by Kate Bradley
I lift the covers.
seventy-four:
– now –
I can’t believe it: Jack is here, curled foetus-like, in his pyjamas, around his favourite bunny. Is he all right?
I reach out, knowing my hand is shaking, and hear the front door slam and think: Nick has found his keys.
I touch Jack’s shoulder and . . . he’s breathing. Thank you, God. Thank you, God. Thank you, God.
I hear Nick’s feet on the drive. I lean close, breathing Jack’s still almost-baby smell. I want to gaze at him, drink him in, soak in his safety and nearness.
I hear the squelch of Nick’s car alarm answering the key fob.
I cross to the little lead-latticed window and quickly unlatch it, pushing it open just as the car door slams. I want to call down to him and let him know Jack is fine, but he’s too fast. His lights turn on, and with a roar, he’s away.
He doesn’t normally drive fast – he’s worried. Something our son has said has upset him. I gaze into the darkness, watching his red tail lights until they suddenly vanish as he turns a corner.
I wait, expecting . . . I’m not sure what. I enjoy the feeling of the night air on my face and wait for something to change – the phone to ring, the sound of Nick’s car returning. Where is my son? But the minutes pass and nothing. I continue to wait, tired, exhausted, unable to go and do anything. I’m very hungry and my wrists need attention, but all that can wait. My brain is mush with the spent emotion of my evening. I’m trying to figure it all out.
This can’t be the end – there can’t be all of this and now . . . nothing.
Somewhere, abruptly, a firework goes up into the night sky. It’s early – it’s not the fifth of November for nearly two weeks. The colours are bold, brilliant. The pop-pop-pop is loud and I lean out to shut the window against the noise in case it wakes Jack. As the burst of light catches the glass, I can see that the heat in the room has caused condensation to mist on it.
And there it is: in the light of the fireworks and the damp of the condensation, is the answer to my questions. Written in the opaque damp is a short message to me.
One letter in each diamond.
I M S T I L L H E R E
seventy-five:
– now –
He’s sitting at the kitchen table, my son. His back is to me, his shoulders broad in a leather jacket that looks expensive. His hair is very short – I never think of him with short hair, it looks neat, tidy. He turns his head: ‘Lisa! And here you are!’ He sounds friendly, but I don’t trust it. He doesn’t look at me, not properly. I think some people could spend years in the company of my son and not realise that he only pretends to look at you – that he does all the right actions without actually making eye contact. But I see it because I see him.
He smiles at me over the top of a glass – just like his dad, he’s drinking my whisky. ‘Glad you’re not crouching in the stairway now. Must’ve been uncomfortable for you, earlier, hiding like that from me as I went to the bathroom. Sorry about that – I heard you coming up the stairs – but when you’ve gotta pee, you’ve gotta pee.’
I pause in the doorway, shocked. I can’t breathe. But not from surprise that he saw me before, cowering and afraid and yet said nothing – that’s just so Jack – but because what shines through is love: I’ve missed him so much.
My son.
Love is amazing: how it endures even through the duress of such wanton destruction. It seems even fire doesn’t turn it to ash, but instead melds into something tougher, more enduring. I could’ve never believed it possible. I think of my mum, what she would say if she knew I still loved my son despite what he did to her, what he did to the residents of Sunningdale. Regardless of what Nick says, I still believe my truth. And I believe that she would just love him anyway – my mother was full of love. She loved being his Nana.
‘Why didn’t you say something if you saw me there?’
‘None of my business if you want to creep round your own home. Besides, I was being a good boy. Dad told me to leave you alone, so I did.’ He pats the table as if he wants me to sit. ‘I’d would’ve poured you a glass, but it’s not your poison, is it, Lisa?’
I keep my hand on the door; my escape hatch. Like I could leave if I wanted to.
‘Come on, come and sit down.’ He grins. ‘No point hanging around like you’re going to leg it across the fields again. Although ten out of ten for effort that you did it in your socks.’ He looks me up and down. ‘No offence, but you look like you need a rest, now.’
