The instant I saw him my heart kicked me so hard in the ribs I couldn’t get my breath. I thought I’d die, right there behind the counter. He didn’t come to me. I was on records and he wanted a cassette. This friend of mine, Pauline, was on the cassette counter and he went to her. I stood and stared all the time she was attending to him. He was the most gorgeous creature I’d ever seen and I couldn’t tear my eyes away. If the boss had come in just then I’d probably have got the sack, but I couldn’t help it.’ She smiled, lifted her cup and sipped. ‘I followed him with my eyes as he left the shop. We didn’t have the cassette he wanted and Pauline was ordering it for him. I went across to look at his name on the order pad. I’ve never forgotten it. It was Gordon Payne, and it rang bells for me. I couldn’t understand why Pauline hadn’t passed out with excitement, but when I asked her when he was calling in again she said “Tuesday” in a matter-of-fact voice and slid the pad back under the counter.

  ‘Tuesday.’ Grandma sighed. ‘Of course, I can’t remember now whether it was a Tuesday or some other day. It doesn’t matter. The point is, it was four or five days before I saw him again, and during that time I was in torment. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I mooned all day and neglected my work. I lost interest in my friends and the things I liked to do. I somehow managed to convince myself that he’d noticed me, that he was pining for me right now as I was for him, and that when Tuesday came he’d declare his love and we’d live happily ever after.’

  She paused and looked at me. ‘He didn’t, of course. I’d waited all that morning in what the novelists call an agony of suspense, and when hecame in he collected his cassette, paid and left. He hadn’t even glanced in my direction and I never saw him again, but it was months before I stopped hoping. Months.’

  She sipped her coffee and I said, ‘You’re warning me, right? You’re saying he’s probably forgotten me already.’

  ‘I’m saying it’s a possibility you should bear in mind, Zoe. It could save you some pain, though of course it’ll cause you some, too.’ She smiled. ‘There was a song – oh, before my time even. “Love Hurts” it was called, and that’s what I’m trying to say. It hurts, even when it’s got everything going for it. When it hasn’t it hurts more, and this love of yours has nothing going for it. Nothing at all.’

  She meant, with him being a Chippy and all, but she didn’t call it impossible or tell me I only thought I was in love, and that’s what I mean about Grandma.

  I nodded. ‘I know.’ My voice was shaky with trying not to cry. ‘But I’ve got to see him again, Grandma. I’ve just got to.’

  I cried then. I couldn’t help it. I slid down off my chair and knelt on the carpet and buried my face in her lap like I used to when I was very small, and she stroked my hair. Neither of us spoke for a while, and then Grandma said, still stroking my hair, ‘Wait, Zoe. It’s all you can do. If this boy feels anything for you he’ll find a way to tell you so. And if he doesn’t, you’ll be left ri
ding out the pain, as I was.’

  It sounded a bleak prospect. I mean, maybe the guy wasn’t feeling anything for me right now – he only saw me once, for a few hectic seconds. If we could meet again in different circumstances -.

  I sniffled and said, ‘Couldn’t I go there, Grandma? Back to the Blue Moon?’ I felt her shake her head.

  ‘Better not, Zoe. Wait. I know it’s hard. It’s one of the hardest things there is, but you know we can’t make people love us. It happens, or it doesn’t. I hope it happens for you, but if it does it’ll only be the start of your real worries.’ She ruffled my hair and stirred and I lifted my face, leaving a damp place on her skirt. I said, ‘I feel much better, Grandma, now I’ve talked to you.’ It was true.

  ‘I feel better too,’ she said. ‘Perhaps I’m getting over Gordon Payne.’

  DAZ

  Mister James sez Wots got in 2 you Darren? He calls me Darren. its a fursday and i’m in school. i dint jack it in cos i’m not in Dred. Well its som wear to go innit.

  Noffing sir i sez, but thats a fib. somfing got in 2 me alrite and i know wot. Subby girl got in 2 me but i cant tell him that, can i?

