Life Begins

by Amanda Brookfield

  ‘Mum?’ Charlotte took another step towards the bed. She was lying so still, so awkwardly. Absorbing the implications of this, Charlotte was aware not so much of horror as a deepening shame that she could ever, no matter how briefly, have imagined taking the death of this woman – loved, hated, never understood – in her stride.

  ‘Did Jasper enjoy his walk?’

  ‘Charlotte gave a gasp of relief. Yes… at least…’ She hesitated, recovering still. ‘Good, you’re okay, then… That’s good. Jasper, yes, I think so. He was tired, actually,’ she confessed, guiltily recalling the dog’s ride home in the crook of her arm.

  Jean tilted her chin to a more natural position and eyed her daughter steadily. ‘Another pillow would be nice.’

  ‘Another pillow… of course.’

  ‘In the top cupboard. You’ll need to stand on the chair.’

  ‘Got it. Fine. Here we are. Can you sit up? That’s it… Better? I was going to make supper. Pasta and some lovely sauce – I’ll add extra mushrooms and things, make it really tasty.’

  ‘Thank you, dear, but I’m not very hungry. Just a piece of toast will do and maybe some Bovril.’

  ‘Bovril? On the toast?’

  ‘Butter on the toast, Bovril in a mug, with hot water. But first, I wonder, would you mind…’

  ‘Yes?’ Charlotte was fumbling with the window catch. The room was so stuffy she could barely breathe.

  ‘Please don’t, there’ll be a draught.’

  ‘A draught… right.’ Charlotte replaced the latch and folded her arms tightly across her chest, tucking her fingers into her armpits as if to prevent them doing any more harm. Two more days. Just two more days and she would be free again – to be impatient and undaughterly and get on with her life. A team of four would cover the visits for a week, the health-care people had said – work in a rota and without any of the irritation, probably, that Charlotte felt, with her dark thoughts about the self-pity behind the helplessness, the fact that (as the nurse had said) it was her mother’s confidence rather than her body that had taken the real bruising. ‘You were saying?’

  ‘My hair… I wondered if you could help me wash it?’

  Charlotte’s first instinct was to find a pretext to refuse. She had done so much, shopping, fetching, cleaning, carrying, walking, shutting herself off from the outside world, with the hateful Cindy débâcle gnawing at her and no comfort except the occasional call to Sam, who seemed to have nothing to communicate but a hurtful eagerness to get off the phone and race back to his baffling new friendship with the Porters. Their conversation the previous evening had lasted for precisely fifty seconds.

  ‘A hairwash – of course. You should have said before.’ She spoke brusquely in a bid to mask her reluctance. Would you like to do it now or after your –’

  ‘Now.’

  It wasn’t easy. The bathroom was small, the basin at precisely the wrong height. They tried it with Jean sitting in a chair – sideways, front ways, backwards. She got very wet, then distressed. ‘It’s not my arm, it’s my neck. I can’t bend it the right way – it’s hopeless.’

  ‘Perhaps I could tape up the plaster with clingfilm and help you stand under the shower,’ Charlotte suggested, eyeing her mother and the old fixed showerhead uncertainly. She, too, was rather wet now, splashed down her front and with sodden shirt cuffs, in spite of efforts to keep them out of the way.

  ‘No. Let’s leave it. Never mind. It’s all too hopeless.’

  She was crying, Charlotte realized, astonished, glad of the steamy mirror that had allowed her to make the observation without any obvious scrutiny.

  ‘I want my Bovril,’ Jean barked next, standing up. ‘And my toast. Could you do that at least?’

  ‘I’ve a better idea,’ Charlotte replied, pressing her gently back into the chair. ‘Don’t move.’ She returned a few minutes later with an old plastic shower attachment, a cherished accoutrement during her teenage years, dug out of a bottom drawer in her bedroom, and several more towels. ‘Kneel on these,’ she ordered, placing two of the towels on the floor and one across Jean’s shoulders, then pushed and cajoled the crusty old suctioned ends of the hose over the snouts of the taps. ‘There. Now, lean forward as far as you can on your good elbow. That’s it. Close your eyes. The towel will help, but you’re so wet anyway a bit more dousing won’t do any harm. We’ll find dry things afterwards.’

