The Cornflake House: A Novel

by Deborah Gregory

  ‘It’s like this,’ she told me, ‘I want the lot to go up in smoke, a freeing of the spirit, no possessions left, nothing to cart around in the hereafter. I want it done straight away, before the authorities get wind of my death. And I can’t be doing with ceremony, Eve, not church or those poky little chapels for cremation. I’d burn anyway, Dear, and I’d rather do so here, where we’ve been cosy and together, than in a greasy furnace.’

  What could I say? It would have been cruel to deny her; besides she was right. The local cemetery has been full for years now, and not being a church-goer, not having booked a plot, well there’d have been no hope of burial; she’d have burnt anyway.

  There lies the way through the tangle. Valerie should use this information: my mother was obsessed, from an early age, with the idea that she was of Gypsy blood. She asked me to burn her home because that was how it was done, or used to be done, by the people she believed she came from. I can try to explain, if I’m allowed, how hard it had been, living under the shadow of death with such a strong and single-minded woman.

  What a time that was for me, with my mother growing weaker by the day and her impressions of my bleak future in The Cornflake House strengthening. No wonder I took little persuading when it came to destruction; I was an emotional mess, I’d have agreed to anything just to change the subject. On the night she talked of safe harbours I took a deep breath and stepped gingerly on to forbidden ground. I did so in an effort to go backwards, to the past, in order to take our minds off what was to come.

  ‘Will you tell me,’ I asked tentatively, ‘about the fathers?’

  The second the words passed my lips I wished I’d kept my mouth shut. No other question could have brought the situation home to me so clearly. To begin with there was the chance she might answer, and that diversity from the normal lack of willingness to speak of those men would indicate that Mum had reached a turning point; that she considered her death not only inevitable but imminent. That there was nothing left to lose and she might as well take this final opportunity to fill the gaps in my knowledge. On the other hand she could keep quiet, evading answers, as always. But this option made my skin freeze too, because it meant that we, mother and daughter, had not reached that round-house in our relationship where the mother, being old and in need of care, relinquishes authority to the daughter. If Mum refused to reveal secrets, to unload burdens of memory on to my shoulders, then she was in full possession of her faculties; she was dying too young. We were about to miss a stage of our lives. Since childhood, I’d accepted that there would be a time when I would take control and look after my ageing mother. I’d assumed that I would stay on when the others had left home, keeping Mum company. I’d foreseen this time in our lives without a scrap of regret, giving no consideration to what I might have been missing elsewhere. There was nothing saintly about it, I wanted it to be that way.

  Now I’d asked a question which had a distinct ring of finality, and as Mum sat looking back at me, contemplating her response, I longed to retract it, but it was too late. The men had already arrived. I couldn’t yet see them, of course, but I felt they were nearby, each one standing stock-still, waiting like characters in Eliot’s Family Reunion for the spotlight to fall on them.

  ‘Oh Eve,’ Mum said, her eyes full of mischief, ‘I hardly knew them. Except in the Biblical sense.’

  ‘Never mind, then,’ and I waved my hands, hoping to send the bastards packing.

  ‘No, you should meet them, it’s time you did. Get us both a tot of rum, and then I’ll introduce you.’

  Rum was my mother’s medicine, and her treat. She never drank soft drinks, it was tea, strong and sweet for her, or neat rum. We had a glass-fronted cupboard, bowed like a bay window, where we kept a set of dainty gold-rimmed glasses and the bottle of rum. We couldn’t call it a drinks cabinet because apart from the rum it contained bric-a-brac which had nothing to do with imbibing. There was a salt and pepper set, a pair of blue-birds who’d lost their stoppers, and a honey pot shaped like an old beehive, with a giant, rather grotesque bee balanced indelicately on top. Junk, all of it. No point, now, in pining for useless trash. But the glasses were pleasing to hold, not cut but smooth as the rum itself, and curved to fit exactly in an open hand. I poured us both a generous amount, taking a good swig of mine for courage, and settled back in my chair.

