Not My Problem

I thought my chest was going to explode. There was sweat dripping down my . . . my everything. And I don’t mean a light sheen of sweat; I mean there was actual dripping. My legs burned for a bit and then they became numb and heavy. I stopped repeatedly and retched. Ms. Devlin watched me from a deck chair she’d set in the middle of the field. She had a stack of papers to mark but it looked like she found my struggle more entertaining because she didn’t seem to be doing a whole lot of work. She’d dressed me in long-lost gym gear. The T-shirt was too big and the shorts were too small and she’d slipped off her own trainers and thrown them to me.

“Aren’t you lucky we both have small feet, Aideen,” she’d said, amused.

I gagged.

These were working trainers.

After five laps I lay down in the grass and begged for death. It took Ms. Devlin a minute to appear, blocking the weak January sun from my eye line. I felt tears rolling down my face but they could have been sweat. I wasn’t sure.

“Aideen, that’s ten percent done.”

“Miss, no,” I croaked. “The Geneva convention prohibits this kind of torture.”

I had no idea what the Geneva convention was but I thought I’d heard that line in a film before.

“The Geneva protocol prohibits biological warfare, Aideen. Nice try. Up you get.”

“I can’t. I literally cannot move. I live here now. The birds will take me eventually. Try to move on with your life. Don’t blame yourself.”

“If you’re still spouting nonsense, then you have a few more laps in you. Take it at a walk.”

I groaned but, sensing her resolve weaken, I thought I could give her another few laps at a snail’s pace and then maybe she’d let me go because I’d tried so hard. What was there to go home to anyway? Would Dad be there again this evening? Drinking out of my mugs. Getting his gross molecules all over my sofa. Kissing my mother and pretending like he wasn’t just taking a break from his real life.

Rage got me through another few laps. When it began to ebb out of me and I slowed down, Ms. Devlin blew a whistle, entirely unnecessarily.

“All right,” she said. “Hit the showers.”

“Ew, gross. I am not getting in those showers. And I am definitely not drying myself off with an abandoned towel.”

“Whatever, princess. Go home then. And if anything like this happens again—”

“What, a hundred laps?” I said.

Her face turned serious. “It won’t be laps next time, Aideen. There’s only so much I can do.”

I nodded, understanding she’d gone to bat for me on this. She might not even have told Mr. Walker what had happened.

I sloped off the field toward my schoolbag and pile of clothes. I threw everything into my schoolbag and slung it over my shoulder. Ms. Devlin called my name again.

“Trainers,” she said, pointing at my feet. They were basically welded to my swollen feet now, so I cursed as I kicked them off.

“That’s not how you take off trainers, Aideen, you’ll ruin the backs of them.”

“You sound like my mam,” I said. But as soon as the words were out I wanted to take them back. She didn’t sound anything like my mam.

I exited through the main building, and as I passed the office I heard a familiar voice. Two familiar voices. Holly and Jill. I hesitated. She still hadn’t replied to me about what had happened this morning with her and Meabh. But she was bound to be upset. I should put my petty feelings aside and go to her.

“Are you sure?” Jill asked.

“I’m sure. If it ends up being our last hard copy then at least we’ve gone out with a bang.”

Holly’s voice caught. There was a long silence and I imagined that Jill was giving her a hug. That should have been my hug to give. I looked down at my gross outfit. Maybe it was my fault I wasn’t the one Holly had gone to for comfort. If we were out of step with each other, perhaps it was because I was the one keeping secrets.

After a few moments I heard Jill whine, “I wish you weren’t leaving. I don’t want to be editor.”

So Holly had picked Jill to replace her. That made sense. They were friends. And if Jill didn’t want to be editor then that made it easier for Holly to take her place back when the election was over . . . whether she won or not.

I realized I was eavesdropping and I either had to go in and say hello or leave.

“You’ll be amazing,” Holly said. “You’ll probably be even better than me.”

I took a few quiet steps and pulled the door to the main entrance open. I was partway down the hill when I heard Holly call my name. Turning, I pasted on a smile. She was half jogging down the hill toward me.

“I thought it was you,” she said when she reached me. “But you were wearing gym clothes so I was confused.”

She took in my baggy T-shirt and tight shorts paired with my school shoes.

“What is going on?”

“Detention,” I said, aware that my words were coming out in a tone I couldn’t quite control. I sounded hollow and cold.

