by Rebecca Done
‘I never succeeded, Alex,’ he says then.
‘Succeeded at what?’
‘Making Dad love me again, after Mum died.’
I shut my eyes, my heart pounding in a mixture of sympathy and my own regret. ‘He always loved you, Gray.’
‘Come on, Alex. His will proved exactly the opposite.’
I swallow. There’s no denying that Dad delivered a heart-wrenching blow to Graeme in his will. He has left the entire cottage, and all of its contents, solely to me. To Graeme – presumably to stop him contesting anything – he left a few measly stocks and shares, bonds, some savings amounting to a couple of thousand quid.
In so many ways, Graeme was the much better son – yet I’m the one he rewarded at the end. From beyond the grave, Dad’s still punishing Graeme for a mistake he made before he even knew what mistakes really were.
The timing, though, is bittersweet – the lease is soon up on mine and Molly’s flat, plus the landlord’s been maintaining it less and charging more for years. It was already the ideal time to move on and now … we have been given an entire house. But never has there been a more emotionally loaded inheritance, and it’s paralysing me. How can I possibly move into the cottage, knowing what it represents? Doing so would be almost to collude with Dad’s bitterness and blame.
I attempt a clumsy consolation. ‘Dad knew Molly and I were getting screwed over on rent, that’s all, Graeme. I used to complain about it all the time. But you own your place – I’m sure it’s that simple.’
We both know it’s not, but it would kill Graeme for me to confirm it.
‘No, Alex. He stopped loving me that day. He could barely even look at me after it happened. Leaving the cottage to you was the final way he could say, I blame you, Graeme.’
‘You weren’t to blame,’ I say, like I’ve said a million times. ‘And deep down, Dad knew that too. And anyway, look – I’ve been thinking. You should get a share of the cottage too.’
It’s only right – it isn’t fair that I’m inheriting a mortgage-free cottage worth three hundred thousand quid, while Graeme’s getting only the financial dregs of our dad’s estate.
‘What do you mean?’ He’s still turned away from me, staring down into the plughole.
‘I mean … I’ll do what’s right. Dad might not have thought he needed to be fair about it, but I do. I’ll sell the cottage, and give you half.’
He lets a loose laugh into the sink. ‘Don’t be insane. I won’t let you do that, Alex. Dad’s wishes should be carried out.’
‘No. Dad left the cottage to me. It’s up to me what I do with it.’
There is a short silence. ‘You should enjoy it, Alex. You deserve it. Just accept it with good grace.’
‘How can I do that, knowing you got cut out?’
‘Have you told Molly? That you got the cottage?’
‘Not yet.’
‘If you sold it,’ he says then, looking at me over his shoulder though his body remains firmly turned away, ‘I’d be really angry. No matter how I feel about Dad, that place is still our childhood home, Alex – it shouldn’t be sold to strangers. That wouldn’t be right.’
‘But I don’t have the cash to square you up …’
‘Forget it,’ he says, far more blithely than I know he feels. ‘I’ve got other plans.’
‘What plans?’ I ask him, but my question’s met by silence, and he looks away.
‘I tried to get him to forgive me, you know,’ he says eventually. ‘On the afternoon he died, just before you arrived. I asked him to say it, and he wouldn’t. You know why?’
‘Why?’ I whisper, rubbing his back, swallowing the tears that are pooling in my throat as I picture Dad as he was that last afternoon.
‘Because he didn’t forgive me. He still blamed me, all the way to the grave.’ He starts laughing. ‘He just wanted to see his Golden Boy one last time, Alex. He was only interested in you. All he ever wanted was for you to move back to Norfolk, to be with him. Didn’t matter to him that I was already there.’
In so many ways it would be easier to hear this if I didn’t agree with Graeme – if I thought that he’d simply misinterpreted Dad’s attitude towards him. But the worst part is, I don’t think he has. I’ve always felt Dad’s resentment towards Graeme as strongly as I’ve felt his affection towards me. I could sense it, constantly: when he berated only Graeme if we both misbehaved, in the celebration of my achievements and passive acceptance of Graeme’s, when he’d switch on the TV while Graeme was mid-sentence. On the surface, all was more or less as it should be, but those bitter undercurrents were always there.
