White Phantom Chapter nine

Chapter Nine

Beth had to run down the street to keep up with Jennifer. ‘Phantom, stop, look just wait a minute, will you. What are you going to do?’

She didn’t slow her pace; she was striding down Oakwood Drive with furious determination.

‘Oh, I’m not going to do anything, mate. You are.’

Beth pleaded with Jennifer all the way to Maggie’s house. She had no idea what was going on in the girl’s head but she knew that it wasn’t going to be nice. She played with the idea of turning around and going back home. Maybe Jennifer would run out of steam if she didn’t have an audience to play to. She was still trying to decide what to do for the best when Jennifer stopped short. They had been running along Birchwood Drive and had rounded the corner of Sands Road.

‘What number?’

‘What’re you going to do?’

‘Number.’

Beth tried desperately not to glance at Maggie’s house but couldn’t help herself.

‘Ha ha, gotcha!’ Jennifer smiled triumphantly and set off.

Number twenty two was the house on the corner. Jennifer stopped short of the manicured lawn as Beth caught her up.

‘Wait,’ Beth said.

‘Wait for what? Christmas?’

The curtains in the master bedroom upstairs were closed. Graham was obviously in bed after his night shift. Somebody was trimming the front hedge of the house two doors down. A young boy was walking along the other side of the street with a dog. There was nobody milling around number twenty two.

They were on the side road. Jennifer was looking up at the back of the house. ‘Hmm, they never had the back done when they double glazed the front then, that’s typical of her type,’ she went on, not waiting for any reply. ‘All show, rotten windows at the back and a pretty façade to show to the neighbours. I bet they save all year for a for a three-star trip to the Costas. Her type has a houseful of cheap ornaments and saves pound coins in a piggy bank, for a bidet.’

Beth still wasn’t sure how old Jennifer was, older than she’d at first thought, though. Sixteen, she figured, maybe eighteen at a push, but she was extremely astute. Maggie and Graham did struggle all year to have a cheap package in Spain.

Jennifer bent over and picked up a large stone from the rockery edging the side lawn. ‘Come on, follow me,’ she ordered Beth. She stepped over the two foot wall and across the lawn to the back of the house. Peering cautiously into the kitchen window she made sure that nobody was in the room and then straightened up. The house was secluded from their adjoining neighbour by a high fence that trailed clematis. This suited her purpose well. Beth knew what was coming and felt powerless to stop it. ‘Come here,’ Jennifer hissed.

Beth followed her into Maggie’s garden.

She was going to pull her back out and talk sense into her. ‘Here,’ said Jennifer and thrust the rock into Beth’s hand. ‘Smash the window with it, and don’t even think of missing because I’ll come up with something a lot worse if you do. I wonder…Does Maggie’s youngest go to that playgroup down the road?’

‘Please don’t do anything to those kids. Surely you wouldn’t hurt a baby?’

‘Throw the stone.’

‘I can’t,’ said Beth dropping it, and then more resolutely, ‘I won’t.’ She was going to go on to tell Jennifer how childish and stupid this was when Jennifer bent, picked up the stone and lobbed it through the kitchen window.

She didn’t stop to survey the damage; she was running before the broken glass had time to settle. Beth panicked. She was standing in Maggie’s garden looking disbelievingly at the jagged hole in the window. She heard the lounge door opening. In a few seconds somebody would burst into the kitchen to see what had happened. She’d have to explain that it was Jennifer, and then she might have to explain about being blackmailed about Marc.

She ran.

She hit the street, not bothering to avoid Maggie’s newly planted azaleas and she turned the corner just as the back door was thrown open. Across the street, Jennifer was disappearing into an alley. Beth followed and then they ran neck and neck until they emerged at the far end of Oakwood Drive. Beth hadn’t run like this for years. She felt sick and didn’t know if it was because of the vandalism they’d just done to her friend’s property or because of the pain in her chest and the stitch in her side. She wanted to stop but Jennifer grabbed her by the arm and dragged her on.

Jennifer was laughing. ‘Oh, you should have seen your face.’ She giggled, still pulling Beth along. They took another back alley to the entrance of the park and then slowed to a walk.

‘That was evil,’ said Beth between gasps. ‘I want you gone.’

‘I’m not going anywhere. You’re stuck with me and you know it. I refuse to leave. Call the police if you have a problem with it.’

