The Perfect Girl

ZOE

Chris’s words have made me shake. I’m used to being called bad things, but not by him. I run upstairs to fetch my mum like he asked me to.

On the landing, I notice the butterfly again. It’s come out of the bathroom, and now it’s high up in a corner flapping uselessly against the walls. I don’t like it doing that, because I imagine the sparkling dust on its wings being dislodged every time it makes impact, a microscopic shower of iridescent powder falling like sand through an hourglass, weakening the butterfly little by little, until it won’t be able to fly any longer.

It makes me think of my life, and of the damage I’ve done, and I think that I’ve been lucky so far, because when things have gone wrong, and when the sand in my hourglass has run through and time has run out for me, I’ve been able to pick it up, turn it over, and start again. But I wonder if that’s ever going to be possible now. I wonder how many chances a person can get.

I ease open the door to Grace’s bedroom. My mum is lying on the bed that’s in there, on the other side of the room from Grace’s cot. Grace is lying with her. As I adjust to the darkness, I see that they’ve turned their heads towards me, that their eyes are darkly reflecting the light from the hallway.

‘Mum,’ I whisper. ‘Chris wants to talk to you. Shall I look after Grace?’

I don’t mention what he’s said to me because I don’t want anything else to go wrong for my mum today, especially not if it’s my fault.

Normally, Mum would leap up if I said that. She always goes quickly to Chris. She’s super-attentive to him. Chris gets first-class service, because the Second Chance Family is a First Class Operation, just like Chris’s business, and just like my and Lucas’s standard of performance. Chris and Mum set a lot of store in that.

Mum doesn’t leap up though. As I walk through the inky darkness of the room towards them, I see that she and Grace are lying together like a bear and its cub. My mum isn’t trying to get Grace to sleep; she’s playing with her. Mum runs the side of her finger down over Grace’s temple, and Grace reaches for Mum’s hand and holds it in front of her face. Mum uses a fingertip to dab Grace lightly on the nose and Grace giggles.

I approach them quietly because I want to be on the bed with them. There’s a little space just below where Grace is lying and I perch there cautiously. Mum is against the wall. Grace kicks me gently with her feet. The room’s hot and she’s just wearing a nappy and I feel her warm toes on my bare leg. I move them a little because that’s near where the piano bruised me earlier.

‘Chris wants you,’ I whisper to Mum.

‘Lie with us,’ she says.

My heart begins to beat so freaking loudly when she says that that I feel like I might hyperventilate. Mum shuffles over towards the wall and pulls Grace gently with her, leaving a thin sliver of space along the edge of the bed. I lie down, my head beside Grace’s, and she celebrates with some monster kicking, and then by taking a hank of my hair and giving it a pull. I don’t mind though, I’m used to it. Grace tries to sit up but my mum whispers, ‘Gracie-girl, lie with us, come on,’ and, miraculously, Grace does.

We lie for a minute and then Mum says, ‘My girls,’ in a voice that’s warm and sweet like hot chocolate, and she nestles her head into Grace and reaches across her to put a hand on my cheek and her thumb runs down my temple too, and for the first time in a gazillion years I forget all the things that have gone wrong, and I just relax and lie there and feel her hand on me and Grace’s wriggly body between us and if I couldn’t hear the butterfly still flapping on the landing, reminding me of my hourglass life, it would be just like heaven.