Her words caused an initial flush of embarrassment, swiftly followed by a susurration of indignation as the shame of being caught out impacted the room. Two people even walked out, causing the proprietor to shake her head and roll her eyes.
When she came over to the table to clear it she had the grace to say, ‘Sorry ladies, welcome to village life. Put it this way, you’re the most exciting thing that’s happened around here in a long time.’ She nodded at Brodie. ‘Oh and your cake is on the house. I can’t apologise for the customers, but I can let you know that we aren’t all suffering from small minds.’
Elaine protested, more than willing to pay for what they’d had, but the woman waved her away, insistent that they accept her gesture.
It was a shame that her bonhomie didn’t redeem the rest of the village populace. Their stares and whispers continued as Elaine and Brodie made their way along the green and onto the road that led towards the cottages. Elaine had to confess to a sneaking admiration for Brodie’s ability to speak out and stand up for herself; it wasn’t something she would have had the confidence to do at the age of fifteen. Even now she would have been more likely to just quietly slip away nursing her mortification. The thought of her inadequacy shamed her.
Despite her bravado, the experience in the cafe seemed to leave Brodie subdued. A state of affairs that ruffled Elaine’s sensibilities and brought out her propensity to mend things.
‘How about we shake the country dirt off tomorrow and go into town?’ she suggested, hoping that the offer of a change of scene would brighten the girl’s morose mood. The black clothes and the bleak countenance were starting to become unnerving.
Brodie gave a sullen shrug, ‘S’pose.’ She paused to kick at a stone that was wedged in the sun-baked earth.
Elaine paused too, and watched as the girl used the sole of her trainer to work the stone loose and liberate it from the mud. Brodie worried at it, like a dentist determined to pull a recalcitrant tooth. ‘You can’t let people get to you like this. What they think doesn’t matter.’ Elaine said, aware of the ineptitude of her wisdom. Who was she trying to kid? She had grown up on a diet of ‘What will people think Elaine?’ and would no doubt spend the rest of her years trying to take the advice she had just given to Brodie.
Brodie paused in her labours and regarded the stubborn stone, then she turned to Elaine. ‘But you do, you worry,’ she said, pointing to the printed muslin scarf that adorned Elaine’s throat.
Instantly Elaine’s hand moved to touch the fabric, the scar beneath radiating a fire that flushed her cheeks and made her grit her jaw. ‘That’s different.’
Brodie tilted her head to one side and stared at the scarf as if looking straight through it to what lay beneath. ‘How? How is it different? It isn’t only the things people can see that make them judge you.’
Elaine felt herself bristle, her indignation fed by long-held defences. ‘I just don’t enjoy people staring at me, that’s all.’
‘Neither do I. But they do anyway.’ Brodie parted her hands to illustrate the uniform of black, which she routinely wore. ‘I used to think that if I dressed like this – boring, black and baggy – that people wouldn’t see me. I’d just blend in, be invisible. But it doesn’t work like that. It makes them notice you. I’m a hoodie, I scare people. If you want to hide something, you have to put it in plain sight. If you’re not bothered by it, other people won’t be either.’
Elaine had to stifle an indignant laugh, ‘When did you get to be so wise, kiddo?’
Brodie shrugged again. ‘When I realised that all these shenanigans are a bit fucking pointless.’
Elaine raised her eyebrows, ‘Nice language,’ she said censoriously.
‘Well, sorry but it’s true.’ Brodie raised a hand and pointed a grubby finger at Elaine’s neck. ‘You wear that scarf thinking that people won’t notice your scar, but the fact that you keep touching the bloody thing every two seconds gives it away. We’re all wondering what’s underneath.’
‘Do I?’ Elaine asked. Her hand reached up again as if it had received a curtain call.
‘All the bloody time! Look at you.’
Suddenly self-conscious, Elaine rammed her hands into her pockets. The urge to check the scarf was immense.
This girl was right. Elaine knew it, she had always known it, but didn’t know how else to be. ‘So why do you keep dressing like that if you know why you’re doing it and it doesn’t work?’ she said in a desperate attempt to flip the attention elsewhere.
Brodie mirrored her by putting her own hands in her baggy pockets. ‘Because my mum’s on benefits and we can’t afford new ones.’ she said bluntly.
‘Right, then we’ll go into town tomorrow and I’ll buy you a whole new wardrobe.’ Elaine slapped the gauntlet down, challenging the girl to beat her and assuming that age would trump gumption. It didn’t work.
Brodie rolled her eyes. ‘Nice one, lovely. That’ll work. Perhaps we can buy a few new scarves while we’re at it.’
Elaine folded her arms, ‘Oh, I see, like that is it?’ She leaned her weight on one hip and regarded Brodie with a mixture of amusement, affront and a tiny bit of admiration.
Brodie’s thin face broke into a sly smirk. ‘Yep. It is,’ she said. Her tongue was literally in her cheek. ‘Anyway, I like being scary. What’s your excuse?’
Elaine sighed, her indignation deflating like a tired balloon. ‘I’m a creature of habit, warts and all. Come on, Miriam will be wondering where you are and I’ve got things to do.’
They walked on, Brodie skipping ahead and kicking at loose stones. She danced around like a drunken football fan, reeling and rolling as she played in the dirt. Elaine envied her the freedom and her youth. Sometimes Elaine felt that she had been born old, like Benjamin Button, except she didn’t get to do the getting younger thing.
At Miriam’s gate they paused and Brodie turned to Elaine, ‘Are you really going to buy me something tomorrow?’ she asked with a sly smile, ‘Only there’s a really nice hoodie in the Animal shop. They do scarves too.’ she added, her tone turning hopeful.
Elaine laughed and slowly shook her head from side to side, a look of wry amusement on her face. ‘We’ll see, you cheeky little mare’.
Brodie beamed at her, and like lightning planted a feathery kiss on her cheek before vaulting over the gate and disappearing into the cottage.
Elaine stared after her for a moment. The infinitesimal weight of the kiss tingled on her cheek like the sting of a tiny, invisible tattoo. She reached up and touched the place where it sat and realised that she was smiling.
*
Alone in the cottage, all thoughts of the tasks Elaine had in mind disintegrated. Burned by unimportance, they fluttered away like ashes on the wind and she was left wondering what to do with herself. Brodie’s observations had made her brave and she took the decision to go upstairs and establish what all the fuss was about.
In front of a black pocked mirror in the bathroom she unwound the scarf and looked, for the first time in a long time, at the ragged scar that punctuated her skin like a Rubicon of angry lava. It ran from the left side of her neck along her collarbone and terminated at the top of her left breast. It was her brand, the mark that divided her from the concept of normal and set her apart from others. Jean had hated it and had forced the habit of keeping it covered. When she’d been a child it had been polo neck sweaters and stiff lace collars and she’d had the constant sense that she was being slowly suffocated. Her face twisted with anguish at the memory and she reached once more for her scarf. Concluding that she was better off with the devil she knew, she carefully wound the fabric around her neck and patted it into place. The motion dislodged a few grains of Jean, which had collected in the folds of fabric. They