Page 8 of The One Plus One
‘You can take these.’
He handed them over! Just like that! Tanzie began flicking through them. Outside a bell rang and she could hear children walking past the office window, their feet crunching on the gravel. She poked her head up to look at them. She wanted to see if any others were reading books.
‘So…what happens next?’
‘Well, we’d like to offer Costanza…Tanzie…a scholarship.’ He lifted a glossy folder from the table. ‘Here’s our prospectus, and the relevant documentation. The scholarship covers ninety per cent of the fees. It’s the most generous scholarship this school has ever offered. Usually fifty per cent is our maximum, given the extensive waiting list of pupils hoping to come here. The new scholarship is designed to recognize children with unusual levels of ability.’
‘Like me,’ Tanzie said.
‘Like you.’ He held out the plate towards her. Somehow they had replaced the biscuits on the plate with new ones. This really was the greatest school ever.
‘Ninety per cent,’ Mum said. She put her biscuit back on her saucer.
‘I do appreciate that there is still a considerable financial commitment involved. And there would also be uniform and travel costs, and any extras she might want, like music or school trips. But I would like to stress that this is an incredible opportunity.’ He leant forward. ‘We would love to have you here, Tanzie. Your maths teacher says you’re a joy to work with.’
‘I like school,’ she said, reaching for another biscuit. ‘I know lots of my friends think it’s boring. But I prefer school to home.’
They all laughed awkwardly.
‘Not because of you, Mum,’ she said, and helped herself to another. ‘But my mum does have to work a lot.’
Everyone went quiet.
‘We all do, these days,’ said Mr Cruikshank.
‘Well. It’s a lot for you to think about. And I’m sure you have other questions for us. But why don’t you finish your coffee, while we talk, and then I’ll get one of our pupils to show you around the rest of the school? Then you can discuss this between yourselves.’
That evening Mum went up to Nicky’s room and got him to hook the computer up to Skype. Every Sunday she would text Dad half an hour before, and he would set up the computer at Grandma’s so that Tanzie could speak to him. She would sit at Nicky’s desk and try not to be distracted by the little image of herself in the corner. It always made her look like she had a really weird-shaped head.
Except it wasn’t Sunday.
Tanzie was downstairs in the garden throwing a ball for Norman. She was determined that one day he would fetch it and bring it back. Tanzie had read somewhere that repetition increases the probability of an animal learning how to do something by a factor of four. She wasn’t sure Norman could count, though.
They had got Norman from the animal shelter when Dad first left and Mum stayed awake for eleven nights in a row worrying that they would be murdered in their beds once everyone realized he’d gone. Brilliant with kids, a fantastic guard dog, the rescue centre said. Mum kept saying, ‘But he’s so big.’
‘Even more of a deterrent,’ they said, with cheery smiles. ‘And did we mention he’s brilliant with kids?’
Two years on, Mum said Norman was basically an enormous eating and crapping machine. He plodded around the house shedding hair and leaving evil smells behind him. He drooled on cushions and howled in his sleep, his great paws paddling the air as if he was swimming. Mum said the rescue centre had been right: nobody would break into their house for fear Norman would gas them to death.
She had given up trying to ban him from Tanzie’s bedroom. When Tanzie woke up in the morning he was always stretched across three-quarters of the bed, hairy legs across her mattress, leaving her shivering under a tiny corner of duvet. Mum used to mutter about hairs and hygiene but Tanzie didn’t mind. She and Norman had a special bond. She knew that one day he would show it.
They’d got Nicky when she was two. Tanzie went to bed one night and when she woke he was in the spare room and Mum just said he would be staying and he was her brother. She didn’t know if they had a special bond, even though they were actually 50 per cent related. Tanzie had once asked him what he thought their shared genetic material was, and he’d said, ‘The weird loser gene.’ She thought he might have been joking, but she didn’t know enough about genetics to check.
She was rinsing her hands under the outside tap when she heard them talking. Nicky’s window was open and their voices floated out into the garden.
‘Did you pay that water bill?’ Nicky said.
‘No. I haven’t had a chance to get to the post office.’
‘It says it’s a final reminder.’
‘I know it’s a final reminder.’ Mum was snappy, like she always was when she talked about money. There was a pause. Norman picked up the ball and dropped it near her feet. It lay there, slimy and disgusting.
‘Sorry, Nicky. I…just need to get this conversation out of the way. I’ll sort it out tomorrow morning. I promise. You want to speak to your dad?’
Tanzie knew what the answer would be. Nicky never wanted to talk to Dad any more.
‘Hey.’
