Ashleigh and Remy Brett 1972 Aged 10 #6
‘Yes, yes, she’s here, just strolled in.
I’ve let Mrs Brett know. Nope, she’s fine, not upset, no, just .
. . quiet. Yep, uh-huh. She’s going to help me in here for a bit, which I think is a good idea, let her settle and let the fuss die down.
But she’s safe, in one piece, and was apparently in the mower shed, hiding.
Why? Oh, because she didn’t want to do the exam. ’
If Nancy was telling Mr Gerald, then it would only be a matter of time before the whole school knew. Her mum would definitely tell her dad, and on it went. In truth, she hadn’t given much thought beyond hiding, hadn’t properly considered the consequences at all.
Still, she knew with certainty that it was worth it. Whatever happened, it was worth it. Her stomach was no longer moving like a food mixer, she didn’t feel faint (genuinely faint!), and gone was the feeling that she could burst into tears at any given second.
It was over; thankfully, and finally, it was over.
Her time in the library slipped by quickly, and just before the bell for home time, her sister appeared in the doorway. Remy rushed over and held both of her hands in her own.
‘There you are, Remy!’ Remy spoke with urgency, and Ashleigh wondered what on earth was going on.
‘What?’
‘I said, “There you are.” Honestly, Remy, Mum and Dad are going to be so mad with you!’
‘Ashleigh, please, be kind! Whatever reason Remy had for not wanting or feeling able to take the exam is neither here nor there, not now it’s all over. We don’t need to make today any harder for her.’
Ashleigh stared at Nancy, who had got the wrong end of the stick, confused them. ‘But I’m not—’
‘Not sorry?’ Remy stared at her, eyes blazing. ‘Well, you should be!’
‘Okay, Ashleigh, that’s enough!’ Nancy shouted, and Ashleigh felt her insides shrink, not only at the rare occurrence of Nancy raising her voice, but also because it was starting to dawn on her what Remy had done.
Ashleigh stared at her, mouth slightly open, her chest heaving.
Remy gripped her hand. ‘Come on. Mum will be here any minute.’
Nancy took her seat behind her desk and smiled at her. ‘Try and remember, Remy, that these things only feel important at the time. But trust me, in a few weeks, a few months, a few years, you will barely think about it.’
Ashleigh nodded, hardly trusting herself to speak, as Remy led her from the room.
They walked hand in hand. She felt like the condemned as they made their way to the pick-up spot in the car park where their mother, Ruthie, liked to collect them, knowing she’d be where she said she would be, arriving like clockwork, reliable.
Unlike her, who couldn’t even make it on to a minibus to take a stupid exam.
Remy let out a long, loud breath, suggesting she had been holding it in.
‘Why?’ Ashleigh managed, feeling perilously close to tears. ‘Why are you doing this?’
‘Because I don’t care!’ Her sister laughed. ‘I don’t care about going to St. Jude’s, and you do, and I don’t want you to be upset over something so daft. It doesn’t matter to me, none of it, and I know it matters to you.’
‘Did you put my name on the paper?’ She tried to get the facts straight in her mind, to catch up.
‘Of course.’
‘I don’t know what to say!’ She shook her head, her confusion genuine.
‘Don’t say anything! It’s done! I did it for you. I love you, Ash.’
‘I . . . I love you, but . . .’ This was a whole other level of subterfuge she had not banked on.
‘No buts. It’s all over!’ Remy smiled at her.
‘Did you pass, would you say? Do you think you got the scholarship?’
‘Of course, it was easy-peasy pips, all of it.’ Her sister spoke with conviction.
‘Supposing . . . supposing someone asks me questions about it!’ It was starting to feel horribly complicated and deceitful.
‘They won’t! There’s only me, William and Rukmal who took it, and they’re none the wiser. No one knows. No one questioned it. It doesn’t matter!’
‘I know, and it matters to me.’ Ashleigh hated how worry over the exam was now replaced by worry over her sister’s actions. What if they got caught? Were they criminals now?
‘We need to forget about it and, as far as the whole wide world is concerned, you took the exam and I didn’t, and that’s the end of it. And now we just wait and see.’
‘I still don’t really understand why, Remy . . .’
‘It’s done, Ash! No one will ever know, and that’s all that matters!’ She sounded certain, and Ashleigh envied her confidence.
‘You might get into trouble with Mum and Dad for not going to sit the exam even though you did! I think we might go to prison!’ Her heart raced.
Remy pulled a face. ‘We are not going to prison! You don’t go to prison for things like that, you go to prison for robbing banks and setting fire to things!’
‘I’m scared.’
‘Don’t be. I did it for you, and I know that if it was something important to me, you would have done the same.’
‘I would.’ The words easy to say, yet she was unsure if they were just that – words.
‘We’re not to mention it, not ever again. Just make out it hasn’t happened, let everyone believe what they know to be true, that you took the exam, Ash. That’s the end of it. Promise me!’
‘I promise.’ Her mouth felt dry. It was overwhelming that her sister had done this remarkable, daring, and crazy thing just for her. ‘Thank you, little dove.’ Ashleigh reached for her sister then and held her close.
