The Tip of My Tongue Read online

  My dad says it’s okay to feel sad and cry, but when he does it he pretends it’s not crying. Like in the mornings when his handkerchief is covered in snot, and he says, Hay fever, my love, what a bugger.

  When I came off the train and saw my mother wasn’t at home Slaving in the Kitchen, I asked my dad and he said, She’s gone, lovely.

  Has she gone to be on a cruise with Mrs Mickey? I said, and he went, No, my darling, she hasn’t.

  People tell you to do lots of things, but mostly they say, You’ve got to mind your daddy now, haven’t you, and be a big girl.

  I will mind my dad all the time but he is the big one and he has got a beard too as well now on account of his Trembling Hand, so he looks like Bluto.

  My dad can make me a piccalilli sandwich, he’s made one before, so I go and look for him outside. He’s standing by the Beast with Uncle Horace and they are both smoking fags and my dad has a pint of beer and Uncle Horace has something brown in a little glass. Probably his Single Malt which he must’ve smuggled from Devon.

  Whenever Uncle Horace got home from his works, he’d go to the Drinks Cabinet and say, Who’s been at my Single Malt again? Was it that useless son of ours?

  Sometimes Aunty Celia would go, Don’t be ridiculous, Horace, he’s only fourteen, you must have drunk it yourself, but mostly she’d say, Not in front of the child, dear.

  Aunty Celia would never own up and I couldn’t say because it was Our Special Secret.

  I run up behind my dad but Uncle Horace is in the middle of talking so I stop going to pull my dad’s arm and wait because my mother says it’s rude to interrupt. He’s going,

  ...not even as if she’s your responsibility, is it, Carlo, old boy, and my dad goes, Wanna Bet, OLD BOY? like that so I think he might punch Uncle Horace on his nose like he did some man at The Rev when Danny got chucked out the door and broke his arm. Then they both see me and go quiet.

  Just give it some thought, says Uncle Horace, really quiet, For Celia as much as for the child.

  Then my dad turns round and goes, What do you want, Kid?

  Sometimes my dad calls me Chicken and sometimes he calls me Trouble, or Nuisance, or Spawn of Satan when he’s messing at being angry. And he often calls me Enid, which is my name. The way he says Kid is like when he’s telling Robert Crumb off for swinging on our gate.

  Can I have a sandwich? I say, and he looks into the back door and says,

  Enid, there are a thousand bloody sandwiches in there. Go and help yourself. God knows...

  I don’t say anything to that because his voice is all wavy like it is in the mornings. I remember I’ve still got the Ladybird earring in my hand so I’m putting it creepy-slowly into his suit pocket for safety. He must feel me doing it because he stops right in the middle of his speech and grips my hand really tight through his suit and squeezes it and squeezes it like he does with the flannel when he gives me a facewash. It’s like an angry feeling because I can feel him shaking, but it’s not, because when I look up, his eyes are crying. His mouth is like a hole in a hedge because of his beard being so thick.

  Uncle Horace goes, You poor man, I’m so very sorry, and he starts blowing a trumpet into his handkerchief. But then my dad stops squeezing my hand and snatches it out of his pocket and holds my arm up in the air so it looks like I’m pointing at Uncle Horace and he says, Okay, then, take her. That’s what you bloody came for! Take her!

  Ten

  Erbin Manor

  Autumn 1976

  Again, says Geraint, Repeat after me: I promise I will not spy on my cousin Geraint.

  I promise I will not spy on my cousin Geraint.

  Upon pain of death.

  Upon pain of death.

  Good.

  Good.

  No, Enid, you don’t repeat that bit.

  No, Enid, you don’t repeat that bit.

  I only say it because I know it will make him raging.

  No! Stop repeating now!

  No! Stop repeating now!

  I’m warning you!

  I’m warning you!

  I have to run down the hall as fast as possible because I can see his hand going out for the clock next to his bed, and here it comes, there it goes, whizz bang straight past me and then Smash! into the banisters. He is not very good at throwing. If Fat Karen from school was throwing that clock she’d have had my eye out. So far Geraint has thrown:

  A book

  A shoe

  A pencil case

  A statue of Wellington on his horse

  A teatowel

  A clock

  And he has missed me every time. The statue of Wellington was the best because it smashed into a million pieces and then Geraint went all white and said, Holy Crap! The Old Man is going to marma­lise you! until I said, But Geraint, I never threw it, did I?