  You might think it was the rum, but once I’d accepted that I was about to meet these legendary men, I was dizzy with excitement. They had been there throughout my childhood, shadowing, walking behind as if playing Grandma’s Footsteps. They’d come on visits in the night, filling my dreams, making me strain my ears in case they were downstairs talking to Mum. In every game I played there had been hidden characters, larger than life, but invisible, unmentionable. The Fathers; as elusive and impressive as the God of small children’s prayers, often in fact confused with this white-robed powerhouse or with Father Christmas in his red outfit but with the same fluffy facial adornment. Even as a grown-up, clutching a glass of rum, I half expected the appearance of a line of men akin to the seven dwarfs in everything but size.

  ‘The last shall be first, since we’re using Bible talk,’ Mum knocked back most of her drink in one go and gasped, ‘Ahh, right then.’

  My heart lost its way and stumbled over beats until I felt my head swim. I was excited, very scared, a little queasy. They were coming, here, now, into this room. The Fathers.

  ‘Samik’s dad,’ Mum announced. ‘There’s a sweet man for you.’

  I followed the turn of her head in order to see what she saw. Samik’s father was conjured to stand in the doorway, a small, narrow silhouette who made me shiver yet stare. His head was round as a football because, I was just able to appreciate, his hair grew straight against his skull, like a tight cap.

  ‘He came down from Greenland, on a fishing boat. Not as interesting to look at as his son, bit on the short side with a flat face. Lovely eyes though, black as jet. He smelt of cod-liver oil and salt, a vast improvement on the beer-and-fags aroma of the local lads. I never could pronounce his real name, so I used to call him Joe, ’cos he was so honest. Naïve too, the green one from Greenland. There, Eve, meet Joe.’

  A gentle yellow glow, reminiscent I suspect of old gas lamps, fell on this shadow of a man, touching his clear, olive skin, making his eyes sparkle. I nodded in greeting but got no response. Clearly the vision was one way. I liked the look of Joe. He had a bewildered expression but seemed eager to learn, to please. I knew without enquiring that he’d been a virgin until he fathered Samik. He was young and, as Mum said, sweet. He may have smelt of his trade but he had none of the roughness I associate with men who fish for a living. I smiled at him but he was already starting to fade.

  ‘Bye Joe,’ Mum called as if she bumped into him every day. Who knows? Perhaps she did meet him and the others often. I didn’t ask. Life has to hold some mystery.

  ‘You liked him,’ I said with surprise. Hadn’t we always been led to believe that our fathers were great brutes who came, practically raped and plundered, and left a trail of blood, sweat and tears in their wake? But there was Joe, an innocent abroad, and the boot seemed decidedly on the other foot. I’d seen my mum as Victory, tarted to the nines, ready to knock ’em dead, and I knew my own way around the mating game; it wasn’t hard to imagine how it had been when Joe’s boat docked.

  ‘Course I did. Like I said, a sweet man. What?’ she pulled a face at my puzzled, accusing expression, ‘You think I should’ve told him he was a dad? Dragged him back here to support his little boy? Is that it?’

  ‘No, but,’ I thought of my brother, how insecure and desperate Samik had been, suffering from the lack of a father. Surely Mum could have allowed him the odd glimpse of Joe? Would that have done any harm?

  ‘I thought it would unsettle the lad,’ Mum explained.

  I wasn’t sure if I’d spoken out loud. Her thought-reading was often confusing.

  ‘Seeing Joe from time to time, like this, and not bein
g able to hug him, to get close, I thought it’d be worse for Samik than not knowing him at all. Call me selfish, but I had my hands full with Django and Merry, I didn’t want little Samik becoming seriously disturbed too.’

  I nodded, and another sip of rum warmed my throat. My head was developing a pleasing buzz.

  ‘Besides,’ there was regret in Mum’s voice, but resignation too, ‘I could never have let Joe know about Samik. He’s a dad several times over now, a grandad too. Such a good man, he’d have found it hard if he’d known, he’d have felt himself pulled two ways.’

  I topped up our drinks. I wanted to be seriously tipsy by the time my own old man appeared in the limelight.

