Things We Have in Common

  Published in Great Britain in 2015 by

  Canongate Books Ltd,

  14 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1TE

  www.canongate.tv

  This digital edition first published in 2015 by Canongate Books

  Copyright © Tasha Kavanagh, 2015

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ Words and Music by Freddie Mercury © 1978.

  Reproduced by permission of Queen Music Ltd / EMI Music

  Publishing Ltd, London W1F 9LD

  ‘Save Me’ Words and Music by Brian May © 1979.

  Reproduced by permission of Queen Music Ltd / EMI Music

  Publishing Ltd, London W1F 9LD

  British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

  A catalogue record for this book is available on request from the British Library

  ISBN 978 1 78211 594 6

  Export ISBN 978 1 78211 595 3

  eISBN 978 1 78211 596 0

  Typeset in Sabon by Palimpsest Book Production Ltd,

  Falkirk, Stirlingshire

  for my mum

  Contents

  Chocolate Hobnobs

  Strawberry Tarts

  Rum and Cokes

  Rotting Fruit

  Curry for Two

  Turkish Delight

  Chocolate Hobnobs

  The first time I saw you, you were standing at the far end of the playing field near the bit of fence that’s trampled down, where the kids that come to school along the wooded path cut across.

  You were looking down at your little brown straggly dog that had its face stuck in the grass, but then you looked up in the direction of the tennis court, your mouth going slack as your eyes clocked her. Even if I hadn’t followed your gaze, I’d have known you were watching Alice Taylor because she had that effect on me too. I used to catch myself gazing at the back of her head in class, at her silky fair hair swaying between her shoulder blades as she looked from her book to the teacher or said something to Katy Ellis next to her.

  At that moment she was turning to walk backwards, saying something to the girls that were following her, the sketchbook she takes everywhere tucked under her arm. She looked so light and easy, it was like she created space around her: not space in the normal sense but something else I can’t explain. Even in our green school uniform it was obvious she was special.

  If you’d glanced just once across the field, you’d have seen me standing in the middle on my own, looking straight at you, and you’d have gone back through the trees to the path quick, tugging your dog after you. You’d have known you’d given yourself away, even if only to me.

  But you didn’t. You only had eyes for Alice.

  I looked round to see who else had spotted you. There were loads of kids on the field, but they were all busy with each other, footballs or their phones.

  I looked back at the windows of the school building. I thought I’d see a teacher behind one of them, fixed on you, like I know your game, sunshine. I saw Mr Matthews walk past the History window reading from a piece of paper and Miss Wilcox one floor down in the staffroom talking to Mrs Henderson.

  Then the bell went.

  I didn’t see your reaction because Robert pushed Dan into me, shouting ‘He wants you, Doner – don’t deny him,’ then staggered backwards, laughing as Dan swore at him and tried to get him in a headlock.

  I caught a glimpse of your blue jacket disappearing between the branches, though. The saying Saved by the bell came into my head because Dad always used to say it, and as I walked back across the field, I whispered the words slowly – ‘Saved by the bell, saved by the bell’ – even though I knew that you weren’t saved by anything, that you’d be back.

  My name’s not really Doner. It’s Yasmin. It’s just Doner at school – which is hilarious by the way because it’s short for Doner Kebab and as well as being overweight I’m half Turkish. It used to be plain ‘Fatty’ at junior school, then ‘Blubber-Butt’ when I came to Ashfield, or ‘Lesbo’ till Mel Raynor and Natalie Simms started publicly making out, making lesbianism à la mode, whatever that means.

  Anyway, I didn’t see you at school the following day, even though I watched for you. At break and lunch I sat against the Games Hut where all the PE stuff like nets and balls and bibs is kept. I could see the whole of the fence that runs alongside the wooded path from there. I ate the chocolate Hobnobs I buy every morning on the way to school, chewing slowly and trying to ignore the fact that my bum was going numb from the concrete, scanning the trees for a bit of your jacket and listening for the kind of bark your little dog might make.

