The Day She Died (25 page)

I heard him nudging the wheelie into its space on the porch and coming in the door.

“I love your kids,” I said to him, when he came into the living room.

“Me too,” he said laughing. “Have they been up, running about, being lovable like?”

“No, I'm just saying. I love kids and I'm sick of keeping away from them. I need to speak to you.”

He held up a finger to tell me to wait, went out into the hall, and came back without his coat. He dropped down into his armchair and started unlacing his boots.

“I thought I should steer clear cos I'd never be able to cope if something happened. And you have to cope. If there's little kids around. You just absolutely have to. Because if you don't, then everyone's stuffed, aren't they?”

He sat waiting for me to go on, holding both ends of his laces tight, making me think of a cartoon of a bird pulling a worm I'd seen in a book when I was wee and hated.

“Something happened. More than I've told you.”

“I know,” he said.

“About my granny's quilt.”

He said it again. “I know.”

“But I want to trust you,” I said. “I'm going to tell you. Even though it's the worst thing I've ever done in my life. Unless you want to go first and tell me?”

He went back to his boots again then, finished taking them off, set them at the fireside to dry out—he must have been on the beach—and rubbed his socks together.

“I'm all ears, Jess,” he said.

“Please, please,
please
call me Jessie,” I said. “My mother calls me Jess. I can't stand thinking about my mother when I'm here with you.”

“So tell me the rest of the story just one time,” he said, “and you never have to think about her again.”

Like he knew it was my mother all along and not my granny at all. Like he knew already what I was going to say.

The rest of the story. Where was I starting from? What had I said before? I pulled the stuffing out of the quilt and my mother tied me down. I'd told him it was in my room at home, but he'd seen through that. He knew it was my granny's house. And he knew I couldn't turn my face, but he didn't know why. Could I tell him? I could try.

“My mother was going to some … jamboree,” I began. Gus laughed and I joined him. Where had that expression sprung from? Oh, yes, Kazek had said it to Ros's sister on the phone. What a weird English word for him to know. Or maybe it was the same in Polish, like polka. But why was he talking about it anyway? “Yeah, sorry,” I said. “My mother was off to a jamboree. All weekend. But Friday was my granny's whist night. So my mum bedded me down and my granny came in to check me before she went to bed.”

I remember the door opening, the look of the flowery landing wallpaper in the lamplight and Granny's head, done up in rollers and shining with cream, coming slowly round the door. I squeezed my eyes shut. So ashamed for her to see me tied up like a dog in a yard.
Suffer the little children
, my mother had said to me and,
a child is known by its doings
. As well as the line about the rod and the spoiling, of course. She just loved that one.

“She'd carped on and on at me about the quilt—showing her up, how she had to sit through a lecture from Granny about how children were children and you couldn't knock it out of them, shouldn't even try. She was so angry. I couldn't bear that I'd made her so angry. I couldn't stand the thought of Granny seeing what a bad girl I was that my mum had to tie me.”

“Wait a minute,” Gus said. “This isn't the night you pulled the stuffing out?”

“No, this was after. My mum tied me up so I wouldn't do it again.”

“Was your gran still angry with you?”

“No, I was telling the truth when I said she thought it was funny. But she didn't think it was funny when she saw me tied.”

“What did she say?”

“She didn't say anything. She just made this noise.”

She had walked over to my bed and bent down low to kiss me. Then she froze and slowly she pulled back the covers, showing my wrists and the ropes. She made a whistling, whooping noise and turned away. Couldn't she bear me in her sight? Then she made a noise that was like a dragon in a cave, a horrible roaring, choking sound. Was this the wrath that my mum was always warning me I would bring raining down?

“I heard a crash and I opened my eyes. Granny was lying on the floor, rolling from side to side. And she was in brown puddle. Probably not brown, but it was dark in there. She'd thrown up. God, her hair and her shiny face with the face cream. And she was clutching at herself and making this noise.”

That
noise
.

“It was like a kind of gobbling,” I told Gus. He was right forward in his chair, right on the edge, holding his knees, staring at me with his mouth hanging open. “Wet and choked and just the most horrible thing I'd ever heard. I didn't understand what I'd done.”

“What
you'd
done?”

“I know, I know, I know now,” I said. “But I didn't know that night.”

“What happened?” he asked.

“I turned and faced the other way. Even though there was a feather end sticking in me. I kept facing the wall. And eventually she was quiet. She passed out. That's what I know now, grownup me. Little me thought she'd fallen asleep.”

