Adults

by Emma Jane Unsworth

  ‘Should have got Linda to do us a carry-out,’ my mother says.

  I look at the almost-bare trees. The last leaves flutter in the wind. I’m not normally an alfresco person but I think you can occasionally commune with nature if the conditions are right and you’re miserable enough. I’ve had a few ‘moments’ with rats, foxes and squirrels: eye contact, each other’s focus for a brief second. I even had a mini-thing with a Canada goose once, but I think it was possibly brain-damaged.

  Straight after our moment it flew into a railing.

  When we get home, she runs me a bath. Blobs of lavender and rose oil bob around the top. I sit and try to let my body soften in the water but then a big gob of period comes out. I watch it unfurl between my legs, like a brown fern. It turns the whole bath brackish.

  My body feels like a city I have been defending vaguely, and selling off, piece by piece. I remember the first bra I wore – triangular and stiff – the first chunks of me portioned up into shapes to be sold. I was rainforest, razed for cattle. There’s a block of new luxury flats just behind my right ear. The boundaries of myself depress me because they are meaningless. I’m ravaged inside. I have been invaded by a Trojan horse full of Time.

  After my bath I head downstairs. My mother is in the kitchen drinking her nightly eggnog that she swears by for strengthening her already strong voice (a green smoothie every morning to regenerate her liver). She sings a sudden line of Billy Joel and I am reminded of how she does this in her own kitchen – in our old kitchen – to ‘soften the atmosphere and dispel the spirits’.

  ‘Want one?’

  I shake my head.

  She pulls a box of melba toast out of the cupboard, extracts one piece and spreads it thinly with extra-light cream cheese. I watch her as I breathe.

  ‘Do you not have it up anywhere?’ she says. ‘That picture of you and the roses?’

  ‘No. It has nothing to do with me any more really, that.’

  I don’t even know where it is. I think he must have taken it with him. It was his photo, after all. I was in it – or rather, my body was in it, but now I think if I saw it I’d feel more than I meant to.

  ‘How’s Art’s mum? What’s her name, Deborah? What does she think about it?’

  ‘We exchanged brief texts, all the best and whatnot, you know. I don’t really know. I feel like it’s not really my business any more, is it?’

  My mother raises her eyebrows and bites her toast.

  I ADORED

  Art’s mother. She was splendid – stately and sharp, in her tiny flat by the water in Glasgow. Her name was Deborah (Deborah) (it did, actually, suit her) but everyone called her Debs. My mind often returns even now to those Friday nights when we caught the sleeper train to her place. The duck pond. The red bricks. The hallway tiled with tasteful art. I’d walk through the dappled lounge out to the veranda and she’d rise from her sunbed, warm and musky, and pull me close with such a sweetness I felt as though she was my daughter – that was the level of delight. When she cooked for us – invariably a roast chicken – all the condiments came out: mustard, horseradish, peanut butter, mango chutney, the lot. She was like that. Generous. I got to a point where I was scared of saying I liked anything in case she gave it to me. One time she packed me off with a thin, sinister wooden statue of the Virgin Mary (I thought it was a decorative shoehorn!), Art rolling his eyes as I trotted dutifully out of the door with it in my hand. I still had that, somewhere, in a shoebox, along with a silver St Gerard pendant she gave me when we said we were trying.

  DRAFTS

  Dear St Gerard,

  Fat lot of use you were.

  BR,

  Jenny McLaine

  ART SAID

  ‘Don’t take this the wrong way, babes, but you’re not very maternal.’

  I stared at him.

  ‘It’s not a bad thing!’ he said.

  ‘It sounds like a bad thing.’

  ‘You’re just very conscientious and neurotic, delightfully capricious and contradictory – and hilarious of course.’

  ‘What’s that, Art?’ I said. ‘The fucking feedback sandwich?’

  ‘Ha! There – you see?’

  ‘NEUROTIC?’

  ‘Sorry, that’s the wrong word. You just think too much.’

  YOU

  You are not maternal, said the blood.

  You are not maternal, said the tobacco.

  You are not maternal, said the overtime.

