Wonderboy Read online

  “You’ll be talking a grand,” Pest Controller adds.

  Instantly, I go off the idea of disturbing these birds’ natural habitat. There’s something pleasing about providing temporary accommodation for small creatures who huddle together in nests. Plus there’s the educational aspect. In this modern age, crammed with stuff I vowed I would never allow in our home—Quavers, Nesquik, Dairylea Lunchables—Tod can at least while away hours by standing in the garden, noting when the parent birds go in and out. It might even distract him from Mazes and Labyrinths.

  Pest Controller hands me his card, flicks a cobweb from his thigh and steps into his ordinary car. “There is good news,” he adds. “At least it’s not rats.”

  June sixteenth. School sports day. Sunshine pounds onto the playing field, triggering grown men to wear minuscule shorts in shimmery fabrics and expose limbs in shades varying from blue-white to putty. Marcus, who has taken a day off work to encourage Tod to excel at athletics, looks quite dazzling in his white T-shirt, jeans and sunglasses, which Tod has been banned from touching since he was found experimentally bending their arms.

  Marcus’s presence has been noted by several mothers who stand in a tight circle, their children bounding around them like hares. One boy’s T-shirt already bears three winners’ rosettes. Most of Tod’s classmates—even Harry, with his wheat intolerance—are big for their age, or is it Tod who’s under-developed? He still wears an age-four-to-five gym kit. His knees look like knots in the threads of his limbs. Rather than limbering up and assessing the track marked out with little triangular flags, he is jamming his left foot into a rabbit hole at the far edge of the field.

  “Start by picking up your egg and spoon,” Miss Cruickshank booms to a cluster of children. “Run to the hoop, step through, and sack-race the final stretch. Tod? Tod Skews! The race is starting.”

  Tod squints up at the sun, extracts his foot from the burrow and creeps stealthily across the field toward her.

  She blasts the whistle, and there’s a roar from the parents, and I’m amazed at how fast small people can run, even with eggs and spoons. A redheaded boy ploughs ahead of the pack. He has powerful thighs and trainers that light up as each foot smacks the ground. He’s still panting excitedly as Mr. Quigley, the head teacher, pins on his rosette.

  Tod disentangles himself from his sack and folds it neatly, aligning its edges to form a hessian rectangle.

  “Good effort,” Carl says, patting the top of Tod’s head.

  Carl’s sunglasses are teardrop shaped, the lenses graduating from clear to pink. He came round to our house last night. He and Marcus had stuff to discuss. I slapped emulsion on to our newly plastered kitchen walls and tried to blot out their voices with fierce sweeps of my roller.

  Just after ten, they went out. I ran upstairs and watched them cross the road and stride into Joe’s garden. His truck was gone, and there were no lights on in the house. I watched them through Tod’s yellow binoculars. There was some pointing and crouching in the long grass. I was still clutching the roller, which dripped on Tod’s bedroom floor.

  Carl marched back in with a puffed-out chest as if he’d got away with doing something really naughty, like stealing a penny sweet. “Thirteen inches tall at its highest point,” he announced.

  “What is?” I asked.

  “The weirdo’s grass. That might not sound too bad, Ro, but the thistles are taller and there’s bindweed running rampant.”

  A bubble of laughter rose up my throat and exploded out of my nostrils.

  “It’s not funny, Ro,” Carl said. “The weed seeds will infect other people’s gardens.”

  Weed seeds, I liked that.

  “It’ll be the weather,” Marcus said, pouring a whiskey for Carl. “Highest rainfall for over a decade, the Gazette said.”

  My serious boots were speckled white from the paint. As he was leaving, Carl asked, “Is that bare plaster you’re painting?”

  “Yes, Carl.”

  “Then you should have diluted the first coat. Better coverage.”

  Now, between races, children cluster around a rickety table bearing juice cartons with straws stabbed through their lids.

  “Won anything yet, Tod?” Lucille asks.

  Tod is guzzling a scary green drink. “Don’t like races,” he huffs.

  The girl from the grocer’s is chatting animatedly to Marcus. Her writhing toddler is parked on her shoulders, and keeps slapping his hands over her eyes. When the child’s dummy falls out, Marcus picks it up for her. The girl sucks it, and hands it back to the kid.

