Margot & Me Read online

  Not quite sure what to do, I kneel down in the hay and scoop him into my lap. He stirs feebly, but it seems like the strength is leaving his body and he hardly bothers to struggle. I cradle him like a human baby and position the bottle to his mouth. ‘Come on, you tiny weirdo. Eat something.’ I’m not taking no for an answer. I force the bottle into his mouth and some milk trickles out. The piglet splutters and spits the milk onto my knees – man, this is grim. I try again, and this time it looks like he’s swallowing. ‘There you go! Good boy!’

  Margot clatters in, carrying a big silver lamp. ‘I can’t believe I’m bothering with this.’

  ‘Look, he’s feeding!’ I say triumphantly. ‘What’s he called?’

  ‘I don’t give them names.’

  The piglet nuzzles against me. ‘Well, that’s stupid. I’ll give them names.’

  ‘Felicity, I really wouldn’t, if I were you. You don’t want to get too fond of them.’

  I ignore Margot’s advice. ‘You,’ I say directly to the pig in my arms, ‘look like a Peanut to me. Peanut the Piglet!’

  Margot mutters something under her breath and plugs the lamp in. I ignore her and continue to feed Peanut.

  Who needs an alarm clock when there’s a cockerel? The bloody thing starts crowing as the sun rises at about five. I stuff my head under the pillow but hear Margot rise and thud downstairs.

  As soon as I’m awake, I’m awake. First day of school. I can’t avoid it any longer and I can’t deny I’m nervous. I wish I was still at St Agnes. I think about Tiggy and Marina and Booey and Livs greeting each other on the first day after the holidays and how excited they’ll all be to see each other. I wonder if they’ll talk about me. I’ve been going there since I was eleven and all the teachers liked me. Dr Greenaway once commented I was head-girl material. I hope someone else doesn’t overtake me before I get back to London.

  After I’ve showered, I take some time in selecting a perfect ‘First Day Impression’ outfit. I want something that demonstrates I’m from London, something that says I’m fashion-forward, something that screams I’m not from the Welsh Valleys. I select a simple black shift dress and wear it over a white blouse along with crisp white knee socks and the Mary Janes. I finish the look off with a black Alice band and a spritz of CK One. Cher Horowitz would be proud.

  I imagine a new film. In this one I meet a group of tragic, downtrodden village girls and empower them through better fashion choices. I would totally watch that.

  Feeling more than a little nauseous, but determined not to show it, I make my way downstairs. Once again there’s an impressive spread on the kitchen table – well of course there is, Margot’s been up since dawn. Strawberry jam, lemon curd, marmalade … all home-made in reused jars.

  Mum, cradling a black coffee, looks tired, obviously having risen so early just to see me off on my first day. She hasn’t bothered to put the wig on. Her scalp is still visible under the soft baby hair that’s growing back. I don’t like it when she’s not in the wig; she looks like a cancer patient. With a bit of a shiver I have a flashback to the days when I’d find clumps of brown hair between the sofa cushions, matted in the carpets, clogging the plughole; everywhere. ‘Mum, you should go back to bed. You look awful.’

  ‘Charming. I wanted to wish you luck on your first day!’

  ‘Thank you.’ My tummy gurgles. I change the subject. ‘Where’s Margot?’

  ‘Out collecting eggs.’ Mum rests her mug. ‘Fliss …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’ll settle in, I promise. Don’t make life hard for yourself.’

  ‘I’m not.’

  ‘OK …’ She doesn’t seem convinced. ‘I had an idea. Margot and I are driving into Llanmarion today. Why don’t I ask around about dance schools?’

  I shake my head. ‘No.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Fliss. You haven’t danced in years … not since … well, now seems like the right time to get back into it.’

  ‘I don’t want to.’ I am aware how whiny I sound. Ballet feels like something a different girl used to do. The girl from The Time Before Mum Got Ill. I can’t believe she was ever really me.

  ‘It used to make you so happy.’

  ‘So did My Little Ponies. I’m too old for ballet.’

  Mum can evidently sense she’s onto a losing battle. ‘Fine. But what a waste of talent.’

  ‘I don’t think I could even do it any more. I’m also too fat for ballet.’

  ‘Felicity Baker! What absolute shi—’

  Margot bursts through the back door, casting a long shadow over the table. ‘Righty-ho! Is it fried, poached or scrambled?’

