V) Game Plan: chapter one

As bad days went today was worse and Mickey Blaine was glad to be
standing at the bus stop in the icy wind and torrential rain. At least
being here meant that he was on his way home and another school day had
come to an end. What made today worse than most was the fact that it
was Mickey's Sixteenth birthday. He figured that no matter who you are,
birthdays carry expectations. It's as though everyone has a God given
right to have a pleasant day on their birthday. But this year, it
seemed someone had forgotten to remind God that it was his birthday,
and today had been just like every other day. Now, although going home
was marginally better than being at school, he had to make jolly and
pretend that this was the best birthday ever. The thing was, no matter
how much trouble the folks had gone to, they could never give him the
one gift he really wanted. No one could.

Andy McGaskill and two of his sidekicks were pounding towards the bus
stop, Mickey watched their approach as they stomped in puddles and
soaked all the people they passed. Mickey huddled further into his
coat, partly against the weather that was worsening by the second and
partly against the inevitable onslaught of McGaskill and his cronies.
Instinctively as they went to run behind his back Mickey turned
sideways on to face them. Sean Blevin pushed into him ramming his
shoulder hard into the Perspex of the almost useless shelter. At the
same time McGaskill grabbed the shoulder strap of his sports bag and
spun him round by it. Mickey almost lost his balance and had to pull
hard on the other end of the strap to stop McGaskill running away with
it.

"Get lost McGaskill you freak," shouted Mickey.

The boys ran off down the road laughing and splashing each other in the
puddles.

A man at the stop smiled a little smile at Mickey and looked relieved
that things hadn't got any worse there. If the thugs had really hurt
the lad then he would have had a decision to make. Sure he could do the
British thing and look the other way, but maybe he'd have had to do the
right thing and intervene. Mickey smiled reassuringly back at the man
as he hunched his sports bag back on to his shoulder. The man was
absolved of any feeling of responsibility and turned away from the
sadness in the young lad's eyes to face into the biting wind.

Sports bag that's a laugh. Thought Mickey. He remembered briefly how
much he used to love playing football, funny even the cold felt colder
now.

When the doors of the bus opened a small cloud of body steam came off
before the three disembarking passengers. A lady struggled to get her
brolly open before stepping off the last step and into the nasty
weather. She almost poked him in the eye and was either too rude to
apologise, or just plain didn't see him standing there. It seemed that
since he'd been back at school, Mickey was either the focus of
everybody's attention, or just plain wasn't seen at all. Nothing felt
'normal' anymore.

His left leg dragged behind him ever so slightly when he boarded the
bus, and he had to hitch awkwardly while struggling with his cumbersome
bag as he climbed the steps. Of course the only seat available was
towards the rear, three rows from the back, so he had to endure the
gamut of "Excuse me's" and "Sorry's" while he bumped and bundled his
way to the seat. The large man already occupying the window-side place
made a show of moving over but put his rounded bottom back in exactly
the same position as it had been before he raised. Mickey mumbled a
"Thank-you." And flopped gratefully into his three-inch of seat.

She was there. Mickey blushed and felt awkward after his clumsy entry.
He daren't look at her, would she be laughing at him? But after his
peripheral glance he instantly forgot about the cold that had seeped
through his clothing and wrapped around his bones. He thought about her
a lot and her presence on the bus made the nightmare journey to and
from school bearable. She always sat alone, or at least she always
seemed to be alone, where was the giggling side-kick that teenage girls
seemed to be permanently adhered to? She was gorgeous, heck she even
had boobs, but that wasn't what attracted her to Mickey. On his very
first day back at school she smiled at him. Of course she would never
know what that one warm smile meant to him, but she seemed nice. A girl
like that would never look at a lad like Mickey Blaine. Not really, he
knew that and kept his fantasies in his head where they belonged.

He'd looked for her every day at school, in the corridors, the yard and
while he waited in the canteen queue at lunchtime, but he never saw
her. It was odd that, he'd done a whole week at school and not caught a
glimpse of her anywhere. He began to mentally work out the ratio of the
number of pupils in the school, by the probable opportunities of
meeting by the surface area of the building and grounds. He very
quickly came up with a scientific percentage that by the law of
averages told him that he should have seen the girl no less than eight
times and no more than fifteen taking everything on a random playing
field with no contrivance. Mathematics was Mickey's thing, While the
other kids groaned aloud at the beginning of each maths lesson, Mickey
hoped that the teacher would have something on offer to stimulate his
brain and make him think. To Mickey numbers were beautiful because they
always made sense. If you applied the correct formula and followed the
correct procedure, they always came out in a logical manner. Mickey
liked patterns, and numbers made perfect patterns that he could
understand. Unfortunately people didn't.

He felt as though she was looking at him. The bus pulled into a stop
and he wished it was her stop and then he could avoid turning round to
see if she was looking at him. He tried to resist the feeling, he
watched another two people get on the bus and tried not to look at the
man four seats down who was picking his nose and wiping it on the seat
in front of him. The man looked round to see if anyone had seen him and
Mickey hastily looked away. He turned his head too sharply to the left
and stopped directly in the girl's eyeline. She was looking at him. As
he turned towards her, she smiled. It was a nice smile she had nice
teeth and her eyes crinkled at the corners beneath her glasses.