Still, I attempt again to reassure him. ‘Did you ever think, Gray, that Dad might have … wanted someone to blame? He wanted someone to be angry with – and that should have been the driver, but they never caught him. So you were next in line. Things would have been different if they’d caught the guy. He’d have had someone to direct his anger at.’
I admit that in a very small corner of my heart, I’m relieved I’ll no longer have to play peacemaker for Graeme and my dad, mediate for them as I have been doing since the age of seven. It’s been a long road.
Our mother, Julia Frazer, was knocked over in a hit-and-run on 3 September 1991, when Graeme and I were seven. Even then we were already chalk and cheese – as different as it was possible for twins to be. Graeme was errant and disobedient, wilful and prone to tantrums. I, on the other hand, admittedly preferred to follow the rules – do my homework, eat what was put in front of me, turn my lights out when instructed. We were living, breathing proof that nature trumps nurture.
On that particular afternoon, Mum was in the kitchen making tea. She’d ordered us to get on with our homework, but Graeme had other ideas – he wanted to go out with his friends, play football at the playing field. Our parents had been having a nightmare few months with him being awkward and headstrong, and they were getting to the end of their tether with it. He was already supposed to be grounded, a concept few parents of seven-year-olds were yet familiar with.
So Graeme climbed out of the living-room window, escaping down the road to the playing field. Too loyal (or was that terrified?) to give him up, I said nothing, and fifteen minutes or so after he’d vanished Mum came through to the living room, spatula in hand. Needless to say, I got a good smack over the back of the legs for my failure to tell on my brother before she stormed out of the house to look for him. It was to be the last interaction I would ever have with her.
She didn’t get far, our lovely mum. Dad was out at work in our only car, so she was obliged to follow Graeme on foot. She was mown down on the verge by a hit-and-run driver as she made her way towards the playing field.
The first Graeme knew of it was several hours later when he returned to the house, curious to know why he hadn’t been fetched home, whereupon he was greeted by me, hysterical and inconsolable, and the grave face of our next-door neighbour. The police had just left, and Dad had fled to the hospital to hold Mum’s hand as she lay dying, to let her know how much he loved her.
Dad changed overnight, of course. For almost two weeks he could barely look at Graeme, and Graeme himself hardly spoke for nearly six months. What had once been a lively, energetic house (albeit sometimes tense since Graeme discovered free will) was now virtually silent from day to day. There was never any food in the cupboards, never any music on the stereo. Birthdays went uncelebrated, Christmases unmarked. Dad sank into a deep depression and turned to booze. But what could have torn Graeme and me apart ended up pushing us together, because actually, I didn’t blame him. I had often been tempted myself to disobey the rules as he did, only I was too scared – and I had always envied his confidence. As Dad shut down, we had to rely on each other, and it bonded us in a way that still surprises me now, when I look back on it. Mum was gone, and Dad was gone too – just in a different way – so we only had each other.
From the main hall now, we hear a cheer go up. I have a momentary yet horrifying vision of
Molly’s parents being forcibly dragged into a conga by a crowd of Dad’s old drinking mates.
‘Be sad, Graeme,’ I tell him, because I have a sense that he needs someone – anyone – to give him permission to do that. ‘Cry if you need to. You never really grieved for Mum, did you? Because you didn’t really feel like you had any right to. Don’t make the same mistake with Dad. It’s okay to be sad.’
‘Oh, I grieved for Mum,’ he corrects me softly. ‘I used to sneak into the bathroom at night, turn the taps on and cry myself to sleep.’
I stare at the laughing parrot on his back. ‘You never told me that.’
‘There’s a lot I never told you.’ Finally he straightens up, turns round and leans against the counter, his back to the sink.
‘It’s gloomy in here,’ I say. ‘Maybe if you went out and chatted to some people …’
‘All of those people in there know the story,’ he says. ‘They know about Mum, and they despise me for it.’
