The Artificial Anatomy of Parks Read online

  I remember feeling that close to the real Mr Hicks once, feeling like – apart from my grandmother – he was the only one who supported me. “You understand everything better than you give yourself credit for,” he said.

  “You explain it better,” I said.

  “You’re very sweet, you know?” he said. “You can’t teach that.”

  I feel sick. At how corny I sounded, the way I behaved around him. That was the lesson I asked him for a cigarette, and he looked at me like he was wavering.

  “I shouldn’t really encourage you – how old are you?”

  “I’m sixteen in a month.”

  “On your sixteenth birthday then. And not before.”

  “What’s the difference between now and then?”

  “The law, I’m afraid.”

  “You sound like my dad.”

  “Why?”

  “He thinks I’m a kid too.”

  “That’s ridiculous. No one could mistake you for a child.”

  My whole body feels like it’s burning up now.

  Stupid. What did you talk about then? How your father made all your decisions? How he wouldn’t let you look after your grandmother because you were too young? And Mr Hicks looking sympathetic, saying, “Well I think you’re very mature, I really do.”

  Aunt Gillian’s phone buzzes and for a second I think it’s Malkie calling and I jump to my feet. She looks guilty. “I’ll call you back in a minute,” she whispers into the receiver.

  I rub my eyes, trying to get rid of the past. That might have been the day we discussed career options, too. The day I first told someone I wanted to be a nurse. He was collecting little clay pots that had been drying on ledges and placing them on a tray, I remember, and he turned around and said that was a great idea. We’d have to work on my maths and chemistry, of course, but my biology was already good.

  “Cool,” I’d said.

  “Cool,” he’d said, and laughed. “Okay, good. Good. Nothing else you want to discuss?”

  “No,” I said. “Don’t forget my birthday present, though.”

  He winked at me. “I hope you’re good at keeping secrets.”

  “I’m going downstairs,” I say. “See if the café’s still open.”

  “Don’t be too long,” Aunt Gillian says.

  It feels like my life has been a low-budget family drama lately, with only enough money for three sets – hospital, café, home – and my father playing the lead role, even if he’s out of sight.

  I dial my voicemail number – nothing. I pocket my phone and buy a herbal tea; my nod to being healthy. It’s more of a pretence than a nod, and I suddenly want to talk to someone who I’ve never been able to fool, someone who really knows me. Maybe that’s why I’ve been missing Toby over the last few days.

  I cup my hands around the tea and breathe it in: lemon and ginger. It reminds me of a teashop in town Edith and I sometimes hung out in at the weekends. After a while, Toby started joining us, even though it was always full of girls and female teachers and he always looked too big and gangly for the crockery. Some of the teachers would come up and talk to him, laugh at how out of place he looked, and I thought about telling him how I thought the place was twee and ridiculous and that I only went because Edith liked it, but I never did. I kind of liked that he’d take being laughed at so he could hang out with us.

  I remember it was easy to find things to talk about, even though we saw each other every day. Toby discovered I barely knew any current TV shows and tried to educate me on Baywatch and Xena, while I described the joys of Murder, She Wrote.

  I take my first sip of the lemon and ginger. He even came shopping with us. Every Saturday there was a market in town, mostly, by that point, for the tourists. They came and took photos of the Saxon-era church and the yellow irises along the banks of the canal and the shopkeepers who stood in their doorways wearing aprons, squinting in the sunlight. The old men who sat on the benches in the main square for the rest of the week were swept away, along with the sweet wrappers and coke cans that littered the cobblestones. Instead the place was full of stalls selling tat: antique bowls and oranges and children’s books. The three of us would do a slow circuit, and each of us had to name the item we’d least like to own. Then we played rock, paper, scissors, and the loser had to buy their item. That was how I ended up with the hand mirror in the shape of a bear’s head, and Edith bought a VHS of A Nymphoid Barbarian in Dinosaur Hell. Toby paid three pounds for a jar of buttons.

