by Jane Renshaw
‘Right, you,’ said David, pointing at Finn. ‘And you, and you, and you.’ He jabbed a finger at each of the boys. ‘Pockets. Let’s see what you’ve got in them. Turn them out. Contents on the table.’
Finn just looked at him, smiling slightly and shaking his head.
One of the men from the group by the barbecue had come over. ‘What’s the problem here?’ One of the dads, presumably.
‘Vandalism,’ said David. ‘One of these wee buggers has vandalised my nine-year-old granddaughter’s artwork.’
‘In the downstairs loo,’ Bram elaborated. ‘Someone’s scrawled across it in black marker pen.’
And oh no, there was Phoebe, standing next to Fraser helping him with the burgers, along with her three friends. Phoebe had a roll in one hand and a buttery knife in the other, staring across at them. Bram hurried over to her.
‘Okay, Phoebs, let’s go inside and–’
‘The mandala?’ she whispered. ‘Someone vandalised the mandala?’
Bram nodded. ‘But we can paint over it and do another, can’t we? An even better one.’
‘Who did it?’ She looked up at him. ‘Why did they do it?’
Bram cupped a hand over her head. ‘I don’t know, kleintje.’
‘Let’s be having you, lads,’ said David. ‘Contents of pockets on the table, now.’
One of the boys was complying, placing a wallet and keys on the picnic table, and pulling out the insides of his jeans pockets to show they were now empty. But Finn and the others hadn’t moved.
‘And what makes you think it was any of them?’ the dad demanded.
‘This is discriminatory,’ Finn drawled. ‘You’re accusing us because of our age and sex. It could have been anyone. And what gives you stop and search powers anyway, Grandad?’
‘That’s right,’ said the dad, squaring up to David. ‘You’ve got a cheek, laying down the law to other folks’ kids. It’s usually you on the receiving end of the law, eh, McKechnie? What gives you the right to get in these lads’ faces and–’
David, completely unperturbed, flicked a glance over at Bram.
The message was clear.
Are you a man or a mouse?
‘This is our home!’ Bram found himself suddenly shouting, striding across the terrace towards them. ‘That’s what gives him the fucking right! Get out! I want everyone out of this house and off our property now!’
It took an hour to get Phoebe into bed and off to sleep. On top of the traumas of the mandala being vandalised and watching her dad lose it, she was having to deal with the worry of what was going to happen with the Miller girls. Their parents had appeared on the terrace just as Bram was launching into his sweary diatribe, and had whisked their three young daughters away at once. ‘Will they let us be friends now, Dad?’ Phoebe kept asking.
He descended the stairs wearily. He found the family in the kitchen, Linda, Max and David sitting at the table and Kirsty and Fraser clearing up.
‘Well, I’ve done it now, haven’t I,’ said Bram, collapsing onto a chair. ‘And to think that this housewarming party was meant to help us integrate into the community. They’re basically going to hate me forever.’
David chuckled. ‘Na. People round here respect a man who stands up for himself. Who stands up for his family. Didn’t know you had it in you, Bram.’ He nodded. ‘Nice one.’
Bram couldn’t help himself smiling back, weakly. Having David’s approbation was a new experience, and one that offset, just a little, the feeling of despair that was hanging over him. ‘I really just threw all our guests out?’
‘Yeah Dad,’ grimaced Max. ‘Way to go.’
Max was slouched over the table, his head resting on one arm, eyes closed.
‘Hey,’ said David, tapping the table in front of Max. ‘Your dad was quite right. Some yob or yobs think they can get away with messing with this family, shooting Bertie, shooting at Bram, breaking in and making threats, vandalising your wee sister’s drawing, and who knows what all else. You think we should just let them get away with that?’
‘Uh – no,’ Max got out.
‘You need to be ready to defend yourselves, because Fraser and I can’t always be here, you know? You and your dad need to man up, lad.’
‘No they don’t,’ said Kirsty. ‘That’s not the answer.’
‘We have to let the police–’ Linda began.
