Let Go My Hand

by Edward Docx

  No blood for oil. Not in my name. Saturday, February 15th, 2003. London skies of seal-belly grey. A marrow-creeping cold. Human breath hanging visible in the air. And all day we marched. Me and Dad. Hand in hand. And it was a grand and mighty day of cold fingers and hot cups of tea and the close comradeship of those we met and the deep solidarity of millions of people across the world who were doing the same. The world belongs to its people. Surely. Surely. Surely. ‘Stop the war’.

  I remember I carried a banner for a while – ‘Blair’s Achilles’ heel is the way we feel’. And what we were doing felt important, significant. And Dad seemed to know all the important and significant people. And when we got to Hyde Park he said, ‘Hang on to me, Lou, let’s see if we can go backstage’; and so I held on to his hand and we squeezed and slipped through the press of the people like were crossing the busiest dance-floor in the world. And on the loudspeakers, some politician was saying . . . ‘Friends, we are here today . . . to found a new political movement . . . This is the biggest demonstration ever in Britain and its first cause is to prevent a war against Iraq.’ And Dad nodded at someone here, and raised his fist at someone there, and on we went, and on we went until we were standing right at the side of the stage. And the politician was saying that the world in which we live is dominated by the military, the media and the multinationals. And then Harold Pinter came past and Dad says, ‘Hello,’ and of course I didn’t know who the hell Pinter was but Pinter said, ‘Hello there, Professor, good to see you. And who’ve we got here?’ And my dad, who isn’t a professor, said: ‘This is Lou. He’s with us. Aren’t you, Lou?’ And I nodded and Pinter nodded back. And Dad said, ‘Let’s wait here and see if we can catch the mayor,’ and he looked around to see who else he knew.

  And three hours after all of that, we walked home back across the Thames because – I don’t know – we wanted to keep on walking, to stay in the streets and because we were high, I think, on the whole day. Tripping. Elated. Like what we were doing really mattered. And that’s when we stopped in at Jack’s old flat near the Oval for a cup of tea.

  He had just started going out with Siobhan back then – and she was somewhere in the bedroom or something and he had been writing about the march for the paper and so he was residually stressed from the deadline – as he always was on Saturdays. And right there in the kitchen, Dad started to have a go at Jack for not being out there on the march. How could you write about something if you didn’t take part and get among the people? So Jack said that he had been there all morning. And Dad said it didn’t get going until the afternoon – with the speeches and everything. So Jack said he watched it on TV because he had to be at his desk to write because the newspaper needed him to file by six. And Dad scoffed. And that really got to Jack and he started asking did Dad see all the pro-Palestinian groups? And was Dad still pals with Hamas and Hezbollah and what about the IRA? And why don’t you grow up, Dad, and stop with the posturing bollocks? Which wasn’t what Jack thought, I knew, but it was what Dad goaded him to say. So Dad said, look who has changed his tune since he got a new paymaster – and did Jack think it was a good idea going into Iraq? Had Jack any idea of what a shit storm the war would unleash and he hoped that the consequences would make an appearance in Jack’s article. And Jack said – so what? – you’re pro-Saddam: you think he’s the good guy here? You think America is the bad guy where people get to vote and there’s the rule of law and freedom of expression and nobody gets tortured or goes hungry? And Dad became all incredulous – what nobody gets tortured? What about people being executed? What about the bloody death penalty? And Jack said, hang on a minute – didn’t you have dinner with Blair six months ago? And weren’t you telling us all about that – what an impressive guy he was and how competent he seemed. And Dad said, there were fifty people at that dinner and of course he went – you’d have to be truly incurious not to go to the dinner with the Prime Minister and that doesn’t mean I support him or this idiotic war. And Jack said, then why did you go on the radio then – why did you go on the radio and tell the nation you hated every minute of the dinner because all you could think about was the poor Iraqi families?

  And neither of them meant what they were saying – but they were saying it because something enraged them about each other, which was nothing to do with the Middle East or any of the world leaders or Hezbollah or Tony Blair. Which they also knew. But couldn’t admit. Because of something about honesty and deception; about the necessity of this deceit which they saw through and despised and which infuriated them even as they could not abandon it. Because of something about honesty and deception that was deep-deep down wholly impossible to confront. Because humankind cannot bear too much reality. Which is why it had to be Hamas and Bush and Blair and Iraq – their own proxy war instead of the real thing.

