by T M Heron
The parking area of my parent’s house is a disgrace. Seven cars are there at present, the most luxurious of which is a Ford Taurus. I loathe wealthy people who are unpretentious. It’s the height of arrogance. The Taurus probably belongs to the maid.
The house is positioned to maximize sea views and looks out over Cook Strait. Long, steep, wooden steps zig zag down about three hundred meters to a private beach. Someone up top is doing the lawns on a late-model ride-on mower which probably cost more than his annual salary.
I have no option but to ring the bell as I’m not privy to the door code. It’s answered by a girl of about twenty, who’d be pretty if she hadn’t obviously been crying. She doesn’t recognize me. She squints up through puffy red eyes and informs me the family aren’t accepting visitors today.
I had pictured coming home and reconnecting with my mother in many ways on the forty-five-minute drive from Wellington to Plimmerton. Not one of them was remotely like this.
Is this girl a relative or staff? I rule out the relative option immediately as I can easily picture myself violating her, and any thought of sexual interaction with family naturally sickens me. This makes her staff. I cannot believe my parent’s staff would not at least know who I am. My jaw clenches.
Surely my parents still talked about me? There would have been numerous arguments about making contact again. Long drawn-out affairs with my mother crying and losing her appetite and feeling empty. My absence a festering wound kept in check only by the possibility of my eventual return home to the family fold.
I’m beginning to guess I’m not going to see photos of myself on the staircase wall. My Master’s degree will not be framed and hanging in the library alongside all the photos of my father with everyone from the mayor to the Governor-General.
The girl who is currently standing in the doorway, making no secret she’d like to close it and get back to hogging my mother, will be the first to go, I decide. But for now, it’s easier if she likes me. So I give her a gentle smile, followed by a look that says, “I’m sorry you’re hurting, but I’m hurting too.” Now can I please see my fucking mother!
Then my mother appears in the foyer. I haven’t laid eyes on her since I was twenty. She looks a lot older than she did then so it’s as much as a shock for me as it is for her. Then I work out that she must be in her early sixties and realize she looks great. In fact, she must have had quite a bit of work done. She’ll be highly eligible with my father gone. I’ll have to watch that. I don’t want any stepfathers muddying the waters of my inheritance.
“Jacky.” This is what she calls me. “Jacky.”
That’s all she says, and she just stands there. We all just stand there.
He pushed me out of here, I want to say. One small mistake and he disowned me. Well, now I’m back.
Then the girl puts one arm around my mother’s shoulders and goes to shut the door with the other. She says, “I’m sorry, but it’s not a good time.”
How asinine. Of course it’s not a good time. But I’m here to make it better. The silver lining in the cloud. I step forward with an authority granted only to people with height, peel her arm off my mother’s shoulder, and replace it with my own. “I came as soon as I heard, Mother,” I say gently.
Then I start to cry. A masculine cry and it’s not completely faked. I am upset. This does not feel like the return of the prodigal son. And an infiltrator is already on the scene to give my mother comfort.
I wait for my mother to introduce me, to dismiss this member of her staff who I will one day fire with relish. Instead, her shoulders tighten under my arm. “He wouldn’t want you here,” she says.
10
Did I mention it was me who pushed Helena off the pool house roof?
She was a cute wee kid. Dressed in gorgeous little outfits by my mother and loved by just about everyone on sight. But I didn’t push her off the roof because she was favored by our parents, or cleverer than me, or even annoying to me. She was none of those things. No, we were just up there, and no one was around. So I pushed her to see what would happen.
It wasn’t worth it. First, what happened wasn’t particularly exciting. There was no blood or screaming, as Helena’s landing was buffered by a flax plant and she immediately passed out.
Second, I hadn’t thought it through. Of course, sooner or later my father was to start wondering just how a six-year-old child had managed to climb onto a two-story roof. Where was Jackson, he asked himself, when this all happened?
