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.There they were as children, Sophie and Alex, arms around each other, both with fair hair, although I could see Alex was always darker.Childhood in silver frames.Sophie and Sebastian squinting into the sun, Sophie holding a baby in a long christening gown, one hand protectively over her face.Sebastian with hair.Older people, Mr and Mrs March, all of them in the garden, sunlight on their faces, smiling at the camera.Lucy as a toddler, wearing puffy shorts and a hat and clutching the neck of a small dog, a whole generation sitting behind her.Alex with his arm around a beautiful dark-haired girl.Skinny hips.Arm slung casually over her shoulder, her hand holding his.Cool beautiful people.That same knowing look on his face.I shut the drawer.My heart was thumping.If I met him on the way down the stairs I would say, Hey I was looking for your dog.That’s all.‘Augusta? Where are you?’ Where was she? Did it matter? She was here now, in the house of her beloved George, even though he was a bastard.Maybe she knew he was here somewhere, just like she was.She still went back to him.She’d stop bothering me now.I could go home and be a normal person with Algie, him and me against the world, and I’d never ever think about Alex March again.The front door slammed shut.Oh diddly fuck.Augusta? Where the hell are you?Voices in the hallway.‘Alex? You here?’ Lucy Bloody Rutherford-Fuchs was in the house with another voice, a male voice, behind her.My heart leapt out from my dreaming body and shot me halfway across the room.Quick, you idiot, you big blundering idiot—hide!Footsteps coming up the stairs, footsteps and voices, behind the door, no, no, no, they’ll see me, under the bed, under the bloody bed, oh you mighty, mighty fool.I crawled under Alex March’s bed, my heart thumping like a drum in a marching band, boom boom boom and glory, glory hallelujah, perhaps I would die like this.Death from embarrassment while Lucy Rutherford screwed her boyfriend—not Dave, please don’t let it be Dave, she chucked him, didn’t she?—on the bouncing laughing bed.I lay under the bed with a mouthful of dust from the wooden floorboards.I was going to have to come out and surprise them.But it didn’t sound like Dave.Sounded more like Alex March, a little bit posh, a little bit London, not a Wye on Thames voice.‘You sure about this, Luce?’‘’Course.Alex says I can use the place whenever I want to.He knows what Sebastian is like.’Why, Lucy darling, Alex says the same to me, use the place whenever, Rebeccah, stay under the bed for as long as you want to.‘He’s okay.Is to me, anyway.’‘Yes of course he is to you.He likes you.He thinks you’re a good influence on me.Oh God, if only he knew.’There was a terrible, terrible silence, and I could hear all sorts of terrible, terrible sounds I’d have given anything in my life not to hear.Augusta, get me out here, please.The door opened and from where I lay I could see her black little shoes swing into the room.She stood at the door watching Lucy in her twentieth-century act of passion with whoever was meant to be a good influence on her.As Augusta stood there a huge swirl of dust went up my nose and I desperately tried to stop the sneeze, but I couldn’t.I knew it was coming.Oh shit shit shit.I practically shoved my whole arm into my mouth.I would have shoved my whole body into my mouth if it had stopped the sneeze, but no, it was coming, it was coming, any second now.It nearly blew my head off.And one sneeze was never enough.‘Oh my God, did you hear that?’ Lucy shot up off the bed.I could see Augusta’s feet dance over to the windows where she flapped the curtains, opened the window, slammed the bedroom door shut then opened it again and turned the bedroom light on and off, on and off.She was magnificent.They both scrambled up from the bed, almost screaming with fright.‘What the hell’s going on? Oh my God, what the hell is this?’I prayed that Lucy wouldn’t look under the bed for the source of the sneeze, but at that moment Jojo raced in.God bless you, Jojo, and God bless you, Augusta (was that a funny thing to say to a ghost?).He barked his head off at Augusta and Lucy and the boy, and Lucy was saying, ‘Oh my God, we’re not staying here, wait till I tell Alex he’s got poltergeists in his bloody house.Come on, Nick, let’s get out of here.’Augusta slammed the bedroom door shut behind them and I heard Lucy scream halfway down the stairs.Augusta really seemed to be enjoying herself.I could hear Jojo outside scrabbling over the driveway behind Lucy and Nick, whoever he was.I slid out from under the bed.Car doors slammed, an engine started, then revved away.Shaky legs, beating heart, covered in dust.‘Augusta! You marvellous thing.Thank you.’She inclined her head to me.‘Is all that hard to do?’Easy.