The Trouble with Perfect Read online

  “Thank you for getting out of bed to help us, Violet. We’d be lost without you, as ever. We’ve the same problem as the one I thought I’d fixed earlier – some of the screens in the Brain have gone blank, and I can’t get them to come back to life. I think if we work together – you two whizzing up and down between the Brain and the eye-plant beds on those bikes – we may be able to find out exactly what’s going on, and fix it. We’re a great team, us three. I know these hours seem unconventional, Violet, but I don’t want to cause any alarm in Town, especially after Vincent’s Committee questions. Hope you don’t mind!”

  “What are we checking the eye plants for, Dad?” Boy asked, trying to make some sense of his father’s rambling mind.

  “Loose transmitters or wires, foggy lenses, infections, that kind of thing. I’ll check the wiring here again. Now don’t split up – I know Town is safe without those Watchers patrolling our streets, but Rose and Eugene wouldn’t be pleased if I allowed Violet to wander around in the dark alone.”

  “They won’t know, William.” Violet smiled.

  “Nevertheless, Violet, please stick together. I know you two are more than capable of looking after yourselves, but I must at least try to act responsibly.” He smiled. “Just go to the bed on Forgotten Road, the one in Market Yard and the one at the footbridge. They’re the ones giving us trouble. See if everything looks normal, then come straight back.”

  Boy nodded, and turned his bike towards Archers’ Avenue.

  “Take this,” William said, grabbing a strange, black rectangular device from the floor of the Brain and handing it to Boy. “Let me know if you see anything odd. Remember to say ‘over’ at the end of your sentences, otherwise I won’t know when you’re finished.”

  “Right, Dad,” Boy said, rolling his eyes up to heaven, but so only Violet could see.

  “What’s that thing William gave you?” Violet asked, as the pair started to pedal down the street.

  “It’s a walkie-talkie. Dad just made a pair. It’s for talking to him whenever I’m helping. They’re really useful, especially if we’re at different ends of Town, checking the eye plants.”

  “I’d love one of those.” Violet grabbed it out of Boy’s hand and placed it in her back pocket before sprinting ahead on her bike. “Bet you can’t catch me!”

  Violet could hear Boy over her shoulder, chasing her down, as she wheeled left onto Archers’ Avenue and then took another sharp left onto Rag Lane heading for No-Man’s-Land, Boy’s old home.

  When Town was called Perfect and under the Archer brothers’ control, No-Man’s-Land had been a prison for people who were different and didn’t fit with Edward and George’s plans for perfection. The No-Man’s-Landers were outcasts, and their families still living in Perfect were robbed of all memory that they ever existed.

  When Perfect fell, George Archer was captured and imprisoned in the clock tower of the Town Hall. The Watchers, who’d guarded Perfect under the Archers’ control, were locked away in the basement of that same building. Edward escaped, disappearing in the graveyard beside the Ghost Estate.

  The No-Man’s-Landers and Perfectionists, who had been living on different sides of a wall in the same town, united. The gate into No-Man’s-Land was ceremonially knocked down, and the streets and buildings were renovated.

  Forgotten Road was no longer forgotten – many of its buildings were already restored. Market Yard still held close to its roots, as a vibrant place where people gathered once a week to sell wares and exchange ideas.

  Violet’s mouth watered as she pedalled past Sweets for My Sweet, which had opened a few months before and was now one of Town’s favourite shops.

  Boy screeched to a halt as they neared the old orphanage.

  The orphans had all gone back to their families, who’d forgotten they existed during Perfect, and now weren’t orphans any more. The orphanage itself was left as it had been, and opened as a museum to Town’s difficult history.

  William told Violet, once, that the museum was so nobody ever forgot their Perfect past. She thought that was silly, since people wanted to forget about the horrible things that had happened in Perfect. At least, her mam did anyway. Rose got upset any time Violet brought it up. However, William had explained that sometimes the past was painful but, if you never wanted to feel that pain again, you needed to remember it. “People have short memories, Violet,” he had warned her. “If we forget our past, it will catch up with us.”

