Gifts
Four Poignant Stories
By
Jonathan Broughton
Copyright 2012 by Jonathan Broughton
Cover design: Rayne Hall
Photo: Mindfreak-KiD
Three-Ply Fantasy Special
I wish I could knit starlight into wool. Sitting at my window I see, high above the burnt out remains of Hastings Pier, a sky full of stars; and I knit and I watch and I wonder.
Stars; Three-Ply Fantasy Special, two, with six points at random, one on each shoulder and the cuffs to finish in single rib.
“Oh no dad, not another one.”
I didn’t hear Melissa come in. I jump at the sound of her voice like a naughty boy.
“You’ve knitted Alice five already. And why are you sitting in the dark?” She hits the light switch and the stars vanish.
There I am in the window’s reflection, in my cream coloured high-backed chair, a ball of Three-Ply Fantasy Special in my lap, size three needles, white ones, and an almost completed knitted child’s cardigan in my hands.
Behind me is my lounge, painted in primrose yellow, in this modern block of flats called Waverley Court. Lounge; a grand word for a room the size of a large bathroom.
Three plastic boxes, piled one on top of the other, fill the right hand corner. I’m moving tomorrow. Why does my face, sagged and wrinkled, look so unfamiliar? I don’t feel withered, so why do I look it?
“This is crazy dad. Alice is never going to wear them.”
They weren’t right, that’s why. This one is going to be the right one.
“She’s growing fast. You know? The way children do.”
She’s beside me, shouting in my ear. I’m not deaf. I don’t talk, but my hearing’s fine. Mum was deaf. She shouted at her. She thinks deafness and muteness are the same thing, and daftness.
“This is daft.”
Her long hair brushes my face. Sickly smell, coconut I think. It’s loose today, strange colour too. Dark red flecked with copper. It used to be black, like mums’, and so thick that it shone in the sunlight. She’s wearing her white plastic mac, the one with the silver buckles. It creaks when she moves.
“You need to think about tomorrow dad.”
She’s crouching now, looking up into my face, her purple-painted lips pressed into a thin tight line. That little face that I once loved so much has disappeared, pushed aside by anger.
It happened when mum died. I started knitting and she started complaining and I stopped talking. Why shouldn’t I knit? Mum taught me when arthritis forced her hands into strange shapes, and I cheered her up by having a go. Mum chose the wools, picked out the patterns, and instructed me in my first clumsy attempts with the needles. She loved it that I learnt so fast. Now, it’s a comfort to me.
“Put that down and listen to me. Have you got everything packed?”
I don’t know. I haven’t packed anything because you wouldn’t let me. You decided what I could and couldn’t take. You decided what you thought I needed.
“You mustn’t leave anything behind. Think dad.” She’s standing up and reaching into her mac pocket. “The removal men will be here at eight tomorrow. That’s early, so you’ve got to be ready.”
She thrusts a piece of paper in front of me, hitting the needles with her hand and making me falter. But I do not drop a stitch.
“I’ve printed out some labels for the boxes. See?”
The paper is covered with small squares, each one filled with two lines of thick black print.
Mr. Harold King
c/o Castlemaine Care Home
“I’ll stick them on. I’ll do it now.”
Three boxes, such a small number for eighty one years of life; clothes, wools and needles, three ornaments, two pictures and a plastic fern. The plastic fern will ‘brighten up my room,’ Melissa says; my room, my one room with a bed and a basin and a wardrobe. Where will the plastic fern go? I want to leave it here, a welcome gift for the new people.
Mum would have done that. My wife, my Nellie, she’s on one of the pictures, sitting on the beach with me and Melissa, smiling fit to burst. It’s as if that time never existed.
“There: all done, just your wash-things to pack in the morning. I’ll make a cup of tea. Do you want one?”
I nod. Melissa strides into the kitchen, and I push myself out of my chair and switch off the light.