‘What did you do with my shoes?’
‘They’re just neat and tidy in the bottom of your wardrobe. No drama.’
I pull the chair back; it scrapes loudly against the slate tiles and without thinking, I glance upstairs, always on the lookout for waking Jack.
He wrinkles a lip: ‘Don’t worry about him – he couldn’t wake if I exploded a bomb.’
Suddenly I understand: ‘What did you do to him?’
His face turns towards me suddenly – again that pretence of face and near eye contact without the real thing: ‘Only what you did to me.’
I press my fingertips against the wood grain as if it will suppress the scream building in me: ‘How dare you. What did you use?’
‘Relax Lisa, nothing of yours. But cut the indignant crap: you used to drug me all the time.’
‘I didn’t – how can you say such things?’
‘Now, now Lisa. Is that really true? Or is that just one of the lies you tell yourself so you don’t have to engage with what a shit mother you’ve been?’ His handsome face twists to a sneer. ‘To me anyway. Of course you’re Mother of the Year to Jack.’
There’s too much to react to; I just blink, exhausted.
‘Would you,’ he says, mimicking my voice now, ‘like your Sleepy now, dear? It’s soooo yummy!’
It sounds grotesque coming from him.
‘It was only a child’s antihistamine, I gave you,’ I tell him. ‘It was just a difficult situation and I admit, I struggled to cope. If I didn’t give it to you, you would become really difficult visiting Nana. You were very challenging.’
‘Well, if you will take a little kid into a terrifying prison, what do you expect?.’
‘It was Nana! She wanted to see you and we had no idea when or even if, she was ever going to get out, so what was I supposed to do? Leave you at home on your own? Your father never changed his shifts or his golf or anything else he wanted to do, for me.’
He laughs.
Something in me simply shatters. I jump up out of my chair and grip my son by his shoulders. I want to shake him, punish him, but it’s like shaking a boulder. I want to hit him and kiss him and hurt him and love him. I still – regardless of what Nick’s told me – think he killed her, but it seems that what I feel for him is indestructible. It’s hard; it’s confusing; it’s painful. I collapse into a boxing clinch; leaning and struggling against him. ‘Did you kill her?’ I finally gasp into his shoulder. ‘I have to know. Please, please tell me the truth.’
I have spent the whole of the last year mourning – I don’t think I will ever get over the loss of her.
He lets me rest for a minute but then takes me by my elbows and says: ‘I didn’t kill Nana on purpose, if that’s what you’re so pissed off about.’
I am crying and crying and crying now and I just don’t think I can get my voice back. I’m not sure how long this goes on, but then I do finally sit down. ‘Tell me what happened,’ I finally say.
He shrugs – urgh – I hate even that casual movement of his, as if my mother’s death is a casual thing.
‘I went to see her and she smelt smoke and petrol on me and asked me why. When I told her, she went mad and had a heart attack. Not my fault.’
‘You told her about Sunningdale?’
‘She asked.’
I want to ask about Sunningdale: Why? How? I want to ask about Jack. But most of all, I want to know about my mum. ‘Did she suffer?�
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‘It looked painful.’
I start crying again. ‘Did you help her?’
‘I don’t know how to do CPR.’
‘So you just watched her die?’
‘Look, Lisa, Nana was always good to me. She walked herself into that grave by having a go at me, but I didn’t want her to die.’
‘Then why were you there?’
He shrugged: ‘I thought you would turn up with Jack. I expect you did, but I wasn’t going to hang around with her being dead.’
‘And Sunningdale? Why?’
He lights a cigarette and shakes his head. ‘You know why.’
‘No, I don’t know why you would do that. I actually have no idea.’
‘Because you took Jack.’ He blows the smoke out slowly. ‘You pissed me off, so I thought I’d piss you off.’
I feel I could lose it. Properly lose my mind. I see their faces: Gladys Silsbury; Rose Nuttel; Maureen Squires. Dead. Killed by him. ‘You were in the crowds that night, weren’t you? You were watching me as the place burned?’ How my voice sounds so even, I will never know.