  I was vigilant, and I wouldn’t have missed you because of being distracted by friends because I don’t have any. People look at me and think the same as I thought when I saw you: freak. So I figured, as well as feeling compelled to stare at Alice Taylor, being freaks was something else we had in common.

  English is the only classroom I go to that overlooks the playing field, so I looked out for you there too. I have to sit in the third row from the window, but I could just about see the fence at the bottom of the field if I sat up, except that it was difficult to look without being obvious about it – which I was, because Robert threw a screwed-up piece of paper that hit my ear, and because a few minutes later Miss Frances, my English teacher who’s really a Borg, said ‘Yasmin’ in that sarcastic tone teachers use just to waste everyone’s time because they know you’re not listening and won’t be able to answer whatever it was they asked.

  I looked at her, rolling my biro in my fingers.

  What she was telling me with her ice-blue eyes and black triangular eyebrows was, I hate you Yasmin Laksaris and wish with all my frozen heart that you’d leave this school I have to teach in, but while you’re still here don’t think I won’t make you pay for it. What she said was: ‘Any ideas about why Robert Browning chooses to set his poem in a storm?’

  I thought about what the weather had been like when you were watching Alice. Dull and grey and so still it was as if the world had been sucked into another dimension where everything moved in silent, super-slow motion.

  ‘She doesn’t know, Miss,’ Robert said. ‘She’s a kebab’ (said like Shish a kebab). Miss Frances didn’t laugh, even though I’m sure she found it quite amusing. She didn’t want Robert stealing her spotlight. She folded her arms till she had everyone’s attention again, then said, ‘Do you have any opinions about anything, Yasmin?’

  I stopped twirling my biro. It’s chewed, the plastic split halfway to the tip and the blue bit that fits in the end isn’t there (I’m a chewer as well as a freak). I thought about giving my opinion that her drawn-on eyebrows make her look like she’s a member of an enemy alien race that’s managed to infiltrate the education system. Then I thought about giving my opinion about you – about how you were watching our school and had your sights set on Alice Taylor and that, if I was asked, I’d say one day pretty soon you might even take her.

  I don’t think I realised till that second that I did think you were going to take her. I knew it then, though. I knew the way you’d looked at her was never just looking. It was wanting. I bet it was wanting in a way you’d never wanted anything before. Like you’d never seen anything so lovely, never even dreamt about having anything quite that good – being able to touch her hair, slide your hands beneath her crisp white shirt.

  Anyway, luckily for you I didn’t say anything. No one would’ve believed me in any case. I’d probably have been sent to Miss Ward, the Head, who’d have said something like I’ve told you about telling lies before, haven’t I, Yasmin? Which she has, several times. Instead, I looked around. Everyone was staring at me and I realised they were all waiting for me to answer M
iss Frances’s question about having opinions. Dan sniggered.

  ‘No?’ I said. It came out like a question, like I didn’t know whether I had any opinions or not.

  The whole class fell about then, and even though I couldn’t care less, I felt my face burn. I probably looked at Alice without thinking, instinctively, to see if she was laughing with the rest of them.

  She wasn’t. She was the only one that wasn’t. She was just looking at me over her shoulder, her green eyes sort of observing me.

  I thought maybe in some parallel universe or via telepathy she’d heard my opinion about what you were going to do and that she’d understood somehow that I was going to save her, so I smiled. A small, secret smile. And even though she frowned and wrinkled her nose up before she turned away, I knew she’d felt it too – the connection.

  I’ve kept Alice’s steady green eyes in my head ever since. I still think of them even now – usually when I’m alone in the house, doing something ordinary like wiping the worktop or changing the sheets on the bed. They appear as suddenly as they did that day in English, and float about the house with me, watching me wherever I go, whatever I do.