‘Oh aye, the police are about as much use as a chocolate teapot when it comes to this kind of low-level stuff, as they call it – right up until it escalates and the bugger’s coming at you with an axe. Oh aye, they’ll maybe charge the bugger then.’
‘I don’t think that’s a very likely scenario,’ said Bram as Max’s eyes suddenly came open and he lifted his head.
‘You should come along to the boxing club,’ David suggested to Max. David was a coach at a boxing club in the town, which took place in a grotty garage with punchbags strung from the rafters and an incongruously pristine boxing ring that they’d somehow wangled through lottery funding. ‘It made a man of Fraser.’
Bram glanced round at Fraser, who was up on the stepladder, arms exposed in a short-sleeved T-shirt, huge biceps bunching as he ripped down the bunting. He turned and gave Bram a slow, rather menacing smile.
‘I don’t think boxing is really your thing, is it, Max?’ said Bram.
Max shrugged. ‘I’m willing to give it a go.’
Ten minutes later, Bram found Max slumped comatose on one of the sofas in the Room with a View, surrounded by the debris from the party – stained napkins and pulverised crisps and dirty plates and glasses.
‘Max? Max?’
‘Urgh?’
‘Can’t hold his drink,’ said David at his elbow. ‘That’s what comes of having a father who’s virtually teetotal. When Fraser was his age, he had it in his head that he liked wine.’ David shook his head in amusement. ‘Social suicide, Bram. As far as young lads are concerned, wine’s a lassie’s drink. I had to take him in hand.’ He frowned at Max.
‘Do you think he’s okay?’
‘Ach, he’s fine.’
There was a string of drool from Max’s open mouth to the cushion his head was pillowed on.
‘Peer pressure,’ said Bram.
‘Aye, nothing like it to give a lad a kick up the backside. A good bit of healthy competition.’
Bram couldn’t help chuckling at that. But: ‘There’s nothing healthy about this, David,’ he said, taking a tissue from his pocket and wiping up the drool.
Max reluctantly opened his eyes. ‘Wha’?’
‘You need to drink some water, Max, to dilute the alcohol in your system.’
Bram sat with him and made sure he drank a whole bottle of water. He didn’t like to come the heavy parent, but maybe in the morning he might suggest that Max stop spending quite so much time with Finn and his friends. Especially after what had happened tonight. David was probably right and one of those boys was responsible for vandalising the mandala. Maybe it was nothing to do with the other stuff, although he couldn’t shake a nagging doubt. Stupid hippy shit was horribly reminiscent of Fucking wee hipster arsewipe in that troll’s comment. He couldn’t help thinking that both were directed at Bram specifically.
And the heart and Your next.
He stared at the bottle in Max’s hand, at the water sloshing about as he lifted it to his lips.
Owen, bound hand and foot, struggling in a swollen river.
He sat down next to Max and ruffled his hair. ‘You’re a good lad, Max. I’m guessing you probably miss your old friends, am I right?’
‘Yeah.’
Max’s friends in London were a gentle, high-brow lot, into café culture and poetry and going to classical music concerts, and heavily involved in volunteering. Litter-picking. Fundraising for museums. Their idea of a wild night out was going to someone’s house to watch four episodes of University Challenge back to back. A lot of them – like Max, until now – did not drink alcohol.
It was
as if the four of them had landed in the midst of a primitive Pictish tribe and were being made to conform to their barbaric practices: first Kirsty and then Max getting off their faces, and Bram yelling at people to get out of his territory, basically, while preening in the glow of David’s approval.
It was a disaster.
This whole move had been a complete disaster.
Something had woken him.
Kirsty.
She was lying on her side, turned away from him, trying to muffle sobs.
He put his arms around her and she turned over against him, and he held her close, and murmured nonsense to her, and she let him do it but she didn’t hug him back, she just lay passive in his arms and he sensed, as he always did in these moments, a withdrawal, a holding back. There was still a part of her that he couldn’t reach, this part that cried in the night, that had always cried in the night, for as long as he had known her, and passively resisted his comfort.
