Mollie + Chester

Chapter Five

On the first Saturday of every month at eight-o-clock on the dot, Mum would wake me up instead of letting me sleep in and this Saturday was no different. She touched me on the shoulder, whispering "sweetie," until my mind acknowledged her and I opened my eyes. When Seth was made to wake me up, he flicked me in the forehead, rested a finger on my nose as if he were an annoying fly and finally scream my name so I woke with a jolt. Following that, I would wack him on the arm and glare until I couldn't hold in the laughter anymore.
To be honest, I liked Seth's way better.
"Muuuuum," I whined as she unhooked all the whatchamacallits with names so long if you piled up all their letters, it would be taller than me. Chester emerged from under the covers and stretched. "Why do we even have to go? They just gossip and stare anyways."
Mum sighed and took me hands to help me out of bed. I pushed her away and got up myself.
"Oh Mollie, we must. It is what you do when you live in Tamwood."
"Why does stupid Perfectville Tamwood even need a monthly meeting?" I asked as we made our way down the stairs into the kitchen with Chester following. I could smell burnt blueberry and wheat pancakes (the healthy kind) which meant Seth was stuck on cooking duty. When Mum cooked the pancakes, they were perfectly round with the exact same amount of blueberries in every one.
"We need a town meeting, Mollie," Mum said. As usual her voice was dripping with worry. "How else are we meant to know what's happening in town?"
Yes, because otherwise everyone would be oblivious in the population: 100 town and nobody would be able to find out Mrs Ranchfield's cat got rescued from a tree again.
Mum started pouring out my morning medicine while I sat down to a shrivelled, and almost black pancake. Seth always made mine like that because he knew it was the best way to have them. What was the point of eating homemade disgusting healthy pancakes if you knew how they would look? I liked to guess with Seth what animals the food looks l like.
"It's a... Puppy?" I said taking a bite out of the part that looked like a tail. Chester meowed at me, jumping up onto my lap and staring at my plate Seth examined his own pancake as if he were an extremely good art collector, wanting to buy a painting.
"Mine's a caterpillar," he said.
"Oh really, Seth, must you be so childish," Mum said stopping and glancing in the shiny surface of the fridge to pin back a stray hair. I don't know how she would handle it if the perfect ladies of Tamwood saw her with an imperfection other than me.
"I'm not childish, Mum," Seth said flicking me when I giggled at him. "I'm just a very nice brother."
I scoffed, holding back laughter. The corner of Mum's mouth turned up the tiniest bit.
"You do spend a lot of time with your sister," she said, "but wouldn't you rather do teenage things..."
"Like 'clubbing' at the town hall with the rest of the people in this town do on a Saturday night? I'd rather gouge my eyes out with a fork, rather be de-"
He cut himself off, seeing Mum's face. Around here, the D word was even worse than swearing. I could see Mum was about to say something but she was cut off.
The swinging door to the kitchen squeaked and we all looked up as Dad entered, his eyes dark and sunken but his posture saying he was ready to work non-stop for the next week. He leaned down and Mum kissed him on the cheek, but he didn't say anything, didn't even look down at the table or at me. Now I understand how hard is to have a kid slowly waste away right in front of your eyes, with nothing you can do to stop it, but in that moment, I bit my lip and looked down at my plate.
We spent the rest of the breakfast in silence save for the clinking of forks to plates.

The town hall was this giant old building made of crumbling bricks with a flag out the front, right in the middle of the perfectly cut grass.
We drove down in our ugly brown family car that we got years ago. Mum wanted to get a silver car, just like every other car in the town but Dad wanted to be different, so he went out and brought home the ugliest and most non-Tamwood colour in the world and the car sale guy wouldn't take returns so Mum was stuck with it. She now called it the 'coffee coloured and vintage car' to the other ladies of Tamwood but me and Seth said it was the colour of dirt.
Mum pulled into the tiny ten space car park next to the town hall between the other privileges cars allowed a spot so close to the centre. That was one of the privileges of having a sick kid; we got one of the very scarce car parks to stupid town meetings because I couldn't walk that far with a tumour in my thymus making me out of breath.
We walked inside just like every month and every head turned to us.
The conversations died down and silence fell upon the hall. We moved slowly to find some seats, all eyes glued to me, all of them with that same sympathetic but relived look. They were glad it was me who had cancer, not them or their children or their husbands or wives. Just me, the girl famous in this town for dying.