And I fell asleep too, the way kids do. I slept until her crying woke me. Her sobbing and the way she was calling my name.
Jess, help Granny. Help Granny, there's a good girl. Dehhh, hehhh Gannnn, goohh guuhhh.
But I wasn't a good girl. I was a bad girl and my mother had tied me up, so I couldn't help Granny like a good girl would do.

“She wet herself,” I told him. “And she shit herself. There's nothing dignified about dying, you know.”

“She—fuck sake, Jessie. She
died
? When you were tied up and couldn't—”

“Eventually. It got light and I was hungry. Then I wet myself too. And I slept and so did she, then it was dark again and she was moving, thrashing about, and her head knocked against the floor and, God, the smell. The smell of the pair of us in there.”

When it got light again and I looked at her, it wasn't Granny anymore. It was this purple thing. Lying there, crusted and twisted. I didn't understand. I heard her talking to me a lot after that, but I know now I was dreaming. Or hallucinating.

“I was there another night and day after the day she died. One more and it would have been me too. But my mother came back and found me.”

Only that was a memory I wasn't going to touch with a ten-foot pole. I wrapped it up, shrank it down, and threw it out to sea. So far out that it went over the horizon and hit the setting sun and it hissed as it shrivelled and disappeared.

“And so that's why I thought to myself I should stay away from kids because I can't handle feathers, and you've to handle things with little kids because they can't cope on their own.”

Gus had put his head down in his hands and now he rubbed his face hard, but he hadn't rubbed away all the tears when he looked up again.

“That doesn't make any sense,” he said. “You were five and you were tied to your bed. How could you cope with that? How could anyone?”

“I know,” I said. “It makes no sense at all. Sometimes things just don't.” Like Wojtek's bracelet in Becky's junk basket. But I wasn't going to think about that now.

“Is that really really really what happened?” he said.

“Gus,” I said, “don't even. It took me twenty years to get that night straight. Twenty years to sort out what was what.”

“How come? It sounds pretty clear to me. Hellish, like, but clear. And it's no bloody wonder you can't forgive your mother, by the way.”

I said nothing. I didn't want to milk the sympathy. I didn't want him to know that for twenty years and counting my beloved mother hadn't managed to forgive me.

Twenty

Wednesday, 12 October

Which is why I ended up phoning her the next day. I only ever phone my mother when I'm dead angry and dead clear and there's no chance she'll gaslight me. As to
why
I phone her, I'm just keeping the lines open, just in case the day ever comes. And, she's my mum. Caroline with the couch told me about these baby monkeys that get taken away from their mothers and put in a cage with a fur-covered box. It's pretty useless, hard and hollow and that, but it's all they know. And the thing is, if you take it away from them, they pine for it. Even if you take it away and replace it with an actual female monkey who cuddles them back, they pine for the fur-covered box cos it's what they know. So I don't beat myself up anymore about phoning my mum sometimes. I'm a monkey.

“Jess,” she said when she answered. I wasn't holding my breath to hear what followed, not really. “Long time, no hear.”

“Things must be bad, Mum, if you've had to put your phone to incoming calls only.” Two sentences—one each—and we were fighting. I took a deep breath and tried again. “How's Allan and Penny?”

“Fine, as you'd know if you ever called them.”

“Oh, they're feeling the pinch too, are they? Can't afford to call me?”

“Penny's busy with the children,” said Mum. “It's all right for you.”

“Yeah, lucky me. Okay, now you ask me a question and before you know, it'll be a conversation.”

“
Any man among you who bridleth not his tongue
,” said my mother.

“James, Chapter 1, I forget the verse,” I said. “I'm rusty.”

“Well, I suppose you've no call for it, in your everyday life,” she said. “Just pick a saint and light a candle.”

“Actually, Mother, what I do is sort clothes and wash them and help people who really need them to choose what's best and try not to make them feel too crap for being there. What have you done for anyone except yourself lately?”

“My prayer group—”

“Exactly,” I said. “Well, it was lovely to catch up, as always.”

“That's it?” She almost shrieked it. “Not a word for months—”

“From either one of us,” I said. “Not until I phoned you.”

“I shouldn't have to phone you,” she said. “I'm your mother.”

“How often do you phone Allan?” I said.

“Penny's busy with the little ones,” she said again. “That's different.”

“If I was busy with kids, would you phone me?” I asked.

“Don't tell me you've disgraced yourself on top of everything,” she said. “I'm not stepping in, Jess, if the social workers take it off you. I can't start all that at my age.”

“You are unbelievable,” I said. “No, I haven't disgraced myself. I'm still single and childless and living alone in my thirties. Is that what you want to hear? Is that what you want for me?”

