by Susan Sallis
If I had reported just those times I suppose . . . think . . . I would not have been reporting everything that was important. Perhaps David had already shown me that the universal and the particular had to co-exist to make any kind of sense. That meant I felt bound to report on Hildie and Mick Hardy. And then Della, who was so important in my life, even though I had never seen her. And her twins: Joy, Michael. And Tom Hardy, who, incredibly, had been Della’s husband and, it seemed, felt brotherly towards me! There were so many other things: absurdities, real-life cartoons. Juniper who could have been Juniper Jinks. Poor Jinx himself, who had kept my secret to the end.
This report cannot be like that. My contact with David after his violent death had to be in the context of day-to-day life to make it real, to keep me from ‘losing it’ completely; in fact, perhaps to bring me back to sanity. This report has nothing to do with day-to-day life. There must have been a day-to-day life, but it was overshadowed by the separate life. A secret life. I can barely remember going to school, accepting as many sleep-overs as possible yet never making friends . . . It happened so long ago and has very little to do with Viv Venables. It’s about Vivvie Lennard.
So here goes.
Before Viv Venables there was Vivvie Lennard. She was nine when they moved into Montmorency House, a block of flats overlooking Hotwells. Her mother called her ‘my nut-brown maid’. Her father was called Dennis, and jokingly referred to himself as Dennis the Menace from a character in a comic. He called his wife his ‘brown bird’ so they – mother and daughter – must have looked the same. Except that brown bird was beautiful and plain and nut-brown maid was just plain. Brown bird’s real name was Barbara. She was beautiful and plain at the same time.
Vivvie was an only child, and her school friends were just school friends. Her mother was her very best friend, she needed no one else. The few times she brought anyone home – Janet Atherton or Maria Sykes – her mother laid tea for three in the kitchen, and then said, ‘I’ll leave you to have a chat. Have mine later.’ Vivvie felt she had wasted precious time with her real friend. She stopped asking anyone to tea.
She said to her mother, ‘You’re my friend, aren’t you?’
‘Of course I am, Vivvie. You know that.’
‘Shall I call you Barbara?’
Her mother laughed. ‘If you like. Why not? I call you Vivvie.’
‘And nut-brown maid!’
‘Too true!’
‘I can’t call you brown bird.’
‘No. Better not.’
But Vivvie rarely used her mother’s name. Until the night her father came home and told them he’d lost his job. He was angry. He said it was only a case of last in first out, nothing to be ashamed about. But he was angry because he was always going to be the last in. Since Vivvie’s eighth birthday he had had three jobs.
Barbara was not so sympathetic as usual. She dished up sausages and mash and said brightly, ‘Vivvie started a new job today, actually, darling. It was her first day at her new primary. Have you forgotten?’
Dennis made an effort. ‘Make any friends?’
Vivvie wanted to make it all right for him; wanted to show him that if they had each other, the three of them, nothing really mattered.
‘I’ve got my best friend,’ she said.
He wasn’t really interested but said, ‘Oh? Have I missed something? Who’s that, then?’
‘Barbara, of course!’ Vivvie laughed. She was absolutely unprepared for the stinging blow to her head which sent her reeling on to the kitchen floor. Barbara was crouching over her, gathering her up. ‘It’s all right, darling. Dad reached for the cruet and fell over the table . . . it’s all right . . .’
But beyond the comfort came a vicious voice she had heard before, sometimes, in the night, or perhaps in a dream. ‘Cheeky little cow! Why can’t she get her own friends – leave us to have a life of our own? For God’s sake stop smothering her – come here, give me a kiss – not like that – come here I said—’
And incredibly Barbara let herself be engulfed by him. Vivvie, sitting up and holding the side of her head, not surprised any more, knowing somewhere somehow that this would happen.
A year later. Dennis would not, could not, believe in the breast cancer. He said just once, ‘Good job it’s there. Isolated. Cut it right away. Get rid of it.’ He said he had never heard of lymph glands. Therefore they did not exist.