  “These seem fine,” Boy said, pulling Violet from her memories, as he examined the eye plants in the first bed they’d been sent to inspect, on Forgotten Road.

  The beds were mounds of deep-red clay about two metres long and oval-shaped. They were edged with white-painted paving stones and lined with rows of knee-high eye plants. Beside each bed was a small tank of blood – supplied weekly by Mr Hatchet, the butcher – to feed the plants with.

  Violet dropped her bike on its side and walked over, bending down for a closer look.

  The red stem of one of the plants nearby pulsed as it fed from the deep clay. Its translucent skin-like petals were open and its eyeball centre watched Boy suspiciously, following his every move.

  “Be careful, you don’t want to annoy them,” she warned her friend.

  She remembered the last time the eye plants had screamed, on the night Edward Archer disappeared. The sound was eerily haunting and she definitely didn’t want to hear it ever again.

  “These things freak me out,” she whispered, looking straight at a bloodshot eyeball as it surveyed her.

  “These ‘things’ are keeping everyone safe, Violet,” Boy said, as he crawled gingerly through the bed.

  “Well, I don’t see anything wrong with them,” Violet announced, dusting off her trousers a minute later.

  “Wow, you searched really hard!” Boy smirked, looking up from the clay.

  “Yes, I did. As much as you did, anyway.”

  “Well, how come I’m the one still down here checking them, then?”

  “Please…come on, can we just go? I can’t look at the eyes close-up for much longer, they’re disgusting!”

  Boy laughed, jumping up from the ground to grab his bike. “Fine. They do all seem to be okay. Anyway, I thought you weren’t scared of anything!”

  “I’m not scared of the eyes,” she huffed, “I just don’t think they’re nice to look at!”

  Boy was about to say something, when he stopped and looked around. “Does this remind you of anything?”

  Violet shrugged as she mounted her bike. “Does what remind me?”

  “The silence and empty streets.”

  “No, why?”

  “How about when we used to sneak through Perfect – when nobody else was about, only us and the Watchers?”

  “Yeah, I suppose so,” she replied. “I’m not sure I want to remember back then, though.”

  “It wasn’t all that bad,” Boy said, pushing down on his pedals. “Sometimes it was exciting! Town is so normal.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with normal! Do you miss danger or something?” Violet asked, confused.

  “No, but sometimes I do miss adventure. And doing bad things.”

  “‘Bad things’? What are you on about?”

  “I don’t mean proper-bad things. I just mean things that weren’t allowed, like climbing the wall into Perfect or tricking the Watchers. Everything feels really safe right now.”

  “Isn’t safe good?” Violet asked, cycling behind her friend.

  “Yeah, I suppose, but sometimes it’s boring!” Boy called back as he disappeared down the laneway towards Market Yard.

  “Maybe it’s just you who’s boring,” Violet teased, speeding past him in the narrow space.

  Boy put his head down and raced after Violet, the pair almost colliding as they skidded to a halt near the Rag Tree in the centre of Market Yard.

  “I won!” Violet panted, throwing her hands into the air.

  “No, I won! I always win – that’s the
rules!” Boy laughed, leaping off his bike and jumping around in mock celebration.

  “You can’t always win!”

  “Yes I can, that’s the rules.”

  “The rules you made up!” Violet retorted, pushing his shoulder.

  “Rules are rules, Violet,” Boy teased as he walked over to inspect the next bed of eye plants.

  Violet was about to reply, when Boy looked up at her, his face serious.

  “We need to get Dad! Give me the walkie-talkie.”

  “Why? What’s wrong?” she asked, rushing over to hand it to him.

  A large patch of eye plants was missing from the middle of the flower bed, as if someone had plucked them right out.

  “They screamed earlier, gave me an awful fright,” a voice called from across the yard behind them. “I was going to tell your father, in the morning, but now I’ve seen you two out here, saves me the bother.”

  Violet looked around. An old man was hanging half out the top window of a house on the edge of Market Yard.

