What’s Up With Jody Barton?, page 11
I don’t know who I was more disappointed with. Him or myself.
Jolene said, ‘I don’t even know this Titch person!’
‘Don’t ask me,’ I mumbled, and, without daring to look up, I passed the phone back to her. I was shivering pretty badly now. It can get dead cold in our backyard. Especially when you don’t happen to have a My Little Pony sleeping bag wrapped round your shoulders. And, even though my mum and dad wanted me to somehow cheer Jolene up and even though I somehow wanted to tell her the God’s Honest Truth, I suddenly couldn’t cope with another single second of being there. The frosty air was making my eyes water and I didn’t want Jolene to look at me and think I was crying. Because I wasn’t. I definitely wasn’t. So I did a 180° turn and began to walk to the door.
Jolene said, ‘Hang on a minute. You were upstairs with Liam and now you’ve got a fat eye! It was Liam, wasn’t it? Liam hit you!’
My body froze. But inside my head two thoughts launched into life like a rocket. They were these:
1. Here we go again!
2. TELL HER. TELL HER NOW.
With my eyes now streaming, I turned round and opened my mouth to speak. And, just as the words there’s something I’ve got to tell you were forming on the tip of my tongue, someone else spoke. And that person said, ‘How’s the hero?’
It was my dad.
I quickly wiped my eyes with the back of my hand and closed my mouth.
My dad said, ‘I’ve just been talking to your mum. She told me how you got the shiner.’ And then he looked at Jolene and said, ‘Your brother has been defending your honour, girl. If that QPR scumbag ever comes in my cafe again, just you let me know. I’d like to serve him up a great big piece of my mind.’
‘So Liam was talking about me,’ said Jolene.
‘Oh God,’ I groaned.
My dad said, ‘Leave it, Jolene. Sticks ’n’ stones will bruise your bones, but words will never hurt you. Not when you’ve got a twin brother like Jody looking out for you.’ And then he clapped me on the back and said, ‘You’ve got gravel in your guts, son. I’m proud of you. Now will the pair of you get inside before I have to drop you off down casualty and get you both checked out for hypothermia?’
Jolene looked at me. ‘Thanks,’ she said.
‘Don’t,’ I said back.
‘In,’ said my dad.
We did as we were told. At the foot of the stairs, my dad said, ‘I don’t need you in the cafe today, Jolene. Go and play Call of Duty or something. Shoot some wrong ’uns. Cheer yourself up.’ And then he punched me playfully in the shoulder and went back to his burgers.
I started to walk up the stairs.
Jolene said, ‘Jode?’
I stopped.
Jolene’s lip wobbled. ‘Do you think everyone at school will know I’ve been dumped? I don’t want them to. I’d rather they all think that I dumped him.’
I sighed. ‘I don’t know. But you said you didn’t love him. So I don’t see how it actually makes any difference.’
‘Yeah,’ said Jolene. ‘It totally does. It makes a helluva difference to my reputation. I don’t want people thinking I’m a sad dumpleton.’
I sighed again. ‘Is that seriously all you’re worried about? Whether you’re a dumpleton or not?’
Jolene turned pink and looked as if she was about to cry again. With a blatantly irritated edge to her voice, she said, ‘My mistake, Jody. I shouldn’t expect you to understand, should I?’
I held on to the stair rail and stared at her. My eyes had started to swim again. I waited a moment or two and then, in as steady a voice as I could manage, I said, ‘No, Jolene. Because I’ve never dumped anyone and I’ve never been dumped. So I don’t know much really, do I? But I do know one thing for certain. Getting your reputation hammered doesn’t hurt anywhere near as much as having your heart hammered.’
And I put my hand over my own battered heart and turned round and carried on walking slowly up the stairs.
The next day, my eye wouldn’t open at all and the bruise underneath it was the colour of Cherry Coke. I took one look in the mirror and decided I wasn’t going to school. So I told my mum I felt sick.
She said, ‘You poor pigeon! Have you been feeling peaky all night?’
And I lied and said, ‘A bit, yeah.’
And she said, ‘Jody, you should’ve come and woken me up! Do you feel dizzy as well?’
And I lied and said, ‘I do a bit, yeah.’