  It screwed evryfing up, that nite. Evryfing. i wish it never happen but it did. i cant stop finking abowt her, even thogh i know she dont give a monkeys abowt me. Subbys dont fink we human even, but i fink abowt her all the time. How she hung abowt 2 say fanks. Kiss me. Gotta mean somfing, rite?

  Rong. Dont mean noffing. Subby trash playing arownd, like thay do. i wish i never helpt em. i do. Mick stopt coming 2 school. He’s in Dred. Only com 2 school cos i do and now hes gon. Week after that nite i call rownd his place. Arst him 2 fix anovver meeting wiv Cal. Yor joking, he sez. Cal risk his life 4 you and wot dos he see – he sees a guying lucking at Subbys like he lovs em. Sees a guy sooner help Subbys than his own sort. Own famly, mebbe. You make a prat outa me Daz, he sez, and nobody makes a prat outa me. Bog off he sez, and dont you com rownd no more.

  i want 2 join Dred. i do, but i keep seeing Cal. Jumpy Gal. The luck in his eyes. The way he went frou that window.

  So evryfings mucked up, rite? Only 1 happy our mam and she dont know abowt the girl. If she did she wont be 2 happy neever i can tell you.

  Aniway thats wots got in 2 Darren Mister James.

  Noffing.

  ZOE

  I really did feel better after I talked to Grandma. I’d been hatching all sorts of wild plans aimed at getting back to the Blue Moon, torturing myself with pictures of him finding someone, telling myself I could be that someone if only I wasn’t trapped in a cage called Sil-verdale. Now I found I had the strength to shut out these thoughts, and it was one less thing to fret about. It’s out of my hands, I told myself. I can only wait. It was sort of restful for a while.

  I’m not saying it was easy. It wasn’t. Waiting for something you really, really want and probably won’t get is terrible, and it’s particularly bad if you can’t share it with those around you. I mean I couldn’t say to my parents, oh by the way if you find me a little tense these days don’t worry. I’m expecting a message from this Chippy guy I met, or maybe even a midnight visit, and if it happens we just might go off together. I couldn’t tell them I was under a strain, and so I had to try to be my old sweet self, answering politely when they asked about school and friends and things like that – stuff I didn’t care about anymore. It affected me in various unexpected ways.

  Like that same Saturday. That day, while I was visiting with Grandma there’d been some sort of disturbance in the city. A riot. It happens a lot, and there’s usually a bit on the news about it, and then Dad will have something to say about Chippies and what he’d do to them if he were the government. He always says the same things, and I don’t pay it any heed because it’s just an automatic response with him and it’s not important, anyway – he’s never going to be the government. Mum doesn’t pay it any heed either – maybe she doesn’t even hear it anymore. Anyway, this item comes on screen and Dad says ‘Riot? I’d give ’ em riot. I ’d have a door-gunner in every ‘copter and cream ’em.’ He snorts. ‘They’d think twice before they’d riot again, I can tell you.’

  As I say, he’d said it all before, only this time I got a picture of Chippies crumpling under a hail of lead, and one of them was you know who. I said, ‘They’re people, Dad. Some of them’re probably nice if you know them.’

  He looked at me sharply, then his startled expression softened into a sneer. ‘Nice? I’ll tell you how nice they are, Zoe. One night a couple of months ago a bunch of Fairlawn kids drove into the city. Their folks thought they were visiting Goldengrove, and when they hadn’t returned at midnight a parent raised the alarm.’ He paused to create some suspense. ‘They found them next day, four of ’em, hanging by their feet on the forecourt of a derelict gas station, shot through the back of the neck.’

  Mum said ‘Gerald!’ – like that. I guess she thought Dad ought not to have told me this horrible story but it was all right. I’d heard it ages ago from Tabby, who likes such things. I said ‘That was Dred, Dad. They’re not all in Dred. Most of them’re just poor folks getting along the best way they can.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ I could see he was getting mad but I was mad too. ‘And just what in the bright blue blazes d’you think you know about it, Zoe? You, who’ve never so much as set foot outside of Silverdale in the whole of your spoiled little life?’

