Sixes and Sevens
The thing Amanda remembered most about her childhood in Heald Green, Cheshire, was the stench of jet fuel on her clothes. But what could one expect, living so near Manchester Airport? Even at six, she hadn’t seen the point.
“Mummy,” she had once said to Lydia, who’d just lugged in another toxic load of laundry from the clothes line, “why do we bother with the washing if it’s just going to get all smelly again?”
“Don’t be stupid.” The other thing Amanda vividly recalled was St. Hilary’s, her posh private school in Alderley Edge. How could she forget with her mother’s relentless reminders about how she’d had to drain her inheritance and take on two shifts at Kwik Save just to afford the blinking fees?
Even now, Amanda could still picture the motley cluster of mossy, whitewashed buildings sprinkled across Macclesfield Hill, her drafty classroom with its moldy smell, flickering florescent lights and massive wooden building blocks, one of which she’d seen fit to smash through a window on a whim. No sooner had the glass shattered, the hysterical teacher, Mrs. Liptrott—better known as Mrs. Lip Snot amongst the cheekiest—seized the child’s hair and hurled her into the unlit cloakroom.
Click clack, went the lock. Clomp stomp, the angry retreating shoes. Nothing to do but curl up in a corner, cuddling her coat and awaiting the uproar. It was so lovely and quiet she nearly nodded off until sure enough, here was her mum, all screams and smacks. The usual dramatics. But what struck Amanda most were the awe-frozen faces of the other children as she’d been dragged off by the ear, her eyes dry as bone.
Next morning, they’d swarmed her, her classmates had. Did she fancy sharing their sweets? Could they each have a turn stroking her black streaks? (Her black streaks: those twin face-framing, ink-black stripes staining her caramel tresses; a source of vexation to her mum, and of fascination to all and sundry. She’d not been born with them, see; they’d sprouted virtually overnight when she was two, as soon they’d moved from America to England. Or so said her mum.)
But Amanda had a secret. She wasn’t one bit brave; it just hadn’t hurt, all the slaps and ear pulling. Which was why she turned up the next day with a large sewing needle stashed in her jacket pocket. To nonchalantly thread through the heel of her palm at recess. Quite nice, all the attention. She wrapped rubber bands around her fingers till they were blue, swallowed staples, plunged pencils into the tender skin of her thighs. The most popular child in her form, was Amanda.
Until one day she went too far. Left unattended during one of Mrs. Liptrott’s frequent toilet trips, Amanda darted to the teacher’s desk, slid open a drawer and drew out a shiny gold cigarette lighter. Without a word, she climbed atop the desk, flicked on the lighter, pressed the flame to her wrist and regarded the tidy rows of upturned, captive little faces.
But then one of the girls screamed and Mrs. Liptrott swooped into the room and carted the “little beast” off to the headmistress’s study. Here Amanda was deposited in a chair and shot eye-daggers as her mum was rung up and regretfully informed that her little girl was no longer welcome at St. Hilary’s.
“And not a moment too soon,” Mrs Liptrott told the headmistress. “I’ve been at sixes and sevens ever since that window incident.”
Six and seven, thought Amanda, made thirteen. Mrs. Lip Snot equaled thirteen, the unluckiest number of all. Amanda met the women’s stares with an unnerving smile, which—ha!—set them pacing about the room, sucking shaky cigarettes. Ha bloody ha.
“What’s taking her so long?” wailed the teacher. Until at last: pound, pound, pound at the door. “She’ll be needing a good dose of discipline when she gets home,” she said, shoving the child roughly into her mother’s wringing hands. “I should think.”
Lydia turned to the headmistress. “Are we not to even discuss this?”
“Nothing to discuss.”
“She’s a bad influence on the other children, you see,” bleated Mrs. Liptrott. “Not to mention a danger.”
“There’s something not right with that child,” said the headmistress, though not unkindly. “You really ought to take her to a doctor or something before she hurts someone.”
“Don’t be thick!” burst Amanda.
“Good heavens!” gasped the headmistress.
“The cheek!” said Mrs. Liptrott, with a tight, gratified smile.
Amanda lifted her eyes to her mother’s, bracing herself for the brutal smack.
But Lydia just snorted. “Don’t mind the likes of them, Amanda. Hoity-toity cows.
“The apple, I see,” Mrs. Liptrott huffed, before slamming the door, “doesn’t fall far from the tree.”
The next day Lydia quit her job. For word had already spread and who in her right mind would look after such a child? Indeed, neighbors and acquaintances were already turning their taut faces on the high street.
“Pay them no notice, Amanda. Ruddy busybodies sticking their beaks in. I have half a mind to shove off once and for all.”
At last, the longed-for words. “Back to America then, are we? To me dad?”
“Dafty. Not for all the tea in China.”
Stinking Manchester forever, resigned Amanda. Until several weeks later, she spotted the colorful, sunflower-printed paper sello-taped to a lamppost outside Safeways. “What’s that, Mum?”
“Something to do with gardening, looks like.”
Amanda craned on tiptoe to see as well: an advertisement for rooms for women at the Sunflower House in Gipsy Hill, Southeast London. “Children are most welcome,” she read aloud. Ace!
“Rent’s blooming cheap,” said Lydia, tearing the paper from the lamppost and popping it into her handbag. “Got a nice ring to it, doesn’t it, Sunflower House?” Once home, she dropped the shopping on the floor and flew to the phone. “A fresh start,” she’d said as her fingers briskly spun the rotary dial. “That’s what we’re after, isn’t it?”
Fingers crossed, thought Amanda, there were still rooms available.
Though there was indeed one vacant room, the lady on the other end of the phone had been a bit guarded, grilling Lydia on what she did for a living, if she was married.
Lydia had supplied her usual half-truth: “I’m a mum. Widowed, actually.”
“Oh, lovely. All the sisters here at Sunflower House are free spirits as well.”
“Grand.” After ringing off, Lydia startled her daughter with a reckless smile. “We’d best start packing.”
