What Becomes (20 page)

This meant Barry would have found it amusing that without him there might be no more Uncle Shaun. However much he'd hated the character Barry had kept it close. He'd started writing the stories for Angela when she was three or four, maybe older – this was another set of details Lynne could not reliably recall. Barry had polished his versions and sent them out for publication when there'd been no money coming in, not even from voice-overs, not even from those bloody awful eye-drop ads. It was the first and only occasion when one of his bouts of creative despair bore fruit. The books were accepted and prospered. The audio versions had come along when they needed a replacement boiler and Barry had, despite himself, furnished a voice for
the nation's favourite uncle
. He had, indeed, been every voice: Bill Badger, the Llamas, Mr Pearlyclaws, everyone. Another demonstration of capacity.

But he wouldn't do telly.

With Barry, there was Shaun, but no telly.

Without Barry – no Shaun, but telly not a problem.

Being dispassionate, then: all that was needed would be another Shaun.

No one absolutely said this out loud – it simply became apparent, rose to the surface of every Shaun-related conversation and floated. Lynne pictured it bobbing and drifting, maybe slightly like her daughter's goldfish when it died.

Pets are always a serious undertaking, prone to calam-ities which may precede the recapitulation of older griefs – that's why the puppy and kitten options were still un-decided. Richard was in favour, Lynne was unsure.

Lynne –
dead Uncle Shaun's widow –
did not express an opinion on the search for some fresh, theoretical Shaun and she didn't observe the auditions, because she'd assumed that would have been grotesque. She chose to be aware that they were taking place and to acknowledge that financial security was important, especially in unstable times. She was responsible for Angela's future. Lynne had, naturally, been a performer herself in her twenties, but she had no illusions about her talents and even the finest actresses could find middle age a hurdle: not cute and young, not cute and old: you were grown up, that was all – and nobody wants that. Uncle Shaun would have to provide.

The production company sent her Shaun hopefuls on cassettes, to which she didn't listen. They also sent her
DVD
s, at which she didn't look. And then, for a while, there were more calls and a few letters, which mentioned how irreplaceable Barry might perhaps turn out to be. Lynne felt she agreed with this, should almost tell them –
yes, Barry was Barry and no one else
. Barry with the fake face for parties, Barry who loved to flirt, Barry who was scared, who was utterly terrified, that having a child would mean he couldn't leave Lynne if he wanted, couldn't upgrade, couldn't be comfortable with moving on. She'd understood this immediately in the hospital, in their first post-natal, post-paternal encounter. Barry Westcott, he was one of a kind.

A kind she'd been supposed to like. If you could no longer love, she had reasoned, you should try to like. Curiously, liking had been much more difficult to achieve.

Barry had offered her a child as a consolation for
his
inability to love
her
. (Liking was also beyond him.) In order to shore up something that couldn't stand, they had made a person: a complete, living human being. Reckless addition, that – no idea what they'd both been thinking – if they had, in fact, been thinking.

Although, Lynne
had
been thinking: otherwise, she wouldn't have stared at her husband as he first picked up his daughter, hefted her tenderly, gracefully, feelingly – so the nurses could not help but remember the scene, believe it – and she had thought –
Got you
. She'd seen his eyes: the wide, unfamiliar chill that was settling in them and she had thought –
Got you. Fuck you. Deal with that.

It had surprised her – that she would allow someone else to exist simply to defeat her husband. Then she forgot about it. When you come across something this unusual, this far out of your character, you're best to forget.

Anyway, it was no longer true and therefore didn't matter.

And eventually Shaun might not matter, not to anyone but her – that's how it had seemed. The messages of irreplaceability became more insistent, apologetic, and then dropped away entirely. Lynne had assumed that the multimedia hopes for her husband's other creation were being laid aside. There would, no doubt, be efforts to exploit what material there was, but in the absence of further storylines, of the voice, of the man himself, then everyone's options were severely limited.

Until that final package had arrived.

When she picked it up off the hall floor, honest to God, it weighed oddly, gave an impression of internal mobility, like holding on to something when it flinches, blinks. The usual company label was there on the usual type of padded envelope and the usual cheap plastic boxes were inside holding the discs – audio and video recordings.

The slip enclosed read –
We really think he's it. Our Shaun. We would be so delighted if you agree.

Richard was on the discs.

Richard Norland.

First time she'd seen the name.

He'd done other work, but she'd missed it.

She'd missed him.

Her intention had been to do some ironing, dissipate the tension that had apparently started cluttering the edges of every room – and this would allow her to hear the thing without feeling too uncovered, too close.

Except that didn't work.

Not remotely.

Because she'd pressed play and heard her husband's voices, his exact voices, reproduced – those silly, for-children voices, only they were better – there was somebody inside them, running about inside them and finding unexplored lights and fresh corners and a joy they'd never had, never delivered.

Made her cry.

Made her happy.

Didn't make her miss Barry.

Sitting down – couldn't remember dropping to a chair, but she must have done – sitting down and hearing a type of unnecessary beauty being threaded into something of her past – the iron, meanwhile, ignored and tinging, breathing steam – not a chance of her doing anything but listening until the talking stopped.

That was ‘Uncle Shaun and the Living Fish Tree', read by Richard Norland.

His own words those, his personal sound, with the tone of a bedtime story, the idea of lips that were close, next to your ear. Soft as trust. Fearful as trust.

Not that you'd trust some actor you don't know who's good at impersonating a total bastard.

This a sensible time to grab up the iron and harry some pillowcases flat, move on to the sheets. She'd laughed at herself then, for being idiotic, trying to work up a crush based on the speech patterns of a ghost.

