A Dog Called Homeless

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“Oh, dear,” she said, “we’re all a little upset.” She sniffed the flowers and put them in my hand.

I made my way round the tight circle of bodies and squeezed between Aunty Sue and Dad.

“Do you believe in ghosts, Aunty Sue?” I said. “Have you ever seen Mum, even though she’s not supposed to be there?”

I guided her arm so that she would turn round and look over at the wall, so she could see Mum, colourful and bright and real as anything. I watched her eyes for the sudden surprise. Her mouth made the shape of a smile, but she frowned. I didn’t know what that meant.

“She’s there, Aunty Sue,” I whispered, pointing. “Over there.”

She blinked. Nothing.

“Dad,” I said, “look! Look over there on the wall. It’s Mum!”

He rubbed his beard. They both looked at me, in that way people do when they’re not really listening to what you’re saying. So did Grandma and Grandpa Hamblin and Granddad Fisher.

Granddad Fisher said, “Now, now, Cally, it’s neither the time nor place for silly games.”

Then Grandpa Hamblin looked at the sky, at the distant grey clouds. “Rain’s on its way,” he muttered.

Dad looked at the silent earth.

“Dad?” I said. “I can see her. I know she’s dead, but she’s here.”

And right then, when I looked across and Mum’s eyes shone as bright as a whole sky full of sunshine, I felt that her and me were the only ones truly alive. My heart thumped, my lungs filled and I wanted to shout, “Mum, sing a song, then they’ll hear you. Make the birds wonder, just like you used to.”

“Cally, love,” Aunty Sue said, “sometimes our imaginations play tricks on us.” She reached round and rested her hand on Dad’s shoulder. “Sometimes, when you really want to believe something, you can make it seem true.”

Tears smudged her mascara. Grandma blew into her tissue.

I thought I heard something, like when the carnival starts and you’re miles away down the other end of town, but you know it’s coming. Mum made a funnel of her hands, like a loudspeaker.

“Dad, she wants to tell us something,” I said.

I saw into his eyes before he looked away, like all the words waiting there were too big to pronounce, too hard to say properly. He hunched his shoulders, rubbed his face.

“Enough, Cally,” he said, “you’re upsetting people.”

I whispered, “Can’t you see her?”

She’d stopped smiling. She searched her pocket as if she was trying to find something. I wondered why she had a coat and hat on when it was such a warm summer day.

“Dad,” I pointed, “you can see her, can’t you?”

“No,” he growled, “and neither can you. And I don’t want to hear another word about it.”

3. (#ulink_c40f37c8-1c47-5009-96e9-d0378a5fdb53)

“GET INTO GROUPS OF TWO OR THREE. EACH group will represent a planet,” said Miss Steadman in science. “As it’s stopped raining, we’re going out to the playground to map out the solar system.”

I said to Mia Johnson, who was my best friend, “Let’s us two be Earth.”

Then Daisy Bouvier came over, chewing her nails. She hung around us like she’d been doing a lot lately since she fell out with Florence Green at a sleepover. Mia looked at me funny and said, “Daisy, you’re in my group too.”

Miss Steadman started talking about planets being millions of miles away and that we had to pretend the playground was the whole solar system. I nudged Mia and tried to whisper about what us two could do at break-time, not including Daisy. But I couldn’t tell her because Miss Steadman said, “Shush, Cally. Let’s try very hard today not to talk when I’m speaking. Otherwise you won’t learn anything.”

She marked our place with a blue chalk circle and set off to Mars with another group and some red chalk.

Doing space reminded me of the day when our family had gone to Wells. Inside the enormous yellow cathedral was one of the oldest clocks in the world. The earth was painted in the middle of the clock and the ancient sun circled round the outside on the long hand.

Mum had said, “Sometimes people get things the wrong way round.”

Because it was hundreds of years old, the people who painted it didn’t know what the universe was like. Now everyone knows we are the ones spinning on our tiny planet through space, circling round the sun. It’s funny how that happens and we can’t even feel it.

“Look,” I said to Mia and Daisy, “this is how our planet spins.”

With my arms out, I went round and round. It made my hands go heavy and my eyes go giddy.

“Stop it,” said Mia, “we’re supposed to be listening not talking and spinning.”

“You could be the moon,” I said to Daisy.

“Miss Steadman didn’t say to be a moon,” she said. “And I wanted to be Mercury.”

“But look,” I said, “look what would happen if we suddenly started spinning a different way.”

I bumped into the moon and that made me fly off in a different direction.

“Look,” I said, “we could go right out into space and see what’s there.”

“Cally Fisher!” Miss Steadman shouted across the galaxy. “Go back to your circle and stay there!”

But I wanted to see what was out there. I imagined a splash of light winking from across the universe. Maybe it was a star, maybe it was a doorway, a way through a hole in the sky where souls and angels go. And who wouldn’t want to find out what was shining in the darkness when it’s the only bright thing in the whole of space?

Anyway, I got sent to Pluto with Daniel Bird who didn’t have a partner.

“You’re in trouble again,” he said, because he is always stating the obvious.

4. (#ulink_249334f4-49e2-55b9-8ec7-0a3691667641)

WE HAD MUSIC NEXT WITH MR CRISP. I LOVE singing. I get that from my mum. She could sing and Dad would say the early morning birds ought to think about getting another job. Mum said singing is like knitting: it ties everything together, especially people. That’s why Dad played the guitar for her and why he played in a band down at the pub on Friday nights. Well, he used to.

So when Mr Crisp said we were doing a farewell concert at the end of term, me and Mia said we’d put our names down for the auditions to sing together, seeing as it was our last year at Parkside Juniors.

Then, after music, I heard Daisy talking to Mia in the loos.

Daisy said, “Let’s just put our names down to do something on our own. We’ll just not tell her.”

Mia said, “We could do a duet, seeing as we’re best friends now.”

They talked about some songs they liked.

“She’d only drown us out anyway,” said Daisy.

They laughed and Mia said, “Actually, I think she’s a rubbish singer.”

Then they came round the corner of the cubicles and Mia slammed, smack! right into me in the doorway.

“I’m not rubbish,” I said.

Her eyes flashed. “I never said that.”

“I heard you.”

Mia went red. She punched her hands on her hips. “I was only joking,” she said.

“She can’t take a joke,” said Daisy.

“And anyway, every time we do something with you, you always get told off. And you’re always making such a big fuss about everything.”

“No, I don’t,” I said.

“Yes, you do!” said Mia.

“No, I don’t! And you’re supposed to be my friend.”

“See, you’re doing it now. You just spoil everything. And I never said for definite I was going to do it with you.”

“You’re not a very good friend. Good friends wouldn’t say things like that.”

“Well, if that’s how you feel,” said Mia, hooking Daisy’s arm and marching down the corridor, “we don’t have to be friends any more.”

I stayed in the loo with the door locked, peeling bits of plastic off the scabby patch by the loo roll until the bell rang.

I could still put my name down for the concert. Only now I’d have to sing on my own.