by Jo Verity
‘Yes, thanks.’ Tessa gave what she hoped was an enticing smile. ‘Can I come in?’
‘Sure.’ He stepped back, leaving her to push her bags into the room. ‘Going away?’
‘Yes. No. I’m leaving home, actually.’
‘Oh, yeah.’ Unsmiling, he closed the door.
‘Dad found out about … last night. About … you know.’ She blushed, embarrassed by the reference to what had occurred yet determined to arouse his guilty sympathy. ‘He’s thrown me out. So I was wondering…’
He held up his hands, like a policeman stopping the traffic, and shook his head. ‘Uh-uh.’
She pressed on. ‘It would only be for a week or so. Until I can find a job and a room.’
‘The answer is no.’
His unconsidered reply affronted her. She wanted to slap his face and tell him that he was arrogant and that his feet smelled but she reined in her fury, pouting and adopting a little girl voice. ‘I won’t get in your way. Honestly. You’ll hardly know I’m here.’
‘It’s nothing personal. I never let girls stay here. End of story.’
She could contain herself no longer. ‘Prick. You owe it to me.’
‘How come?’
‘You got me drunk and … took advantage of me.’ She glared at him.
‘And that entitles you to move in?’ He shook his head in mock amazement. ‘If it worked like that, I’d have a dozen girls cluttering up the place.’
Frustration, rage and exhaustion swept over her and she was unable to hold back the tears. ‘Bastard,’ she howled. ‘I can’t believe I wasted my virginity on a creep like you.’ She folded her arms around her head as if to protect herself from any more blows.
‘Okay, okay. I didn’t realise. Honest, I didn’t.’ He chewed his lip. ‘Look, how’s this? You can stay until Monday. But then you’ll have to sort something out.’
Chapter 12
Lewis pushed open the door, set to retreat if Tessa shrieked or threw a shoe at his head. But she had gone, her abandoned clothes covering the bed and the floor like seaweed dumped on the beach after a storm. He tiptoed in and closed the door. Stepping over the mess, he made his way across the room, and sat on the upright chair, still and silent, as if he were in a holy place waiting for a miracle to happen.
Had his parents been in here since she left? Surely not or it wouldn’t still be in this mess. His mother fretted if anything was out of place and was forever hanging coats in wardrobes, pushing socks and underwear into drawers, replacing books on shelves. A few weeks earlier he’d asked her, gently, not to tidy his books away when he was in the middle of homework. ‘I’m sorry, dear,’ she’d apologised, as if unaware that she was doing it.
Tessa’s Fair Isle jumper, patterned with green, blue and white zigzags, poked out of an open drawer, one sleeve dangling as if it were trying to make a break for freedom, too. He took it out, burying his nose in the scratchy wool, disappointed that no hint of her smell lingered in the intricate rows. When someone died there was a funeral and their possessions were disposed of, but if someone simply disappeared – what happened then? During wars and natural disasters, people went missing all the time but, once in a while, years later, one of them reappeared. Did they expect to find their belongings, if not exactly where they’d left them then, at any rate, safely stored somewhere? He had no idea what had happened to Gordon’s things. Was his mother keeping them safe, just in case? There were lots of cardboard boxes in the attic and they could well be packed in one of those. But what would have been the point? Were Gordon ever to turn up, rattles, bibs and little vests would be of no earthly use to him.
Lewis had been trying to keep Tessa’s confession locked in a soundproof box at the back of his mind. But the essence of his sister dominated the room, trapped in her abandoned clothes and etched in the mirror on the wardrobe door. And this essence – this force – eased the lid off the box, and her words seeped out again. Especially after what happened tonight. It was impossible not to picture what had gone on and he felt ashamed of himself for doing so. But, worse than that, he was disappointed in Tessa.
He folded the jumper and put it away. Dresses, skirts and slacks went back on their hangers. Books on the desk. Dressing gown on the hook on the back of the door. Finally he collected her discarded shoes – sandals, tennis shoes, slippers, pumps – pairing them and placing them, side by side, in the bottom of the wardrobe. The tidied bedroom eradicated some of the violence of her leaving.
He took refuge in his room. His parents would want him to track Tessa down and talk her into returning; they would cross-question him, trying to wheedle out any secrets that she might have confided in him. They would watch him like hawks; they would demand to know where he was going and with whom; they would smother him with attention. They would expect too much of him. He understood why they would behave like that. They had just lost another child.
Opening his maths books, he immersed himself in the comforting formulae. Immutable and reliable, here was something that would never let him down. But despite the alphas and betas, the x’s and y’s, he couldn’t stop thinking about Tessa.
‘Lewis?’ His father’s voice came from the other side of the door, tentative and polite, as though he were talking to an invalid. ‘Lewis?’
‘In here, Dad. I’m doing my homework.’
