Free The Island by Olivia Levez

out of the flat and out of her hair.
    Only a fiver in her purse today. She’ll not miss it. I wish she’d miss it.
    I carry on past the station, then change my mind and cross back over the road towards Brixton. I walk down avenues of posh houses, gloss-painted front doors in smart navy and green and plum.
    Each Peach Pear Plum.
    That was the name of Johnny’s favourite book. Together we knew all the words, only I’d pretend not to remember and he loved that; he’d shout the end-rhymes and get it right every time.
    Little white Fiats are parked on the tarmacked drives; first cars for teenage kids. Inside the sash windows are wooden blinds to stop people like me staring in. A couple of builders sit on some steps, dragging on fags in the rain. They watch me as I walk past and I switch on my Medusa stare.
    I am a rock.
    Â 
    Dead Pigeons Don’t Cry
    I decide to eat before heading back.
    Everyone’s packed in here because of the rain; the only table free is mine and Johnny’s.
    Tinny pop music and lime and orange walls. I sit on a brown fake-leather stool with my quarter-pounder-no-cheese.
    I want to die because all the kids remind me of Johnny.
    That little boy with the buzzed hair who gazes at me with treacle eyes. He trails his hand across my table as he passes. He’s sitting next to his mum now, kicking the bench with his white Velcro trainers. Has a chicken burger the size of his head but he’s still making good work of it. He tilts his head to one side in concentration as he licks mayo from his mouth and his mum reaches over and nicks a chip.
    I stare out of the window.
    My burger tasted so good I could eat three more, but I only have pennies left. I can make a large Coke last hours.
    There’s Lambeth Town Hall.
    I once saw a wedding through this window. A white couple, the girl in a short cream dress, him in brown polished shoes that shone like conkers. And a little crowd of friends, all young, happy and laughing. Two women had sandwich bags filled with rose petals and were throwing, throwing, and snapping, snapping with their cameras. And the groom stooped and grimaced but you could tell he loved it really and he and his new wife clutched each other for all eternity in those photos.
    My little brother, busy playing
The A-Team
on my smartphone.
    â€˜When can we go home, Frannie?’
    â€˜Not yet,’ I say.
    A dad, his dreads tucked up tight under a black beret, is asleep sitting up; his head sways and nods as he sits with his kids, a girl who stares out the window, and a boy with his orange juice and his iPad. This kid is chubby, cheeks fat as pumpkins.
    I sit alone, jeans clinging cold to my thighs.
    I am a rock. I am an alien.
    Outside, red buses reflect in glassy puddles.
    Walking back up Brixton Hill, the rain still falls.
    Glassy pavement. Glass-eyed people. By a wall, a crow pecks at a puddle of vomit.
    Outside our flat, on the pavement, I see a dead pigeon.
    A woman is pulling her kid away from it.
    â€˜Why’s it got no head, Mum?’
    I check the time on my phone: 4.30 p.m.
    Cassie should be done by now.
    Â 
    Animal
    So today I bleed.
    A lot.
    Blood drips, over my cupped hands, through my fingers, into the sea.
    I watch it drip down the inside of my legs.
My legs are hairy
, I think. Hairy and blistered and tanned as a conker.
    The first day’s always heavy.
    I’m squatting in the shallows, and the water’s flowering pink with my blood and the sun’s scouring the back of my neck and I’m naked and I’m bleeding and I don’t care.
    At first it felt strange and raw to be naked; I felt watched by the beach, the whispering trees by the edge of the forest.
    But there’s no one to bother about. There’s no one to see.
    My belly throbs. To ease it, I swim, pulling at the water, smoothing out my pain. It helps.
    Later, I wash out my bikini bottoms and SpongeBob’s still winking. I hang them on a rock and take the tampons