Beth was near to tears. She wondered what Maggie would have done in her situation. How would Maggie have played it differently? All Beth wanted to do was go to her and talk everything through. Maggie would have the answers; she’d know what to do. Beth felt spineless and weak.

Jennifer was still talking. ‘In fact,’ she said, ‘seeing as I had to do all the work back there, there’s going to be a penalty. I feel like going shopping. Come on, have you got your purse?’

Jennifer was excited. She was like a five year old jiggling about on the seat of the bus into Barrow. Beth expected her to insist on going to Homebase to get the stuff for her bedroom makeover.

Jennifer refused to tell her where they were going and Beth was beyond caring until Jennifer dragged her into the pet shop Feather and Fur.

‘What are we doing in here,’ Beth said dumbly, ‘You know I haven’t got any pets.’

‘Not yet, we haven’t. Not even a cat to fall over.’ She was animated and her eyes danced with excitement. She was walking down the isle picking things up and putting them down after scant examination. ‘A coat for a poodle? I ask you, who would put a poodle in a fucking parka? I could just see you with a poodle, Beth. You’d call it Foo-foo and it’d be a spoiled substitute for a child. Can you have children by the way? You act like the type who can’t.’ She put the dog coat down and walked to the next shelving unit displaying treats and toys for cage-birds. ‘When you were a little girl did you ever steal a fiver from your mum’s purse?’

‘No, of course not. Can we get out of here now, please?’

Without looking around Jennifer picked up a seed bar marketed for budgies and slipped it into her jacket pocket.

‘What the hell are you doing? Put it back. Are you mad?’ hissed Beth.

‘Nope.’ Jennifer looked smug. ‘See? It’s easy.’

‘Put it back, Phantom. She’ll see you.’

Jennifer looked at Beth. ‘Your turn.’

‘Absolutely not. I’m not a thief.’ She was still whispering but her voice had risen slightly in indignation. She turned and started walking towards the door of the shop without looking behind her to see if Jennifer was following. She heard a sigh and then started slightly when she felt Jennifer linking arms with her. Relief that she was accompanying her out of the shop was mixed with the fear of them being caught with the stolen goods in Jennifer’s pocket.

The till was to the left of the door and the shop assistant was labelling some books, the pricing gun clicking rhythmically as she worked.

‘Excuse me,’ said Jennifer in an unnecessarily loud voice. The girl looked up and smiled. Beth blushed and quickly turned her attention to the display of chew toys. ‘I was supposed to be meeting my brother in here,’ Jennifer continued. ‘Don’t suppose you’ve seen him, have you? He’s tall.’ She raised her hand to indicate a height far taller than her own. ‘Dark hair.’

‘No, sorry love. There’s been nobody in for about half an hour.’

‘Not to worry. Sometimes you’d think he’d died he’s that slow. I wonder if somebody’s murdered him? Oh, Beth, before we leave didn’t you want to look at something over there?’ Beth nodded meekly. She had no choice but to follow Jennifer back to the budgie section.

Beth nervously picked up a tiny mirror and looked around the shop.

‘No, no, no,’ Jennifer said, grinning. She reached up to the top shelf and picked up a large brass bell that would hang from a parrot cage. Beth focused on the gaping space left between two smaller parrot bells. Jennifer rang the bell and the sound echoed around the small shop. The assistant raised her head and smiled. Jennifer smiled back. She put the bell back in its place. ‘I want that bell,’ she said in a conversational tone.

‘We don’t have a parrot.’

‘Parrots are lovely, aren’t they?’

‘I can’t, it’s massive.’

‘Course you can. You could fit the bell, a cage and the bloody parrot in that bag of yours. I wonder if Marc’s coming yet?’

‘It’s too big and it makes a noise. What if it goes off in my bag?’

‘It’s not a bomb. You should be more worried that parrots can talk, Beth.’

Hastily, Beth lifted the bell down from the shelf. She felt the sweat in her armpits. Her face was burning. The clapper hit the side of the bell and rang once as she brought it down to waist level. She glanced nervously towards the assistant.

‘Stop looking round, you look like a shoplifter,’ whispered Jennifer. ‘Just get it in your bag, quick.’

