Page 18 of Charlie Sunshine
“Well, that’s just wonderful. I do so love our family problems. Thank goodness there’s more than one. What’s the first?”
She grimaces. “Anya got suspended.”
“What?” I say far too loudly, and she hushes me quickly. “What for?” I say in a lower tone.
“She handcuffed herself to some railings at school.”
“She handcuffed herself torailings?”
“Are you going to repeat everything I say tonight?” she asks.
“Probably, if every statement is going to be as ridiculous as that one. Why the fuck did she chain herself to railings? Is she Emmeline Pankhurst?”
“No, but she’s very passionate about climate change.”
“Oh my God,” I groan. “I might have known. Is it the plight of the penguins this week, or the mating grounds of the lesser spotted pink whistled puffin?”
“Anya is very concerned about the world, Misha.”
“How about she becomes concerned about the plight of the stressed-out banker? I don’t see her chaining herself to any railings over me.”
She laughs, and I sit back in my chair and stare at her over the teapot. This situation is so familiar to me. I’ve lost track of the number of times we’ve sat here together with tea and biscuits trying to sort out family situations.
There’s a noise at the door, and Charlie comes in, grinning at my mum. I look at that smile and feel the tight muscles inside me relax. Charlie’s family might have kept our house running, but it was Charlie who saw me through. He’s lived next door to me since we came here, and it feels like I’ve always had him in my life.
I first met him when I was six and we moved into this house. Ipoked my head over the garden fence and found a blond boy lying completely still and spread-eagled on the grass.
“I’m Misha. Are you dead?” I hissed, displaying a strong streak of callousness.
He opened one eye. “I’m Charlie, and I’m still breathing,” he said earnestly, even then showing his special talent for blatant obviousness.
“But you’re so still.”
“Don’t you ever lie still?”
I tried to think of an occasion but then gave up. “No,” I admitted.
He smiled at me, and it filled his whole face, showing a gap in his teeth. “Come over, then, and lie down.”
I immediately clambered over the fence and found myself in a long messy garden. I flung myself next to him and looked at him. “What are we doing?” I asked.
“I read in a book that the grass whispered. I’m trying to hear it.”
We lay there for a few minutes before my dad’s voice rose up from the house.
Charlie sat up. “Is he speaking a foreign language?”
“He’s Russian,” I said in a resigned tone. “And he’s this noisyallthe time,” I warned him. I looked up at his house. “Do you live with your mum and dad?”
“My dad and his boyfriend live in the upstairs flat, and my mum’s got the downstairs one with her boyfriend.” He shot me a look that contained a fair degree of trepidation and an expectation that I’d take the piss.
Instead, I considered the information and then shrugged. “That’s brilliant. Another two grown-ups to buy presents. How wicked is that?”
He smiled happily at me, and we lay back down for a few more minutes.
After a bit, he sighed. “I can’t hear anything from the grass,” he said.
“Books!” I said in a suitably disgusted voice. I paused. “Our shed’s falling down. Do you want to get some sticks and hit it until it collapses?”