  You are not maternal, said the overdraft.

  TERMS OF ENDEARMENT

  The next evening I wait outside Sonny’s dance school near Tower Bridge. I watch the lights inside the building, looking for signs of departure, in between checking the comments on my column, which this week is about the benefits of being big spoon for a change.

  Sonny comes out. I am stunned, for a moment, by the height of him.

  ‘All right?’

  ‘All right? Did your mum tell you I’d be coming?’

  ‘Course she did. Be a bit weird if she didn’t.’

  ‘I suppose.’

  He sets off walking. I follow. I wonder whether I should have brought him a drink, or some chocolate. Crisps? A Kinder egg?

  He pulls out a pack of cigarettes.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘You smoke.’

  ‘I don’t care. This isn’t okay.’ I take his cigarettes off him and put them in my pocket. ‘You can’t do this in front of me. You have to hide with your mates in a shitty bus station somewhere. Or even better, don’t do it.’

  ‘I thought you weren’t like them, but you are like them.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The rest of them.’

  ‘I’m sorry I forgot your birthday, Sonny.’

  ‘That’s okay.’

  ‘I’ve been … having a bit of a hectic time. I’ll bring you a present round soon, okay?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Let me know if there’s anything in particular you want.’

  ‘That pack of cigarettes.’

  ‘Very funny.’

  He starts looking at his phone, so I look at mine. I loop back round my apps and refresh. As my Instagram feed refreshes I see there’s a new post from Suzy Brambles, from a few hours earlier. How did I miss this?

  It’s a picture of someone’s arm. A man’s arm. There’s a section of tattoo visible. A trident of some kind.

  It is Art’s arm.

  I fall to my knees, phone in hand.

  IT IS A PICTURE OF ART’S ARM.

  Not only that, but he has commented underneath:

  Nice composition, Foxface x x

  ‘Aunty Jenny? Are you all right?’

  I cannot reply. All I can do is stare at my phone.

  ‘Are you having a stroke? You’ve gone a funny colour.’

  Forty-six people have liked the Foxface comment.

  My mind rises up and leaves my body. I am not myself. I do not know who I am but I am not here and I am not this and I am not myself.

  I get up and run off down the street.

  I hear Sonny shouting after me. ‘Aunty Jenny? AUNTY JENNY?’

  I don’t know where I’m going but as I’m running I’m checking things against things in my head, calculating, computing, adding it all up. How was I blind to this? I am better than this … obscene ignorance. It is inexcusable to have not deduced this earlier. If I could fire myself from running my life right now, I would. This is an act of gross misconduct. Of negligence. A head must roll! Something must die. SOMETHING MUST DIE!

  I reach the bridge and push past a group of protesters standing holding signs for something or other. ‘MOVE OUT OF THE WAY,’ I yell, ‘THIS IS A LIFE OR DEATH ISSUE!’ They move out of the way. They are unified, momentarily, through fear of me, this madwoman, heading for the edge of the bridge. I find a ledge and climb over the barrier and stand, staring at the river below.

  ‘Call the police!’ someone shouts.

  ‘Don’t do it!’ shouts someone else.
<
br />   ‘I have to!’ I shout. ‘There is nothing else for me to do now!’

  ‘It’s never as bad as you think!’ shouts another person.

  ‘Don’t say that! You’re not meant to say that!’ someone replies.

  I notice a small box of cards affixed to the girder by my head. I pull one out. It is a message. It says: Things are bad but they will get better. You are valuable. Never forget that x

  I wonder who has written it.

  But I’ve made my mind up. They are all too late. I take a step back (someone gasps) and then I wheel my arm like a bowler with a cricket ball and launch my phone – far far far into the Thames. Then I crouch in a ball and sob.

  ‘Are you okay?’ someone shouts.

  I raise my head. A trail of snot connects my nose to the concrete floor of the bridge platform. ‘NO, I AM NOT FUCKING OKAY!’

  I get back to the house and close the door behind me. I stand in the hall.

  ‘Jenny?’ says my mother, coming out of the lounge. ‘I thought you were going to get Sonny? You’re back early.’