“Did Miss Sullivan realize it wasn’t your work? You didn’t tell her I did it, did you?”

“No. It wasn’t that.”

“So what, then?”

“Why didn’t you answer my message earlier?” I asked. Holly looked surprised that I would bring that up. But in my annoyance I didn’t feel embarrassed for a change.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “I didn’t get it till the end of the day and then I had to hand over the paper to Jill. Meabh told Ms. Devlin that I couldn’t stay on it because it wouldn’t be fair and Ms. Devlin agreed because she’s a sour old bitch and Meabh is the principal’s daughter.”

“That’s awful,” I said, in my flat voice again. “I’m sorry you lost the paper.”

“It’s temporary,” she replied. I wasn’t sure if she sensed my tone or not. Maybe it was all in my head. “But why did you get detention?”

“I got caught rummaging around in Mr. Walker’s desk,” I said. Might as well spill it now, see if it changes anything, I thought. But it sounded bitter even in my head.

“What? Aideen, what the hell? Why?”

“I was doing someone a favor,” I said. I enjoyed her surprise.

I have things going on too.

I thought I saw a shift in her expression. But it was so tiny, over so quickly I couldn’t be sure.

“Who?” she asked. And this time it was her voice that sounded weird.

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Meabh?”

“No. Why would I be doing a favor for Meabh?”

If you could see guilt it would have surrounded me like a mist. But why? I hadn’t been helping Meabh. This time. Fear of making Holly mad at me tugged against anger that I didn’t really understand.

“Who, then?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Since when are there things you can’t tell me?”

I almost laughed in her face.

Right, because we’re so close now. There couldn’t be anything I wouldn’t tell you. It’s fine for you to have this other life with your other friends, but not me.

Was I really being mad at Holly for having other friends? That wasn’t okay.

“It’s something I’ve been doing,” I said, unsure if I was confessing or rubbing it in her face. “I’ve been fixing things for people. But I got caught this time.”

She looked shocked. Didn’t she?

“What do you mean? Fixing things?”

“People ask me for favors, things I can help them with, and in return they owe me one.”

I could tell she was choosing her next words carefully. We were this close to a fight.

Or were we already having one?

“Like what? Helping people with presentations?” She was talking about Kavi, but her tone was a slap in the face. I knew what she meant by that.

I didn’t answer that. I thought if I opened my mouth I’d cry.

“Why won’t you tell me who it is?” she asked. “I won’t tell anyone.”

“Well, that’s what I told them.”

“I’m supposed to be your best friend.”

I’m sure you tell Jill things you don’t tell me.

“I’m sorry. I’m not trying to keep things from you. I just don’t feel right betraying someone else’s secret.”

We stood in awkward silence. I wondered if we were about to lay it all out. All the stuff that had been building up. I couldn’t meet her eyes and I stared at a spot behind her shoulder instead.

“I should go,” she said finally.

“Me too.”

We went our separate ways.

The flat was empty when I got home. That wasn’t surprising. Mam was supposed to be at work until six. But it had an abandoned feeling I couldn’t put my finger on. I was turning over my conversation with Holly in my head. I’d felt both like a dog cowering from a raised hand and one snarling and snapping for no reason. Deep down, if I probed, I thought there was a tiny germ of disappointment that it hadn’t descended into a screaming match. Where I could have said the things I really wanted to say, in the heat of the moment. But what were those things? They belonged to some ugly, growling creature and I didn’t want them to belong to me. So I pretended they didn’t.

I was also starving after my marathon around the pitch, and grimy and gross as well. I focused on those things. I hopped in the shower first and then, wrapped in a towel, I inspected the cupboards. Red lentils and beans. Gross. The fridge wasn’t better. It had an almost empty carton of milk and a jar of mint sauce. We needed groceries. Badly. In that moment I wanted nothing more than a cheese toastie and I was willing to go to extraordinary lengths to get it. I resented the idea of having to get the rest of the shopping at the same time, so I planned to head to the corner shop and just get what I needed. I texted Mam to get groceries after work. I knew she’d have had a long day too but just this once I wanted to collapse on the sofa and let her pick up the slack.

My message didn’t deliver. I got a sick feeling immediately. I told myself maybe there was nothing wrong. She turned her phone off at work. I’d just go get the groceries after all. My stomach churned. I told it, it would take me twenty minutes to get dressed and go to the Spar and come home again. In twenty minutes we’d have two toasties to make up for it.

