Free The Girl With Glass Feet by Ali Shaw Page B

pummelled by rain, landed on the car bonnet and staggered over it before hopping down on to the tarmac and stumbling in another direction.
    Midas’s father clapped his hands. ‘Boats, Midas! A fine way to do things. Finer than this nonsense with the bin liners.’
    ‘What
about
the bin liners?’
    ‘A fool’s business. Boats, Midas! My God, but you’re a stimulant.’
    He turned the ignition suddenly. ‘Let’s get you back to school.’
    Midas hung his head. He arrived back at school in time for double maths, with only a soaked dishcloth to show for his escape.

10
     
    When Midas woke, his head hurt and his joints felt stiff. He’d fallen asleep in the armchair in Ida’s room, where it was pitch dark. They’d talked about easier things, books (they figured he’d read one for every twenty of hers), the news (he was out of touch) and cinema (he told her he couldn’t cope with movies: he wanted to study every frame as he would a photo, but the effort made him dizzy). Eventually tiredness caught up with them. They fell asleep where they sat.
    They’d left the curtains open and the world outside was visible now in vague blue layers, like looking out of a submarine. Soft breathing came from the bed. Midas’s mouth felt dry and still tasted of white wine. He tried to settle back to sleep but that failed. He reached for the lamp. A spider raced up the wall, away from the soft orange glow that suddenly filled the room. Ida lay on the bed, her silver-dotted blanket folded over and beneath her. Her feet poked off the end of the bed. He watched them for a while, in a kind of doze. She snuffled and turned her head every so often, but her feet didn’t move once. Even when she clenched her fists and drew them protectively to her chest, her toes remained still as stone.
    Night-time seemed to upheave his curiosity, like the moon swelling up the tides. His camera nestled in his satchel beside the chair. He took it out, removed the lens cap, then realized what he was thinking and clipped it back on. He put down the camera on the bedside counter and refused to look at it.
    It looked so innocent, but with Ida sleeping in the room it also looked weirdly alien, as if it were an accessory. He took hold ofthe strap, felt the coarse weave of its threads on his fingertips. He had thought of it for so long as an extension of his body, as others might think of a wheelchair or a pair of spectacles, that to consider acting independently made his shoulders tense and his toes go cold. He’d be blind without its guidance. Looking at Ida’s motionless feet, he doubted he had the courage to investigate them without its cool.
    His knees clicked when he got up and crept to the foot of the bed.
    The top pair of Ida’s socks were creamy white. He glanced back at the camera, the dull plastic of the lens cap masking its eye. His fingers twitched. He steadied his breathing, then gently placed a thumb on Ida’s big toe. She didn’t notice. The unexpected coolness of her foot meant it didn’t feel like touching another person. She breathed regularly, lips parted, a fleck of saliva in the corner of her mouth. He pressed lightly. Her socks were soft. But her toe was hard like diamond.
    He pulled his thumb away at once and stepped back from the bed. The white wine must still be addling him. What he’d touched hadn’t felt like a toe.
    He returned to the armchair and cradled his camera. Soon he was happy to believe he’d deceived himself.
    He was ninety-nine-per-cent happy to believe that.
    Drawing the strap of his camera over his head, he moved back to the end of the bed, took a deep breath and took her big toe between finger and thumb. He squeezed until he couldn’t deny how icy hard it felt. And she surely couldn’t feel it. She mumbled in her sleep. He shoved his cold hands into his pockets. On the ceiling, the spider cantered back and forth, in and out of the arc of the light.
    He reached for the top of Ida’s socks and gripped them gently