  Anyway, that day after school, I didn’t know Alice’s eyes would watch me forever, so I concentrated all my efforts on not losing them – on keeping them there in my head. It was like a self-induced trance. I didn’t speak to anyone and ate dinner gazing somewhere beyond the telly, ignoring Gary pointing his knife at my plate and having a go at Mum for putting too much mash on it, saying, ‘You’re not doing her any favours you know,’ and moving along the sofa without a word when Mum patted me to budge up, all the while only hearing things like they were far away and only seeing Alice’s green eyes watching me, watching me, watching . . .

  When the six o’clock news came on, I went up to my room. Mum had closed the curtains and it was nice and cosy. I shut the door, switched on my giant lava lamp and took Alice’s Box out of my bedside cabinet. It’s square like a cube and gold and probably had chocolates in it to start with. For years it had my hair things in, like clips and scrunchies, but I stopped wearing them when I went to senior school and threw them away.

  The first thing I put in it – the thing that made it Alice’s Box – was a piece of green foil that went round a snack she’d had at break. That was in Year 7 when we were all new. It was a nice green, sort of smoky. I’d watched her lay it on her French book and smooth it carefully outwards from the middle with her fingertips. I don’t know if she meant to leave it behind, but when everyone’d gone and I’d slid it carefully between the pages of my textbook, I imagined she had. I imagined it was a secret message – her way of telling me she’d be my friend if she could, if Katy would let her.

  I started keeping other things of Alice’s I found after that. Not any old thing. I didn’t want her used tissues or empty crisp packets out of the bin – just things that were nice, or personal to her. Apart from the green foil, which was special because it was the first thing, I loved the heart: Alice’s heart. She drew it. If I try and describe it, it won’t sound anywhere near as lovely as it was, so you’ll have to imagine the black lines, finer than cat hairs, swirling in and out and around each other. She was amazing at art, better than anyone. It was the way she saw things, I think, like she wasn’t just looking, but feeling them too.

  The thing in Alice’s Box that you’d probably think was the weirdest was one of her trainer socks. For a few days I wasn’t sure myself if it should go in, but then because I liked holding it and smelling it, I decided it should. It didn’t smell of feet, if that’s what you think (even though she’d worn it) – just a soft cottony smell.

  I got a nice feeling when I looked at her things, when I held them. They made me feel calm. I’d whisper to start with – just words, her name, things I’d like to say to her – turning and touching whatever I was holding till I got so calm I stopped needing to whisper, stopped needing to breathe, even. Till everything floated away and it was just me and her.

  After I put Alice’s Box away, I took the Cadbury’s Dairy Milk Turkish Delight out of my bedside drawer. I broke off a row, broke that in half, then put both bits in my mouth and lay back on the duvet. I let the chocolate melt slowly across the roof of my mouth and held my eyelids almost closed so I was looking through my lashes. That way, the galaxy that Gary painted on my ceiling before Mum and me moved in two years ago looked more convincing. I think he forgot I was thirteen and not eight when he did it, but I suppose it was nice of him. He didn’t have to.

  I thought about how it’d be when you took Alice – where I’d be when it happened. I imagined myself walking into English after lunch break (which would make it a Friday). I notice that Alice isn’t at her desk. Everything’s normal apart from that; everyone’s messing around. Katy’s the first to act any different, looking up at the clock that’s saying it’s two minutes past and calling across to Sophie, Where’s Alice? Miss Francis comes in then. Everyone settles down and then she asks, Where’s Alice? I look out of the window but of course you’re not there. Nobody’s there. Katy says she was with Alice at lunch. She went back to get her coat after the bell, she says. She left it by the tennis court. Miss Frances starts the lesson, reading from a book. She’s distracted, though, and ten minutes later she glances up at the clock and checks her watch. She tells us to carry on reading, that she’ll be back in one minute, and leaves the room.

  I thought about how you didn’t know I even existed, which gave me a nice feeling, like that even though you thought you were the one in control of things, you weren’t because I was. I was in charge. I could save Alice. I thought if I told anyone what you were going to do, they wouldn’t believe me, but that if I found out more about you, I could tell the police when the time came . . . when you took her. I thought I might even catch you in the act, if you tried to take her while we were at school. I thought I wouldn’t let her out of my sight.

