‘One thing, Anja,’ I said. ‘There’s one thing I’ve been meaning to ask.’
‘Yes,’ she said cautiously.
‘It’s just. Why me?’
She gave a rolling chuckle. ‘What do you mean?’ she said.
‘At the airport. How did you decide? Why me?’
We were on the street now. Home in five minutes.
She was silent and I saw that she was considering her answer. I took to counting our steps; a nail must have come through the sole of a boot, for my heel marked out a sharp metallic beat.
I went back to the fantasy of my involvement; a scene I visited for comfort.
Anja gets off the plane; no plan but alert to opportunity. Every nerve sings. She is looking for someone. She will know her when she sees her.
Next we are in the loo, standing in line. She studies me up close, sees the hump of bone at the top of my neck that aches from the journey; a whorl of scalp where my hair is flattened, the slope of one shoulder bowed in testament to every handbag I’ve ever worn. But she doesn’t see vulnerability or feel pity. She doesn’t see middle-aged woman at all. She sees someone who will change her life, who is strong and brave enough to help. She is wondering, should she? Dare she? She needs to find a way to ask. She wills the question into life. Somehow, miraculously, I hear it and look across; I see that face. Our connection is made. Everything is agreed.
Still Anja hadn’t spoken.
‘You were just there, Maggie,’ she said, in the end.
‘I felt sick. The pregnancy. I got to the toilet and I thought I would throw up and they would know. I was panicking. I splashed water on my face to try and stop myself. And I looked up and I saw you in the mirror, and you were staring at me so hard that I felt frightened. It sounds so stupid now.’
‘No,’ I said.
‘I was terrified. I couldn’t move, all of a sudden. I thought I might even die. And so I said a prayer – the first time in years – I prayed to god to help me. I even whispered the word out loud, I think. When I heard a knock on the door I nearly passed out! I saw it was you and I ran.’
‘But you grabbed me, Anja.’
‘I’m sorry, Mags! I just needed to get away! I know this is crazy but for a minute I thought you were with him.’
I thought how fluent she had become, how expert her English.
‘But soon I saw that you could help. That I could hide better with you beside me. And the weirdest thing of all, it was so easy! All I had to do was decide. It was up to me. Just me. It was amazing to know that, Mags.’
My vanity exposed; I might even have laughed out loud. How could it have been otherwise? I knew this world. Blind and indifferent. But it was still the world that delivered me Anja.
‘Why don’t you stay tonight?’ I said, all in a rush. ‘The spare room’s made up. It wouldn’t be a problem. Not at all.’
The idea had been growing as she spoke. Now it filled my head; the neat clean bedroom, sheets fresh out of plastic, hospital corners.
‘That would be great actually, Mags,’ she replied. ‘I do feel tired.’
‘Come on then. We’re nearly there.’
31
I put her in the sitting room.
‘Hold on. Let me just go and air it for a sec. Then I’ll show you up.’
‘I know it, Mags! I clean in there all the time!’ she said.
‘Of course. But you’re a guest now. Just give me a moment. I’ll check it’s all OK.’
I took the stairs in twos. The door needed a push across its dense inch of carpet. The air inside was still, unbreathed.
I pulled up the sash window and a bit of London rushed me, the deep release of bus brakes and the shriek of a girl who must have slipped. Next door’s nanny was smoking in the garden and I leant out and inhaled. I took in just enough for something to happen – a tightening behind my temples, the briefest sense of alteration.
I went to the airing cupboard and fetched two towels that I laid on the chair.
I straightened the covers, plumped and then levelled them.
There was a carafe with a glass on the bedside table. This, I rinsed and filled.
I turned the radiator on and the bedside lamp, rubbed the surfaces with the elbow of my sweater. There was nothing else. The room was small and otherwise empty. I caught sight of myself in the mirror. My hair had bounced and I looked a little manic.