  I don’t reply. I go upstairs and get my laptop out. I stare at the picture some more. Then I go to my emails and email Art.

  Why is there a picture of you with Suzy Brambles?

  He replies instantly.

  Hey. What?

  Why is there a picture of you with Suzy Brambles on her Instagram? It’s a simple question.

  Who?

  SUZY BRAMBLES STOP MAKING ME SAY IT

  Oh haha that’s not her real name. I forgot she has that daft pseudonym! Her real name is Suzanne

  I breathe. I exhale and I inhale and I exhale again.

  Where did you meet her?

  She got in touch via Instagram

  Wtf

  Then we met at her friend’s photography book launch

  Are you seeing her?

  How do you mean?

  I mean are you seeing her shitbird u know what I mean

  Okay. I don’t want to argue like this so can we talk this through properly on the phone?

  NO WE CANNOT

  Trying to call

  I am not available right now

  I am hyperventilating.

  Jenny please talk to me

  No. I don’t think we will achieve anything

  Okay. But just let me say this. You and I broke up over six months ago

  I can feel hair follicles clenching on my back.

  It’s not that. She knows me!!!

  Suzanne is pretty sure she doesn’t know you, Jenny. You must be mistaken x

  What, is she there now?

  Art?

  Is she there???

  I hope you’re not giving her the fucking speech, Art

  Which speech?

  The ‘my ex is so hurt because I am so powerful’ speech

  The ‘my ex is so crazy’ speech

  FUCK OFF WITH THOSE SPEECHES, YOU AND EVERY MAN FOREVER

  Take care of yourself, Jenny. Get a spa day! X

  My spinal fluid boils loose. I am formicating.

  Fuck you hard, Art, fuck you in all the ways and also in ways they haven’t invented yet

  I am popping all over, like a carcass in a furnace.

  ‘JENNY,’ my mother says. ‘Step away from the computer.’

  ‘Fuck off, Mother.’

  ‘Jenny, I’m going to take the computer now, okay.’ She does it like she’s defusing a bomb. Like I’m packing explosives in my vest. ‘Just – breathe, and stay calm.’

  I collapse on the floor. ‘He’s fucking seeing her.’

  ‘Who? What?’

  ‘Art is seeing Suzy Brambles. I mean, can you believe that? And everyone tells me I’m paranoid and I overthink – well, you know what? The paranoid people are on to shit.’

  ‘I’m just going to put this down over here.’

  Then it dawns on me.

  She stalked him on my Instagram. This explains everything.

  ‘OH MY GOD.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘GET ME A GIN, MOTHER.’

  She gets me a gin. I am in the same position when she comes up: calcified. I take the gin without moving my face or indeed any part of myself.

  ‘Okay, darling, there you go. Now, tell me, slowly, what happened.’

  I reel off the intel. ‘Suzy Brambles has posted a picture of Art’s arm and he has commented underneath using a nickname he used to call me. It’s an utterly sociopathic act, by both of them.’

  ‘Let me see.’

  I open my laptop for my mother and show her.

  She sighs. ‘Oh darling, that doesn’t prove anything. Your imagination is filling in the gaps and joining up dots to create the wrong picture. You were always too good at that.’

  ‘He just confirmed he’s with her now!’

  ‘That doesn’t mean anything. It could be a one-off. You’re over-analysing, as usual.’

  ‘You have to leave.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I can’t do this. We can’t be friends. I want you to go.’

  IF

  you’re going to have a miscarriage I can highly recommend doing it during a production of Macbeth. It’s not only thematically apt but it means you get to exact revenge on an overpriced theatre seat by bleeding all over it.

  We’d gone to see some Shakespeare because I was hankering for academia.

  Pregnancy made me like that. Nostalgic. Elitist. Sedate. It was January. We were nine weeks. I was thinking, periodically (bemusedly) about August. The whole future had changed. My body was changing. I was being invaded. Realigned. Unutterably. Permanently.

  And then, I wasn’t.