That’s how they stood, cheek to cheek, with their hands around each other’s backs, curly hair falling over the other’s arms and shoes toe to toe. The symmetry was stunning, these two little girls indistinguishable, almost; two halves of one egg, one person . . .
Remy
‘Get in.’
Remy watched as her mum held open the car door, avoiding eye contact, but looking around as if she were a getaway driver making sure the coast was clear. She slipped on to the back seat. Ashleigh sat next to her, on the right.
Ashleigh always sat on the right.
Her mum, usually in a hurry to get supper on the table, sat still for a second. Slowly, she buckled up, missing the connection with the end of the seat belt; it took her two attempts before it locked in, and with her trembling hands she gripped the steering wheel.
‘I don’t honestly know what to say.’
Her tone wasn’t what Remy might have expected.
There was no shouting, no overt anger, no questions fired or judgement offered, nothing loud.
It was worse somehow; far better the yelling that she would know how to react to.
This was more reminiscent of when their grandpa had died and her mum had sat on the edge of the bed and said gently, I have some really rotten news . . . It felt the same.
Remy stared out of the window, avoiding the frequent blink of her mum’s eyes in the rear-view mirror that she feared might be a forerunner to tears, and quite unable to look at Ashleigh.
It was a dreadful thought that she might be about to make their mummy cry!
She hadn’t wanted that, definitely not that.
‘I mean, I just . . .’ Her mum shook her head, as if confirming that she really didn’t know what to say. ‘Me and your dad, we’re at a loss . . . It makes no sense.’
And this was how it went. Her mum barely keeping the lid on her sadness, her confusion, as she pulled the choke, started the engine, and drove slowly out of the school gates. Remy stayed silent, while the atmosphere inside the car screamed loudly of all that they tried to contain.
‘Honestly, Remy, what were you thinking?’
She felt her sister’s hand creep across the seat and reach for her fingers.
And there they sat, each staring out of the opposite window of the car as it moved towards home, holding hands.
Both aware of what she had done and yet both sworn not to mention it, not ever.
There was something very satisfying about having come up with a plan and executed it, knowing she had done so for her sister, yet any joy was tinged with sadness at the way her mum was now reacting.
‘I even made a lemon meringue pie to celebrate.’
‘I won’t have any.’ Remy spoke clearly. She thought it best to show she wasn’t expecting any special dinner, not when she had, in her mum’s view, let them all down so badly.
At the thought of the promised treat – toad in the hole, mash and onion gravy – her stomach growled.
It had been a busy old day, what with the exam and all, and she was hungry.
‘That’s right, you won’t!’
Her mother spoke sharply now, as she shook her head; this no doubt just the first punishment to come Remy’s way. She hadn’t expected this anger, this uproar, it was, after all, only one exam.
She felt the tremble of her sister’s palm and slowly turned to face her, wanting to help allay her fears, to smile and reassure her, but to her surprise, Ashleigh was not shaking with fright or nerves, she was instead laughing, quietly laughing until the tears rolled down her face.
Remy tried not to, knowing it might tip her mother over the edge, but it was impossible, and she too started to giggle.
‘Well, I don’t know what about this is remotely funny!
I really don’t. Mr Gerald was in a flap, thought you’d been abducted!
We were minutes away from calling the police!
Can you imagine how worried I was? He did four laps of the paddock with a stick, prodding every bush, looking behind trees.
He had the caretaker search every cupboard and storeroom.
They even took a torch into the crawl space under the terrapin! ’
Their mother fired from thin lips, her voice a firecracker in the quiet, and it became clear that suddenly she knew exactly what to say.
Ashleigh laughed harder, wheezing now with one hand on her chest. This only made Remy giggle more, snorting in an almost uncontrolled fashion that was always the way when one of them laughed, and it was contagious.
‘You can laugh now, but my God! All that money, the scholarship, beyond our wildest bloody dreams!’ Her voice cracked.
‘And when one of you is holidaying in Sardinia and the other in Southend, it won’t be funny.
When one of you is driving around in a Ford Granada and the other is taking the flippin’ bus, it won’t be funny!
When one of you is running your own business and the other is emptying the bins, trust me, you won’t be laughing, Remy Brett! ’
Her mother had made it abundantly clear that she was the one who would be holidaying in Southend, having travelled there by bus, on a precious day off from bin-emptying.
This dire prediction of her life felt so removed from her ten-year-old self travelling in the back of her dad’s Austin that it was hard to picture.
Again Ruthie gripped the steering wheel so hard that the leather squeaked under her palms.
‘I really don’t see what is funny about it, about any of it!’
‘What’s funny,’ Ashleigh spoke up, clearly and confidently, ‘is that Remy doesn’t even like lemon meringue pie.’
‘I thought it was you who didn’t like lemon meringue pie, Ashleigh? I’ve made you a mini apple Charlotte!’
‘Nope, other way around.’ Her sister smiled at her. ‘Don’t worry, Mum. It’s easy to get us mixed up, everyone does it. It’s hard to tell us apart sometimes.’
Remy sat back in the seat. Her sister was right: it was hard to tell them apart.