  Either way, whether I was there or not, I’d still be the one that saved her. I’d be a heroine – Alice’s heroine – and afterwards me and Alice would be bonded forever in the way people are after something traumatic. And even though Alice’s parents would try and give me thousands of pounds in reward money, which Mum and Gary would be pleading with me to take, I’d say all I wanted for my reward was your dog. And in the papers there’d be a picture of me holding him and it’d say I was a heroine in the true sense of the word.

  I went downstairs to get a drink then, being quiet because I didn’t want Mum, or especially Gary, to come out of the sitting room and catch me with a glass of his secret Coke stash. Fizzy drinks are strictly forbidden on my diet plan (along with Cadbury’s Dairy Milk Turkish Delight and chocolate Hobnobs, in case you were wondering). Apparently I should drink water instead. Dr Bhatt says it’s nice when you get used to it. In his Indian accent he goes, ‘. . . and with a bit of lemon or lime squeezed in it’s really something rather special’, his eyebrows all high like he actually believes it! I love Dr Bhatt. He’s my dietician. He’s sort of spiritual in the way he says things. He’s kind as well, even though he’s got to deal with me, which must be frustrating because I’m bigger now than when I first started going to him a year ago.

  Anyway, I managed to get the Coke out from behind the Pledge Furniture Polish and Mr Muscle Window & Glass Cleaner without making too much noise. Mum and Gary think I don’t know he keeps it there under the sink, and even though, when he’s having a go at me about my weight (like he’s not pretty rotund himself), it’d give me great pleasure to be able to point out what a bloody hypocrite he is – I want to keep it that way. I poured myself a glass and drank it down quick, then had another one. It’s not as nice when it’s not cold but it was too risky to faff about getting ice out of the freezer. Then I rinsed the glass under the tap and filled the bottle up with water to the same level it was before, because Gary, I bet you anything, makes a mental mark on the bottle of exactly how much is left every time he’s had some. That’s the kind of person he is, which is why, no
rmally, I buy my own drinks.

  I heard Mum and Gary arguing, then – or rather Gary delivering one of his lectures, his voice raised. When I was going back down the hall, I heard him say, ‘It’s a bit more than just puppy fat, Jen! I hate to say it, but it seems to me like she growing into it, not out.’

  I stopped outside the sitting-room door. I suppose you just do that, don’t you, when someone’s talking about you, even if you really don’t want to hear? Even if you couldn’t care less what they’re going to say.

  ‘She’s been much better recently,’ Mum said. ‘She’s definitely lost a few pounds. Let’s just wait until she’s been to the hospital.’

  ‘OK, fine. But I think you’re avoiding the issue. You’re burying your head in the sand.’

  ‘And I think you expect too much.’

  ‘It’s not about what I expect, Jen. I want her to be happy.’

  ‘She is happy.’

  ‘Have a normal teenage life,’ Gary went on. ‘You know – friends. Boyfriends. I mean, come on! Who’s going to want to date her like . . . like she is?’

  ‘Well, we’re dealing with it, aren’t we?’ Mum said, her voice raised as well now. ‘She’s losing weight. Honestly, Gary, she’s only fifteen. I don’t really want her doing anything with boys.’

  There was another silence. Then Gary, wanting to have the last word like always, said, ‘OK then. Let’s just pretend she’s losing weight and everything’s hunky-dory, shall we?’

  ‘Everything is hunky-dory, Gary. Let’s just wait and see.’

  I did a silent cheer for Mum for beating Gary to the final word and started up the stairs, but she wasn’t finished. She said – the words clipped like she was accusing him – ‘You weren’t there.’

  Yeah, I thought. You weren’t there, Gary Thornton – Gary Thorn-in-my-bum. You weren’t there.

  School felt different the next day, and it wasn’t anyone else. Everyone was the same – basically either ignoring me or calling me names.