  We stuck it together again with the glue he uses for his Skylab Model which he has been building since the Year Dot, and put it back on the mantelpiece with only a bit of the horse’s hoof missing. Uncle Horace has eyes like radar, Geraint says, so when he came in from his works I pretended to faint like a lady in the old films and Uncle Horace was so busy making sure I wasn’t sick on the sheepskin he didn’t even notice.

  Afterwards, Geraint said, You were brilliant, you should be an actress with that talent. He said it in a very sarky way so I could tell he didn’t have a Reprogramme like my dad says Errol had which made him go all funny and be nice on top when underneath he is still That Cheating Scumbag. So while Uncle Horace was in his Study studying, I got out my felt pens and coloured the hoof in black and now it looks perfect, nearly.

  I spy on Geraint a lot, mainly because it annoys him but also because he never lets me play with any of his stuff ever since I broke his Docking Platform which was only a bit of a cornflake packet bent in half anyway. Geraint says he wants to be an astronaut when he grows up, and that is why he is building the Skylab so he can Familiarise himself with the Technology. One time I said, And I want to be a spy when I grow up, and that is why I spy on you, to Familiarise myself with the Technology. He said, Firstly, girls can’t be spies, Secondly, you have to be able to speak Russian, and Thirdly...

  But by the time he got to Thirdly I was very bored and couldn’t stand him flicking his fingers out like that for one more second. Who needs their fingers to help them count to three anyway? I have decided that Geraint is annoying and also my Nemesis as well which is a really bad thing for a spy as it is their sworn enemy and a villain and all that is evil. Also he is a Liar which is another very bad thing.

  Geraint says his Skylab is a Prototype Model which means that it is the very first ever built, but I have seen him copying from a picture in one of his comics, so that is a Lie.

  I do not like lies, so when I promised Geraint I wouldn’t spy on him any more, I had my fingers crossed behind my back. That makes it not a lie, but a Cree, which is Welsh for Not Really. Spies have to be very sneaky.

  Apart from promising (not really) that I won’t spy on him any more, there are the other rules which Geraint calls his Lines of Demarcation. When he said it, I said, Are they lines like the ones Miss Lintel gives to Robert Crumb? ‘I will not swing backwards on my chair. One hundred lines, please, Robert Crumb.’

  Geraint said, Don’t be stupid, they are limits, like lines you don’t ever cross.

  He pretended to draw a line on the carpet near his bedroom door and said,

  Look, this is a line you must not cross.

  Where?

  It’s an imaginary line, I mean... invisible.

  I put my toe over the line and skidded my foot along the carpet.

  Doesn’t hurt, I said, Are you sure you’ve done it properly?

  It’s a symbolic line, he said, and he sounded so smug, I got suspicious, so I didn’t ask him what a symbolic was as it was clearly a trick, I just went, Oh, in that case – and slid my other foot over the line.

  Then I had to scram really fast because he was going for a throw. He’s got about a h
undred other rules, like, I must never touch any of his stuff, I must never say hello to him if he is outside with his pals, I must never have the last bits out of the cornflake packet, I must never even LOOK at his bicycle. Once I said, These rules are so boring, they’re always things I must not do, and he said, Here’s a rule you can do: fuck off.

  That is a really bad Swear and I almost told on him before I remembered rule 53 hundred: Never tell on him to his mum and dad.

  I went away to ask Aunty Celia what a Line of Demarcation was. She was busy dusting the Drinks Cabinet and checking all the bottles were lined up nice and said, Go and ask your father.

  Can I? I said, and then she looked at me a bit funny and said, I meant your Uncle Horace. Ask him when he gets home.

  But I will ask my dad anyway. I write to him every day, nearly, and he writes back a lot when he has time. He says things like, I hope you’re being a good girl, say hello to everybody from me, but mostly he tells me what is happening in the world. He calls it Newsflash!

