Atlantic

"Sympathy for the Devil" #1

"sympathy for the Devil" #1

Do you know that feeling? When your Mum takes you to Paris every weekend? When you finally manage to master that impossible piece on the piano? When you do your first pirouette? When you get the highest mark in the class for maths? Every single minute of my life was crammed into those preteen years: even the dancing, playing and very unusual mental powers (well you know... doing well in maths)

If you ever tried to do a timeline of my life it would be horribly unbalanced: so unbalanced I would slide of it into the dark pits of hell... well I guess you could say I already have.

I live in Hackney, London. My name is Veronica and I have one twin: Vanessa and our younger brother Sam. Nessa had always tried to deny it but, yes, I was 47 minutes older than her. Life had started out quite dandy: I had been the clever hard working one, becoming quite a well-known child genius in the area, whereas Nessa had pretty much winged her whole life, she had a bunch of friends and about 10 000 favourite TV shows. We would go to saint Pancras station every weekend and dad would take us to Paris, we watched ballets, listened to piano recitals and god knows how many times we stood underneath the Eiffel tower.

One weekend dad bought me a piano- I was 3. I had learned to play it in months- my chubby toddler fingers dancing with surprising ease across the keys. Dad began to bring home Saxophones and Flutes, trumpets and guitars. I would learn to play them all. By the time I was eight I had pretty much tied the whole of the woodwind family up with a little bow and a smile. The older I got the bigger the instrument: 10 year old, cello. 11 years old Tuba. 12 years old, well that's when they stopped. Dad would stop bringing my beloved instruments. He hardly ever came curled up with me and Nessa on the cold winter evenings: revising, reading and laughing. I missed it but I guess sometimes you have to get used to things. My piano lessons dripped and drizzled out to nothing and I was left teaching myself in the dark, cold room that was once so bright, warm and fun. I stopped going to ballet with Nessa and the house missed that ring of those squeaky voices echoing down the cosy stairs. Mum would barely be home, dad too. But both for completely different reasons.

I used to Love that pub. It was one of the oldest in London: found in those tiny alcoves on the banks of the Thames. We would go there for birthdays, meet ups and country wide celebrations. I remember when Sam was only 2 ( I was 6) and we played darts, every single one of my hits was off the target, I still had full points until the end of the game when an old gentleman came and held my had when I threw it: I got 3 triple twenties.

I never want to go to that pub again: not from the pain it caused us. Mum would come home drunk every night and dad came home even later: struggling with work to pay off her drinking habits.

Birthdays came and went and slowly the presents stopped, we would always celebrate, Nessa, Sam, dad and I but it would always be and 11pm when mum had passed out from the alcohol in her system. It was the 18th of September- Nessa and I's birthday, mum was suffering from a bad hang over, not bothering to get up for work again. Dad came down- a small box wrapped up in checked purple wrapping paper. I turned to look at Nessa, shock filled her eyes as she smiled with delight- the smile never reached her eyes though, just like it didn't for me. We opened it and inside was two beautiful silver necklaces a small butterfly hung from each chain studded with green, blue and purple stones. We gasped and pulled dad in for a hug, squeezing his frail bones as much as we dared. "Dad..." I whispered "thank you"

"It's okay, sweetie I love you... I am sorry I wasn't there for you" he kissed me on the cheek and moved to clip up the necklace.

"You were always there for us, dad" Nessa whispers as he clips her chain into place.