My eyes take time adjusting to the gloom, and I look up and I wait; one, twenty, a hundred. The stars are shining so bright tonight that I think I can see their light reflected in the water.
One star, low on the horizon pulses, rapid and constant, neither white nor silver, though it might be both. I stroke the knitted star with my fingers and wish that I have done it right.
It’s there, in the wool, the Three-Ply Fantasy Special has come up trumps. That single silver strand, interlaced with the shiny black one and the pearl grey, shines in the dark like starlight. I sigh and smile at the stars. How long have you been there? How long will you be there?
“Oh for goodness sakes dad, leave the light ON! What’s the matter with you?”
The sudden brightness is like lightning and makes me blink. She’s beside me, hands on hips, legs apart, her mac flapping open. Tight black jeans and a pink top is today’s outfit; glitter writing in silver letters scrawls across her bosom. I think it says “Hot Bitch,” but it’s difficult to read when she’s moving about.
“And you’re out of milk. I shall have to go and get some or you won’t have any for breakfast tomorrow. You must have seen you were low. Dad? You’re not blind you know.”
Her rising voice frightens me.
“It’s a bloody good job you are going into a Home. You’re impossible.” She’s bunching up her fists. Please don’t hit me.
“Bloody senile dementia; I promised Steve I’d be back by now. He can’t look after Alice all evening while I’m running around after you.”
She storms out of the room and talks at me from the hallway.
“It’s not fair dad. You hear? No sodding consideration. I’m taking the change out of your jacket pocket.”
I wanted that to tip the removal men. The front door slams. I push myself out of my chair and switch off the light.
Melissa hasn’t hit me. Not once. Not yet. But sometimes I think she might. She hates what I have become; an old man who knits. She can’t understand it. She wants a dad with friends who goes out on coach outings to Battle Abbey and Beachy Head. All jolly pensioners together and a nice plate of fish and chips to finish off the day.
Once, she took me to A&E at Conquest Hospital, telling the doctors I’d had a stroke and couldn’t speak. There was nothing wrong. Depression they said, after mum died, grief hits people in all sorts of ways, gave me some pills and sent me home. I flushed them down the toilet. I do talk, to mum, in my head, when I’m knitting.
Stitch, yarn over. The last star is almost complete. Just two more points to go.
I haven’t any money now, at all. Melissa’s sold the flat to pay for the Home. She collects my pension too. The walk from the Home to the Post Office will be ‘more than I can manage.’ I wouldn’t be safe. She’ll bring it over when she visits. And if it’s a bit late, well it won’t matter. It’s not as if I’m going to need anything, she says.
There’s the door. One more look at the stars. I’m working fast, the needles gliding across my fingers as I feed the wool into the final point of the last star.
“Jesus Christ.”
The light bangs on. She’s in front of me, blocking out my reflection in the window.
“I’m going now. Steve will be furious with me.”
The new man, I haven’t met him.
Yarn over, cast off. It’s finished, beautiful. I hold it up for Melissa to see. Look
, a deep cobalt blue for the body with two silver stars on the shoulders, their points reaching down at the front and back. The cuffs finished in silver too, complementing the stars.
“I suppose you want me to take that?”
I have a bag ready behind my cushion.
“Oh give it here.”
She snatches the bag and stuffs the cardigan inside. “Bloody ridiculous; she’s not going to wear it.”
She will love this one. It is perfect.
“I’m not coming to see you tomorrow. Give you a chance to settle in. I’ve left the milk in the fridge. Bye.” She drums the top of my head with her bright red fingernails and goes, slamming the door behind her.
I push myself out of my chair and switch off the light.
I feel tired but happy. I did well mum; that was my best yet. You would have been so proud.
There’s Melissa below me, crossing the road, walking home along the front towards St. Leonards, the bag swinging at her side.