  Newsflash! Errol is going to live in a yurt (that’s a big tent like Chipperfield’s circus have got) in San Francisco (that’s in America).

  Newsflash! Mrs Mickey fell off her scooter and broke her ankle in four places. I do her shopping on Saturdays now and she has TONS of Pale Ale!

  Newsflash! Robert Crumb’s dad was cleaning the leaves off the front path and found a Gold Watch! That’s what he told the copper, anyway (Ha!Ha!).

  He always says goodbye like this: Sleep tight, my lovely girl, and don’t forget to say a prayer for your Mammy. Don’t be sad, your dad xxxxxxxxx

  He never says when I can go back home. I expect the roof will take a long time to be fixed, because I’ve been here twenty-seven days already and he hasn’t said anything about it in his letters. I will write a list of things to ask him about next time I send him a letter, and I will ask about the roof as well.

  *

  Sunday 12th September 2mp

  Dear Dad,

  Can I call you Pops? That is what Gerant calls his dad when he not caling him Papa or the Old Man. How are you? Tomorow I starting school it is in a old builing building with big windows like in the horor films and Aunty Celia has bought me the unform which all the girls were (there are no boys! Brill!) How is the roof? When can I come home?? How is danny and have you see errol again? How is mrs mickey? Have you still got a beerd?

  Dad, what is a Line of Deemarkshon? Is it invisble like barb wire? Gerant says it is a simbolick, what is a simbolick? Can it hurt you if you touch it?

  Has robert crumb app said sorry for the window? He is Accur! Gerant says that is like a dog, only even more. Can we have a dog when I come home?

  LOTS OF LOVE!!!!!!!!! Xxxxxx yor Enid.

  Ps have they fix the phone box? This is our number is case you lost it last time 0392 477439

  Lots of love xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxEnid

  Eleven

  We are learning songs for the Harvest Festival next week. My new teacher is called Mrs Reynolds and she is very strict and says things like, Now, Jennifer, what is eight nines? and then Jennifer has to say a number. When she did it on me, she said, Now, Enid, what is eight sevens? and I said Four and everyone started laughing and she said, Stop Laughing At Once, and everyone stopped laughing at once really fast. I didn’t know it was my times table, because I know them all the way up off by heart. It was like a trick question, the way she said it. Spies have to learn things very quick, so I am on Red Alert and Stand By For Action!

  In my class there is Jennifer Watson, Rose and Emily who are The Twins, Cynthia Asquith and Carol Curtis, and Annette someone who has got to sit on her own near the door because of her impetigo. There are lots of other girls who sit behind me who I do not know. When Mrs Reynolds does the register she only calls out the last name. The first day, I thought she didn’t call me and then she pointed at me and went, Pay Attention, Erbin. Enid Erbin! And I said, Is that me? And she said, Hands up if there is anyone else in this room called Enid Erbin, and Jennifer started laughing through her nose. I said, My name is Enid Bracchi, Miss. And she said, Not according to this register, Enid Erbin.

  I shall ask my dad about it next time I write to him.

  Harvest Festival in my new school is not like at Saint Saviour’s, when my mother always sent me with a tin of beans for the poor. When I said to Aunty Celia that I had to bring something, she went, Oh heck, and started cooking stuff for the whole day. I had to carry a big bread shaped like a plait and not drop it, and I would have had the cake too only Uncle Horace came in from his works and had a massive slice out of it. That caused a Discussion between Aunty Celia and Uncle Horace. I spied on them by pretending my Sindy needed ballet practice on the landing and then I memorised it and then I wrote it down in code writing in my special top secret spy file:

  Cel: It’s lwys the sme with yu. I’m stck hr in this gd frskn plc ll on my own. I mt as wll be dd.

  Hor: Gddmm yu wmn it ws only a pce of cke! Try kping yr bk out of the bttle for fve mns and gt sme prspctiv.

  Cel: You crul bstrd. Is it any wnder? Yud drv a sint to drnk!

  Hor: A sint! Dn’t mke me lgh.

  Except that when I read it back, I couldn’t understand it. I shall have to learn Russian very quick.

