Just Peachy

To Lottie Erratt-Rose

CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE

DEDICATION

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

ALSO BY JEAN URE

COPYRIGHT

ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

I never knew until recently that it is a criminal offence to shout “Fire!” in a crowded theatre. Well, or a crowded anywhere, I suppose, if it comes to that. Unless of course there actually is a fire, in which case you should probably shout just as loudly as you possibly can, at the top of your lungs, like, “FIRE!” It’s just if there isn’t one that it’s criminal, I guess because you could cause panic and start a stampede, and people could get trampled on or even crushed to death, and then it would be all your fault and you could be sent to prison.

I was at the dentist when I made this discovery. Sitting there with Mum, reading a magazine and trying to take my mind off the horrors to come. I am a bit of a wimp about the dentist. Mum knows this, so I think she was quite surprised when I gave this little bark of bitter laughter, like, “Huh!”

She said, “And what have you found that’s so amusing?”

Well, obviously it wasn’t the idea of people being crushed to death. But all the same it did strike me as funny, cos quite honestly, with my family, you could bawl through a megaphone at a thousand decibels and it wouldn’t cause panic. Nobody would stampede. They wouldn’t even bother to look up.

I know this, cos I have tried it. Last year, in the Star of Bengal, which is Dad’s favourite Indian restaurant. Saturday evening it was, and we’d all gone out to have a meal. Mum and Dad, my sister Charlotte, my brother Cooper, me and the twins. I was eleven at the time. Charlie was thirteen, Coop fourteen and Fergus and Flora had just had their ninth birthday. They were all sitting there, airing their views and shouting at one another across the table, making a lot of noise, same as they always do. It’s something they can’t seem to help; it is just the way they are.

“Naturally exuberant,” Mum says, with a touch of pride.

They all have these massive great personalities, the sort that come roaring at you like tidal waves, and they all have opinions. Opinions about anything and everything. Sometimes quite violent ones. Even the twins.

“We’re just a very lively bunch,” chortles Mum.

Except for me, who is probably a bit of a disappointment. I do have opinions, but I find I don’t voice them all that often. Not, at any rate, when I’m with the rest of the family. When I’m with the family I mostly just sit quite quietly, like a mouse.

It was what I was doing that evening while the conversation rocketed to and fro, with Dad yelling at Coop, Charlie yelling at Mum, the twins yelling at each other. I expect to outsiders it might have sounded like they were fighting, but they never fight. They are all very good-natured. It is just that yelling happens to be the everyday mode of expression in my family. If there is anything you want to say, you have to join in and start yelling yourself to get their attention.

Which, in the end, is what I did. I would far rather just have gone on quietly sitting there, doing my mouse act, keeping myself to myself, but I knew that the time had come. I had to take action. I had to rise up and shout “Fire!”

Well, to be honest I didn’t actually shout, cos I mean we were sitting in a crowded restaurant and it would have been rude. Unlike the rest of my family, I do try to have some manners. And I didn’t actually use the word fire, for the same reason: crowded restaurant. I wouldn’t have wanted to frighten people. (Or to commit a criminal offence, though I didn’t realise then that it was one.) But the thing that I said – that I tried to say – in this very firm, clear voice, was something Mum and Dad would have found every bit as startling. If they’d stopped yelling long enough to listen.

I got as far as, “Actually—”

And then Mum came crashing in over the top.

“Darling,” she shrieked, “that’s wonderful!”

Needless to say, she wasn’t talking to me. She was talking to Charlie.

“It’s one of the main parts,” yelled Charlie.

“Darling, I know!” Mum reached out and squeezed her hand. “I’m so proud of you!”

I sank back on my chair. Obviously not the right moment for an earth-shattering announcement.

“Alastair, did you hear that?” cried Mum, leaning forward to rap Dad on the back of the hand with a menu.

“What’s that?” said Dad.

“Your clever daughter’s playing Gwendolen!”

“And your clever son,” said Coop, “is writing the music.”

“Music?” Dad seemed puzzled. “I thought it was a play?”

Mum and Charlie exchanged pitying glances. Coop rolled his eyes.

“Dad,” wailed Charlie, “we already told you… it’s being turned into a musical!”

