07 . Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others

I’d been into Platt Hall before. We went on school trips there because it was close to school so you didn’t have to pay for a minibus to get there, could just get on a bus, and it was free to get in too I think which was good for some people. Once you got there of course there wasn’t that much to look at, a few glass cases with shop dummies dressed in what looked like jumble sale clothes, with labels saying things like ‘Psychedelic trouser suit by Zandra Rhodes. Nylon. London, 1978’, or ‘Horrible shoes by Ossie Clarke. Plastic. London, 1967.’ We didn’t have a clue who they were but we had to listen to a woman from the Hall drone on about what people used to wear and how great it was in the 1960s and then we’d get to go outside and eat our packed lunch in the sun.

The exhibitions that they don’t change are the best bit. You go into a dark room (I think it’s to preserve the fabric) with proper old wooden cabinets and inside each one is lit up so you can see all the detail on the old clothes in there. They have all these beautiful old party dresses that make you wish you lived back then so you could have worn them. I said that to my mum when she took me ages ago and she said the reason they’re still good enough to display is that they were hardly worn and that the clothes that people like us would have worn haven’t survived because we would only have one set of clothes that we dabbed with vinegar and would have been bought second hand in the first place. I prefer to think of myself as the sort of person who would have worn those silk bodices though and I decided then that I’d wear one some day.

My favourite section was the underwear, and I think it was mum’s too. We spent ages staring at the hundreds of hooks and buttons and imagining how long it would take to get dressed in the morning, how long to sew them all on by hand even. They had some of the boxes they came in and with the low lights and no one else around and imagining the ladies taking hours being dressed and going to balls and fanning themselves it was fun. I think that must have been before Mum went funny, when we used to do things together.

There was a guard sat outside on one of those plastic stacking chairs as we walked up to the doors. He looked like a cat in the sun. He’d taken his jacket off and his white shirt was unbuttoned at the neck. He still looked too hot. His face, turned up to the sky, was pink and blotchy and sweat stains were creeping outwards from his armpits. We walked past without him noticing we were even there.

It was chilly as soon as we passed the patch of light that wedged open the heavy front doors. You could feel it come off the tiled floor and from the long corridors that stretched in front of us, in spite of the bright light streaming in the windows. The sounds of the summer day behind us seemed a lot further away, as if the still quiet in there could somehow cancel it out. We stopped and looked up at the curve of the staircase angling round to the upstairs gallery, the plain walls where once there must have been decoration and laughter and dancing and ladies in dresses that swished along but were now trapped like butterflies in heavy oak cases. As we started up the stone stairs that municipal smell hit our noses, a scent of damp and disinfectant, cheap paint layered on mouldings in an attempt to keep it all looking smart. It made me relaxed though; being with Jane made me relaxed. Far more than being with Em, who made me feel a lot of the time like I was her mum, or her big sister, sitting around like a lummox waiting for life to happen to her.

We moved further up, the hollow building amplifying even out cushioned soles so they swished and echoed loudly up to the ceiling far above. It got to the point where I could even hear the cloth of my trousers hiss as my thighs met and passed each other with each step. We were silenced ourselves by the stillness and the history in the place, our minds whizzing with what ifs and I wonder what happened here, once upon a times that it’s easy to assume were happy but I guess my mum wo
uld say weren’t necessarily so.

We passed through huge double doors and alongside towering windows through which we viewed summer scenes laid out like an Impressionist painting. They seemed so far away, silent, as if they had been placed on a screen for us to look at, but never be part of. Everything seemed hyper-coloured, a splash of vivid life against the stillness we inhabited in there. It would surprise me each time we approached a window and it burst into view again, families with picnics and footballs, dogs shitting and chasing each other, and us in an air lock, faint sounds leaking through to remind us it was really there.

Eventually we got to the end of the series of rooms and hit a small door with a ‘Private’ sign on it. Jane walked straight up to it and looked round at me.

“This is it,” she twinkled, and looked past me to check there really was no one around.

There’s something about ‘Private’ written anywhere that makes you want to go in. I was curious but nervous too.

“What if it’s alarmed?” I murmured, keeping my voice low even though there was quite obviously no one around. Jane shook her head.

“Then we run like fuck. Anyway I’ve been here before and it wasn’t alarmed then.”

She didn’t look very reassured by her own words though, turned the handle carefully and pushed the door a crack. No alarm sounded. Jane moved her body in line with the doorframe and slowly eased the door open, sliding her head to one side to look if there was anyone on the other side. Once she’d had a quick scan she swung it further and motioned for me to come through.

“Shut it behind you,” she instructed me, and I obeyed mutely.

Once I’d shut the door it took a while to be able to make anything out. The room we were in was dark with panelling, narrow and long, with the only light coming from a small window at the end. Even though it was grimy and smeared you could tell it was a nice day outside from the quality of the light seeping through. It didn’t get as far as where we were standing. Jane was swearing quietly and searching around by the door, I guessed for the light switch. She found it eventually and a single light bulb offered about half as much light as before. I stared round at piled up chairs and broken tables as she came over to where I stood.