  “What time was it?” Boy asked. “Did you see anyone?”

  “It was late, after midnight I’d say,” the man replied. “The screeching was awful, worse than squabbling cats. I didn’t see anybody, but it was dark, mind.”

  Boy spoke into the walkie-talkie, then looked at Violet.

  “Dad’s not answering. We better check out the next bed.”

  The pair got on their bikes and raced down Wickham Terrace, past Boy’s house, towards the footbridge and the last of the beds William had asked them to examine.

  “This one is the same – some of the eyes are missing,” Boy panted, turning to look at his friend anxiously.

  He tried the walkie-talkie again. A rustling sound, like leaves in the wind, rattled across the airwaves.

  “Dad, someone’s stealing the eye plants. OVER,” Boy said. “Dad… Dad?”

  Static fizzed out into the dawn.

  “He’s such a feather-head,” Boy huffed, as he shoved the device into his pocket. “We’d better get back to him, quick, Violet!”

  The sun was just rising over Town, as Boy and Violet swerved onto Edward Street and pedalled furiously back to the Brain. William Archer’s nose was almost touching one of the screens as he fiddled with some dials.

  “What’s happened?” he asked, looking up. “Did you find something?”

  “We met a man who told us the eyes screamed last night. There’s some missing from the bed in Market Yard and the one at the footbridge,” Boy panted.

  William seemed confused. “What do you mean? Have they died, or fallen over? I don’t understand.”

  “No, gone, Dad, like someone has pulled them up and taken them,” Boy said bluntly.

  “Oh dear. Are all the plants in those beds gone?” William asked, scratching his head.

  “No, just some of them,” Violet replied.

  “Surely if someone took the plants, they should have been spotted by the other plants? Why can’t I see it on the screens? This is very strange, very strange indeed…”

  Violet and Boy watched as William Archer strode forwards and backwards, muttering to himself.

  “We need to tell the Committee. It’s probably just someone playing a trick, though I wish they wouldn’t play it with the eye plants – they’re delicate.”

  “Delicate? More like disgusting,” Violet whispered.

  “Crooked will have a field day with this! Violet, will you tell Eugene I’ll be over a little later this morning, to fill him in?”

  “What’s going on, Dad?” Boy asked.

  “I don’t know, son, but as I said, I’m sure it’s just someone playing a trick.” William looked straight at Boy. “Let’s not talk about this in front of your mother, though. At least, not until we figure it out a bit more. She’s got enough on her plate already.”

  Boy nodded.

  “Is it okay if I cycle back with Violet?” he asked.

  “Okay, then come straight home,” his dad replied, over his shoulder.

  Boy nodded, then quickly cycled off down Edward Street.

  “I can go home by myself, Boy,” Violet insisted, as she caught up to him.

  “I know you can – I just don’t want to go back yet!” He smiled, pedalling ahead again.

  “Why did your dad say that about your mam?” Violet asked catching up once more.

  “Say what?”

  The sun was just popping out behind the clock tower of the Town Hall as they passed Archer and Brown, on the corner of Edward Street and Splendid Road.

  “Not to tell her about the eyes, that she’d enough worries?”

  Boy didn’t reply. He looked a little sad, not like his normal self.

  “Is there something wrong?” Violet asked, feeling worried this time.

  “No… Well, I don’t really know…”

  “You can tell me, I’m your best friend.”

  “I know, Violet, I just don’t know what to tell. Mam is acting weird. She’s sneaking around a lot and always seems kind of upset. It’s like she doesn’t listen, like her head is somewhere else.”

  “Did you ask your dad?”

  “Yeah, he got awkward and said something about her finding it hard being free of the small room the Archers kept her in. I don’t believe him, though. I think he knows what’s really going on. I’ve heard them whispering, sometimes. I don’t know why adults whisper like that.”

  “I know.” Violet sighed. “It’s like they don’t think kids have ears! Maybe she’s just stressed? Adults get that a lot. I think it’s like the flu, or something.”

  “I don’t think that’s what stress is, Violet!” Boy laughed.