  The other boys wouldn’t join us; we used to meet them out on the playing fields instead. After that first lunch, they were okay. John was on the swimming team. Francis was Toby’s best friend, they played rugby together. He had four female fans in the first year who turned red whenever he walked into a room; I liked how crinkly his eyes were already, and his big, slow smile. If he’d been older and had longer hair, he might have been Malkie’s brother.

  The boys scared Edith. She didn’t like it when they farted around her, or had arm wrestling matches, but she acted game in front of them so she could spend time with Toby. Lunchtime was the same every day – Toby and Francis messed around, showing off their muscles, and Edith swooned.

  One time we agreed to break out at night and meet on the playing fields. Me and Edith climbed out of the window and shimmied down the drainpipe. The boys were waiting for us on the grass, tussling with each other, snorting with laughter. I lit a cigarette and sat watching them, thinking how much fun it looked to be a boy. Edith crouched down next to me.

  I pointed up at the stars. “Check them out. You can’t see them in London.”

  “That’s Ursa Major,” she said, indicating. “The Great Bear.”

  “You know stars?” Toby asked, flopping down onto the grass beside us.

  “A little,” Edith said, and I could tell she was turning pink.

  “What about star signs?” John asked, joining us.

  “That’s not the same thing.”

  “Course it is. They’re all up there. I’m a Scorpio, which means I’m a fantastic fuck.” He waggled his eyebrows.

  “John, can you just stop thinking about your dick for one second?” Toby said.

  John picked his nose and flicked snot in Toby’s direction. “Can’t,” he said. “It’s too big to ignore.”

  “Up yours.”

  “That’s mature,” John said.

  “You can talk about being mature when they finally let you finish nursery,” I said.

  Toby looked at me. “What star sign are you?”

  “Aries, I think.”

  “Stubborn and headstrong,” Edith said.

  “Actually, that’s kind of a good fit,” Toby said, laughing.

  “Shut up,” I said, grinning. I looked at Toby out of the corner of my eye. Everything about him was exactly as it should be, I realised: his eyes, his nose, his eyelashes, which were dark and long, but still not girly. His hands, which were usually rammed in his pockets, were smooth and tanned and long, with blue veins that stood out a little from the surface. His stomach, which I caught a glimpse of when he yawned and stretched in front of me, was completely flat, and there was a dark trail of hair that led from his belly button down to the elastic of his boxer shorts.

  “Wanna play catch or something?” I asked.

  “What are we, five?” John said.

  “We’re playing catch,” Toby stage-whispered to Francis, and he bounded over towards us.

  “Francis is It,” I said, and ran as fast as I could in the direction of the gym. Out in the middle of the field, the night was black as ink. I jarred my ankle several times where the ground was higher or lower than I expected it to be. I heard footsteps thumping after me, then Francis shoved me and I lost my footing completely, dropping onto my knees.

  “You’re It,” he said, and I heard footsteps retreating.

  I tagged John, who got Toby, who came after me. I tried to run in zig-zags. He chased me around half the field until we were far enough away from the others t
hat I couldn’t hear them at all. I couldn’t hear anything except the blood in my ears, but I could feel the damp grass and the fresh wind, and everything seemed better than it had for a long time.

  Toby lunged at me, his body knocking into mine, and we went down. We were tangled up on the ground, and I could feel the heat of his breath on my neck, and his hands on my shoulder blades, then they were gliding lightly over my skin. I turned onto my back and his hands stopped, fingers splayed at the edge of my ribcage. I was aware of the mud and turf beneath me, and Toby above me, and past him, the sky, which was so far away it almost didn’t exist.

  We looked at each other and I felt the blood drain from my ears and rush around my body. “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Nothing,” he said, sliding off quickly. “I mean – nothing.” He sounded hoarse.

  I started to feel stupid, sitting on the ground while he was standing with his hands back in his pockets. I got up slowly, brushing myself off.

  “Hurry the fuck up,” John yelled across the field.

