Chapter 5 Charlotte
Charlotte
As Charlotte headed back across Brentwell, she felt better than she had done all week.
It was good to have found a place to hold Grandma’s wake.
Aunt Marjorie’s Tea Room looked nice. Grandma had often met friends there.
It would be a good place. She smiled as she thought about the young man who had served her. He’d seemed nice.
Instead of going straight home, she walked back past Brentwell Primary. The kids had all gone home, of course, but there were still teachers in the staffroom. Charlotte went in, noticing a few strange looks from the other teachers as she sat down at her desk.
‘Is everything all right?’ asked Jennifer Stevens, who taught Year Three, and sat on the desk opposite. ‘I’m so sorry to hear about your grandmother.’
Charlotte smiled. ‘Thank you. It was a shock. I just want to get back to the routine, you know? It’ll make it easier to deal with things.’
Jennifer smiled. ‘Your kids are missing you. Bernard has been covering your class all week. I don’t think I’ve seen one of them smile. I walked past this morning and he had them drawing pictures of the weather.’
‘Wasn’t it overcast all morning?’
‘Yep. A whole lot of grey paint being used.’
‘Oh dear. We’re supposed to be well into the Christmas activities by now.’
‘He did let them watch A Christmas Carol yesterday.’
‘The Muppets version?’
Jennifer sighed. ‘No, the black and white original.’
‘He’s going to ruin them.’
‘It certainly looks like he has some Christmas nightmares in his past. You know, he wanted to skip the school tree in the gym this year. He said it would cost too much. Since taking over from Greg he’s been going on and on about budgets.
I pointed out that it’s the same tree we use every year, and it won’t cost anything to get it out of the cupboard. ’
‘We’ll have to share a little Christmas cheer,’ Charlotte said.
‘For sure. Maybe get into some karaoke at the staff Christmas party.’ She lifted her bag off the back of her chair. ‘I’m off now. Tom’s taking me to the new pizza place that opened last month next door to Evans’ Carpets.’
‘Have a good time,’ Charlotte said. ‘I’ll be off Monday for my grandmother’s funeral, but back at school on Tuesday. Hopefully Bernard won’t repaint my classroom in the meantime.’
‘I’ll try to hide the leftover grey paint. See you next week.’
Charlotte grabbed a few things and headed for her classroom.
While Mr. Wilson hadn’t turned it into the total pit of despair that she had feared, it was looking a little neglected.
Some of the fake snow on the windows had been smudged, so Charlotte retrieved the can from her drawer and resprayed it.
And the corner which she had cleared out and cleaned ready for the Christmas tree was now blocked by an unused table, a stack of old textbooks and a box of toilet roll piled on top.
Concerned by Mr. Wilson’s passive-aggressive denial of Christmas, Charlotte set to work re-clearing the space so that he would see it when he took her class on Monday.
Feeling in the mood to spread a little Christmas cheer, she rummaged through the Christmas decorations bag in the bottom drawer of her desk, found a little cardboard cutout elf doll that had seen better days, its legs and arms hanging crookedly from the drawing pins that acted as its joints, then hung it from the wall in the corner.
Below it, she tacked a sheet of paper with a Christmas-themed border, in the middle of which she had written: Reserved for Christmas tree delivery! Yours sincerely, Mr. Elf.
Mr. Wilson would surely see the funny side, even if it didn’t look like he would.
It was dark outside now, and the classroom lights didn’t penetrate far out into the night.
Charlotte pottered around for a little bit, tidying and organising, straightening chairs and tables.
Only when she found an eraser and started rubbing away the pencil marks from some of the desks did she realise that she was playing avoidance; trying to get out of going home.
Even with Harry by her side, the first few days without Grandma had been tough.
Daylight was manageable, but at night the world seemed to close in on her, and all she could think about was where Grandma would have been, what she would have been doing at one time or another.
Cooking dinner, folding clothes, poking around in the utility room, idling around in the front garden, sometimes weeding by torchlight because, as Grandma always said, ‘I don’t care if it’s dark. It’s only five o’clock.’
Grandma had been a constant presence; the only constant presence in Charlotte’s life since Grandpa’s abrupt heart attack when she was fifteen. Charlotte would be thirty on her next birthday; Grandma had been everything for almost half her life.
Aware that soon Maud, the dour secretary, would come wandering around to complain that she wanted to go home, Charlotte headed back to the staffroom to get her things.
To her surprise, in her tray was a leaflet and a pack of coupons for an upcoming magic show at Brentwell Public Theatre.
She went to the school office to find Maud, who was packing up her bag and had already switched off her computer.
‘Maud, where did these come from?’
The old woman looked up. ‘Creepy guy in a cloak just showed up in a Lexus. Parked right out from there, in Mr. Wilson’s spot. Dropped them off. Free entry for kids.’
‘Oh, right. Well, it looks interesting. I’ve never heard of … what’s this man called? Ah, James Steamblack. Wow, he sounds like some kind of Victorian magician, doesn’t he?’
Maud, whose moody, dour exterior was as familiar as the muddy footprints in the entrance after football practice, suddenly grinned.
‘I saw him on Britain’s Got Talent last year.
He made that posh tart levitate. God, she was screaming the whole time.
I was there thinking, my God, pull yourself together, woman.
I mean, it’s all faked, isn’t it? Certainly looked impressive though.
And the magician … he was a real dish.’ She gave a long, drawn out sigh.