“By none other than yours truly,” added Coop.

“Is that so? In that case—” Dad thumped triumphantly on the table, causing all the cutlery to bounce. Being on the radio, he is very into the whole showbiz thing – “this calls for a celebration!”

Definitely not the moment.

“Such a talented family,” beamed Dad.

“Yes, and that’s not all,” said Mum. “Tell him, you two!”

“Me and Flora’s gonna be in our play too,” said Fergus. “Dunno what parts we’re doing, but we’re def’nitely gonna be in it. Miss Marshall said so.”

“Course you’re going to be in it,” said Dad. “Course you are! Can’t put on a play without a McBride in the cast!”

Mum smiled fondly. “Imagine,” she said, “when the twins get to Summerfield that will make four of them! Well, five, of course, with Peachy.” She hastily patted me on the shoulder. Mum doesn’t like me to feel left out. She does her best to include me whenever she remembers. “But four in the limelight!” She giggled. “A clutch of McBrides!”

I wouldn’t actually mind being in the limelight. Being on stage. Having my name in the programme. Not that I exactly hanker after it. I’m just saying that I wouldn’t mind. I don’t have stage fright or anything. But I’ve come to the conclusion that there are backstage people and there are onstage people, and I’m just one of the backstage ones. Least, that’s what my family would say.

“Hey! Will I still be around?” said Coop.

“What, when the twins go there? Of course you will! It’s only two years away.”

Two years for the twins, just a few months for me. I was supposed to be starting next term. They’d had all our names down for Summerfield practically ever since we were born. It’s like a sort of family tradition. On Dad’s side, that is.

I took a breath. It was time I dropped my bombshell.

“Actually—”

“You never know,” said Coop, “I might be at music college by then.”

“Not at the age of sixteen,” said Mum.

“Not even if I’m a genius?”

“You are a genius, darling, but you’re still staying on at school. I cannot possibly have you leaving till the twins are there. Imagine,” exulted Mum, “a whole dynasty. A McBride takeover!”

I cleared my throat. Noisily.

“ACTUALLY…” I said. I leaned forward. “I d—”

“Five, all at once!”

“I don’t—”

“Five’s not the record,” said Dad. “When I was a boy, there were six of us at one time. Your Uncle Daniel – ” he nodded at us as he ticked names off on his fingers – “your Aunt Helen, me, plus three cousins: Will, Shula, Rory. All there at the same time!”

Mum said, “Yes, but this will be five from just one family. I bet that’s never happened before! We ought to ask for reduced rates.”

My heart began hammering. This was it! I had to get it out. Now. Before they went rushing off to demand reductions.

I took another breath. Deeper this time.

“As a matter of fact,” I said, “I don’t really—”

“Bubbly!” Dad thumped again, on the table. “A bottle of bubbly. That’s what we need!”

“Don’t really w—”

“McBrides United!”

“—really want to go to Summerfield!”

I might just as well not have bothered. Nobody was listening.

“What a team, eh?” Dad winked at Mum.

“We are doing rather well,” agreed Mum.

“Yeah, cos me and Flora – ” Fergus bounced boastfully on his chair – “we didn’t even have to take auditions! Everybody else did, but not us.”

“That’s right.” Flora nodded. “Miss Marshall said she knew what we were capable of.”

“Well, of course she did,” said Dad. “Chips off the old block, the pair of you!”

I think what he meant was, they took after him. Well, and after Mum too, if it comes to that. Mum might not be on the radio, but she is every bit as theatrical as Dad. So are all the others. They are all chips off the old block. Except for me. I am like the cuckoo in the nest. The odd one out. It wouldn’t ever have occurred to Miss Marshall to say she knew what I was capable of. She didn’t even suggest I took the audition, even though I can sing in tune. Of course I could have asked her, if I’d really wanted. But I kept thinking how she’d look at me, with this air of doubt.

“You, Peaches? I thought you’d be helping out backstage?”

What I would have liked was for her to ask me. But even if she had I probably wouldn’t have been given anything, and then the twins would have told Mum, and Mum would have made a big fuss and hugged me and cried, “Oh, darling, don’t think you have to compete! You have your own thing.”