I reached into my underwear drawer to look for the stash of cash I kept for rainy days and emergencies. I couldn’t feel it. I kept stretching my fingers into the corner as though the roll of cash was playing hideaway with me.

But it wasn’t.

It was like someone had hollowed out my insides.

I pulled my arm out of the drawer and banged my elbow, swearing and rubbing it as I rushed into Mam’s room and took in the sight.

There were clothes all over her bedroom floor. There was makeup in clumsy piles by the light-up mirror that didn’t light up anymore. I tried phoning her. Her phone was off. Of course.

Maybe the cash had fallen down the back of the drawers. I went back to my room and pulled all the drawers out of the frame.

I tried calling some of her friends, but two of them said they hadn’t spoken to her in a year and the last one was a disconnected number. I debated whether to call Jacqui, her boss, wondering if I could maybe pull off casual over the phone.

“Hi, Jacqui. This is Aideen.”

There was a long pause.

“Lisa’s daughter?” I added.

“Yeah, I know.”

“Okay, um, is Mam working today, do you know?”

“I could ask you the same thing.”

That wasn’t good. I played innocent though.

“What do you mean?”

“She didn’t show up today.”

“Oh, well, I mean, I stayed at my friend’s house last night. We have a big project for school. So I didn’t know. She did say she was feeling sick yesterday morning. Maybe that’s why she’s not answering her phone.”

Was that believable?

Jacqui hmphed in a way that let me know that it was not.

I hung up quickly before I could get my mam fired.

I logged on to Facebook. I only kept it to keep up with Mam. She loved posting embarrassing TMIs and playing Cafeland. She hadn’t posted anything today though. With a sinking feeling I clicked on Dad’s page. There was a close-up picture of him and Sarah smiling. They had checked into the airport this morning.

Off on a winter holibob with this one. She deserves a break!

For a second I was filled with a rage that felt bigger than what my body could contain. This would have crushed her.

Part of me wanted to scream. Part of me wanted to cry. Part of me wanted to lock the doors and never let her back in the house, because how could she fucking do this to me again. Why did she keep doing this? She knew how it always ended with Dad and she knew she couldn’t cope with it. So why did she keep choosing him when I ended up suffering for it? Was I so worthless that nothing she did to me mattered? That she could keep hurting me over and over and over and still tell me she loved me and cared about me more than life itself?

I couldn’t cry though and I couldn’t scream and when I thought about locking her out I just worried about what might happen to her if she stumbled home and passed out in the hallway of the building. So I ignored the pounding behind my eyes and walked right out of the flat.

If she was going on a bender, she’d only be in one place. So I marched down to the bottom of the street and through the doors into the dark pub. I didn’t see her. This wasn’t the kind of pub where families went for food. It was a pub where drinkers went to drink. It was mostly empty save for a few obvious regulars. This made me feel worse. At least if I’d found Mam here, I could have maybe wrestled some money back from her. I would have known she was only a few hundred feet from our front door and would probably get home safe. Or if I waited a couple of hours she’d be drunk enough that I’d be able to come back down and drag her home myself.

I tried phoning her again but I knew before I even pressed the call button that there would be no answer. So I put my phone in my pocket and ran home, because if I didn’t get home quickly I was going to cry in public.

I gave myself fifteen minutes. I bawled my eyes out. Face in my pillow. The kind of sobs that make your chest hurt. In a way I was relieved, really, that the tears had finally come.

Maybe it was more like twenty minutes. But then I stitched up the hole that ripped open when these things happened. That scar always healed in an ugly way but it was tough. I got up and splashed my face with cold water to try and look less like a puffy mess. It didn’t do anything. I was just a puffy mess with a wet face. I dried my face with the towel that was hanging up and thought about how I needed to put on a load of washing. Did we have washing powder?

I remembered to take a few plastic bags with me before I left the house, playing my music as loud as it would go to try and drown out the thoughts in my head and the gnawing in my stomach.

The first time I went to the food bank I was nine and I was with my mam’s friend Elaine. She started shouting about how I was being neglected and how there wasn’t anything to eat in the house and wouldn’t somebody do something. It was after that the social came the first time, and I never saw Elaine again, which was kind of annoying because she used to come round a lot and make me cheese on toast and paint my toenails pink. At the time I didn’t even think of her as Mam’s friend. I thought I had somehow acquired an adult friend myself.

