Shtum

by Jem Lester

  ‘Appropriate: Suitable, fitting, apt, proper, right, correct, applicable. Appropriate, in legal terms is not definitive – it’s woolly, general, vague.’

  She raises her eyes and tasers me.

  ‘And therefore buggeringly hard to prove. Why do you think they chose that word?’

  ‘So it’s a fix.’

  ‘No,’ she states and leans back in her upholstered chair, placing her hands behind her head. ‘Not a fix, more a term alighted upon by the legal equivalent of an insurance actuary. He or she knows they will win some and lose some, but has to pitch their premiums at the right level to maintain a positive balance sheet by attracting the right number of clients. It’s quite clever really.’

  ‘A fucking outrage is what it is.’

  ‘Remove the outrage, Mr Jewell. That’s why you’re here.’

  ‘No, I’m here to provide the best possible future for my son and so my wife and I can finally share a home again.’

  ‘That’s not something I can help you with, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But the fact we’re apart will help Jonah’s case, won’t it?’

  ‘Not in the least, Mr Jewell. This is about Jonah’s education only. Your home situation is a social services issue, therefore immaterial. Divorce law is not my speciality, although I could point you in the right direction. Mr Jewell, are you still with me?’

  ‘Immaterial? I’m sorry but you’re wrong.’

  ‘Excuse me.’

  ‘My wife has taken advice on this. Being a single father is one of the commonalities of successful appeals. We’ve been living apart for two months on the basis of—’

  ‘I’m sorry, but I think she’s been badly advised. Maybe you should phone her and tell her to come home. Mr Jewell?’

  Valetta’s look is knowing, the sympathy ersatz.

  What kind of an expert has Emma been speaking to? This whole charade, avoidable. How could Emma not know, how could …? I am in agony.

  ‘Will you excuse me for a second, Ms Price? I need to visit the gents.’ I don’t wait for a reply. I tunnel through the corridor and out into the sobering air. I am sweating and nauseous – staggering between the homicidal embraces of humiliation and rage, I dial her number. Answerphone. I dial her number again, blocking my caller ID. Answerphone. I call her office: she’s not in. I call home: answerphone. Her mobile again: answerphone. Message: ‘Fucking phone me back, please. Why did you lie to me? All that shit about single parents, commonalities. Shit! And don’t try and pretend you didn’t know, you’re a fucking lawyer. You’ve made a right dick of me. Why, Emma? This bollocks is over now, do you understand?’

  I end the call, yet part of me wants to take the message back, or send another, placatory and grovelling – which only increases the cycle of rage and humiliation. I breathe in deeply as if I’m about to dive underwater, release the air and repeat and repeat, massage my neck. Back inside the building I splash water on my face, pat down my hair and draw from my hip flask. Jonah, I remind myself, this is for Jonah.

  Back in Valetta’s office, my cup vibrates in my hand. I try to put it down but tea sloshes on to the desk. I’ll do anything to get out of here right now. I repeat ‘Jonah, Jonah’ in my head as a mantra and feign control.

  ‘Thank you for the offer, but I don’t need a divorce lawyer, we will be back together soon.’

  ‘Well, good for you,’ Valetta says, nonchalantly. ‘But let’s concentrate on Jonah, shall we? I’ve already told you, should I be engaged by your solicitors, that will be my job.’

  ‘I don’t have a solicitor.’ Another blinding piece of ignorance.

  ‘Then you should use these.’

  She passes me a glossy A5 folder, with a business card stapled to the top right-hand corner.

  ‘Curran and Partners, Manchester? How am I supposed to travel up there?’

  ‘You won’t. Everything will be done via phone and email. Shall I phone them for you now?’

  She begins dialling before I open my mouth. Whatever Valetta Price says, I’ll say yes to. I feel my will ebbing away as all the anger makes a U-turn and bears down on me. I want to punish myself, sink into a bath of vodka and scrub myself with wire wool. Obliterate myself, feel nothing. Force everyone away from me, care about nothing and have no one care about me.

