“But I said OK,” I said quietly. I didn’t understand why he wasn’t pleased that I was going to do what he wanted me to do. Generally, I found that grown-ups got cross because you didn’t do as they said, because you argued back. It seemed Uncle Victor was getting cross because I would do as he said. I was starting to get the impression that Uncle Victor was just a cross man. Maybe being dead had made him even crosser.
“Aye, I suppose you did. Well, I’ll be watching you.”
“From where?”
He blinked at me again. “What do you mean from where? Just everywhere.”
“At the same time? You’re going to be everywhere at the same time?”
“Yes.”
“Are you God?”
“What makes you say something like that?”
“God is everywhere at the same time, watching us. Are you God?”
“Don’t be so bloody stupid.”
“Oh,” I said. “Are you going to be watching me when I go to the toilet?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Or when I have my bath?”
“No, of course not.”
“So you won’t be watching me all the time?”
“I suppose not,” he said, very cross again.
“But how will you know if you’re not watching all the time when I’ll be using the toilet or having my bath?”
“This is why I didn’t want you,” he said, sounding as cross as he looked. “You ask too many questions. I’ll just be watching you. That should be enough for you to believe.”
I had been told I asked too many questions. Mum was often sending me to Dad to find out the answer to things I asked. Dad would send me to a dictionary. Or bed, if the dictionary didn’t answer me. “OK, Uncle Victor.”
“Now run along,” he said, waving me aside with his bony hand.
“Thank you, Uncle Victor,” I said.
“Thank you?”
“For visiting me.”
He looked surprised. “Aye, well …”
I smiled at him, glad for having the chance to speak to him again. That the last time I saw him wasn’t him being dead in the coffin.
“Wash your hands, lass, there’s a good girl.”
“Oh, OK.” I turned to our new green sink and rubbed my hands together under the water, neglecting the soap that sat on the side of the bath. When I turned back, Uncle Victor had gone.
I sneaked outside to resume the game I’d been playing and never told anyone about seeing Uncle Victor. I didn’t doubt for one minute that I’d seen him, that he’d spoken to me, but I knew enough about grown-ups to know that they wouldn’t like me saying it. Aunt Mer had been crying all the time since Uncle Victor had died, and the doctor had to keep “giving her something” to make her sleep. Mum and Dad were with her all the time and they wouldn’t like me saying it. I couldn’t tell Mal and Victoria, because they wouldn’t like to know their dad had visited me but not them. And Cordy would just tell Mum and Dad.
I saw Uncle Victor a few times after that. He didn’t speak to me. He was just there sometimes, I’d catch a glimpse of him reflected in the dark kitchen window when I was washing up. Or I’d see him standing at the end of the garden. One time he was sitting on the edge of the bath when I went to go to the toilet, but disappeared just as soon as I opened the door a bit wider (I hadn’t been able to use the loo for a good few hours after that). It was a reminder, I suppose, of what I’d promised him.
As I grew up, I became more and more interested in “out there.” What lay beyond the ken of everyday experience. What we couldn’t see or hear or experience but was still going on around us. What we might see or hear or experience if we learned to tune in to it.
My interest was about uncovering what else lay around us, in the spaces between this world and wherever we went to after we died. It was about finding out what else lay within us. What else you could perceive if you knew what you were looking for, what people could tune in to.
For the past few days Uncle Victor has been on my mind, since I recognized him as the man in the dream, the one who has come to take Leo away. I’m not sure if it means anything, or if I’m just associating the two because Uncle Victor was the first—although not the last—ghost I saw. I know for definite he is on the other side, and I’ve always thought that leaving this life would be made easier if you had someone who loved you to meet you. And Uncle Victor would have loved Leo. Of course he would. I had been tempted to name Leo, Leo Frank Victor Kumalisi, but then that would have given the game away. Would have confirmed for everyone who Leo really was.