Alice will love it. I know she will. She’s so pretty. I have a picture of her too, packed away in the boxes; her sweet face smiling out at me, her blonde hair blowing in the wind. Her father’s colouring I expect; whoever he is. I haven’t seen her for a long time. Melissa doesn’t bring her anymore.
She’s striding along beside the railings now, swinging the bag as she walks, backwards and forwards; each swing higher than the one before. And, on an upward swing, she let’s go, sending the bag over the railings and into the sea.
She doesn’t look to see what she has done. She must know that I am watching. She keeps on walking, and I lose sight of her in the dark.
I gaze at the stars. Some big, some small, all shining. Yes mum, it is sad. What’s happened to our daughter? Would you know if you were here? I wish you could have seen that cardigan.
But now, in time, it will rot, the wool unravel, the fibres disintegrate. Perhaps that silver strand will shimmer, even in the cold sea, and the stars will catch its light and make it sparkle. Like stardust.
Stars and Stripes
The front door slammed.
Oliver punched the air, leapt onto the sofa, and snatched up his game pad. Mum and Uncle Tim had left. At last!
The Playstation 3 purred next to the TV. On the screen, in big metal letters licked by flames, the title burned: “Beachhead: Hell’s Kitchen.”
He felt for the earplugs in his jeans pocket. He would need them when the fireworks went off outside.
He scrolled through ‘Saved Games’ until he reached ‘Salvation.’
GIs trapped in a bombed church. Commander Oliver (that was him), and his crack squad of six marines had ten minutes to rescue the Americans before Panzer tanks levelled the church to dust.
This was his third attempt. He checked the volume, zero. It doubled the game’s difficulty, but he hated the explosions, the crack of rifle fire; the pumping heartbeat as the edges of the screen turned red. A sure sign that he was about to die–again. The random noise made him shake, rendering concentration and action impossible. It was why he hated fireworks.
He reasoned that Commander Oliver was deaf, a palliative for his own fear, making the successful achievements of his fictional self even more remarkable.
He pressed “Play,” and the screen faded to black.
Bump.
What was that? Had mum and Uncle Tim returned? He listened for voices, but heard none.
The screen smouldered in red and orange fire. Grey smoke drifted towards him. It thinned, revealing the ruined street and the derelict church in the distance.
Then, crack, like wood snapping. He spun round. Something had broken; inside the wall? He couldn’t see anything. Was an SFX pitched so low on his game that it registered even with the volume at zero? Had the fireworks started early? He reached for the earplugs.
Then a long loud squeak, echoed down from the landing. He dropped the game pad, his palms prickling with sweat. He knew that squeak. He knew the floorboard that made it; the one just outside the bathroom door. Somebody was upstairs. He swallowed.
Other sounds filtered through the house. Laughter, as people passed the front window, the shrieks of excited children.
The screen pulsed red. He had failed –AGAIN.
His mobile was in his shirt pocket. Uncle Tim would answer in seconds; he would be back in minutes. But what would he say? That a fourteen year old was scared of funny noises in an old house? What a wimp!
He left the phone in his pocket, slowly stood up and crept to the living room door, where he stopped and listened. His shallow breathing was the only sound. He tip toed to the foot of the stairs and peered up; pictures on the wall, cluttered ornaments on the steps, nothing amiss.
He began to climb, scanning the landing as it emerged in front of him. The bathroom door shut, as always, the bedroom doors open. The steel ladder angled against the loft door leading up to the attic.
His eyes ached from staring so hard. What a plonker! Frightened of his shadow?
But - had something landed on the roof?
“There’s a breeze off the sea. Sparks from the bonfire will blow over the Old Town,” Uncle Tim had explained. “I’ll put a bucket of water up there, just in case.”
If anything happened, Tim expected him to sort it out.
Oliver picked the torch up from the landing window and aimed the beam at the top of the ladder. He clasped hold of the cold aluminium.
One foot, then the other, as Tim had shown him, securing his balance on each rung before he moved on. The ladder creaked with every step.