At first their wrath was vented on our babysitter. But much later my role did become at the very least questionable. And so the doubts crept in. But only for my father. Never, to the best of my knowledge, for my mother.
However, I am not about to let this get in the way now. With my father, bless him, gone, and my mother vulnerable I will not let this opportunity pass. I know I can overcome any obstacles in the way. With my father out of the picture this is possible. In death I will beat him.
So when my mother says, “He wouldn’t want you here,” I respectfully remove my arm from her shoulder. I look her in the eye and say, “I’m not here for him, Mother, I’m here for you.”
But my mother stands her ground. An internal struggle is happening, and I am losing the battle without even understanding why. Then I recognize what is taking place. My mother is wrestling with loyalty.
“He wouldn’t have wanted this,” she says again.
But she says it quietly now, and there is longing in her voice.
Then someone’s voice says, “Actually, Mother, you’re wrong. It’s exactly what he wanted.” And I realize the voice is mine.
I’ve had a much-needed epiphany. It has occurred to me that invention is on my side and I can literally say anything I want. Just like the pool house, there’s nothing that can be disproved.
With a new-found authority, I dismiss the interloper. “This is a family matter. We’ll be in my father’s study. I’ll call if we need anything.”
I’m thinking very clearly now, thinking ahead of the situation. Because there’s a good reason we’re going to have this talk in my father’s study. Several of them actually.
I realize as we enter the study that my love of the old-school wooden panels and leather furniture has come straight from this stately room. It’s how Bakers looked until they redesigned everything in their attempt to cater to both genders. It’s the way Bakers still should look.
My mother and I settle into a couple of deep-red leather chairs. I don’t think I’ll move into this house when I inherit it, but I’ll certainly retain everything from this room for my personal study. You can’t buy furniture like this anymore. I’m excitedly imagining how everything will look in a place of my own when I remember my mother’s there awaiting enlightenment.
“Dad visited me not so long ago,” I say. “He knew he wasn’t well and wanted to put things right. I refused to speak to him.”
My mother looks taken aback.
“He’d written me letters before that. Some of them I didn’t even read.” I can’t help adding, “Although if you’d contacted me it would have been different.” I allow a nicely timed pause, taut with grief and betrayal.
“He was my husband,” she says. “I tried. Jacky, believe me, I tried.”
I’m not completely devoid of appreciation as to how marital relations are between people of my parent’s generation, as opposed to my own.
“Finding out about Dad by reading it in the paper was probably the worst experience in my life,” I say shortly. “I wish you’d contacted me. I’m still his son. I had a right to know.”
This gets her attention. But I’m too busy feeling wronged. And the more of this I say the more wronged I feel. Because it could have been true.
“I can give you all the proof you’ll ever need that Dad wanted me to come back home. That he regretted doubting me,” I continue. Suddenly my father is on my side. And we’re both disappointed and let down by my mother. “You shouldn’t need proof. But I’m go
ing to give it to you anyway. I have letters from him at home.”
My mother hunches her shoulders and covers her face with her hands. I want to tell her to sit up straight. How many times has she said that to me when I was younger? She usually looks so proud in public. Almost aloof. Where is her dignity?
“But what’s even worse is that the whole reason I came straight out was to support you. To be here for you. I couldn’t stand to think of you alone here. Grieving. And this is what I get.” I stand up. “I won’t stay any longer. I’ve got my own guilt and my own grief to deal with. But I will send you copies of his letters. For the sake of his memory I want you to know he tried to mend broken bridges before he died. It’s what he wanted.”
“Jacky, that won’t, that isn’t, it’s not necessary,” she says.
Her emotions are in turmoil; her world has been rocked once, now it has been once again. “I’m not myself at the moment. Of course I want you here.”
“I can go if that’s what you’d prefer,” I say.
