Page 17 of Until Now
‘It’s misfiring,’ he explains. ‘I think it has something to do with the coils.’
‘Coils?’
He proceeds to go on in great detail about what coils do, and for once, I’m glad for the distraction. I forget about Archer and Cassie, and I let my dad talk. He needs this. He needs me to be interested in his hobbies. I can’t help him with my mum, but I can help him forget, just for a moment. I can bring a ray of joy into his life.
‘How’s school, kiddo?’ he asks.
I try to smile. The last thing he needs is to worry about my education, even though he'll be getting a call soon from the headmaster because it goes against their policy for under eighteens to vacate the grounds during school hours. ‘It’s really good. I’ve just finished an assignment onMacbeth,so I was sent home early.’
Kevin Johnson is so old that school systems were a lot different in his day, so he doesn’t question it. He just says, ‘Good. I’m proud of you. You’re a star. Are you still wanting to work with animals?’
‘I think so.’
‘No reason why you can’t apply now.’
‘Because you need a degree to work in a zoo, Dad.’
‘Bollocks. It’s just a piece of paper. How hard can it be to feed lions and monkeys? Anyone can do that.’
I sigh. I don’t want to get into the technicalities of animal husbandry and adequate experience, because I know vigorous, in-depth grilling will still go over his head.
Just then, a bee lands on my arm.
I startle, but then I force myself to relax. Its mandibles tickle as it drinks the salt from my skin.
It’ll be summer soon enough, and the wildflowers will be massacred. I don’t understand how it isn’t illegal to rob bees of their food source—it wouldn’t stand if we did that to people, would it?
‘Dad?’
He’s been staring at the Stagg for the past five minutes. ‘Mmm?’
‘Can you help me build a bughouse?’
There are scraps of wood in the garage, and I can gather dry leaves and twigs and bits of bark. I also have loads of pinecones under my bed because whenever I go for walks in the autumn, I can’t help but collect them.
The bee takes flight, and I watch it go. It’s almost as if it heard my idea, thought it was great, and wants me to start right away.
???
Fortunately, Archer doesn’t visit during work. I’m not sure what I’d say to him if he does. I’d probably throw something at him.
Ping ping!
Kai:hey cucumber?
God, it’s so good to talk to Kai. I want to tell him all about my day, but I can’t do that. One, because we have an unspoken rule when it comes to personal matters (despite me breaking that rule twice), and two, because I can’t discuss my day without revealing what Archer and I did.
Me:heyyy, how’s the piano?
Kai:there’s a hamster in it
Me:You’re joking, right???!
Kai:nope, heard something scraping around when I was trying to sleep, so I open up the piano and I find a live hamster
Kai:Tess, it fucking screamed at me. You never told me hamsters do that!!
Me:we’ve never discussed hamsters