His head cleared the attic floor and cold air encased his warm face. The fug of stale dust tickled his nose. He levelled the torch in line with his shoulders.
Thick piles of insulation rolled in static mounds across the floor, and ancient cobwebs looped from the rafters.
He wound his arm round a sturdy beam and stepped off the ladder onto a square of MDF.
Shadows zig-zagged in the torch light.
There was nothing unusual, nothing out of place. Against the brick wall, that separated Tim’s house from his neighbour’s, stood a pair of stepladders.
“Use these to climb out. But only if you have to,” Tim had cautioned. “You can see the roof by opening the trapdoor.”
Oliver put down the torch. The top of his head cleared the sloping roof by centimetres. He reached up, feeling for the bolts to release the trap. Tim had oiled them and they moved easily, but they left his fingers feeling greasy. He released the door and it swung back on its hinges.
The intense cold blew in with the night air and gave him goose bumps.
The splattered remains of seagull droppings glowed phosphorescent white across the roof. The orange bucket stood where Tim had left it and the dark water reflected the stars on its still surface.
No sign of any stray sparks, but better check once more, just to be on the safe side, and he bent down for the torch.
A cold hand brushed lightly across his back.
“No!”
Oliver fell forwards, twisted, and sat down all at the same time. His body tingled with fear. He grabbed the torch and thrust it forward, slicing the beam from side to side, like a light sabre.
Shadows jumped, growing and shrinking in rapid succession. The cobwebs nearest the trap trembled in the draught.
No sign of any intruder, but the reality of that touch had been so real, so cold.
He shone the torch into the farthest corner of the attic, where the insulation banked against the stone wall, like a wave about to break.
There was something odd. The shadow from the insulation filled the wall right up to the roof but, behind it, was a second shadow, like a figure crouching.
His hand shook and the torch beam shuddered. “Who’s there?” he squeaked. “Who’s there?” Louder that time, more confident, like Tim.
The shadow bent lower.
“Come out. I can see you.” He felt sick. “I’m calling the police.” His hand went to his breast pocket.
�
��Don’t hurt me.”
He froze. The voice was thin and high. Male, he thought, and with an accent that he recognised from his game; American.
The shadow shifted, its movements unclear, suggesting that its form, when it settled, might be human.
Oliver swallowed, “C-come out.”
“I can’t see. Please turn the light off. It hurts my eyes.”
He wrenched the phone out of his pocket. It slipped out of his sweaty hand, bounced against the ladder with a loud clang, and smashed onto the landings’ wooden floor.
His body jolted, as if charged with electricity, and the torch light jumped.
“Don’t-don’t tell me what to do,” his teeth chattered. “I’m calling the police.” Tim had a phone in his bedroom.
“All right.”
What? It was all right for him to call the police? His fear wavered, wrong footed by this unexpected reply. He took hold of the torch with both hands to stop the shaking.
“I-I want you to come out from there,” his voice cracked and he took a deep breath. “Now.” That was better, more threatening.
The figure shifted in its odd shapeless way, but failed to emerge. “I’m hurt.”
“What do you mean hurt?”
“I’m waiting to be rescued.”
“Rescued?” This was crazy. “You’re trespassing in my Uncle’s house.” That was good, full of authority.
“Please turn the light off.”
His legs shook. Dare he risk lowering his guard? What would Tim do?
“Ok-look -,” he could take control, he had to. “I’ll shine the torch over your head. You stand up really slowly, right?”
“Yes sir.”
Sir? Yeah, respect, that was good. “And no funny business, understand?”
“I understand.”
He gripped the torch with his right hand and took hold of the ladder with his left. Then he lifted the beam until the circle of light cleared the insulation and shone directly onto the wall.
“OK. Come out.”
The figure rose, or flowed, like rising water.
Oliver’s chest tightened. Terror mounted, but he quelled it. The odd movement was just a trick of the light, or his nerves.
Gifts Page 1