The Tutti-frutti Collection

I was dreading that she would feel resentful and that we’d be in for an attack of the sulks, but the other day she was even suggesting names to me and was starting to sound enthusiastic! I realise now that I was wrong to keep it from her – Roly said all along that I was – but I’m hoping no real harm has been done. I am making sure that we spend some part of every day talking about the baby together, even if it’s just five minutes, so that she will be made to feel a part of it and not left out in the cold.

I’m glad you’ve had a good week (meeting handsome Texans! You just watch it!) because after a bumpy start so have we. Roly went away to Newcastle for just one night and I missed him more than I could have thought possible, but it gave me the opportunity I needed to talk to Cherry and make my confession, and when he came back the next day he’d brought her the most truly beautiful china ornament that he found in an antique shop. I told him that it’s far too valuable to give to a child, especially one as clumsy as Cherry, but he insisted that he had bought it for her and that she must have it. She mumbled her thanks – not quite as ungraciously as usual – and seemed reasonably pleased with it. She has put it away very carefully on a high shelf, but it’s only a matter of time before it gets smashed to smithereens.

I sometimes wonder whether Roly is trying too hard. Might it not be better if he gave her tit for tat and treated her with the same contempt as she treats him? Unfortunately – or fortunately – it’s just not in his nature. He is a very gentle, caring person and I’m afraid that a child like Cherry rides rough-shod over him. I’m hoping that the baby may bring out the softer side of her nature. If she has one!

No, that’s not fair. She has on the whole a very sunny personality, very bright and bubbly, and can be quite warm and loving when she chooses. I remember after Gregg and I first split up she was incredibly supportive. I couldn’t have asked for a better daughter! It’s just that at the moment events are rather conspiring to bring out the worst.

On Saturday she wanted to go to something she calls a sleep-over at a friend’s house and we had a bit of a scene when I wouldn’t let her. Roly says I should have taken the chance, but he hasn’t seen the parents!!! The father works in a gambling den and the mother – well! The mother is something else. Huge peroxide beehive, mascara ten inches thick, mock leopardskin coat. Roly says what does it matter, but I don’t want Cherry being led into bad ways and coming back here using foul language, which she is likely to do. The child swears like a trooper. Anyway, to make up for not letting her go we all went up the road for a pizza and then came back to watch a video. Guess what we saw? SNOW WHITE! Did you ever see it when you were a kid? I adored it – and still do! Cherry was inclined to be rather sniffy at first but afterwards she went out into the hall to telephone one of her friends and I heard her laughing, so she was obviously happy, which is something she hasn’t always been just lately.

She’s desperately looking forward to staying with Gregg for a few days at half-term. I just hope he doesn’t let her down. Originally she was going to go for the whole week, but surprise, surprise! He can’t get the time off. Funny he could spend a whole fortnight in Florida back in July and is going off skiing for another fortnight at Christmas, but can’t spare just one week to be with his own daughter.

I know I mustn’t run her dad down in front of her, but the temptation is sometimes very strong! Happily on this occasion, bless him, Roly stepped in before I could open my big mouth and say something which I might afterwards have regretted. I wouldn’t want to poison Cherry’s mind against her dad. I won’t say she regards him as a god, exactly, but he is certainly far higher in the popularity stakes than my poor Roly. On the other hand, I do believe I have detected a slight softening in her attitude just recently. I am keeping my fingers crossed!

Please report on handsome Texans.

Love from

Chapter 5 (#u9bfd9cb0-0f56-5bd1-83bf-75605afd6e61)

Monday

He’s still shoving these stupid cards under my door. I really hate the thought of him creeping about doing that while I’m asleep. I just keep chucking them in the waste-paper basket. I’m still on strike and so the basket is practically overflowing and everything is thick dust except for the crinoline lady on her shelf. I am too scared to dust her because she is so fragile and so I blow on her, ever so gently. Maybe if she gets too dirty I can give her a bubble bath and use the hair dryer.