  I’d woken at 3 a.m. that morning, knowing something was wrong. My boobs weren’t sore any more and I felt completely normal – the previous abnormal suddenly standing and revealing itself, in all its utter abnormality. I’d forgotten how normal felt, but now I remembered. I felt distinctly un-pregnant. Googling led me to miscarriage chat rooms. I didn’t post anything, just read, really. I found a pregnancy message board and a bunch of posts from other panicking women who were terrified, alone, in the early morning, sharing their stories about this terrible unspoken thing that shouldn’t be a terrible unspoken thing, but is. I just woke up and found this … Can’t get back to sleep … Is it blood or is it mucus? It’s just a bit pink really, don’t you think? Anyone else had this? Anyone out there? It made me love the internet, briefly. It made me love women, everywhere, protectively. Maternally.

  The day passed bloodlessly. I sat tight.

  Then, in the theatre that night, beautifully, horribly, perfectly – it began. During a battle scene I felt a hot blip, and. And. I knew it, and it knew me, and it had come. I excused myself and ran to the toilet, checking the fabric as I vacated my seat. Thoughtful of me, don’t you think? Aren’t women The Best.

  I sat on the toilet and stared at the back of the door, unsure how to feel. I was thankful no one knew, but I also had no one to share this with, now. I wanted Kelly. Not my mother. Kelly. I felt as though I had failed on some sort of fundamental level (YOU HAVE NO INTEGRITY …). Why was I so upset? I wasn’t even sure I’d wanted a baby (how can you, intelligently, want something so seismic and unknowable?). Was it hormones? Punctured pride? Or – darker, shall I even … yes, yes I must – was it that I was aware on some level of not getting what I’d paid for; what I’d ordered; what I’d felt was my right? Was this the dissatisfied customer in me? The irate little Western consumer? It was puzzling.

  I packed my pants with loo roll and went back to my seat. Art looked at me enquiringly and took my hand.

  ‘I think I’m losing it.’

  The ‘I’ then, not the ‘we’. It was mine then it was ours then it was mine again. I got both shitty ends of the stick.

  ‘Oh, babes.’

  He squeezed. I heard the pity in his voice and I hated being pitied. I felt as though he’d lost respect for me, somehow. That I was reduced by the whole endeavour, and not in the way I expected.

 
; We sat on opposite sides of the taxi, going home. I looked out of the window, watching the rain dance off the low windowsills of the shops. Back at the house, I made us pints of orange squash, like always. Art went to his cellar. I would usually go down too, poke around, pester him, but something kept me upstairs. My phone, I suppose. I looked for advice on when to go to the hospital. That night we slept on opposite sides of the bed. I say slept. I didn’t sleep. I put on my eye-mask and even though I could hear Art breathing it felt as though there were miles of silence between us. At one point he farted. It sounded like whale song.

  I got up at five, still bleeding. I said: ‘I want to go to the hospital now.’

  He said: ‘Yes. I’ll help you.’

  ART’S MOTHER SAID

  ‘Is Jenny not coming down?’

  I heard her, from upstairs. She’d come round to see us, a few weeks before we broke up. I couldn’t muster up the energy or social grace to go down and make conversation. I was also punishing her as a way of punishing him, I see that now. The sins of the son. Something like that.

  DRAFTS

  Dear Barista,

  I did not mean to shout HI! when you handed me my coffee this morning. I meant to say Thanks! like a normal person. I am sorry I made you jump. I am having a bit of a bad time at the mo – although even at the best of times I am not much of a Johnny-on-the-spot. Or a Jenny-on-the-spot, even. (My real name is Jenny, which also might come as a surprise to you because I know I’ve said ‘Suzy’ a few times in the past and that is what the cashier has written on my cup.)

  You will never see me again, if that is any consolation.

  Sincerely,

  Jenny McLaine BA Hons.

  FULL DESPERATE

  What happened??? Sonny just told me you ran off. Did you have some kind of panic attack?

  Art is seeing someone I know

  So that makes you leave my son in the street?

  My son?? Why are you being so motherly and judgmental about this?

  Sorry what?

  This is real heartbreak, Kelly. I saw them together.