  ‘I’m not hungry,’ I say.

  ‘Nonsense! Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Your brain can’t work on an empty stomach.’

  Mum joins in. ‘Fliss, you’re not going to school without breakfast.’

  ‘OK, OK, I’ll have some toast.’ I pick a slice out of the rack and push myself away from the table. ‘I need to go and feed Peanut before school.’ As soon as I’m outside, I frisbee the toast into the trees.

  Chapter 4

  Peanut fed – and still alive – I refuse the offer of a lift. I need to learn my way around this wasteland, or I’ll be stuck on the farm relying on Margot’s highly questionable kindness until the end of time. Ysgol Maes-y-Coed – which I can barely say, let alone translate – is about twenty minutes away and Margot informed me there’s a school service that trundles around the valley, picking stray children off the farms and hamlets.

  I only recently learned that my education at St Agnes in London was courtesy of Margot and Grandad – I always assumed Mum had paid my fees, but she hasn’t worked in a long time and I have no idea what TV producers actually earn. There is one private school in the area, but it’d be about an hour’s drive each way and they have no boarding. I can’t believe I’m even considering boarding school as preferable to staying at the farm. What decrepitude has my life become?

  Boys cross my mind. I’ve never been to a school with boys before and I’ve been led to believe that, en masse, they’re noisy, smelly, chimpanzee-like creatures. At St Agnes we were free to get on with learning without having to worry about them. That said, I hope there are some hot ones.

  The bus, one of those sad green hoppers that delivers old people to day centres, pulls up at the bus shelter. I check it’s going to the correct school before I climb aboard. Gross, it smells of old-lady-cabbage-farts. When I try to pay with cash, the driver explains I need a pass from the school office. So much newness to deal with. The driver swerves off and I tumble down the aisle.

  Luckily there’s only one witness to my clumsiness. A giant sits on the back row and very nearly fills it. He’s not fat, just huge, like a regular human blown up on a photocopier to 150 per cent. I get a first look at the Maes-y-Coed uniform – a navy blue sweatshirt with a white polo shirt. Hardly the blazer and kilt I had back home, which I always thought was pretty cute in a Malory Towers way.

  I sit on the third row and smooth my skirt down. I open my satchel and take out this month’s Vogue. Amber Valletta smiles from the cover, announcing ‘Miniskirts are BACK!’ I think this will send a very clear message to onlookers. I wonder if you can even get Vogue out here.

  I’m so engrossed in ‘The New Suit’ I don’t even notice the giant has moved into the row behind me. ‘So then,’ he says in a heavy Welsh accent. ‘You m-m-must be M-Margot’s granddaughter.’

  Oh, I can’t cope with stammers. I always feel so sorry for people with them. It’s like when I see a blind person with either a white stick or a guide dog, I just totally want to cry for them. ‘I am. I’m Felicity Baker. Fliss.’ If nothing else, St Agnes taught me the value of good manners. I shake a bear-paw-sized hand.

  ‘Dewi Allen. Nice to meet you.’ He too is wearing CK One. Who isn’t?

  Why does that name ring a bell? ‘The milk man?’

  He smiles. There’s a little gap between his front teeth. ‘I’m Dewi Allen ju
nior. M-my dad owns the dairy farm, isn’t it. I help out, like, over the weekend.’ I turn back to Vogue. ‘What are you reading?’

  ‘Vogue.’

  ‘Mam sometimes read that. Dirty magazine, if you ask me, all those naked girls.’

  I close the magazine and turn to face him. ‘And how would you know?’ He blushes and shrugs. I feel a little mean. ‘Anyway, it’s not pornographic, it’s high fashion. There’s a big difference.’

  He smiles again. ‘I didn’t know there were different types of nipple.’

  I can’t help but laugh. For someone so huge, he has a harmlessness to him. I suspect a lot of it’s in the lilting accent, to be honest. The bus stops to pick up more students – some younger, some older – and Dewi points out the local shops and unattractive attractions as we pass. As we roll through Llanmarion, there’s a baker and a butcher, a bingo and pool hall, a town square and village hall, a very sad-looking leisure centre (I can smell the chlorine even as we pass) and, of course, the old colliery.

