by Stuart Evers
‘What’s wrong?’ Robin said as she took her place beside him.
‘Nothing,’ Neka said.
‘You’ve been gone ages.’
‘Bumped into Lucy in the cafe. What did I miss?’
‘Nothing of note,’ he said.
‘You okay?’ he said again.
‘I’m fine,’ she said. ‘Just cold all of a sudden.’
Her mother wouldn’t last without him. There’d be nothing for her to live for, nothing to prop herself up with. Like the wailing women in North Korea, distraught at the death of their beloved leader, but without the hope of a successor.
She should not have apologized though. It was weak to have apologized.
Robin put his arms around her, warming her, rubbing her back. She looked for Femi on the left wing, his hands on his hips, looking around, deciding on position, where to run to. She watched him and not the ball, watched him jog then sprint, challenge for the ball. She hadn’t asked about Nate. The ball came to Femi and he shot it at goal. The keeper saved it, touching the ball over the bar. It missed and she hadn’t asked about Nate. Not one question. Cold again. Cruel.
Wednesday, 7 March 2012
Something by the door, something breathing, human-shaped, but with no scythe in sight, just shallow breath and the sad scrape of a chair, the light dark, and the breath closer, coming to the bed, coming close to him, loud the breath beside him.
‘Hello, Dad,’ it said.
‘Annie,’ he said. ‘Is that you, Annie?’
‘Don’t call me Annie,’ she said.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I forget. I forget you don’t like that name. There’s another name. Another one you don’t like, isn’t there?’
‘Fish,’ she said. ‘You used to call me that, but I didn’t like it.’
‘You were such a good swimmer,’ he said. ‘Like a fish in the water, you were.’
‘Does it hurt?’ she said. ‘Are you in pain, Dad?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It hurts. It’s agony.’
She made a noise, rearranged herself. He couldn’t quite see her, but he could smell her, almost touch her.
‘I knew you’d come back,’ he said. ‘I always knew you’d come back to me.’
‘You knew?’ she said.
‘I said to your mother you’d come back. Eventually. In your own good time. No point in chasing you. No point sending out search parties. You’re my daughter. Stubborn runs through you like Brighton rock.’
He laughed, coughed, a machine blinked.
‘Did you think of me?’ she said.
‘Oh my love, I thought of you every day. Not a day went past when I didn’t think of you. No matter what they’ve done, you always love your children. Even if they’re killers or terrorists, you can’t help but love them. Can’t help but forgive them.’
‘You’re comparing me to a murderer? To a terrorist?’
‘They’re just examples,’ he said. ‘Don’t overreact. It’s the drugs, they make me say things I’m not sure of.’
‘But you forgive me, that’s what you’re saying?’
‘Tell me it wasn’t the making of you.’
‘The making of me?’
‘Yes. Had we come for you, had we marched you home, what would have happened then? Would you have respected that? Would you have been happy? We knew you were with Lissa in Liverpool. We went there and we knew she’d tell you. We gave you an option. But you ignored us. You punished us for nothing. And that was so hard on us, so very hard. But we let you live your life, even though we were not part of it.’
‘So you forgive me?’ she said. She laughed.
‘Why do you laugh?’ he said.
‘You know why,’ she said.
‘You think I should be asking for your forgiveness?’
‘Do you think you should?’
‘You left us,’ he said.
‘You should have believed me,’ she said.
‘What was there to believe?’ he said. ‘You’d done it before, there was no reason to think—’
‘I told you what happened,’ she said. ‘You should have believed me.’
‘So you keep saying,’ he said. ‘But you ran. You defied me.’
‘That’s the crux of it? That I disobeyed you?’
‘I forgive you,’ he said.
She put her head next to his head. He could not see her, but could smell her. His Annie, his little Annie.
‘I forgive you too,’ she said. ‘I just wanted to say that, I just wanted to let you know that you’re right. It made me who I am. And I forgive you. I absolve you.’
‘I’m dying,’ he said.
