Perhaps he’d heard, perhaps he hadn’t. It hardly mattered. More and more during those days, there had seemed to be no way of reaching him.
And things had got steadily worse.
There was that awful night when she had woken suddenly, hair prickling, the back of her neck tingling. It had taken a moment or so to adjust her focus, to understand where she was, what she was hearing. She’d looked around her, grappling with the unexpected sensation of fear. Her bedside light was on, her book open on the pillow beside her. There was a distant pull of pain across her shoulder from resting too long against the headboard, the angle an awkward one. She’d had no idea what time it was, what day it was, or why she had awoken so abruptly. Then she heard it again: a strange, dragging, muffled sound, coming from the hallway below.
Fully alert then, Rose had thrown the duvet back and shoved her arms into the sleeves of her dressing gown. She’d walked quietly, quickly, out onto the landing. Her bedroom door was always open, a deliberate statement to her family that she was there, watching over them, protecting them. It might have fooled her children, but Rose knew that she could never fool herself: she was still nervous whenever she woke during the night. Darkness brought with it those nameless, primitive fears that had never dared claw at her insides as long as Ben was in her bed. Now her heart began to hammer against her ribs and from some distant viewing point, she saw herself leaning over the banisters, terrified that the magnified drumbeat was echoing throughout the whole house.
There it was again.
Her hand shaking slightly, Rose reached out for the light switch. At precisely the same moment, someone below her coughed, and the spell was broken.
‘Damien!’ she cried, unsure whether relief or anger was the stronger emotion. Light flooded the stairway and the hall below. Damien stood halfway between the front door and the kitchen, his rucksack dragging against the wooden floor. That’s the sound, she’d thought, her heart beginning to return to normal. Nothing sinister; nothing supernatural; just a rucksack. It took a moment before her gaze reached Damien’s face. She was unhappily conscious of what stood in front of her, even before her son spoke. His face seemed peculiarly out of proportion, dirty, formless somehow. The features were no longer his: they belonged to some alter ego, some fairy child that had magicked its way into his place. He had deserted his own body, filtered himself away somewhere into the darkness, leaving her with the changeling child. He began to sway then, very gently, back and forwards, back and forwards.
‘Hi, Mum,’ he said thickly.
Then she knew for sure, of course she did.
‘You’re drunk,’ she said bluntly. ‘Again.’
He said nothing, just continued to make his unsteady way towards the kitchen. Rose followed, almost tripping on the belt of her dressing gown in her haste to reach her son.
‘This has to stop, Damien.’
‘What has, Ma?’ He was standing in front of the open fridge, just bending slightly as he reached for the orange juice. His stance filled her with sadness, an intense rush of emotion composed partly of memory, partly of regret and partly of a searing, blinding vision of what the future was becoming, unfolding right there in front of her eyes. He tried to keep the teasing, affectionate tone he always used when he called her ‘Ma’, but she could hear the strain in his voice. And he kept his back to her, his unsteady gaze still directed towards the contents of the fridge, the carton of juice apparently forgotten.
‘Look at me, Damien. I mean it.’
He turned, his gaze glassy, hostile. ‘I’ve just had a few pints with the lads. First time we’ve met up in a while, for God’s sake. I’d no dinner, so . . .’ he shrugged, allowing her to reach her own conclusion. It was the empty stomach, your honour. I’m not to blame. No responsibility here, your honour, not on my part.
‘It’s not just tonight, and not just the start of the new term, or the end of the old one. This is happening far too often. It’s dangerous – can’t you see it’s affecting your whole life?’
Even as she spoke, Rose realized how useless her words were. Who thinks of their whole life when they’ve only recently celebrated their twenty-second birthday? Their whole life is the here and now, living for the moment. Years unfurl in front of them, rushing full-bellied before the wind, heading towards an unconsidered future. All of life is now: growing older happens to other people. As though he’d just read her mind, which her elder son had always had the uncanny ability to do, Damien looked at her mockingly.