Terrible row with Mum this morning when I arrived downstairs in T-shirt and leggings and my Doc Marten’s. She screamed, “You can’t wear that gear to school! You go back upstairs and change immediately!” I said, “Into what?” I said, “It may have escaped your memory, but we don’t happen to have any school uniform at this school, we can wear whatever we like, and right now everybody is wearing T-shirt and tights and Doc Marten’s.”

Mum said not to take that tone with her. (What tone? What is she talking about?) She said she didn’t care what other people were wearing, she wasn’t having her daughter go to school looking like some kind of big-footed grotesque. I said, “That is very big-footist.” And she snarled, “Never mind the smart mouth! I have spoken and that is flat and final. How can you expect to do any serious learning in that ridiculous get-up?”

Mum is incredibly hidebound. I said, “Well, if it comes to that, how can you expect to have any serious baby, wearing those ridiculous dungarees?” which is what she has taken to wearing now that her secret is out. I said, “I bet the Queen didn’t wear dungarees when she was having babies.” Mum started to get all red and hot, but old Slimey laughed and said, “She’s got you there!” almost as if he were on my side against Mum. She still wouldn’t budge.

I met the Skinbag at the school gates and asked her what the sleep-over was like. She said it was brilliant and that Harry meeting Sally was even better second time round and why wouldn’t my mum let me go? I told her it was because of Gemma’s brother saying That Word and Mum thinking I might start saying it and the Melon agreed that mothers could be a real drag. She said that right at this moment hers was being even more of a drag than usual which I found hard to believe as the Melon’s mum is really nice. She would for instance never make promises and then break them. Like if she said the Melon could have a dog, then she’d let her have a dog. I mean she’s already got one, of course, but if she’d said she could have another, or choose a video or whatever, she would let her. So I said, “How is she being a drag?” but the Melon wouldn’t tell me. She just said, “Behaving like a teenager.”

I don’t see anything particularly draggy about that.

When I got home from school, Mum started on about the baby again, wondering whether it was going to be a boy or a girl, trying to get me to say which I’d prefer. I wouldn’t prefer either! I don’t want to know about the beastly baby. I hope it never comes out. I hope it withers on the vine. I hate it!

Tuesday

Boiled organs and baked toenails for dinner. It was one of the boys that said they were organs. Male organs. He fished some out and made rude patterns with them on the table. Boys like doing that kind of thing. Skinny said she thought the toenails might in fact be potato skins, but who wants to eat potato skins? What happened to the insides of the potatoes? Skinny says we’ll probably get to have those tomorrow, all lumpy and foul.

Got into trouble with Mrs James today because she said I was rude to her. I wasn’t! She accused me of passing notes and I wasn’t passing notes, it was John Lloyd and Steven Carter, I just happened to pick one up off the floor for them. Mrs James said, “There are other ways of letting me know that you have been falsely accused. There is no need to be aggressive.”

I complained to Skinny Melon about it afterwards and Skinny said, “Well, you were aggressive. You always are, these days. People hardly dare open their mouths in case you jump on them.”

I can’t help it. I feel aggressive. I feel like screaming, sometimes. It’s living with Mum and Slimey and this baby that Mum’s carting around with her. That’s what’s doing it.

I keep remembering when Dad was here, before he and Mum started having rows. I was happy then. I haven’t been happy ever since Mum and Dad split up. I hate them all!

Wednesday

Got into more trouble. Miss Bradley, this time. We were playing netball and she pulled me up for running with the ball when I wasn’t. She just thought I was because someone barged into me. I explained this to her, as polite as could be. I said, “Excuse me, but you have made a mistake,” and she instantly leapt down my throat and yelled that she was sick and tired of what she called my “attitude”, and that if there was any more of it I would be suspended from the team. Why does everyone keep getting at me all the time? I can’t wait till it’s half-term and I can go and stay with Dad!