  Jean did as she was told without another word, and after a moment or two Charlotte fell silent too. She worked quickly, moving her fingertips deftly through the froth of the shampoo, feeling the soft contours of the scalp, not with revulsion, or self-righteousness, or reluctance, or any other of the unedifying emotions that had dominated the last few days – the last thirty years – but with a simple, respectful tenderness. At the reapplication of water for rinsing (nicely warm, not too hot, Charlotte found herself taking as much care as she had during the early, joyful, gurgling years of bathing Sam), and Jean released several audible sighs of pleasure. There was no soap left to rinse but Charlotte kept the water running, stroking the thin wet streaks of hair till they squeaked under her fingertips.

  It was such a simple task, not just the cleansing, the soothing warmth of the water, but the act of human physical contact, performed with caring hands. Turning the taps off at last, it dawned on Charlotte that she had experienced a few moments of the same nurturing attention herself, a couple of months before, kneeling on almost the same patch of lino, drooling and wretched, when Jean had held her hair for her and pressed the soft hot flannel to her aching head.

  Invisible, infinitesimal as they were, the sense of these two connecting moments flooded Charlotte’s heart; almost, she decided later, trying to describe it to herself as she lay in bed, how she might have imagined a state of grace, were she sufficiently religious to believe in such things. Whatever it was, she knew that Jean had felt it too: it had been like a conversation between them, unspoken and yet the most powerful they had ever had. Afterwards, giddy with the surprise of it – the joy of it – Charlotte had helped Jean into dry clothes, then happily accepted expulsion to the kitchen to do battle with gluey spoonfuls of Bovril and the toaster that only popped when its contents were blackened beyond salvaging.

  By the evening of bank-holiday Monday the two-day spell of tropical blue skies had thickened and darkened to a ceiling of lowering grey. The muggy breeze that had been teasing under the rugs and skirt hems of afternoon picnickers began to whip its targets in greater earnest, driving them home to seek the comfort of thicker clothes and hot meals.

  ‘They’ll be fine.’

  ‘I know they will. I’m not worried about them in the least.’

  ‘Then stop looking out of the window.’

  ‘They missed an egg – in the hinge of the gatepost. I can see it from here.’

  ‘You could do some more unpacking.’

  ‘And you could return to your own home.’

  ‘I’m cooking, remember? Goose fricassée.’

  Dominic turned from the window, frowning. ‘Yes, what is that exactly?’

  Benedict was lying the length of the sofa, sucking a pencil and studying a script for an audition the following day. ‘Same as my chicken fricassée except with goose, to the accompaniment of French beans, new potatoes – a veritable feast. Christ, you’re lucky to have me as a brother.’

  Dominic returned his attention to the front window. In fact he had been on the lookout for a black Volkswagen more than the children, both of whom had phones, not to mention the protection of the father who had been hardy enough to suggest a pre-school get-together for their class in the park – rounders and bring-your-own picnic. Five o’clock, Charlotte had said, and it was almost six. He had tried to call to tell her about the rounders, to warn her not to hurry on account of it, but her phone had been off, for the journey, he had assumed, but that had been two hours ago. ‘How long do you reckon the drive is from Tunbridge Wells?’

  ‘An hour?’ hazarded Benedict, returning his
concentration to his character (a lawyer with a fondness for Persian cats and a vengeful ex-wife) and fighting a mushrooming urge to trade the flaking end of his pencil for a cigarette. ‘Maybe two if the traffic’s bad.’

  ‘Which it would be today, of course – especially the South Circular – Catford, Lewisham…’ Dominic shuddered on Charlotte’s behalf.

  ‘Keen to get rid of Sam, then?’

  Dominic wrenched himself away from the window and began to plump up cushions and stack the weekend newspapers in tidy piles. ‘On the contrary. In spite of their decidedly unpromising start, he seems a good kid. On the quiet side, secretive – just Rose’s cup of tea. I thought you liked him too – all that bonfire and barbecue business, you had him in raptures.’

  ‘The boy’s okay.’ Benedict put down his script and levered himself upright. What’s up?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Are you worried about him and Rose liking each other?’

  ‘Don’t be absurd.’

  ‘Well, you’re worried about something.’