He reaches around and locates a saucer. He flicks his ash neatly into it. I should’ve guessed when I saw his flat that there was a particular reason for the mess – of course there was a puppy. My son has always been meticulous with his things.
‘When I saw your face, mother dearest, it was worth it.’
At his confirmation, I realise I can’t give up on Jack upstairs – I have to try to get him away from this man. I press my feet against the floor to steady myself. I have to focus on saving my grandson. This is a dangerous situation and I need to be clever about it. ‘Thank you for telling me. And about Nana too.’ I’m satisfied with how calm I sound. It gives me the strength to continue. ‘She would be glad you’ve been honest with me. I think I will have that drink, now, please,’ I say, buying for time. I drink my water and substitute it for a double of whisky. I wonder where he put my phone. ‘Top-up?’ I ask him, holding the bottle up. I want him to see I’m shaking – he always liked it when I was scared and I know it’ll put him at ease.
His mouth flickers with a rare smile, says, ‘Lisa, you always crack me up,’ but he drains his glass and holds it out for me to fill.
I know I shouldn’t be drinking with him, but I don’t care. Yes, I need to buy time to plan what I’m going to do next, but it’s more than that. Deep in my marrow I think I might not see him again after tonight. Something in the way it has all come together makes me feel this wildness, this craziness, cannot continue.
The thought gives me courage to drag my gaze over his face: he has suffered a broken nose, I think, since I’ve seen him, but perhaps he’s filled out a little too; and I’m glad – he looks better for it. He’s gained a maturity I’ve not seen before. I want to ask him about his job, about his life, but he wouldn’t tell me if I did. I want to put my hand over his large knuckled one – I so want to touch him and tell him I love him. My baby, my sweet, difficult, tormented baby.
‘I do wish you wouldn’t keep crying, Lisa.’
I swipe away the tears, not even aware that I had started again. ‘Who says I’m crying?’ I try to smile through the ache in my throat and the diamonds in my eyes. Despite the initial horror, it actually feels like a relief to have the truth from him. And to realise I’m not mad. But it’s even more than that: I’ve missed him so much. It’s almost as if this time without him was just marking time until this moment.
Even when he was a little boy, after he killed Winston, I would try to hold him, worried that one day he’d pick a fight he wouldn’t win, and that I’d find out, many years after the event, that he died in a terrible way. But here he is and it hasn’t happened. Not yet.
Sitting across from him, I want to speed this up so he’s gone far away from Jack, but at the same time, I want to revel in his company, be close to him while I still can, before we say a final goodbye.
I remind myself to stick to my new game-plan-that-isn’t-yet-a-plan. I need to start with finding my phone. I change the way I’m sitting, hoping to spot it, but suspect it’s in my wardrobe with my shoes. ‘You rang your dad – he tore out of here worried about you.’
He only raises an eyebrow as if he’s learnt something new. ‘You want something – I could always tell when you want something, Lisa.’
‘I do want something.’ Oh, so very much. ‘Tell me the truth, please, because I have to know. I know I’ve disappointed you, but tell me that you do know, because it’s so very important to me, that you know—’
‘Spit it out.’
‘I just want to know if you knew that I always lo—’
‘Loved me?’
He draws on his cigarette and blows out slowly. ‘I don’t know why you have to assume that everything is about you. Bit of a narcissist, aren’t you, Lisa?’
‘No!’
‘Ha! Always so easy to wind up.’ He drums his fingers briefly against the table and checks the wall clock. ‘Is that the right time?’
‘Yes.’ I wonder why he wants to know: I wish I knew how this will end. Perhaps I asked this question because he reaches out and grips my wrist. Hard. Oh, how quickly we revert to the old days. I think I might even tell him he’s hurting me, just to reminisce. That’s all it would be because it certainly wouldn’t make him stop – it never did.
Then I look at his hand, consider what he’s just said, think of the speed in which Nick sped off. ‘What did you do, Jack? Where is your dad?’