  And that’s when Dad said, we saw Evelyn backstage, by the way, and she hadn’t given up her principles. And Jack said, if Lou wasn’t here, Dad, I’d tell you to fuck off out of my flat right now. And I asked, who is Evelyn? Because I’m standing there and I’ve got to say something. Which was when Siobhan came into the kitchen and Dad said loud and clear that Evelyn was one of Jack’s girlfriends from his Socialist Worker days, Lou, and hello Siobhan, it is lovely to see you, we’re just having a discussion about Iraq.

  And I was pretty sure of one thing: whoever Evelyn was, we didn’t see her. But I couldn’t say this to Jack. Or Siobhan. Or Dad. So whom do you tell?

  ALL FOR ONE

  My brothers are exactly the kind of people you would have wanted on one of those pilgrimages way back whenever Dad was saying they were. The two of them have so much going on that you just know the conversation would be interesting all the way to Canterbury – or Jerusalem or Babylon or Gomorrah or the Celestial City or wherever the hell we were going. They want to open you up not shut you down. And at the camp shop, without Dad, I feel this sense anew in my heart . . . that the world is sunnier and restored and open-ended. And I’m suddenly glad they’re here again – unequivocally and without the cross-currents of whatever else I felt.

  ‘Four of every kind of croissant you have, please,’ Jack says in French.

  ‘Especially almond,’ Ralph says in English.

  The shop assistant is wearing a short-sleeved blue polka-dot blouse and she smiles a smile that speaks of the certainty of fresh French bread every morning and a world untroubled – untouchable – by anything else.

  ‘OK, yes. Sixteen in total,’ Jack says in French. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Ralph says in English.

  We watch the back of her caramel-blonde ponytail dancing – three stupefied aliens – as she cheerfully tongs the croissants into the sleeves of her paper bags. The smell of fresh bread mingles with the faint scent of the sugared fruit in the pastries. The radio is tuned to something classical that sounds pretty as a river running on polished pebbles in spring’s first thaw. I’m thinking that if we never find a way out of here, it won’t be so bad.

  ‘We have to go deeper, Jack. The problem is . . .’ Ralph tails off.

  He is continuing the conversation from before we came in. We didn’t exactly plan it, or say anything, but we wanted to come to the shop together. Without Dad, we can breathe, we can talk, we can be. We left him sitting down, resting under his awning.

  ‘Maybe the problem is that you can’t distinguish between your support and your agreement,’ Ralph says.

  One by one, the woman flips the paper bags and twizzles the corners so that they are twisted shut. She is thirty-two at a guess and has lightly tanned arms from the many seductions of the French sun.

  ‘You can not agree with something that somebody is doing, but you can support them in their decision.’

  ‘Can you though?’ Jack asks.

  ‘We do it all the time.’

  ‘Do we?’

  ‘Marriages. Divorces.’

  ‘We should get some bread in case they run out,’ I say. ‘Make baguette sandwiches.’ Outside, a fren
zy of kids chase white ducks through the railings of the pool. ‘Maybe some of the apple tarts that Dad likes, too,’ I say. ‘And – fuck it – some custard slices.’

  ‘Millefeuille,’ Ralph says, slowly.

  The woman’s arms stop their croissant-wrapping roll. I think she’s cross about my bad language, which I am instantly ashamed of. But actually she is waiting for confirmation. This seems to have to come from Jack. I’m thinking that Jack is like Dad in this: wherever we go and whatever we do together, everyone assumes he’s the authority. Maybe he is. He reiterates our requirements in French. The problem is that I can tell that Jack is going to ignore Dad and start over at some point when we get back. Whatever the Latin rhetorical term is for the force of cumulative argument, that’s what Jack is going to do. Part of me thinks we’re heading for a physical fight – some of us battering the others to force a way into that suicide room for Dad, some of us battering the others to force a way out for him; none of us sure which side we’re on or why.

  ‘You can support without endorsing,’ Ralph says.

  ‘So,’ Jack says, ‘somewhere on a campsite in France – Christ knows where – you are telling me that I can – no – that I should – support my Dad’s suicide but—’

  ‘Assisted death,’ I say, quietly.