And she said, ‘Can you see OK? Or is your eyesight going fuzzy?’
And I think I may have got slightly carried away with the drama of it all because I said, ‘Mum? What’s happening? You keep going all blurry!’
I wouldn’t normally tell such a pack of pickled porkers, but I seriously did not want to go to school. Even though it was Maths Club Monday. And even though Mrs Hamood was giving us a class test on geometric sequences and I’m especially good at them. I just wanted to stay in bed and not move. And if faking an outbreak of the bubonic plague was what it took, I’d have done it.
But the problem with porkers is that they have this tendency to leave you in a worse place than where you started.
My mum said, ‘Oh my good God! You’ve got concussion! Get dressed. I’m taking you across the road to see Dr Rash.’
‘No way,’ I groaned. ‘We don’t need to bother with that. I’ll just stay in bed and I’ll be as right as rain later.’
My mum said, ‘Yeah, and that’s what your granddad said about an hour before the angels took him. Lying in bed didn’t do him any good, did it?’
‘But he was ancient,’ I said. ‘I’m still only fifteen. Strictly speaking, I’m still only three!’
‘But the twenty-ninth of February is only a couple of weeks away and then you’ll be four,’ said my mum. ‘And, more importantly, you’ve got a dirty great bump on your face. So don’t argue with me, Jody. Shut your pie-hole and put your clothes on.’
My mum is a difficult person to do battle with.
Fifteen minutes later, I was wearing odd socks and an inside-out sweatshirt and standing in front of the reception desk of Dr Rash’s surgery. Behind the desk was Marigold Malcolm, Senior Receptionist. Everybody knows who she is because she’s built like a truck and feistier than a cage-fighter. Also, her name is printed on a badge.
‘Dr Rash is off today,’ snapped Marigold. ‘But your son can have an appointment with the locum doctor, Dr Benjamin.’
I said, ‘Ahhh no, it’s not really imp—’
‘Yes, please,’ said my mum. Just like I wasn’t even there.
‘Sit down in the waiting room and Dr Benjamin will buzz Jody through when he’s good and ready,’ barked Marigold. ‘Will you both be going into the consulting room?’
‘No, she’s go—’
‘Yes,’ said my mum.
I looked at her and frowned. And then I looked at Marigold Malcolm and frowned. And then I said, ‘Err . . . Hello? I am here you know.’
Marigold looked at me. Her nostrils were flaring. ‘I’ll thank you not to take that tone with me, young sir. I’m just doing my job.’ She sucked her cheeks in and kissed her teeth, and when she’d finished doing that she looked at my mum sympathetically and said, ‘Somebody thinks he knows it all! But they do at that age, don’t they?’
My mum did a nervous little laugh and said, ‘Oh, but he’s a good boy really. And he can’t help it. He’s not even turned four yet.’ She did that phony laugh again, looped her arm through mine and started to drag me off towards the rows of bolted-down chairs. My feet allowed themselves to be led away, but my eyes remained fixed on Marigold Malcolm’s face. Her forehead had crumpled into a great big frown. If I wasn’t so colossally fed up with the world in general, I might have found her blatant bafflement actually quite funny.
We sat down in the waiting room and started waiting. We weren’t the only ones. The place was heaving. After sitting there for a while, I worked out there were five old people, four random coughers, three little children with their mums, two mismatching broken arms and me. I was at an extreme end of a sickly geometric sequence. After thinking about this for a little while, I got bored and started looking around for something new to think about. I noticed there was a small back entrance to the surgery as well as the main front entrance that we’d used on our way in. I’d never noticed this other door before.
‘You don’t have to stay and sit with me,’ I said in a low voice. ‘I’m nearly four years old after all. I’m perfectly old enough to wait by myself.’
‘No, you don’t,’ said my mum in a low voice back to me.
‘No, you don’t what?’
My mum fiddled with her hair. ‘I know you, Jody Barton. You’re planning on bolting through that back door the second I get up and go. That’s why I’m not shifting.’
I sat there in silence for a second or two. And then I said, ‘How the heck did you know that?’
My mum smiled. ‘I’m your mum, aren’t I? I know what you’re thinking before you even think it.’
