I Could Love You (18 page)

When she takes the coffee into the front room she finds he’s bought Cas a Christmas present and allowed him to open it right away. It’s a robot.

‘Jesus! That is so ugly!’

‘Isn’t he just?’ says Guy.

The robot is the size of a small dog and looks like a grotesque parody of maleness: bulging chest and arms, tiny head. It’s made of black and white plastic and has red illuminated eyes. Caspar is gazing at it in a trance of admiration.

‘Shall I put him through his paces for you?’ Guy says to Cas.

‘Yes please!’

Guy picks up a remote control that looks as complicated as a computer keyboard and starts pressing buttons. The robot lurches forward, red eyes flashing. Then it does a little dance. It isn’t pretty, but it is fascinating. Then Guy makes it hold out its gripper for Cas to shake, and the robot speaks in a gruff grunting voice.

‘What did he say?’ cries Cas.

‘He’s talking Caveman,’ says Guy. ‘And listen to this.’

He presses more buttons. The robot emits a long fart. Cas convulses with laughter.

‘Honestly, Guy,’ says Alice. ‘How old are you?’

‘About six,’ says Guy.

‘What’s his name?’ says Cas.

‘Well, he’s called Robosapien V1. But I think you should give him a name of his own.’

‘I will,’ says Cas, nodding and frowning. He takes the task seriously.

Guy starts showing him how to work the robot, lying down on the floor by Cas’s side and at his level. He makes the robot kick and punch, and do a lumbering run across the room. Alice watches without taking part. This is boy stuff.

She feels angry at Guy and ashamed of her anger. She is his real daughter and he’s never bought her a gift of such magnificence, or laid himself down on the floor to play with her.

‘How much did that thing cost, Guy?’ she says. ‘It must have cost a fortune.’

‘Not at all,’ he says. ‘I didn’t pay a penny. It came in as a promotional gift. But they’re not that pricey, to be honest. You can find them on the Internet for £25.’

Cas isn’t listening, he’s too absorbed in the robot. But somehow Guy can get away with this sort of thing, telling you his present was a freebie, and you still feel honoured to receive it.

The doorbell rings. Alice goes to answer it. It’s Chloe.

‘Bad time?’

‘No. Come on in.’

Chloe comes in, looking round curiously.

‘I’m supposed to be shopping. I hate Christmas.’

She seems subdued. Through the open door to the living room she sees the robot’s flashing red eyes.

‘Fuck! What’s that thing?’ Then, seeing Cas, ‘Sorry.’

Guy is amused by the fuck. His eyes linger on Chloe. Alice introduces them.

‘Guy, my dad. This is Chloe.’

‘Hi,’ says Chloe.

‘My robot says hi,’ says Cas.

He presses a button and the robot makes a growling noise.

‘Kick me out if I’m in the way,’ says Guy.

‘No,’ says Alice, ‘you go on playing with Cas. Me and Chloe will go up to my room, if that’s okay.’

Guy gives a regal wave.

‘Off you go.’

Upstairs in Alice’s room the two girls sit on the bed and Chloe is silent, so Alice has to prompt her.

‘Well?’

‘Well.’

Another silence. Then Chloe comes out with, ‘So that’s your dad?’

‘Yes.’

‘He looks too young to be your dad.’

‘He’s forty-one.’

‘And he lives in London?’

‘Yes. Actually, Chloe, he’s a useless dad and I hardly ever see him so I’m not really all that interested in talking about him.’

‘Okay.’

‘So what’s your news?’

‘My news?’ She looks startled. ‘Why should I have news?’

Blushing slightly, Alice says, ‘You talked to Jack.’

‘Oh, yes. Right. Jack.’

All this is odd and disappointing. Yesterday on the train Chloe had been so positive, Alice had let herself start to believe in her power to make things happen. Now she seems distracted. So why come round?

‘How did he sound?’

‘Fine.’ Then she seems to remember why she’s here. She sits up straighter, becomes more animated. ‘We talked a lot about you. He remembers you really well.’

‘We were at school together for nine years.’

‘You know what I mean. Anyway, it’s all fixed. You’re meeting him for lunch at Harvey’s, one o’clock tomorrow.’

‘He agreed to that?’

‘Sure. Why wouldn’t he?’

‘Did you tell him I wanted to see him?’

‘Don’t worry, I kept it all very casual. I said you’d love to get together, talk about the old days, blah-de-blah. I said if I could make it I’d join you. But I won’t, of course.’

