My Husband's Wife(8)

No wonder no one wanted to be her friend.

‘Carla!’

The teacher’s voice made her jump.

‘Perhaps you can tell us!’ She pointed to the word on the board. ‘What do you think this means?’

P U N C T U A L? This wasn’t a word she’d come across before, even though she sat up every night in bed, reading the Children’s Dictionary. She was on the ‘C’s already.

C for cat.

C for cold.

C for cunning.

Underneath her pillow, Carla had carefully written down the meaning of each word and drawn a little picture next to it, to remind her what it meant.

Cat was easy. Cunning was more difficult.

‘Carla!’ Teacher’s voice was sharper now. ‘Are you daydreaming again?’

There was a ripple of laughter around her. Carla flushed. ‘She doesn’t know,’ chanted a boy behind her, whose hair was the colour of carrots. Then, a bit quieter, so the teacher wouldn’t hear, ‘Hairy Carla Spagoletti doesn’t know!’

The laughter grew louder.

‘Kevin,’ said the teacher, but not in the same sharp voice she’d used earlier on Carla. ‘What did you say?’

Then she swung back, her eyes boring into Carla in the second row. She’d chosen to sit there so she could learn. Yet it was always the ones at the back who made trouble and got away with it.

‘Spell it out, Carla. What does it begin with?’

‘P.’ She knew that much. Then a ‘U’. And then …

‘Come on, Carla.’

‘Punk tool,’ she said out loud.

The squeals and shouts of laughter around her were deafening. ‘I’ve only got to C at home,’ she tried to say. It was no good. Her voice was drowned out – not just by the taunts but also by the loud bell. Immediately, there was a flurry of books being put away, feet scuffling on the ground, and the teacher saying something about a new rule during lunchtime play.

Lunch? Then it must be ten past twelve instead of twelve past ten! Carla breathed in the peace. The classroom was empty.

The boy with the carrot hair had left his green caterpillar on his desk.

It winked at her. Charlie, it said. I’m called Charlie.

Scarcely daring to breathe, she tiptoed over and stroked its fur. Then, slowly (scared-slowly), Carla placed Charlie inside her blouse. She was ‘nearly ready’ for her first bra, Mamma had said. Meanwhile, she had to make do with a vest. But things could still be hidden inside, just as Mamma often hid paper money ‘in case of emergency’.

‘You’re mine now,’ she whispered as she pulled her cardigan down over the top. ‘He doesn’t deserve to have you.’

‘What are you doing?’ A teacher poked her head round the door. ‘You should be in the canteen. Go down immediately.’

Carla chose to sit away from the rest of the children, conscious of Charlie nestling against her breast. Ignoring the usual spiteful remarks (‘Didn’t you bring your own spaghetti, Carla?’) she worked her way through a bowl of chewy meat. Finally, when it was time to go into the playground, she walked to the far end where she sat down on the tarmac and tried to make herself invisible.

Usually she’d feel upset. Left out. But not now. Not now she had her very own green caterpillar who felt so warm and comforting against her skin. ‘We’ll look after each other,’ Carla whispered.

But what will happen when they find you’ve taken me? Charlie whispered back.

‘I will think of something.’

Ouch!

The blow to her head happened so fast that Carla hardly saw the football hurtling through the air. Her head spun and her right eye didn’t feel like it belonged to her at all.

‘Are you all right? Carla, are you all right?’ The teacher’s voice was coming at her from a long way off. In the blurry distance, she could see another teacher telling off the carrot-haired boy. The one who really owned Caterpillar Charlie.

‘Kevin! You were told quite clearly about the new rule, this morning. No ball games in this part of the playground. Now look what you’ve done.’

This is our chance, hissed Charlie. Tell her you need to go home and then we can make our escape before they realize I’m missing.

Carla staggered to her feet, careful not to make a sudden movement that might dislodge her new friend. Folding her arms to hide Charlie’s shape, she managed a smile. One of her brave smiles that she practised in front of the mirror. This was a trick she had learned from Mamma. Every evening, her mother ran through a series of different looks in front of her dressing-table mirror before the man with the shiny car arrived. There was the happy smile when he was on time. There was the slightly sad smile when he arrived late. There was the smile with the nose slightly tilted when she asked if he would like another glass. And there was the smile that didn’t quite meet her eyes when she told Carla to go to bed so she and Larry could listen to some music on their own.

Right now, Carla assumed the slightly sad smile. ‘My eye hurts. I would like to go home.’

The teacher frowned as she took her to the school office. ‘We will have to ring your mother to make sure she’s in.’

Aiuto! Help! She hadn’t thought of that. ‘Our telephone, she is not working because we have not paid the bill. But Mamma, she is there.’