by Sarah Jasmon
‘I don’t know …’ Helen could hear herself giving in. ‘OK …’
But as Victoria began to saw at the first chunk of hair, Helen pulled away.
‘No, I don’t know!’ She grabbed at her head with both hands. ‘I can’t do it!’
Victoria chucked the scissors on the table.
‘If you say so.’
Helen crossed over to the door and reached for the brush.
‘Let me think about it—’
But Victoria shrugged and slid off the edge of the stool, placing it carefully back under the table.
‘It’s up to you, Helen. It’s your hair.’ She pushed past her towards the door. ‘You never do anything, anyway.’
And she was gone.
Helen stood, frozen, holding the broom in front of her. Victoria was so … But no, she wasn’t going to let her walk away from it this time. She let the handle fall, and slammed out of the door.
‘Yes, it is my hair!’ She yelled down the path, only to find Victoria in the other direction, towards the garden, watching her with an amused expression.
‘All right, all right, no one’s saying anything else.’
‘You … you…’ It was no good. Helen let out a laugh. ‘Well, you got one bit.’ She put up a hand to find the place with the chunk missing.
‘Go on, let me balance it out. I’ll make a good job of it, honest!’ Victoria was smiling as well now. ‘You can do it with a ponytail, it works every time.’ She drove in on her advantage. ‘You want to, I can tell. And it’s not true you never do anything. Feel the fear. Remember the greenhouses!’
Helen put a hand up level with her chin.
‘No further than this.’
It worked quite well in the end. Victoria had her gather a bunch of hair together and hold it over her head as she attacked it with the scissors. She did look sort of French, Helen thought to herself, checking in the hand mirror and seeing the short, shaggy layers fall down around her face. She turned, making her lips pout. Victoria pushed her on the shoulder.
‘All you need’s a beret.’ She cocked her head to one side. ‘Is that what I think it is?’
Through the open door came the sound of an ice-cream van. Helen held a finger up. One came by on its regular route around the villages, occasionally pulling in at the end of the lane for a rest before carrying on. The chimes came to a halt.
‘Have you got any money?’ Victoria was already feeling in her pocket. She pulled out some coins and counted them up.
‘Dad’s usually got a bit in here.’ Helen checked in the cup on the fridge top. ‘Yep. Quick! Let’s run!’
It felt good to be running in the toasted air of the afternoon, the ends of her hair just tickling her neck.
Victoria gave her a grin as they reached the van. ‘Good feeling?’
Helen grinned back and turned to the window, where the man was standing with a resigned expression.
‘Icepops. Give us icepops.’
They walked back down the lane, holding the frozen tubes by the ends so the top bit would start to melt. Helen held the coolness against her cheek.
‘What we need …’ Victoria paused to suck up the mouthful of the cold liquid pooling at the bottom of her tube ‘… what we need now is a lot of black eyeliner.’ She stuck her tongue out as far as it would go, squinting down to see the colour. The violent blue of the icepop had already left a streak down the centre. ‘I’ve got some in my room, come on.’
‘In a minute.’ Helen’s tongue was green, the colour draining at every suck from the remaining ice.
A car came up behind them and beeped for them to get out of the way. As it drew level, it slowed down, and the window rolled down. A woman with careful makeup and a padded neckbrace leaned out.
‘Helen.’ Her voice was treacly. ‘How are you? Mr Weaver and I only came back from Spain this week.’ She indicated her neck. ‘I’ve been having terrible trouble with my cervicalgia.’ She paused to smooth her already immaculate hair. ‘How are you and your father doing? I bumped into your mother when we were over in Southport, she said she hasn’t seen much of you this summer.’
The Weavers’ bungalow had been built facing the main road, but the entrance and sweep of gravel drive was some way down the lane. Helen could make out the fancy arches which ran all the way along the house front, as if it was a toy ranch. She could hear her father’s voice, Paid a nice sweetener to the planning to get that through, and she had a vision of the Weavers as plastic dolls being positioned in their world by a cosmic child playing a game of pretend. That would explain Mrs Weaver’s stiff neck. A cough made her realize everyone was waiting for her to reply. What had the question been? She forced herself to concentrate. Something about her dad.