Something in my mother switches. “No, don’t go. Don’t go, Jacky,” she says. She starts crying. “You’ve only just arrived. I’m sorry. This is just all so much to take in. I can’t believe he’s gone. He was so healthy.”
A stupid thing to say because healthy people don’t die of heart attacks.
I look at her with what I hope is shared misery on my face. “Well, I’m here for you to lean on now, Mother. Although I’ll admit I’m struggling myself. Only weeks ago I was talking to him, arguing actually, and now he’s gone. It doesn’t seem real.”
She nods her agreement and gets up. “I’m going to have Kylie bring us some tea,” she says. My guess is that she’s suddenly desperately in need of some more of whatever sedative the good Doctor Brockhurst undoubtedly will have her on — and then the tea. She disappears in search of the soon-to-be-dismissed Kylie.
I walk over to the desk. In the first drawer on the right is a stack of blank RIL stationery for Ray Investments Limited. In the second drawer down, just as it always has been, is my father’s personal monogrammed stationery. I take a generous wad of pages and a few envelopes and tuck them into my suit jacket. It looks dubiously bulky. I take the jacket off and loosely fold it over them.
The drawer below has some letters in my father’s handwriting. There is a framed photo of my parents on the desk. I add a few of the letters and the photo to my stash, plus a fountain pen from the desk. There are a few $50 notes floating around among some paperclips and rubber bands. I take them
◆◆◆
My mother and I go in search of Helena to tell her the good news. She has lost her father, but she has gained a brother. My mother explains as we walk the halls that Helena’s companion positions her in different parts of the house when it’s too rainy to go out. This is to prevent her from becoming bored.
Ditching the companion and sticking her in front of a TV seems like a better idea but I keep it to myself. I almost can’t be bothered seeing Helena, aside from an idle curiosity. I’m beginning to feel mentally tired and this reunion will force me to dredge up yet more affectionate, animated behavior.
“Helena’s finally learned to communicate,” says my mother.
My stomach churns for a few seconds until I realize she can’t be communicating that well or my father would have had me arrested.
“That’s great,” I say. “Does she know about Dad?”
“Of course she does. She’s devastated.”
We finally locate Helena and her companion, who to my surprise is young and male.
“You couldn’t find her a female nurse?”
My mother laughs, forgetting for a minute her new status as widow. “Of course your sister has female nurses.” I can tell she feels good saying the words “your sister”. Brent, my mother tells me, is Helena’s “companion”. Helena has several young male companions, apparently. Yet another strategy for staving off boredom, I’m guessing. But Brent is her favorite. And he’s the one she has spent all her time with since our father kicked the bucket. I’m sure he appreciates the overtime.
Helena, who was always cute, is even better-looking at thirty-three. Her skin is so clear it looks airbrushed. Probably, I reflect, because she’s never had to get off her ass and do anything. She’s been pampered, babied and clearly spoiled. The snowy hair she had as a child has darkened to beige and is wound to one side of her head in a thick plait. She’s wearing a cream mohair jersey with an embossed pattern down each sleeve and a Burberry rug over her knees. Her eyes are calm and attentive as she stares at the delightful Brent who is halfway through some titivating story.
I can’t work out whether it’s good that my tetraplegic sister is hot (it’s undeniable proof nothing can ruin our family genes,) or bad, as good looks are wasted on cripples.
“Wait until you hear her talk,” says our mother.
Helena doesn’t see me until we’re right in front of her as she has limited movement in her neck. By then I’ve already heard her entire vocabulary. I hear it as she interacts with Brent.
“Ngah,” she says. “Ngah.” She sounds like a Siamese cat with strep throat.
I step into her field of vision. “Hello, sister dear,” I say.
Her eyes widen, pupils dilating. “Nnggaahh!” She makes a stiff sideways movement with her jaw which is no doubt her full range of ambulation. “Nnngggaaahhh! Nnnnggggaaaahhhh!”
Brent looks at me in horror, as if I’m the freak. Surely he can’t know what she’s saying? It’s only one word.