  ‘Georgia, hi, yes good thanks. Have a potential client, an autism Part 4 placement. I know it’s a bit late in the day, but …’

  Now I’m sitting forward on my chair clasping my sweaty hands together. Late?

  ‘Yes, I’ll pass him over now.’

  She thrusts the receiver at me.

  ‘Hello?’ I say.

  ‘Hi, Mr Jewell. This is Georgia Stone here at Curran. Valetta is going to get your paperwork copied and emailed to me now. Really, you should have started this process last year, but don’t fret, we could still make it by July the thirtieth if we gather everything we need and can get a tribunal date that suits everyone. Mr Jewell?’

  Georgia sounds young and disarmingly sympathetic.

  ‘Yes, I’m listening.’

  ‘Okay. Do you have any questions?’

  ‘What happens if we don’t get a date before July the thirtieth?’

  ‘Then unfortunately we’ll have to aim for a date in September when – thankfully – things are a lot quieter, and Jonah will have to remain out of school until the tribunal has been held and the result delivered.’

  I’m doing the computation in my head: that’s six weeks of summer holiday, plus probably the whole of September. That’s ten or eleven weeks, alone with Jonah and Dad. No. Emma will have to have Jonah for some of the time now.

  ‘We have to get into this session. It’s a must.’

  ‘We’ll all do our best for you, Mr Jewell. But the quicker we start the more chance we have. Would you like me to advise you of our terms?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose you better had. No, wait, wait a second! What is the overall cost likely to be?’

  ‘They average at around twenty-five thousand pounds. It depends on the local authority, time required by ourselves and Valetta, expert witnesses, etc., but it should be no more than thirty thousand. Mr Jewell?’

  No more than thirty grand! Which planet … ‘Yes, I’m listening.’

  ‘Our terms?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘We require an initial deposit of ten thousand pounds and a monthly standing order of five hundred pounds that will be held in your client account. I could get the ball rolling now if …’

  Now this I haven’t planned for either. Sickened, I pull out my wallet and check through my credit cards. Could any of them possibly pass muster at credit control – the business credit card definitely won’t. I may have to call Johnny, if all else …

  ‘Do you take credit cards?’

  ‘Certainly. Is it a Visa?’

  ‘Three of them are.’

  Valetta takes the phone from my sweaty palm, as I wait for the sugary-sweet excuses of dodgy card readers and downed internet for my cards being spat back like a dose of poison.

  ‘So, Mr Jewell, all systems go then.’

  I laugh at the shock of it. ‘They went through, all eight of them.’

  ‘It appears that way.’ She passes me a sheet of paper.

  ‘These are the experts I need to have see Jonah. Some will need to observe him at school and at home, but they will advise you of that. Again, we have had a bit of a false start so need to catch up and, as these names are the best, they’re probably booked up by now. I would begin phoning as soon as you get home and tell them I’m acting on your behalf. If they tell you they have no availability, refer them back to me. Any last questions?’ she says, glancing at her watch. ‘Okay, then I’ll see you at the tribunal. Oh, and by the way, the experts will invoice you separately.’

  ‘Of course they will.’

 
She shakes my hand limply and I’m back in the courtyard without a memory of leaving the building. Somehow I feel I’ve just been sold a timeshare or joined the Church of Scientology.

  Outside, I find a bench and slump down on to it. Commonalities, that’s what she said. Being a single father would greatly help Jonah’s case. I am bored of this sick feeling, this weird haunting ectoplasm that engulfs me the further from Emma I move. Is it possible her colleague was wrong, or misled?

  It’s only been a couple of months and I’m having trouble summoning the sound of her voice – how can things decay so quickly? How can my senses and memories have such a short half-life? Should I phone her again and give her the ‘good news’, that Jonah and I can come home? Pretend I do not question her motives? Maybe Jonah and I should just move back into the flat, buy some balloons and cupcakes, a bottle of wine? Surprise her? Yes, won’t that surprise her.