He got a job a week before Barbara died. It was a good job, well paid: he drove one of the enormous machines that extended the motorway into the south-west. He did not like not being a white-collar worker any more, but the new job gave him a sense of power he had never known. He was up there in his small cab by himself, with a battered radio blaring forth on the shelf in front of him. He was all-powerful. He thought he could conquer Barbara’s illness and she would be grateful, and they would be back to being man and woman. Vivvie, who looked disturbingly like Barbara, would be going to a sixth-form college one day. Barbara wanted her to go to university; he thought it would make Vivvie think she was someone special. But maybe a teacher-training place wouldn’t be a bad idea. She looked a bit like a school-marm when she was doing her homework of an evening . . .
When he got home that night, the house was empty and some interfering neighbour came out to tell him that Vivvie was by her mother’s bed at the infirmary. He hated that. He should be there. Vivvie always came between him and Barbara. When he got to the ward the night sister told him in hushed tones that Barbara had passed away three hours ago. He did not believe her. ‘My bird? She wouldn’t go without waiting for me to say goodbye.’
‘We could not contact you, Mr Lennard. And your daughter was with her, of course. She wanted to stay by her mother until you arrived, but we have sedated her, and she is lying down in one of the side wards.’
He went and looked at Barbara. She was still beautiful, still his brown bird, but she was no longer inside her own body. He turned almost immediately and said, ‘I’ll take Vivvie.’
They woke Vivvie up with some difficulty. She walked by her father’s side like a zombie. The corridors went on for ever. The night air was not cold, but she gasped with it, even so. Dennis unlocked the door of the flat and went straight to the kitchen. She heard the familiar sound of a tab ripping from a beer can. She sat in the living room for a long time, but he did not join her. She went to bed. Perhaps she would die in her sleep like her mother had. Perhaps her mother was waiting for her. She closed her eyes. When she opened them it was light and she could hear her father being sick in the bathroom.
After the funeral she gradually accepted that Barbara’s death had been her fault. Dennis shunned her, except when one of his explosions of anger needed an outlet. Then he would turn his back on her for a long time while she stayed frozen-still, sitting ‘doing nothing’ – which meant doing homework – or standing at the cooker making some kind of meal. Once the contents of the frying pan caught fire because she dared not move. There was no escape. He would suddenly whirl around, one arm and open palm outstretched. The incident of the frying pan resulted in a visit to outpatients. The sister in charge asked a lot of questions. Dennis seemed unable to speak. Vivvie said, ‘I was cooking bacon and I forgot it, and when it caught fire I tried to throw it into the sink and – and—’ She started to cry. ‘I fell down and Daddy came in and brought me here.’
‘Then that’s fine.’ Sister hardly liked to produce a barley sugar for this girl who looked more like sixteen than eleven. ‘Show your daddy what a brave girl you are. Let’s have a smile!’
When they emerged into the weak January sunshine she did her best. ‘Look at the snowdrops, Daddy. Spring is coming.’
Before Dennis could respond, a woman rounded the corner, making for the orthopaedic ward, and smiled recognition.
‘It’s Vivvie Lennard! Do you remember me? I taught you in reception class.’
Vivvie managed a proper smile. ‘Mrs Lachlan.’
‘Top marks! And this is your father? Mr Lennard.
I’m really pleased to meet you. I meant to write or telephone. I was so very sorry to hear that your wife had died.’
Dennis blinked, took the outstretched hand, then let it go.
‘You worked away, didn’t you? But I expect she told you how well Vivvie was doing. And to get in to Cutler’s High is no mean feat! Are you enjoying it, Vivvie?’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘Well, I have to go. My husband has broken his arm, and is having some physio. I am picking him up.’ She turned again to Dennis, and moved her head from side to side. ‘My goodness, Mr Lennard. Your daughter is so like her mother. That must be a comfort to you. You have each other.’
She was gone, and they walked on to the bus stop. Dennis said nothing until they were in the lift of Montmorency House. Then he said, ‘Stupid cow.’
But that evening was different. That evening he kept turning from the television and looking at her. When she went to bed he said abruptly. ‘My brown bird loved snowdrops.’