“Well, that's a mercy,” she said. “But don't try to make me feel guilty because you set your face against everyone. I didn't train you to turn people away. I've done my best to help you make friends. If you were part of a community … ”

“I'm not joining the church, Mother. I don't believe any of it. Why don't you join a mosque first and tell me how it's done when you don't actually buy a single word?”

“Oh, Jess,” she said. “You push people away. You don't keep in touch. You ignore people who're trying to be in touch with you.”

“Give my love to Allan. And Penny as well if she's not too busy with the children to take it.”

“I try to help,” she said. “I suppose nothing came of it?”

“And remember where I am, every weekday except Thursday. Don't pass the door.”

“I'm not in the habit of going into such places, Jess,” said my mother. “You know how easily upset I am by … unpleasantness.”

“Yeah, beggars and lepers can whistle as far as you're concerned.”

“I don't share your tas
te for long-haired layabouts, Jess. That's no need to—”

“Just as well there's plenty of folk who don't mind them. Like Jesus and me.”

“Do not take the Lord's name—”

“I didn't. I was referring to him in a completely normal—”

“—in vain, if you'll let me finish.”

“—way. As opposed to Jesus motherfucking Christ in a”—the phone went dead in my hand—“cummerbund.”

“What's a cumblebund?” said Ruby. She was right beside me, standing on the cold lino in her bare feet, her toes white. Her circulation must be as bad her daddy's. I peeled off my bed socks and put them on her.

“You're a cumblebund,” I said. “You're the best little bundle of cumbles I've seen today, anyway.”

“Can I keep these socks?” she said, sliding them up the lino at the edge of the carpet strip towards the living room. She turned. “Dillon's got a minging nappy, by the way.” She smiled and disappeared through the doorway.

It was long gone eight before Gus got up. He came into the kitchen wearing the old hairy suit and a white shirt and tie. His hair was in a pony tail. He had his everyday black work boots on.

“I know,” he told me. “It's the best I can do.”

“You look daft, Dad,” said Ruby.

“Thank you, my sweetheart,” he said.

“But where are you going?” I asked him. He opened his eyes very wide and then glanced between both the kids.

“Quick word in the living room, Jess?” he said. I followed him. “Have you forgotten? I know you were upset last night, but … do you have black-outs?”

“What are you talking about?”

“It's Becky's funeral today. You're watching the kids.”

“I have absolutely no memory of this,” I said.

“You said days ago you would watch them whenever it was,” he told me. “I said I was taking them, and you said no. So I asked if you would watch them.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I said. “I remember that.”

“You just said you didn't.”

“No—yes. Oh, shit. Look. What I meant was I didn't remember that it was
today
.”

“But I just told you last night.”

“I forgot.”

“You just said you remembered.”

I turned away and walked towards the front window. There must be a way to work this out; there had to be. I was freaking out at Gus because my mother had just scrambled me. That was all. Then I froze.

It was caught in a cobweb in the corner of the frame. Four inches long, grey and white, with a weird brown streak through it. It was kind of separating, like greasy hair combed away from a parting, and it blew gently back and forward.

“What's up?” said Gus.

“Nothing,” I told him. I couldn't drag my eyes away from it. The sheen on the curve of it, where it all held together; the little gaps on the straight bit where it spiked into points like the teeth of a comb. And the brown bit that didn't belong. “Look, I was really upset last night, like you said. And I think you're more upset than you know this morning. So I'll phone in sick, you go to the funeral. I'll see you tonight. I'll get a hold of myself, I promise. Stop … fretting about things that don't matter.”

“What things?” he said.

At last, I managed to turn my head. I turned my whole body, faced him.

He was looking at me in one of his many special, creepy ways. I had the thought before I could block it.
Not creepy
, I told myself. Just really alert, with his head on one side, slightly off to the side, like a bird with a worm. That bloody bird with a worm again.

“Stupid things,” I answered. “Like why Becky put the bins out last Tuesday before she drove away.”

“What?” There were two spots of colour high up on his cheeks.

“Things like that,” I said. I couldn't stop thinking about it, right there behind me. What if a gust of wind blew it free? Was the window closed all the way? Could it blow in through a gap and land on my neck? I could feel my skin crawling.

“Tidying up,” said Gus. “Putting her affairs in order, they call it. Seems about right to me.”

“Okay,” I said. “But she must have waited for the binmen to come and then brought them back over too,” I said. “And that's bothering me. Fine, I agree, she'd clear out the nappies, but why would she wait until the men came and then wheel them back? This week it was dead late before they showed up.”

“And what makes you so sure she did?” said Gus.

