Junk - Melvin Burgess [69]
Of course I know she never will.
Sometimes my dad’s there. He takes the phone.
‘David? David? Are you all right, David?’
I haven’t got anything to say to him. I just breathe down the phone, ‘Hurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr,’ very softly but loud enough for him to hear. Just like I used to hear her breathe when she was letting me dangle and breathing out her fag smoke.
‘David, is this some sort of joke?’
I listen a bit more, but I really have got nothing to say to my dad. So I put the phone down, carry on my way. I don’t know if I’ll bother doing it again.
I always think that, but I always do.
Chapter Nineteen
Gemma
WHEN SOMEONE TEMPTS YOU YOU CAN’T REFUSE
IT’S GETTING COLDER AND YOU KNOW YOU’VE
GOT NOTHING TO LOSE
YOU NEED IT
NO YOU GOT NOTHING TO LOSE
YOU NEED IT
The Only Ones
Lily was in her pyjamas. She almost never goes out these days, so she doesn’t need to get dressed. She was looking at herself in the mirror. Then she turned round to watch Sally push down the needle and smiled that big Lily smile.
‘Yeah! Sal?’
‘Better,’ sighed Sally. She took the needle out of her arm. She wiped it carefully on the tissue and put it down. Sally is always so neat and delicate.
We always use separate needles ever since we started work. You’ve got to be sensible. We used to share because it was only with each other. These days I only ever share with Tar. If I got something like Aids, he’d get it anyway.
Then Lily said this thing right out of the blue. She said, ‘I’m going to have a baby.’
Christ!
‘Oh, my God! What are you going to do, what are you going to do?’
‘Oh, Lils,’ said Sally sadly.
It was so awful. Sally was pregnant a while ago and she had an abortion and she felt dreadful for ages after.
I said, ‘Have you told the doctor yet? Has he given you a date?’
Lily glared at me. I could feel myself shuffle back on the bed a bit, because she really has a temper and she doesn’t often glare at me because we’re soul sisters.
She leaned across to me. ‘Listen, Mrs Sister. You know what dead babies do. They come back and haunt you. They’re all over the place, I see ‘em. Yeah – dead babies floating on the ceiling looking for their mums ‘cause their mums had ‘em scraped out and they never had a life…’ She kept glancing across at Sal as she said all that stuff. I started remembering how when Sal had her abortion Lils was all quiet about it, just smiled and never said a thing. Now Sal was looking upset, and I thought, O-oh…
‘I’m not gonna kill my baby. That’s my baby. No one’s gonna kill my baby.’
‘I didn’t say kill it.’
‘I said, I’m going to have a baby. I’m going to have it. There’s gonna be a baby. A baby, Gems…’
I glanced at Sally. Even though she looks so prim Sally’s got a terrible temper. She said, ‘You’re on the game and you’re a junkie, Lily. You ought to have an abortion.’
‘Are you telling me to kill my baby? Are you telling me…?’
‘You ought to have an abortion for the sake of your baby.’
‘You want to kill my baby? You wanna? You wanna kill it? Come on, come on, you kill it then, you do it now.’
‘Your baby is a junkie. Your baby is inside you and it’s full of junk, same as you. You want to give birth to a junkie? Is that what you want? Is that how much you love your bloody baby?’
Lily’s eyes were absolutely bulging out of her head. ‘I’m a fucking junkie, are you telling me I’d be better off dead because I’m a junkie? Are you telling me that?’
‘I’m telling you it’s not fair to your baby to be pregnant with it while you’re full of junk. What sort of a mother…?’
She didn’t need to say any more. Lils was up off the bed walking up and down the room, poking herself on the chest and trying to find the words. I just held my breath. When those two start, you take cover. I was getting ready to disappear under the table.
Finally Lily got it out. ‘I can give it up any time I want…’
Sally just laughed. I mean, it wasn’t funny but under other circumstances it would’ve been. The number of times we’d tried to give up – I’d lost count. I dunno why. It used