He lets go of me. ‘He’s on an errand.’
Now that he’s here, I’ve got the perfect opportunity to talk to him. To buy time until I can figure something out – some way of saving Jack from him – but also because I suspect I might never get another opportunity to try to get answers for the thousand questions I have about my son. ‘Now it’s just us, maybe we could talk a little more. Perhaps we could be honest about a few more things.’
‘Like what?’
‘I just want to know where we all went wrong for us.’
‘Do you mean why I’m different?’
I’m surprised – I’ve never heard him acknowledge that he’s different before. I wasn’t even sure that he knew. I’m not sure if it’s a trap. I play safe and raise one eyebrow: ‘Different from . . .?’
‘Oh, don’t pretend. Or is this your way of being tactful?’
I don’t say anything.
‘Let me help you out. You’re wondering why I just don’t really care about anyone? You’re wondering if it’s something you’ve done. Oh!’ he says, raising his voice to mimic me again. ‘Oh! Are you all right? Poor little Jack! Poor baby! But don’t mind me while I –’ his face twists in fury and his voice drops an octave – ‘while I drift into a drug-induced haze for a few hours and leave you all alone with nothing to do and no one to play with!’
I hold my breath. I’m scared of him, but I’m even more scared of the truth being reviewed like this. I thought I wanted honesty.
‘But you don’t want to hear that, do you? I’ll tell you instead that it was fine; you were fine. It was all fine. I just don’t care. I never have.’
I’m so overwhelmed, stunned that he knows there’s something wrong with him; gobsmacked that he knows I care about him; sickeningly ashamed that my drug abuse affected him when I’d been so careful to kid myself they were only ‘naps’. ‘I know you don’t care about me . . .’ Pathetically I pause, hoping – still – that he’ll frown and say: No, I care about you, Mum. When he doesn’t, I feel almost amused that I am still so sad about this.
Then it occurs: ‘But you must care about one person – you must care about your son. Otherwise, why did you try to kill me to get him back?’ I say, checking over my shoulder to check he’s not standing in the doorway, listening.
‘I didn’t try to kill you – if I’d wanted to, I would’ve. If you got a whack on the head, though, that’s your fault – you deserved it, stealing him from me.’ He gives me a sly look. ‘But don’t believe that
guff I fed Dad. I was one step ahead of you the whole time. That day you took Jack, I got your text saying you were coming round. I was expecting you. Let’s be honest, it was only a matter of time before you’d weaken and come snooping, but I knew, even before I got your message, that you were coming on that day. That’s why I set you up with the whole Jack-in-the-puppy-cage thing.’
I stunned with the truth. That I was right all along. ‘How did you know?’
‘Simple. Jack was adamant that he’d put his spelling book in his bag. He’s a very sensible lad, so I believed him. If he said he did, then he did.’ His grin deepened. ‘Which means you had to have removed it from his bag as you followed us after school, back to mine. And you would’ve only done that for one reason.’
I’m speechless. Finally, I say: ‘You were behind your bedroom door.’
He laughs a little and lights another cigarette from the dying embers of his first.
‘But why let me take him if you didn’t want me to?’
‘Because I did want you to. I never wanted Jack. I just wanted to piss you off.’
‘No,’ I say slowly. ‘That’s not true. You make it sound like you don’t care about your own son.’
‘Can’t think where I get that from.’
I ignore the dig. ‘No, I just don’t believe it. I’ve watched you both together; all those times I’ve followed you home from the school pick-up, hand-in-hand. I’ve seen the way you both look at each other. You don’t just fake that.’ I stare into his face, wanting – needing – to see something. Some hint that I’m right. When I don’t see anything, I push again. ‘All that effort of getting a flat near the school, reeling Jack in, he’s only young, you wouldn’t do that. You might want to hurt me, but you’re not so cruel you’d do that to a little boy, your own son.’
He just smokes and watches me.
‘And all that you told Dad, you just said all that stuff to what, piss me off?’
‘And him. He’s no better. He abandoned us, I seem to remember, when I was only five.’