The Yips. Nicola Barker

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СКАЧАТЬ style="font-size:15px;">      ‘It’s not really a question of ownership, Frédérique …’ (she pronounces the name with a measure of emotional resistance), ‘no one’s denying that the remote is yours. It’s more a question of …’

      She is about to say trust.

      ‘Piffle!’ her mother snorts (before she gets a chance to). ‘Absolute, bloody piffle!’

      Valentine freezes.

      ‘I do find it odd how it’s never a question of ownership,’ her mother grumbles on, oblivious, ‘whenever I happen to own something.’

      Valentine doesn’t respond.

      ‘I mean don’t you find that just a tad hypocritical?’ her mother persists.

      Still nothing from Valentine.

      ‘Well don’t you, though?’

      Her mother squints over at her daughter through the gloom.

      Valentine is silent for a few seconds longer and then, ‘Piffle!’ she whispers, awed.

      ‘What?’

      Her mother stiffens.

      ‘Piffle!’ Valentine repeats, raising a shaky hand to her throat, her voice starting to quiver. ‘You just said … you just said …’ She can’t bring herself to utter it again. ‘That was one of Mum’s favourite …’

      ‘I’M FRÉDÉRIQUE!’ her mother snarls, pointing the remote at her (as if hoping to turn her off with it – or, at the very least, to change the channel). ‘Don’t you dare start all that nonsense again!’

      Valentine promptly bursts into tears.

      ‘STOP IT!’ her mother yells.

      ‘I can’t stop it!’ Valentine sobs, the grip of her hand on her throat growing tighter. ‘That was one of Mum’s favourite words, don’t you see? She used to say it all the time! Not in a nasty way. Not in a mean way. But when there was some … something she didn’t like on the TV or the ra … radio. “Piffle!” she’d say. “Absolute, bloody p … piffle!” And then she’d reach for the –’

      ‘FRÉDÉRIQUE!’ her mother screams, covering her ears.

      Valentine’s suddenly bent over double, her chest heaving, her face convulsing. She can’t breathe.

      ‘GET OUT! GET OUT! I HATE YOU!’ her mother yells, then hurls the remote at her. The remote flies over Valentine’s shoulder and hits the wall behind her. Valentine turns, feels blindly for it in the half-light, locates it, grabs it and then darts for the door. She staggers out into the hallway.

      ‘I feel dizzy, Mum,’ she pants, clutching at her throat again. ‘I can’t breathe. I think I might be going to … I think I might be …’

      Her voice slowly fades down the stairwell. In a neighbouring room a child is crying. Valentine’s mother cocks her head and listens intently for a while, then, ‘VALENTINE!’ she yells.

      Pause.

      ‘What?’ Valentine finally answers, hoarsely, from some distance off.

      ‘How about twice of thirty-one?’ her mother demands.

      ‘What?’ Valentine repeats, incredulous.

      ‘Twice of thirty-one. Twice of … Merde!’ her mother curses. ‘Tu es sourde ou seulement –’

      ‘SIXTY-TWO!’ Valentine howls. ‘SIXTY-TWO! DOUBLE! DOUBLE! DOUBLE!’

      

      Jen snatches her wrist from him, clamps her hand over her mouth and staggers backwards, her eyes bulging, bent double, convulsing, like she’s choking on something.

      Ransom gawps at her, in alarm, then realizes (with a sudden, sinking feeling) that she’s not actually choking, but laughing – at him.

      ‘Oh God!’ she wails. ‘I’m so sorry! I just couldn’t resist …’ And then, ‘Urgh! Look! How disgusting! I’ve snotted on my hand!’

      She holds up the offending digits and then goes to grab a napkin.

      To mask his confusion, Ransom lunges for the beer bottle and tries to take a swig from it, but the bottle is empty.

      ‘My dad always says if there was an A-level in bullshit then I’d get top marks …’ Jen chatters away, amiably, ‘but, as luck would have it, I’m compelled to operate within the tedious constraints of a regular school syllabus.’

      She gently blots the tears from the corners of her eyes. ‘I got such a low score for my maths GCSE that my teacher took me aside and congratulated me for it. She said it took a certain measure of creativity to get a mark that bad.’ Jen blinks a couple of times as she speaks. ‘Are my eyes still all red and puffy?’

      She leans towards him, over the bar top.

      Ransom puts down the bottle and gazes into her eyes, noticing – as she draws in still closer – that she has a tiny tuft of tissue caught on the side of one nostril and that she smells of raisins, industrial-strength detergent and baby sick.

      ‘You’ve smudged your make-up,’ he mutters (there’s a thin streak of black eye-liner on her cheekbone). He takes the napkin from her and gently dabs at her cheek.

      ‘Thanks,’ she says, surprised.

      After he’s finished dabbing he doesn’t immediately pull back. Three, long seconds pass between them in a silence so deafening it’s as if the bottles of spirits behind the bar have just thundered out the last, climactic notes of a rousing concerto. This hiatus is only broken by the quiet beep of Ransom’s phone.

      ‘So you’d do anything to stay at the Leaside?’ he murmurs, ignoring the phone and focusing in on the nostril again, his tone ruthlessly casual.

      ‘Pardon?’

      Jen blinks.

      ‘Earlier’ – he grins – ‘I thought you said …’

      As he speaks, he notices how the milky-white flesh of her inner arm is now stained by an angry, red handprint. His grin falters.

      ‘I have a boyfriend,’ Jen says, stiffly.

      ‘God,’ Ransom mutters, withdrawing slightly, his mind turning – briefly – to Fleur, his deeply suspicious (and litigious) American wife. ‘I feel really, really pissed.’

      He glances down at his phone and then back over his shoulder again, as though willing Gene to reappear, but Gene’s nowhere to be seen, so he lifts his hands and rubs his face with them (as if trying to revive himself, or excoriate something, perhaps). Jen, meanwhile, has tossed the used napkin into the bin and strolled over to the till, where she starts to cash up.

      ‘You know we had a kid like that at school,’ Ransom mumbles, dropping his hands. ‘Percy McCord. Played cymbals in the band. Wore lace-up boots, СКАЧАТЬ