I was so disgruntled, what with Miss Bradley having a go at me and Skinny and me being a bit distant after her telling me yesterday I was aggressive, that I decided I wasn’t going to stay in at lunch-time like we’re supposed to. For one thing I couldn’t stand the thought of having to eat the insides of yesterday’s potatoes, and for another, I saw Skinny going off with Avril Roper and Uchenna Jackson, so I hopped out through the gates when no one was looking and went into town. I got some crisps and a bottle of Coke and walked up the road to the station, which is where the cab company is that Dad used to work for after he’d been made redundant.

Lots of the same drivers were there and they remembered me and asked me how I was doing and how Dad was liking his new job. They’re ever so much more fun than the people Mum and Slimey know. All of Mum and Slimey’s friends are either writers or publishers or something else to do with books. Books are all they ever talk about. They’re always pushing them at me. “Here’s a copy of my new book for you, Cherry.” “Here’s a copy of a book we’ve just published, Cherry.” “Here’s a copy of a book I thought you might like, Cherry.”

And then I’m expected to sit down and read them and say what I think of them, which most of the time isn’t much, only I’m not allowed to say so for fear of being thought rude or hurting their feelings. It’s not that I don’t like books, just that I don’t like their books. The sort they push at me. They’re all so babyish! I’m more into the hard stuff. Horror, and that. Mum and Slimey are horrified (ho ho!) but I say what’s wrong with reading something a bit scary? They don’t seem to realise that I’ve grown out of all this kiddy crud.

Anyway, when it was time to go back to school one of the drivers, who is called Ivy, said she’d take me in her cab. We talked a bit on the way and Ivy asked me how I was getting on with my mum’s new husband. I was glad she didn’t say “your new dad” as I can’t stand it when people do that. So I pulled a face, and Ivy said, “Tough going?” And then she told me how it had happened to her when she was about my age and how she’d thought she’d never get used to her mum having a new bloke, “Never!” but how in the end she had and, “Now we’re the best of friends.”

I know Ivy was only trying to be helpful, but I am afraid it is not going to work out like that for me. I still have my real dad, even if he does live miles away. It was different for Ivy as her real dad was not really a very nice person. In fact Ivy said he was “a right *******”. (I have to put stars as the word Ivy used is not the sort of word I wish to record in this diary.) I told her that my dad is the best dad in the world and that I am going to stay with him over half-term. I said that I am really looking forward to it. Ivy said, “Well, have a good time, but don’t expect too much, will you?”

I don’t know why she said that. I didn’t have a chance to ask her as we had already reached the school gates. Skinny was mooning about nearby with Avril and Uchenna. You should have seen their faces when they realised who was in the cab!

They couldn’t have been more surprised if I’d stepped out of a Rolls Royce. Skinny shrieked, “Where have you been?” It was just my bad luck that Mrs James happened to be passing at that particular moment and also wanted to know where I had been. I told her I’d been visiting my dad’s old work-mates and she said, “You do know you’re not supposed to leave the premises at lunch time without permission?” and I said yes, which was a dumb thing to say. I should have said no, though I don’t expect ignorance is any defence, and she said, “Very well, Cherry,” all frozen and unsmiling like an ice lolly with the colour sucked out of it.

I am to go and see her tomorrow, first thing after assembly.

I know what that means. It means she’s going to bawl me out and threaten to tell Mum. I don’t care! It was worth it. I’m glad I went. I don’t see what right they have to keep making all these rules and regulations anyway. Nobody ever asks us what we want. Grown-ups do just whatever they like. Get divorced. Marry creeps. Have babies. It isn’t fair!

Thursday

Went to see Mrs James. Actually she was quite nice. She said that “this sort of behaviour” couldn’t be allowed to go on but that she didn’t want to have to write to Mum unless I absolutely forced her, and then she said, “Did you ever think about my suggestion for keeping a diary?” and I said yes, I was doing it, and she asked me if it was helping, but without prying into the reasons why I might need helping, which is what lots of teachers would have done. So to please her I said I thought perhaps it was, just a little bit, and she told me to keep on with it because it could only be a good thing.