  Sports day ends with a relay race. Each of the three school houses forms a precarious line. I lurk by the drinks stall, away from the other parents, so I don’t put Tod off. The race starts. Tod appears to be batting off a flying insect. He’s front of the line now. It’s his turn. His teammate lurches past, flings him the baton. Tod looks down at it. “Baton!” someone yells, too close to my earhole.

  Miss Cruickshank skitters over and presses the baton into Tod’s limp hand. He studies it, as if it’s a mysterious object you’d find in a museum, possibly used for grinding corn to make ancient Egyptian bread. Sweat patches darken the armpit regions of Miss Cruickshank’s silvery blouse. Tod looks up from the baton and scans the cluster of mums and dads. Then he spots me and starts waving. He’s so pleased to see me that he’s forgotten about sports day and the baton. He hasn’t the faintest idea why he’s standing at the front of the Medway House line with thirty children, all yelling, behind him.

  The mums and dads are laughing now, and no one is watching the other teams, who are passing batons efficiently; they’re all looking at Tod. He’s frowning at me, like he can’t figure out why I’m not waving back. Marcus is pretending to brush grass from his shoe.

  When it’s over, he takes Tod by the hand and says, “Come on, Wonderboy, let’s get you home.”

  Tod is grinning wildly and springing from foot to foot. He thinks Marcus means it in a good way, like he’s a wonderful boy. He thinks he’s done the right thing.

  Carl is useful for certain difficult tasks. Having learned of our bird problem, he shows up at teatime with his son Leo and a shiny new aluminum ladder with which he will access our eaves. Leo lets his end of the ladder drop on our path with a crack.

  I have never had a proper conversation with Leo. I am unsure how to relate to a person who speaks like a man, yet requires his mother to airlift the batter from his cod when they eat out at Fat Billy’s Fast Food. Lucille is worried about him. He used to be out all the time with his basketball friends, but now spends most of his time in his bedroom, poring over astronomy books.

  “Hold it steady,” Carl instructs, climbing up to investigate the birds’ entry point.

  Leo doesn’t hold it at all, just picks at the wall of our house where the stone is crumbling, probably due to bird poo corrosion. He is behaving as if he wants his dad to fall off—and who could blame him?

  “Seen the state of this guttering?” Carl yells from up high. His enormous shorts billow outward, like pale lemon pillow-cases. He is wearing socks the color of Elastoplasts, plus tan sandals. I hope none of the Best-Kept Village judges witness this spectacle.

  “I think there’s a hole above Tod’s bedroom window,” Marcus shouts up.

  “There are many holes,” Carl declares.

  He has also brought chicken wire with which he will block the gaps. He and Marcus have already scoured the attic as best they could, although I told them that Pest Controller had been up there already. They found only a broken ironing board and a hefty leather-bound bible, but nothing resembling nesting material.

  Lucille shows up with Adele when the holes have been fixed. Marcus has asked them all round for supper. I had this great idea of letting everyone design their own pizzas and have laid out dishes of ham, pepperoni, peppers and cheese. I’m feeling quite chuffed at being so organized and child friendly.

  “Don’t like pizza,” Adele announces. Her hair is scraped back into a tight p
onytail, a style that makes her head look like an enormous egg. Reluctantly, she drops two slivers of ham onto a tomato-smeared base. She and Leo have passed the age at which it’s exciting, getting to design your own dinner. Leo has a milky complexion and the beginnings of sideburns. He appears incapable of using a knife properly, yet can cultivate decorative facial hair.

  “I spoke to the council,” Carl says through a full mouth. “Passed from department to department—planning, environmental health. They doubt it’s a health hazard. It’s not like he’s letting his household rubbish pile up. People can do what they like with their own gardens—can you believe that?”

  “What about the tree house?” Lucille asks.

  “They’re concerned about that, with this being a conservation area. The planning guy’s sending someone round.”

  Tod has hacked away the center of his pizza, leaving a ring of crust, like a primitive necklace. “I’d like a tree house,” he announces. Marcus chooses to ignore this. “Joe says I can play in his tree house whenever I like,” Tod adds with a smirk.