Dick Swinburne had discarded the old shirt and trousers he generally wore at weekends, replacing them with grey flannels, a pale blue shirt and striped tie and, despite the heat, a blazer with mock military buttons. His forehead shone with perspiration. ‘Could you stick around? Keep your mother company? I’m going out for a while.’
‘Are you going to look for Tessa?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where is Mum?’
‘Downstairs. I think she should take a tablet and lie down but she wants to stay near the phone.’
‘Dad?’
‘Yes?’
‘…’
‘What, son?’
Lewis didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was wasting his time and that Tessa had no intention of being found. ‘You look very smart.’
His mother was sitting in the kitchen, flicking over the pages of Woman’s Own, her eyes skimming the pages like an apprehensive patient in the dentist’s waiting room.
‘Fancy a cup of tea, Mum?’
‘That’s kind of you, love. Yes, please. You’re a very thoughtful boy, Lewis. Thank you.’ Her gratitude was pitiful and he felt rotten.
This whole business was stupid. With his parents – strictly speaking, his father, because his mother never seemed quite present – everything in the world was either right or wrong. There was never any ‘perhaps’ or ‘maybe’, no blurred edges or room for negotiation. Tessa could be a pain in the neck but teenagers were notoriously difficult, weren’t they? There were countless films and books and songs on the theme, so how could the phenomenon have taken his parents by surprise? What they could do with was a crowd of friends. They could all sit around grumbling about the problems they were having with their delinquent children. They’d soon see, then, that the odd broken curfew wasn’t so terrible. But they didn’t have friends any more. The only regular visitors – not counting people like the insurance man or the man who read the gas meter – were Gran and Uncle Frank. Distant cousins and obscure relatives, ‘connected by marriage’, whatever that meant, occasionally dropped in to report on a death or deliver a Christmas card, but they were invariably on their way somewhere and never had time to stay long.
Gran came every Friday to help his mother with the weekend shopping and she usually stayed for tea. She seemed smaller and paler than she used to be, but no less pessimistic. Tessa was convinced that Gran was losing her marbles and, indeed, sometimes she didn’t seem too sure who he was. Only last week she’d called him Michael and asked him where he lived.
Uncle Frank, too, had lost his appeal. Now that he could no longer amuse them with rough and tumble games and corny jokes, he seemed not to have
a clue how to talk to them. He still liked to hold the floor but he tended to repeat the same old tales and he’d been quite sharp with Tessa when she’d teased him about it. ‘You should have more respect for your elders and betters,’ he’d growled and it was clear that, for once, he wasn’t joking.
The phone rang. His mother flinched and rose a few inches off her chair then, as though she’d thought better of it, asked, ‘Could you answer it, love?’
Lewis lifted the receiver. Beep-ing followed by clunk-ing indicated that the call was from a public phone box. He grinned. ‘Tess?’ But it was his doubles partner, demanding to know why he had missed tennis practice.
Dick Swinburne returned, irritable after an unproductive search, and Lewis, pretending that the phone call had been from Mr Fisher, asking him to do an extra paper round, was able to make his getaway.
It was a perfect day, the breeze barely stirring the bunting on the garage forecourt and, as he spun along on his bicycle, his spirits lifted and the world regained its steadiness. He rode aimlessly, wondering how to occupy the hour before he genuinely was needed at the shop, contemplating calling on Kirsty before his scheduled visit with the evening paper. It would be a tremendous relief to tell her everything that had happened and to have her opinion on the mess they were in. But he daren’t do that. The Ross family were faultless. Mr and Mrs Ross treated Kirsty like an adult, asking for, and taking heed of, her views on all family matters. They’d lived in the town only a few months, yet already they had a host of interesting friends – proof that they were sociable and fun. Douglas and Gavin Ross, both brainy and successful young men, made frequent visits home, clearly enjoying their parents’ company. To top it all, every member of the Ross family was remarkably good-looking – Kirsty had shown him a photograph of them at a recent family wedding.
In turn, of course, she wanted to know everything about the Swinburne family. He explained about the accident which had caused his father to be classified unfit for military service; how his mother was gentle and loved gardening but wasn’t very strong; that his sister was bright and creative and funny. He omitted to mention that his baby brother had disappeared without trace; that his mother had, on two occasions, been an in-patient at the local mental hospital and was now scared to go anywhere on her own; that, over the past eight years, his father had hardened into an unapproachable, unhappy man who preached that the world was a dangerous place. Now he could add to the dismal record that his schoolgirl sister had had sexual intercourse with the local Casanova, dropped out of school and run away from home. Why would a Ross want to associate with a Swinburne?
