The Walk Home (11 page)

“That’s why they fell out. Eric and your Dad.”

Lindsey said it, flat. Like she’d been happier while she could tell herself there was a different reason. She turned to Brenda:

“Was it bad like that here as well?”

Maybe she’d thought nowhere could be as bad as Ireland. She didn’t wait for an answer anyhow, Lindsey just let out her breath in confirmation:

“That’s why Eric had to get away from him.”

Brenda nodded, quiet. It was hard to hear it, said straight out like that, bald fact: her brother and father went twenty years without talking, neither of them budging, two decades lost to both of them. She’d sooner have closed the subject, only then she saw the look on Lindsey’s face, like she’d been let down.

“How come you never said? About Franny. You could have just told me.”

Brenda knew she should have.

She’d come close, any number of times, and she wished just now that she’d taken that plunge, instead of it coming out in a mess like this. She’d started off thinking Graham would let slip, surely, or one of his brothers; someone else would take that onus. Brenda ended up leaving it so long, part of her had kidded on, the girl already knew it; that it was unspoken but understood anyhow, in all their Franny conversations. And what to say now?

“I’m sorry, love. I wasnae tryin tae hush it up.”

Brenda could see that must be just how it felt.

Maybe Lindsey thought she was ashamed.

Maybe she was.

Where the girl came from it could be life and death, which side of the great divide you grew up. Why folk over here wanted part of that was a mystery to Brenda. It was mostly just the ignorant who stuck their oar in, as far as she could make out, glorying in someone else’s fight, or taking the battle to the football grounds. All those idiots who sang rebel songs at Celtic Park, or smashed out the green traffic lights at junctions when Rangers lost, stabbing each other on the side roads after Old Firm cup ties. They talked like they were carrying the torch, from the Reformation to the Troubles, but Brenda thought it was just small-minded, taking pride in bearing grudges.

Lindsey asked:

“What did your mother say? Nana Margaret? Couldn’t she have got your Dad to see sense?”

Brenda shook her head:

“She’d passed by then, a good couple ae years back.” Not there any more to temper him, if she ever had.

And anyhow, Brenda wanted to get one thing straight: it wasn’t Franny she was ashamed of, it was her Dad. She said:

“Franny was her ain woman, aye? An she was just right for Eric.”

Brenda thought Papa Robert had known that fine well, even without her mother there to point it out.

“My Da could never bring himself to say it. He just couldnae get over hissel. His ain hurt, aye?”

He said it all went back to Louth. And he’d told them enough times: how they didn’t think about things long enough, go back
far enough, take the time to understand. All the blows his family suffered.

“Course Eric wouldnae hear it.”

Her brother had told her it was just bigotry, and it didn’t matter how their Dad dressed it up. So Brenda sighed now, telling Lindsey:

“It was a hard fight, aw told.”

She’d spent so many years as the go-between, choosing her words; not just with her father, but with Eric as well. Always thinking before she spoke: what she could say and what was best swallowed. It got so she couldn’t even talk to Malky, he got so sick of all that back and forth, and the grief it caused.

“I mind when Papa Robert died. It was a relief, aye?”

It wasn’t what a daughter should say about her father’s passing, but there it was. She’d said it now, and it was true as well: she’d needed a break from all that strife. Brenda thought they all had, the whole family—a fresh start, a gloss put on the past—and she looked at Lindsey now, hoping she might understand.

Lindsey gave no sign, not at first, she just turned back to Eric’s picture, Franny’s early morning profile. Then she said:

“He’s been drawing Papa Robert. Eric has. He showed me, just this week.”

It gave Brenda a jolt to hear that, and it must have shown, because Lindsey went on:

“They’re nice. Eric’s new drawings.”

And she smiled a bit, like she hadn’t expected that either.

“He told me he’s not done a picture of your Dad in years. He’s always got stuck before, when he’s tried.”

Lindsey put her head to one side.

“Now I can see why.”

She met Brenda’s eye, soft, like Brenda was forgiven, or
getting there in any case; she’d grown up with Papa Robert too, after all. Then Lindsey said:

“Eric’s done three big sheets of your Dad and his roses. Planting them up. Back when you were kids.”