It was like a sort of family myth, me having my own thing. Nobody ever said what it was, and I never quite liked to ask. It was just something Mum used to say to try and make me feel good.

“I’ll tell you what!” Mum’s voice rang out, very clear and bell-like. Heads at the next table turned to stare. “If I hadn’t had you lot, I might have gone onstage myself.”

Dad at once started to sing. He has a deep dark baritone. Very loud.

“Don’t put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington—”

Mum slapped at him. “I could have done!”

“Of course you could, my angel.” Dad blew her a kiss across the table. “You could have done anything you wanted.”

“Instead of which, I had this lot.”

“Ah, but think how proud they’re going to make you!”

“What I should like to think,” said Mum, “is that we could get a reduction in school fees. Dog breeders get reductions. Why can’t we? I mean, let’s face it, sending five of them…”

I think at this point I must have made a little squeak of protest without realising it. Mum broke off and looked at me.

“Did you say something, darling?”

I opened my mouth. I don’t want to go to Summerfield! I’d been trying to say it for the last fifteen minutes. And now, just as I was on the point of actually doing so, Dad gave a joyful cry – “Here’s Raj!” – and Mum snatched up a menu and instructed everyone to order. The moment had passed.

“What’ll we have? Who wants what?”

“Poppadoms, anyone? Who’s for poppadoms?”

And then they all started shouting at once.

“Chicken tikka!”

“Prawn masala!”

“Lamb biryani!”

Raj, who was used to us, stood calmly in the midst of it all writing things down.

“Everyone ordered?” said Mum brightly.

“Yes, yes.” Dad, impatient, gathered up the menus. “Don’t forget the bubbly!”

It was Raj who noticed I hadn’t ordered anything.

“And for the young lady?” he said.

“Young lady?” said Mum. “Which young lady?”

“Just Peachy,” said Coop.

“What? She hasn’t ordered?”

I’m not absolutely positive, but I think Raj may have winked at me. Sort of like showing sympathy. My family!

“So what are you going to have?” said Mum. “If you had the chicken korma, we could mix and match.”

“Yes, all right,” I said.

“You’re sure?”

I nodded. Raj stood gravely, his pen poised.

“She’ll have the chicken korma,” said Mum. “Honestly, darling, you really must learn to speak up!”

“Like on stage,” said Flora. “If you don’t SPEAK UP – ” her voice rose to a shriek – “no one’ll be able to hear you.”

“Well, they’ll certainly be able to hear you, all right,” said Mum.

Flora gave this little complacent smirk. “That’s why Miss Marshall chose us, cos we have these really BIG voices. There’s this one girl in our class – Alisha Briggs? She really fancies herself, she thinks she’s going to get to play the lead, but she won’t cos she has this silly little squeaky voice like an ant. Squeaky squeaky!”

“Ants don’t squeak,” I said.

“They do so,” said Flora. “You just can’t hear them. Like you can’t hear Alisha. Plus she can’t even sing in tune. She goes like this: doh, re, mi-i-i-…”

Flora’s voice rose, shrill and quavery. One of the ladies at the next table placed a hand over her ear.

“I’m going to be singing,” said Charlie. “Coop’s already written one of my songs for me. Haven’t you?”

“Right,” said Coop. “Wanna give them a taste of it?”

Charlie never needs a second invitation. To be fair she does actually have a good voice. Very high and silvery. Not always quite in tune, but who cares?

“Lovely, lovely!” cried Mum, when we’d listened to three full verses plus the chorus. Everyone clapped, madly. Dad even shouted, “Bravo!” I was a bit embarrassed so I just tapped my hands together without making any sound, but some people in the restaurant actually turned in their seats and joined in. Even the lady at the next table, the one who’d put her hand over her ear.

I’m always surprised that people don’t get angry and ask us to be quiet, but they never seem to. I suspect it’s cos of Dad being on the radio, and sometimes on TV, which makes him a sort of mini celeb. Celebs can get away with anything. I bet if ordinary people were to start singing and shouting and making a noise, Raj would say something quickly enough, but he was smiling happily as he brought the champagne. Of course, Dad spends a lot of money in his restaurant. I expect that helps.

