The Confusion of Karen Carpenter

by Jonathan Harvey

  Some workmen are in the road, painting an Olympic symbol in the bus lane.

  This rain shows no sign of abating.

  It’s heavy. Before I know it, there are about twenty of us under the scaffolding. It’s like an air raid and we’re huddled together till it passes. I decide to ask some of these people if they know how I can find the Tube station, but as I open my mouth to say it, something weird happens.

  Really weird.

  Like completely weird.

  I hear a voice. A voice I recognize. It says one word.

  ‘Karen?’

  And I know immediately who it is.

  OK, he says a couple more words. Well, four to be precise.

  ‘Karen, is that you?’

  I turn and I see, sheltered in the tunnel alongside me, none other than Kevin.

  TWENTY-THREE

  No. This can’t be happening. This is weird, too weird. I came here looking for Michael and instead I’ve . . . conjured up Kevin instead? No. No! I look away, then look back. He’s still there, seemingly a little bewildered.

  Bewildered? He should try being me for a bit!

  And oh God, I’ve conjured him up and for some reason my brain has made him even better-looking than usual: new haircut, more stubble, paler skin, making the eyes look more piercey I’m not totally bananas about his ‘hi-vis jacket and battered jeans’ look, or the light dusting of talc on his face. Has my brain decided that he too is a ghost, and is that the best my brain’s make-up team can come up with?

  I look away again. Then he will dissolve in the rain, I just know it. The rain will wash him and his talc away. I watch the rings being painted on the road. Lovely Olympic rings.

  But he says it again: ‘Karen?’

  Other shelter members are looking round now. A black guy with a gold tooth looks warily behind me, then at me, and says, ‘Is he giving you grief?’

  ‘Is there someone there?’ I ask urgently. He looks again, now thinking I’m mad, then nods again.

  ‘Karen, it’s me, Kevin,’ he insists behind me.

  ‘He’s called Kevin,’ says the black guy.

  ‘I know,’ I admit, for I am not deaf.

  OK, so he’s real, but even so, this is just too crazy for words. To go looking for the dead one and find instead the alive one, in a part of London that has no proper link for either of us . . . I look back at him. How did he get more gorgeous in the past few weeks? How? How is that humanly possible? It’s not fair. Why can’t I get more gorgeous, incrementally, week by week? Bloody hell, by the time I’m sixty, I could be Angelina Jolie. I fluster, unsure what to say to him, because I don’t actually believe he’s there by his own free will. This must be something that’s going on in my head, whether other people can see him or not. And because of this – it’s all about me – I really have no idea what to say to him. I must say something, though.

  And so I say the first thing that comes into my head, the thing my dad taught me to say when stuck for social discourse.

  I say, ‘Watch your language!’ then turn on my heel and run.

  And here I am again, running, with no idea where I’m going but with a huge determination to escape some sort of perceived threat. I hear him running after me and calling out my name. It seems to dissolve in the rain. I know I can’t keep this up for ever – I’m getting out of breath, and running in this weather is hazardous; I’m sure I’m going to go flying soon. This is pointless. Completely pointless. I may as well give up and give in to it. So I do. I slow down, from a sprint to a canter to a stroll, and then he’s there, alongside me.

  ‘Why do you keep running away?’

  It’s a fair enough question, but then mine that follows is too.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Talking to you.’

  ‘Here. In Whitechapel.’

  ‘I’m working here. The flats back there. We’re doing some renovations for the housing association that owns them. It’s not the sort of thing I want to do, but it keeps things ticking over.’

  OK, that makes sense.

  ‘So this is just a coincidence?’

  ‘What, that we’ve bumped into each other? Well, what other reason would there be?’

  I’m sounding mad. I back-pedal. ‘No, I’m just . . . Oh, I dunno.’

  He stops walking, which makes me stop walking. We’re both drenched. It reminds me again of that scene from Four Weddings. Only now if one of us proposed and they didn’t know it was bucketing down, they would indeed be certifiable. I realize the talc on his face is on his clothes too, and it’s dust from plastering.

  ‘Why do you keep running away from me?’ he asks again.