‘I know,’ she said. ‘I have to go now.’
‘You’ll be back?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Not again. This is the last time.’
‘But you forgive me?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I forgive you.’
‘Now I can die?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes, you can die.’
Friday, 9 March 2012
The medics carry him into the farmhouse, upstairs to the spare room, two of them, though one would be enough to haul his bones. Carter and Daphne are waiting downstairs, Nate is making them tea. This is the last round, the last goodbyes. He gibbers sometimes, sometimes he is lucid. Gwen has never been one for organizing parties, but this has fallen to her, to let each of them have their last time with him. Surrounded by friends and family, what they say in the papers when someone famous dies. Somehow a comfort that, as though softening death; death not so bad when done in good company.
The medics leave and Gwen plumps up the pillows. He feels drool at the corner of his mouth.
‘Bath,’ he says.
‘What?’ she says.
‘Bath,’ he says. ‘I want to go in clean.’
‘Hush now,’ she says. ‘I can’t carry you that far.’
‘A shave?’ he says.
‘I don’t know how,’ she says. ‘Wouldn’t know what to do.’
‘Carter,’ he says. ‘Carter do it?’
She puts her hand on his arm.
‘I’ll ask him,’ she says. ‘Are you comfortable?’
‘She came to me,’ he says. ‘Did I say?’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘You told me she came.’
‘My Annie came back,’ he says. ‘Tell me when she gets here, Gwen. Tell me when she’s here.’
‘I’ll go and get Carter,’ she says.
*
He’s always envied the way Carter shaves, always so neat, so exact, the upward stroke, the downward stroke, watching him of a morning in their berth, the bristles collecting in the small sink.
‘Keep still,’ Carter says. ‘Don’t want to cut you now, do I?’
The blade is warm from the water, it glides along his face, the foam comes off in a thick pile, drops to the water in the bowl below his chin.
The two of them alone again, the two of them old and young, always both. Safe in his hands, always safe in his hands. Safe in each other’s. Ready to catch if they should fall. Feeling small in his arms, Carter towering over, scraping away the beard, saying nothing. Tears in his eyes, wipes his nose on a handkerchief before recommencing the shave.
‘It’s been a good life,’ Drum says. ‘Hasn’t it?’
‘The best,’ Carter says. ‘The best with you in it.’
‘I saw they were cheating you, didn’t I? The skates with their cards.’
‘Yes,’ Carter says, ‘You stood up and you were counted. And you saved me on our One.’
‘We did our best, didn’t we?’
‘Yes, Drum, we did our best. In difficult circumstances, we did our best.’
‘Without you,’ Drum says. ‘Nothing. No life without you.’
‘You would have done fine without me, Drum, don’t you worry there.’
‘Annie came to me,’ he says. ‘Did I say?’
‘Yes,’ he says.
‘We forgave each other.’
‘I’m glad,�
� he says.
‘Can die now,’ he says. ‘Easy to die now.’
‘Well don’t do it yet,’ he says. ‘I’ve not finished the shave. Don’t want you arriving at the pearly gates with foam all over your neck.’
‘You’re always thinking of me,’ Drum says.
‘Always,’ he says. Carter cries then, the real tears, the proper tears, no faking that. No faking them, not those tears, real ones, for love those tears.
‘Don’t die,’ he says. ‘Not now, not here, Drum. Don’t die now.’
‘Not yet, no,’ he says.
‘We always keep our promises, don’t we, Drum. Always keep the promises we make.’
‘Always,’ Drum says. ‘You can depend on me.’
‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Always.’
Carter finishes the shave, wipes the foam from Drum’s face, holds up the mirror so he can see the result. In the mirror there are the two of them. He wants to see their younger faces. He wants to see their hair cut en brosse, their eyes shining. He wants to see them in their uniforms, their lives ahead of them. But he just sees two old men. Two old men, one of whom has shaving foam on his earlobe. They look into the mirror. The two old men look back at them. Caught, the two of them there, in the mirror, in their age, never to be younger, never again to make the choices they made.
