Armadillos Page 9

  ‘No pressure,’ Freak said, ‘but the guy I use is sweet. His name’s Duke. Looks after me real good. He’s got a lot of sympathy for street girls.’

  Is that what I was? A street girl? Freak read my mind.

  ‘Hell, Aggie. We can’t stay at Ade’s forever.’

  Her words struck home. I suddenly worried I might be overstaying my welcome, so I offered to wash everyone’s clothes. Ade was the only one who didn’t take me up on it, which was annoying because he was the only one who counted. I washed everything in two big basins in the back, one for scrubbing, one for rinsing. I was happy because I’d got a stain out of Freak’s cream top and I knew she’d be pleased with that. I laid everything over chairs and crates and waited for it to dry. There was a bare patch of earth alongside one wall. Too small to be useful, I made a mental note to ask Ade if I could plant a climber there. It could look real pretty, I thought, as I folded the dry clothing.

  As I entered the hallway with the pile of laundry, the dimness made me temporarily blind. I stood for a second to let my eyes recover and heard a strange shuffly type of noise. I glanced across the wall the staircase ran along. Whatever the noise was, it came from the understairs closet. I placed my ear against the wooden door. The air smelled of paint.

  Steadying my bundle with one hand beneath and my chin on top, I raised my fist to knock, but the door suddenly swung outwards, bashing my head and causing me to drop the clean clothes all over the floor.

  ‘Jesus, you scared me.’

  It was Tawanna, her eyes and nose puffy from crying. She knelt to help me gather everything up. I was flustered, like I’d been caught doing something I shouldn’t.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I thought I heard something.’

  ‘You did. Me.’

  She folded a pair of Freak’s jeans and placed them on top of my pile.

  I glanced over her shoulder into the cupboard.

  ‘Uh, what’s the attraction?’ I asked.

  Her eyes grew wide and she did a little laugh of disbelief.

  ‘Aint no one told you about this yet?’

  ‘Nuh-uh,’ I shook my head.

  Before I could object, she grabbed the laundry from me and pushed me in. It was empty apart from an old towel and a can of paint with a brush lying across the top.

  ‘This is where we let go,’ she said, whispering like we were in church. ‘Look closer.’

  I walked into the center and up to one of the three and a half walls until I almost touched it with my nose. The paint fumes were strong enough to make my eyes water. Beneath the fresh white paint, I made out a faint scrawl of writing.

  ‘It’s like a house rule. Whatever’s bugging you, you put it on there. Just get it all out. It was Virginia’s idea. She wanted a whole room but Ade gave her this cupboard instead. Makes no difference, we’ll never run out of space. You just write and write whatever the fuck you want. Nobody’s gonna judge you, cos when you’re done, when you’ve got it all out, you just pick up the brush and paint it all out. See? Easy.’

  Now I saw it. All over the walls, beneath the whiteness, lines and lines of anger and hurt and sadness. I counted at least three different styles of handwriting.

  ‘Does everyone come in here?’

  ‘Mostly, at some point.’

  Which was Freak’s?

  ‘But anyway,’ she said, ‘that there wall is wet so if you wanna use it you gotta wait. Or use that smaller side there.’

  I looked at the clean white wall.

  ‘Aint got nothing to say,’ I said, as I grabbed the laundry and pushed past her.

  The dreams kept coming. Jojo always. A desert with no rocks or plants, just bright yellow sand, stretching as far as the eye can see. Fenced in by sky, we’re like tiny figures in a giant snow globe.

  Except if you shake us you get sand instead of snow.

  ‘Take my hand,’ I offer. ‘Walk with me.’

  I can’t, Aggie. You know I can’t.

  She pulls at a thick rope that I now see is knotted around her waist. I look along the length of it – it seems to take forever – and of course there’s Pop holding the other end. He’s so far away yet I can make out everything about him: ice-blue eyes, white wiry hair, his tobacco-stained teeth, the deep burn of sun on his skin.

  He binds the rope around his fist and begins to draw her in.

  Aggie.

  No, Jojo.

  Aggie.

  No.

  ‘Aggie, wake up.’