‘Forgotten what it’s like to be young, Ma, eh?’ And he tipped the carton of juice to his lips, throwing his head back, almost keeling over in the process. Rose turned away without a word. She should have left him until morning, shouldn’t have bothered trying to reason with him. But he had frightened her with his sneaky, shuffling entrance, had reminded her of some furtive animal, intent on evading capture. He had been slipping away from her for over two years now – not with the independence of a grown-up, but rather, elusively, resentfully, shielded by a hard carapace of anger.
She left the kitchen, closing the door quietly behind her.
And it wasn’t as if she could have kept this from her other two children, either. On another, later occasion, Brian had looked on shocked, white-faced as his elder brother lurched sickeningly down the hallway, his face twisted into an ugly parody of a smile.
‘All righ’ there, bro’?’ Damien had tried to high-five his younger brother, but Brian had simply stepped out of the way. The sudden lack of connection with the hand he’d been expecting, the emptiness of the air as he swung downwards, had disturbed whatever was left of Damien’s fragile sense of equilibrium. He’d stumbled forwards and come crashing down onto his knees. He’d looked up at both of them, stunned, puzzled to find himself on the floor. There seemed to be a moment when he’d realized what had happened before his eyes closed and he slumped into a heap outside the kitchen door. Brian had looked at his mother, his eyes wide and horrified.
‘Is he drunk?’ he asked in a whisper.
‘He certainly is. Again.’ Rose had been filled with impotent fury. There was no point in pretending. She couldn’t shield Brian from this, and she couldn’t shield Damien from himself, either. She had the familiar, ashen taste of failure in her mouth. ‘Not a pretty picture, is it?’
Brian had shaken his head, slowly.
‘Come on,’ she’d said briskly. ‘Leave him.’
‘What – here? Like this?’ Brian’s expression was appalled.
‘Yes, just like this. This can’t go on. I’m at my wits’ end. Let him sleep there and sober up. Maybe he’ll learn a lesson.’
‘We can’t just leave him here!’
‘Yes,’ she’d said firmly. ‘We can, and we will. I believe it’s called “tough love”. Come on – step over him.’
Reluctantly, Brian had stepped over his brother’s prone form. Rose had thanked God that Lisa was already asleep. This was something a twelve-year-old girl should not have to see.
Later on, she crept downstairs in the darkness. Damien was lying on his back, snoring. Gently, but firmly, Rose turned him over onto one side, making sure his airways were free. He’d been sick on one previous occasion: her terror was that he might choke in his sleep. She stroked an escaped lock of hair back across his pale forehead. Something in the ghostly vulnerability of his face as he slept stirred a deep well of sadness within her.
She saw him in front of her with a bucket and spade, saw him smile up at her from his buggy, from his first tricycle. The face before her was still that child’s and, despite herself, she felt filled with the all the aching tenderness of grief.
‘Damien, Damien,’ she whispered, tears welling and falling uncontrollably. ‘What on earth am I going to do with you?’
She realized that she was crying again, quietly now. The tears surprised her as she sat at her kitchen table, a cup of cold tea in front of her. She’d never before allowed herself to dwell on those times in all their excruciating detail. She knew that
she already carried them inside her, their insistence dulled a little by the act of not remembering. Rose had always felt that if she journeyed there, she might not be able to find her way back. Instead, she had been intent on survival: something that belonged to the present, that focused the future.
If you kept on looking over your shoulder, she’d told herself, the danger was that something, somewhere, would eventually trip you up.
But now Ben’s return had stirred more than just the memories of his leaving. Everywhere she looked, there was something prodding at her, reminding her of loss, of missed opportunity, of all the failures and fractures of maternal love. I’m not at my wits’ end, she used to think, during those long nights when she’d sat up, waiting, hoping, for her elder son’s safe return. I left Wits’ End a long time ago: it was a chilly, deserted place, a mere stopping-off point along the road. I’m much further on than that.
‘That’s enough,’ she said now, out loud. ‘Stop it.’ She stood up, literally dusting herself off. She opened the dishwasher and put her mug inside. Firmly, she emptied the teapot, threw the teabags in the bin. She tore a piece of kitchen towel off the roll, wiped her face briskly. ‘That’s quite enough for one night.’
