Paper Butterflies. Lisa Heathfield

to come back. They’ll all have forgotten about it, you’ll see.’ Her hand is on my shoulder and she’s smiling, but I know she’s lying.

      It’s quiet in the corridor. It’s just the sound of my feet, soft on the floor. I could walk along here, turn the corner, push open the door and never come back. I would survive – I know I would. I would hitchhike all the way to the coast and I’d meet a family on the beach. They would love me and they would be mine.

      The nurse’s door is slightly open and I barely knock before I go in. She’s standing by the chair, shaking a thermometer. A girl sits with a bowl on her lap. Her skin is so white she looks dead, and I know I shouldn’t stare.

      ‘I’ll get the office to phone your mother,’ the nurse says briskly. ‘She’ll have to come and pick you up.’

      ‘She’s at work,’ the girl says.

      ‘Well, she’ll have to come back.’

      The girl nods and hunches further over the bowl. The nurse squeezes past me, heads out of the door and is gone.

      ‘Are you OK?’ I ask the girl. She looks up at me briefly and turns away.

      The window is pushed halfway up. Somewhere, someone is mowing a lawn. The hum stretches into the room.

      I can hear the nurse coming back before I see her. Her shoes click on the polished floor.

      ‘Right. That’s sorted,’ she says.

      And then she turns to me.

      I could tell her, tell her the truth, tell her everything.

      ‘I need some clean clothes,’ I whisper. And now I know that she can smell my damp ones.

      ‘Right,’ is all she mutters as she reaches into a cupboard. She holds up some underpants and chooses a pair. ‘A little bit small, but they’ll have to do.’ She passes them to me. ‘Come over here and I’ll draw the curtain.’

      I do as she says. I pull my wet underpants down. I don’t know what to do with them and she looks like she doesn’t want to touch them, so I put them on the floor.

      I step out of my skirt. The material is damp to touch. I don’t want to look at the size of the wet patch that everyone has been laughing at. My shoes feel sticky. And the smell is glued to my skin.

      ‘Let’s wipe you down a bit,’ the nurse says. She’s at the sink, squeezing out a cloth and then using its warmth to clean me.

      When she’s dried me, she helps me into another skirt. It’s tight over my legs and on my belly. I know what she thinks. It’s what everyone thinks.

      The nurse picks up my clothes and puts them into a plastic bag. She ties a knot in the end of it and passes it to me. I’ll have to walk through the corridors holding it, but I can’t throw it away. I can’t go home without it.

      ‘Thank you,’ I say, and I look hard into her eyes. Please ask me, I beg her. Ask me now and I’ll tell you everything.

      ‘You’re really a bit old for this,’ she says. ‘Try not to let it happen again.’

      And I’m gone, walking back to the class of circling sharks, my bag of clothes waiting to be hung like bait on my peg.

      I wake up early the next morning, because it’s my special day. I imagine plucking the butterflies out of my belly and putting them in a box by my bed – I’d like to watch their colours, to see their wings beating against the glass.

      The door opens and they’re all here. Kathleen, Megan and Dad. He promised he’d go into work late this morning.

      ‘Here’s the birthday girl,’ Kathleen says. Her hug is tight and smells of soap. She kisses me on the top of my head.

      ‘Ten years old today!’ my dad says ‘Here, hold this.’ His smile takes over his whole face as he passes me the end of some string.

      ‘That’s all you’re getting!’ Kathleen laughs, and my dad puts his hand in hers.

      ‘Follow it,’ he says. So I get out of bed and I pull on the string and I twist it into my palm as it leads me from my room.

      It goes into Megan’s room and over her bed. They watch me from the doorway as I step over the mattress, pulling my nightdress over my knees. They all laugh excitedly as I follow the string around the chair and back out again.

      ‘So it’s not in there,’ my dad laughs. I don’t look at Kathleen and Megan. I don’t want them to spoil this.

      The string goes down the stairs, into the kitchen. I gather it clumsily in my fist as I crawl under the table. Back across the hallway, into the living room.

      And there it is.

      Attached on the end is a shining new bike. It’s painted pink, with yellow handlebars. For a moment, I think my heart stops. I look up at my dad and try to speak. He puts his arm round my shoulders.

      ‘It’s all yours, pumpkin. You deserve it.’

      ‘You sure do,’ Kathleen says as she takes my hand and we go towards it. ‘Do you like it?’

      ‘Yes.’ I nod my head, over and over. ‘Can I touch it?’

      My dad laughs. ‘Of course you can – it’s yours.’

      It’s mine. It’s really mine.

      I trace my fingers over the handlebars, down its cold frame and across the seat.

      ‘It’s got a bell,’ Megan says excitedly.

      ‘Yes,’ I say.

      ‘Well, you haven’t got time to try it now,’ my dad says. ‘But I promise I’ll take you out on it tomorrow.’ He leans over to kiss Kathleen. ‘I’ve got to go.’

      I follow him to the front door and try to hold on to his hand as he puts on his coat.

      ‘Save me some cake from your birthday tea,’ he smiles. He picks me up and holds me, my feet hanging not far from the ground. ‘Your mom’d be so proud of you,’ he whispers into my hair.

      Then he puts me down, quickly picks up his bag and is out of the door before he can hear my reply.

      ‘Thank you for my bike,’ I say quietly, and I imagine him smiling back.

      ‘Was it you?’ the bus driver asks when I step on. I look around and pretend that he’s not talking to me. ‘You decided to use my bus as a toilet?’

      I shake my head.

       You were going to save me. You were going to drive me away and I’d live with you and your wife.

      ‘It was you.’ Lauren pokes me as I carry on walking. ‘You’ve got underpants as stinky and wet as a fish.’ All around me, people pop their mouths open and closed like a million stranded fishes.

      When I sit down, the boy next to me gets up, pushes past me and is gone.

      I try to think of my new bike, sitting waiting for me at home. In my mind, it glows. And my dad is going to take me out on it tomorrow, just me and him.

      ‘No one likes you,’ the voice hisses from the gap in the seats behind me. I recognise it straight away. It’s Megan. I hear Anne giggle next to her.

      I move along, so that I’m sitting next to the window. Outside, I look at the fields, blurring by in a patchwork. I’ll get on my bike and ride so far until I get so lost that I can’t find my way home.

      ‘Everyone hates you.’

      But I won’t be scared. I’ll be happy. And then my dad, who’s been looking for me, will drive past me and stop.

      I’ve changed my mind, he’ll say. Three years is enough time to live with Kathleen and Megan and now I want it to be just you and me. I’ve bought a new house. It’ll be