  “William might be right, though,” she continued, ignoring him. “I was only in Macula’s room for a few minutes, but I think living in it for all those years must have been really hard. All your mam did was sit there and write letters.”

  Violet remembered the deep-red carpet and dark mahogany furniture of Macula Archer’s room, the luxury a complete contrast to the derelict house that encased it in the Ghost Estate. She remembered the wild paintings that looked like freedom, and sitting in Macula’s chair reading one of the hundreds of letters to her boys.

  “She never talks about that time.” Boy sighed.

  “Mam always tells me I’ve to talk about things, especially bad things. She said that if you don’t talk about the bad things, they can get stuck in your head and get much worse. Then they turn into really bad things, when they were probably not that bad at all to start with.”

  “I feel sorry for the things that get stuck in your head!” Boy joked.

  “Very funny!” Violet smiled, stopping outside the entrance to her house.

  “Right, I better get back home. I’ll see you in school.”

  “Hey, Boy!” she called, as he turned to cycle away.

  “Yeah?”

  “Your mam will be okay. Remember, my mam lost her imagination and was totally under the Archers’ control in Perfect, and she’s fine now. Parents are always okay in the end. They just like to worry about things.”

  “Thanks, Violet.” He half-smiled.

  She watched until Boy disappeared round the corner, then climbed off her bike and pushed it up the gravel drive, to the side of her house. She was just climbing the steps when there was a rumble of thunder.

  Violet jumped, her heart pounding as clouds gathered in the sky above.

  The sun had perpetually shone in Perfect – or, at least, people thought it did – but since the Archers’ downfall, lots of things, including the weather, were back to normal. The weather in Town was good. It was sunny a lot of the time, broken up by the odd rain shower – but Violet had never heard thunder in the skies here before. She’d almost forgotten what it sounded like.

  “Violet, what are you doing up already?” her dad asked, as she went inside. He was standing in the half dark at the bottom of the hallway.

  “Did you hear the thunder, Dad?” she asked, eyes wide.

  “I thou
ght I heard something, pet. Thank goodness it wasn’t my stomach!” Eugene Brown smiled. “What were you doing out there?”

  “Boy called for me.”

  “At this time?”

  “Yeah, William needed help. There’s a problem with the eye plants.”

  “I thought he fixed that last night?”

  They walked through to the kitchen and Violet sat down at the table. She had filled her dad in by the time William Archer knocked on the door a little later that morning.

  “Any news on the eye plants?” she asked, as William strode into the kitchen.

  “No, Violet, I searched for footage in the Brain’s memory stores again, but there’s no information at all. The other eyes didn’t pick up anyattack. It’s very strange, almost as if something is disturbing the signals.”

  “Violet told me what happened, William,” Eugene said, looking up at his friend. “Sit down, I’ll make you a cup of tea.”

  Tea hadn’t been a favourite in Town for a while after Perfect fell, because the Archer twins had poisoned their brew to steal everyone’s sight. Then Violet’s dad and William had come up with the idea of reopening the tea factory. They called it a “cross-community project”. When Violet asked her dad what that meant, he said it was something that the No-Man’s-Landers and the Perfectionists could work on together, so they could see that they weren’t so different. In the beginnings of Town, some people had still been a little suspicious of each other.

  The factory was reopened a month after Edward disappeared. It had taken Town a while, and a lot of work, but gradually people began to trust each other and the tea factory again.

  Now UniTea was a favourite on all kitchen tables. Eugene was particularly pleased with the tagline, “Bringing Town Together”, which was displayed proudly on every purple packet and over the factory gates on George’s Road.

  Violet loved having the tea back. It was made from the same Chameleon plant the Archer brothers had used and tasted like anything she wanted it to, but was minus their blinding potion, so it didn’t rob her eyesight.

  “Thanks, Eugene,” William said, looking worried as he sat down. “I’m at a loss as to what’s happening. I’m sure it’s someone playing a trick, as I can’t imagine anyone in Town stealing anything – especially not those plants.”