  And I realize I’m in two places at once and I have to choose where to be.

  ‘Wake up, Aggie,’ says Freak, and I fight to find her. I’m not in the desert any more. I’m in my room, the door is in front of me, my hand is on the bolt.

  I blink the last of the dream away.

  ‘Jesus, Aggie. That was some creepy-assed shit.’

  ‘What the fuck just happened?’ I asked her, clutching the bolt, grappling with the fact that only seconds before it had been so purely, so completely, Jojo’s hand.

  ‘You were sleepwalking,’ said Freak. ‘You were doing your kitty cat thing again and then you just got straight up and opened the door, fucking weirdo. You should have told me you did that. Coulda put a bell around you for safety.’

  A noise in the hallway made me look up in time to see Beast Woman coming towards me. I slammed the door and pulled the bolt just in time. With my back against the door, I shuddered with every thump she gave on the other side.

  ‘Get your ass out here, Freak-face,’ she demanded.

  Freak had moved as far away from the door as it was possible to do in that small space. First time I ever saw her scared. Finally, it got quiet. There was nothing to do but climb back inside our sleeping bags.

  ‘What’s her problem with you, anyway?’ I asked.

  ‘Aint you figured it out yet?’ she sniggered.

  ‘She still mad you took her money?’

  She shrugged. ‘More likely she just don’t like the way Ade looks at me.’

  ‘Are they going together?’

  ‘Naw, but I reckon she’d like to. Aint you seen the way he looks at me?’ she smiled. I shook my head, aware my heart had picked up pace.

  ‘Do you like him?’ I asked.

  ‘Maybe. Not sure if he’s worth it. She’s a stupid bitch, though. Might just do him to piss her off.’

  ‘Stupid Beast Woman,’ I said. We snickered like children, which, after all, is what we were, and we didn’t talk about Marjorie any more that night.

  ‘Aggie?’

  We were facing each other so I didn’t need do more than raise my eyebrows to answer.

  ‘What happens to you in the night?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ So quiet I hardly heard myself.

  ‘Is it like… monsters, or something?’

  Had to give that one some thought.

  ‘Something like that.’ And then I changed my mind. ‘It’s my sister but she aint no monster. I don’t know why she comes to me like she does.’

  ‘Huh,’ said Freak, surprised. ‘You never said you’d a sister. Where is she?’

  I faked a yawn and turned over to face the wall but she didn’t take the hint.

  ‘If I’d a little sister, I don’t think I’d ever leave her.’

  She probably said it on purpose and it worked. I rolled over in a flash and it rushed out of me. ‘She aint my little sister, alright? She’s my older sister and she’s big enough to take care of herself.’ I smashed my fist down on the rickety floorboards. ‘She’s damn near enough thirty and aint nothing in the world she needs from me, alright? Aint nothing in this whole wide world that I can do for her. Shut up about it, just shut up!’

  Freak sat up, eyes wide, hands raised in defense.

  ‘Jesus, Aggie, sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it.’

  I hunkered back down but I was wired. I sensed Freak was still sitting up, waiting for me to talk some more. Eventually she gave in, just like I knew she would.

  ‘What’s her name, Aggie?’
/>
  Jo-Jo-Jo-Josephine Jones.

  ‘Jojo, huh? That’s a pretty cool name.’

  Hadn’t realized I’d said it out loud. Confused wasn’t the word. And then for some reason, I suddenly became hyper aware of the tiny little room we were in. A crack I’d been studying for weeks had spread across the ceiling and was making its way down the wall. Everything was all a dusky shade of blue apart from Freak’s pink hair and her face which, peeking out the top of her sleeping bag, looked like a little moon.

  ‘You look like an alien.’ We giggled, though nothing was funny.

  And then I told her my story. Parts of my story. Some parts I left out.

  After I finished, she was quiet for a time. And then she said, ‘Where was your momma?’ and I told her about Momma being a whore who had skipped town.