*
They are alone, again, for the last time, she knows, alone. Still him. Still not Montgomery Clift, still just Drum. She holds his hand tight, but the hand is slack in hers. She strokes the side of his face, familiar after all the years, altered in the closeness to his passing. She hears the first rattle and can feel it inside her, as though she is dying right there with him.
‘I love you,’ she says. ‘Know that I always loved you.’
‘I love you,’ he says. ‘Know that I always loved you too.’
‘Best thing I ever did,’ his voice is close and weak, but there remains will. Remains the last of fight.
‘What?’ she says.
‘Waking up and seeing you there. In the hunters’ lodge.’
‘A long time ago now,’ she says.
‘That’s how it’ll be,’ he says. ‘I’ll open my eyes and you’ll be there. Looking at me.’
‘Yes,’ she says.
‘I’ll wake and you’ll be there. Always be there.’
‘Yes,’ she says.
There are so many things to say, but she cannot speak. She is alone with her husband in her daughter’s room and he is inching away. Another rattle. Another. Another.
‘Come quickly,’ she says loudly. As loud as she can. They come into the room, all of them. She will not let go the hand. She strokes his arm as though she can revive him. His eyes open and close, open and close. And he smiles, a wide smile with teeth and lips. His eyes open and he looks astonished at what he sees.
*
They are all around him, all of them, he can see them, though they are dim and hazed. They are trying not to cry and he is high on the drugs, away with them, and he sees them all, and can feel the laying on of hands. He can no longer speak. He has tried but they tell him not to speak, just to rest, and that is good advice, he’s happy to receive it, happy to receive what is coming to him, what is starting low in his gut, to the left-hand side, coming up that side, warming that, like hands caressing, how warm and cosy the hands, and Gwen is holding his hand, her cool hand clasped around him, a soft cooing, still her face the most beautiful, his girl, Gwen, you can take the girl from the pub, but not the Gwen from his life, and his son there, Nate, how old he looks now, Natey my boy, the milkers needing fixing, do right by her, Nate, for Molly, Nate, and the warm on the right-hand side now, the warm hands, toasted the hands, and the spangles in his chest and in his arms, like fireworks, and no fear now, no fear of what coming, already coming, the buttons already pressed, already primed the bombs, and he survived did he not, he walked Doom Town and came out the other side, surrounded by friends and family now, surrounded and the sirens inside, the sirens in the stammer of leg and the quiet hurry in the guts and here, never more present, the bombs in the neck, the bombs in the head, and Annie, where Annie, Annie there, somewhere, sure, Annie there, standing at back, crying now, Annie, all the years lost, but all forgiven and all forgotten, and feeling he can hold it back, stave off death, silence the bombs, can hold it off forever, just let it come close, then shut it down, a rehearsal and a drill, that’s all, but the feeling too warm, too drowsy, not wanting it to end, wanting it to be there forever, between states, that glorious slip between waking and sleeping.
Surrounded by friends and family, all the years between them, Carter’s hand on his knee, attending to him as though injured, needing to be taken to the field hospital, and suddenly in Spain at Carter’s house, the warmth of the sun on his face, walking the fields and pastures, a heifer born and a baby in swaddling, her mother screaming, Annie screaming and the rush of it now, the warm and the coming cold, the cold coming over the warm, the pins and needles of the cold, and a catch in the throat, a catch and the cold coming strong, coming thick, coming with spite, the warm gone and the cold blasting and the hands on his hands and the hands on his legs and them all waving, waving goodbye, no, not waving, him waving perhaps, and the light changing, the image of them, like a photograph burning, white the light, white the flame and the blind light coming, the blindest of blind lights, clouding the light, brilliant the light, blind the light, and beautiful as bombs, the light. My God, oh my God, the light.
