Paper Princess Read online

  Kate spun around to face Tilly, her bright blonde hair sweeping across her shoulders. ‘My dad told me about your mum.’

  Tilly flinched. She had anticipated that people would be keen to talk about her antics in P.E, but not about her mother. That was too raw to be up for discussion.

  ‘It sucks, truly,’ Kate offered with kindness. ‘My mum died when I was six. Car wreck. I’ve got a step-monster now.’

  Tilly was speechless. She could only gape at Kate in astonishment.

  ‘I know, right?’ Kate shrugged. ‘But yeah, I wasn’t born a bitch. This messed up world turned me into one. No one else knows,’ she said, lowering her voice. ‘I’d like to keep it that way. So, yeah, if you ever want to talk or just have someone there when you curl up into a ball and cry so hard you’re worried you’ve broken all your insides, I’m not all bad, you know.’

  Tilly couldn’t speak.

  ‘I’m not suggesting we become best friends,’ Kate insisted. ‘You just don’t need to be alone, that’s all. Losing your mum is one hell of a kick in the teeth.’

  ‘I’ve not lost her yet.’ Tilly coughed as Sophie and Claire sauntered back, hot on the heels of Daniel West, who completely blanked Kate as he walked in.

  ‘Boys!’ Kate scoffed in annoyance.

  Registration was almost over when Miss Havishorn glanced up from behind her desk and looked towards the back of the room.

  ‘Matilda, can you hang back before your next class, please?’ Although it was delivered as a question, Tilly knew it was an order.

  ‘Duh duh duh!’ one of the boys at the front of the class remarked, which made those around him giggle.

  ‘Calm down,’ Miss Havishorn snapped. The bell tolled and everyone was able to leave, except for Tilly who had to shamefully slink to the front of the room.

  ‘I believe that this is yours.’ Miss Havishorn opened up a drawer and retrieved Tilly’s school planner, which was significantly more dog-eared than it had been at the start of term.

  ‘Thanks,’ Tilly mumbled as she accepted it.

  ‘I was not pleased to hear about yesterday’s display, Matilda,’ Miss Havishorn explained, pushing her glasses up her nose.

  ‘About that –’

  ‘But you don’t need to worry about the detention. I spoke to Miss Grey.’

  The P.E. teacher?

  ‘What do you mean?’ Tilly asked.

  ‘There’s no detention,’ Miss Havishorn clarified. ‘I explained to Miss Grey about your … situation.’

  Tilly blinked.

  ‘What situation?’

  Miss Havishorn sighed and clamped her plump hands together.

  ‘Matilda, I know what’s happening with your mother. Your father contacted the school.’

  Tilly lowered her head in shame. What was happening at home was separate to her life at school and now the two were bleeding together. Did everyone think that she couldn’t cope? That she needed to grow up?

  ‘You’re going through a tough time,’ Miss Havishorn continued. ‘It’s only natural that you’ll feel angry and upset. If you feel it would benefit you to visit the school counsellor then I can arrange that, Matilda, just –’

  ‘Tilly.’ She boldly interrupted her teacher mid-sentence.

  ‘Sorry?’ Miss Havishorn frowned.

  ‘My name is Tilly. I don’t like to be called Matilda.’

  Miss Havishorn lifted her eyebrows in surprise.

  ‘Very well, Tilly.’ She said the name as though it were an ill fit. ‘If you would like to see the counsellor, let me know.’

  ‘Is that it? Can I go now?’ Tilly asked as she looked towards the door.

  ‘Yes,’ Miss Havishorn nodded. ‘But Matil – Tilly, make sure you don’t lose yourself. These are formative years. I’d hate to see this tragedy shape you in a negative way.’

  ‘I hardly see how it could shape me positively,’ Tilly snapped as she turned and strode out the door. As she was absorbed into the flow of students hurrying down corridors and hallways, she didn’t allow herself to be pushed and shoved like a feather caught in an updraft. Tilly locked her jaw and used her elbows to force her own path through the sea of jumpers.

  Tale as Old as Time

  Rain whipped against Tilly’s bedroom window as she sat on her bunk bed, her head down in concentration. Carefully, she manoeuvred the scissors through the piece of coloured paper she’d sneakily brought home from school.