  I don’t want to have this conversation. I am embarrassed and squirmy. I’ve lied to him. OK, so he’s lied to me too (IRA, name and so on), but right now that’s less important than the fact I know he’s spoken with Meredith and all that lot and . . .

  ‘Will you just leave me alone, Kevin? If Kevin is your name.’

  ‘What d’you mean? Of course Kevin’s my name.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry,’ I cut in. God, he’s a good actor, I’ll give him that. He looks genuinely perplexed. Years of practice, no doubt. ‘You’re not the only one who’s lied.’

  ‘I’ve not lied. I’ve been dead straight up with you.’

  ‘Well, I haven’t.’

  ‘Why? What’s gone on?’

  OK. Truth time. Time to face my fears and . . .

  ‘My boyfriend didn’t leave me.’

  He nods. Everybody nods. He doesn’t nod as well as Roberta Flack. This nod is more ‘I have no idea what you’re on about’, whereas hers is ‘I totally get you.’ I prefer hers.

  ‘He died, and I never told you.’

  He nods again, but doesn’t look too shocked.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I add as an afterthought.

  ‘I know.’

  He knows I’m sorry?

  ‘What?’

  ‘I know he died. I’ve always known.’

  He has?

  ‘Claire told me.’

  ‘Claire? Custard Claire?’

  ‘Yeah. I thought everyone knew. I didn’t realize it was a secret.’

  ‘It’s not a secret, but . . . well, didn’t you think it was weird I never mentioned it?’

  ‘No. I just thought you weren’t ready to talk about it.’

  Oh. Right.

  ‘Which is a shame, ’cos I felt it was something we might have in common. I just didn’t wanna press you.’

  Oh. Right.

  ‘You never lied to me, Karen. You never said, I dunno, he’s still alive and living in . . . Mortlake.’

  Mortlake? Why is he saying Mortlake? Have I got to go there to locate Michael’s ghost? Where the hell is Mortlake?

  ‘You were just a bit. . . evasive if he came up in conversation.’

  Oh.

  ‘And I did think it was weird you referred to him as your “ex”.’

  So I didn’t lie to him outright. I was just . . . evasive. Evasive I like. Evasive I can deal with. And as he says the words and I allow them to sink in, it’s as if a weight has been lifted from my shoulders. Literally. I feel lighter. I feel myself rising, growing taller, as if I’m being pulled up like a marionette on invisible strings. I feel amazing, actually. I’m almost levitating. So maybe I didn’t lie to everyone. Maybe I was evasive instead. I’d not looked at it like that. Suddenly my return to school feels far less intimidating.

  Maybe it’ll seem like more of an ‘I wasn’t ready to talk about it before, but I am now’ type thing.

  His phone bleeps. He gets it out of his pocket and checks something on the tiny screen.

  It might be someone from the IRA. The whole ‘renovating flats’ thing might be a cover.

  He looks back up. ‘The lads are wondering where I’ve got to.’

  I gulp. The lads. I can’t let him see I know his secret.

  ‘When did I lie to you? I’ve never lied to you.’

  I shake my head. Poi
ntless getting into that now.

  ‘Oh, I just . . . You didn’t. You didn’t. I’m . . . projecting, probably. Anyway . . .’

  ‘Karen, can I see you again?’

  ‘NO!’

  Jeez, I really did scream it. What a plum! He takes a step back, like my breath has blown him away. I speak more softly now, lying.

  ‘I just . . . I’m not in the right headspace. Does that make sense?’

  Actually, that’s not so much of a lie.

  He lets out an ironic laugh. ‘Oh yeah, it does. Listen.’

  And he hugs me. I don’t want him hugging me. I freeze. And get more wet from him being wet. For God’s sake, get off me, IRA Man!

  ‘If you change your mind, or you’re feeling ready, give us a call, yeah?’

  ‘Of course!’ I giggle, pushing him away. He goes to peck me on the cheek, but I duck out of his way and run off down the street.

  I don’t even say goodbye.

  On the Tube home I think about the word ‘ex’. Maybe it is inappropriate to use about Michael. What word do you use when your partner has turned in on himself, left you out in the cold, then gone and killed himself? ‘Partner’ implies you did everything together. I’m not sure we did. ‘Ex’ implies you split up. We didn’t, not really. How should I word it in future? ‘My fiancé who killed himself’? And then I realize there’s one word I can use that implies nothing. I can just call him Michael.