  Carl laughs, and glances at Marcus. “Is that a good idea, Tod? I’m sure your mum and dad don’t like you playing with strangers. He could be anyone.”

  It’s parents’ night at Chetsley Primary. Miss Cruickshank occupies a table in the farthest corner of the gym hall. Parents are chatting with teachers as if this is some kind of informal get together, with much joking and hilarity. Harry’s parents are having such a rollicking time with the head teacher, a doughy-faced man with several trembling chins, that I suspect they’re planning a two-family holiday. I hear Tina calling him George, not Mr. Quigley.

  The summer term appears to have taken its toll on Miss Cruickshank. Her hair, which once puffed softly and cloud-like, now looks as if it’s been sat on. Her rumpled blouse is patterned with peacock feathers. “Tod is starting to settle in,” she says with a small smile. She waggles her clear plastic wallet of notes. I know what’s coming: reading and maths, fair to middling. Handwriting, poor. Concentration, clearly a problem. Do you do a lot with him, Mrs. Skews? Can you help him to focus at home? Practice his key words?

  Her lips are moving and it’s the same old script. Marcus is nodding, but saying nothing. I am mesmerized by one peacock eye, which gawps from the center of Miss Cruickshank’s bosom. It’s brighter than the others, searing blue with a green ring around it and a hairy brown edge.

  “Sometimes,” she says, “I feel that he’s not paying attention. It’s as if he’s not all there.”

  “What do you mean?” It’s the first thing I’ve said. I sound like a damaged cat.

  Tina stops bantering with Mr. Quigley—George—and gives me a concerned look.

  “He seems to live in a dream world,” Miss Cruickshank prattles on. “Tod World, I call it. The trouble is, Mrs. Skews, he often fails to complete his work in the allotted time.”

  “Shouldn’t we have been told about this?” Marcus asks.

  “Your wife and I did have a chat,” Miss Cruickshank says quickly. Her ring has an emerald in the middle and diamonds around it, like the spikes of a star. I wonder if it leaves a purple groove when she takes it off, or if it’s stuck on.

  “Well, thank you,” I say, shoving back my chair with a clatter.

  “Don’t look so down, Mrs. Skews. His Egyptian topic work has been wonderful. We’ve moved on to botany now. Tod told me about a friend whose garden is bursting with wildflowers.”

  Marcus flings me a look.

  “That’s great,” I manage to say.

  Outside school, I call home. “Lucille? Mind if we stay out a bit longer? Just fancy a drink.”

  “Everything okay at school?” she asks.

  “Yes, great.”

  “See? I told you he’d soon settle in.”

  The Poacher’s is populated by boys who look no older than Leo, boys who can’t cut pizza, and an elderly man in a stained navy suit. He is eating humbugs from a brown paper bag, piling up the wrappers in an ashtray on the bar. A dog lies at his feet, an Airedale I think, mottled gray with a box-shaped head. Tod calls this breed a shoebox-head dog.

  Marcus sets our drinks on the table. “She might as well say I’ve done a crap job as a mother,” I blurt out.

  “You’re not doing a crap job. We both know what Tod’s like.”

  “What does she mean, he’s not all there? Is there something wrong with him?”

  Marcus sips his beer—mine is half-finished already—and nods at the man with the humbugs. “She’s just saying he’s easily distracted, which is quite true.”

  “But he’s not. Look at the time he spends on his drawings. The roof could blow off and he wouldn’t notice, he’s so wrapped up in—”

  “You’re shouting,” Marcus points out.

  “I’m not shouting.” I need another beer but don’t want to blast Lucille with booze breath.

  “Tod’s fine,” Marcus says quietly, “when he’s doing what he wants.”

  “Should he see a psychologist? He might have some kind of syndrome.”

  “For God’s sake,” Marcus says.

  My son is not all there. Is it any wonder, when his dad’s hardly there, either? “You need to do more with Tod,” I announce. “Stuff that other dads do with their sons.”

  “I do my best, Ro.”

  “I feel like you’re not interested.”

  “What about you?” He bangs his glass on the table, which causes the shoebox-head dog to twitch fretfully. “You’re not remotely curious about my work, or octopush. We won last night, beat Fulham Flippers six–two. You never ask about that.”