Beth opened the zip on her large handbag, aware of the sound it made. She shoved the bell inside, pushed it down as far as she could and zipped it up. She was breathing heavily and felt sick. ‘Let’s get out of here,’ she muttered, gripping the bag against her side.

‘Not yet. I want to look at the animals, we might even buy one.’ She wandered off. Beth wanted to walk out of the shop. She could wait for Jennifer outside, or just carry on walking until she was as far away from the shop as she could get, but while she had the incriminating bell in her handbag she didn’t have the courage to walk past the assistant on her own and she couldn’t trust Jennifer’s unpredictability. The bell clanged noisily in her head.

Jennifer bypassed the rabbits and guinea pigs with barely a glance. The chipmunks didn’t interest her, either. That only really left the birds and rodents. Beth felt that if she was going to argue about a pet then it was better to be refusing a budgie that a Great Dane.

Beth had never ventured into the animal section at the back of the shop, in fact she’d only ever been in once when she’d been with Maggie to pick up food for Blue, her Irish Setter. He had died of old age two years earlier. She wasn’t aware that the back room existed and if she had known what it contained nothing could have persuaded her to venture in. Jennifer held the door open for her, a look of wide-eyed expectancy on her face.

Beth was terrified as Jennifer went from vivarium to vivarium. She was terrified of snakes, hated them. She’d never given any thought as to whether she was also frightened of lizards, but seeing all those beady little eyes staring at her she now knew that she was. They all looked so menacing and some of them were massive. At least the snakes didn’t bother to turn their heads and stare at her as she walked by. They looked slimy; the big ones were terrifying but the little ones were, if anything, even worse. They were thin and had a look about them that Beth could only think of as spiteful. It was hot, the air was thick. She couldn’t breathe. She remembered being locked in the vault and the feeling was similar. But the vault hadn’t smelled like this. It wasn’t strong or even horribly unpleasant, but it was a cloying aroma that made her feel claustrophobic. She wanted to get out.

Jennifer was wittering. ‘That’s a Burmese python. They grow huge but are very docile and quite easy to keep if you’ve got the room for them. Oh, look, that’s an olive indigo snake. They are the most beautiful things. This one’s a beauty. They’re fast though, always bloody escaping. I wonder how much he is?’ Before Beth could ponder the horrific implication behind the seemingly innocent question, Jennifer had moved on to the next viv. ‘Corn snakes. They make a good starter pet, but they’re a bit boring. We want something’ – she paused – ‘special!’

Beth didn’t want anything at all, unless it came as a double in a long glass with ice. Her first attempt to speak came out as a croak. Even to her the half formed word sounded weak and lacking in authority. She tried again, ‘Phantom, this is ridiculous. I’m going to wait outside. I don’t like it in here. I don’t mind you looking around. Take your time, I’m going to have a fag. This place bloody stinks. I’ll see you outside when you’ve had your fill of creepy crawlies and stuff.’

She hadn’t said anything about not actually buying any of the awful creatures because she realised now that Jennifer was just playing one of her silly mind games. Well, she wasn’t about to fall for it. She almost laughed at her own gullibility. As if you could keep a reptile in a little house like hers. It was just ridiculous.

Jennifer turned reluctantly away from the viv that contained two boa constrictors. ‘I really don’t want us to fall out over this, Beth,’ she said sweetly. ‘You know I don’t make idle threats. I need a small pet to help me get over the death of my brother. Call it therapy, if you like. And let’s not forget what you’ve got in your bag as we speak.’ She started to sing. ‘Ding dong bell, I’m gonna tell.’ And then her tone hardened, ‘I’m not leaving this shop without Rosy.’

She pointed at the snake nearest to the viewing panel of the largest vivarium. The laminated card on the front of the viv read, Rosy Boa, Lichanura trivirgata.

Beth thought she might be sick. She’d always been frightened of snakes, though she’d never been close enough to one for it to be more than a revulsion. Now she wondered where discomfort turned into a titled phobia. Just looking at the horrible creature had made her palms clammy, her breath was coming in short heavy gasps, pulling the smell of the place deeply into her throat until she could almost taste it. The heat was making her dizzy and she still didn’t know if Jennifer was just playing with her or if in fact the demon who had invaded her life did actually intend on bringing this horrendous animal into her home.

‘I’m not having a snake, Phantom, and that’s final. Please, let’s just get out of here.’