If Helena were only a little more human, she’d be thrashing round in her wheelchair. Beating her hands against the arm rests. Throwing something. But all she can do is thrash round in her head. With her eyes giving it as good as she’s got. Her voice is louder now, and sounds more guttural, although still the same phoneme. Only it’s shorter, her version of a stutter I’m guessing. “Nnggaahh. Ngah. Nn, Nn, Nn.”
My mother steps in front of me and bends down to Helena. “It’s okay, darling,” she says. “It’s Jacky. Do you remember Jacky? Maybe not. He’s all grown up now like you. He’s been away for a long time and now he’s back.”
◆◆◆
On Sunday forty-two out of the fifty partners at Bakers attend my father’s funeral, along with half the country’s business world. A large number of people have flown in from different countries. There’s a good representation of charities, a smattering of people in wheelchairs, which I find off-putting, and hundreds of personal friends of my parents looking shocked and grief-stricken and heartwarmingly shrouded in wealth.
It’s my father’s funeral and I’m overcome with emotion. This is life-changing for me. He disinherited me. He actively stymied my career. I was out in the cold with no back-up. I couldn’t even join the firm and receive their back-up and protection. The kind of protection that was automatically extended to Griz Featherfield when he went through the nightmare of his wife suing him for the domestic abuse he dished out so freely. The kind of back-up a guy like me could do with.
My father took so much from me. And now I’m going to get it back. I’m going to have a mother, an inheritance, and a partnership. I’m going to belong. I hope he’s looking down from somewhere and choking in horror.
I can barely suppress my elation.
People stare. Harry Ray may be gone but look at his legacy. His tall, handsome son who specializes in venture capital and M&A. I wish that red-haired woman was here to see it.
Being cognizant of how many eyes are watching I focus all my attention on my semi-hysterical mother. Helena is too upset even to be here. But some louse, who is currently acting managing director of RIL, has the audacity to get up and read a poem, of all things, from Helena for my father. It’s her favorite poem. Brent apparently gave it to him.
For a good ten minutes after the poem I oscillate between worrying how much influence this acting managing director will have over the Ray board of directors and being embarrassed that Helena — despite being an absent, mute, cripple �
�� has still managed to permeate, and therefore taint, an otherwise dignified funeral.
Then I stop worrying. The board is a token structure. My mother is now the sole owner of Ray Investments Limited, and now it’s the furthest thing from her mind.
I spend the rest of the funeral trying to decipher what exactly I have to offer my mother that will most quickly earn her trust and intensify her maternal affections. Mainly, I think, she needs comforting and love. Something to blunt the teeth of her loneliness.
I’m so busy contemplating this I nearly forget I’m head pallbearer when the funeral finishes. In an inspired display of sympathetic devotion and understanding I take my mother with me. One strong arm steadying the casket on my shoulder and the other wrapped tightly round my weeping mother. She’s incoherent by the time we get outside and although the look I give them is stony and coldly furious I am elated to see the press.
11
Much to everyone’s amazement I’m back at my desk the following Monday, perfectly groomed, utterly focused. There are bunches of flowers everywhere, the largest of which I generously send to Eliza Barnes’s desk in IT.
Packer looks uneasy when he sees me. Due to the threat I have always posed to Leo our relationship is historically antagonistic. He now has the urge to blurt out something typically derogatory but with my father’s death there’s a change to the balance of power.
“You sure you’re up to this, buddy?” he says.
“Who are you kidding?” I say. “We both know he hated me.”
Leo looks more uneasy. He’d like to swallow what he’s just said. “Well, don’t you think you should be home with your mother?” He just can’t help himself. He’s worried I’m not handling the opportunity well enough. And there’s so much at stake.
“I’m not in for long.”
I have always loathed Packer’s matey ball-game lingo. I shut my office door in his face, lock it, then sit at my computer and begin to type.