Fragments by Morgan Gallagher Read Free Book Online Page B

clear?’
    Cathy nodded,
her eyes brimming with tears. James turned away, breathing
deeply.
    ‘There, that’s
much better. Make sure the ribbons don’t come out, won’t you,
sweetheart?’ Alma dropped down to Cathy’s height.
    ‘You know Mummy
loves you, don’t you, darling? I just want the best for you.’ James
turned back to his look at his girls. Tears were brimming in Alma’s
eyes and her voice was choked. James patted her on the
shoulder.
    ‘She’ll do her
best, won’t you, Cathy?’
    ‘There’s no
‘Cathy’ in this house, is there, Catherine...?’ Alma’s tone had
returned to its usual cadence of disapproval and frustration.
    ‘No, Mummy,
only a Catherine.’ Cathy sing songed back to her.
    ‘And don’t you
forget that at school today. If the girls call you Cathy, you tell
them politely and nicely, that your name is CATH-ER-INE. Is that
clear?’
    ‘Yes,
Mummy.’
    ‘Good girl,
well then, let’s get going, we can’t be late!’
    Alma had
already instructed James that he was not to get out of the car at
the school gates.
    ‘None of the
other fathers even turn up. Of course, I’d need my own car to be
able drop her off myself.’
    ‘We can’t
afford another car and the school fees. The uniform alone cost
enough to buy you a little banger.’
    ‘A banger!
You’d let your wife drive a second hand car? Well, that shouldn’t
surprise me...’
    James had taken
in a deep breath and counted to twenty. Once, he’d only needed to
count to ten. He had wondered what would happen if he ever needed
to get to thirty...
    She looked so
small, and fragile, as Alma led her across the school yard to the
lines of children waiting patiently. The Nuns looked so tall in
their habits, so severe. He hated that Alma had won this battle;
every instinct in him wanted him to get out the car, gather his
little treasure up in his arms and take her away as quickly as he
could. With a final instruction of some sort Alma let go her hand
and backed off to hover with the ring of mothers looking on
anxiously. Alma wasn’t anxious. She beamed with pride and happiness
at the sight of her Catherine in the long line of silent little
girls, who looked as if they had been made from a biscuit cutter;
with their identical hats, blazers, satchels and pigtails. The Nun
on the top step of the school doorway rang a large hand-bell she
carried. The lines started to move into the school, older girls
first.
    James watched
as his perfect child, his little girl, his lover of cuddles and
tickles, stood the longest and marched in last: the baby class.
    He gunned the
car up to life. The revving disturbed the silence that had fallen
on the playground as the mothers had nodded and smiled to each
other. Alma’s eyebrows rose up and she shot him another icy gaze.
He ignored it, and when she finally got into the car, he wrecked
the gears as he tried to drive off quickly. The car shuddered and
stalled. He jabbed the pedal down and pulled the key round
hard.
    ‘Careful. You
don’t want to flood the engine.’
    He remained
silent as he slowly started to count to fifty.
    *
    ‘Mum, no one
else wears pigtails in my class.’
    ‘If everyone in
your class jumped off a cliff, would you follow?’ Alma continued to
stitch the starched ribbons with their perfect bows onto
Catherine’s hair.
    ‘No,
Mummy.’
    ‘Exactly.’ Alma
snipped off the thread. ‘There, that will survive gym class. Now,
let’s check your bag.’
    Catherine
opened up her school bag, which had been her Christmas present. It
was gleaming soft tan leather with her initials in gold, under the
lock. Alma had painted over the brass lock in clear nail varnish to
ensure that her clumsy daughter didn’t scratch the plate with the
key. The books and tools of school were laid out neatly, every text
book and jotter double lined in brown wrapping paper. Alma had been
shocked when the nuns had started to allow wrapping in coloured
wrapping paper, and the subsequent competition that had then