  Waffle

  Wynchgate Social Services

  The Civic Centre

  Brown Street

  London N24 3EA

  30 March 2011

  Dear Mr Jewell

  Re: Jonah Jewell D.O.B. 11 May 2000 – Care Package

  It was a pleasure to meet Jonah recently.

  Having reviewed your case I am now in a position to offer you the following care package:

  •A care assistant between 7–8.30 a.m. three days per week to help ready Jonah for school.

  As well as the existing:

  • Every Sunday – attendance for Jonah at the borough’s centre for disabled children 9.30–3.30, including transport. Details to arrive under separate cover.

  • After-school club at above site, two nights per week (including travel school to club and home).

  • Two nights’ babysitting per month.

  Please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns.

  Regards

  Mary Carey

  Senior Social Worker

  At least there’s no more mention of fostering this time, but ‘comprehensive’? They try to dig away at you, inch by inch they take a spade to the foundations of the edifice you build up against them. Bit by bit they undermine your confidence in your own case. None of this was forthcoming before we threatened and started making a fuss about a tribunal. I’m bright enough to understand the concept of limited resources, but fuck, it unnerves me – maybe this is the Gold Standard of Care Packages? And maybe they’ve got little bits of care to add until the balance just tips against our appeal. They’re obviously more practised at this than me. I need to boost my resolve with some serious hatred and anger.

  I clear a space on the sofa, attack his cherry brandy and swear at the panel on Question Time. The rising self-pity is reacting with the brandy, creating a warm glow of indignant rage. I want out of this situation; this is not what I had planned for the onset of middle age. This is bollocks. This is fucking ridiculous.

  I pull my mobile from my pocket and scroll back and forth through my contacts, each time pausing at ‘Emma’. Why hasn’t she called back? How long do I give her before I call her again? I’ve accused her of lying, I’ve sworn at her. No wonder.

  I tell myself I’ll call her at 11 p.m., then at 11.05, 11.10, 11.30. By midnight the cherry brandy is drained, I burp a fruity sweetness and press mute on the remote. Her face flashes up on the screen, smiling. Beautiful and distant and strange, and then the line connects and my finger hovers over the ‘End Call’ symbol as it rings.

  When I worked at Centennial Communications, before Jonah was born, my marketing director was a brute of a man who took pleasure in controlling his staff with verbal abuse. He gave everyone a mobile phone and it was expected to be on twenty-four hours a day. One day I had the bright idea of assigning him a specific ring tone so I would always know it was him and prepare myself before answering. I assigned him the ‘Funeral March’ and at first it was hilarious, everyone thought so. But after a couple of days it began to haunt me, it began to inspire a direct physical response. Every time I heard that droning ‘Da-da-dada, da-da-dada, da-da, dada-da-dada-dada-dada’ I felt my bowels begin to fail. And that’s how I feel now. Waiting for Emma to answer, half hoping she won’t, giving it one more ring before hanging—

  ‘What do you want, Ben?’

  Her voice is croaky with sleep.

  I pause, think of hanging up. ‘Nothing. Did you get my message?’

  ‘Ben? How do you expect me to respond?’

  ‘Look. I can’t take it any more, I’ve had enough, I want our life back. Please, let’s stop this. I’ve hired the best barrister, lawyer, and the experts are in the pipeline. According to her, we don’t need to carry on with this.’ I hear her sigh.

  ‘Ben, Ben …’

  ‘This is bollocks and you know it. Stop pretending. Did you not think I’d find out? Here I am living with my father. Remember him? Trotsky’s ghost? I have Jonah with me day and night. It’s too much. And you’ve just let it happen, pushed us away and taken no responsibility whatsoever. Thank you so much, Emma.’

  The silence kicks in and along with it the sickness and dissonant violins.

  ‘Emma. Em?’

  She blows her nose; she is a snotty crier.

  ‘Emma?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Ben.’

  Again, the drug. ‘Don’t be sorry, I can carry the burden. Jonah’s the important one here …’

  ‘I’m not sorry for that, Ben.’

  ‘You’re not? Then what are you sorry for?’

  ‘I’m sorry because you’re not coming back.’