Mickey turned away quickly, it seemed there was nowhere he could look
without eye locking with someone. In his fluster he'd forgotten to
smile back. Damn, would she be thinking that he was snotty or ignorant?
His cheeks were burning and instinctively he moved his bag further over
onto his left leg, always aware, always self-conscious, ashamed.

The bus was slowing for her stop now. Mickey automatically straightened
himself in the seat to make himself look taller. He liked it when she
got off the bus because he could watch her walking all the way to the
front. Her hair was long and blonde and bobbed onto her shoulders as
she walked. It looked soft, Mickey would like to touch her hair. He'd
also like to touch other bits of her and kiss her, but he tried not to
think too much about those kind of likes while he was on the bus.

He was aware of her rising from her seat, he couldn't see her, but as
if there was no one else on the bus he was only attuned to her
movements. Her hand was on the bar at the back of his seat. He knew
without having to turn around that it was her hand. But today instead
of moving on down the bus she stopped.

Oh my God, she was bending over. She was going to say something
Mickey's mouth went dry and he tried to swallow but almost
choked.

"Happy Birthday Mickey." She said forcing something into his
hand.

She kissed him quickly on the cheek and hurried forward to get off the
bus.

Mickey never said a word. His heart was thumping and his hands were
shaking, and as always his treacherous cheeks were blazing redder than
any post-box Mickey had ever seen.

Mickey looked down at the lavender card in his hands. Hastily before
anyone saw he stuffed it roughly into the side pocket of his bag and
examined the state of the dirty floor.

How did she know it was his birthday? Hell how did she even know his
name?

She'd kissed him right there in the middle of the bus, and Mickey felt
that everybody would be staring at him when he stood up to get off. For
the self-conscious boy, this was the sweetest nightmare he'd ever
endured.

He made the short walk home with a gracefulness of mind, if not one of
body. He didn't once notice the uncomfortable weather and longed only
for the birthday festivities to be over so that he could open his
special card in private.

He had almost forgotten that it was his birthday by the time he walked
through the front door. That is he only remembered his birthday in so
far as it directly related to the girl, so when his parents jumped out
at him from the hallway it was indeed a

'SURPRISE!'

He staggered backwards, fell over the doorstep and almost landed in a
heap back out in the garden.

His parents looked ridiculous peering round the front door at him with
big stupid smiles on their faces. The strain showed in the eyes of his
father and was perfectly mirrored in those of his Mum. He'd rather they
hadn't bothered at all, but knew that this birthday was more for them.
Something they needed to do to be able to face the next day and every
day after that. He echoed their silly smiles and determined to make an
effort to seem happy for his parent's sake.

His mother had washed her hair, she had clean clothes on but the stage
play was easily seen through because her eyes still had that vacant
anti-depressant glaze.

Fruitcake looks delicious with its pretty icing and plastic snowman on
the top, but it will never be chocolate cake he thought beneath the
pretty frosting it was still yeuky fruitcake.

Nothing had really changed in his mother apart from the tidier
appearance and the smell of soap. The next three hours were awful.
Presents and cards were opened, party food was eaten. Champagne --just
the one glass mind seeing as it's a special occasion-was chinked and
everybody smiled a lot. Mickey's jaw ached with smiling and the room
echoed hollowly with the sound of forced laughter and the absence of
one missing voice.

He looked at his row of cards, but could only focus on the card that
wasn't there. Not the card from the girl that was different secreted
away in his bag not for public viewing. This year there was no card
from Gemma. He wanted to read her sarcastic message like every other
year.

He missed her.

Finally after what felt like a week of chipped happiness he got to
escape. He went up the stairs loathing that fact that he could only
take them one at a time, and that he had to allow time to let his left
leg catch up with his right. He couldn't walk up the stairs in a
continuous over-leg movement like everybody else did. And so he went
upstairs rather than ran, in his hippity-hoppity manner.

His hands trembled slightly as he undid the clasp on his bag and took
out the lavender card. It smelled faintly of her and the hand written
'Mickey' on the front was small and neat.

He slid his finger under the flap and took out the card. He could hear
raised voices from downstairs, they'd done their bit and the party was
over.

"Go on then, go to her. What do I care what you do? What do I care
about anything?" Beneath the squall of the voice he heard bottle neck
chink on glass rim and concentrated on the card in his hand.

Surprisingly the front of the card was blank, a lavender fascia with a
small oval cut-out in the top right hand corner. When the card was
closed the picture underneath showed through the hole.

He opened the card. Inside it said only.

The time is now!

Date of meeting: 1st November 2002
Place of meeting: Lightburn Park, bandstand
Time of meeting: 19:30

Strange, no happy birthday or anything.

The picture in the top corner was that of a clown. A happy, smiling
clown.