Maybe I’m just conjuring up that dream because of what I believe; that if Leo is ready to leave, if he wants me to let him go, he’ll have someone to be with. He won’t be all on his own.
Without warning, all energy leaves my body and I have to sit down on my doorstep, because I’m unable to even reach up and unlock the front door.
He has to wake up.
Leo just has to wake up.
I’m not ready to let him do that without me. He has to wake up.
He has to wake up.
CHAPTER 10
M eredith sits in my living room, on the couch, drinking tea.
I never understood why people had such problems with their mothers-in-law. Carole, for example, avoided hers with all the deft skill of a general planning a military campaign. She used her children as spies, finding out her mother-in-law’s plans, then would simply be out if she came over, or would have organized to visit her family in Scotland for Christmas, Easter and birthdays. Dyan, on the other hand, had to practically go into intensive therapy every time her mother-in-law left, because her self-esteem was often in shreds. My mother-in-law was a saint, in many respects. She had, essentially, been Mal’s sole parent for most of his life. She had taught him about responsibility, she had shown him what life was about. If it wasn’t for her, he might not have stayed with me. He may not have made the choices he made.
Our relationship is woven with many complicated strands, though. Meredith, I often think, is my own personal warning; a wake-up call in a five-foot-nine, white-haired package. Whenever she is otherwise occupied, I study her, my eyes running over the soft lines of her face and body, knowing that if I’m not careful, if I don’t hang on to Mal, I could become her. I could be that woman, all alone, relying on the kindness of loved ones and strangers alike. Every time I see Meredith, I leave her company determined to get it right. To never be left sitting at home, waiting for someone to come along and allow me to live.
After the dinner party, when I worked out she is probably Mal’s hotline to Nova and … everything else, I knew I had to talk to her. I had wanted to go to her house, to make this meeting seem far more casual and innocuous than it is, but to go to East London, to that road, would be to risk running into Nova’s parents. I’d met the Kumalisis many times and at my wedding, of course, and they were the loveliest people, who had welcomed me into their fold without a second thought, so the idea of making small talk with them now … Well, there are braver women out there. I haven’t met these braver women, owing to the fact they’re probably wrestling crocodiles and skinning tigers, but I am not one of them. I haven’t seen Nova’s parents at all in the last eight years; since what happened, I thought it best to stay away. Every time I’ve seen Meredith, it has been here or at Victoria’s place in Birmingham, just to avoid bumping into the Kumalisis.
As I fuss with pouring myself tea, I surreptitiously watch Meredith, safely ensconced on my sofa, her long, white locks severely pinned back into a pram-face bun, her brown eyes soft and unchallenging, her mouth a thin, pink line that parts frequently to receive tea and pieces of cookie. She is fuzzy around the edges, almost as though she blends in with her surroundings whatever they may be, never wanting or needing to stand out. A little shudder thrills through me. There go I. I am sitting down with my future self: like most women dated versions of their fathers, Mal married his mother.
Being similar to her means that, in this
setting, with only the two of us, I can ask her anything and she will answer it as honestly as possible.
“Do you have any pictures of Leo with you?” is the question I ask. I’ve always been curious, despite what I intimated to Mal—smoke and mirrors and deflection, all of it—but since I haven’t been able to find out anything about them on the Internet, it has started to border on obsession.
Meredith’s face changes a little, a slight frown flitting around the edges of her expression.
Oh, God, I shouldn’t have asked her, I realize. She has put up with me all these years, hasn’t ever confronted me about what I did, but she hasn’t quite forgiven me either. The frown still on her face, she carefully puts down the cup and saucer from the tea service she gave us for a wedding present, and reaches for her bag, which sits on the floor. I’d given her that bag last Christmas. It was a black-brown suede, with golden links and zipper. I’d seen the forced smile that settled on her face when she unwrapped it; I’d felt the polite—but disappointed—gratitude with which she had kissed both my cheeks and knew she hated it. This was probably the first time she’d used it. Like this was the first time I had used the tea service. The pair of us are such frauds, constantly trying to curry favor with the other.