Brenda could only blink at first, taking in the news. Only then she thought it made sense—almost—for Eric to draw that, because they hadn’t always argued, her brother and Dad. Far from it, in fact. Those early Drumchapel years were good ones, maybe their best times. When Eric started at the High School, Papa Robert had dug over the earth in front of the house, and then they’d heeled in those roses, just the two of them, like to mark his fine achievement. So he must have known their father was proud of him, even if he never said as much.

“Our Da was a proud man, aye.”

Lindsey nodded, wry:

“That’s what Eric says too. He’s drawn the bushes all thick and twisted, from Papa Robert’s hard pruning. But he told me the blooms were glorious.”

“So they were.” Brenda remembered. “They went on for months. Summer tae the first ae the frosts. Fed by the tea leaves he used to fling at the roots, mornin and evenin, efter the pot had cooled.”

She lapsed into thought again, thinking of her father’s good sides. A long time since she’d had cause. All their close neighbours had loved those roses; folk of both denominations and none. They were a scheme landmark, and her father a scheme legend: resolute. His patch of Drumchapel wouldn’t go down the tubes, not while he had life and breath, and when he was on your side you were glad of it, right enough.

Brenda was loved, she’d never doubted that. But Eric was the firstborn, the clever one, her Dad’s best hope, and maybe her
brother was drawing what that had felt like. She hoped it helped him to remember. Papa Robert had read the paper up at the table of an evening while Eric did his school work, not keeping check, or helping, just there to be companionable. They went to the library together on Saturday mornings too. They cycled across to Partick, because that’s where Papa Robert worked, and Brenda used to sit on the steps and watch them go down the road: two bikes and two sets of big, blunt bones.

So how did it come to all that fighting? Brenda thought: it should all have been so different.

Only the girl took her arm then, leaning in close, telling her:

“I’d sooner Eric was drawing Franny. If I’m honest.”

Brenda nodded: agreed. And they shared a small half-smile, the hurt between them healing.

Stevie was still crying, though, at the row he’d just been given. Brenda caught sight of her grandson, hiding his face, all wet-cheeked, and red behind his freckles, and then she felt sorry for shouting.

“Dinnae take it tae heart, son.”

He wasn’t to blame, not for any of this, or the daft words he used. Lindsey put a palm to his cheek to soothe him:

“You gave us a shock, that’s all. It’s a sore subject.” Complicated. “You weren’t to know.”

Brenda cleaned a house in Hyndland, she had done for years, where the family were Italian, way back, three generations. There was a picture of them all in Rome, up on the mantelpiece, taken in the 1970s, when they were lined up on St. Peter’s Square to see the new pope. The kids were still young then, and open-mouthed, the three of them squashed up together at the front of the crowd, huddling close to Mrs. C, who was oblivious; on cloud nine, arms flung high, reaching for John
Paul II as he passed, her fingers almost touching his upraised hand.

Brenda ran a duster over the frame, that ecstatic face, every Wednesday afternoon. And the Sacred Heart in the bedroom too, that gave her the creeps at first, but she’d grown immune. She’d never told the family that her Dad was an Orangeman, although Brenda did think it might appeal to them, their sense of humour. The kids were all grown now, and she’d heard them ribbing their mother about that Rome photo, and Mrs. C laughing too, saying she’d come over all heat-of-the-moment at the sight of His Holiness. But Brenda still kept her little secret. Life was just that bit easier sometimes, if you glossed over the details.

Mrs. C looked after her grandson now, on days her daughter worked, and her husband doted on the baby. He let him fall asleep in his arms instead of the cot, and he went down to the Celtic shop too, to get him a baby-sized strip, with a bib to catch the dribbles, in the same green and white, with
Papa’s Little Tim
printed across the middle.

So maybe Tim could be funny now. Brenda didn’t know. She crouched down next to Stevie anyhow; his small face still a bit teary, a bit wary. He asked her:

“You gonnae say tae Uncle Eric?”

Brenda sighed: she hadn’t yet decided. She told him:

“We’ll have tae give it back, aye? His picture.”

Stevie shook his head:

“I took it for my Maw, but.”

He’d taken it for Lindsey.

This boy was full of surprises. Brenda didn’t know what to say to that, so Stevie just turned to his mother, and buried his face in the folds of her T-shirt.