‘He’s fine.’ Helen kept her eyes fixed on the corner of their windscreen. A dribble of cool liquid came up and over the side of the icepop, and she darted at it with her tongue. At the same time, she glanced round at Victoria, who, lightning fast, stuck a vivid blue tongue out at her. A huge giggle began to force its way up into her chest.
‘And this must be your friend from the cottages.’ Mrs Weaver turned herself round. ‘Now, then, is it your father who’s driving that van around the place?’
Victoria copied her tone, managing to give her voice an even more patronizing edge but with such a straight face that the older woman looked unsure of herself.
‘No, it isn’t.’
Mrs Weaver waited for more, and then carried on: ‘Well, whoever it is, Mr Weaver’s Rover was almost scratched very badly yesterday, from having to drive so near to the hedge.’
‘That is terrible,’ Victoria agreed. ‘I’ve never heard of anything so awful in my whole life.’
Helen had to start walking away, her shoulders heaving. She heard Victoria finish.
‘Perhaps if Mr Weaver would like to pass on his driving schedule to us, we can make sure the road is kept quite clear for him in the future?’
‘There is no need to be cheeky, young lady!’ The window buzzed up and the car completed the short journey to the Weavers’ driveway.
They laughed all the way to the canal, leaning against each other helplessly, repeating fragments of the conversation. Finally, breathless, they sat on the bank with their feet dangling above the water and sucked up the last of the melted ice.
‘You know the funniest thing?’
Victoria leaned out to rinse her fingers in the canal. ‘No, what?’
‘Remember the day I met you, when Pippa came round to my garden?’
Victoria nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘I thought you were her grandchildren.’
‘No! Can you imagine?’ Victoria imitated Mrs Weaver’s voice again. ‘Now, children, in bed by nine o’clock, or Mr Weaver and I won’t have time for our after-dinner games. Chop chop.’
She blew up into the hair hanging over her forehead. ‘It feels funny with it all gone. It’s so … short.’ She blew again, her eyes on the canal. When she next spoke, it was a complete non sequitur: ‘You know when Piet was talking about a party for the boat?’
Helen turned to look at her, wondering where she was going with that. ‘Yes?’
Victoria sat up, and hugged her knees in. ‘And we’re going to have a bonfire?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’ve had the best idea.’
‘What?’
‘Can’t tell you yet. But if it works, it’ll be ace.’
Chapter Twenty-three
The boat wasn’t quite ready on the day it was launched, not in Mick’s eyes anyway. But Piet had a friend with a flatbed trailer, and this was the only day he could bring it over. The boat was on the trailer and endless time had been spent pushing it into the right place for Piet to get his van through ready to reverse it down the lane, and still Mick was trying to delay things. Helen could hear him arguing about it as she stood in the lane. The sun was almost too hot to bear. She was supposed to be watching out for cars or people coming down the lane, though it seemed unlikely that a
nything would be out and about by choice. She fanned herself with a hand that barely disturbed the weight of warm air around her, letting their voices drift by.
‘If we can have a couple more days in here …’ Her dad sounded stubborn.
‘We can finish up once she’s in the water.’ Piet’s voice was soothing. ‘It’s not as if we’re going to have issues with rain.’
Helen let herself drop back into the meagre shade of the hedge. Come on, she thought. Make your minds up.
Right on cue, there was the sound of shoulders being slapped and, a few seconds later, Piet’s engine turning over. The boat began to edge out, Piet seeming to have some trouble getting the angle right as he reversed. The shouts of instruction had nothing to do with her, though, and she let them wash around in a meaningless buzz. She was so deep in her abstraction that the boat caught her by surprise as it reared above her. It was taller than ever; oblivious to the raised voices and mayhem below, it inched backwards, its sides crushing into the hedge. To anyone watching from across the fields, Helen thought, the boat would appear to be sailing smoothly down the lane. She heaved herself upright. They were on their way.