  OK, it’s early in the morning, but there’s a ghost-town feeling about the place. It feels abandoned. Dandelions and dock leaves spring up through cracks in the pavements like nature’s slowly reclaiming the streets after a war or something. Dewi explains that the mine used to be the heart of Llanmarion – nearly every man in town who wasn’t a farmer worked there. Now, since it was closed, those too old to retrain spend the days drinking and smoking and waiting to die. Many were also waiting to hear if they’d get compensation for breathing difficulties they’d picked up down the mine. I had no idea. No wonder everything looks so grey and morose.

  The school is as sad as the town. As the bus pulls into the car park I see miserable pebble-dash blocks with square black windows. In the sixties, this must have been cutting-edge design, but now it looks dirty and almost factory-like. I wonder if there’s a conveyor belt.

  I step off the bus, ready to report to the main reception. ‘Do you want me to sh-sh …’ He stops and blinks to compose his speech, ‘show you where to go, like?’

  ‘It’s all right. I can find my way. Thank you though.’

  ‘J-just go up those stairs and follow the path to th-the glass doors.’ A couple of guys saunter over – Dewi’s friends, I’m guessing. Clearly no one is taller than Dewi, but one is tall and thin like he’s made out of pipe-cleaners while the other is a tubby little thing.

  ‘Bore da, Dewi,’ says the chunky one.

  ‘Hiya, butt,’ Dewi replies. ‘Rhys and Matthew, this is … this is Fliss – Margot Hancock’s granddaughter.’ Another bus pulls in, a bigger one this time. The doors hiss open and a chatty gaggle of pupils pours out to fill the driveway.

  ‘Ah, from Mari-Morgan Farm, no?’ asks Rhys – the stringy one.

  ‘That’s me.’

  ‘I’m well scared of that farm, I am,’ the one called Matthew says. ‘You know what they say about Mari-Morgan Farm, don’t you?’

  Dewi rolls his eyes. ‘Matthew, don’t be filling Fliss’s head with your rubbish.’

  ‘No!’ I say. ‘Go on, what do they say?’

  ‘Oh, doesn’t she talk posh, like?’ Rhys chips in.

  ‘You know what a mari-morgan is, don’t you?’ Matthew says, and I shake my head. ‘It’s like a water spirit. They got silver skin and black eyes. They live in water and, like, lure men to their death by drowning them.’

  ‘It’s just … just an old Welsh fairy tale,’ Dewi says with a sneer. ‘Don’t p-pay any attention to him. And anyway, everyone knows they’re green.’

  ‘It’s true, butt! That’s why Margot changed the name of the farm, no? Everybody around here knows about the mari-morgans in the river.’

  I know it’s majorly ridiculous, but my heart whirrs faster. Water spirits? Sirens? As if! At the same time, I can’t ignore the voices, the whispers I heard in the forest. That happened before I even knew what a mari-morgan was, before I knew Margot had renamed the farm.

  ‘Are you OK, Fliss?’ Dewi asks.

  ‘I’m fine. Sorry, just a little spaced out. I should go find reception really.’

  ‘Matthew, you dickhead, look what you done.’

  ‘It’s OK, really!’ I fake a bright smile. ‘I highly doubt there are water fairies living on my grandma’s farm!’

  I notice a trio of super-scary-looking girls loitering at Dewi’s shoulder. They’re all wearing their uniform in the same way – sleeves rolled up, collars upturned and very tight Lycra skirts with platform ankle boots. I doubt these are my new friends to rescue through fashion. One reaches up and taps Dewi on the shoulder. She has two blonde stripes dyed into the front of her hair and dark brown lip liner with pale lipstick. It’s, let’s just say, a bold choice. ‘Bore da, Dewi.’

  ‘Oh, hi, M-Megan. How’s it going?’

  ‘I’m lush.’ She peers at me through solid black eyeliner, seemingly applied with a marker pen. ‘Who’s this, then?’

  ‘Hi,’ I say, offering a hand. ‘I’m Fliss Baker. I just moved to Mari-Morgan Farm.’

  ‘Good morning!’ she says in a pantomime English accent. ‘Welcome to Wales, Your Royal Highness!’ Behind her, her friends snigger into their hands. One of them is a bottle blonde with eyebrows that look like upside-down Nike ticks and the other is a hard-faced black girl with her hair spiked up like a pineapple.

