The Bed and Breakfast Star Read online

  ‘You’ll be the one standing in the shower if you don’t watch it,’ said Mack. ‘And the cold water will be on too.’ He laughed. That’s his idea of a joke.

  He went all the way downstairs to tackle the big lady about another bed. Mum sat on the edge of the double bed, staring into space. Her eyes were watery again. She didn’t notice when Hank got into her handbag and started licking her lipstick as if it was an ice lolly. I grabbed him and hauled him into the tiny shower space to mop him up a bit. The hot water tap in the basin was only lukewarm. I tried the shower to see if that had any hot. I couldn’t work out how to switch it on. Pippa squeezed in too to give me a hand. I suddenly found the right knob to turn. I turned it a bit too far actually.

  Mack’s joke came true. It wasn’t very funny. But at least we all got clean. Our clothes had a quick wash too. I dried us as best I could. I thought Mum might get mad but she didn’t say a word. She just went on staring, as if she was looking right through the wall into room 607. They were still having their argument. It was getting louder. They were starting to use a lot of rude words.

  ‘Um!’ said Pippa, giggling.

  Mack came storming back and he was mumbling a lot of rude words too. The hotel management didn’t supply beds for children under two.

  ‘Hank will have to go back in his cot,’ he said, and he started piecing the bits of the old duck cot together again.

  ‘But it’s falling to bits now. And Hank’s so big and bouncy. He kept thumping and jumping last time he was in it. He’ll smash it up in seconds,’ I said.

  ‘And that’s not Hank’s cot any more. It’s my Baby Pillow’s bed,’ said Pippa indignantly.

  ‘Baby Pillow will have to sleep with you, my wee chook,’ said Mack.

  ‘But he won’t like that. Baby Pillow will cry and kick me,’ said Pippa.

  ‘Well, you’ll just have to cry and kick him back,’ said Mack, reaching out and giving her a little poke in the tummy. He noticed her T-shirt was a little damp.

  ‘Here, how come you’re soaking wet?’ said Mack, frowning.

  I held my breath. If Pippa told on me I wouldn’t half be for it. Yes, for it. And five it and six it too.

  But Pippa was a pal. She just mumbled something about splashing herself, so Mack grunted and got on with erecting the duck cot for Hank. I gratefully helped Pippa find Baby Pillow and all his things from one of the black plastic rubbish bags we’d carted from our old house.

  My sister Pippa is crackers. Mack was always buying her dolls when he was in work and we were rich. All the different Barbies, My Little Ponies, those big special dolls that walk and talk and wet, but Pippa’s only ever wanted Baby Pillow. Baby Pillow got born when Mum had Hank. Pippa started carting this old

  pillow round with her, talking to it and rocking it as if it were a baby. He’s rather a backward baby if he’s as old as Hank, because he hasn’t started crawling yet. If I’m feeling in a very good mood I help Pippa feed Baby Pillow with one of Hank’s old bottles and we change his old nappy and bundle him up into an old nightie and then we tuck him up in the duck cot and tell him to go to sleep. I generally make him cry quite a bit first and Pippa has to keep rocking him and telling him stories.

  ‘We won’t be able to play our game if Hank’s got to go in the duck cot,’ Pippa grumbled.

  But when Mack had got the cot standing in the last available spot of space and we tried stuffing Hank into his old baby bed, Hank himself decided this just wasn’t on. He howled indignantly and started rocking the bars and cocking his leg up, trying to escape.

  ‘He’ll have that over in no time,’ said Mack. ‘So what are we going to do, eh?’

  He looked over at Mum. She was still staring into space. She was acting as if she couldn’t hear Mack or even Hank’s bawling.

  ‘Mum?’ said Pippa, and she clutched Baby Pillow anxiously.

  ‘Hey, Mum,’ I said, and I went and shook her shoulder. She wasn’t crying any more. This was worse. She didn’t even take any notice of me.

  ‘Here,’ said Mack, grabbing Hank, hauling him out of the cot and dumping him into Mum’s lap.

  For a moment Mum kept her arms limply by her side, her face still blank. Hank howled harder, hurt that he was getting ignored. He raised his arms, wanting a hug. He stretched higher, lost his balance, and nearly toppled right off Mum’s lap and on to the floor. But just in time Mum’s hands grabbed him and pulled him close against her chest.

  ‘Don’t cry. I’ve got you,’ said Mum, sighing. She blinked, back in herself again.

  ‘Where’s the wee boy going to sleep, then?’ Mack asked again.

  Mum shrugged.

  ‘He’ll have to sleep with one of his sisters, won’t he,’ she said.

  ‘Not me!’ I said quickly.

  ‘Not me either,’ said Pippa. ‘He wets right out of his nappies.’

  Hank went on crying.

  ‘He’s hungry,’ said Mum. ‘We could all do with a drink and a bite to eat. I’m going to go and find this communal kitchen. Here Hank, go to Daddy. And you girls, you get all our stuff unpacked from those bags, right?’

  Yes, everything was all right again. Mum rolled up her sleeves and got the cardboard box with our kettle and our pots and pans and some tins of food and went off to find the kitchen. Mack romped on the bed with Hank, and he stopped crying and started chuckling. Pippa said Baby Pillow was still crying though, and she insisted she had to tuck him up in the duck cot and put him to sleep.

  So I got lumbered doing most of the unpacking. There were two bags full of Pippa’s clothes and Hank’s baby stuff. There was an old suitcase stuffed with Mum and Mack’s clothes and Mum’s hairdryer and her make-up and her precious china crinoline lady. And there was my carrier bag. I don’t have that many clothes because I always get them mucked up anyway. I’ve got T-shirts and shorts for the summer, and jumpers and jeans for the winter, and some knickers and socks and stuff. I’ve got a Minnie Mouse hairbrush though it doesn’t ever get all the tangles out of my mane of hair. I’ve got a green marble that I used to pretend was magic. I’ve got my box of felt-tip pens. Most of the colours have run out and Pippa mucked up some of the points when she was little, but I don’t feel like throwing them away yet. Sometimes I colour a ghost picture, pretending the colours in my head. Then there are my joke books. They are a bit torn and tatty because I thumb through them so often.

  I hoped Mum would be ever so pleased with me getting all our stuff sorted out and the room all neat and tidy but she came back so flaming mad she hardly noticed.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ she said, dumping the cardboard box so violently that all the pots and pans played a tune. ‘I had to queue up for ages just to get into this crummy little kitchen, and then when some of these other women were finished and I got my chance, I realized that it was all a waste of time anyway. You should see the state of that stove! It’s filthy. I’d have to scrub at it for a week before I’d set my saucepans on it. Even the floor’s so slimy with grease I nearly slipped and fell. What are we going to do, Mack?’

  ‘You’re asking Big Mack, right?’ said Mack, throwing Hank up in the air so he shrieked with delight. ‘Big Mack says let’s go and eat Big Macs at McDonald’s.’

  Pippa and I shrieked with delight too. Mum didn’t look so thrilled.

  ‘And what are we going to live on for the rest of the week, eh?’ she said. ‘We can’t eat out all the time, Mack.’

  ‘Come on now, hen, give it a rest. You just now said we can’t eat in. So we’ll eat out today. Tomorrow will just have to take care of itself.’

  ‘The sun will come out tooomorrow . . .’ I sang. I maybe don’t have a very sweet voice but it is strong.

  ‘Elsa! Keep your voice down!’ Mum hissed.

  Mack pulled a silly face and covered up his ears, pretending to be deafened.

  We sang the Tomorrow song at school. It comes from a musical about a little orphan girl called Annie. Occasionally I think I’d rather like to be Little Orphan Elsa.