Seth and Dad left Mum and me as families never sat together at town meetings and Mum dragged me over to the seats right in the middle where the respectable Big Nose Society ladies sat.
Once when I was at a meeting holding Seth's hand when I was about three. I asked my older brother what the ladies talked about all the time since they didn't stop talking.
"The Big Nose Society ladies only talk about three things; people in town, who's gonna win the next competition for best pie or best knitting or biggest bum (I didn't realize back then that he was joking about that competition. I thought the ladies actually stood there while people measured their backsides) and anything that inconveniences them the slightest bit."
"But why you call them Big Nose Soci-ty?" I asked him.
"Because those ladies had to go to extraordinary measures to grow their noses so they are big enough to go into other people's business."
The respectable ladies greeted both me and Mum with saccharine smiles, painted like clowns' smiles at the circus.
"Why hello, Heather, Mollie," Mrs Scowd said. I smiled and nodded along as if I were the most perfect daughter in the world.~Mrs Scowd was the sort of leader of the Big Nose Society, she was the one who organised all the meetings and looked down her big nose at everyone else.
"Good morning, Margaret," Mum said nudging me subtly and lightly as if she were scared she would make me break.~
"Good morning, Mrs Scowd," I said, mustering up as much cheer as I could. Why wasn't Seth forced to do this?~
"Mollie!" I heard someone say and I turned around, knowing exactly who owned that voice. Alyssa was stepping over the Big Nose Society ladies, through the small gap between there chubby legs and the seats in front of them. Her chocolate coloured hair, poking out from beneath her moss green beanie, was just longer than mine as she had shaved it all off with her Dad's razor when I had had one of the last rounds of chemo. That was just after we caught her Mum gossiping with Mrs Scowd on the phone about me not wearing a wig or hat to conceal the fact that I had no hair. They had said it was 'unlady-like'. So, Alyssa told me not to cry and ran upstairs where she proceeded to be 'unlady-like' with me. Her Mum had not been happy. Especially since her hair now did not cover her tree shaped birthmark on the back of her neck.
Alyssa pulled me into a hug and whispered ever so quietly in my ear.~
"The Big Noses are suffocating me! If I hear one more comment about the nice weather, I swear... Good Morning Mrs Southbottom!"~
Mrs Southbottom nodded at us and pushed her way right into the middle of the crowd. I caught Alyssa's Mum glaring at her daughter for not greeting the old lady perfectly.
"So, "Alyssa said, taking my arm and yanking me into my chair. "Any bubble-gum coming?" She winked.~
Since the Big Nose Society Ladies loved to hear the latest gossip about the dying kid in the town, Alyssa and I made up a code. Bubble-gum meant a hospital trip.~
"I'm going to get some bubble-gum tomorrow," I said and Alyssa looked sympathetic.~
"What kind?"~
Blueberry meant it was okay, grape meant I didn't know and cherry meant bad. We both agreed cherry flavour tasted of medicine.~
"Grape." Tomorrow they had to do some tests to work out how well the temporary pause button was working. Since I had feinted four times in the last week, I'd say things were not working as well as the doctors had hoped.
"Okay, okay, everyone?" Mrs Temesly tapped the microphone so it made a loud piercing noise. The Big Nose Society Ladies just talked louder. "Come on now, please allow me to have your attention for just a second..."
Mrs Temesly, the Mayors wife was a school teacher at the closest primary school. She had been mine and Alyssa's teacher in grade one, where she separated all us kids onto different tables according to which town we came from. All the perfect girls of Tamwood would sit at the best table and gossip the whole time and glare at the perfect girls of Michdom. That school year had been more like a shark tank than a primary school.
Mayor Temesly took the microphone from his wife and suddenly, the room was as quiet as it was going to be for the next half an hour. You could still hear a dull whisper and occasionally the loud gasps of the dramatic ladies as they reacted to the Mayors news. I watched Mrs Temesly as she took a seat, her oversized backside spilling out of the chair and her smile never faltering.
"Welcome to our monthly meeting." The Mayor's voice projected over the whispers. As he spoke, his funny curly moustache moved up and down. "Firstly; our annual Autumn Fair is on at the end of the month and we need volunteers to sign up at the door at the end of the meeting. Sign-up sheets for the little Miss Apple-bee, the pie making and pie eating contests and many others will also be at the door."