As he looked at the clown he realised he'd seen a card just like this
before. He instantly forgot all about the girl as his mind took him
back the to worst day of his life. And then he went a little bit
further back, and then to a time before that and he smiled losing
himself in 'before'.

Mum wafted in smelling of 'Impulse' and holding a second plate of
toast.

"Ste will you remember to pick up Mickey tonight love, he's got his
football practise."

"Yep no worries, I should finish a bit earlier so I'll be able to see
how he's getting on." Steve Blaine stood up from the table with a slice
of bitten toast in his hand. He wrapped the other arm round his wife
and kissed her loudly. "Ugh," said both the kids in unison as they did
almost every morning.

"Right come on then you two or we'll be late," said Steve, he winked at
Beth. "You should put your hair up like that more often, I like it.
Very sexy."

Instead of teasing her that day and saying she was too old to be sexy,
Mickey wished that he had taken the time to look at his mother
properly, because it was the last time he ever saw her. She was someone
different now. They all were.

Gemma was in a mood because it was Mickey's turn to sit in the front
seat on the way to school. She felt that as the eldest she should get
to sit in the passenger every day. After all she was sixteen. It was an
old and tired argument. They had only just pulled out of their street
and on to the by-pass when Mickey turned in his seat to gloat at his
sister. Why had he done that?

She had become so moody, always flying off the handle, bursting into
tears over the smallest little thing. Mickey loved to wind her up,
almost as much as their dad loved to tease her.

He turned his head and called her a loser. Predictably she blew.

"You putrid little turd. By the way I forgot to tell you I
'accidentally' wiped your PS2 memory card last night. You'll have to
start turrican two right from the beginning. That'll teach you for
being such a little shit won't it?"

Mickey began yelling and trying to his her through the seat with his
school bag. At the same time Steve turned round his head so that he
could see his furious daughter.

"Gem don't swear at your brother like that love. Honestly all this
because you can't ride up front. Does it really matter what Laura
bloody White thinks of you being in the backseat? Hell when you've got
yourself a boyfriend I'll be telling you that under no circumstances
must you spend too long in the back seat of any vehicle." He glanced at
the road ahead and then back at Gemma, he was teasing her again. "You
two should be nice to each other you know bec.."

"Dad Lookout!" Mickey shouted.

It was five weeks before he woke up and another couple after that
before he could speak or make sense of anything. They told him about
the accident, car pulled out of a junction, slammed into the side of
their car, everyone at school send their love, hope you'll be back
soon.

They didn't explain his injuries that day; it was enough they said that
he was alive and back with them. Beth looked tired and refused to look
at Steve. Steve just looked miserable and his smile was almost too
heavy to lift. In those early days he never stayed awake very long.
Gemma didn't visit, Beth mumbled something about school work, exams all
that stuff.

It was another week before he was bright enough to open his cards.
There was a big pile of them most of them from his school friends they
said. Rob Collier said they were keeping his place open on the
team.

That's when he came to the lavender card. His parent's thought it was a
'Get well soon' card like all the other's. The front of the card was
blank, a lavender fascia with a small oval cut-out in the top right
hand corner. When the card was closed the picture underneath showed
through the hole. He opened it and saw the picture of the clown before
he saw the words. He was a happy clown, smiling. It seemed
inappropriate for a 'deepest Sympathies' card.

His head was aching and the pain was stopping him from making sense of
the words. He began to cry and the doctor had to sedate him to prevent
him moving too much.

The card lay open on the bed.

Deepest sympathies on the death of your sister.

You are not alone in this.

We have suffered too and know what you are going through.

We will be in touch.

Your friends from the edge.

His shocked parent's blamed each other for not checking the cards. They
blamed each other for everything now.

They had to tell him when he woke up. He wouldn't let up, wouldn't be
fobbed off, he needed to know. With a doctor on standby they told him
how Gemma had gone missing one-night three weeks after the accident.
They went out of course, looked for her for hours. Then they hit the
telephones, with Beth on the landline and Steve using his mobile they
rang all of Gemma's friends. Some of the parent's just said that they
hadn't seen Gem for a while. What was more worrying though, were the
few who said that their daughter didn't hang round with Gemma anymore
and hadn't for some time.

They called the police then, she'd only been missing for eight hours
but even so they took it seriously enough to arrange a search. It was
early the next morning that her body was found by a poacher. She'd hung
herself from an oak tree down by the river.

Mickey shook his head to clear the images. He didn't want to think
about it tonight. It was his birthday. "Night Gem," he muttered quietly
under his breath.

It must be a co-incidence that the sympathy card had the same design
as his birthday card from the girl. He couldn't even remember who the
other card was from now, it seemed so long ago, almost a year now. It
was a long and frustrating recovery.

He wished she'd signed it. He didn't even know her name. The first of
November was this Saturday, in four days time. He felt scared and
excited at the thought of meeting her in the bandstand. It would
certainly be romantic, there'd probably be the odd early firework going
off and if it was really cold he might even get to put his arm round
her to keep them warm. He couldn't wait for Saturday to come. It wasn't
a bad birthday after all.