“What’s this then?” I asked Jane, “And how do you know about it?”

“Can you see it?”

I was none the wiser, thought maybe she was going slightly mad.

“See what exactly? I can see loads of dust and some old furniture and a dirty light bulb?”

“Very funny.”

She stepped over to the wall, where a small dark frame enclosed an old painting that I hadn’t noticed amongst all the other clutter.

The colours were muddy, which was why I hadn’t noticed it before. It was a picture of a woman sitting reading a book, or so I thought it could be because her arms sort of disappeared into shards of broken colour in her lap that could be the edges of a book but might have been something else. Whatever it was she was looking down at it, and in the hoods of her eyes and set of her mouth she looked transfixed and calm and totally lost in whatever it was she saw there. You could see the room she was in was full of stuff, a bookshelf and a globe and the edge of another chair facing hers, that was empty, but made you think she might have enjoyed talking with whoever sat on it, knee to knee, comparing notes on whatever it was that consumed her at the time.

She was wearing a long skirt, but as I looked harder it didn’t look rich or ornate like a party dress, more like the bottom of a plain cotton nightdress with a sort of dressing gown jacket on top. I wondered whether her feet were bare but you couldn’t see them. Even though the picture was dark as a whole, the front of the skirt and her face, and the folds of her sleeves were illuminated by something like firelight.

“Isn’t she wonderful?”

I realised Jane had been watching me while I examined the painting. I nodded.

“How did you know she was here?”

“My mum had a boyfriend who did security here. Jacked it in cos the pay’s crap but he tried to impress my mum by giving us an ‘access all areas’ tour. Not that you need a key, it’s all bloody unlocked. Surprised there’s anything left.” She sniffed in disgust. “Mind you it’s all crap apart from that painting. Pete told us when we came about how that it’s a copy of a famous one that’s in a gallery in Chicago, except they don’t really know which one’s the copy and which one’s the real one, so they have to look after it in case it’s the good one, but there can’t show it to anyone cos the Americans would have a cow.”

“So it lives in here,” I breathed, “but what if it’s the real one?”

“Then it’s worth loads, but if it’s not it’s worth nothing,” she shrugged, “Pete said they’d prefer it to be fake cos they wouldn’t be able to afford to insure it if it was real and they’d have to sell it. Maybe someone should do them a favour and rob it. Then they wouldn’t have to have it stuck here in limbo any more.” She walked up and examined the paint close up. “It makes you feel like you’re sat there with her, don’t you think? And she’s really comfortable with you, and you’re both just doing your thing.”

I nodded as she carried on, as if there were a million things she had stored up to say and they were all tumbling out now.

“I’ve come back a few times to check she’s still here. And I sit in here and think about it all, how long she’ll be here for, whether she’ll still be here when we’re grown up and we’ve moved away, and when we die. It’s not fair!” She turned towards me, angry suddenly, and tearful. “You can’t have someone put all that effort into making something like that and then shut it away!”

She was right. What good was that picture doing there? It could have been a blank piece of canvas staring into the dingy room with no one to see it or appreciate its angles and the still, quiet face of its subject sat there looking intently into her lap day after day with dust quietly drifting down and settling on the top edge of her frame, with only Jane in to visit occasionally, like a trip to a nursing home to watch a relative wither and eventually die. I walked down to the window, lifted the yellowed curtain and put my face to the glass. Blurred shapes moved jerkily on a green background and the blue of the sky filled the rest of the frame.

“We should take her with us now.”

I spoke deliberately and calmly as I turned back. I saw her jerk like a puppet brought to life by my words.

“What?!”

I repeated the statement.

“We should take it home. What good’s it doing here?”

I looked again at the seated figure in the painting and wanted so badly to have her near me, to be able to look over at her whenever I felt like it, to try and decipher each brush stroke, work out how the marks someone had made there with brush and paint could make me feel this way.

“Really?” Jane looked amused and excited, but doubtful, “I didn’t think you were the sort of person who’d do something like that.”

“Why not?” my voice was fierce, “this matters doesn’t it? We can’t leave her here to rot. Besides which, if we don’t do it someone else will, or someone’ll torch the place like they did that place in Ordsall, and then there’ll be nothing left for anyone.”

My logic was unquestionable. I could tell Jane looked impressed.

“A woman of action. So, how do we do it?”

My mind raced through all the options. We couldn’t climb out the window: too high up, plus it was probably painted shut.

“Walk out with it wrapped up in that curtain,” I nodded towards the window.

“What?” Jane started laughing, “now I know you’re not serious. And there I was thinking you were hardcore.”

I sighed.

“I mean it. There’s no other way we can get her out of here without damaging either her or ourselves. And anyway,” I pointed out, “look how easy it was to get in here, its not like that security guard’s pacing up and down with an Uzi at the ready is it?”