It was a tedious process. Piet reversed slowly, with Mick shouting for adjustments in his angle. Seth was walking to one side, watching for any shift in the boat’s balance, and the twins were leaping ahead, their yodelling voices getting in the way of Mick’s directions. Helen saw him glance at them with annoyance. Don’t say anything, she begged silently. Make this a good day. There had been no sign of Victoria. Helen wondered again what her plan for the launch celebration was.
As the boat reached the water’s edge, the wheels of the van slipped, pulled backwards by the weight of the boat. The van’s engine roared, keeping her steady. They were all cheering her in, everyone except Mick, whose eyes were fixed on the boat’s progress towards the bank. Then a small figure ran out from behind the truck: Will, whooping as he danced down to the point where the wheels of the trailer balanced on the bank’s edge. Seth reacted first, keeping his voice level.
‘Will, you need to get out of the way.’ Will took no notice, and Seth raised his voice. ‘Will, get away, now!’
Will ignored him again, leaning into the trailer, his thin figure braced against the end, his face scarlet with effort. Voices crashed together:
‘Brake! Brake!’
‘Will, stop!’
The boat was pulling at the restraining presence of the van’s engine again, the trailer’s wheels slipping with an awful finality. And Will was there, right in their tracks, about to go under as the boat and trailer crashed over the edge and down into the water. Helen couldn’t look.
Then the engine cut out, and Will’s voice floated up:
‘I stopped it! Did you see, Uncle Piet? I stopped it going in the canal!’
Helen opened her eyes. Piet had stopped in time, with the boat balanced, somehow, right on the edge. She caught sight of her father’s expression. He was pale, his mouth open in mid-yell, sweat pouring down his cheeks. She held her breath for the explosion, but it didn’t come. Instead, he squatted down by the boy and put a hand on his arm.
‘Do you know how much that boat weighs, sonny?’ His voice was calm, gentle even.
Will shook his head.
‘Enough to flatten someone twice your size.’ Mick pushed himself back to his feet with a groan. ‘So you need to think twice about putting yourself in front of it, because the boat can’t do it for you, all right?’ He was studying Will’s face. ‘All right?’ he asked again, this time getting a small nod in return. ‘OK.’ Mick gave him a push. ‘You get up on the towpath with your sister.’
It was as if everyone else drew breath at the same moment. Will ran to join Pippa, and Piet started his engine again. Only Helen saw how her dad’s hand was trembling as he rested it against the side of the boat.
She was graceful, despite her bulk, as she slid down towards the water in slow motion, barely needing the restraining hands on the ropes. She hit the water with a gentle bounce. Helen felt emotion rise up in her throat, for the boat being in the right place, for her dad, for Piet making it happen. She focused on the water. The disturbed surface bobbed around the hull, fussing, checking, approving and, finally, subsiding. Then Piet was behind her, resting a hand on her shoulder.
‘We’d best get some ballast into her.’ He gave her shoulder a friendly shake. ‘All turned out OK in the end, eh?’
In the evening, Helen had a long bath, reading until it was almost too chilly to be sitting in the water. Downstairs, Mick was sitting in the dark. She hesitated by the door to the living room, picking out her dad’s shape on the sofa, not certain if he was awake or sleeping.
‘Dad?’ There was no immediate response, and she trod carefully backwards, heading for the stairs. His voice came as if from a far distance.
‘We did it,’ he began. There was a pause, and he tried again. ‘She’s on her way, isn’t she?’ His voice was sodden.
‘Yes.’ Helen held the door frame, feeling the edges press into her palms. ‘Yes, she’s afloat.’
His face was wet, gleaming in the light coming through the door.
‘He could have died.’
Helen gripped harder.
‘I know.’ She pictured again the moment, Will straining to hold the boat in place. One moment longer and—
‘He’s all right though.’ She felt strange to be the one doing the reassuring. ‘He was all right.’
‘I just …’ Mick’s voice slurred. ‘I didn’t …’
She waited a long time for him to finish, even after the rasping of his breath told her he was asleep.