From her bag she takes out a long wallet and flips it open. I catch a glimpse of a picture of Mal and me on our wedding day, both of us laughing as we shy away from the confetti dancing around us. In the other picture square, an almost identical photo of Victoria, Mal’s sister, on her wedding day. Meredith’s fingers move behind the three ten-, two twenty- and four five-pound notes and pull out three photographs.
She looks at them briefly, then gently, as though it is him, and not his image, she lays them out on the table.
The breath catches in my chest.
He’s beautiful.
My heart contracts with the sudden rush of seeing him for the first time. Tears fill my eyes, and his image swims in front of me. But I could close my eyes and still see him, still remember every line and curve of his face.
He’s so beautiful.
My heart starts to expand in my chest, filling up with … with all I can describe as love. Sudden, unbidden love for this boy I have never seen before.
He’s so, so beautiful.
I slip from the sofa onto my knees in front of the coffee table, staring at the photos that are laid out before me like tarot cards that show me what could have been my past, my present and my future. I reach out, gently stroke my finger over the first one, his school picture, still blurred by my tears.
Again my heart swells and contracts at the same time.
My little boy.
He has inherited Mal’s big, awestruck eyes. His dark mocha skin is the blend of Mal and Nova’s genes. His mouth—incredibly full for such a young boy—is probably from her. His face shape, a wonderful, plump oval, is obviously from Mal. His dark hair lies in thick curly Cs all over his head, just like Mal’s honey-blond curls do.
My little boy.
He should be mine. He should be my little boy.
He is grinning crookedly, his blue, green and white striped tie a little skewwhiff, one lone curl standing to attention beside his ear, and he seems to be looking a few centimeters in the wrong direction so the image seems slightly off-center. I am instantly curious about what is more important than looking at the camera. I remember seeing a photo of Mal that is identical to this. In it, he was about seven, too. His tie was skewwhiff, one curl stood independent of the others by his right ear, and his eyes were focused in just the wrong direction when the picture was snapped.
My finger moves to the next photo. He’s wearing a lurid green superhero costume. It’s far too big for him, hangs over his hands and covers his feet, but endows him with a big barrel chest and impressive six-pack. He is in the process of tying his red belt around his waist and is looking forlorn and puzzled at the camera, almost as though he wants whoever is behind the camera to stop taking photos and to help him. “Help me, why don’t you?” he seems to be saying with his expression. “How can I be a superhero when I can’t get my belt on?”
In the third picture, he’s about four and laughing and laughing. He’s heard the best joke in the whole world, and he’s thrown his head to one side as he laughs and laughs about it. It’s the same laugh that my husband wears in the wedding photo in Meredith’s wallet.
A couple of tears that have been swimming at the bottom of my eyes break free, one landing with a small splat on the corner of the third photo. The tear instantly ruins that part of the photo, leeching out the color and mottling it. I snatch up a napkin from the tray, dab away the tear, leaving behind an anemic crescent at its bottom left-hand corner. “Oh, God, I’m sorry,” I say to Meredith, my eyes flying up to her. “I’m so sorry. I’ve ruined it. I’ve ruined it.” I cover my mouth with my hand. Look what I’ve done. I’ve ruined it. I’ve ruined it. “I’m so sorry.”
Her hand comes to rest on my shoulder, gently steadying me. “It’s fine,” she replies, quietly. “It’s only a photo. It can be replaced. I can easily get another one.”
Why is she being so lovely to me? When I’ve ruined her photo and I’ve stopped her son seeing her grandson, why is she being so kind? Another wave of tears builds up in my eyes, and I sit back to stop them falling and ruining the rest of the photographs. I press the palms of my hands onto my eyes, trying to stem the flow.
Stop it, I tell myself. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. I have to get back some control, otherwise I’ll start sobbing for real. I haven’t cried in an age and this would probably not be the best moment to start. And who would I be crying for? For Meredith? For Mal? For me? For the missing piece of me that at one point might possibly have been found in those photos?