I hope she’s right. I do quite like putting things down in writing. I can say lots of stuff that I couldn’t say to anyone else, not even the Melon – who is back being friends with me again, incidentally. It seems that we can’t survive without each other. Avril and Uchenna are all right, but me and Skin have been together since Juniors.

I stayed in school at lunch-time and dutifully ate yuck in the canteen. It made me feel sick. I feel sick most of the time now, what with eating yuck and Mum and Slimey keeping on and on about this blessed baby. Even the names they have come up with are yuck. If it’s a boy it’s going to be Bernard … Bernard Butter. If it’s a girl it’s going to be Belinda. Mum says she likes what she calls the allitration.

Alliteration. (Just looked it up in the dictionary.) This means having two letters the same. B and B. Like bed and breakfast. Or bread and butter.

I have just thought of a joke. If it’s a girl they could call it Bredan, which is Brenda mixed up. Ha ha! That is a Slimey joke. I shall suggest it to them.

Friday

Dog’s vomit and earwax, with crusty bits on top. I didn’t ask anyone what it was supposed to be. I think it’s better not to know. I just held my breath and swallowed. I am seriously thinking of taking up Mum’s offer of vegetarian sandwiches. I would if it weren’t for him. Old Slimey. I hate the thought of him crowing because he’s won me over. If I decide to do it, it will be out of sheer desperation and a desire not to be poisoned. Nothing whatsoever to do with him.

When I got in at tea-time he was there, which I didn’t expect him to be as he’d gone off to bore some more poor little kids, showing them how he draws elves. So I told them my idea for calling the baby Bredan and Mum (stupid) said, “Oh, you mean like Bredon Hill? But that’s pronounced Breedon.” Slime got it. He got it straightaway. He said, “Bredan Butter! Brilliant!” and promptly started to sketch a loaf of bread on the kitchen table with his felt-tip pen that he always keeps handy in case sudden inspiration comes to him. Mum said, “Oh! Yes. I see. Then we’d have a Roll and Butter and a Bread and Butter. Clever!”

Slimey said, “Yes, and if we had another we could call it Toastan.” I have been trying without success to think of other things that go with butter. All I can think of is T.K. Cann-Butter and Chris P. Bredan Butter. But they are not very good.

I suppose you could have Saul T. Butter. That is not bad.

A woman over the road who has just moved in has asked Mum if I’d like to go and have tea tomorrow with her daughter because her daughter is the same age as me and doesn’t yet know anyone. Mum has gone and said that I will! It is terrible the way grown-ups just dispose of one’s life for one. I don’t particularly want to go and have tea with this person’s daughter. She is called Sereena, which I know is not her fault, and her surname is Swaddle, which again I know she cannot be blamed for. Sereena Swaddle. That is alliteration. Mum says it is “unfortunate”, but why she should think it’s any more unfortunate than Belinda or Bernard Butter is beyond me.

Skinny rang later to know if I wanted to go swimming with her tomorrow afternoon and I had to say that I was having tea with this Sereena person. Skinny said “Who?” and I said, “Sereena Swaddle,” and she said, “You’re joking!” I said that I only wished I was. I went back to Mum and said, “Do I have to do this thing?” and she said, “Oh, Cherry, just once! It won’t hurt you. She’s a sweet little thing, I know you’ll like her.”

When Mum said, “sweet little thing” old Slime caught my eye and pulled a face. I’d gone and pulled one back before I could stop myself. I don’t think I ought to do that. It’s like him and me being ganged up together against Mum. Mum must have sensed it because she said, “You can laugh! It’s nice to know there still are some sweet little things … they don’t all clump around in bovver boots shouting four-letter words and watching ghastly horror movies.”

I have just thought of something else that could go with butter. P. Nutt-Butter. That is a good one!