  ‘Right, now, Merry’s dad,’ Mum clicked her fingers and this time the shadow was the size of dreams, or nightmares. ‘George,’ Mum introduced him, ‘built like a rock, but with a big heart to match.’ Again I was taken aback. Another kind-hearted man. What had happened to the monsters we’d imagined? ‘George was a clever bugger, with his hands, he could mend anything. Merry’s condition wasn’t inherited. George was just a slow mover, deliberate. Liked to think things through before taking action.’ The soft light was shining on a face which reminded me of Merry in many ways. Beneath shaggy eyebrows, George’s eyes were large, pale and decidedly hangdog. He had a vast beer belly but was otherwise thickset rather than fat. ‘A self-taught man, aren’t you, George?’ Mum smiled. Of course he gave no sign of having heard. ‘We were at school together. He was bullied and teased too, left school with nothing, then studied mechanics at home. Runs his own garage now, don’t you? Wonderful with engines, but still a little uneasy with his fellow humans. I suppose,’ she smiled kindly at our visiting ghost, ‘in that respect, you’re more like our Django than Merry.’

  It occurred to me that Mum might have got muddled, that George had fathered Django, not Merry. Although there was a physical resemblance between Merry and this man … maybe George had been father to both my unusual brothers? It hadn’t struck me before, because Mum never let her men friends hang around, that two or even three of us children might share the same dad. I couldn’t cope with the idea of sharing mine, however I might like or dislike him when his turn came. It would have been the same as sharing a security blanket, or letting another child suck your thumb. Mum was busy bidding George goodbye and concentrating on conjuring up a new face. For once she appeared to have no idea what was going on in my head. I tried to steady my racing heart with more rum. Then I realized that Django’s father was next in line and George was fading, so I’d been wrong on all counts.

  If I’d kept a clear head I’d have known that the man who fathered Django was nothing remotely like George. In a corner of our living room a thin, dark Gypsy appeared. He was less solid, more of a spirit than Joe and George, and infinitely more thrilling. He wore loose cord trousers held by braces over a collarless shirt and his chest, exposed because of missing buttons, was smooth and brown. I can’t honestly say he was handsome, although he had high cheekbones and fine eyes, because there was such a look of discontent settled on his face. I knew instinctively that he would have had no interest in me, that women like myself, overweight, pink, would leave him cold. Had I spoken to him, and had he been able to respond, I’d have expected grunts rather than words from his straight, tightly kept lips. Only the exceptional among the fairer sex would loosen that tongue and lighten those eyes, and then only for a short, passionate spell. Apart from the look of discontent, he was the male equivalent of my mother, small, light-boned, agile and busy. I certainly didn’t expect Mum to tell me this was a good, kind-hearted man.

  ‘Jake,’ she said, ‘not as clear as the others on account of our only having met in the dark,’ and she laughed warmly, a sound of rum and flirtation. The accompanying smile took years off her face leaving the impression of a girl who was capable of enticing anybody she chose. While Jake was in the room I saw her, young Victory, more clearly than I saw him. She was bright and a little drunk, young but knowledgeable, teasing but deadly serious about having her own way. For once there was no Taff to hang on Victory’s sleeve, to giggle out of turn and transform romance into tat; only Victory, dressed in crimson, smelling of violets, smiling, confident, happy.

  ‘He was no angel,’ Mum was almost whispering, ‘but I came closer to heaven with him than with any man.’ And she sent him packing with a clap of her hands, as if his very existence was too much for her.

  We had some cheese and biscuits to soak up the rum before I was introduced to Perdita’s father. He appeared to have a shine to him that had little to do with the soft lighting. I think it came from his suit. His name was Colin and he’d been a salesman at the time of Perdita’s conception. His face made me want to climb from my chair, a movement which would have required quite an effort, and dab him with powder. He seemed uncomfortable with the temperature in the room. In fact the shimmer of sweat on his nose and brow had a permanence that suggested he was unhappy with the temperature of this universe. Standing still was obviously torture to Colin, his hands went from pockets to lapels, up to his damp forelock, back to his pockets, while his legs jigged on the spot. Watching him was making me sweat in sympathy. Having been so excited by the prospect of meeting these men, I was surprised to find myself longing for Colin to vanish again. I believe this must be the effect he has on most people. I’m glad Perdita hasn’t met, and will never meet him. I know she imagines herself only one step down from the Royals. Colin left, his shine staying for a couple of seconds after his form had vanished.