  When I get home, I do something I’ve not done for a very long time. I log in to Facebook. My page appears before me. My face smiles back at me from a photograph taken on a school trip to Mont St Michel a few years ago. I see I have thirty-six messages waiting for me. I ignore them and in the search box at the top I type in, ‘RIP, Michael Fletcher.’ I am redirected to another page, where I see Michael’s face smiling back. He looks so happy. He’s wearing a Christmas party hat and has been caught mid-laugh. I’ve not seen the picture before and it floors me. It floors me that he is laughing. And not with me. It floors me that he had a life beyond this house, sometimes. The page, I know, was set up by some of his workmates as a virtual book of condolence. I scan through the members of the group looking for the name Laura. I click on the name Laura Grace and up comes another page. It has to be her. She has burgundy hair. I don’t bother adding her as a friend, but instead click on the box marked ‘Message’, and I write. I eat humble pie and I write.

  On my third visit to Roberta Flack she has introduced something new to her front room: an extra chair.

  ‘Are you expecting someone?’ I ask brightly as I wander in, turn the cushion with The Scream on it back to front and plonk myself on the sofa. I like this sofa now. It’s relaxing. It’s my friend. It welcomes me with open arms (once The Scream is reversed) and says to me, ‘You’ll be OK here, Karen.’

  ‘It’s for an exercise.’

  Keep fit? I wonder. What’s she going to have me do? Jump on and off it balancing a phone book on my head? Or better still, some massive tome about psychotherapy and counselling? The British Register of Shrinks? That’s really going to help my complicated grief!

  A bit of the way into our session she explains the presence of the chair, and invites me to imagine that Michael’s sitting in it. She asks me to speak to him about my feelings, about my thoughts on his death and about our relationship. I look quickly back to the chair, hoping this will be the moment that he reappears, dramatically, filling the gap between the armrests, but he’s not there. Disappointment crushes me, but I take a deep breath. I can already sense that this could be a good thing. Because he might actually be listening. Maybe he’s hiding in the chimney. Maybe in a room above, with a floorboard dislodged so he can eavesdrop. Maybe he’s in the front garden, listening in through a grate or air vent I cannot see. If I can just speak up a bit, he will hear me.

  When I open my mouth, though, I find it’s hard to speak loudly when you’re feeling emotional. I’m shaking, something I’d not anticipated. I take a deep breath, and another, stemming a rising panic in me. Why am I feeling like this? Why can’t I control my feelings and just . . . bloody talk as if Michael is here?

  I take another deep breath and slowly but surely the words start to come. And eventually I become coherent. And once I get into my stride, I wonder whether I’ll actually ever stop.

  God, Michael. I’m so angry with you at the moment. I think I’ve been angry with you for years. When Evie died, and you became depressed, it’s like I wasn’t allowed to grieve for her properly, because you’d sunk so low, and one of us had to carry on and get things done – pay the bills, make the tea. One of us had to keep going. Which meant you could sink as low as you wanted ’cos I kept picking up the pieces. You ceased to function. And although I totally understood why you went like that, it stopped me going like that, and some days I wanted to. Some days I wanted to just curl up in a ball in the living room and scream and kick things, but you were doing that, so I couldn’t. It’s like . . . every time I felt a wave of grief rolling over me I had to fight it with all my might and stop it drenching me, dig my nails into the sand so it didn’t sweep me away, and that was exhausting. And left me feeling numb. And people thought I was coping amazingly. My big fear was that people might think I didn’t care. I did care. I just couldn’t collapse with that care like you.

  There was a woman a few streets away. Do you remember? You couldn’t bear to look at her, because we had similar due dates and . . . well, you felt she was rubbing our nose in it when she walked down the street with her pram. I became a bit obsessed with her. I comforted myself with the scenario that she had our baby. There’d been some hideous mix-up at the hospital and one day soon she’d be back with us. Complete bollocks, of course, but those fantasies kept me warm at night. I even picked out a knitted coat for her from that little boutiquey baby clothes place in Covent Garden and left it on their doorstep. I never saw the baby in it, but I like to think she wore it a lot. And looked pretty in it. I like to think it was her best outfit. I knew it was mad, but I was so looking forward to her starting school, growing older. To me, it didn’t feel like rubbing my nose in it. Each day was one step closer to everyone realizing the mix-up and her being returned to us. Even if that day would never really come.