‘So it’s just meeting up and chatting?’

‘That’s all. You don’t have to put on clean knickers.’

Alice gives a nervous laugh.

‘You have no idea how this kind of thing scares me.’

‘What’s there to be scared of? If it doesn’t work out, what have you lost? Nothing.’

Just another little flicker of hope, thinks Alice. Every tiny failure adds to the burden that I drag behind me, that keeps me earthbound. One day I’ll stop trying. Just sit down on the ground and go nowhere ever again.

‘It’s easy for you,’ she says. ‘You know what to do.’

‘There’s nothing to do. Just be friendly. Then, if it looks like it’s going well’ – she leans over to Alice and lays one hand on her thigh – ‘touch him.’

‘I can’t do that!’

‘Why not? I’m not saying feel him up. Just a friendly touch, like this.’

‘Honestly, I could never do that.’

‘Couldn’t you?’ Chloe gazes at her thoughtfully. ‘It really speeds things up, touching.’

‘But how do I know if he wants it?’

‘Oh, boys just do.’

‘With you, maybe.’

‘See here, Alice. I’m not going to let you screw this up.’ All at once Chloe has become engaged. ‘You can make this happen. He’s only a stupid boy. We’re so much smarter than them. All you have to do is take charge and you can switch them on and off like a Hoover.’

‘Like a Hoover?’

‘Well, I was trying to think of something that makes a noise and then just fizzles out.’

They both started laughing.

‘You don’t sound as if you think much of boys,’ says Alice.

‘I don’t. Or men.’

‘So why do we bother?’

‘Oh, you know,’ says Chloe. ‘It’s biology. Or evolution. Or something. Why do you bother?’

‘I think I’ve read too many stories,’ says Alice, ‘seen too many films. I can see through it with my brain but somewhere deep down I’ve bought the whole romantic couple thing. I want a soulmate. Someone I can love body and soul, who loves me the same way. It’s pathetic really.’

‘Same,’ says Chloe.

‘You’ve at least got a chance. Thirteen and counting.’

‘Yes, but I’ve got no staying power.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, I’m always falling in love, but somehow when it all starts to work out, I get bored. I don’t know why. I wish I did, actually. Maybe I’m just a natural born slut.’

They start laughing again.

‘We should team up,’ says Alice. ‘You can get them started. Then I’ll move in and take over for the long haul. Like breaking in wild horses.’

‘Wild horses! If only.’

Alice watches Chloe laughing and thinks how pretty she is, how if she was a boy she’d want to love her. Maybe that’s all it is after all, a quirk of the genes, a nose like this and not like that, and you get love or you don’t. The mind revolts against such a conclusion, it’s too brutal, too impersonal, but why should nature care about our feelings?

‘Look, I’m going to get back to my shopping. You meet Jack for lunch tomorrow and just keep telling yourself, I’m doing this saddo a favour. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

They go back downstairs. Guy hears them coming and gets up off the floor.

‘See this kid go!’ he says.

Cas works the remote control, tongue protruding between his lips. The robot marches, turns, picks up a Lego man from the floor, throws him aside. Then Cas makes him roar, and roars himself.

‘He’s a monster,’ says Alice.

‘He’s wicked,’ says Cas. ‘He’s blinding.’

‘My God,’ says Chloe. ‘I feel so old.’

Guy catches sight of the time. ‘Christ! I have to motor.’

‘Are you going, Guy?’ For a moment Cas’s little face is bereft.

This is what he does, half-brother. He comes, he makes you feel life can be magical and bright, then he goes.

‘Yep. I’m off.’ Not a hint of remorse. ‘But the roboguy stays with you.’

Roboguy. Please. How much of a giveaway is that? But Cas is innocent and willing to take the trade.

‘Okay. Roboguy says goodbye.’

He makes the robot wave a claw.

‘Love to Liz, yes?’

Guy’s on his way out. Chloe gives Alice a kiss.

‘Kill ’em dead, sister.’

Then she too is gone.

Alice turns back to watch Cas at play with the pin-headed monster.

‘The batteries’ll run out,’ she says.

‘I don’t care.’

‘Is that why you wanted to see Guy? So he’d give you a present?’

‘No.’

‘He didn’t give me a present.’

‘You’re a grown-up.’

‘Yes. I suppose I am.’

Cas makes the robot speak a whole string of growls and grunts.

‘He says, I’m Roboguy and I rule the world.’