  “I’m It, I guess,” I said. I felt flat all of a sudden and something made me afraid to catch Toby’s eye.

  “Yeah,” he said, jogging back towards the rest of them. I followed him, trying not to let my feet drag too much.

  “Are we fucking playing or what?” John called, when I was closer.

  I tagged Edith, who was only making a half-hearted effort at running away. She went after Toby – I could hear her giggling and panting, while Toby dodged her outstretched hand, then she gave a little scream and fell in a heap.

  “Fucking girls,” John said in disgust.

  Toby stopped and went back for her and the rest of us moved vaguely in their direction. I felt bad for Edith, falling over in front of her one true love. I started to say something to brush over it, then I got close enough to see her gazing up at him, showing all her teeth in a smile.

  “You okay?” Toby asked.

  “I think so.”

  “Want a hand?”

  “Yes please.”

  Toby slipped her arm around his shoulders, then straightened up slowly, bringing her with him. They started limping in my direction. Edith was deliberately hanging off him, letting him take all of her weight, and giggling again. “You’re really strong,” she said.

  Francis and John made noises like they were being sick. I felt my stomach twist inside me. It’s just Edith being Edith, I told myself. It wasn’t like Edith though. She was being girlier than normal, and Toby wasn’t even looking at me anymore.

  “Can we stop now?” she asked, shivering melodramatically. “I’m cold.”

  Toby took off his jacket and put it around her.

  We gave up after that, and lay on the ground, sharing my last cigarette. Edith nearly choked on it when it was her turn, and Francis gave her a hefty whack around her shoulders.

  “Ouch,” she said, her eyes streaming. Toby and John hid their grins, and I felt affection for her again.

  “It’s a really strong one,” I said, and she looked at me gratefully.

  Thinking about that night must have drawn Aunt Vivienne somehow, because she comes past the café and waves a cigarette in my direction. “Smoke? I need to do something wicked.”

  Outside, I light up and pass Aunt Vivienne my matches. She smokes Gauloises, I notice. I’m sure it fits in with her image of herself.

  “It’s a filthy habit, you know,” she says.

  “I can still quit.”

  “The folly of youth.” I can’t read her expression. She reaches over and takes my chin in her hand, tipping my face up. Her fingers start to dig in to me, but she just squeezes and lets go. “Did you ever hear how we met? Me and your mother?”

  I shake my head.

  “It was Edward who introduced us. He brought her round one evening for dinner. I used to throw very decadent dinner parties.” She makes a face. “I thought your mother was the most divine being I’d ever seen. She was wearing some hideous floaty nonsense, and her hair was huge. Such a 70s cliché, but absolutely beautiful.”

  I stay quiet. She might be trying to make up for what she said at dinner the other night. But even now she can’t bring herself to be straightforwardly nice about my mother.

  “Eddie had a night shift at the hospital, so he left first.” She pulls on her cigarette. “We were getting on well – I invited Evie to stay the night. Malkie and Jack and Guillaume were due to stay that night too.” She sees my expression. “No, not Starr’s father.”

  “I didn’t ask,” I mumble.

  “Anyway, that’s how your mother became one of the gang.” She inclines her head. “She fit in very nicely, so we looked after her when your father went off on his little trip to Africa.”

  “Dad went to Africa?”

  “Oh yes – some tiny country down in the south, somewhere.”

  “Lesotho?”

  “That’s the one.”

  I wonder how I didn’t know this.

  “He was the only doctor in the whole country, from the sounds of it,” Aunt Vivienne says. “Which suited him just fine, I’m sure.”

  “How long was he there for?”

  “Oh, a year or so.” She looks amused. “I don’t think Edward thought being on two separate continents necessarily meant they were on a break, but I warned him – girls don’t take kindly to being left alone.”

  “Don’t be such a bitch about it,” I say. It tastes like metal in my mouth, the idea that my mother had been abandoned like that, after she’d lost her parents as well.

  “A bitch?”