  ‘That’s fine, I can cope until the tribunal, okay, but—’

  ‘No, you’re not listening, you never do. You’re not coming back.’

  ‘But there’s no need to stay away now …’

  ‘Please, Ben, don’t make it any harder than it need be.’

  ‘For who? Me or you?’

  ‘Both of us.’

  ‘And Jonah? He’s your son, Emma.’

  ‘It torments me …’

  ‘No, it doesn’t, clearly.’

  ‘Ben, please, I’ll take all the blame, but …’

  I rewind the tape, searching for clues, distraught that I may have missed something crucial, a misused word that could have warned me of this apocalypse.

  ‘And where did all the money go really, Emma?’

  ‘Ben …’

  ‘Tell me.’

  I light a cigarette during the silence.

  ‘Emma?’

  ‘I needed the money, Ben.’

  ‘For what? What’s more important than Jonah?’

  ‘Ben, not now.’

  ‘Not now? So when, Emma? What the fuck is going on? Emma!’

  I can feel her across the line, composing herself, rehearsing. ‘Emma,’ I say, softly. ‘Just tell me what happened.’

  ‘Jonah happened.’

  I turn off my phone and bury it down the side of the sofa.

  I feel like my pilot light has gone out. The knowledge of my own naivety is crushing me into this piss-stained sofa. People make sacrifices for loved ones, don’t they? For each other, for their children? Especially for their children. That should be your primary motivation, but is it mine?

  For whom am I performing this selfless charade? For Jonah, of course. But am I? The advocaat tastes too sweet so I cut it with some schnapps. As Emma’s truth sinks in, my internal voice screeches: But I want to run away. Where did she earn the right? Now she’s gone, I can’t.

  I run to the toilet to throw up. It looks like rhubarb and custard.

  Upstairs, I hear their syncopated snoring again. Jonah is lying on his tummy in just a nappy, so I kneel by the side of the bed and gently stroke his back with the palm of my right hand. His skin is still baby soft and warm to the touch. It’s golden brown. If he sees the sun, it tans and never burns – h
e looks like he’s just come back from two weeks in the Caribbean. I rub the back of his neck and push my fingers into his hair then carefully put him in his pyjamas without waking him.

  ‘I love you, Jonah, but sometimes I wish you’d never been born.’ I instantly want to take it back, but it can’t get past the plug of bile in my throat and then his eyes pop open as if he’s heard and understood. He follows me down the stairs in his pyjamas, grabs his shoes and stands by the door. I haven’t the strength to argue, just put on his shoes and close the door silently behind us.

  My thighs cramp up like a dancing Cossack as I shuffle on my haunches by the BMW parked in my spot – if I wasn’t dehydrated I’d piss on its personalised number plate. Moonlight flashes off the pliers in my left hand as the shiny black M5 tyre valve comes free and sends me sprawling backwards into a rosebush.

  ‘How did you get out of the car? Get. Back. In. The. Car. Don’t laugh at me, you sod, we’re not going in.’ Of course he wants to go in, it’s still home to him. ‘Let’s go. Jesus, Jonah – stop it.’ He is plucking off the rose buds and examining their scent beneath his nostrils.

  The third-floor windows begin to blink and then a face – silhouetted against the room’s halogens. It’s Emma.

  The block’s security lights have thrown enough illumination on the car park to reveal my current bedding in all its rosy glory. Dragging him away now would be like dousing two shagging dogs with a bucket of ice water – thank God for the pen knife, the Swiss Army and their obsession with attachments. I usher both boy and bush into the car’s back seat.

  ‘Ben, is that you?’ She is maybe ten feet away, playing Zorro with a stainless-steel fish slice. ‘Ben, what are you doing here?’ There is no surprise in her voice, just the tiresome version of disappointment that manages to be dismissive and pitying all at once.

  ‘Ben? Do you have Jonah with you?’

  ‘He couldn’t sleep.’

  ‘What are you trying to achieve?’

  Now that’s a question I’ve been asking myself for twenty years or more. ‘Complete humiliation?’