‘Do you feel good now?’I was thinking of.She paused, gathering his name from some undisclosed sadness.Then she said it.George.A tiny smile played at the corners of her mouth.I had never seen Augusta smile before.I couldn’t feel her sadness; it sat like a stone in front of me, I could only see it from the outside.I had no idea what she had felt or what her life had been.I only knew mine.I had to get out of there.I was going home to Algernon.Algie, I am coming.Where are you?‘Miss Budde, I am sitting in the wardrobe.’‘What’s up, Algie?’‘I would like some more of your company, Miss Budde.’‘Here I am.’‘Yes indeed, here is your corporeal presence.’‘Exactly.’He looked tired and crumpled but still he smiled at me with his beautiful kind face.Algernon.Oh with what fondness do I regard you?‘Shall I tell you about this afternoon?’‘I told you not to let her in.’‘I didn’t, she was there already.But it’s all right, Algie, nothing bad happened.’‘Misbehaving most likely,’ he said.‘Having fun,’ I said.I was thinking of the huge pile of fluff under Alex March’s bed.I wondered what would have happened if Lucy had looked under the bed.I thought Algernon would be pleased that his sister was busy being somewhere instead of being nowhere.The Great Romantic FoolIt was now June.Last term of college before the long summer break.My book, The Great Romantics, was massively overdue.I had renewed it twice under special provisions from the library for those who stubbornly keep and will not relinquish their books.I was going to have to beg Mrs Johnson’s forgiveness, but first I was going to have to find her.I was going to get a fine.Never mind, I loved that book, couldn’t find it in the shops, and was reluctant to part with it.‘Books, books, books,’ said Mrs Johnson, walking towards me with a brisk eagerness I recognised from her sister Amanda.‘Where would we be without them? Rebecca Budde, just the person I wanted to see.’‘Hello, Mrs Johnson.’‘Hello, indeed.You owe me a large amount of money, young lady.Let me see now.’‘I’m really, really sorry.’‘No doubt you are.Well now, I’ve been having a think about this and here’s what I suggest, seeing as you’ve also failed to return A Short History of Brightley.’‘That’s only a pamphlet.’‘Still counts as a book.Well, Rebecca.Either you can pay me a large amount of money, or you could do some work here in the library for me after class.’‘How much do I owe you?’‘At least, ooh, let me see, about five pounds.And that’s subsidised by the college.’‘Five pounds?’‘Roughly speaking.’Five pounds?! Dad would kill me.He could half fill the oil tank with that.(He couldn’t really [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.There they were as children, Sophie and Alex, arms around each other, both with fair hair, although I could see Alex was always darker.Childhood in silver frames.Sophie and Sebastian squinting into the sun, Sophie holding a baby in a long christening gown, one hand protectively over her face.Sebastian with hair.Older people, Mr and Mrs March, all of them in the garden, sunlight on their faces, smiling at the camera.Lucy as a toddler, wearing puffy shorts and a hat and clutching the neck of a small dog, a whole generation sitting behind her.Alex with his arm around a beautiful dark-haired girl.Skinny hips.Arm slung casually over her shoulder, her hand holding his.Cool beautiful people.That same knowing look on his face.I shut the drawer.My heart was thumping.If I met him on the way down the stairs I would say, Hey I was looking for your dog.That’s all.‘Augusta? Where are you?’ Where was she? Did it matter? She was here now, in the house of her beloved George, even though he was a bastard.Maybe she knew he was here somewhere, just like she was.She still went back to him.She’d stop bothering me now.I could go home and be a normal person with Algie, him and me against the world, and I’d never ever think about Alex March again.The front door slammed shut.Oh diddly fuck.Augusta? Where the hell are you?Voices in the hallway.‘Alex? You here?’ Lucy Bloody Rutherford-Fuchs was in the house with another voice, a male voice, behind her.My heart leapt out from my dreaming body and shot me halfway across the room.Quick, you idiot, you big blundering idiot—hide!Footsteps coming up the stairs, footsteps and voices, behind the door, no, no, no, they’ll see me, under the bed, under the bloody bed, oh you mighty, mighty fool.I crawled under Alex March’s bed, my heart thumping like a drum in a marching band, boom boom boom and glory, glory hallelujah, perhaps I would die like this.Death from embarrassment while Lucy Rutherford screwed her boyfriend—not Dave, please don’t let it be Dave, she chucked him, didn’t she?—on the bouncing laughing bed.I lay under the bed with a mouthful of dust from the wooden floorboards.I was going to have to come out and surprise them.But it didn’t sound like Dave.Sounded more like Alex March, a little bit posh, a little bit London, not a Wye on Thames voice.‘You sure about this, Luce?’‘’Course.Alex says I can use the place whenever I want to.He knows what Sebastian is like.’Why, Lucy darling, Alex says the same to me, use the place whenever, Rebeccah, stay under the bed for as long as you want to.