Instantly, images of me trying to kiss Liam Mackie’s symmetrically perfect lips started scrolling through my head like a film sequence.
I quickly looked down at my hi-tops and tried to think of something else. But I couldn’t. It was like my brain had got jammed on that one single head-scrambling issue. I wedged my hands tightly under my armpits and, as casually as I could, I said, ‘Oh yeah? What am I thinking now then?’
My mum closed her eyes and said, ‘Oooh, let me see.’ And then she smiled, opened them again and said, ‘Call of Duty . . . your dinner . . . pretty girls . . . the usual. Am I right?’
And, even though there was nothing remotely funny about the situation, I burst out laughing anyway and said, ‘You are WAY off.’ I almost shouted it.
Just then a buzzer sounded and a voice that didn’t belong to Dr Rash said, ‘Jody Barton to Consulting Room Five, please.’
I stood up and so did my mum. ‘Nope,’ I said firmly. ‘I’m almost sixteen. I’m going in there by myself.’
‘But I want to know what he says,’ said my mum. ‘I need to know you’re all right.’
‘I’ll tell you,’ I said. ‘And if it’s complicated or if he thinks I need a brain transplant, I’ll come and get you. But please treat me like a man, will you? Because I practically am one.’ And then I smiled because it suddenly struck me that I’m becoming increasingly difficult to do battle with too.
My mum looked at me for a moment and didn’t say anything. And then she sat back down and said, ‘The second he mentions the brain transplant, come and get me.’
‘It’s a promise,’ I said, and then I turned and walked up the corridor.
All my life, I’ve always seen the exact same doctor. From chickenpox to ear infections to the time I jumped off a high-flying swing and twisted both my ankles at once, I’ve only ever seen one man. Dr Rash. Dr Rash is unsmiling and old and every time I see him he smiles less and looks older. He’s also got this habit of tilting his head back when he talks so that you get a really clear view of all his grey nostril hair. It’s possible that Dr Rash has made me ever so slightly doctorphobic. Marigold Malcolm hasn’t helped much either.
I knocked nervously on the door of Consulting Room Five and waited.
‘Come in.’
I pushed open the door and walked in.
The doctor inside was nothing like Dr Rash. For starters, he was young and had a big smile on his face. And, for seconds, he was wearing a really stylish skinny-fit shirt and the kind of black-framed glasses that you buy in places like Topshop. In fact, my overall first impression of Dr Benjamin was that he looked exactly like Superman does before he’s turned super.
‘Come in, come in. Sit down,’ he said.
I did as I was told.
‘That’s a nasty knock you’ve got there,’ said Dr Benjamin, who had stopped smiling and was frowning at my face. ‘Is that what’s brought you here today?’
‘Yep,’ I said. ‘My mum thinks I’ve got concussion.’
Dr Benjamin gave me a sympathetic smile. ‘Mums do worry a lot, don’t they? But it’s their job to, I suppose. Have you been sick?’
‘No,’ I said.
‘Been feeling sick?’
I hesitated, unsure of whether to tell the truth or not. But then I reasoned that lying to a doctor could potentially result in a hospital visit and said, ‘No.’
Dr Benjamin said, ‘Any black dots in front of your eyes? Floating spaceships? Fuzzy vision? Anything like that?’
I shook my head.
Dr Benjamin got up from his chair and came and stood next to me. ‘Okey dokey,’ he said. ‘Well, that’s all good news. I’m just going to have a look at that eye. Open it up as wide as you can, please.’
I did as I was told and Dr Benjamin shone a bright little torch straight into my brain. Then he said, ‘A-ha . . . uh-hum . . . ohhh-kayyy.’ And then he switched his torch off.
I wedged my hands under my armpits and said, ‘I don’t need a brain transplant or anything, do I?’
Dr Benjamin laughed. ‘I shouldn’t think so. Everything is looking exactly as it ought. Fortunately, it’s your face which has suffered the injury and nothing else. You can tell your mum there’s really no need to worry. All this bruising and puffiness will be gone within a week.’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘That’s good.’
Dr Benjamin returned to his desk and started typing something into his computer. ‘But I’m going to give you a prescription, Jody. It’s for an anti-inflammatory. Take it three times a day and it’ll help get rid of that swelling. That should also help to reduce any pain you may be feeling as well.’