Then I stepped around the bed and opened a wardrobe door. There were a couple of old coats and a tangle of dry cleaner’s hangers, which I straightened, ready for her things. An old box lay on the floor, of the sort you assemble yourself. I toed it in to a corner, but its old position remained, marked out as an absence of dust.
On the other side, my summer things hung. This door was stiff, unaccountably so, and when it finally opened, I saw an edge of sundress fall away, bearing an imprint of hinge. I carried the box across and watched it vanish beneath decades of hemline. All things settled, I reached for it anyway. Empty but for shoes. Four little pairs of shoes.
I lifted the lid at arm’s length and felt inside, something of the lucky dip in it. First, I pulled out the mary-janes, black patent, the length of my palm. Their pink soles were unblemished, the only sign of wear a swipe of scuff on the back of one. I imagined her sat at a table, feet swinging, her shoe catching the leg of her chair. Had I scolded her for this? What would the occasion have been? I couldn’t picture her in them at all and didn’t know why I’d chosen to keep them, though they were beautiful enough.
A school shoe next; Rose’s first. I had written in these, her name along the side, though the NS of the surname was rubbed away; an early sign, I realised, of her high arch, which remained undiagnosed for a good few more years. These shoes were better, worn and kinked, the leather stiff and curved back on itself. Evidence of life. When I pulled them straight, I heard a crack.
But my favourites were the smallest ones, two almost identical pairs. Bought years and miles apart, for two distinct girls. The repeat, when I noticed it, had astounded me. Both long outgrown, I’d been packing things away when I found them. At first they had looked the same but when I brought them closer, their differences were revealed. The bigger ones had a more textured grain, and a citrus zing to the smaller pair’s cream. It pleased me to spot this; it bled them of their power. For years they had lain there, untouched, bound together, top to top, in a shroud of crunched brown paper.
I unwrapped them now, with deference, half expecting them to have crumbled or even disappeared. But they were just as I remembered. A common enough shoe really, of leather so thin you felt that you could rip it. Made with just three pieces; the broad clubbed front, a back panel – elastic frilled around the ankle, and the sole, of a rougher suede. Something elfin about them, knife cut and hand stitched. Never meant for the carpet, let alone outdoors.
I rubbed their softness on my cheek, breathed them in. I ran my finger inside each one, as if to ready them for real children’s feet. Anja called from downstairs and I felt a kick of confusion.
‘Can I come up, Mags? I really want to go to bed.’
‘Sure. Course. I’m all ready up here.’
I shoved the box back into the cupboard. The shoes, I laid on the wardrobe floor, where shoes are meant to go. They sat upright, stuffed with a little of the paper to keep them firm, and it pleased me to see them there.
‘I’ve put a nightie out for you, Anja. I left it in the bathroom,’ I called, and she came through a minute later, her arms outstretched, wanting to share the joke of how she looked; ordinary enough in mid-calf, spotted cotton.
She got straight into bed and lay on her side with a shudder.
‘Do you want a hot-water bottle?’ I asked, but she told me no.
‘There’s water here and a glass. I’ll just change the clock,’ I said, but didn’t have my glasses, so she did it herself. I found myself reluctant to leave.
‘Oh and, Anja, see? I’ve left some wardrobe space for you here. In case you want to hang up you
r clothes.’
I opened the wardrobe, gestured with an arm. One shoe had toppled, but I left it.
She sat up.
‘Oh. I think I left my stuff in the bathroom,’ she said.
‘Don’t worry. I’ll get it for you. Shall I pop it all in the machine?’ I asked.
‘Oh yes, please, Maggie. If you don’t mind.’
She sighed and slid back under and I patted the lump which was her shoulder. Her eyes were already closed.
‘Nunight then, love.’
‘Good night, Maggie.’
‘Sleep tight.’
I’d got to the door when she called to me, gently.
‘Will you tell me your story, Mags? One day?’
‘One day. Not now though. Time for sleep.’