Alice bends down and topples the robot onto his back.

‘Hey! What did you do that for?’

He rights the robot, handling him with respectful care.

‘He’s so ugly,’ says Alice.

‘He’s got bosoms. His head’s too small.’

Cas isn’t listening. He’s back working the buttons of the remote, murmuring to himself in his own version of a growly voice.

‘Nobody messes with Roboguy.’

19

Matt Early is working in his shed, absorbed, locked in silent concentration, when the bell rings. This is the bell he rigged up himself when he first built the shed, so that his mother could call him if ever there was an emergency. There never has been an emergency, but still she calls him, sometimes several times an evening.

Matt sighs, but he obeys. He turns out the lights in the windowless shed and locks the door behind him. He alone has the key. He strides down the concrete path to the back door of the house, a path he laid himself, a distance of some ten metres: to him as wide as an ocean, a journey from the new world back to the old.

His mother is sitting in the lounge with the television on, watching
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
on Channel 4. Except she’s not watching: her head and upper body are twisted round towards the back entry, looking out for him. She’s wearing an orange shawl draped over her thin shoulders to demonstrate that she suffers from the cold, even though the house is heated to a temperature of twenty-two degrees.

Every time he sees her again, even after a short interval, he’s surprised by how small she is. She paints her eyebrows with a thin line of brown eyebrow pencil, so she always looks disapproving. Her hair is dyed a colour she calls chestnut, more red than brown, entirely unconvincing. She wears tan coloured slacks and carpet slippers made of tartan cloth. Round her neck hangs the button he gave her, a wireless bell-push designed for front doors that communicates by radio waves with the bell in his shed.

‘Yes?’ he says. ‘What is it?’

He can see at a glance that nothing is wrong. His mother claims to be disabled.

‘I’m sorry, Matthew, but it’s not easy for me, you know. You try sitting in a chair for three hours all by yourself. It makes you want to scream. I would scream, only what’s the point? Who’d hear me?’

‘If you don’t like sitting in the chair you can always get up.’

Matt speaks softly, as ever, but there’s a dull note in his voice. They’ve been here before.

‘But I can’t, can I?’

She presses her hands on the chair’s arms, and pretends to try to rise.

‘You try getting to your feet when your joints are in spasm. Do you have the slightest idea what it feels like? No, not the slightest. Well, I’ll tell you. It’s like being stabbed by knives. It’s unbearable, Matthew.’

‘You’ve managed before, Mum.’

‘Sometimes I think you just don’t care.’

It’s true: Matt doesn’t care. All his capacity to care is used up doing the mundane tasks she requires of him. He has no surplus energy left for actual sympathy.

‘You should move about more, Mum. I keep telling you. If you just sit and watch telly you stiffen up.’

‘Stiffen up! What do you know? Do you have arthritis? Are you the expert? Come over here and help me.’

He goes to her side and offers his arm. With many a groan, pulling faces that would be comical if they didn’t irritate him so much, she pulls herself to her feet.

‘Mother of God have mercy on me!’

They walk from the lounge to the kitchen, Mrs Early leaning heavily on her son and dragging one leg.

‘You were walking fine earlier,’ he says.

‘I was not. I just kept quiet about the pain.’

‘Come on, now. You don’t need me.’

Matt stopped believing in his mother’s pain long ago. She’s perfectly healthy, and sixty-six isn’t old. The only pain she suffers is that she’s a lonely woman living a meaningless life.

‘So now you want to get away too? Is that it?’

Yes, Matt wants to get away. His mother has never forgiven his father for what she calls ‘getting away’: slithering out of his responsibilities by staging a fatal heart attack.

‘I’m here, aren’t I?’

‘Not that anyone would know it. I never see you. What do you get up to in that disgusting shed of yours?’

‘It’s not disgusting.’

‘Well, I’ve never cleaned it. Have you ever cleaned it?’

‘Yes.’

‘That’s a lie. Now put the kettle on. I want a cup of tea.’

‘You can do it for yourself, Mum. You’re not a cripple. If you stop doing things for yourself you’ll end up a cripple.’

‘Not a cripple? What do you know? You never did have any imagination, Matthew. Just like your father.’

‘There. Make your own tea. You can do it.’

He parks her by the sink.

‘Where are you going?’

‘I’m going back outside.’

‘What about me?’

‘You’ll be all right, Mum.’

‘How am I supposed to get back to the lounge?’