  “Stuff octopush,” I snap.

  “Mind if I join you?” The humbug man lowers himself on to the vacant chair at our table.

  “Please do,” Marcus mutters.

  The man has a Scooby-Doo plaster on the palm of his hand. The dog yawns, and settles between the man’s feet. “You’re from London?” he asks.

  “That’s right,” Marcus says.

  “Come from Kentish Town myself. Glad to leave the dump. Isn’t it good to get away from all that, and be normal?”

  Marcus and I never argue. We might have disagreements—that’s what it was, the thing in the pub—but we don’t shout, or throw things. We would never behave badly in front of our son.

  When my dad flung his breakfast across the kitchen, it didn’t make much of a crash. It had landed on the rush matting and snapped cleanly into three pieces. The Weetabix didn’t break. Disks of banana, still glossy with milk, scattered close to my mother’s feet. She was wearing pink slippers with sheepskin cuffs. The bananas looked like checkers, as if someone had kicked over the board because they weren’t winning.

  Mum poured more coffee from a tall brown pot and said, “Natalie, Rowena, you’ll be late for school.” We wanted to stay and see what would happen next, but Mum ushered us out and banged the front door behind us, as if that would ensure that we wouldn’t try to come back in.

  I drove Natalie mad on the school walk because I dawdled. Being late made her anxious and sometimes she’d need a puff of her inhaler. She never needed the inhaler when she started secondary school, and we no longer walked together.

  That banana day, she was staying late after school for gymnastics so I set off for home by myself. The houses were all red brick, with dressing table mirrors looming at their upstairs windows. Usually, if Natalie was at netball or gymnastics, I would find somebody to walk with. This time there was no one.

  I was thinking about the bananas, whether anyone would have cleared up the mess or if they’d turned into a kind of sweet crisp, when a car pulled up ahead of me. The driver wound down the passenger window.

  “Hello, love,” he said.

  I assumed he was lost. I knew all the street names—I’d lived in Wood Green all my life—and felt confident that I would be able to help him. “I’m a friend of your mum and dad’s,” the man said. “They’ve had to go out and said you’re to come with me.”

  I stared into t
he car, at the man’s face. He was old. Older than Mum and Dad, but not quite as old as Auntie Isa, who lived on a broken-down farm and was always losing her teeth. The car had raggedy holes where its rust had got really bad. Its top half was gray, with maroon at the bottom. Maroon was my favorite color back then. I thought maroon was exotic.

  “Come on, love,” the man said.

  I could hear a dog yapping, one of those small dogs with sore-looking eyes. The man opened the passenger door.

  “Your dad says you’re to come.”

  I looked around for a friend or somebody’s mum but there was no one, so I ran until I reached our gate, and our path with weeds jutting up through the cracks, and Mum, who was stitching a bobble on to the bonnet she’d knitted for Dolly Delicious.

  The policeman said I did well to remember so much about the man and his car. I could even describe the cigarette packet on the dashboard. I was sandwiched between Mum and Dad on the sofa, and they agreed that I had been very brave. As the policeman left, his heel crunched on a Weetabix.

  It’s never like that, when Marcus and I fall out. We don’t throw our breakfast or start sleeping in the car. What we do is tell Lucille that Miss Cruickshank is delighted with Tod’s progress, and that we had a lovely time in the pub.

  Which must mean that we’re all right.

  chapter 16

  Will You Miss Me?

  According to Lucille, holiday preparation should consist of a three-pronged approach. One: cleanse from the inside, which means drinking two quarts of water per day and adopting a strict juice-based regime. Two: boost the metabolism with aerobic exercise, at least three times per week, for not less than twenty minutes. Three: ensure that one’s skin is well-nourished in preparation for a blast of Majorcan sun.

  I have bought a juicer just like my sister’s. Natalie makes delicious fresh juice every morning, which may account for the pleasing, cooperative natures of her children. She has sent me her book of juice recipes; the phrase “pure energy” appears in virtually every paragraph. Just leafing through its pages makes me feel purer inside. Tod is so enthralled by our new appliance and mountain of fresh produce that he insists on making his own nectarine-and-strawberry cocktail, and shuns my broccoli-and-ginger variety.