Chapter Twenty-four
2013, Manchester: 7.30 p.m.
The café is full of people milling around. Nobody seems to be going in to the exhibition. Have I got the time wrong? There is no sign of Victoria, none of the buzz that must surround the centre of the evening’s attention. I stand inside the door for a bit, sweaty and awkward, then go to the counter and order a coffee. I don’t really want one, but it might make me feel legitimate. As the girl grinds beans and fusses with milk, I use the time to gather information. There is a framed cutting by the till, a glowing review from the culture section of a national newspaper. I imagine a life where this would be exciting, where I would be tugging on someone’s sleeve to point it out, Look, there, that’s someone I know.
I take my cup, careful not to spill any coffee on the tiny macaroon balanced on the saucer’s edge, and search for an empty chair. The couple already sitting at the table give those false smiles and then ignore me. There are leaflets propped in a transparent plastic holder and I turn them around to face me. They have the same image as the poster, the one of calm water. I wonder if it was chosen because it truly reflects her memories of the time. I may be wrong, I remind myself. For a blissful second, I wonder if my memories have grown out of proportion, if that summer should be remembered as a time of tranquillity. Or the exhibition may have nothing to do with the canal, with me, at all. I am, I tell myself, going to be disappointed. It’s hardly the right word. Disappointment conjures mildness, a small measure of regret. It is a flimsy word, a shallow dip easily escaped. I go to drink my coffee but, before I even take a sip, sharp nausea burns up in my throat. I can’t wait any longer. My hand shakes as I put the cup back down in its saucer. A spill snakes across the table and pools under the plastic leaflet holder. I ignore the sideways glance of the woman across the table and go over to the stairs. Nobody stops me.
The sign on the first floor announces a permanent exhibition. I want to skip it and follow the arrows up towards the next level, but a gallery assistant is coming down from there. I wait for her to go past but she stops, and holds an arm out towards the doorway.
‘Upstairs is for the Dover launch only,’ she says. ‘It will be starting very soon.’ She smiles an air hostess smile. ‘In the meantime, please feel free to experience our permanent collection.’
She watches until I am safely out of the way.
I am in a narrow, long space, the opposite of the tall whiteness I was expecting. The walls and ceiling are hung with patterned fabric, but the light level is too low for me to make out the colour. Darkly glowing oils of still-life flowers are surrounded by an aura of light. They alternate with large glass backlit cases in which big, daisy-like flowers have been mounted and left to decay. Even though my consciousness is elsewhere, my mind fogged with apprehension, I am drawn to them. Are the oil paintings as old as they seem? I don’t trust my judgement. Is it an elaborate joke? They are labelled as being ‘in the style of …’ and the accompanying blurbs talk of statis and change, of what we keep and what we lose over time.
In the final oil painting, a worm emerges from a perfect apple. The apple is balanced against an open book, which in turn is half covered with a white cloth. The portion of the page that can be seen has writing on it, lightly scribbled, as if the owner jotted the phrase down to remember it for later: media vita in morte sumus. I know enough Latin to recognize life and death when I see it, but have to check the label for the translation. In the midst of life we are in death. I stand there for a long time, looking at the shine of the apple’s skin. It is only when voices tell me that other visitors are on their way that I carry on to the next room..
I pass straight through this time. I don’t want to stop again: I need to find the photographs, I need to find them now. There is another room, an unexpected corridor. I hear voices, but can’t tell where they are coming from. There is a door, but it won’t open. Finally, a right turn brings me back to the staircase.
The hostess is nowhere to be seen.
My legs drag, each foot an inert weight, and when I reach the top I am once again finding it hard to breathe. A tape has been stretched across the entrance, and a sign tells me the exhibition is not yet open. I duck under the frail barrier and take a step inside.
The corridor stretches ahead, lined with small frames. Each frame contains the image of a child, and each child is going somewhere. Some look back over their shoulders, some remain focused on their goal. They are going somewhere I know. With each step they take, I see myself disappearing around a corner. In amongst these captured moments, I know for certain that I do exist.