  ‘—but not agree with it? That’s what you’re truly saying?’

  Ralph is equanimious: ‘I’m saying that there is a difference between support and agreement.’

  ‘And I am saying that this is all way too late from both of you.’

  The more time we spend away from Dad, the easier it is to talk theoretically; but then another thing I’ve noticed: the theory of something is much easier to discuss than the doing of the something itself. The door tinkles like an altar bell. A family enters behind us.

  Ralph ignores me and says: ‘Maybe the problem is that Dad is after your approval not just your consent.’

  The woman finger-punches the numbers into the till – impervious as happiness itself.

  Ralph takes the paper bags, piling them up against his chest with exaggerated exuberance. ‘Can you pay this nice lady? I can’t reach my wallet.’

  Jack pays with a fifty euro which looks as though it has actually been ironed. I take the patisserie box. Jack tucks the baguettes under his arm. Ralph indicates with his head for us to go first. The father and his young children behind us meet our eyes with the kind of expressions that look like they’ve never had a better holiday in their lives. And I have the bad thought that we are being decimated as a family, that this is the end whatever happens, that we don’t exist any more except within the narrow parameters of this single conversation. Maybe that’s why Dad wants us to talk about . . . about ourselves, about our work, our relationships. He realizes this. Of course he does. (Maybe he realizes everything.) Anything but him and his disease. And surely we have a duty to make these days good for him? Do my brothers understand this? Outside, the children have chased the fat French ducks into the water, which seems to be where they least want to go.

  ‘Think about it, Jack,’ Ralph continues. ‘There are only three things Dad can do. One: do it – like it or not. Two: do it – with you on his side. Three: don’t do it and get worse and worse and have you as witness to that – as helper, aider, abetter.’

  Jack half turns. ‘And what about you?’

  ‘I am here,’ Ralph says.

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Just that.’

  ‘You approve? Or you approve and you consent?’ A jibing tone of enters Jack’s voice. ‘You support? Or you support and you agree?’

  Ralph ignores the aggression. ‘Meaning that Dad has to decide for himself.’ He pauses. ‘Meaning . . . that he has decided. Or so he says. Meaning I refuse to be embroiled in the drama if he hasn’t. Meaning that I myself have only two choices: to be here or not to be here. And – since that is the only real question for me – because I’ve no moral objections – here I am.’

  Ralph says the word ‘moral’ like it’s code for ‘primitive’. Awkwardly, I have to carry the patisserie box flat in front of me like an offering through the congregation of the campsite because I don’t want it to tip and squash the millefeuilles.

  ‘And yet . . .’ Jack says. ‘And yet we are being invited to have an opinion. You, me, Lou. And we have been – all along.’

  ‘Jesus,’ I say.

  ‘We are the ones who must live with the consequences,’ Jack says. ‘In one way, it is a decision that only affects us. Which he knows. And which is why he covertly solicits our opinions.’

  ‘And yet we can’t let ourselves be implicated,’ Ralph says. ‘Or we will be implicated all our lives. Because this is nothing to do with us – these are his decisions – unless you let the manipulative bastard drag you in. Which is my point. And which he also knows.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake,’ I say. ‘Dad has got nobody else to talk to. Who the fuck else is he going to ask?’

  ‘Maybe we have to go deeper,’ Ralph says, ignoring me again. ‘Maybe we have to find where compassion lies.’

  ‘So fucking late in the day,’ I mutter. ‘So fucking late in the day.’

  ‘I think it’s wrong,’ Jack says. ‘I think it is wrong for all the reasons I have said.’

  ‘But this big rebarbative “no” of yours,’ Ralph counters, ‘maybe it’s solidified into a position rather than a reason. Wait—’

  ‘It’s not a big—’

  ‘And there’s guilt – your wife, your children – which is harder to rationalize – but maybe the truthful reaction is fear. Fear.’

  ‘Why don’t—’

  ‘I’m not attacking you, Jack. Maybe you just don’t want to lose him. And maybe if you said that.’

  ‘I don’t want to lose him.’

  ‘Say that.’

  ‘Say that,’ I mutter.

  ‘I have been saying that – for a whole fucking year.’

