don’t have a bird

There are so many rites of passage you’ve already missed out on, and the school ball is destined to become another item on that ever-growing list. You try to delay the inevitable until every breath from your lungs sounds as if cystic fibrosis is cackling through you. So, with a resigned air, off to hospital you go.

Although you’ve been denied the opportunity to attend the ball, no one is prepared to give up the ritual altogether. Instead, your sister Mel, your mum and I arm ourselves with my ball dress, a curling wand and a bag of make-up. Together, we crowd into your hospital room. We giggle while we do your make-up and curl your hair, then, when you’re finally dressed, we start our photo shoot. You shine with happiness, and, as the chief photographer, I have a most important task: to make sure your bare feet never appear in any of the photos to spoil our carefully crafted illusion.

There’s a sense of belonging, that someone understands you when they bestow a nickname upon you. But I don’t get mine. “Why Bird?” I ask. “I’m no bird, I’m all woman.” You roll your eyes and explain it again. “Bird as in ‘flip the bird’ or ‘don’t have a bird,” you say. “I’m pretty sure that’s ‘don’t have a cow’, and it’s from The Simpsons.” Your reply is swift: “In the olden days, before Bart turned it into a cow, it was a bird. Besides, you can’t argue that you’re kind of grumpy.” Your expression is smug, unmoveable. You’re utterly convinced of your righteousness and you laugh as I stomp off.

Journal-writing holds no appeal for me. Instead, I write extraordinarily long letters to you in exercise books. I add badly drawn illustrations, jokes and the occasional piece of trivia – anything to fill the pages, because your golden rule as my reader is that we cannot discuss anything written until the exercise book has been