Secrets Read online

  Patsy should go back too. She’s curled up in the corner with my new red coat over her as a blanket. It arrived this morning. I love it. I hope Patsy doesn’t dribble on it. She’s sucking her thumb, nearly asleep. She’s been crying. Terry wouldn’t go for her – Nan would tear his head off his shoulders if he did – but she might panic and blurt out where I am. Loretta’s too canny to give so much as a hint and Britney can’t talk so I don’t have to worry about them.

  It’s been such a long day. It was fun at first. Nan gave us each five whole pounds and we went round the market for ages choosing stuff. I bought a new big, fat spiral notebook with a gold cover because I’ve filled up every single page of the Terry Torture book with my diary entries. Patsy bought a little pink glittery notebook and some pink daisy hairslides. Willie bought a weird garage CD and two old copies of Viz off a second-hand stall. Loretta donated her fiver to Britney and bought her three yellow plastic ducks with orange beaks, the sort you float in the bath. Britney always grizzles and fusses when Loretta baths her, though she’s fine when I have a go, splashing round like a little water-baby, but it would NOT be tactful to point this out. As soon as she spotted the ducks Britney loved them and wanted them right now, this instant. She didn’t want to hold just one, she wanted to clutch all three, which is a bit of a job if you’ve got normal-size hands and totally impossible if you’re a baby. After a great deal of fussing we got her holding the big mother duck with the two ducklings tucked either side of Britney in her buggy.

  Britney was so excited she kept trying to kiss the big duck and getting pecked all over with its plastic beak. She had little pink peck marks on her cheeks and forehead but she didn’t seem to mind a bit. I said, ‘Yes, Britney, duck! Lovely duck, three lovely ducks. Who’s a lucky girl to have a duck, eh?’ so often that she seemed to get the hang of talking too and said ‘duck’ herself, over and over. Only she hasn’t got enough teeth to make a clear ‘d’ sound so it seemed like she was swearing and we all burst out laughing.

  Then we took her to the park and we all had a swing. I started showing off, climbing up the rusty swing poles and hanging by my hands from the top. Patsy squealed and Loretta nagged but Willie was dead impressed, I could tell. He tried to shin up himself but he kept slipping down. He said it was because his hands were sweaty, but that was an excuse. Then a green mini-van pulled up and I started sweating myself but it wasn’t Terry, it was just a woman with a whole load of dogs, though it made me start worrying all the same. I thought we shouldn’t be hanging around somewhere like the park. It was one of the first places Terry might come looking for me.

  I couldn’t think where else we could go. Patsy was starting to droop a bit and Britney was getting hungry and needed changing.

  ‘We’ll go round my friend Marianne’s,’ said Loretta.

  ‘What, all of us?’ said Willie, pulling a face. ‘I can’t stick your mate Marianne.’

  ‘You don’t have to come too, Willie,’ I said. ‘You can go off with your mates if you want.’

  Willie thought about it. Then he shook his head.

  ‘Nah, it’s OK. I’ll come with you lot. If Terry tracks you down you’ll need me to protect you, right?’

  I threw my arms round him I was so touched. Willie went red and wriggled away as soon as possible. I thanked him. I thanked them all.

  ‘Put a sock in it, Treasure,’ said Loretta. ‘Don’t go on like that in front of Marianne or I’ll be dead embarrassed.’

  Loretta got to know Marianne when she was in hospital having Britney. Marianne had a little boy on the same day, called Tim, only she calls him Tigger and dresses him in these cute little orange-and-black stripey outfits. Tigger certainly roars like a tiger. When he and Britney are both having a cry you can’t hear yourself think. But that was great, because I didn’t want to think, not about Terry and Mum round at Nan’s.

  I wasn’t all that keen on Marianne either. She’s nineteen and yet she acts like she’s Patsy’s age. It’s daft, the council have given her this smashing flat and yet she can’t get her act together and keep it clean. She can’t do the simplest things like turn on the boiler or get the phone connected. The council won’t give Loretta her own place because she’s only fifteen but she’s heaps more sensible than Marianne. Loretta wants to move in with her which seems a great idea, but her social worker thinks this mightn’t be a good idea. She thinks they might go out clubbing and leave the babies on their own.

  ‘Cheek!’ said Loretta, heating up a bottle for Britney in Marianne’s cold and grubby kitchen. ‘As if we would!’

  ‘Well, I’d always babysit for you if you did fancy a night out,’ I offered.

  ‘That’s sweet of you, Treasure. You’re great with Britney, I know.’ Loretta paused. ‘Maybe that’s why your mum’s desperate to get you back. Do you help her out a lot with baby Gary?’

  ‘Yeah, but he’s nowhere near as cute as Britney. Anyway, she’ll have to manage. I’m not going back.’

  ‘Of course you’re not,’ said Loretta. ‘Not with that Terry around. I don’t know what’s up with your mum. If any bloke of mine hit Britney he’d be out on his ear. Not that I’m that fussed about blokes if Britney’s dad is a shining example. Nah, soon as I’m sixteen, seventeen tops, I’ll nag for my own flat just like this one. Then you could always come and live with Britney and me, Treasure.’

  ‘No, Treasure and me are going to share a flat the minute we leave school,’ said Patsy, doing a little grapevine-chassez-kick-ball-change routine up and down the tiled floor.

  ‘Well, I’m not sharing a flat with Treasure,’ said Willie, grinning. ‘It would cramp my style with all my girlfriends!’

  But Willie stayed with me at Marianne’s all afternoon, sprawling in one of her slippery leatherette armchairs, yawning and cracking his knuckles and sighing, not even able to watch television because Marianne’s set has gone on the blink and she hasn’t done anything about getting it fixed. We used the babies like little television sets, all of us sitting gawping at them as they lay on their backs and kicked on Marianne’s dusty hearthrug. It’s black-and-orange striped acrylic so Tigger in his tiger playsuit blended in so completely Patsy didn’t notice he was there and very nearly trod on him.

  Loretta phoned Nan at four but it was obvious my Mum and Terry were still grimly sitting it out with Bethany and Kyle and little Gary. She heard him grizzling in the background.

  So we sat on too, waiting and waiting, until Britney started to fuss for another feed. Loretta didn’t have any more bottles. Marianne didn’t have the right formula as she’s put Tigger on cow’s milk already, so Loretta had to take Britney home.

  Willie and Patsy and I stayed on at Marianne’s for a bit but then her new boyfriend came round on his way home from work and it was obvious we were in the way. So we cleared off. Patsy and I are hanging out at McDonald’s now, like I said, and Willie’s just rung and Terry’s van is still there.

  I don’t know what to do. They’re obviously camping out at Nan’s all day. Maybe all night too. I don’t know what to do or where to go.

  Patsy’s woken up again now but she’s a bit sniffly. Two different mums have clucked over her and asked me if we’re all right. I keep saying yes, we’re fine, but we’re not. We can’t stay here much longer.

  A third woman has just come up and asked where our mother is. We both said, truthfully, that she’s at home. Then this woman shook her head at us and said that we should be at home too, and didn’t we have anyone looking after us? I told her, equally truthfully, that my uncle was going to meet up with us soon. That reassured her a little, but she did shake her head again over Patsy.

  I’m worried about her. She’s trying to be so good. Every so often she reaches up and puts her arm round me and tells me not to worry – but she keeps on crying. I’ve used up half the paper napkins in McDonald’s mopping her.

  Later. Much, much later! You will never, ever, ever guess where I am!

  OK, I was in McDonald’s with Patsy and then the