The Funny Thing about Norman Foreman, Julietta Henderson [best novels to read for students .TXT] 📗

was even getting a few apologies. Then I saw Kathy and Tony standing slightly to the side of the crowd, deep in a conversation where nobody else existed. And over there, a brown-haired, bearded giant towering over the rest of the heads, staring off into the middle distance like he might be reciting poetry in his head. Big Al. Larger than life. Safe as a house. Lovelier than a sonnet.

I shook my head to change the unexpected direction in which my thoughts had drifted, but my new-found articulation appeared to have lost its way already.

‘H— how did they . . . I mean, what . . . when did . . . ?’

‘I think, I mean I guess I know . . . well, I called them, Mum.’

Norman’s face was close to mine and I could almost see my reflection in his pink, shiny and almost totally scale-free forehead.

‘When you and Leonard didn’t come back by six at the latest I was so . . . well, I was pretty scared, Mum. So I thought I should make a contingency plan, which was to call a responsible adult and, well . . . they are, I think. But then none of them answered their phones and I had to leave messages and then . . . then I remembered the last name on the list, which was James . . . so I called him and then, well, that’s a really, really long story, Mum. I can’t wait to tell you, but . . .’

He tipped his head to the left so he could see around me to the crowd across the road.

‘I reckon we should . . . come on, Mum, let’s go and say hello before the show. Mum, come ON!’

He’d already grabbed my hand and was dragging me across the road, turning his head every couple of steps to check on me but heading full tilt for them. All I could do was follow. And so I did.

We pushed through the crowd, and there they were. Kathy, Tony, Adam and Big Al, now anchored by Leonard, who was busy making introductions and being charming. I hesitated, and I felt Norman’s hand slip out of mine as he moved forward into the little circle. Then everyone was talking over the top of each other, trying to get Norman’s attention, touching him lightly, a squeeze here, a gentle hair ruffle there.

I took a step backwards, almost losing my footing, and as I tried to right myself I lost sight of Norman. Then I felt the pressure of a gentle, steadying arm on my shoulder and a soft, deep voice in the back of my head. I’ve got you, Sadie love.

I ducked my head and peered through the shoulders and backs of heads of the people who were no longer strangers to Norman and me, and I could see him again. He was laughing. His head angled back, looking up at Big Al like he was the best thing since Jax. His hand resting on the back of Adam’s mobility scooter like it was the only place in the world that hand wanted to be. Leaning ever so slightly to the left into the nook of Leonard’s creaky shoulder like he’d been there his entire life. And past Norman, past Kathy and Tony’s smiling faces, on the outskirts of the crowd, I caught my second sight of James. Leaning against the wall of the pub, smoking. Watching Norman, too. Over a boy, our eyes met and James raised one eyebrow and smiled a long, slow and steady smile that didn’t quit.

Right then and not an instant before was the moment I realized I’d always been wrong. It wasn’t the final awful curtain call of a desperately unhappy man dangling from the kitchen rafters, it wasn’t the insidious skin disease that waged its relentless war year after year, and it certainly wasn’t forty-three series of Come Dine with Me that had chiselled out the shape of mine and Norman’s world. It was a potty-mouthed, magnificently bad boy who’d had to cram an entire life into just twelve years. It was the hopeful heart of a lousy comedian but a very good man who made it all the way to the top, at least to his appreciative audience of the world’s best daughter. And it was two kids’ crazy, impossible and totally brilliant plan that took us all the way to the end by making us go right back to the beginning.

I looked back at Norman, who was now listening intently to something Tony was saying, and I knew with absolute clarity that he’d become all he was not just in spite of me but because of me, too. Whatever happened up there on that stage in the next half an hour didn’t even matter, because he was going to make it. And we were going to make it.

I felt a twinge as the me-parts that never quite fitted eased into a strangely comfortable place and the warmth of a body moved into the space beside me. Leonard took my hand in his wrinkly old paw and stepped forward, pulling me gently into the circle of our friends. And I let him.

52NORMAN

First rule of comedy: Always give it everything you’ve got.

I know it isn’t possible to make time go backwards, but if I could, the one thing in the world I’d do is reverse the hands of that big old clock that runs the universe to the night before Jax died, and I’d jam something in good and hard. Then I’d go over to his house just after he went to bed and I’d get his backpack from down near the front door where his mum always yelled at him for dropping it. Then I’d look inside and get out the Boots bag with the brand-new inhaler in it and put it right next to him where he could see it. Maybe on his pillow. Maybe even in his hand. And then I’d tell him that he’s the coolest kid that ever walked this and I’ll