  ‘I don’t care!’ Monica’s angry words travelled across the landing, slightly muffled by Tilly’s closed bedroom door. ‘I’m getting a ride with Andrew. It’s not my problem how you get there!’

  Doors were slammed. Heavy footsteps stomped across the landing in the direction of Tilly’s room.

  ‘Can you believe her?’ Monica asked as she swung the door open.

  Tilly ceased cutting and glanced up at her sister. Monica’s cheeks were flushed. Her wet hair fell down her back and was starting to curl, as it always did when it was left to dry naturally. Any kinks would be ironed out later with expert precision.

  ‘She’s mad because I’m not going with her to the ice rink.’ Monica was tapping her left foot, one hand draped against her waist.

  ‘You’re going with Andrew,’ Tilly said.

  ‘You heard?’

  ‘The whole street heard.’

  ‘Yeah, well,’ Monica shrugged. ‘Andrew is in college and has a car. Of course I’m going to go with him instead of riding the bus with Maria.’

  ‘I heard that!’ a muffled voice snapped from behind a distant door.

  ‘Does Mum know?’ Tilly asked innocently.

  ‘Does Mum know what?’

  ‘That you’re getting a lift with a college boy.’

  The red shade of Monica’s cheeks darkened.

  ‘Squirt, do yourself a favour and stop being a goody two-shoes, OK? Mum doesn’t know. And it’s going to stay that way.’

  ‘She probably heard you shouting.’

  ‘Please, lately she sleeps like the dead.’

  As Tilly tensed, the scissors she’d been holding slid from her fingers and dropped to the floor.

  ‘Oh, crap, I’m sorry.’ Monica slapped a hand against her temple and came to sit beside Tilly. ‘I’m not … I’m just not thinking.’ She looped an arm around Tilly’s shoulders and pulled her close. ‘I’m on my period,’ Monica added quietly.

  ‘It’s OK.’

  Their peaceful moment was rudely interrupted as Tilly’s bedroom door was pushed open with such force that it smacked against the wall, causing it to shudder.

  ‘You’re giving me a lift!’ Maria strode over to the bunk and glowered at her sisters. She looked comical with only half of her hair straightened. ‘We always go together, Monica! I don’t care how fit this Andrew is!’

  ‘Do you have your period too?’ Tilly wondered. They were both being overly irrational.

  ‘Yes!’ both girls snapped in unison.

  ‘It’s some weird thing, women who live together end up in sync,’ Monica explained with a roll of her eyes.

  ‘I’m going to the rink with you,’ Maria declared.

  ‘Fine.’ Monica threw up her hands in defeat and gracefully departed the lower bunk.

  ‘Good.’ Maria hadn’t expected such an easy victory. The anger which simmered within her was suddenly without an outlet.

  ‘Come on, I need you to do my hair.’ Monica was halfway out of the room, but Maria remained where she was.

  ‘Squirt, what are you doing tonight?’

  Tilly had been reaching for her scissors. She froze, hand extended.

  ‘Me?’ she asked.

  ‘Yeah, you!’ Maria confirmed.

  ‘You’re not suggesting she comes with us, are you?’ Monica asked from the doorway.

  ‘Well …’ Maria twirled a strand of hair around her finger. ‘I was twelve when you first took me to the disco at the rink. Maybe she should come with us.’

  Monica pursed her lips together as she considered it.


  ‘What do you think, squirt? You want to come?’

  Tilly was stunned. Her sisters had never thought to include her in their plans before. A part of her fluttered with excitement at the prospect of going to the ice rink for the weekly disco. She’d heard stories of what went on there. Hearts were won and broken in the space of one song.

  She looked down at the coloured paper she’d carefully been cutting. She wasn’t ready to step into her sisters’ world yet. Somehow she sensed that once she began donning eyeliner and wearing her hair poker straight there would be no going back, no reclaiming the person she’d once been.

  ‘I’ve actually got plans,’ she told them. ‘But thanks for asking.’

  ‘So, next time?’ Maria glanced towards Maria, who was already heading back towards their bedroom.

  ‘Yeah,’ Tilly smiled. ‘Next time.’

  Maria started walking after her older sister, but she paused as she reached the landing and turned around.

  ‘What plans do you have tonight?’

  ‘I’m doing something with Mum.’