‘Okay, come on then.’ Jennifer was laughing merrily. She wasn’t laughing at Beth, nor was she yelling, throwing a tantrum, or brandishing threats to get her own way. Her eyes were still shining with excitement. She was in good humour. Beth had just refused her something and she seemed perfectly happy to just let it go and concede to Beth’s authority, but Beth wouldn’t trust her anymore than she’d trust the snake.

Jennifer grabbed Beth’s hand and literally skipped her out of the reptile room and into the main shop where the air-con was buzzing and the breeze was fresh and cool. Jennifer was pulling her along the shop. ‘Well, if I can’t have a snake. Can I have one of these?’ She was pointing again, this time at a glass tank filled with half a dozen rats. They were horrible and looked vicious, but at least Beth comforted herself with the fact that they had fur, well, apart from their ugly tails that looked as though they’d been skinned.

Suddenly Jennifer was bouncing up and down beside her. ‘Oh look, look, it’s a Kaluki Blue. I’ve got to have that one. Oh, please Beth, please. I’ll do anything to have that one there. It’s very rare. I’ll keep it in my room. You won’t even ever know that she’s there. Please, it’s only a fiver. I’ll pay you back. It’s a Kaluki. It’ll probably be ages before she has another one of those in.’

Beth couldn’t have cared less if she never had another one of those in and the shop went bust for lack of them. She had to admit that Jennifer seemed to know what she was talking about. There was no card saying that the rat was a Kaleeky Blue or whatever the hell it was called. She couldn’t believe that she was standing in a pet shop giving serious consideration to having a dirty-filthy rat in her house. But, she reasoned, it would be in a cage. It wouldn’t need walking. It wouldn’t pee all over her carpets and surely a rat wouldn’t cost much to feed. If it kept Jennifer off her back it was small price to pay. Best of all – the very, very best thing of all – thought Beth, it isn’t a damn snake. But rats are vermin. She didn’t like rats.

Maybe there was room for compromise here.

‘How about a hamster? I had a hamster when I was a kid. He was called –’

‘Are you serious? A hamster?’ said Jennifer, her voice dripping disdain. ‘A hamster? What the hell would I do with a hamster? Do you know how stupid they are?’

Beth refused to think of the implications of what Jennifer might do with a rat. She couldn’t imagine that she’d want to actually do anything with it. ‘Well, admittedly,’ she mused, ‘I’ve never heard of a hamster with a university degree, but…’

Jennifer cut her off again. ‘Rats are superior rodents. They are the most intelligent of them all. Hell, they make better pets than any other cage animal. Do you know that once a rat is tame it will rarely bite unless it’s cornered? Bloody hamsters bite for the hell of it.’

Beth had to admit that Jennifer was right. She’d only ever handled her hamster once. It had bitten her hard and she’d bled for hours and cried for ages. Was Jennifer right? Would this horrible rat never bite? And would that come in writing with a guarantee, she wondered? But then she had no intention of getting anywhere near the dirty creature to give it the opportunity to bite her. She felt herself caving in. How far would Jennifer actually go if she put her foot down and refused? She gripped her handbag a little bit tighter, terrified that the bell inside it might tilt and jangle. She felt as though she was holding onto a ticking time bomb. What if the shop girl went over to that shelf and saw the bell-sized hole?

‘Okay, go on then, you can have it.’ Was she mad? She couldn’t believe that she’d just agreed to buy a rat. A rat, for God’s sake.

Jennifer screeched with excitement. She grabbed Beth and cuddled her. ‘Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. You won’t regret it.’

Beth already did.

And within seconds she came to regret it even more. Jennifer shot off across the shop. She grabbed the girl from behind the till and reeled off lists of things that she would need, while Beth stood back bemused and horrified. She tried to interject some reason into the proceedings when Jennifer ordered the biggest rodent house in the shop. It was four foot square at the base and three storeys high, with ladders and slides and bloody hammocks connecting the levels.

The shop assistant explained that you could buy tunnels and add-ons to make the tank even bigger. Jennifer wanted them all and ordered a second house with two tunnels that would connect them both. The equipment in the deluxe houses could be moved around to introduce different stimuli into the rat’s life. Beth didn’t like the idea of an intelligent rodent with access to a ladder. She liked even less that Jennifer was buying half the shop while they both had stolen items on them. Jennifer was high on the thrill of her shopping trip and nothing was going to stop her. She bought sawdust and hay, a sack of rat food, two heavy ceramic dishes and two water bottles.