  ‘I used to think she’d run off with pirates.’ I grinned, and next thing I was telling her about when I was little and Jojo used to put me to bed with a stubby scented candle tucked under my pillow. Tropical Seabreeze, she’d called it. Once upon a time that candle smelled of something good but it had long gone. Still, Jojo always wanted to know that I could smell it, and I’d nod, even though there was nothing there, and she’d seem satisfied and say that’s where Momma’s gone. Living on the high seas, Momma was gonna get rich and then she’d be back for us all. Such a gleam in her eye right then. Told her I believed it as well. I smiled, trying to cover up that familiar emptiness. She’d smile and curl into me, and hold my hand, stroking my hair over and over till finally, behind the raggy curtain, the sun was gone and I was in the land of sleep.

  For the first time, I noticed something wrong with this story. It was Freak who said it.

  ‘How come your momma’s so precious if she was such a whore?’

  I had no answer. The ceiling crack was going down the other wall too, I noticed.

  ‘Guess you were lucky you had such a big older sister. Guess she was like your momma, huh?’

  My words were stuck. There was something inside me and I didn’t know what. Far off I heard the cry of gulls, birds I’d seen so rarely on the farm, but had dreamed of my whole childhood.

  Freak rolled over and fell asleep. Just like that. I was surprised with how open I’d been. Wasn’t like I trusted Freak all that much. I’d kept what little money I had tucked away in my bra. And I’d forgotten all about that memory with the candle, hadn’t thought of it in years, it just rose up from nowhere. Wonder if Momma really had made it back to the ocean? Jojo and Ash seemed convinced of it. We’d spend long hours in Jack King, them swapping stories about Momma while I acted interested, but all the while quietly bored with my lack of memory.

  Freak’s breathing came slow and rhythmic, like waves on the shore. I settled down beside her, but spent the whole night wide awake, trying to remember my momma. Try as I might, it was only Jojo’s face I saw. Just the way it had always been.

  She wanted me to put on her Sunday dress. It had hung at the back of the closet all these years, waiting for the time it would fit me.

  But Jojo, we don’t go to church no more.

  She kneeled before me and tried to pull my T-shirt up. I kept my arms rigid.

  Don’t you want to look pretty? she said.

  I want to look like you, I sulked. I aint never seen you in such a dress.

  Well, that’s cos I’m grown now. But this was mine when I was your age. Little girls should look pretty sometimes. It’s fun. Come on, just try it. It’ll only take a minute.

  I let her pull my T-shirt over my head and I wiggled my arms through the holes.

  Don’t like it. It scratches.

  Oh hush now. And look here, these are the shoes I wore. See if they fit.

  She pulled my foot onto her thigh and slipped the navy blue Mary Janes over my bare feet. She spun me round to zip up the back and I caught sight of myself in the mirror and gasped. Jojo rested her chin on my shoulder and grinned at my reflection.

  Now, child, aint you a thing sweeter than stolen honey?

  I spent many a fine afternoon preening, sashaying and twirling for Jojo. The way she laughed made me enjoy it almost as much as she did.

  Aside from doing everyone’s laundry, I also took to working in the garden. Back home at this time of year the ground would be thick with snow, but here it still gave up salad and carrots, kale and potatoes. The builders hadn’t got around to putting down lawn so it was just soil. Almost the entire backyard had been given over to growing food. I made soup for everyone, just the way Jojo showed me. It wasn’t the same as hers, something missing, but it was good enough, and people tolerated me. Most people, anyway.

  One day Marjorie found me picking zucchini in the garden. She made out like she’d just been passing but I was right in the furthest back corner and there was no place for her to pass to. The day was pulling in and the sun was about to disappear behind the house.

  ‘Smoke?’ She smiled as she offered. When Marjorie smiled, it was just plain weird. Made me think of crocodiles. I shook my head, squinting with the last of the sun in my eyes. She lit up and took a draw. Through the sun and smoke I saw straight up the sleeve of her T-shirt. The tattooed snake twisted around her arm, up to her shoulder, and disappeared down her back. No saying where it stopped. I got a shiver and carried on digging, trying to ignore the smoke as it blew in my face.

  ‘What’s your story, little freak-friend?’ She’d called me this ever since that first night. Freak said it was because she felt threatened by us. It didn’t bother me, because privately I still thought of her as Beast Woman.

