Excerpt
If We Were Stars
Eule Grey © 2024
All Rights Reserved
Chapter One
Elephants
Ten footsteps to the left, ten footsteps to the right.
I’m ten years old, pacing the corridor outside the headteacher’s office, wearing one shoe, reeking of fear. It’s my birthday. My school shirt is torn. Voices bombard my head, but they’re not new.
How dare they?
I hate them.
Unfair!
And quieter echoes:
I hate me.
Stupid Kurt.
It’s weird how I can never hear my own voice. If it’s present, I don’t recognise it. Mum calls the voices my temper as if I have any control over them. Try to calm down, Kurt. Sometimes I can, and sometimes I can’t. She doesn’t understand why I get into so much trouble, and nor do I. I’ve tried to explain the best way I can. Htyr hur eer aaaaa. Kkk. Bl. It makes sense to me, but Mum gets cross. Speak properly!
Ten footsteps left.
Ten to the right.
One wrong move will cause my gasket to blow, just like Dad’s car.
Miss Smith doesn’t believe I’m sorry, not anymore. I hadn’t meant to rip the posters off the wall or call the dinner lady a fucker. If only Michael would stop chanting my name over and over, Kurt O’Hara, Kurt O’Hara, Kurt O’Hara, until the scared thing inside me blows a gasket. Bang!
Ten footsteps left.
Ten to the right.
Hearing my name chanted doesn’t bother me; the spite lurking behind Michael’s voice does. Those mean kids probably know all the answers. Otherwise, why would they wind me up? Last year hair-pulling, and now this.
I’m sorry about the posters, the dinner lady, and most of all about the badness. Maybe I should add an apology to my name. Kurt Sorry O’Hara. It would save a lot of time and energy.
Stupid Kurt.
Mum says the others don’t hate me. She’s wrong. I’m not sure why they hate me though. Why? What have I done? Worrying about what makes me unlikeable stops me from sleeping, even at weekends. I can’t enjoy my books and numbers like I used to. Why, why until I can’t escape, and then I blow a gasket again. Worse, the mean kids know about the scared thing inside me.
Ten left.
Ten right.
Repeat.
Repeat.
Today has been the ultimate shitstorm, worse than last year when Miss Smith and Mr Rogers rugby-tackled me. I was confused then, and I still am. How could being squashed achieve anything good? It made the scared thing inside desperate because it was threatened. Ten to the left and ten to the right didn’t calm me down. Now, I can’t be inside little rooms or lifts, and stairwells aren’t so good either.
Miss Smith is mean. Last week, she made me sit facing the wall like I was nothing. She pressed her pen too hard because the sound against the paper was as scratchy and loud as Dad when he crashes the kitchen pots and pans. I almost asked Miss Smith if she’d like me to show her how to hold a pen correctly. It hurts your hand, but Mr Wilson says it’s necessary if I want to write like the other kids.
After a while, Miss Smith left me alone, facing the wall. “Think about what you’ve done!”
I tried to think but grew bored and scared, so I read through a file with my name on the front. I didn’t mean to, honest. She left it on the desk, and I couldn’t help it. Unfortunately, Kurt O’Hara displays signs of autism, with little empathy for his peers. Now, the file’s stuck inside my head. I don’t know what to do about it. What can I do?
Then I went ahead and read a booklet inside my file, too, which said autistic children don’t understand love.
I can’t love. I was so ashamed I cried in Miss Smith’s office, with birds shrieking outside and the ring of the dinner bell inside my head. When I asked Mum what empathise meant, she cried too. Nothing good came of Miss Smith and her stupid report. Maybe it’ll be stuck inside my head forever, mushed up with the brain glue, buzzing to be free.
Can’t love. No empathy.
Can’t love. No empathy.
Htyr hur eer aaaaa. Kkk. Bl
Maybe, my tenth birthday will be bad enough to make Miss Smith call Mum from work. Mum’ll be sad-cross again, and I won’t get any birthday cake. It’s hidden in the treats cupboard and is the best thing ever.
Ten left.
Ten right.
Repeat.
Repeat.
Repeat again because of the birthday cake.
Repeat again because of Mum.
Maybe I haven’t been naughty. Everything’s mushed inside my head. I’m not sure.
Eventually, I sit in my usual place on the bench outside Miss Smith’s office, right arm alongside the wall. Mum jokingly says my name should be inscribed on the seat. Kurt O’Hara’s place. I wish my mum were here. She doesn’t understand, but at least she believes me.
I remove my remaining shoe, draw my legs into my body, and cover my ears to block out the faraway footsteps, memories of my crimes, and the dinner bell. Better. Much better. The dull quiet is nice. It’s not enough. A big black hole opens inside my head, more painful than pinches and punches.
Stupid Kurt. Scared and bad, scared and bad, scared and bad.
It eats me up. I’m crushed, overpowered by the facts of my crime, faraway footsteps, banging doors, an airplane outside, Mum’s disappointed face, my alien birthday cake, and a long dark tunnel.
The crushing is bad, really bad. I’d do anything to stop it, but it’s inside, so I can’t. I’m scared about what will happen when Miss Smith opens her door, and I have to go inside the room where she keeps the file. Her room is pure bad luck. I’ll try to explain about Michael htyr hur eer aaaaa. Kkk. Bl.
Stop.
Just stop.
Stupid Kurt.
If I could open the window, maybe I’d jump even though Miss Smith’s office is on the third floor. Maybe the air and the sky would stop the crushing, the badness, and the too much. Enough is enough. Maybe I would.
I’m opening the window when a kid appears from a room at the end of the corridor and stomps across to where I’m sitting. I think it’s a girl. How am I supposed to know which is which? It’s not like anyone wears a badge, I’m a boy! I’m a girl! Girls don’t have to say horrible stuff about their mothers, but boys do. Girls don’t let me stand with them at break times, nor do the boys. I don’t like girls or boys.