Wallowing was not part of the plan.
Go to bed. Pandora’s box would wait until tomorrow.
She turned off the lights, checked the alarm, climbed the stairs slowly to her bedroom. Exhaustion claimed her even before she took off her dressing gown. She half-pulled the duvet over her, and sank gratefully into the merciful oblivion of sleep.
Chapter Three
ROSE PULLED UP outside the local supermarket at ten o’clock, just as it opened. She’d slept little the previous night. Too many cups of tea, she’d scolded herself, trying to be matter-of-fact, no-nonsense. But she knew, of course she did, that tea had had nothing to do with it. She’d dreamt of Damien whenever she did sleep, and then lurched awake, head pounding, palms sweating. Once awake, she could think of little else. Her son’s face ambushed her at every turn: that pale forehead, the defiant lock of hair.
But despite two restless nights, Rose could now feel a welcome return of energy. She relished the feeling, getting stronger and more insistent with every hour, that now was not the time to be tired: now was the time to be smart, alert. Saturday had been spent, wasted, in a fog of inertia, of listless worrying. But some time around three o’clock on Sunday morning she had been jolted awake by a shock of realization. It was nothing new: nothing she hadn’t felt a hundred times already, since Ben’s return. But in the darkness of her silent bedroom, the thought had acquired a new clarity.
These were not the days to fill with waiting. She was a woman on a mission: she had things to do, days to organize, people to handle. She needed to act, to make things happen. The old Rose, the one who’d spent so much of her early adult life in a state of passive animation, had no place here. She’d had a sudden surge of will, one that had kept her awake until dawn. And now, all the remaining lethargy of the past two days disappeared somewhere between the tinned tomatoes and the cheese counter.
She made her way quickly up and down the broad aisles, mindlessly calculating what household supplies were critical, what was running low, what could wait for another day. This was the one thing she no longer needed a list for: it was as familiar to her as breathing.
Briskly, she emptied the contents of her basket onto the sluggishly moving belt at the checkout.
‘Are you collectin’ the stamps?’
Rose looked blankly at the checkout girl. Her young face was a white wall of boredom, its sullenness strange against the glint of a nose stud, the defiant gleam of an eyebrow ring.
‘Pardon?’
The girl sighed. ‘The stamps, for the fryin’ pan and saucepan set?’
Rose almost laughed out loud. ‘No – no thank you. I think I’ll pass.’
The girl suddenly grinned at her: a bright, broad ray of feminine complicity. For some reason, the exchange cheered Rose enormously.
Frying pan? Saucepan set?
Rose had no clear idea of where she wanted her life to go next. As yet, she didn’t know in what directions Ben’s unwelcome return might point her. But wherever it was, she was damned sure that she, and the checkout girl, would both bring with them something a lot more interesting than a frying pan and saucepan set.
Later that evening, Rose pulled up outside Heuston Station. She parked behind the long line of taxis queuing for passengers off the evening trains. Just at that moment, her mobile rang.
‘I’m outside, Brian – just down from the taxi rank. Yes, I’ll wait for you here.’
She didn’t want to meet him inside the station, knew that his sharp eye would see that all was not well. She’d a fighting chance of fooling him in the fading light, but fluorescent lamps would only highlight the dark circles under her eyes, the normally pale complexion now red and blotchy from lack of sleep.
Dad’s favourite son: how would he take the news of the prodigal father’s return? She remembered how, in the early days after Ben left, her middle child had had difficulty even looking her in the eye. She had played a deliberate waiting game with him, knowing him well enough to hope that he would, eventually, emerge from his chrysalis of hostility. And he had – at about fourteen years of age, in a cloud of deodorant and hair gel, demanding to be seen, insisting that she notice him, his clothes, his hair, his brand-new personality.