  Clearly I’m not going to let on if I’m bothered, which I’m not. These girls have just made it really easy to know who I’ll be avoiding. ‘Thanks. So far I’m having a lovely time. The farm is so beautiful.’

  ‘And so is your outfit,’ Megan says with a smirk.

  ‘Megan …’ Dewi says, although he doesn’t sound too brave.

  A little trick I learned when dealing with cattiness at St Agnes: the more horrid Megan gets, the nicer I’ll be. She’s not going to break me. ‘Well! So nice to meet you, but I’d better go find out where I’m supposed to be! See you around!’ I smile broadly, turn on my heel and set off up the path.

  ‘What’s she come dressed as?’ the dark-skinned girl says, well within earshot.

  ‘She looks like Wednesday Addams, yeah?’ Megan says, and her sidekicks howl with laughter. Not the impression I was aiming for. I flinch but keep walking, head up high, and pretend I can’t hear.

  A nice lady called Yvonne from the school office shows me around. She has bushy burgundy hair and red-rimmed glasses. Once upon a time, she must have been very glamorous, but now the lingering cloud of Dior Poison that follows her is a bit of a hangover.

  She tells me about the great rivalry with the Welsh-speaking school on the other side of town but I’m so overwhelmed that most of the tour goes in one ear and out the other. I’m clearly going to get very lost.

  ‘Doll, your uniform’s been paid for by your naini, so you can pick it up at the end of the day.’

  ‘Could I change into it now?’

  Yvonne looks a little taken aback. ‘Well, of course. If you’re keen! Come on round, doll and we’ll find your size.’

  I select a sweater, T-shirt and skirt and take them into the toilet to change. The uniform is shapeless, unflattering and there’s nothing I can do to make it look less box-fresh. It screams ‘new girl’ just as much as my own clothes. I keep the knee socks and Mary Janes, obviously. I’m not changing my style simply because some hill-dwelling scrubbers don’t like it. What do they know, anyway? Ginger Spice is not a fashion icon.

  I leave my own clothes in a carrier bag behind the reception desk so I don’t have to drag them around all day, and Yvonne prints me out a timetable. ‘There you go, doll. Now hurry along or you’ll be late for first period.’ My first lesson is maths in E14. ‘Up the stairs and don’t forget we always walk clockwise in the E-Block.’

  So many pointless rules to learn. It’s a good thing my head is spinning or I might remember to feel nervous or lonely. I hurry upstairs just as a bell goes, signalling the end of what must be registration. Classroom doors open, students flood the hallways and suddenly I understand the clockwise rule. All I can
do is join the current and see where it takes me. I manage to duck out of the stream and slip into E14. The teacher hasn’t arrived yet and my new classmates run wild, chasing each other around and throwing missiles. This would never happen at St Agnes, where we have to queue in silence outside the classroom until a teacher lets us in.

  At the back I see Megan and her skanky friends sitting on the desks and blowing bubbles with Hubba Bubba. Classy. I can’t see Dewi anywhere, which is a shame as at least then I’d know someone to say hello to. I demurely seat myself underneath the window at the front, away from the chaos, and take Vogue out of my bag. I’m quite happily leafing through an accessories feature when I become aware of people staring. At the furthest end of the front row is a girl with copper-wire hair and freckles alongside a very beautiful Asian boy with swishy curtain hair.

  I’m not sure why they’re staring so intently, so I return to my magazine. Oh, what I wouldn’t give for a pair of patent-leather Miu Miu sandals. In my peripheral vision I become aware of the Asian guy waving at me, pointing at the magazine. I don’t get it – is he making fun of me? Or is he asking to see what I’m reading? I hold it up and point to the cover.

  Across the room, he rolls his eyes and gestures, tucking his hands under the table. Now I’m really lost. I shrug just as the magazine is torn out of my hands. ‘Oi!’ I protest.

  A stony-faced man with yellowed, nicotine-stained teeth stares down at me. ‘Magazines aren’t allowed in school. Books only.’

  ‘But … I … It’s my first day. I … didn’t know.’ There’s a snigger from over my shoulder and I don’t need to turn around to know it’s Megan or her minions.

  The teacher curls my Vogue into a baton and tucks it under his sweat-crusty armpit. ‘You can have it back at the end of the lesson in that case.’