There were many excited gasps and everyone began to talk louder about the many contests they would enter.
Alyssa nudged me. "You should enter Miss Apple Bee this year."
I glared at her. "Yep, I will, when you fly to the moon in a poofy dress with big hair."~
"But you at least have some experience with winning, I never won, so you would be better than me." Alyssa grinned.~
"Right, because the time I won when I was four gave me sooo much experience."~
Like every other mother in Tamwood, Mum had entered me in every Little Miss competition she could since I was born. Finally, I had won because Mum had curled my incredibly long hair and dressed me up like a doll where I danced and smiled and didn't fall over. I think my tiny frame (cancer's fault) made me look cuter than the others which is why I won.~
The mayor cleared his voice again and the contest entering chats quietened.
"Also, Mrs Ranchfield's cat was successfully rescued from the cherry tree..."
The rest of the news was just the same. The cat was rescued from the cherry tree, another Big Nose Society meeting would be in two days and some old person passed on.
I wandered what they would say when I died. They rarely lost children, only old people died once in a while. But I bet they would be happy because the town would finally be rid of the imperfection.~

As soon as the Mayor said his lame trademark farewell, "I bid thee farewell, until I see thee again," the Bently triplets shot off their parents' laps and ran around the town centre pretending to be aeroplanes. Alyssa was second out of her seat, dragging me as far away from our parents as possible so she wouldn't be nagged at by her Mum again until she was found.~
"God, that was so boring!" Alyssa groaned as we sat on the waiting seats just opposite the signing sheets. Everyone would be staring at the people signing up, instead of us so it was the perfect place to be hidden.~
"We need to see each other again sooner, I haven't seen you since before my birthday." Sure, I could have seen her on my birthday, but if I went down to see my friend, I would have to put on the fake smile and talk to all the strangers who tried to guess why I had scares and short hair, and the people of the town who knew too much about the imperfection.~
"I know," Alyssa said.~
"So, can you come over tomorrow after I come back from the hospital?"~
I was ready for Alyssa to jump up and say yes, say she will be there as soon as I come home so we could spend as much time as possible together, but she didn't look sure.~
"I... Um, have to go to this thing tomorrow..." She said not looking me in the eyes.~
"So, the next day then?" She was not telling me something.~
Alyssa jumped up. "Um, I have to go, Mum's waiting and..." She was gone.~As she disappeared into the crowd, o eyed the cotton friendship bracelet she wore that matched the one on my own wrist. We had had them ever since we were five.
"What was that all about?" Seth asked, coming up behind me. He ruffled my hair and I slapped a hand away.
I shrugged and flopped back down into the couch.
"Hey, hey!" Seth squishing into the chair with me and putting his arm around my shoulders. "All she did was say she was busy, no need to get all sad." He looked over at all the ladies busy pushing and shoving to sign up for all of the competitions. "Are you going to sign up?"
"Me?" I asked incredulous. "What, am I going to do? Parade around the pavilion in a poofy dress? If you hadn't noticed, my hair is not big enough for me to win any competitions."
"There are others, what about the pie baking one?"
"Pfft, I can't cook!"
"Alright, the pie eating."
I gave him the look. We both knew the only pie Mum allowed me to have was the healthy kind she made herself with all organic food.
"Okay, fine, be a party pooper."
He grabbed me, throwing me up into his arms and carried me out into the sunshine where most of the families from the meeting were talking and laughing. I banged on Seth's shoulder but he didn't let me go, taking me all the way to Mum and Dad who were pretending to listen to one of the Big Nose Society Ladies. Dad looked relived at the distraction and proceeded to interrupt the lady, earning a scowl from her.
"We had better head home, Martha," he said although he did not look at me at all as he said that. His eyes flittered across everything except me.
"Seth, let her down!" Mum said shocked. "You might hurt her, you know she's fragile."
He flipped me back to the ground and I swayed, taking gasping breaths, while laughing. "I'm... Fine..." I said.
Because I was fine. I was not made of precious china like she thought, and Seth knew that.
The rest of Tamwood spilling out of the town hall moved, leaving a path for us to walk through, looking at me with sympathy.
I wish everyone was like Seth.