I don’t look at her. She’s white, and I’m brown. Mum’s brown and my dad’s white. I ignore her, and she ignores me. It’s best for us both. She moves too close for comfort, drawing up her legs despite wearing shoes. Then she covers her ears with her hands just like me.
Ten taps.
Ten taps.
I’ve never seen anyone else cover their ears or tap like I do. Dad says normal kids don’t do either. I want to ask the girl—I think she’s a girl, but I’ve been wrong before—if she’s trying to block the crushing, like I am.
The girl’s arms are covered with drawings of little elephants with colourful trunks. The drawings are good! I want to look closer but am too scared. Stupid Kurt.
She scrutinises my scabby knees, and I hers. My ears are buzzing with too many voices wanting my attention. It’s weird how a new echo has appeared at the periphery. Maybe it comes from the girl’s head. It could be she’s as exhausted and confused as me. I want to take her hand and tell her I understand how bad the crushing can be. I wish I could make her feel better. Her hurt hurts me.
Ten taps.
The girl copies me.
Ten mutual taps.
Ten mutual taps.
The girl speaks in a loud, high voice, trying ever so hard to say what she wants before she messes up. “Where’s your other shoe? I like your elephant print socks. Do you want to see mine? Yours are grey, and mine are green. Gr—we’re both gr. Grey and green. See?”
Because I’m tired, almost fainting, I don’t answer right away. The scared thing inside me pipes up.
What should I say?
What would be the correct answer?
Where even is my shoe?
See her what?
This is why I never make any friends. Even when kids are nice to me, I mess it up—stupid Kurt.
The girl doesn’t mind my lack of an answer. She picks up my remaining shoe by the shoelace and dangles it. “Or maybe you never had a pair in the first place. Stupendous! Why. Didn’t. I. Think. Of. Doing. This? One shoe is excellent. It is an attack on the norm. I hate the hierarchy. I will resist.”
She speaks like a robot. I’m not sure, but I think she’s concentrating very hard on each word because she wants to pick the right ones.
We tap together.
Ten taps.
Ten taps.
She does something so cool I relax my hands and place my feet back on the ground.
The girl removes one of her shoes and carefully hides it beneath the bench. “I’m with you, comrade. Solidarity. Fight the masses and walk alone.” She meets my eyes and then gently bumps my fist with hers. “What’s your name? If we’re going to start the revolution, I need to know who you are.” She produces a tiny notepad from her pocket, covered with baby elephants and giraffes.
It’s the second coolest thing I’ve ever seen. “Kurt O’Hara. What’s yours? Will you draw me a baby elephant? Did you know there are ten elephants at Whipsnade Zoo? They belong in the wild, not locked away. Seeing them in cages makes me cry. One time a hippo looked right at me and asked for help. My parents said no, it’s not possible, but I tell you, I heard it speak.”
The girl draws ten elephants on my arms with a tickly pen I’ll remember forever. “I believe you, comrade. I believe you. We can release the elephants into the wild if we work together to save the planet. My name is Beast.” She glares at me as if angry, yet I know it’s not anger but worry, anxiety, and desperation blasting from her eyes. “I’ve inked your skin. You know what it means?”
I shake my head, hoping it means Beast wants me to like her as much as I want her to like me.
She draws a line. “My ink will never fade. Our partnership is for life.”
I write my name and fall in love. “I’m delighted to meet you. Will you draw me more elephants? If we’re going to save the species, we need to be bold.”
I tell Beast my secrets and invite her to share my birthday cake. She tells me Miss Smith has a file about her, too—with exactly the same booklet inside. ‘No empathy. Can’t love’. We move on to other matters, such as gravity and the depth of the oceans.
Beast communicates with aliens. She illustrates how by placing her jumper over our heads and then flashing a torch using Morse code. Three short/three long/three short flashes of light. “Always at midnight. I lean out of my bedroom window and aim my torch at the ledge. They always answer. Mum doesn’t believe me. I’m going to design an alphabet using flashes and my cryptography book.”
I understand with deep, intense clarity that I’ll love her forever. “I do. I believe you.”
Miss Smith opens her door and stares at Beast and me, holding hands, all our elephants forming a herd and the universe finally opening up.
Beast grips my hand as tightly as Grandma. “Before you ask what happened, Miss, it was like this. Htyr hur eer aaaaa. Kkk. Bl. Kurt didn’t mean to say fucker. It was self-defence due to extraneous circumstances. My mum says PDA is something we can’t control, so there.” She glares like a bull, but her hands tremble. “Do you understand PDA, Miss Smith? It’s when your body says no, no, no to something it thinks is a threat. Even when it’s not really. If you told me there’s an elephant in the yard and I had to go right now and see it, I’d refuse. Because you said I had to.”
I’m not brave enough to speak. My head is too full. Along with my crime, faraway footsteps, banging doors, an airplane outside, worry about Mum’s disappointed face, my alien birthday cake, and a long dark future tunnel ahead, something amazing happens—Beast’s echo grows louder until it becomes a voice.
I take the voice as proof—Beast, and I will be lifelong comrades, just as she says. “It’s the same for me, Miss Smith. Htyr hur eer aaaaa. Kkk. Bl.”
I never knew a teacher could laugh so loudly. “Oookaaaay. Best thing I’ve heard all year. You two will be the death of me.”
“Because we don’t do empathy, you can’t tell us off,” Beast says smugly. “Haven’t you read your own files about autistic kids?”
We’re moved into the same class and allowed to sit together. On the walk home from school, my mum and Beast’s mum talk. Beast is allowed to come for tea. My tenth birthday is the best day of my life.
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