He’d seemed willing, finally, to shed his coat of sullen silence, his air of lofty grievance. Almost overnight he’d turned into a noisy, in-your-face, up-front adolescent. Rose had grown used to the sound of his large feet taking the stairs three at a time, landing with a thump on the wooden floor of the hallway. She’d greeted every loud outfit, every new haircut and colour, no matter how outrageous, with the same mild mantra.
‘Well, well,’ she’d remark. ‘What can I say? You take my breath away.’
Choose your battles, she’d learned. Fight only the ones worth winning: passing fads and fashions were not one of them.
He’d display each of his new outfits in the hallway, twirling dizzily, the soles of his trainers squealing against the floorboards. He’d always finish his dance with a flourish, his hands extended in a music-hall ‘ta-da’ for her entertainment.
‘Give me a hug,’ she’d demand, every time.
And he would. On cue, he’d lope towards her, much taller even then than she was, and lift her up in a bear-like embrace. When she insisted he put her down, he’d be delighted to oblige: suddenly, and with some force.
Damien had never cared for that sort of experimentation, and Lisa had only ever wanted to be the same as everyone else. But Brian, it seemed, had been driven to express enough individuality for all three of them. His became a sartorial rebellion which Rose hadn’t minded in the least: she had welcomed its brash, colourful ordinariness with a huge sigh of relief. Often it had brought with it a measure of fun and frivolity to a household sometimes sadly lacking in both.
She smiled to herself, now. She used to ruffle his hair back then, too, before the days when gel and wax and product had taken over. Now his locks were permanently constructed into complicated peaks and valleys, the texture unwelcoming – spiky on the hills and gooey in the lowlands. She had learned not to travel there.
She waved now as her tall, gangly son approached her, hunched over from the weight of his rucksack. Where did I get such tall children? Rose wondered idly. It’s a complete mystery to me.
Brian grinned at her, his face unshaven, shadowed by three days’ dark growth. He pulled open the door, dumped his rucksack into the back of the van.
‘Hi, Mum! Thanks for collectin’ me. You on your own?’ He struggled into the passenger seat, folding his long body to fit into it.
‘Hello, love. Yes, Lisa’s watching something on television.’ She leaned towards him, met his kiss halfway. ‘Did you have a good time?’
‘Wicked.’ He nodded. ‘Absolutely brilliant. Great party.’
&
nbsp; ‘Good,’ said Rose, pulling away carefully from the kerb. ‘So John’s no longer a teenager. He’s a mature old man now, don’t you think?’
Brian grinned. ‘Well, I don’t think I’d ever accuse John of being mature. But at least he’s older: and boy, has he turned twenty in style.’
‘Were there many there?’
‘Yeah, about eighty, I think. We didn’t get to bed until six on Saturday morning. And when we got up, we just started the party all over again.’ He looked at her quickly. ‘Don’t worry, I didn’t overdo it. Believe it or not, I was sensible.’
She glanced over at him and smiled. ‘I do believe it. I’m glad you had fun.’
‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes,’ said Rose. ‘Why?’
‘You look as though you’re the one who’s been up for two nights in a row.’
‘I haven’t been sleeping.’
She didn’t want to tell him: not here, not in the car. She wanted to take him home, to the comfort of her own kitchen, somewhere he could be angry, or silent, or indifferent. He deserved at least that. She had a bright, brittle vision of sitting in the little wicker chair by the window in Brian’s bedroom. Her eleven-year-old son had sat before her in complete silence. She’d tried to explain to the white, pinched face, all the usual stuff about Mum and Dad still loving the children, while her tongue felt like a dried fish in her mouth. When she’d faltered her way to a finish, Brian spoke. His words had been stony.
‘Can I watch television now?’
His grief had sliced at her heart. On that day, her son, her baby, had become a human scalpel with spiky hair and grubby trainers. It had taken until the following morning for him to cave in, to weep into his porridge like there was no tomorrow.
‘Mum – you’re very quiet. Are you sure there’s nothin’ wrong? Mum?’ His tone was suddenly anxious, urgent. ‘Tell me.’
Rose hesitated, just for a second, but it was a second too long.
Something Like Love Page 6