  ‘No, I am not.’ Dominic punched the last of the cushions and dropped it into place, puzzling over the business of loving someone who could be so wilfully irksome. He wondered, too, whether the moment had arrived to reveal the latest unfortunate twist in his City career, a twist about which he, bizarrely perhaps, could still muster no real concern beyond hurt pride. If Benedict was picking up anxiety on that score it was entirely subconscious.

  ‘Hah. I’ve got it.’ Benedict slapped the script against his knees. ‘The lovely Petra. You haven’t mentioned her, from which omission I can only deduce…’

  ‘Bugger-all. Shouldn’t you be doing something useful like tearing goosemeat off a carcass?’

  Benedict swung himself off the sofa, grinning smugly as he hitched up his shorts. One cigarette in the back garden before the rain had started, a treat for eating only half the mountain of chocolate he had accrued during the course of the weekend’s festivities and for managing to pass on seconds of Dominic’s apple pie at lunch the previous day. ‘You are seeing her, aren’t you, you sly fox? I put her your way and then you don’t even have the decency to –’

  ‘We’re having lunch on Friday,’ Dominic cut in, suddenly weary, not just of his sibling’s curiosity, which, as they both knew, arose as much from brotherly fondness as a serious deficiency in his own life, but also of the human knee-jerk assumption (his own included) that every adult needed to find a partner. He had been feeling good lately, much more secure, and increasingly able to recall Maggie’s maddening habits with the genuine irritation he had experienced at the time rather than through the cunning prism of nostalgia. There was an emotional freedom to being alone that he was also starting to enjoy and would not, again, surrender readily.

  Petra’s contribution to this more secure state of mind had been as a walk-on part in the occasional sexual fantasy, playing the role with such unwitting efficiency that Dominic had even wondered whether it wouldn’t be better to keep her in such confinement, untested, unable to disappoint, the blank sheet he so craved, rather than throwing her into the dragon’s den of real life, so messy in comparison, so full of scars and skeletons, maddening habits and dashed hopes. He wasn’t worried about Sam and Rose per se, but he feared for the rawness of their young hearts, for their innocent ignorance of the fact that acquiring the capacity to love went hand in hand with the power to disappoint and inflict pain.

  ‘That is excellent news.’

  ‘Glad, as ever, to have your approval,’ remarked Dominic, drily, moving back to the front window and noting that the foil-wrapped egg had disappeared from its perch on the gatepost – blown off, probably, by the wind. Behind him, he was aware of his brother retreating into the kitchen, banging a few drawers and then, softly (like the dope he was, thinking he could fool anyone), opening the back door to sneak out into the garden for a smoke. Such a great, warm, open, talented man, yet hamstrung by secret vices, Dominic mused with familiar, cheery despair as he held back the curtain for a better view of the street. He stood there for a few moments, using his free hand to fire off a text to Rose saying that if rain didn’t end the get-together he wanted the pair of them home by seven p.m.

  It was only as he was letting the curtain drop that Dominic spotted the car – patches of black behind a fuzz of pink blossom – parked a good fifty yards away, opposite the derelict church, which was soon, according to laminated council plans pinned to lampposts, to be converted into a primary school. It might not be the Volkswagen, of course – it was impossible to be absolutely sure from the angle he had and at such a distance – but Dominic, for no good reason other than a curious stirring in his gut, felt certain that it was.

  ‘I’m going out,’ he called, pushing open the back door and surprising Benedict, who spun round like a guilty schoolboy, face pink, keeping the offending item cupped behind his back. ‘Bury the stub, won’t you?’ Dominic added, chuckling to himself as he grabbed his jacket and hurried out into the street.

  It was definitely a Volkswagen. Dominic slowed his pace, recalling the last occasion he had approached her car in that same street, when he had been finalizing things with the Stowes. There had been a gale blowing and she had treated his offer of help like a bad smell. Dominic began to smile, then stopped abruptly. The car was empty and dusted with blossom. It could have been there for hours. Not hers, then. Idiot. Christ, as if it mattered when the bloody woman arrived. She used him as it suited her, treated kindness as a commodity rather than a gift.