“They were here,” I said. “I met you in Marks, we came back here, you went away with the cops and came back with them. And then you got the pen from Ruby's bedroom and went outside with it. The wheeliebin was there on the porch, and I don't see how it got there.” He said nothing. Didn't move a muscle. Didn't even blink. “Stupid things like that,” I told him.

“Maybe the men were early that day,” he said at last.

“But she drove away through the farmyard so no one would see her,” I said. “Would she really risk bumping into someone when she was doing the bins?”

“Or maybe someone else brought them back,” he said. “For a favour.”

“Who, though? When I asked if there was someone who could come and stay with the kids, you said there wasn't. And why wouldn't they do the favour this week again when they knew what a time you were having?”

“Jessie,” he said. “Are you sure nothing's upset you?” And I swear he glanced at the corner of the window. Unless I was going crazy. Unless my mother had really messed me up again.

“Noth—” I said, but he cut me off.

“It was probably Gizzy,” he said. “She hates our wheelies at the end of the path making her site look untidy. That'll have been it.”

I nodded. It made sense. But I knew I would never ask Gizzy. I didn't want to know.

“So,” he said, sounding like someone who was off on a picnic, not heading to where he was headed today, “you're sure you can face the kids? Last night must have kicked up some dust.”

I went back to him and put my arms around him then. He was leaving his children with me. And I knew how much he loved them. And yet it was me he was worried about.

“We're both knackered,” I said. “I'm going to ask for some time off once everything's settled.”

“What everything?”

Kazek and the money and Ros and Gary the Gangster
, was what I couldn't say.

“This everything, of course,” I said flipping his tie. “The funeral.”

He tipped my face up and kissed my cheek. I waited until he was out of sight before I wiped the trace of the kiss away.

And I
would
be okay with the kids. I was in charge of whatever I chose to do. I wasn't in charge of how I felt, but I didn't have to let how I felt run the show. “Thanks a bunch, Stacey!” I whispered to myself. Nothing like a bit of cognitive behaviourism to strip you of any comfort and make you feel like crap. I went into the kitchen—“All right for a minute, kids?”—and put on a pair of rubber gloves.

“Another nap-py!” Ruby sang. “Cos of all the gra-hapes!” I wondered if it had ever occurred to her she used to wear them too. I didn't tell her. I went through the living room, into the hall, out the front door. Since Ruby had my bed socks, my feet shrank and stung when they hit the cold brick of the path, beaded with melting frost, and reaching in towards the living room windowsill I stood on a thistle too.

I couldn't have said why, but while I stretched my hand out to
wards it I thought of my granny's face, wooden and purple,
pebble-dashed with the dark vomit that she'd died in, teeth dry in her mouth, eyes clouding over like eggs slowly poaching.

And bugger me if it didn't help. Or maybe Gus trusting me had helped. Or my mother giving me something to push against. Maybe all three. For whatever reason, I grabbed it, pulled it free of the spider's web—it had stuck itself in there quite tightly—and brought it towards me, holding it up in front of my face for a good long look.

My heart was going
gub-gub-gub
, right up in my throat, and I knew I was shaking, and not just from the cold seeping up my legs and through my thin nightie. But I stared at it, the quill, like nail parings, like dead skin, like claws; and the grey part, stiff with grease, waxy; the softer white part, plump, plush, and gleaming. It was disgusting. It was horrific. And there was something else too. That funny brown streak running through it. I brought it closer still. Did they all have that? Did I just not know because I'd never looked before?

No. Definitely not. Not all feathers had that patch of stiffer brown in them, because it was a thread from a hessian sack. I pinched together two yellow rubber fingers and plucked it out, watching the waxy, gleaming length of it cleave to let it go and then fold in on itself again. I opened my fingers and let the strand of hessian fly away.

I dressed the children in warm clothes and wellie boots, did their teeth, brushed Ruby's hair and tied it in bunches, then set out with them across the turf to the workshop. I had to know.

“Oh, Daddy'll kill you,” said Ruby, when she knew where we were going.

“I'll chance it,” I said. “Did Daddy not like Mummy coming here?”

“Mummy,” said Dillon.

“Mummy's dead and living on a cloud in heaven,” said Ruby.

Yeah, I thought, as I dragged them along. Even though she wasn't pregnant after all. Because she couldn't stand it anymore. Even if she was gay, she wasn't from the fifties (or the Brethren). She loved her kids and her garden and she had a friend. So what exactly was it that she couldn't stand anymore? What else was there apart from the one thing in her life I hadn't even looked at until now, because it was the best thing I'd ever had? A dream come true.