  “Yes,” I say. “A bitch. Don’t be a bitch. I know you can be decent sometimes.”

  “Quite the mouth on you, darling.”

  I close my eyes and hold my breath, keeping the smoke inside for a moment. I can feel Aunt Vivienne watching me still.

  So Dad thought you were going to wait for him, Mum? I’m guessing you didn’t, exactly, or Aunt Vivienne wouldn’t be telling me this.

  I can see the parallels between them and me and Toby already. None of us managed to come out and talk about our feelings properly, avoid any confusion. It makes me feel closer to my father in a strange way, and sorry for him.

  “I’ve never had many female friends,” Aunt Vivienne says. “But your mother… ”

  I open my eyes, exhaling. “Can we not, please?”

  Aunt Vivienne shrugs.

  “I wonder if someone’s come to see us yet,” I say.

  She looks away. “This place is a shambles,” she says. She brings her cigarette up quickly and pulls hard on it. She doesn’t get nervous, I tell myself. You’re imagining things now.

  I finish my cigarette and stretch, placing my hands on the small of my back and twisting until I hear a crack. I can’t get too angry with her. I understand what it’s like to be friendless.

  ‘They’re not all real, you know… ’

  Was it Grandad who messed you up like this, Aunt Vivienne? Do any of the others have friends? I can’t think of any of my father’s. He never seemed to want them, but maybe he didn’t trust anyone enough.

  That’s where the damage started, isn’t it, with good old Albert Park?

  I feel another buzz of adrenalin. “Let’s go back in,” I say.

  “Whatever you say,” Aunt Vivienne says, and blows smoke out through her nose.

  Mr Henderson, my fifth-year biology teacher, had a hooked nose and a limp and thinning white hair and reminded me of Mr Tickles.

  We were learning about genetic inheritance – dominant and recessive alleles. “Brown eyes are dominant,” Mr Henderson told us, beaming. “And blue eyes are recessive. Can you tell me why two blue-eyed parents can’t produce a brown-eyed baby… Tallulah?”

  “You need the alleles to be present in both chromosomes in the pair,” I said. I’d read about this in my father’s textbook. It’d confused me at first – my father had blue eyes, and my mother had green, but mine were brown. Hazel was a recessive colour too though, and in certain lights my
eyes were hazel.

  “Great.” Mr Henderson wrote ‘alleles to be present in both’ on the board. “But can two brown-eyed parents produce a blue-eyed child?”

  Everyone else looked bored, even Edith.

  “Yeah,” I said. “The parents might have heterozygous chromosomes, where they carry the alleles for both blue and brown eyes.”

  “Exactly right. That would give these parents a twenty-five percent chance of conceiving a blue-eyed baby.” He sat down heavily behind the desk at the front. “Fifteen minutes until the bell. First person to finish the multiple-choice questions on page sixty-three gets a prize.”

  I sped through the questions and raised my hand. Mr Henderson made a note of my name just before the bell rang, then motioned for me to stay behind.

  He rummaged around in his drawers while everyone else filed out, and finally produced a black and grey rectangular object. “Your prize – a mini, illuminated microscope.”

  I went up to his desk and took it from him. “Thanks.”

  “You deserve it,” he said, shutting the drawer again. “You obviously share your father’s love for science.”

  I felt a bump of surprise in my stomach. “You know him?”

  “I taught him in my first few years here.” Mr Henderson started rubbing the lesson off the whiteboard. “Actually, although I never had him as a pupil, I coached the hockey team and came across your Uncle Jack, too.”

  “Oh yeah, my grandma said he played.”

  “He was our star,” Mr Henderson said, wrinkling his forehead. “Haven’t you seen the photos along the fourth-floor corridor?”

  “No.”

  “I was very fond of both those boys,” he said. “Although I can imagine Jack would have been a handful in class. Very bright and interested, your uncle, but only on his own terms.” He shook his head. “I know your father’s in the medical world now, but I rather lost sight of Jack. What exactly did he do after school?”