The last time Dad left, I came here a few times. Mam was getting unemployment but sometimes the money disappeared before I could get the shopping in. She never noticed that somehow we still had food. She never asked where it came from. Getting other things was more of a problem. Soap, toilet paper, tampons, washing powder. You could get them at the food banks sometimes but not always when you needed them.

The second time the social got involved was when I was twelve and a teacher caught me stuffing my schoolbag full of loo rolls. Mam always pulled it together after they came round. She really, really tried, too. She went to the support groups and she stopped drinking and I’d never been taken away from her, though I had spent more than my fair share of weekends in respite. That’s what they call it, to your face and everything. At the time I wasn’t sure who was supposed to be getting a respite, me or Mam. But I was the one who had to share a room in a conference center with a bunch of other kids whose parents were rubbish in some way while they made us do abseiling and canoeing even though it was freezing outside. There was always one kid who made it his mission to find out why you were there, probing and asking questions while you’re orienteering in the drizzly April weather.

I never wanted to be back there. Not stealing toilet paper from school. Not talking to social workers. Not climbing a hill with a bunch of other kids who needed money, not a camping trip. I was older now. I could take more control. It wouldn’t be like that again.

The nearest food bank was in a church hall about twenty minutes from our flat. When I pushed open the doors it was fairly empty. That was worse to me. If it was really busy at least you could disappear. You were just another person in the queue. When it was empty you got the personal shopper treatment, which was mortifying. I felt like they would memorize my face and remember me if I passed them on the street or sat near them on the bus.

“Is this your first time here?” A stocky woman in her forties approached me with a clipboard.

“Yeah,” I lied.

“All right, come with me and we’ll get you sorted.”

I followed her and sat while she gave me a cup of tea and some biscuits and asked questions.

“How many people in your family?”

“Just me and Mam,” I said.

“What age are you?”

“Sixteen,” I said, feeling like I was lying because no one ever thought I looked sixteen. Sure enough, she gave me a once-over.

“Do you need any period products?”

My cheeks burned. “If you have them, I suppose.” I wasn’t on my period, but if Mam’s bender lasted, then it was better to be prepared.

“Do you mind me asking what’s happened?”

“My mam got sick and had to take some time off work and she doesn’t get sick pay. The social worker drove me down here.” That would fend off any well-meaning interference.

The lady shook her head. “This country’s a disgrace,” she said.

She asked me a few more questions and then got up.

“Can you put them in here?” I asked, handing her my Tesco bags.

“We have boxes and bags,” she said.

“Just use mine, please,” I said. My bags were new from last week’s shop.

She took them and told me to wait where I was. I ate three more biscuits but left one on the plate so I didn’t look like a greedy gorb or a starving orphan or something. When she came back, she handed me back two full bags.

“Is your social worker giving you a lift back? These are heavy.”

“Yep,” I said. When I lifted them I knew carrying them home was going to be a pain. But what was she going to do about it? And besides, I wanted to get in and out as quickly as possible. As soon as I was back on the street I could feel like a normal person carrying shopping. In this old musty church hall I felt poor and I felt neglected. I felt like a charity case. Don’t get me wrong, it could be worse, but it could be a whole lot fucking better too.

The lady gave me a worried look I knew well and I gave her an “everything is fine, this is just a blip” smile even though I thought there was a good chance I’d be back in a few days and I’d have to come up with a better excuse. I could just say Mam was really sick? Maybe I’d be able to boot Mam into gear and get her back to work before she got fired.

These were the things I was thinking when I heard my name.

You hear your name, you turn around, even if it’s a bad idea. If my brain had a second to catch up I would have kept walking. Before I even saw her the voice registered. It was too late, I’d already turned.

Meabh.

She immediately cringed. She was carrying a huge box, but she scurried up to me as fast as she could given what appeared to be her very heavy load and booted foot.

“I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have called your name out like that. It was so insensitive. I didn’t think.”

Could the almighty not do me one single solid and strike me down right now? In ye olde testament it sounded like he did a lot of striking and smiting and yet when you needed a good smite into a pile of dust or a pillar of salt or whatever, he was nowhere to be found.

“It’s fine,” I said, wondering if that was enough and I could walk away now. “Well actually, it’s not, but it’s done now.”

She winced.

“Sorry,” she said again. “Can I help you with those?”