  ‘Oh,’ Maria didn’t seem to know how to take it. She nodded then walked off.

  ‘Yeah.’ Tilly smiled to herself as she resumed cutting out shapes. ‘I’ve got plans with my mum.’

  It was seven o’clock and Tilly had been shut up in her bedroom all day, only emerging to have dinner. Her hands felt stiff from having held the scissors for so long but she was finally happy with the finished product.

  ‘You are not going out like that!’ her dad’s appalled voice carried from the hallway downstairs.

  ‘Dad, everyone dresses like this!’ Monica declared. Tilly crept out of her room and sat on the landing, out of sight from her family gathered below. She used to love sneakily watching people. She found it strangely comforting – as if witnessing drama unfold made her somehow a part of it.

  Both Monica and Maria were wearing black miniskirts and tights which seemed to have been deliberately slashed to ribbons.

  ‘You’re a state!’ Clive insisted, gesturing at their legs. ‘You look like vagabonds.’

  ‘One, I don’t know what this is.’ Monica was listing her points on her fingers, showing off freshly-painted silver nails. ‘Two, we look hot!’

  This made Maria giggle.

  ‘I can’t let you go out like that!’ Clive declared, though he gave an exasperated sigh which signalled imminent defeat.

  ‘It’s too late anyway, we’ve got to go else we’ll miss the bus.’ Monica was opening the front door.

  ‘Yes, the bus,’ Maria giggled. Clearly their father wasn’t privy to their plans, which involved getting in cars with college boys.

  ‘Be home by eleven!’ Clive leaned out of the door and shouted. ‘I mean it! Dammit.’ He thrust his hands into his trouser pockets and lowered his head.

  ‘Dad?’ Tilly stood up and approached the top of the staircase.

  ‘What is it?’ Her dad lifted his gaze to look at her. He was still wearing his work clothes which were stained and faded beyond recognition.

  ‘Is Mum still sleeping?’

  ‘Probably,’ Clive sighed.

  ‘Can you wake her up?’

  ‘What? Tilly, no.’ He removed a hand from his pocket to wave at his daughter. ‘You know we need to let her rest.’

  ‘But I’ve made her a surprise.’

  ‘Tilly, it can wait until tomorrow.’

  ‘No, it can’t.’

  Clive pushed a hand through his thinning hair. ‘Why can’t it wait?’ he asked, managing to keep his voice level.

  ‘Because tomorrow isn’t an option anymore,’ Tilly said. ‘Tomorrow Mum might be gone. Tomorrow I might go to the ice rink with Monica and Maria and a part of me will be gone too.’

  This made her father nod thoughtfully.

  ‘They asked you to go?’ He peered up at her with sad eyes.

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘And you said no?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘Good girl,’ he complimented, still ruffling a hand through his hair. ‘You’re not going to be twelve forever, are you?’

  ‘Nope,’ Tilly replied with certainty.

  ‘Maybe there’s something to be said for not being in a hurry to grow up,’ her father said as he began to walk up the stairs. ‘All your sisters want to do is cover their faces in make-up and chase boys. I don’t know what I’ll do with them when –’ He stopped himself. ‘Let’s see if your mum is awake.’

  ‘OK.’

  Tilly watched her father quietly approach his bedroom door and ease it open. As he did so, he released the tainted, built-up air. It spilled out on to the landing, pungent with medicinal undertones. Tilly recoiled as she inhaled it. She loathed the smell. It seemed to cling to everything her mother touched, like she was bringing a part of the hospital home with her.

  It was a smell Tilly recognised from when she’d gone to visit her grandmother just before she’d died. It was a smell she’d forever associate with death and decay.

  ‘Ivy,’ Clive timidly called, and in the darkness something stirred. ‘Hey, baby.’ He let the air envelope him as he went inside but Tilly remained on the landing. She no longer liked to go into her parents’ bedroom. The bedside table was now littered with pill bottles and tissues instead of books and perfume. The curtains were always drawn together, plunging the room into an eternal night time. The putrid smell of sickness tried to creep into Tilly’s bones each time she was forced to breathe it in.

  A few minutes later, Tilly’s mother emerged, bleary-eyed from the darkness, her husband supporting her as she took tentative, pained steps. She was a skeleton underneath the robe she’d hastily pulled on. She looked worn out, like a toy that had been played with too many times.