  And then one day: disaster. You came in from work and said you’d seen a removal van outside their house. I ran round in my slippers and saw a sofa being loaded into a huge van. I asked the driver where they were moving to. He just replied, ‘The country.’

  I was furious. I kicked one of the tyres on the van. He gave me a piece of his mind and then I scarpered. You were delighted. You hated seeing their happiness. It put your unhappiness into stark contrast.

  I stop and take a sip from the small bottle of water I’ve brought with me.

  Roberta grabs her chance. ‘Talk to him about his death, how that’s made you feel.’

  She flicks me a nod. Her nod. And I find it so gratifying I can’t wait to carry on, but I fear I’m going to sound like a scratched CD.

  ‘I’m really cross with him about that too,’ I say, like it’s a bad thing.

  ‘Tell him,’ she encourages.

  Oh God. He’s never going to come back if I’m honest. It’s one thing having a go at him about the aftermath of Evie, but about this? I’m not sure I want to do it. I go from ‘gung ho’ to ‘oh no, no’ in a matter of seconds.

  But then I think, Well, he might not be coming back. He might not have been there in the first place, you mad bitch. So in for a penny, in for a pound.

  How dare you?

  My voice is quiet. But I amaze myself with the sudden surge of anger I feel.

  How dare you kill yourself ? How dare you!

  Oh God. It’s like someone’s lit a touchpaper inside me and the flare is about to shoot off into the sky. I try to keep a lid on it, my temper, but it’s hard. I see Roberta’s eyes aflame also, dancing with excitement that I am showing my true colours. Here we go, then.

  I stuck by you. All that time. You withdrew from
me, you stopped loving me, and I stayed. I stayed because I thought I’d get you back, that one day your illness would be cured and we’d be OK again. Jesus, I only agreed to marry you because I thought it was a sign things were getting better. And then bloody Asmaa had to go and kill herself. And then you became more interested in her than in bloody me, you bastard!

  She’s liking the swearing – I can tell – but I’m not doing this for her now.

  I’ve felt so alone for years and years, and that’s your fault. And now I feel stupid ’cos I should have left you years ago. And I didn’t because, d’you know what? I’m a decent person. I’m nice. I’m not so bloody selfish that I don’t consider other people’s feelings. And you didn’t. You never did. Well, you used to – that’s unfair – but in the last few years you didn’t. And certainly you didn’t when you hung yourself from that bloody tree.

  I’m not even looking at her now. I’m staring at that chair, quelling a huge desire to get up and kick it. Where is this coming from?

  I’ve felt so alone and now you’re gone. It’s like nothing’s changed. Even though everything has. Because it feels like I’ve been mourning our relationship for ages. It’s like you started to vanish as soon as Evie died. And you kept on vanishing. Bits of you. Like the Cheshire Cat. Only your grin didn’t stay – your grim outlook did, pervading every corner of the house. And then you’d come back. New pills. For a bit. But then you’d go again and that’s why I’m all fucked up. And haven’t been able to tell people, or talk about it, because it’s embarrassing. I was useless to you as a girlfriend. I was that crap that you stopped loving me – everyone could see that. You made no pretence of being nice to me in front of anybody towards the end, and now you’ve paid me the biggest disservice by bloody topping yourself. Now everyone probably thinks, What a waste of space. Couldn’t stop him killing himself? It must be something she did. She must be partly to blame.

  And maybe they’re right. ’Cos much as I feel angry towards you, I feel guilty. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I couldn’t help you. I wanted nothing more in the whole wide world than for you to be happy. And you couldn’t be. And I was the person you allegedly shared your life with. I should have been able to make you feel better. I should have been able to stop you killing yourself. I should have. And I’m sorry I didn’t. And couldn’t. I really am sorry.