‘It’s a shame the support staff don’t get the same perks as you classroom lot. ’
Charlotte smiled. ‘I’m sure we’ll be able to find a spare ticket from somewhere.’
Maud sighed again. ‘Oh, I doubt that, budgets being what they are. Talking of budgets, particularly for electricity, are you about done?’
‘I’ll just grab my bag.’
‘Good. This school won’t shut itself, more’s the pity.’
Charlotte headed home. The rain started spitting just as she reached the entrance to Sycamore Park, so instead of cutting across, she took the long route around the park’s outside, stopping in at a takeaway on Parkside Road for a bag of chips and a battered sausage, only realising as the server took her order that she’d ordered Grandma’s favourite.
Shaking off the sudden feeling of loneliness, she tried to distract herself by looking over the local notices on a board in the corner while she waited.
A couple of part-time jobs. A litter of kittens that needed a home.
Requests for electrical items from a local charity shop, which was also looking for volunteers.
A dog-eared advert for a window cleaner, another ad for a dog-sitter, which she took a picture of with her phone.
Now that Grandma had passed on, she would need to find someone to give Harry a little attention.
School hours could be long, and Harry wouldn’t be happy stuck in the house all day.
Just as the server called her forward for her order, the door opened behind her.
Charlotte wouldn’t have even turned, but the server, a young girl probably from the secondary school, stared past Charlotte’s shoulder as though she’d seen a ghost. Charlotte pocketed her change and took her order.
Then, as she turned to leave, she let out a little gasp and nearly dropped the plastic bag on the floor.
A man had entered. He was tall, perhaps six-foot-six, towering over the other customers.
Wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a knee-length leather jacket open over a wine-red waistcoat and a belt that had a gold buckle, he looked like he’d stepped out of a Quentin Tarantino film.
Like the other customers, Charlotte found herself gravitating to the nearest wall as he approached the terrified girl on the counter.
White gloves rose, making figures in the air. Eyes ringed with black eyeliner narrowed, a thinly bearded chin jutted, a smug smile appeared. A hissing sound came from somewhere, then with a pop and a sudden burst of smoke, a poster appeared in his hands.
‘Oh my God,’ cried a woman cowering beside Charlotte. ‘Oh my God, it’s him.’
The man didn’t seem to hear her. He stared at the server who was regarding him with absolute terror. Then a small smile creased his lips.
‘James Steamblack, master illusionist. I would be honoured if you would find a place for this poster.’ He flapped his hand and a spread of cards appeared in his fingers, a perfect semi-circle. ‘Discounts for all staff. Here.’
The server was visibly shaking. The woman beside Charlotte was repeating ‘Oh my God,’ over and over.
Steamblack glanced around at the assembled customers. For a brief second, his gaze lingered on Charlotte. His eyes were dark green, like a cat’s.
‘I’m a little hungry,’ he said. His left hand twisted and a tissue appeared.
Then, he leaned down, putting his right hand against the sloping glass of the display counter.
Just inside was a stack of battered sausages.
Steamblack let out a sharp cry, slapped his right hand against the glass and lifted it, a battered sausage balancing on his palm, which he swiftly passed into his left and enclosed in the tissue.
The server looked about to faint. Steamblack reached out with his now empty right hand, twisted it next to her ear, then waved a five-pound note in the air before putting it down on the counter.
‘You take cash, don’t you?’
The server gave a dumb nod.
‘Keep the change. See you at the show.’ He turned, eyes passing over the other customers. ‘See … all of you.’
With a flourish of his cloak, he turned and marched out, jumping into a Lexus idling outside.
The moment the car was gone, the inside of the takeaway erupted into chaos.
The woman next to Charlotte screamed, ‘He’s so handsome!
’ far louder than was necessary, while across the room, a man was saying to his friend, ‘You didn’t see him eat it, did you?
It was totally plastic, one of them magic shop props,’ while, behind the counter, the girl had disappeared.
A moment later, another worker rushed out of the kitchen, squatted down, flapping a paper fan.
As the server who had fainted got up, she opened her eyes and looked around.
‘I thought he was going to make me disappear,’ she muttered. ‘I saw him do that on the telly.’
Charlotte eased her way through the commotion and slipped outside.
The rain was getting heavier. Halfway up the street, the Lexus had stopped outside a Chinese takeaway, but keen to avoid any more drama, Charlotte crossed the street, cutting through an alleyway that would take a couple of minutes off her journey.
Harry was pleased to see her, jumping up and down and making a fuss, although without quite the same wild enthusiasm he had before Grandma had died.
Dogs were loyal to their first owner, she knew, and although she had known Harry as a puppy, he had been Grandma’s constant companion.
Still, she would do what she could, maybe finding a sitter for him during the day.
The house, as always, felt empty without Grandma.
Charlotte fed Harry, then loaded her own food onto a cushion tray and sat down in front of the television.
There was nothing good on terrestrial, so she browsed the streaming services on the smart TV, and there, to her surprise, was a recommendation for a special by James Steamblack.
Titled Illusion at the Speed of Light, she found herself clicking on the programme.
Harry jumped up and sat down on the sofa beside her, no doubt wanting to steal a couple of chips. Charlotte patted the dog’s back.
‘We’ll be all right,’ she said. ‘Me and you. Won’t we?’
The programme began to play, opening with a burst of fireworks and an entire steam locomotive appearing out of the back wall of a theatre.
It was all illusion, she knew. But if it helped to take her mind off things for a while, then all the better.