After the fancy dress party, Bram and Kirsty started having breakfast and dinner together in the canteen at the halls of residence, and, if Bram hadn’t gone home to his parents, spending time in each other’s company at the weekend. Then everyone disappeared off home for Christmas and New Year. When Bram got back for the new term, he realised, from something Kirsty said about fireworks keeping her awake, that she’d been back here for New Year. He didn’t like to think of her all alone in the empty halls.
‘I left it stupidly late to get my train ticket,’ she explained. ‘The only cheap return I could get was coming back on 28 December.’
Not only was she having to deal with the trauma of her boyfriend’s murder, but she was so far away from her family that getting home and back was logistically difficult. He started inviting her to spend time at his own home, but she usually declined the offer.
Just before half term, Bram was standing in the lobby putting on his cycle helmet when he heard Kirsty’s voice. ‘Hi, Mum.’
She must be using the pay phone round the corner.
‘I just thought I should let you know I can’t come home after all – this girl who lives on a farm in Norfolk has asked a group of us to go and stay there. We’re going to be sailing on the Broads and stuff… Yeah. That’s what I thought… I’m sorry, but… Yes, they’re a really nice bunch and it would to be so much fun… And I’ll see you at Easter, so…’
What the…?
Apart from Bram, Kirsty had no friends. Steph’s folks lived on a farm in Norfolk, but there was surely no way she would invite Kirsty there?
And sure enough, at half term Steph disappeared off to Paris and Kirsty went nowhere. She was obviously trying to make out to her family that she was having a ball and had invented a mythical social life. They would presumably be really worried about her, given what had happened, so Kirsty was pretending she was enjoying herself too much to go running back home every holiday.
That half term, Bram was determined that Kirsty would enjoy herself. He took her for a swim in his local pool in Primrose Hill. He showed her London, the tourist stuff like the museums and the galleries and the Tower of London – she loved the ravens – but also lesser known points of interest. Kirsty was particularly intrigued by the Victorian sewer lamp behind the Savoy Hotel, which was still powered by methane from the sewers.
It was the most delicious kind of agony: to spend so much time with her, to talk with her for hours, to sit beside her in the intimate gloom of the cinema and feel they were the only people in the place, so conscious was he of her presence right next to him, of her tiny giggle at a funny line, her caught breath when the baddie suddenly loomed up from the dark, but not even be able to take her hand.
And when he wasn’t with her, he was thinking about her. How to get her to open up to him? They chatted away like old friends, but never about Kirsty herself, never about her past or her home, although she talked about her family a bit, so he knew that her dad was a builder and her mum was involved in counselling people with sight loss, being blind herself from birth. And there was one brother, Fraser, who was a year older than Kirsty. Because she had told him so little, his imagination was free to fill in the gaps, and he spent hours wondering about her, trying to picture her home and her life there.
His course work suffered a bit.
His director of studies asked to see him.
One bright April Saturday he took her to the Hampstead Pergola, a magical, romantically overgrown Edwardian folly where you could stroll along a grand elevated walkway, a bit like an avenue but with vine- and wisteria-covered stone pillars instead of trees, and the structure of the pergola overhead instead of branches; a long, high corridor that turned and turned again, went up and down steps, in and out of little pergola rooms, and all the while you were looking over beautiful gardens to the wooded Heath.
‘Like something from a fairy tale!’ she breathed, walking ahead of him, and then she was running like a child, hair flying, and he was running after her, laughing, slipping, almost falling as he skidded round a corner, desperate not to lose sight of her, his feet pounding on the criss-cross patterns thrown on the flagstones by the shadows of the pergola.
When she came to the end of it, to an open, circular space on top of a little tower, she twirled slowly, arms held out, face shining. And then, to his delight, she caught his hands in hers and twirled him with her, like they were dancing some wild Highland reel.
He pulled her to him and kissed her.
He couldn’t help himself.