We sit in silence for a few minutes while I calm myself, wrestle the out-of-control emotions back in check. A few deep breaths and I feel them recede, the feelings flowing away, like the tide going out.
I inhale deeply again, feeling myself calm down even more, enough to take my hands away and blink my eyes completely dry. How embarrassing. Doing that in front of Meredith of all people.
“Does she still hate me?” I ask quietly. It probably isn’t fair to ask, to put her in the middle of this, but I have to know if Nova still curses my name.
“Does who hate you?” Meredith asks.
I turn my head to her and find her regarding me with confusion in her eyes, perplexity on her face.
“Nova. Does she still hate me?”
Meredith’s face furrows with more bewilderment. “Why on earth would Nova hate you?” she asks.
“Because …” I point to the photographs.
Her grayed eyebrows shoot up in surprise. “My goodness, because of Leo? I’d rather think it would be the other way around.”
“Pardon me?” I reply.
“I may not be very good at maths, dear, but I know that you have been married for ten years and Leo isn’t yet eight.”
“She never told you, did she?” I say, with suddenly clarity. “Nova didn’t tell you what happened.”
I see the hackles of Meredith’s body rise, the softness I know her for suddenly gone. “Malvolio and I may be close,” she says, tartly, “but his intimate business is his intimate business. I would never discuss it with him. Nor with Nova.”
I only partially hear what she is talking about, the rest of me is processing what I’ve just discovered. This is so typical of Nova. Years ago, when Mal and I announced we were getting married, she had immediately come to me and said that she didn’t want to be a bridesmaid. She only wanted to be a bridesmaid once in her life and that was for her sister, so she didn’t want to be a bridesmaid for me. I had thought it a bit audacious of her because I wasn’t even going to ask her. After she left, I wondered if she didn’t want to be in the bridal party because it would have been too painful for her to be that close to Mal when he was making the ultimate commitment to someone else. I’d let the matter pass until I discovered the real reason:
Mal assumed that she would be a bridesmaid. Chief bridesmaid, of course. He just assumed. She knew he would, she knew I wouldn’t want her to have any part in my wedding party, so she had given me the easy way out. I could tell him that she didn’t want to be a bridesmaid, which stopped the pitched battle that would have ensued between Mal and me, during which I’d have to confess my true feelings of continuing ambivalence toward her. I wasn’t sure who she had done it for, but it had ultimately made my life easier. She’d done it again with this. Something much, much bigger. She could so easily have painted me as the monster I became all those years ago. The creature who ruined her life, took away her most precious friend. Even a toned-down version of what happened would have placed everyone firmly on her side and turned them against me. But she hasn’t. She hadn’t told anyone, I’m sure of that now.
If Meredith doesn’t know, then Nova hasn’t told her parents—they and Meredith are too close for that to have been kept a secret. They all probably know that Mal is Leo’s father—just a glance at him reveals that—and they all probably think less of her because he was a married man when she conceived him. She’d taken on that shame when there was no need to. That is why Meredith had looked at me like that when I asked to see a picture of Leo. In fact, that is obviously why she tries to curry favor with me, why she walks on eggshells around me: she thinks I have been wronged, betrayed. She probably feels guilty about being in touch with her grandson, she probably feels guilty about talking to Mal about him in secret.
“Nova and Mal didn’t have an affair,” I say to Meredith, wanting to put things right for Nova. To clear her name. She’s probably been secretly branded as a lying, scheming mistress, even by the people who love her. They probably all pity her a little, wonder why she has such low self-esteem that she became involved with someone who wasn’t available and who couldn’t love her enough to leave his wife for her. And then she got herself pregnant. They probably wondered if she’d done it on purpose to force his hand, or if it’d been an accident for which she was paying the price. They all loved Leo, were all completely enamored of him, but there was probably a faint, enduring sense of shame of how they thought he came about.
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