“Someone’s birthday?” said Raj, as he popped the cork.

“Celebration,” said Dad. “Double whammy.”

Mum explained about Charlie and Coop and the twins.

“All reaching for the stars!”

This time, Raj really did wink at me. It gave me this little glow of happiness. It made me feel that he was on my side. Everybody, but everybody, loves Mum and Dad, cos they are funny and warm and they make people laugh. But maybe Raj understood how it was, being me. Just Peachy, the mouse in the middle.

“Righty-o!” Dad raised his glass. “Let us have a toast… the McBrides!”

When we’d toasted the whole family together we toasted Charlie and Coop, and after that we toasted the twins. And then Mum said, “To Peachy!” and they all drank a toast to me. And then the food came and everyone immediately fell on it in a kind of mad feeding frenzy, like in those wildlife films where they show bunches of jackals tearing some poor dead thing to shreds. You have to eat really, really fast if you want to keep up. Sometimes I manage it OK, but sometimes I am a bit slow. What made me slow that particular evening was worrying about how and when I was going to break my earth-shattering news to Mum and Dad and how they were going to react. They were not going to be happy.

“Peachy,” said Mum, “stop messing your food about.”

“What’s the matter?” said Dad. “Don’t you want it?” He leaned across and dug his fork into a piece of chicken. The very piece I’d been about to dig my fork into.

“Oh, well, if she’s not going to eat it,” said Mum, and she leaned across and dug her fork in too.

“Really,” said Dad, “I don’t know why you order things if you don’t like them.”

“If you’d have preferred something else,” said Mum, “you only had to say.”

“No need to be scared.” Dad helped himself to more chicken. “Just sing right out!”

“She can’t sing,” said Flora.

I said, “I can so! Shows how much you know.”

Complacently, chewing chicken, Dad said, “All the McBrides can sing. Even Peachy.”

Tomorrow I would definitely tell them.

Usually on a Sunday morning I stay curled up under the duvet for as long as I possibly can. All the family does, except for Mum. Mum is always the first up. She says she likes to have the house to herself for half an hour before the rest of us appear and start banging and clattering.

“A little bit of peace and quiet, that’s all I ask.”

Hah! That is a joke. Even when she does have the house to herself Mum isn’t quiet. Or peaceful. I could hear her, that Sunday, down in the kitchen bawling at the radio. I knew I had to make an effort. Catch her on her own.

Blearily, I forced my eyes open and with one hand threw off the duvet. The hand immediately fell back with a heavy flump on to the bed. It felt like a bag of wet cement. My eyes started to close again. It was a great temptation just to let them. I so didn’t want to have to drop my bombshell!

An angry bellow from the kitchen jerked me back into wakefulness. I swung my legs over the side of the bed, groped my way into jeans and T-shirt, wobbled out on to the landing and staggered downstairs and along the hall.

Mum was sitting with her feet on the kitchen table, drinking a cup of coffee and shouting at the radio. Everyone in my family always shouts at the radio. They can’t ever listen to anything without joining in. What Mum was listening to were the Sunday-morning highlights of Dad’s weekday breakfast show, when Dad gives his opinion about what is happening in the world and the public call in and give theirs, and they have a conversation about it. Well, sometimes they do. Sometimes Dad decides that people are idiots and cuts them off. Sometimes they decide that Dad is an idiot and cut themselves off. Sometimes some of them are bonkers. Like this one woman, Monica, that calls in practically every day. She was on there now, her words splattering round the kitchen like machine-gun fire.

“If-you-ask-me-they-should-all-be-made-to-run-naked-through-the-streets-and-have-raw-sewage-thrown-at-them.”

I giggled. I loved Monica! “What’s she talking about?”

“Politicians,” said Mum. “Oh, listen to her, listen to her! That is too much. She is completely mad! JUST BE QUIET, WOMAN, AND GO AWAY! Honestly, I don’t know why your dad puts up with it.”

“He probably agrees with her,” I said. “He probably thinks it’s a good idea.”

“What? Naked politicians running through the streets?” Mum rolled her eyes. “Heaven forbid! They’re quite bad enough with their clothes on, thank you very much. What are you doing up so bright and early?”