For two wonderful seconds, she kissed him back. And then she pulled away, all the laughter gone out of her eyes. ‘I’m sorry, Bram. I’m so sorry. I can’t. I just can’t. I’m sorry.’
And he dropped her hands, and tried to smile. ‘It’s okay. It’s fine. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that. Got a bit carried away there with the romance of it all.’ And he grinned, and swept a hand at the pergola behind them, the gardens, the trees, while inwardly he was cursing himself, terrified, as he’d never been of anything in his life, that she would want to stop this, stop spending time with him. ‘Can we just forget that happened?’
She smiled, and nodded, and he wanted to take her in his arms again and make it right, to take away that terrible pain that was never far beneath the surface, waiting to rise up and engulf her and sweep her away from him.
13
Bram was woken the next morning by a phone call from Ma.
‘Bram, whatever is happening on your blog? And have you seen Max’s Facebook page?’
His heart sank. He had a fair idea what would be on there before he logged in. And sure enough, the trolls were going wild in the comments section of the blog. They had posted links to a Dropbox account on which a video had appeared of Bram singing the bothy ballad. And it had popped up on Max’s Facebook page too.
Bram had deleted all the previous troll comments from his blog and blocked those posters before his parents had seen them. He hastily deleted all the new ones, and then he woke Max, pulling the curtains open and setting his laptop down on the covers.
‘You need to take a look at these.’
Max half sat up in bed. His hair was sticking up around his face in a mad punk look, and he seemed unable to open his eyes. There was a sweaty, vinegary stench in the room.
Bram opened the window. ‘There are a whole lot of troll comments on your Facebook timeline. We need to get them deleted. That’s possible, isn’t it? Ideally we should block them too. Is that possible?’
‘Yeah, but they’ll just pop up again with new profiles.’
‘They’ll soon get tired of it.’ Bram sat down on the bed. ‘You need to do this now, Max. Oma and Opa have seen the comments and are pretty upset.’
That had him screwing his eyes open. Max loved his Dutch grandparents. He sat up properly and Bram gave him the laptop.
‘Look at this one,’ Max said, frowning at the screen. ‘Dad, look!’
Someone calling themselves William Wallace had posted a photo of Bram singing the bothy ballad to Max’s t
imeline, with the text:
Talk about cultural appropriation.
Cara Taylor had waded in:
What, so unless you can trace your Scottish ancestry back five generations you’re not allowed to sing a Scottish song? Talk about racism.
That had been a red rag to a bull, with half a dozen people commenting that it was fine as long as they did it respectfully, but Bram was just having a go. Bessie Brown – aka Red? – had posted:
The guy’s out of control.
‘Good of Cara to stick up for me,’ Bram said weakly.
‘I’ll get on to it,’ Max promised, his eyelids drooping again.
‘Okay, but see that you do. Don’t go back to sleep.’
Kirsty appeared an hour later, when Bram and Phoebe were sitting on the sofa together in the Room with a View designing a new mandala for the wall of the downstairs loo. Bram had photographed the writing ‘Stupid hippy shit’ and then painted over it, but it looked like it would need at least two more coats to obliterate that aggressive black marker pen.
Phoebe jumped up and ran at her. Kirsty stooped to her level, adjusting the collar of Phoebe’s shirt. ‘What are you two doing?’
‘We have to make a new mandala. Because the psychopath – Okay, okay, Dad,’ Phoebe pre-empted him. ‘I know: there is no psychopath.’
‘Well,’ said Bram, going over to them and tweaking Phoebe’s plait. ‘Do you really think one of the people at the party last night was a psychopath?’
Phoebe nodded. Damn. ‘I know Grandad thinks it was one of Max’s friends, but I don’t. It’s someone older.’
‘What makes you say that, kleintje?’
Phoebe frowned. ‘I don’t know. There’s just… too many things, and too horrible, for it to be just a kid.’ She grabbed Bram’s hand. ‘Don’t go outside today!’
‘We have to get water from the stream. But other than to do that, I won’t.’
‘What are the police doing to catch him?’