I shook my head. “I should probably offer to help you with that instead,” I said.

“Right,” she replied, picking up that I didn’t.

We hung awkwardly for a second and then I nodded and left her standing there.

Outside it was getting dark and I hoped the January air would cool my cheeks. I hated being ashamed of being poor. I knew it wasn’t my fault. I knew it wasn’t even my mam’s fault. I knew that it didn’t make me a bad person or a lazy, stupid person. I knew all that. In theory. And yet somehow I never stopped feeling like it was some kind of moral failing.

When I was growing up on my street I hadn’t felt so bad. I had friends whose parents also drank, friends who had social workers, friends who had nothing but toast for their dinner the night before the dole was due. They weren’t around anymore though. A couple had moved. Courtney’s dad had a work accident and got a massive claim and they bought a house up the road where everyone from my estate buys a house if they make a bit of money. Mostly though we just grew apart. With me going to St. Louise’s on Dad’s guilt money, I didn’t see them at school.

There had been times too, after I’d just started at St. Louise’s, when they’d invited me out, to hang around, drink in the park and whatever, but back then Mam had been trying to stay sober and I needed to stay in and look after her. Stop her from cracking. My friends thought I was looking down on them. I wasn’t. I was just afraid to leave the house. The gulf is too wide to bridge now. If I pass them on the street they don’t even say hello.

“Aideen!”

I didn’t turn this time. I kept walking.

Meabh hobbled up to me as fast as she could. I heard her boot clunking against the pavement and I slowed down in spite of myself. I noticed she did everything as fast as she could, and then I remembered her bananas schedule and realized it was probably the only way she could get everything done.

“Let me walk you home. I can carry one of those. They look heavy.”

“Your foot.”

“It’s fine. And besides, I’m much stronger than you.” She flexed her biceps and gave me a silly throwaway smile. My body flooded with a warm feeling that spread out from the center of me. That was weird.

“Right, all those pull-ups,” I said, mouth suddenly dry.

“Exactly. And I’ve been slacking since the ‘accident’ so I need the exercise.”

I glanced doubtfully at her foot again.

“Honestly,” she said, “I could probably take it off now, but I’m milking it for as long as I can.”

I shrugged and gave her one of the bags. I didn’t love the idea of her seeing where I lived but my arms were aching and besides, she’d found me at a food bank so she probably wasn’t expecting to walk back to a six-bed mansion in the leafy part of town.

We didn’t really talk on the way back. But when I kept switching arms to carry the bag I had, Meabh took it off me without a word and carried them both with very little effort. That made me feel weird. Good weird. I decided it was hunger and that I’d make the Pasta ’n’ Sauce I’d spied in the bag when I got in. Why was I mesmerized by the way the muscles in her arms tensed as she clutched the bags, though? There were only two explanations. One was that I was a cannibal. The other didn’t bear thinking about.

When we reached my front door there was an awkward moment. I didn’t want to ask her not to tell anyone that she’d seen me today. Somehow that would have felt worse. Admitting that I was ashamed. I didn’t think I needed to ask though. She handed me the bags and I nearly collapsed under the weight.

“I can help you upstairs if you want?” she said.

A little part of me wanted to invite her in. I had a picture of us having a cup of tea, both of us with our feet curled underneath our bums on the couch. But it was cold upstairs and Mam might come home soon. I hoped she’d come home soon. Maybe she’d come home already and I’d somehow completely misconstrued the situation upstairs. Mam could have found the cash and become alarmed at having money in the house like that. She could have rushed out to the bank, but not before changing her outfit several times because she had a crush on the bank teller.

It could happen.

“No, I’ll be okay. Thanks for helping.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow? Upstairs for PE?” she asked.

“Yes, I think I’ll have syphilis tomorrow,” I mused.

“Do you know what syphilis is?” she said, smothering a smile. Unsuccessfully.

“An old-timey disease?”

“It’s an STD that causes sores on your genitals, rectum, and mouth.”

“Wow. Are you implying I couldn’t have syphilis because no one would want to sleep with me? That’s rude.”

“No. I’m sure you could get syphilis from anyone you want,” she joked. Then she flushed. With her pink cheeks and dark hair she looked like Snow White. “Anyway . . . tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow,” I said.

She smiled, still flushed, and kind of rolled her eyes at herself as she waved me goodbye with both hands.

My stomach reminded me that I was starving.