She lived in terror of him turning his back on her. He did it more and more. It did not always mean that there would be an explosion of fury directed at her. Sometimes he would bring his fist down on the nearest breakable object. If the object cut him, he would hold out his arm to her and she would bathe it with disinfectant and plaster it up.
When she was almost twelve she began to have moments of being not so plain. She learned to cook properly. He would give her money each week, and she would spend it carefully so there were hot meals each day. Very occasionally he thanked her and gave her a quick hug. One day he watched her finish her own meal then leaned across the table.
‘Are you coming back to me, brown bird?’
She looked at him, eyes wide. She knew how unpredictable he could be; she slowly moved her chair away from the table so that she would be out of reach of that whirling arm.
He said in a low voice, not angry, ‘I did not realize . . . did not know. I can’t live without you. You knew that. Yet you left me . . . just left me. It made me angry, bird. So angry. And all the time you – you – you were coming back to me. You always did.’ He smiled. He had a piece of lettuce in his teeth. He stood up, and Vivvie froze as usual. But then he gathered her to him and just held her and stroked her hair. She clung to him; she cried. She thought at that moment she would gladly devote her whole life to him. She loved him.
It made no difference when she tried to fight him off. She should have done what Barbara had done, and let him engulf her completely. But later, when she learned to do that, it still made no difference. When he realized she was not Barbara he still hit her frantically, accusing her of trying to make a fool out of him. She ran out of the flat. It was dark. Leaves were falling in Cumberland Road and she remembered going to her first school this way. Her feet knew where to go. He was still panting and calling behind her . . . don’t be a little fool . . . you’re old enough now to know . . . come home this minute . . . He was fitter than she had known, and she could not shake him off. She turned left and ran alongside the river, and turned right again and straight over the footbridge across Coronation Road and into the small streets of Bedminster. Everything looked so different in the dark, but at last she spotted the wall of the playground. His voice was silent. She vaulted the wall and stood close to it – clung to the rough stone – and heard his feet kicking the leaves as he ran. Tears of terror ran down her face and she clapped a hand over her sore mouth in an effort not to sob.
He seemed to know exactly where she was. He stopped and leaned against the wall. She could have sworn she felt his body heat through the stone. She shuddered again and again and now fought nausea.
He whispered, ‘Vivvie. I’m not sorry. I paid you the compliment of seeing my brown bird inside my nut-brown maid.’
That did it. She sobbed and vomited at the same time. He must have heard her yet he continued to speak.
‘You’re an adult now. You know about love. That was love, Vivvie. And you are a lucky girl to learn about it.’ He paused, then with an obvious effort he said, ‘I know it was wrong. It won’t happen again. But you will always know that I love you.’ He said nothing about the beatings. She controlled her heaving body and tried to dry her face on ripped clothing. He listened to her fighting for breath. He said, ‘I love you. I don’t think I knew that before. You are all I’ve got, Vivvie. And I am all you have got. And now we have this secret. I trust you with it. That is proof of my love, surely? Walk round to the gate, my beautiful girl. I’ll help you over it. We’ll go home together. Barbara loved meeting you from school and scuffing through the leaves. We’ll do that. Come on.’
She stood for a moment longer. She had kept the beatings secret because it might have meant Social Services taking her right away from Bristol, and she could not bear to leave Cutler’s. She had to keep this secret, too. He had said nothing about the beatings; perhaps he would never mention this again. And he was her father. Of course she loved him.
He did not touch her as they walked home. Instead he talked constantly of her mother. She had loved snowdrops in the spring and in the autumn it had been the ‘chestnut spikes’.
And all the time, Vivvie knew it would happen again.
Twenty-one
Vivian’s story
AFTER I GOT that far I left the whole thing for over a week. I intended to leave it for always . . . nearly burned what I had done. It did not help in any way whatsoever to ‘confess’ in the third person. When I wrote that last sentence I just got to the bathroom before I threw up.
But then Maisie telephoned. She had started at St Bede’s, and it was horrible. Her mother had gone down to the flat to paint the new bathroom, so she had phoned me; she did not want to worry her mother, and had told her that everything was going well and that she was settling in. But she needed to talk to someone honestly. Could she have a day with me one weekend?
