The Aftermath Of You

Chapter Nineteen

The sun was warm even with the slight chill in the breeze, though Toni was bundled up in a large black trench coat with a floppy black hat covering her face. As she neared the pavement, she stopped short and realised what she'd done. Turning around she limped back to the front door and took off her silly disguise, leaving it in a bundle for her return. With her scrawny shoulders back proudly she hobbled down the road, her skinny arms on display for all to see.

Opposite two woman were talking happily across their fence. One turned and gawped at Toni. "Do you know, I've lived here two years and I've never seen her once."

At least they could attempt to whisper, Toni thought indignantly. The other woman also peered at her, engrossed. "Look how pale she is! Like a ghost!"

Toni quickened her step (or quickened her hop), trying to put as much distance between her and her busybody neighbours.

Four doors down a little girl shouted to her sister. "Look, Martha, it's Anna!" It was their name for Toni, which she had deduced was short for Anorexia. Toni pasted on a brave face, and kept hopping. "Oh she's so skinny! Look, I can see all of the bones in her arm."

"No wonder she broke her ankle, she's like a twig," Martha said.

"You do realise that I can hear you?" Toni said. "And I'm not anorexic, I just have a very fast metabolism."

The little girls' lips started wobbling violently and soon they were crying their eyes out. Toni hopped onwards, determined to get as much distance from them as possible, in case the girls' parents tried to find the tyrant who made their little darlings cry.

On the other side of the street three blocks down, the tiny little man who was a World War II survivor sat in his wheelchair, gazing out at the road in interest, noting anything remarkable to tell his beloved wife that night at her hospital bedside. He took one look at Toni and burst into tears.

"Grandpa, Grandpa, are you ok?" a young woman cried, rushing out of the house. After seeing Toni the girl looked uncomfortable, "Come on, Gramps, it's alright." She pushed him back inside as fast as his wheels could carry him.

Toni hobbled as fast as she could to get to the convenience store. Pushing quickly to the hygiene aisle she stopped and threw every conceivable thing into her shopping basket which could be related to teeth. That's when they caught her eye. They stared in her direction, watching her every move. Their pouty lips, flashing eyes and tousled locks, all in shades of blonde, brunette, black, burgundy - in fact, most colours bar green. Long bouncy curls, straight locks and short spiky cuts. Toni propped herself up on her shopping trolley. She couldn't decide which of these women she wanted to look like. Black was out. She'd had black hair since the first day she'd entered the world -= with a head full of hair that would have made Cher seethe with jealousy..

'You were quite unique,' Granny Smith told her, when she was growing up.

'Unique?' Lulu had hollered in her brash way. 'What about unusual? What about unkempt or uncommon?' Everyone felt sorry for me. You had such a big head, like a lollipop, with such a big black woolly mop.'

Black was a depressing colour. Emo teenagers wore black. So did Goths, vampires and anaemic punks. Toni was sure that if Adolf Hitler had been the proud owner of long blond tresses he wouldn't have had such a big chip on his shoulder. Blond was the color of happiness, the external flame which symbolized internal joyand apparently blondes had more fun. Toni had to have it.

The box of bleach caught her off guard. The green-eyed woman stared into her soul. If only I looked like that, my life would be gorgeous, she thought. Toni stared at the pouting model for a few more seconds. Then, unable to resist, she snatched the dye off the shelf.

A recognizably shrill voice shattered the silence. "Is that you, Toni?"

Tucking the hair-colour under the outsized bottle of mouth gargle, she turned a pained smile on her mother. "Hello, Lulu."

"What have you been doing today? Did you go and see Baker's Buns?"

"I've been busy," Toni told her.

"What on earth are you doing wearing that ungodly hat?" Lulu wasn't religious but she felt it flavoured her language to use words like ungodly and god-fearing.

"It helps me to connect to my soul."

"Bollocks!" her mother boomed. "You look like a twit."

"I'm writing a biography," said Toni, trying to distract her. "I've decided that I'm going to sell it. The title will be, 'My Aching Love' by Toni Handcock."

"That's a ridiculous title," Lulu told her simply.

"What would you call it?"

"'I should get a job' by Toni Handcock."

"I've got a ruddy job!" Toni snarled in frustration. "I'm an author."

"Your father and I have been talking and we think that you volunteering to do tours is a good idea."

"Really?"

"We think you should volunteer for a month until you get a lot of customers and then you could start charging people. You could probably charge eighty dollars a person - these foreigners love throwing their money around."

"I'm not really interested in-"

"I might make you some business cards. What should we call it?"

"Don't even worry about it, Mother, it was just an idea."

Lulu snatched up a packet of razors and threw them into Toni's trolley. "Do you remember Wayne Kerr? You went to school with him ... I saw him earlier on this morning. He was asking after you. He wanted me to give you this."

She scratched around in her purse and placed a note in Toni's hand. His phone number. Happily Toni tucked it into her pocket. He'd been a very cute boy, the most popular in her class. She could remember the last time she saw him – aged seven – he was already dating several girls at once.

"How's your foot?"

"It's good. Now do you want to read my ruddy book or not?"

"No, because then I'll have to pretend I like it. Granny Smith told me you've been drinking lots of sugary drinks to put on weight."

"How did she know that?"

"She got one of those Ouija boards, so she can get in touch with Granddad whenever she feels like it."

Toni's shoulders slumped as the realization set in. Now her granddad's spirit was knocking about, there was going to be even less privacy than before. "Well, I'd better get going. I've got a lot of stuff to do today."

Some of the nearby shoppers looked alarmed at Lulu's shrill laughter. "You - busy? That'd be the day. Make sure you ring Baker's Buns. I told them you'd be in to see them some time this week."

Exhaling noisily, Toni turned and hopped away.