I took her clothes from the bathroom floor, hooked her pants out of the leg of her jeans and put on a wash.
When I checked later, she was sleeping, so I went back down and poured a whisky. A man’s drink, my mother used to claim, which was why I’d said yes the first time it was offered. When I sunk my nose into the glass, though, there had been a wonderful recognition. I’d smelt it warmed on Frannie, all those years, when she’d crept back up for one last goodnight. I’ve loved it ever since.
32
Putting the key in the piano that night made me cry. It opened something up.
I raced from room to room, the ruins of dinner everywhere and when I noticed my shoes, on their sides, pigeon-toed, I grabbed them and very nearly ran. I wanted Frannie, but Mum would never forgive me that, and so I called her instead, whispering even though I was alone. Her voice was tipped with worry when she answered and sharpened as she listened. When she had the barest facts she said she’d come.
‘Don’t leave the house. Bet can drive. We’ll be there soon.’
Those next two hours, while they drove to me, were almost sweet. The mother of a small child is rarely alone and I moved around the house feeling ghostly, filling time. I tidied up and sat in the corner of the settee to wait.
It was still warm. I had no need of a jumper and the air seemed swollen and pillowy, as if I could take a pinch between two fingers. I closed my eyes and must have slept for a second or two, before my neck collapsed and I was jerked back into life. The silence outside was complete, the birds hadn’t started in my suburb and there was no traffic, but I could hear the mechanical chug of the dishwasher in the kitchen, found a rhythm in it after a time that I began to anticipate.
The street was behind me through closed curtains and theirs was the first car in a while. I heard a change of register as Bet shifted gear, and a rev that tore up the silence. Two yellow headlights hit the opposite wall as they pulled up the short steep ascent of our drive. It was just after four, daybreak in less than an hour. I couldn’t have borne it in the sun.
Mum was all business. She patted my arm: ‘OK?’
I followed her as she unbuttoned her coat, making straight for the kettle. Bet came afterwards – ‘You all right, love?’ – and sat herself uncomfortably at the small square of kitchen table. Mum put a biscuit tin in front of us that she’d brought with her from home.
‘So who’s this Jan then?’ she said, into the fridge.
‘Oh no one, Mum. A friend.’
‘Funny kind of friend.’
‘More of an acquaintance.’
‘Well. I’d expected an air hostess or someone from abroad.’
‘There’s been those too,’ I said.
She looked at me, acute.
She brought across three mugs and milk in a jug from the night before. I went to pour it then remembered they liked it added afterwards. The beginings of a rind had grown over the surface and I tipped the jug in gentle circles to see how long it would hold.
My mother approached with the pot, took the lid off at the table and stirred. It would already be too strong for me but when she spooned in two sugars, the way I’d drunk it as a child, my mouth filled with saliva and I found I couldn’t wait. I opened the tin. Something dense and oaty with dried fruit spooned through.
‘Go on, eat one. It’ll do you good.’
She took her tea away with her, blowing on it as she went.
‘What did he say then?’ she asked, straightening the tea towels that I’d left to dry on the handle of the oven.
‘That he wants to be with her,’ I said.
‘And she’s got a husband has she? A house, this woman?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s good. That’s something. And what have you said?’
She was looking at me now, still a long way off.
‘Hold on.’ Betty cocked her head and raised a finger skywards.
‘I thought I heard her. Shall I go?’
We listened but there was nothing, just a faint electrical hum.
‘Yep. You do that, Bet.’
I heard her creaking up the stairs. Outside the darkness thinned.
My mother pushed out a rectangle of window above the sink.
‘It’s so hot up here, Maggie. I don’t know how you can stand it.’
She wiped her hands on her pinny, and I wondered if she’d travelled in it; I hadn’t notice her put it on.