  But when she saw her daughter she smiled, and her smile still warmed her faded features.

  ‘Hi, sweetheart. Your dad says you’ve made me a surprise.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Tilly replied. She reached for her mother’s hand and held it tightly within her own, and slowly guided her across the small landing. ‘I’ve been working on it all day,’ Tilly explained.

  ‘I can’t wait to see it.’

  ‘I’ll be right downstairs if you need me,’ Clive whispered to his wife before kissing her cheek and descending towards the hallway.

  ‘Mum.’ Tilly paused at her bedroom door. ‘You know how everyone is always telling me I have to grow up?’

  ‘Yes, sweetheart.’

  ‘And I get that I need to,’ Tilly nodded, ‘but sometimes all I want to do is live inside all my fairy tales because it’s safer there. There’s no cancer, only happily ever afters.’

  ‘It’s a nice thought, Tilly.’

  ‘But I was thinking that maybe, just for tonight, we could both escape, just for a little while – like we used to do when I was little.’

  ‘I remember,’ Ivy smiled.

  ‘We’d curl up and watch movies. We’d watch films about princesses and brave explorers. Mum, you showed me a world where I never had to be scared or alone.’

  Ivy swallowed as a solitary tear slid down her pale cheek.

  ‘And I want to take you there with me, just for tonight.’ Tilly pushed open her bedroom door and her mother gasped.

  Hundreds of paper streamers hung across the ceiling and draped around the bed, transforming the room so it looked like a grotto. Tilly had painstakingly cut out dolls, snowflakes, butterflies – anything she could think of. And now the paper streamers had managed to make her room look like it was magic.

  ‘Oh, Tilly.’ Ivy stepped inside, bending to avoid some of the low hanging streamers. A hand fluttered up to her throat. ‘It’s … it’s beautiful.’

  ‘I was thinking we could watch some of our old movies.’ Tilly pointed towards her lower bunk. Gone were the stuffed toys, who were now up in the tower. In their place were all her pillows, as well as both duvets. She’d created a snug nest which her mother could comfortably lie in.

  Ivy wiped at her eyes. ‘That w
ould be lovely.’

  Slowly and carefully, she positioned herself so she was half sitting, half lying down. Tilly turned on the television and grabbed the remote before shuffling in beside her mother. Although she smelt medicinal, Tilly could still make out the faint hint of vanilla which stubbornly clung to her mother’s clothes. Tilly smiled as she smelt the sweetness; it reminded her that somewhere beneath the sickness her mother was still there.

  ‘So what are we watching?’ Ivy asked.

  ‘Your favourites,’ Tilly told her with a smile. ‘Starting with Beauty and the Beast.’

  ‘Ah yes.’ Ivy nuzzled contentedly against her daughter. ‘That was always one of my favourites.’

  Tilly was smiling so much that her cheeks were beginning to ache, but she didn’t care. This was all she’d ever wanted – to step into a fairy tale with her mother by her side.

  ‘What time do you call this?’

  A door slammed downstairs and Tilly was abruptly woken up. Rubbing her eyes, she sat up and for a moment was confused that she was on her bottom bunk. Then she spotted her mother sleeping soundly beside her and it all came flooding back. The bedroom light was still on, illuminating the streamers in all their glory. On the television, the DVD screensaver had come on. At some point during their third movie both Tilly and her mother had fallen asleep.

  ‘Dad, relax, it’s only half eleven!’ Monica shouted.

  ‘What time did I tell you to be home?’ Clive asked, his voice as sharp and direct as a steel blade.

  ‘Urgh!’ Monica exclaimed. Footsteps thundered up the stairs and Tilly turned towards her mother.

  ‘Mum, do you want to stay here or go back to bed?’

  Ivy’s eyes remained closed.

  ‘Mum?’ Tilly reached for her and nudged her shoulder.

  ‘Mum?’ Tilly was almost shouting now, nudging her mother so forcefully that she’d surely awaken. But Ivy’s eyes remained tightly shut.

  ‘Mum!’ Tilly was screaming, the sound erupting out of her like a volcano. Seconds later, her bedroom door was thrown open causing her paper streamers to shudder in the sudden wind.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Clive demanded, his face devoid of colour.