  ‘How come you’ve made friends with such a freaky little whore?’ she wanted to know. ‘Can’t be good for you.’

  I stopped digging and looked at her. Four of me could probably fit into one of her. She reminded me of one of Cy’s bulls and I didn’t like my chances if it came right down to it. Her eyes never left mine as she flicked some ash in where the kale and carrots were growing.

  ‘Don’t mind if I do that, do you?’ It wasn’t a real question. I shrugged.

  ‘Good for compost.’ I’d dug plenty back home and knew my way round a vegetable patch.

  ‘You like it here?’ she asked.

  ‘Some, I guess. It beats the street,’ I added quickly, in case her plan was to get me to leave.

  ‘Guess it does. Where’s your little freak-friend gone then?’ She spat on the ground.

  ‘I aint her keeper.’

  ‘You’d do well to make new friends, Aggie.’ Her cold eyes cut through the gray smoke. ‘I’m being nice now and warning you, alright? I’d worry for you if you keep on keeping bad company. Don’t you say you didn’t get no warning, that’s all.’

  She ground the butt beneath her heel and flicked it into the soil.

  ‘Ade don’t like trouble,’ I said. ‘He’ll throw you out if you touch a hair on her head.’

  She got right up close to me, nose to nose. Marjorie’s breath was fouler than a dog’s. I tried to stare her out but eventually I had to breathe so I turned my head away. I think she took it for weakness.

  ‘Ade aint throwing me anywhere, freak-friend. But I want Freak gone and I want you to tell her. She’s bad news. I’d hate for you to get caught up in the crossfire.’

  As she walked away, I asked myself if she was right. I pushed the thought away as soon as it arrived. I wasn’t in the business of being disloyal to my friends. Besides, if Freak was bad company, I must be, too.

  11

  It was a week before Christmas and Freak said it was time I left the house. I’d holed up in there living off carrots from the garden for so long she said I was in danger of not only going soft but also turning orange. I was sitting up at night to avoid any more sleepwalking; it always sparked an avalanche of questions. As a result, I had that kind of heavy tired that just sits inside, the kind where you’ll do just about anything anyone says and agree with anybody over anything. So when Freak took me shoplifting, I couldn’t find it in me to resist.

  We hopped the bus
uptown, wearing clean clothes and looking just like two regular girls. Freak’s hair was the only thing that made us stand out, and she’d tucked most of it away beneath a cowboy hat. A little boy in front of us stood on his momma’s lap and I played peekaboo with him till they got off. Looking out the window, everything was so pretty. People had gone to town on decorations, flashing lights everywhere. Block after block all you saw were giant nativity scenes, donkeys and everything, spread over roofs, windows, parks and gardens.

  The mall had a tree taller than four buses. So many shiny sparkles on it, you could have gone blind from looking too long. Shoppers busied in and out of stores like elves, carrying more bags than Santa on Christmas Eve. I’d never seen anything like it. Back home, we’d pulled out the same plastic tree we’d had my whole life. By the time I was six, I was bigger than the tree. Santa paid us a visit till I was seven years old and then he stopped. The only presents in that house were between me and Jojo.

  The first store we went to, Freak steered me towards the make-up counter and made me sit down on a stool. It was right by the escalator and I felt a fool as I let her paint my face in different colors while crowds of people stared down at me. The assistant lady came over looking like she wanted to give us trouble but when Freak told her we didn’t need any help she backed off quicker than a bear from a hornets’ nest. Guess it was just the way she said it. When she was done, she let me look in the mirror. It wasn’t too bad in the end. I was expecting something clownish but there was a pretty golden glow slicked across my eyelids, and a shimmery kind of peach on my lips. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I liked it, but it was different. Maybe felt a little like fun.

  ‘You should get yourself some of this, Aggie.’ Freak was dabbing something else on my cheeks. ‘Makes you look older.’ And it did. I figured that might not be such a bad thing, all things considered. I checked the price tag. The expense made me mad. It deserved to be stolen. A quick glance told me the assistant was occupied with an older woman who was having trouble deciding between two face creams. It found its way to my pocket.