It was a densely flowered cotton and clashed with her skirt underneath, in the same style as for ever – A-line, stiff, calf-length. Her ankles were still trim above doll’s feet in courts so closely fitted they looked custom made, and I had a picture of myself as a girl, fat legs paddling in an effort to catch up, the snap snap snap of her heels as she pulled away. A wild lunge and the prize of a fistful of acrylic. She would swipe my hand off without acknowledgement and get on with what she was doing. I did the same, occasionally, to Bella; a reflex, but afterwards I bent to her, full of horror at the inevitability of it.
I laid my forehead on the table, felt its tacky laminate kiss.
‘What’s up, Maggie? Come on. Get a grip. There’s your daughter to think of.’
‘I know there is, Mum. And another.’
‘What? What d’you say? Sit up, girl.’
‘There’s another baby, Mum.’
Everything changed.
‘You what?’
She came close to me but I kept my head low. It had started to throb to a huge expanding beat. She put her finger under my chin and lifted, a move that I remembered. This near, the whites of her eyes looked lumpy and congealed and I had a sudden presentiment of losing her.
‘What are you saying, Maggie?’ she asked hard into my face.
‘I’m pregnant, Mum. You heard,’ I said, and jerked my head away. ‘Don’t do that to me. I’m not a child.’
‘And you’ve told him? And still? Well.’
She didn’t wait for my reply but pulled away and stood at the back door looking out, arms crossed under her bust. Instantly furious. This was an affront of a different sort. It required a new approach. Betty was back but didn’t come in. She waited, trying to read the room.
I could see my mother thinking and the moment that the outrage dropped out of her and a worse suspicion rose. There was a collapse across her shoulders and when she came, she was terrifying.
‘What else is there to this, Margaret?’ she said.
She approached slowly in her well-worn shoes.
‘A man might look elsewhere for some things but he doesn’t leave his child. Not a man like Chris.’
I said nothing. I found that I had stood.
She got to me, and slapped my face hard. The sting of it felt like a burn, but it was over fast, and cleared my head. When I faced forwards again, she was still right there.
‘You stupid, stupid girl. You selfish girl,’ she said.
She was moving, kneading her hands.
‘Who? Some idiot, I suppose.’
I swayed gently on my feet but didn’t think that she saw.
‘Now where are we?’ she muttered to herself. ‘Nowhere, that’s where, thanks to you.’
She seemed exhilarated, almost, her anger gaining pace. The pattern was fam
iliar, but she’d hit me early. It was hard to know where she could go from there.
‘You think you’re the only one, do you? You think you’re the first?’
Turning on her toe as she reached the end of the room.
‘Your marriage boring, is it? Out here among all your fancy things?’
She flicked her hand around her, looking for proof, but it was just an ordinary house. She opened the fridge again. She was in luck.
‘Oh, that’s right. With your dinner party and your duckling breasts, wasn’t it? With blackcurrant something or other. It’s a hard life, Maggie.’
I remained still. Any hint of response would mean defeat.
‘You don’t know you’re born, you don’t. Still that’s probably my fault.’
An aside again, as she marshalled her argument. She had a gift for rhetoric. Should’ve been a lawyer, or else on the stage.
‘But do you know what the worst thing is?’
She’d stopped and raised a finger, inches from my face.
‘You’re stupid. And I wouldn’t have had that of you. Do it, do what you like. But don’t get caught.’
‘What do you know about it?’ I said, to her back.
She paused.
‘Pardon?’ she called, her head looking straight out over her shoulder.
‘I said, what do you know about it?’
She let the phrase hang there, gather meaning.
‘Me? What do I know? Well now.’
I had to respect her control. She slowed it right down. At least a minute passed, my mother feigning thought. She gave me time and space. This was the moment for me to say sorry, to sink to my knees before her.
But I did nothing. I felt the queasy suggestion of consequence but held my gaze steady and watched surprise flash briefly in hers, and harden into a total commitment to beating me.
‘You know what, lady? I am done with you,’ she said, almost a whisper, with a twitch of her head either in emphasis or outside her control.
In My House Page 17