‘I’ll collect you on Saturday. I want you to see some cartoons I’ve unearthed – see them in the context of the everything. D’you remember what we were saying about the everything and the nothing?’
‘Of course.’ But Maisie’s voice was small. Things had got in the way of her understanding of David’s work. She could only cope with one thing at a time, and the enormity of her new school had swamped her.
I said, ‘I’ll pick you up early and we’ll be back here in time for coffee. That gives us until about six or seven in the evening – depending on your other plans. In that time we can rearrange the whole world. St Bede’s first and then the universe.’ She laughed reluctantly. I said, ‘Will it be awkward?’
‘No. Tom’s got a day off, so he and Mum are meeting Hildie and Mick at the flat. They reckon we can move in at half-term.’ She sounded unenthusiastic.
‘Right. Settled. What shall we have for lunch and tea?’
Her voice lifted slightly. ‘Steak and kidney? And one of your sponges for tea?’
‘Jam or marmalade?’
‘Well . . . I’d prefer jam but it wouldn’t be one of your specials, then. So marmalade, please. And Viv . . .’
‘Go on.’
‘Don’t tell Hildie and Mick I asked you to invite me down.’
I didn’t ask why. I said, ‘OK.’
On Saturday I left the house at eight o’clock. Elisabeth had telephoned me and thanked me so much for asking Maisie to come for the day. ‘She was going to come with us and help with some painting, then changed her mind. Quite honestly, Viv, I think she’s having a hard time at the new school. I’m really glad she’s not going to be sitting at home all day brooding.’
I was with her before nine and we were back in the garden with mugs of coffee at ten thirty.
She told me about the absolute ‘foreigners’ at her new school; the cleverness of the girls; the cliques that had already formed and excluded her; the little smiles when she told the art teacher that she wanted to paint everything.
‘They thought I meant everything. And of course I meant . . . everything.’ She made a face. ‘I might have to do still
life next Wednesday. Still life.’ She looked gloomy. I had to laugh, and then she looked hurt.
‘Maisie, I’m so sorry. But just because you admire David’s sky and seascapes, you mustn’t think he never painted a still life. He went to art college, for goodness’ sake. The skyscapes and the cartoons evolved as he evolved. Listen, when is the school taking you to the museum again?’
She looked gloomier still. ‘Next Tuesday, as a matter of fact.’ And repeated, ‘The museum! I ask you!’
‘Right. I want you to find all the examples you can of still-life paintings. Note the painters. Find out more about them. Internet or encyclopedia. Ring me.’
‘What about?’
‘About still life. About the painters. Your feelings on the two.’
She groaned, but grinned too. ‘I can tell you now. I feel the whole idea of a vase, a dead flower, a scarf on a table . . . too petty for words. Who cares? Who wants to know?’
‘Well I do, for one.’ I stood up. ‘I have to look at the steak and kidney. No, don’t come with me. Here’s a pencil and a note pad. Choose one thing – no good coming indoors, because I haven’t got any vases with dead flowers and scarves. Stay right here. Choose something – the fig tree, a bit of wall – something in the garden not beyond it. And describe it. In words not pictures. Don’t name it. You’ll read what you’ve written to me, and I must know exactly what you are talking about, and I must know it intimately.’
I came indoors while she was still spluttering protests. I knew I sounded unbearably school-marmish. And I knew something else, too. I would have to go on writing about myself in the third person.
She chose the straggle of nasturtiums that fell over the wall right next to where we had been sitting. She said defiantly, ‘You have to know it’s a flower, of course. But you must try to tell me which flower. Is that OK?’ At one point she read out that it was like the aurora borealis. That threw me for a moment, but when she spoke of it creeping over stones, curious like kittens, I knew. I had seen films of the Northern Lights, and the fingers that swept across darkness were like nasturtium growth on fast forward. That was her way of describing the everything. The kittens represented the paradox. And if she could take the time and trouble to do it, what choice did I have?