Still, the guy was good, you had to admit it – ideal. He'd avoided those sharp little inflections that used to signal how disgusted her husband was by the burden of entertaining children. Mr Norland had greatly improved upon that.

She'd waited another day to watch the
DVD
, partly in case it disappointed – but mainly because she was sure it would not and then where would she be?

Somewhere silly and hormonal
.

A response to bereavement.

Or else somewhere I have never been and might like to go – no preparations, no map.

Because why not?

For once, why not?

There being no reason why not that she could find, she spent the following afternoon with her computer in a dimmer and dimmer living room as the day surrendered into a pewter sheen and then left her and she watched a man plainly demonstrate that being alive was something not everyone did well, or even adequately. On the
DVD
Richard Norland was working without working – something she'd never been able to do, that Barry had never been able to do – Richard had the knack of visibly racing to meet with the best of himself: no caution, no reserve, no need to please – he made himself an indisputable fact.

Lynne had wondered if there was such a thing as a beautiful fact.

She played the
DVD
a number of times.

Once Angela had eaten, done her homework, gone to bed, Lynne had emailed a response to the producers. She assured them, in general terms, that she was pleased Shaun seemed to be in such good hands. She suggested that, should Mr Norland wish, they might get together, discuss things. There would be matters to discuss.

There were days when this seemed insane.

There were days when she was certain this
was
insane.

There were no days when she wasn't going to attempt it – seeing him.

If he wanted to see her.

Which, it turned out, he did.

He sent an email. Formal. Polite. Anachronistically polite.

Perhaps he was pompous, pretended to be intellectual, was an arse.

No harm done if it fell flat, which it was likely to.

But you have to try.

She checked his
CV
a few days before they were due to meet – in case they had something in common she should know about – or to feed the necessary small talk – or to check if he might be likely to be an arse – or to work out that at certain times he was ten years younger than her and at others only nine. A single-figure difference was okay.

Not that she'd been projecting.

She'd been pretending, playing. That was permissible, natural.

Telling myself a bedtime story. Nobody else here to do it.

She'd invited him up to her house. This made sense was logical. She would feel secure in her own home – previously
Barry Westcott's ranch-style country retreat
– and she'd asked Mr Norland to arrive at three thirty so that, should he turn out to be mostly illusory, no more than a bundle of skills, Angela would come in from school before the situation got too awkward and be reason enough to send him packing.

When Richard had appeared – five minutes early and with a pot plant held tight in big-knuckled hands – there was no trace of Barry when he spoke, but also not much of the softness she'd liked in the recording. He'd seemed nervous and was, as might have been hoped, smaller and quieter than he'd been in the audition. He'd worn an ugly brown pullover that she didn't see again and which gave the impression he was slightly thick around the middle.

Actually he is, but only very slightly.

Smoothed-looking face, rounded, with a heavy jaw and those clever eyes – measuring, judging, flickering about – then settling, studying. Lynne had, in their initial hour, a good many opportunities to study him back, because their conversation didn't flow. Eventually, they stared at each other. With no particular interest. Minutes passing limply. Lynne babbled for a while about Barry's career, of all things, and noticed she was inserting the word
obviously
into virtually every sentence.

They peered at each other some more.

They stopped drinking their cold tea.

Angela saved them. Her additional presence edged Richard into grinning, then joking, then talking to the mother through the daughter, to the daughter through the mother, letting everyone hide themselves enough to feel safe.

They decided they'd eat dinner together – might as well, there was enough for three – Lynne still calculated their food for three – and then it was Angela's bedtime and there was also the noise of Richard doing something – from the clatter, probably an unanticipated culinary something, which was slightly alarming – while Lynne was trapped upstairs in going through the evening drill and Angela complained about having to sleep when interesting events might be unfolding.

‘It'll be boring. Grown-up stuff. Business. Yes, it will. Close the eyes and go to sleep, you've got gym tomorrow.'

Down in the kitchen, Richard had been busy. ‘Hi.'

‘I'd thought you were washing up.'

Two dishevelled mugs had been set on the work surface. He'd picked one up and held it out to her, left the handle free and let his fingers suffer the heat. ‘No. I was making cocoa. And more washing-up.' There was a sense of him leaning forward in this and seeing what she would say.

‘Great. I never can get enough washing-up.' She took the mug.

Richard flapped his hand to cool it and stared towards the window and its bluish dark. ‘If you have any we could throw in a dash of brandy, or rum or something and be grown-ups. Or leave it alone and just be kids.'

‘We'll leave it.'

‘Okay.'

They'd wandered through with their childish drinks and sat on the sofa in front of a television with a disconnected aerial.

‘Why don't you sell it, then? Or give it to someone?'

Lynne hadn't answered. She'd been thinking –
he's nothing like a total bastard. That's a promising start
. She was already constructing the ways they might say goodnight. And then halting the construction. And then starting it up.

They parted that night – as she'd predicted several times – with a hug: an initial hesitation and then a firm, slow, unthreatening embrace. She'd realised they were both testing what it meant, prolonging the contact out of caution, rather than desire. There was a tiny change of pressures and emphasis as he said, ‘Thanks. That was a great evening.'

‘No trouble.'

‘We didn't really talk that much about Shaun.'

‘Some other time.'

He'd drawn back at this, held her shoulders with both palms. ‘Okay. You're on. I'll write down some points we should cover and bring them with me.'

‘That'll be fine.'

Their progress had been infinitesimally slow, partly because Richard had been dating someone else and only gradually sabotaging what was left of that relationship by obsessing about Shaun – how would he dress, what would be his best haircut, even making notes towards fresh plot lines. He was also spending regular evenings with Lynne –
Uncle Shaun finding a new lease on life.