  ‘He was just passing through,’ Mum explained, giving a short giggle at the innuendo.

  We were getting fairly sloshed by this time and apart from that sinking, apprehensive feeling I had at the prospect of meeting the skeleton from my own cupboard, I was enjoying the evening as much as any I could remember.

  Zulema’s father was next. A sweetheart of a man, who came, not from India as I’d always imagined, but from South America.

  ‘Mixed blood,’ Mum told me, ‘half Spanish, half some Indian tribe. Over here to study English, had the dearest accent. Jorge. Another George really, but very different.’ Jorge was comfortably round, a man at peace with his body in open sandals and baggy trousers. He was wearing a shirt so white it defied the yellow lighting, and his teeth were bright to match. I found it hard to think of Jorge having sex – and after all he must have done so at least once. It was a little like trying to picture a soft toy with an erection. The rum was definitely doing its evil worst. Still, Jorge didn’t seem to mind being mentally undressed, his smile was good-natured, sunny. In fact he was perfect for Zulema, appearing to be conjured from pure sunlight.

  When Jorge had gone and Fabian’s dad appeared, I gave an involuntary gasp. The man was beautiful. It’s rare to meet such beauty head on, even if the handsome face belongs to a ghost. My jaw dropped and I felt myself blush. If this man had been there, in the flesh, I’d have been unable to speak to him. Fabian is good-looking, tall, striking even, but his darker, more streamlined father was a god. Mum laughed at me. ‘That was the effect he had on all the girls,’ she assured me, ‘and best of all, he’d no idea how lovely he was. I rescued him, Sidney’s his name by the way, from the clutches of a very undesirable character. I didn’t want to spoil him, his innocence was part of his beauty, but somebody had to teach him a few hard facts.’

  ‘Was he musical?’ I asked, my voice a hoarse whisper.

  ‘He’d hum a lot, under his breath, but no, he didn’t play anything or sing. Maybe Fabe got his talent from me. How about that? I’d have liked to play a guitar or a fiddle.’ I was sorry I’d jumped to the wrong conclusion, but I didn’t take Mum’s suggestion seriously. She knew I credited her with many of the talents her kids had inherited or developed but the only music she played, or had ever seemed to want to play, was on the radio. Whereas Sidney looked incomplete without a violin or a double bass. Maybe he learnt to play later, once he knew his hard facts.

  ‘He can’t stay,’ Mum told me with moc
k regret, ‘even though he’s so easy on the eye. Do you think Fabe would approve, by the way? I meant to ask you that of each of them. Do they live up to expectations? Apart from Colin, that is.’

  Before I could answer I found myself getting emotional, losing my voice through the effort to hold back tears. Whether this was true sorrow due to our losses, or fear of the man who was coming next, I’m not sure. I pictured Samik in the arms of Joe, a scene which was followed instantly by one of George bending to greet a tiny Merry. Those two men, at least, met all the requirements of fathers; they were exactly right.

  Then it hit me. I’m not a complete fool, Matthew, and it struck me just in time, seconds before my own dream was to come true, that what I was witnessing was nothing more than a conjuring trick. All done by lighting and wish fulfilment. Nothing to do with reality whatsoever. I was seeing what I wanted to see. Had I been absent, and Perdita sitting in my place, Colin would have been so much more the man, upright, intelligent, important, and my father, Eve’s dad, would have been a scruffy, insignificant bloke with holes in his shoes.

  I looked reproachfully at Mum.

  ‘Had enough?’

  I didn’t know if she was talking about the rum or this game. Anyway, I was passed caring, having had enough of both. Now that I knew I was less likely to meet my real dad than to fly round the room, I shrugged and told her we might as well make it a full complement.

  ‘My father’ appeared in his pool of light, a medium-sized, sandy-haired man, not in any way evil, but not golden with goodness either. Was he the best I could do? This average man with his blue eyes and freckled face?

  ‘What’s his name?’ I asked with a sigh, knowing the answer a split second before it came.

  ‘David. Dave. Nice enough chap, older than me, kind in his way. What do you think he did for a trade?’ she asked, tossing the ball into my court.