“Aw, son.” Lindsey put her arms about him. She still had hold of the drawing, and it looked like she wanted to keep it.

Brenda caught sight of her brother’s lines again, the way he’d sketched his Frances, comfortable, middle-aged, still lovely. She wondered if it was a new one. It hurt to look at, so she thought it must hurt to draw it.

She didn’t know if they should put it back. If they should risk that. Brenda didn’t think she could face Eric’s today in any case. She rubbed her forehead and looked about herself, at the wide hall and all the woodwork; all these hours they’d been here, and the floors still had to be mopped. They’d spent half the morning in someone else’s house, going into things that still cut so deep. That shouldn’t still hurt so much, surely. Only they did.

The boys had tiled two walls in the main bathroom by late Thursday morning and—stealing aside—Jozef was impressed. There was no way they’d manage both bathrooms by Friday, but he didn’t tell them that: they were keen and he knew this was to his advantage. They kept on well into the evening, until it was dark enough to need the lights on, and by the time they called it quits, they had only the floors left to complete.

Stevie was laying plywood in the ensuite when the developer arrived on Friday morning. The boy didn’t look up during the inspection, he just kept on with his measuring and fitting, pencil tucked behind his freckled ear, but Jozef had the uneasy feeling that he was listening to everything. To the developer’s specifications—it had to be brushed steel for all the fittings—and to how Jozef pointed out the neat silicone seals around the shower tray as well. Even if it was strange to be overheard, Jozef liked what he saw: all the tiles lining up precisely at the corners. He told the developer:

“We deliver good workmanship, yes?”

And the man threw a last, grudging look around the ensuite.

He left Jozef with three catalogues of bathroom fittings, with Post-it notes marking the relevant pages. Jozef made all the phone calls, costing everything up—steel shower rails and towel rails and taps—but then he didn’t place any orders. It was hot again, and nearly the weekend, and the past few days had started badly but finished well, with plenty of good work completed, even if the developer couldn’t bring himself to say it. They were close to halfway done now, and it was midsummer too, the warm days becoming a heatwave, so Jozef walked down the road to the off-sales and bought two pallets of cans: enough for everyone.

His workers stood around by the back steps drinking before they went home, with Stevie joining them, almost. The boy kept to the edge of the group, avoiding Tomas, and Jozef thought that was a good move.

On Saturday, the whole place was quiet. Jozef slept until eight, which was late for him, then had some breakfast and went back to bed. He dozed and read; a whole stack of newspapers from home that his sisters sent him. Marek knew Jozef’s weekend habit, and he’d told him it made no sense when he could get Polish TV news in his room, or on his phone, and while it was still news too, not a week or more old.

Jozef thought it was a mistake sometimes, having family on the job. He was uncle to Marek before he was boss, and Marek crossed lines that shouldn’t be crossed with all his
you should see yourself
and
why do you do that?
Jozef was glad his nephew wasn’t here at
the weekends, so he could read in peace: keep up with home, keeping home at arm’s length. So much easier to do it like that.

Jozef went to the launderette, late in the afternoon, once it got cool enough to drop off his week’s clothes, and when he got back in, he remembered the boy. It was his second weekend here, and Jozef wondered if he was in the top flat; what he was up to. He stood and listened for sounds from up there, but there was nothing: just the church clock marking the hour, and him at the bottom of the wide stairs.

It was getting dark when he got a phone call from Marek. Jozef had just finished eating, and he thought his nephew sounded drunk, out and about the pubs again. But he wasn’t with Tomas, or any of the others. Marek spoke fast, tripping over his words, making little sense, until he said he was with Stevie.

“We’re in Mount Florida. At the last job.”

Marek told Jozef he was in the back court behind the unfinished tenement, and then:

“Bring the van, bring the van, yes? Stevie’s inside, right now. He’s getting us the towel rails.”

Jozef cursed down the phone, and he cursed on the drive there. Half past ten and the evening streets were lit up, all the shopfronts, the pub-goers out in short skirts and T-shirts. Jozef almost turned round twice, at two different junctions, thinking he should leave the idiot boys to deal with this. It was their mess, and if they got picked up by the police, it was their look-out as well. But then the police might come to the house, and—besides, besides—Jozef could never justify that to Ewa.