  I wanted to tell him then. Oh, I did. About the trash and the dogs and the Blue Moon and Chippy eyes up close. The crowd closing in and the way we were saved. I wanted to see the look on his face but of course I couldn’t so I said, ‘Grandma says they’re people like you and me.’

  ‘Grandma’s an old lady,’ he said. ‘Her savvy’s out to lunch.’

  Mum shot him a look because this was vulgar and also untrue. I didn’t say anything. I got up and walked out and went to my room and drew a helicopter and wrote ‘FAN’ underneath in big letters and left it around for him to find. Fan’s a Chippy word and he hates me using Chippy words.

  So I was in trouble at home. This was on top of my original problem, plus the fact that my few friends were cooling off from neglect and I couldn’t get interested in anything.

  Then, just as it began to seem that nothing would ever be right again, something else went wrong.

  I got in trouble at school, and this was something new for me. I believe in keeping my head down so I don’t get noticed, and this has usually worked. I never got detentions or counselling or any of that stuff. Not until this day I’m going to tell about.

  It was a Monday – the Monday after my Saturday clash with Dad. Modern History with Miss Moncrieff. I’ve never liked old Moncrieff and I usually switch off in her class because history’s so boring. Dates, dust and deadmen, right?

  Anyway, it was Modern History and I was looking out of the window. It was one of those gorgeous mornings you sometimes get in October when the sun shines through mist and makes it look like gold, and the dew’s still on the grass and that’s gold too, and all the trees are red and gold and there are spider webs made of crystal lace. I was looking out the window, wishing I was out there walking hand in hand with you know who, and Moncrieff’s voice was droning on in the background. She was talking about something called the Franchise (Income Qualification) Bill of 2004. (Yawn, yawn.) Not the most riveting stuff, even the first time around, and this was the second time around because we were revising for the November exams. Well – the others were. I was rehearsing something else entirely.

  Anyway she’s on about this bill and she must’ve spotted that I wasn’t paying attention and she stops droning and goes, ‘Why did the Dennison government introduce this bill, Zoe Askew?’

  ‘What bill, Miss?’ I asked. Well, she took me by surprise.

  ‘The bill I’ve been talking about for the last half hour while you’ve been gazing out the window.’

  ‘I don’t know, Miss.’

  You could tell she didn’t like it. She grew very still. Her cheeks went white and
twitched a couple of times as she looked at me. I felt quite nervous. I thought she might flip and fling herself at me, screaming.

  She didn’t. Instead she started speaking, softly and very distinctly, moving her mouth in an exaggerated way like I was just learning to lip-read or something. ‘The Franchise (Income Qualification) Bill was introduced to correct an anomaly whereby those sections of the population which contributed least to society were able to exercise undue influence upon it through misuse of the vote.’ She looked at me. ‘Do you think you can remember that?’

  ‘Yes, Miss.’

  ‘Good.’ She smiled like a shark. ‘Because when you go home this afternoon you will write it out forty-five times, word for word in your neatest hand – that’s one time for each minute you’ve wasted in my class today.’

  Some of the kids tittered and she froze them with her gorgon special. That’s a look she gives which damn near turns you to stone. She thought they were laughing at me but they weren’t. I knew why they were laughing. They were thinking, we’ve all wasted the forty-five minutes, Miss – that’s what your classes are – a waste of time, but of course nobody would say it. I was the only one dumb enough to talk back to old Moncrieff.

  I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, is that it? Is that what you call trouble – a few stupid lines to write out?

  Well, no it isn’t. We haven’t got to the trouble yet. That’s coming up next, as they say on telly.

  DAZ

  Dred gud, Subbys bad

  Dred gud, Subbys bad

  Dred gud, Subbys bad

  Dred gud, Subbys bad

  Dred gud, Subbys bad