I could see her eyes go all faraway as she thought it over and wasn’t so sure of my plan as I’d sounded to her. I looked from Jane to the painting, so perfect, hung there like a treasure just for us, and it made me want it more. It could belong to Jane and I, we could take turns to admire it, watch the lady, so peaceful, together, without ever getting bored or wanting her to do anything but quietly contemplate her reading, the firelight warm on her legs, maybe a clock ticking a beat, but its hands never moving, a perfect moment frozen in time.

“Okay then,” I heard steel in Jane’s voice, a little quaver too, “but first let’s have a little dab.”

I laughed, and nodded, rubbed a little of the white grit she offered me on my gums and opened my eyes wide.

“Come on then!”

As Jane carefully lifted the frame down I stood on tiptoe to fiddle with the curtain hangings, then, as the speed kicked in I grabbed the bottom and yanked the whole thing down around me. Dust went everywhere. The curtain rail popped off a couple of rusty screws at one end and hung there drunkenly.

Jane jumped like a gazelle and whirled round.

“What are you making all that noise for you dick!” she hissed.

Her eyes were fierce and she looked round nervously at the door. I stood there foolishly, the fabric greasy with dust in my hands, expecting any minute to see a patch of light appear at the door, a uniformed figure. I wanted to sneeze. We stood, like musical statues, for seconds that seemed like hours, not even daring to breathe, listening for footfalls outside. Nothing but the faint sounds of kids shouting from outside, the faraway ping of an ice cream van from the road. I silently cursed myself for being so stupid and spoiling everything.

When we finally realised no one had heard us we started to move slowly, as if we were swimming, I felt so light and yet my limbs felt tense, as if I was pushing them through water. We clumsily wrapped the picture in the curtain, but it was loose and ungainly, unwrapped it and tried again. I lai the fabric out as best I could and we made it into a parcel, rolling it over and over in the cloth, tucking the edges in neatly until we had a compact bundle.

I lifted it gingerly and tucked it under my arm. It sort of fit if I curled the ends of my fingers round the bottom and braced them hard. I was surprised by how light it was. I don’t know why I expected it would be heavy and awkward, but it was easy to carry like that. I liked the feel of it next to my body, hugging it tight to stop the edges of the curtain unfurling. I wondered what it would be like to sleep with it next to me, to turn over and check it was still there.

Jane switched the light off and silently cracked the door open a fraction, pushing her face right up to the gap to check the other side. She swung from side to side to try and survey the whole scene as I stood behind her, poised like a marathon runner, with my charge under my arm. Eventually she straightened up and pulled the door gently open, moved through quietly and held it for me as I passed through.

I’d forgotten how bright the rest of the Hall was. As we passed each window we saw again that they were illuminated with midsummer scenes, only now people were picking up their balls and shouting for their dogs to come to heel. It was time for them to go eat salad on the patio, watch Barrymore with the curtains drawn.

We stepped through each room as poised as dancers, our necks craned to see and hear he slightest signal that anyone else was around to see us. I swear I could have smelled a human scent in those few minutes, or even felt the breeze as someone moved down below. I thanked my guardian angel for the spongy soles of our trainers that we placed toe hell deliberately on each step, Jane going ahead each time to check the way, me following, keeping my cargo safe and steady.

The stairs were easy: you could check the whole hallway from the top, although if we’d got caught halfway down we would have been in trouble. When we got to the bottom Jane walked silently to the door while I stood in the shadow cast by the heavy double doors.

“He’s still out there,” she murmured when she got back to me. “I thought he might have gone to do a check round but the lazy bastard’s still sat there with his feet up.”

“Shite.”

My mind raced through the options: leave it here, go put it back.

“Is there a back door?” I asked hopefully.

“I think it’s alarmed. At least they got that bit right.”

Jane looked apologetic.

I thought again. It was simple really.

“Go talk to him and make him look away from the doors, and I’ll meet you back at mine.”

The idea was formed after it left my mouth.

“Really?”

She looked impressed now, stepped back and questioned with her eyes until I nodded, sure now.

“Go on then.”

I positioned myself inside the doors so I could just see her swagger out towards where the guard’s foot stuck into my field of view. I saw her stop and stick her hip out a bit. She started to twirl her hair and moved round slowly as she talked. I couldn’t hear what she was saying but cold imagine the guy gradually swivelling round on his chair to follow her. I shuffled forwards, the bundle awkward now, and leaned my head out a little. He was offering her a cig and she looked quickly over his head as he bent to pick up his lighter and signalled for me to go. It was weird, I knew it was wrong somewhere in my head but I didn’t really care, and it was exciting too, like being in a TV drama only it felt more real than normal everyday life. I knew exactly what to do, slipped out and walked quickly down the side of the building and round the back, not stopping or looking at anyone until I got up the path to the road. Even then I didn’t stop, strode stiff jagged steps all the way home, only putting my treasure down to fish out my door key.