‘You didn’t kill her, Graeme.’ I state the obvious to remind him. ‘You weren’t to blame. Nobody in their right minds would blame a seven-year-old for what happened.’
‘If I could turn the clock back …’
‘Of course. But life doesn’t work like that.’
‘You know how I know you’re a good person, Alex?’
I smile faintly. ‘Because I let you talk me into buying these God-awful shirts?’
He offers a dutiful laugh, though it’s slightly muffled by a sudden pick-up in the music next door. ‘Well, yeah. But also … you never blamed me. You never once raised your voice, or lost your temper, or told me you hated me for what happened. I deprived you of a mum, but you never blamed me.’
‘Do you know why?’ I say gently.
He shakes his head, because still it won’t sink in.
‘Because it wasn’t your fault.’
A single tear escapes down his cheek now, and he nods. ‘Thank you.’
‘Come here.’ I put my arms round him and pull him into a hug.
‘I’m selling my flat, by the way,’ he says then into my shoulder. Or, at least, that’s what I think he says.
‘What?’ I draw back from him.
‘I said I’m selling the flat.’
‘What? Since when?’
He shrugs defiantly in a way I probably haven’t seen since we were seven years old. ‘Dad’s not around to disapprove of me any more. So I’m going to cash in the equity and go travelling.’
‘Travelling where?’
Graeme laughs. ‘I don’t know. Anywhere. Australia, America – who cares?’
I care. ‘Gray, just think about this. Today’s not the day for making rash decisions. You might feel differently in a couple of weeks.’
‘Too late. I’ve already got a buyer. I put the flat on the market the day after he died. And I quit my job.’
‘Jesus, Gray, don’t do that – please! I’ll give you the money to go, just … please don’t sell your flat.’
‘We both know you don’t have any money unless you sell the cottage, and I would never let you do that. And you don’t owe me anything, Alex.’
Actually, I do. I owe you the love you never got from Dad.
I stare at him as the timer on the cooker starts to buzz, presumably to inform us the sausages in the oven are cooked. Graeme turns it off.
‘Like I said,’ I say desperately, ‘I’ll sort you out, with the cottage. Put your name on the title deeds or something.’
‘Screw my name on a piece of paper. It’s meaningless.’
‘No, it’s not!’ I am feeling increasingly desperate. Selfishly, I’ve sort of been hoping to spend some time with Graeme now that isn’t clouded by the spectre of our past, and already he’s telling me he’s upping and leaving. Please don’t let our family fall apart even more, Graeme. There’s only the two of us left now.
‘Who knows,’ Graeme says, ‘you might never see me again.’
‘Shut up,’ I tell him. ‘Don’t say things like that.’
‘I’m free,’ he whispers. ‘I’m finally free.’
16
Molly – present day
Since I haven’t stayed out this late in a while, I return to Mike’s flat with Graeme when he tells me he’s making a move, rather than stay on at the bar. We head back without saying much, silenced mostly by the stares of other people on the tube, passers-by on the street, their curiosity piqued by the state of my face.
When we get in he asks if I fancy a nightcap, but being wary of a crashing headache tomorrow I ask for a cup of tea instead.
I follow him into the kitchen, where I am relieved to finally kick off my shoes.
‘That’s better,’ Graeme says, moving past me to fetch the kettle. ‘It was unnerving me, you suddenly being so tall.’
‘These heels are stupid,’ I admit. ‘They pinch my feet, and I can’t balance in them.’
‘Well, you’d never tell. You have the art of faking poise down to a T.’
‘Story of my life.’
He laughs softly, refills the kettle then switches it on to boil.
‘I don’t get to dress up too often these days,’ I confess.
‘Makes a nice change?’
‘Yes,’ I realize. ‘And to be in a bar until late, that’s a real novelty.’
Graeme nods up at the clock on the wall. Embarrassingly, it’s not even midnight yet.
I cover my face with one hand. ‘This is late to me, okay?’
He smiles. ‘If you say so.’
‘So, when was the last time you got in from a big night at midnight?’
‘Er … last week.’