This was it. The moment I was dreading. I sank down on to a chair opposite her.

“Mum,” I said, “there’s something I w—”

“Omigod, there she goes again! Get rid of her, get rid of her!”

“OK.” I leaned over and switched the radio off. Mum gave a shriek.

“What are you doing?”

“You said to get rid of her.”

“I was talking to your dad! I didn’t mean – oh, never mind, it doesn’t matter. I lose all patience with that woman. Did you want to say something?”

She’d noticed. At last! I braced myself against the table.

“You know last night,” I said, “when you were saying how there’d be five of us at Summerfield?”

“Yes! Great fun. But I definitely intend to ask about a reduction.”

“The thing is,” I said, “I—” I stopped. I couldn’t get it out!

“You what?” said Mum.

I gulped. “I don’t want to go there!”

My voice came out in a pathetic squeak. Mum stared, like I had suddenly gone green or turned into some weird kind of thing from outer space.

“You don’t want to go to Summerfield?”

I hung my head.

“You’re not serious?” said Mum. “Please! Tell me you’re not serious?”

I took a deep, trembling breath.

“Omigod,” cried Mum, “you are!”

There was a silence. Long, and awkward. Mum ran a despairing hand through her hair. Mum’s hair is very thick and springy. It was already sticking up from where she’d been sleeping on it. Now she’d made it look like a bird’s nest.

“I’m really sorry,” I whispered.

This was turning out even worse than I’d thought. I had never, ever known Mum be at a loss for words before. She was shaking her head, like she had earwigs crawling in her ears. She seemed totally bewildered.

“Darling,” she said, “what on earth are you talking about? Of course you’re going there! The McBrides always go to Summerfield. It’s all arranged!”

“Yes,” I said. “I know.”

“Coop and Charlie couldn’t be happier. They love it!”

“Yes,” I said. “I know they do.”

“It’s not like you’ll be on your own. They’ll be there to keep an eye on you.”

I stared down at the table.

“And the twins,” said Mum. “They can’t wait to get there!”

I mumbled again that I was sorry.

“Is it something someone’s said? Something that’s put you off?”

I assured her that it wasn’t.

“So… what is it?” said Mum. “I don’t understand! Why all of a sudden don’t you want to go?”

“I just don’t!”

The squeak had turned into a kind of desperate wail. Please don’t keep asking me! Because how could I explain? How could I tell Mum the reason I didn’t want to go to Summerfield was that I needed to be on my own? To be somewhere I could just be me, safely anonymous, without everyone knowing my dad was on the radio and who my brothers and sisters were. I loved my family, I truly did, but sometimes they made me wonder whether I actually really existed or whether I was just this empty space in their midst.

“Darling?” A new idea had obviously struck Mum. She studied me anxiously. “It’s not because of them, is it? Charlie and Coop? Because they’re both doing so well? It’s not that that’s bothering you? Because it really shouldn’t! I mean, Coop and his music… we can’t any of us compete with Coop. Not even your dad. As for Charlie – well! She’s just being Charlie. Centre of attention. That’s her thing, it’s what she does. Not everyone can be like Charlie. We’re all different! And just as well, if you ask me. The world would be a very boring place if we were all the same, don’t you think?”

Mum gave me this bright, hopeful smile, like begging me to agree with her. I smiled rather tremulously back, but was saved from having to say anything by the whirlwind arrival of Dad, who came crashing noisily through the door. Dad is quite a large person; he does a lot of crashing.

Mum said, “Alastair, we need to t—”

She never got to finish the sentence. With a howl, Dad lunged at the radio.

“Why isn’t this on? Why aren’t we listening to my highlights?”

“I was,” said Mum. “Peachy turned it off. We n—”

But Dad had already switched the radio back on. His rich fruity tones came booming out across the kitchen.

“Hah!” he said. “I knew they’d play this bit!”

Mum pulled a face. I sort of sympathised with her. Dad does tend to drown people out. But then Mum does a fair bit of drowning herself.

“This next guy was a right plonker,” said Dad. “How about mad Monica? Did they play her?”

“Never mind mad Monica,” said Mum rather grimly. “We have a problem on our hands.”