‘All this for one little rat?’ Beth couldn’t believe it.

‘It’s not much, Mum.’

Beth’s face withered at the thought.

‘Just think, if we’d bought a snake it would have cost you two hundred pounds before all the equipment it needs, so you’ve saved money, haven’t you?’ They loaded all the gear into the car. The back seats had to be put down to accommodate one of the massive enclosures and Beth assured the shop assistant that they’d be back for the other. At the till, Beth had to go into her bag to get her purse out. She couldn’t have been more terrified if the stolen clanger at the bottom of her bag was the Liberty bell. She removed her purse very carefully, if she dislodged the bell and it made a noise the game would have been up. After handing over her credit card the assistant brought a little box with holes to the tank with all the female rats in. Jennifer pointed to the one she wanted and it was put in the box for her. ‘Oh and…’

Jennifer moved along to the next tank. She glanced once slyly at Beth, ‘That one, please.’ She said. The girl dipped into the second tank and pulled out another rat. It was predominantly white with chocolate brown patches.

‘What are you doing? We agreed one rat.’

‘Don’t be daft; you can’t keep one rat by itself. It would be cruel. They are very sociable creatures.’

‘Oh aye,’ interjected the girl, ‘they like a bit of comp’ny.’

‘But, that one’s a boy, isn’t it?’ asked Beth, eyeing the enormous balls protruding rudely from the back end of the rat. ‘Won’t they have babies?’

‘Oh, no, not for years yet, and I’ll have left home by then.’ Jennifer said quickly.

The assistant opened her mouth to speak and Jennifer shot her a warning look. She closed it again. Jennifer winked at her.

Even as they left the shop, Beth expected to hear the girl running out after them shouting, ‘Thief, thief.’ Only when they got in the car and drove out of the car park did she breathe freely since putting the bell in her bag. ‘I have never stolen anything in my life until today. Shame on you for making me do that,’ she said.

‘Making you do it? Seemed to me you took to it like a pro, sticking things in bags and pockets like a proper Artful Dodger.’

She turned in her seat to look at Jennifer, ‘What do you mean? You’re the thief. I only…’

Jennifer grinned at her. ‘Pockets feeling a little heavy, are they?’

Beth put her hand into her pocket and pulled out the seed bar that Jennifer had taken.
‘I never stole a bloody thing from that shop,’ Jennifer said. ‘There’s only one thief in this car love.’ She turned her attention back to the rats on her knee. Beth was terrified that they’d chew through the thin cardboard and get loose in the car while she was driving.

At home, when the eight foot rat house had been set up, loaded with sawdust and hay and sat resplendent with its two inhabitants in the living room, Jennifer said, ‘I’m going to call the boy Riff-Raff and the girl Magenta.’ When Beth complained about their placement, Jennifer said,

‘Well, it won’t fit in my room, will it?’

Beth’s Welsh dresser had to be moved out into the small dining room and one armchair was now too close to the sofa. Her spacious living room, dressed just as she had wanted it, now looked cramped and uncomfortable and the bloody rats seemed to have more damned space to move around than she did. The large brass bell dangling from the top of the cage only added insult to injury. However, she had to grudgingly admit that she was fascinated watching them running around exploring their new home and getting acquainted with each other.

‘Oh, oh they're fighting,’ Beth said as Riff-Raff grabbed Magenta at the back of the neck and made her squeal.

‘No, they’re not, they’re having sex,’ said Jennifer. ‘But don’t worry, they’re too young to have babies.’

‘Oh, that’s all right then,’ muttered Beth, dubiously.

She’d watched as Jennifer set up home for her new pets. It was as though she was sharing her life with a different girl. Jennifer was happy and spoke to her differently. For the first time, Beth saw not the manipulative monster but a young girl, excited and buoyant. She had become a reluctant foster mother. How the hell was she going to cope with her career as a busy nurse along with the demands of a troubled teenager? How long was she going to have to do this? And given the way that it had all come about, what the hell did the future hold for her?

‘Do you want to hold one?’ asked Jennifer.

‘No.’