Free To Be Someone by Louise Voss Page A

never tells me to go away! In fact , I wish Mrs. Grant was my mother instead of you. So there!”
    I ripped off the necklaces and the gluey green shirt, just catching Mum’s stricken, defeated look as I flounced out of the room.
    Sam was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs. “Come on, Augenbrau, let’s go to my place,” she said sympathetically, putting an arm around my neck as we went through the back gate and toward the Prince of Wales.
    Augenbrau was one of our many code names for each other. It was usually accompanied by sweeping a forefinger slowly across one’s eyebrow while looking shiftily from right to left, and could be used in any language, although it sounded best in German. We already knew the word for eyebrow in about six different languages.
    Raking a glittery hand across my eyes and sniffing unattractively, I said in a tremulous voice, “Where’s the Hel-Sam box? And how did you hide all the bits of felt and glue and stuff? ”
    “It’s all in your room. I swept up most of the glitter with your mum’s hairbrush,” Sam said sheepishly. “As long as she doesn’t want to do her hair until you’ve had a chance to clean the brush a bit, we should be all right.”
    I smiled at her, ruefully giving the Sign of the Eyebrow to show my gratitude.
    “Thanks. You’re one hell of an eyebrow, girl.”
    Arriving at the pub, we cut through the bar. Mr. Grant looked up from wiping beer mugs to give us a cheery wave as we headed up the stairs. Dylan was sitting at the kitchen table when we arrived, leafing through the pages of Shoot! magazine and picking his nose. “What’s the matter with you, then, fatso?” he said to me without looking up.
    “Get lost, moron,” I retorted as we passed through the kitchen in search of Mrs. Grant. She was in the living room, ironing shirts and dancing around to the Jackson 5 on the tinny transistor that dangled by its plastic handle from the doorknob. “ ‘Oh no, no no-oo no, never can say good-byeeee,’ ” she warbled to herself. Fascinated, we watched her fluorescent polyester-clad hips shimmying to and fro, until she spotted us in the doorway and wiggled to a halt.
    “Oh, hello, girls! What are you up to?” she asked in a cheerful voice. Unlike my own mother, Mrs. Grant always seemed to be in a good mood.
    “Helena’s had an argument with her mum because her dad’s taken the bed and she wouldn’t let us do our dance for her and she’s all cross and Thinifer,” gabbled Sam.
    “I can’t do anything right. I don’t think Mummy loves me,” I said dramatically, making my eyes tear up again with self-pity.
    Mrs. Grant smiled faintly and propped the iron up on its base. She leaned across the ironing board to talk to me, the contours of her breasts puffing out sympathetically across its scorched surface. “Listen, sweetheart. Your mummy loves you very much. I think she just gets tired a lot of the time, doesn’t she? ”
    “But why?” I asked. “You don’t.”
    She laughed. “Oh, I do. It goes with the territory. Maybe not quite as tired as Mummy, though. Just try and be a good girl for her—I think that’s all you can do, really. She often doesn’t feel well, and it’s very hard to be jolly when you’re poorly, isn’t it?”
    “But Mum,” Sam joined in. “Mrs. Nicholls is really scary when she’s cross! Even more scary than the witch in Pufnstuf !”
    Mrs. Grant gave her a look, and picked up the iron again to attack a recalcitrant crease in one of Mr. Grant’s sleeves. “Don’t worry about it, Helena, love. Why not do something extra-nice for her later? Make her one of your super cards or something.”
    “All right,” I said, feeling fobbed off. “Thank you, Mrs. Grant.”
    “Oh, good gracious! How many times have I told you to call me Cynthia?”
    Many times, it was true—but I just could never bring myself to call a parent by her Christian name. Somehow it didn’t seem right. I loved that she always asked me to, though. It