‘Oh,’ I say. ‘I misjudged you.’
He grins. ‘Yeah. Midnight … two days later.’ Swilling our mugs from earlier under the tap, he dunks a teabag in each. ‘So, Moll. About that black eye. I’ve been meaning to ask …’
‘No, it’s never happened before.’
He exhales. ‘Good. Okay.’
‘But …’
‘But what?’
‘Yes – his anger scares me sometimes. A lot of the time.’
Graeme shakes his head. ‘God, I wish you’d talk to me. You say you’re not proud, but –’
‘Because I’m not.’
‘So why don’t you ever tell me how you feel? You always say you’re handling everything okay.’
I think about it for a moment. ‘Because nothing can change, Graeme.’
‘Rubbish. There is so much we can do.’
When it comes to Alex, Graeme’s one of those no-mountain’s-too-high people, which is mostly great, but I know for a fact that some problems simply cannot be solved. There is no easy solution to the riddle of Alex.
‘Why don’t we ask the doctor about more anger-management classes?’
I shake my head. ‘Alex would never go to any more of those classes. You know that.’ And it’s true – Alex considers himself to be far beyond the assistance of anger management, especially group sessions. I can understand it, in a way – he has made such huge strides since the accident, and he’s now in that awkward period of recovery where all the improvements we see are tiny. Marginal gains only from now on. I can see why he thinks he no longer needs to attend classes with people who are at a far earlier point in their recovery than he is.
‘Meds, then.’
‘I don’t think I could go through all that again.’ We completely failed to get the balance right before – when Alex wasn’t flushing them down the loo behind our backs, the dose would either be so high they’d knock him out completely, or so low they’d have zero effect; and all the while the side effects were taking their toll on him even further.
I think for a moment about Alex’s secret sketching, about the latent skill still half buried that he clearly gets something from, and decide on his behalf that I don’t want to risk anything that might knock him off-kilter, destroy his ability to be creative.
‘A psychologist, then,’ Graeme continues. ‘Someone new?’
I say nothing.
‘Molly, I know he doesn’t get funding any more and I hate to be crass, but I’m sure your parents would pay. I know that’s incredibly presumptuous of me, but …’ He trails off, reading my mind. ‘Or an occupational therapist, if that’s easier for him to accept.’
‘Maybe,’ I say, for, thinking objectively, this is the only option with any mileage. As I see it, if Alex could just be persuaded to keep one appointment, then it’s the therapist’s job to get him to stay and listen, convince him they can help.
The kettle boils and Graeme starts making the tea. ‘So how often does he lose his temper like that? With you, I mean.’
‘Not as often as he used to. But it’s worse now when it does happen. You know – he can be fine and then the slightest provocation …’ Alex’s temper ran at more of a steady simmer straight after the accident; now, it goes from nought to a hundred in the space of a second. Less frequently, perhaps, but when it does happen it’s always much more sudden and fierce.
‘I worry you’re not safe.’ Graeme fishes out the teabags, sloshes milk into the cups and stirs two sugars into mine.
‘He’s never threatened my safety,’ I say truthfully. ‘Not deliberately, anyway. Thank you,’ I add, as he hands me a cup.
We head through to the living room as before, only this time Graeme sits down next to me on the sofa, which is so tiny our knees practically knock together. I pull down my dress hem like a teenager, suddenly conscious of how much shorter it seems in someone else’s living room than it does in a bar.
I catch the edge of the scent of Alex’s old aftershave again. I breathe in deeply, shut my eyes briefly. He could be sitting right next to me.
‘Moll, have you texted Charlie? Just to check … sorry.’ Graeme shakes his head. ‘Maybe you’re not too fussed right now.’
‘I texted him earlier,’ I say, guiltily bringing myself back to reality. ‘Alex was already in bed.’
‘Right,’ he whispers. ‘Sorry.’
‘I will always care about him, Graeme. You need to know that.’
He nods, and for a moment I think he’s going to ask me if I still love his brother. An unwelcome vision of Nicola appears in my mind, and I realize that right now, at this moment, I’m not sure if I do.