  For the Harvest Festival we are singing ‘We Plough the Fields and Scatter’ and ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’, and some other songs I don’t know. In assembly Mr Lane who plays the piano said, Would anyone like to suggest a new hymn for us to sing at the Harvest Festival? and Cynthia Asquith put her hand up and said, Sir! ‘I’ve got a Brand New Combine Harvester’, sir! It was so funny but when I joined in laughing with Jennifer and Emily and Rose they all looked at me, and Rose said, Poo, what’s that bad smell?

  Cynthia Asquith has got glasses with one of the windows covered in a plaster. Mrs Mickey sometimes has a plaster on her glasses when she falls off her scooter and breaks them but not over the glass bit. When I saw Cynthia at playtime, I said, Is the glass broken? and she said, No, I have a Lazy eye. I said, Are you resting it? And she said, No, it’s this one, and pointed to the one without the plaster on it. I told her about Mrs Mickey’s glasses and now we are best friends.

  I’m going to ask Aunty Celia if Cynthia can come round to play after school and then I will get a ride home in her mother’s sports car with the lid down. Cynthia’s mother is Mrs Asquith and she is a Governor and a Doctor when she’s not governing, and her car is pure white. She looks like Penelope Pitstop when she comes through the gates with her yellow hair all covered with a long scarf.

  Even though Mr Lane pretended to be cross when Cynthia suggested a new hymn, it didn’t last long because he was standing outside the gates when Mrs Asquith came at hometime. He does that nearly every day while he is pretending to look after the playground, and you can tell when she is coming up the drive because he pats his hair down over the baldy bit and shakes his keys up and down. Then he waves at her and sometimes she stops for a minute and has a talk with him.

  I have to get the bus to school every day now after the first week. Aunty Celia drove me okay on Monday and Tuesday, but on Wednesday she was twenty minutes late picking me up, and on Thursday I waited and waited outside the gate until the Headmistress came along and said, Who are you, little girl? When I told her she said, Come along with me, and I sat in her office and she rang Aunty Celia but got no answer.

  Then a Policeman arrived with Aunty Celia looking really upset with her make-up all over the place and they all went into another room without me and closed the door. I thought it must’ve been about my dad, and my heart was banging so hard I almost forgot I was a spy. But after a bit I went up sneaky to the glass in the door and listened and the Policeman was saying, Most unfortunate, but I am afraid this is not the first time.

  Then I could hear Aunty Celia going, Oh, sob, like that, and then she went, Oh my god, if Horace finds out! What will I do?

  The Headmistress has a quite deep voice and she said, Surely, Reginald, we can c
ome to some arrangement on this occasion? The circumstances are very unusual. It’s not as if she was actually on the road.

  There was nothing for a minute except flick, flick, which I think must have been the Policeman going through his notebook and I was right because then the Policeman said, Well, I can issue a caution, I suppose. Mrs Erbin, I must warn you that being drunk in charge of a motor vehicle is a very serious offence and I will not be as lenient next time. The penalty for an offence can be up to three...

  And Aunty Celia said, There won’t be a next time, Reginald – Officer. I absolutely promise.

  And then I had to get back to my seat quick because I could hear their chairs scrape on the floor.

  The Policeman gave us a lift back home in his car, and I was excited and said, Can you put the hooter on? And he said, No little girl, it is not a toy. Now please do not distract me while I am driving.

  After a few minutes I was feeling a bit sick but I didn’t want to distract him again so I tried to open the window.

  You will find those windows are locked, little girl, he said, and Aunty Celia joined in, very bright now that she wasn’t going to jail any more, saying, That’s to stop the baddies jumping out, isn’t it Reg – Officer?

  He started going on about some Unsavoury Characters and I tried not to be sick but then it was too late and I had to walk the last bit home.

  When I got there, Aunty Celia and the Policeman were out the front, looking into a bush and talking. I could see Aunty Celia’s car stuck in the bush with the door hanging open. She was saying, Thank you, I really appreciate it, and then he got in it and put it back in its normal place on the drive so it looked the same as ever.

  What shall we say happened to the rhododendron, Enid? she said when he had gone.