‘OK, thanks,’ I said.
Dr Benjamin printed the prescription off on his printer and passed it to me. I folded the paper up carefully and put it into the pocket of my trackies and then I wedged my hands back under my armpits.
Dr Benjamin smiled and adjusted his Clark Kent glasses. ‘Was there anything else?’
I bit my lip. And then I took a deep breath and said, ‘The reason I’ve got a black eye is because I tried to kiss someone.’
For a moment, the words hung in the air like space invaders. I don’t know who was more surprised by them. Dr Benjamin or me. Probably me. Because after only a nanosecond of delay, Dr Benjamin smiled and said, ‘Well, we all make mistakes, Jody. It’s part of growing up.’
I said, ‘Hmm. Maybe.’ And then I said, ‘But it was my sister’s boyfriend.’
Dr Benjamin adjusted his glasses again. I could see him trying to work things out in his head.
And, because he seemed pretty safe and because I knew that I’d probably never see him again and because I’d started and I really desperately wanted to finish, I took the biggest deep breath I’ve ever taken and said, ‘He hit me because I tried to kiss him.’
And then I breathed out slowly and frowned at the floor.
For a moment, the consulting room was silent. I just couldn’t stand the suspense so I lifted my head up again and looked Dr Benjamin right in the eye.
He scratched his ear and smiled. And then he shrugged one shoulder and said, ‘You’re not the first person to experience these feelings and you certainly won’t be the last. And nobody should ever be punching you in the face.’ Opening a drawer in his desk, he rummaged around in it and pulled something out. ‘Have a read of this. It might make things a little clearer.’
I looked at the leaflet he was holding out to me. It was called Am I gay/lesbian/bisexual? Frowning, I took it and stuffed it quickly into my pocket. I didn’t want a stupid crummy leaflet. I wanted Superman to solve my problems with his superpowers.
‘And you could always book an appointment to have a chat with one of our nurses if that would help.’
‘Oh, no, no, it’s OK,’ I said.
Dr Benjamin smiled again and shrugged both his shoulders. ‘So . . . was there anything else I can help you with?’
I stared at him. And in my head I was screaming . . .
What?
You mean apart from that?
Does there need to be anything else?
Dr Benjamin’s smile was fixed to his face while he waited for me to speak.
I stood up. ‘Nope. That’s all, thanks.’ And I let myself out of Consulting Room Five and went off to find my mum.
I spent the rest of the day in my room. I wasn’t ill though. I wasn’t even pretending to be ill. I was actually sitting cross-legged on a wobbly mountain of duvet and playing Call of Duty so hard that my thumbs were hurting. Strictly speaking, it’s Jolene’s game, not mine. I’m not really fussed on it. But, even so, there are certain days when it’s handy to have it in the house. Because sometimes running around war-torn France with a submachine gun is a whole heap more preferable to staring into space and thinking about your own problems.
So I played Call of Duty for a solid two hours and fifty-three minutes and then my mum stuck her head round the door and made me lose concentration. It was almost fatal. My sergeant shouted, ‘Don’t stop firing,’ and someone else shouted, ‘Move move move,’ and then an enemy grenade exploded right in front of me and sent my Damage Indicator rocketing upward. I did some secret inner swearing and pressed the PAUSE button.
My mum said, ‘I hardly think you should be playing on that Xbox if you’re feeling sick.’
‘I’m feeling better now,’ I said.
My mum raised her eyebrows. ‘Well, in that case, maybe you should go back to school. If you leave now, you’ll be in time for this afternoon’s lessons.’
I pulled a face. ‘We’ve got games,’ I said. ‘There’s no way I can handle games. Not with this eye.’ And then I stared intently at the frozen war scene on the telly and hoped my mum wouldn’t remember which days Jolene and I dump our stinking PE kits into the laundry basket. Wednesdays and Fridays. Never Mondays.
My mum fiddled with her hair and said, ‘Fair enough. But if you’re well enough to participate in mindless computer violence you’re well enough to go back tomorrow.’
‘Fair enough,’ I said. ‘But it’s not mindless computer violence. It’s actually very deep and meaningful violence. I’m liberating France from Adolf Hitler.’