  ‘Not quite, Jack,’ Ralph says. ‘You’ve been saying things around it.’

  ‘While you say nothing? And you feel nothing? Because it doesn’t affect you – the great puppeteer?’

  ‘Of course. But . . . For me . . . For me, this is Dad’s decision. I’ll go along with whatever he decides. I’m not participating in the self-dramatization – that’s all.’

  ‘You keep saying that. But maybe you’re hiding behind your show of indifference. Maybe—’

  ‘I’m—’

  ‘I’m not attacking you, Ralph. I’m just saying that—’

  ‘Don’t “just say”,’ I say.

  ‘—that maybe Dad desperately wants to hear from you. But you don’t want to make yourself . . . vulnerable. That’s it . . . that’s it. You don’t want to be emotionally vulnerable. You’d rather blank him. Why is that, Ralph?’

  ‘What I want is impossible,’ Ralph says. ‘I want Dad to be well.’

  ‘But this is happening now,’ Jack says. ‘We have to deal with it. This is now. You can’t be absent from everything.’

  Ralph is clear-voiced: ‘I support Dad’s decision – whatever that is. I’m not in the persuasion business. I’m just saying that—’

  ‘Don’t fucking “just say”.’

  ‘—that you have a view – a strong one, Jack – but that maybe the most powerful thing to say is that you’re afraid and you don’t want to lose him.’

  ‘I don’t want to lose him. I have no problem saying that.’

  ‘But you will lose him, Jack,’ I say. ‘Because he is dying. And do you know what: actually, he doesn’t want to talk about it any more. He wants us to tell him about our lives. He wants us to distract him. That is what he wants.’

  ‘Christ, this whole fucking thing is some kind of . . .’ Jack tails off and sighs.

  ‘We have to go deeper,’ Ralph says again. ‘All for one and one for all. Compassion is not something you have or don’t have like . . . like red hair; it’s something you choose to practise. That’s what we all need to do: practise compassion. And�
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  ‘Maybe he wants to be talked out of it,’ Jack says. ‘Maybe this is his way – as shitty as it is – as shitty as he has always been – maybe we have to be big enough to let him do that to us. Maybe he wants to be talked out of it, Lou.’

  ‘Maybe the compassionate thing is . . .’ Ralph stops short. ‘Oh shit! What the fuck?’

  Up ahead, there is a car on our plot – twelve feet behind the back of the van. The wheels are skidding on the wet grass. The driver is over-revving the engine in neutral, then sliding forward again, the car skewing a little, then stopping two inches closer, digging in, creating ruts of mud. The noise is terrible, trapped and echoing in the trees. But what pulls us up short like we’ve run into a wall of invisible daggers is the sight of Dad staggering along the side of the van without his stick . . . He’s doing this weird, flailing, hip-dipped walk and he’s waving and motioning at the driver who obviously can’t hear him even though he’s shouting pretty loud. He’s still in his gaping dressing gown. When the engine noise drops we can hear his voice.

  ‘No. No! Round the bloody side. Round the bloody side!’ He has picked up two long wires with crocodile-clipped ends. He’s waving them madly and shouting. ‘Round this way. This side. I can’t reach you there.’ He gestures at the car furiously like a man shooing a hated neighbour’s dog – and then he does these massive exaggerated repeat sweeps with his arms to indicate that the driver come around the other side of the van from where we’ve erected the awning. ‘Take her back and start again. Take her back. Start again. Back. Back! This side.’

  The noise of the revving engine is somehow trapped in our shallow wooded valley so that it sounds like some kind of deafening insult against nature.

  ‘Jump leads,’ Jack says.

  ‘Flat battery,’ Ralph says.

  ‘The heater,’ Jack says. ‘I bet you had the heater on for hours last night.’

  ‘Fuck,’ Ralph says.

  The driver is in reverse and yet the wheels are spinning. He’s got this sick rocking motion of the car going – in and out of the muddy ruts, which it can’t now escape and which the wheels are making deeper with each revolution. We’re all running now. But before we’re seen or heard or can actually do anything, Dad places his hands on the bonnet and dips to push like he’s twenty-five years old and I can tell just from the angle of his body that he’s in the grip of all his fury and why-the-bloody-hell-do-you-have-to-do-everything-yourself?