Hal
doubts his looks
This
was chopped because it added little to Hal's
character which wasn't already known. Also
quite sentimental, even by Prince's standards:
‘Mum,
am I good-looking?’
‘Of
course you are darling. You’ve grown
up into a very handsome young man.’
Hal
sighed. ‘Well why don’t any girls
like me then?’
Kate’s
head shot up in disbelief.
‘Hal
what do you mean? Everybody likes you.’
‘Girls
don’t. Not in that way. One girl said
that she thinks I’m funny but could
never ever imagine me as a boyfriend. She
also said that she couldn’t even imaging
me being with any girl, because she didn’t
think I was the type to have girlfriends.
She doesn’t think I’m gay or anything
she just reckons I’m not the sort of
boy girls fancy.’
As
Hal spoke, sadness smells filled the room.
They were coming from Kate, mainly. Her face
crinkled, and tilted in sympathy.
‘What
girl?’ she asked.
‘Just
a girl. From school. You don’t know
her. Sally Janson.’
‘Well,
it sounds to me that she just wants to hurt
you and girls like that aren’t worth
bothering with anyway.’
‘But
she’s right. I’m ugly. I’m
tall and skinny and I’ve got horrible
moles on my face. Why would any girl ever
want to get near me.’
‘Horrible
moles?’ Kate’s voice was now cross.
Caring-cross but still cross. Her head rose
and stretched her neck. Eyebrows moved closer.
The display of bafflement she often deploys.
‘You can’t even see your moles.’
‘She
can. And anyway, you’re my mother. You’re
biased.’
‘Well,
I can hardly change that can I? And anyway
Hal, you’ve got to stop being so silly.
There’s nothing wrong with you. You
look lovely and you are very warm and funny
and intelligent and caring and once you get
to university girls will be falling over themselves,
you wait and see.’
‘But
-’
‘No.
That’s it. Come on, you’ve got
bigger things to think about. Nobody cares
about looks anyway.’
‘You
do,’ he gestured over to a dressing
table cluttered with Kate’s face creams.
Kate
laughed. Some of the sadness smells started
to lift. Others lingered. ‘They’re
anti-ageing products,’ she said. ‘I
don’t think you have to worry about
that just yet.’
Hal
sat down on the bed next to his mother. I
wagged my way over and rested my head on the
space between them then gave them the look.
A knowing glance at both of them, punctuated
with a blink between. Intelligent eyes, but
not so intelligent they would get suspicious.
A hint of humour.
They
both laughed and stroked me. Well, Kate stroked
me. Hal gave me a quick, playful tug of the
neck. We bonded. The three of us. It wasn’t
enough to take away the sadness, not entirely.
But it helped bring them closer together,
that was the main thing.
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