‘He’s okay.Is to me, anyway.’‘Yes of course he is to you.He likes you.He thinks you’re a good influence on me.Oh God, if only he knew.’There was a terrible, terrible silence, and I could hear all sorts of terrible, terrible sounds I’d have given anything in my life not to hear.Augusta, get me out here, please.The door opened and from where I lay I could see her black little shoes swing into the room.She stood at the door watching Lucy in her twentieth-century act of passion with whoever was meant to be a good influence on her.As Augusta stood there a huge swirl of dust went up my nose and I desperately tried to stop the sneeze, but I couldn’t.I knew it was coming.Oh shit shit shit.I practically shoved my whole arm into my mouth.I would have shoved my whole body into my mouth if it had stopped the sneeze, but no, it was coming, it was coming, any second now.It nearly blew my head off.And one sneeze was never enough.‘Oh my God, did you hear that?’ Lucy shot up off the bed.I could see Augusta’s feet dance over to the windows where she flapped the curtains, opened the window, slammed the bedroom door shut then opened it again and turned the bedroom light on and off, on and off.She was magnificent.They both scrambled up from the bed, almost screaming with fright.‘What the hell’s going on? Oh my God, what the hell is this?’I prayed that Lucy wouldn’t look under the bed for the source of the sneeze, but at that moment Jojo raced in.God bless you, Jojo, and God bless you, Augusta (was that a funny thing to say to a ghost?).He barked his head off at Augusta and Lucy and the boy, and Lucy was saying, ‘Oh my God, we’re not staying here, wait till I tell Alex he’s got poltergeists in his bloody house.Come on, Nick, let’s get out of here.’Augusta slammed the bedroom door shut behind them and I heard Lucy scream halfway down the stairs.Augusta really seemed to be enjoying herself.I could hear Jojo outside scrabbling over the driveway behind Lucy and Nick, whoever he was.I slid out from under the bed.Car doors slammed, an engine started, then revved away.Shaky legs, beating heart, covered in dust.‘Augusta! You marvellous thing.Thank you.’She inclined her head to me.‘Is all that hard to do?’Easy.‘Do you feel good now?’I was thinking of.She paused, gathering his name from some undisclosed sadness.Then she said it.George.A tiny smile played at the corners of her mouth.I had never seen Augusta smile before.I couldn’t feel her sadness; it sat like a stone in front of me, I could only see it from the outside.I had no idea what she had felt or what her life had been.I only knew mine.I had to get out of there.I was going home to Algernon.Algie, I am coming.Where are you?‘Miss Budde, I am sitting in the wardrobe.’‘What’s up, Algie?’‘I would like some more of your company, Miss Budde.’‘Here I am.’‘Yes indeed, here is your corporeal presence.’‘Exactly.’He looked tired and crumpled but still he smiled at me with his beautiful kind face.Algernon.Oh with what fondness do I regard you?‘Shall I tell you about this afternoon?’‘I told you not to let her in.’‘I didn’t, she was there already.But it’s all right, Algie, nothing bad happened.’‘Misbehaving most likely,’ he said.‘Having fun,’ I said.I was thinking of the huge pile of fluff under Alex March’s bed.I wondered what would have happened if Lucy had looked under the bed.I thought Algernon would be pleased that his sister was busy being somewhere instead of being nowhere.The Great Romantic FoolIt was now June.Last term of college before the long summer break.My book, The Great Romantics, was massively overdue.I had renewed it twice under special provisions from the library for those who stubbornly keep and will not relinquish their books.I was going to have to beg Mrs Johnson’s forgiveness, but first I was going to have to find her.I was going to get a fine.Never mind, I loved that book, couldn’t find it in the shops, and was reluctant to part with it.‘Books, books, books,’ said Mrs Johnson, walking towards me with a brisk eagerness I recognised from her sister Amanda.‘Where would we be without them? Rebecca Budde, just the person I wanted to see.’‘Hello, Mrs Johnson.’‘Hello, indeed.You owe me a large amount of money, young lady.Let me see now.’‘I’m really, really sorry.’‘No doubt you are.Well now, I’ve been having a think about this and here’s what I suggest, seeing as you’ve also failed to return A Short History of Brightley.’‘That’s only a pamphlet.’‘Still counts as a book.Well, Rebecca.Either you can pay me a large amount of money, or you could do some work here in the library for me after class.’‘How much do I owe you?’‘At least, ooh, let me see, about five pounds.And that’s subsidised by the college.’‘Five pounds?’‘Roughly speaking.’Five pounds?! Dad would kill me.He could half fill the oil tank with that.(He couldn’t really [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]