  Dominic continued down the street, nursing the vague intention of joining in with the tail end of the class picnic, maybe offering his services as a deep fielder. He had been good with a ball once upon a time – cricket and footie – before marriage and work had eaten up the time necessary to pursue such hobbies. That was another thing he could consider now – a spot of weekend cricket. It would be perfect with the summer approaching; he might make some new friends into the bargain, like-minded souls to raise a pint with on a Sunday evening – yes, that would be nice.

  Dominic proceeded slowly and with diminishing conviction. His appearance at the rounders fest, he realized, might not be greeted with unbridled glee, either by his daughter or her new friend. They might think, for instance, with their still so recently acquired, still fragile thirteen-year-old independence, that he had decided they needed an escort home. Which wouldn’t do… wouldn’t do at all.

  Dominic stopped again. He had crossed the road by now and was by the church, right next to the no-trespassers sign that hung at an angle on the fence, as if someone had tried to prise it off. The sorry state of the fence itself made the warning seem pointless – slats broken and missing like a set of rotten teeth. The primary school would seem like a palace in comparison. The church, with its pock-marked red bricks and boarded-up windows, looked embattled to the point of defeat. Strewn around its base was a rich assortment of litter – cans, bottles, Styrofoam containers, the odd gnarled item of clothing; almost, Dominic decided, as if some of the inhabitants of the graveyard had tunnelled out of their resting-places for a spot of nocturnal partying and not cleared up afterwards. Through the trees crowding the side of the church he could just make out the tops of a couple of headstones pitched at angles in the long grass. And a woman. Dominic blinked. A woman with a blue top and red hair was visible… ducking behind a gravestone and then… Where had she gone? A ghost? Dominic squinted, uncertain of his emotions and his eyesight in the failing grey light. Maggie? He opened his mouth to call, then eased himself sideways through a gap in the fence instead, the widest one, right next to the wonky sign forbidding entry.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be silly. There’s nothing to be sorry for. It happens.’ Theresa eyed her socks as she pulled her pants up, wondering dimly if they could have been to blame: ankle-length, grey, serviceable, comfortable, with a small ladder over the left anklebone, they were hardly what one might have described as erotic. Henry had been so eager, prising her awa
y from loading the dishwasher, chivvying her upstairs, tugging at zips and buttons, that it hadn’t occurred to her to worry about the need to appear especially alluring. It was the first real physical interest her husband had shown in more than two months so it also hadn’t occurred to her to refuse, even though there were a thousand other things she had planned to do before George and his brothers were dropped back from their various play-dates in and around the park. She had especially enjoyed their ungainly progress up the stairs, giggling and shushing each other on account of Matilda, who had ultimately to take credit for their opportunity: she had performed the unprecedented act of falling instantly asleep after her bath.

  Once in the bedroom, they had taken the precaution of locking the door nonetheless, then fallen on to the bed, separating only briefly to attend to the business of removing garments. Except socks… had Henry left his on as well? Theresa had been too embroiled in rediscovering the ancient pleasure of desiring and being desired to notice. He had them on now, certainly, along with the chinos that needed washing and a checked shirt he had been so eager to button up again that the entire set was misaligned.

  ‘Hang on a minute…’

  Henry pulled away, misreading the approach as a fresh effort to stir his passions.

  ‘Your buttons,’ said Theresa, anger pushing through the wifely compassion. What had she done wrong, after all, except respond to his advances and then, when he had gone irretrievably, inexplicably, off the boil, try to be understanding? She knew plenty of women who found sex tedious, who joked that the pretext of a week off provided by their monthly cycle was a blessed relief. Not her… at least, not recently. Deprived, she had rediscovered real physical hunger. No one, when assaulted next to a dishwasher, could have been more eager, more willing to please, more delighted. ‘Your buttons,’ she pointed out tersely. ‘They’re wrong.’

  After Henry had gone Theresa lay back on the bed to do up her trousers, which were tight – far too tight – and closed her eyes. She wished suddenly that she could leapfrog over what she knew would be a hectic few hours, and cut straight to the business of falling asleep. The boys would be tired, but hungry too, no doubt, in spite of their respective teas and picnics. George was supposed to have done a project on the Taj Mahal and the two younger ones had had spelling lists and Alfie had said first that his trainers were too small and then that they weren’t and now she wished she had bought some anyway.