Wildboarclough
2019
Sunday, 18 August
1
The house was cold stone and silence; no trace of Nate in the empty rooms, presumably out with the cows, the Sunday milking to be done. Neka made herself instant coffee; turned on the radio, turned it off again. The news never-ending, always going on, no matter if listened to or not. She no longer followed the news. To get old was to whittle, to pare life back to essentials. And so little seemed essential. Her son, her husband, her job, the quiet satisfaction of an orderly house, her mind no longer teeming, no longer racing. Leave that to Robin; leave that to Femi.
They talked, the two of them, animatedly, persuasively, of the world around them, the world and its descent. Conversations she was invited to join, but ones she could not in good conscience enter into. She made the right noises; she said the right things, but didn’t feel them the way they did. In those deep, conspiratorial conversations, they became other versions of themselves, no less true, no less real, but altered, as though they were the superheroes Femi worshipped as a child, the two of them living double identities, neither guise the full story.
There had been a reawakening in Robin, a resurgence of the activism, the anger, even some of the language of their early days together. It was thrilling, magnetic, exhausting. He had lost weight, gained momentum, began receiving death threats on social media.
‘Everyone gets them,’ he’d said. ‘Makes you nostalgic for when death threats actually meant something. The letters cut out of newspapers and all that.’
He was happy-angry, delighted-dismayed, optimistic-livid. But unlike before, back before they were married, lovers even, he did not mention the fact of her skin. Decades together, she’d seen it close at hand, he said, which gave her ‘insight’. She did not feel insightful, though; she just felt swept into a battle she thought long-ago won.
This for him, and this for Femi. The whole thing, for them. What she told herself. What she told Robin. Femi would be the first of his family, the first of hers, to go to university. He’d been pushed for Oxford, pushed for Cambridge, but fancied neither. Not real enough. Not real the worst of all insults. Off to Manchester for now. London, he promised, for later.
She listened to him with his friends, the words she didn’t understand; their alien argot. At home though, he was the same little boy, grown big, grown gangly, grown hairs on chest, on legs, on cheek, but still the same delighted boy, the same longed-for child. It had been hard not to spoil him, hard not to express to him ever
y day how the world seemed to be waiting for him. Hard not to smile when, as a younger teen, he’d shouted he wished he’d never been born, as the ghosts of his dead and unborn siblings laughed at him.
She called home, sipped her coffee, waited for Robin to pick up. He’d wanted to come. He’d demanded to come, at least in his own little way.
‘We could make a weekend of it,’ he’d said over a pub lunch. ‘We don’t even need to drive. We could stay in a hotel. There must be nice hotels there.’
In bed, the television on: ‘You don’t know him, not really. Wouldn’t you feel safer if I were there?’
The previous morning, the last of it. Sitting at the kitchen table, the car key pushed between his middle and ring fingers, the way she’d once held door keys while walking home. She’d heard what he’d said, but had not listened. It was his final appeal.
He was going over the hotel options again. From the iPad he read the names of places they could visit, the places they could stay: spas and lodges; old staging posts and thatched-roof inns. She did not recognize any of them.
She disconnected her charging phone and put it in her handbag. Their coffee mugs were still on the table, the crusts from his toast scattered on top of two stacked plates. A normal, lazy weekend morning, late waking, Femi still in bed, and soon to drive to the supermarket, to start on the garden, to visit family.
‘Look, here’s one,’ he said. ‘Pool and a spa, a few miles from your brother’s.’
She didn’t look at the screen. She put her hand on his shoulder and lightly kissed his cheek.
‘I told you,’ she said. ‘Nate said to come alone.’
‘He wouldn’t need to know. Look, it’s got a golf course,’ he said.
‘You hate golf.’
At this he smiled. Then didn’t. The dark under his eyes. The slight bloodshot to their whites, the creeping hoods of his eyelids. She saw the frustration he failed to conceal, his quick movements and swallowed annoyances. Her brother had not told her to come alone; Nate lacked the wit to have even suggested it. It was an easy deception, simple to execute after years of Robin believing he knew when she was lying.