He followed the dreamy cycle route he had taken the previous night. The phone box where he and Tessa had abandoned the plasticine baby was still there on Buckingham Road, red and solid, as permanent as a war memorial. Leaning his bike against the railings he pulled open the door. The interior smelled of stale cigarettes and disinfectant and there was a puddle of liquid – he didn’t like to think what it might be – in one corner. The metal shelf next to the phone had been defaced with initials and slogans gouged into the black paint in angular lettering. It was an ugly and unhappy place. On the shelf, in the precise spot where he and Tessa had abandoned the paper bag, there was a cigarette carton, empty apart from a few flakes of tobacco and the silver paper which had wrapped the cigarettes. Someone had pencilled a telephone number on the fold over tab of the carton and, for a fanciful second, Lewis wondered whether it might be important.
Looking up he noticed that a woman was waiting to use the phone. Realising how stupid he must appear to an observer as he stood there without making a call, he dropped some pennies in the slot and dialled the number on the carton. He felt panic and excitement flutter in his stomach. What would he say to whoever answered the phone? He wished Tessa were with him. She was brilliant at this sort of thing. The phone rang and rang but no one picked it up and Lewis, half relieved, half disappointed, pressed the ‘B’ button and his coins were returned to him, down the metal chute.
Strictly speaking, in taking this cycle ride, he was breaking the promise he had made to his father eight years earlier. ‘You children are not to wander off. I don’t want you going anywhere near the old house. Or that weird couple. It would only start tongues wagging and get your mother in a state.’ Once or twice, in the beginning, Tessa had suggested they go back to search for clues but when Lewis had refused to go with her, she seemed happy to let it go. That was all so long ago now and Lewis felt excitement not guilt as he resumed his journey.
On a summer’s day like today, Medway Avenue – the branches of the plane trees touching overhead – used to be a long green tunnel stretching as far as a child’s eye could see. But many of the trees had been taken down and the few that remained severely pruned. The Avenue had lost its grandeur and Lewis, whose recollections of his life there had been framed by arching branches, felt that he had been duped.
As he passed number seventy-four he freewheeled, standing on the pedals and raising himself off the saddle. There had been many alterations to the house and he saw that it looked nothing like it did in his dreams. Its once green window frames were now harsh white and the old front door – varnished oak, solid and steadfast – had been replaced by something modern with a glass panel at the top. Flower beds no longer lined the path leading up to the door. His mother had been so proud of those beds and she could identify every variety of rose that grew in them. ‘Peace’, ‘Golden Showers’, ‘Ballerina’, ‘Prosperity’. Names that evoked a benevolent world. The clipped privet hedge had been replaced by a low wooden fence and the whole front garden was grassed over. It looked like the home of people who didn’t have time.
He wished Tessa were at his side. It wasn’t right to be time-travelling – because that’s what it felt like – without her. Then, remembering how readily she had ditched him and gone chasing off after Rundle, he carried on down Medway Avenue and turned right. Head down, he toiled up Cranwell Road, not sure what he wanted to see when he reached the top. If the garden of Cranwell Lodge had been cleared and the house ‘done up’ it would surely mean that Mrs Channing and Mr Zeal had gone and, along with them, the opportunity for atonement.
But, like the phone box, Cranwell Lodge was still there, gloomy and fascinating. Peering through tangled briars and overgrown shrubs, it occurred to Lewis that nature, once left to its own devices, reached a kind of end point where it imploded and sustained itself and that, were everyone in the world to let their gardens go untended, there would be no dire consequences for life on earth.
Wedging his bike between the low front wall and the sickly hedge, he pushed through the foliage. He had been mistaken – the house had changed. The paint on the front door had lost its sheen and it was impossible to tell whether it had once been green or brown; several of the leaded lights in the hall window were cracked; the remnants of a coir doormat lay on the doorstep, half buried under a layer of compacted leaves which must have lain there since the previous autumn, or the one before.
He knocked the front door. The ride up the hill had made him sweat but, standing there in the heavy shade, he shivered. His bladder felt tight and he wished he’d gone to the lavatory before he left home. ‘No one there,’ he whispered, then felt foolish at having spoken his thoughts out loud.
He was debating whether to risk peeing behind the laurel bush when he heard a quaver-y, ‘Who is it? What do you want?’ from the far side of the door.
There was still time to walk away but it would be wrong, unkind, first to scare Mrs Channing – he was sure it was her voice – and then increase her anxiety by disappearing. He leaned close to the door, ‘Don’t worry, Mrs Channing. It’s Lewis Swinburne. From a long time ago. My sister and I used to visit you. I was just passing.’ He was reluctant to shout the additional piece of information, the thing which would unquestionably jog her memory.
She spared him that. ‘Did they ever find your brother?’
‘No. No, they didn’t.’
The door
opened a few inches and, although he could only see a narrow slice of her through the gap – white hair, searching blue eyes, some sort of kimono, red slippers – she was unmistakable.
‘The door is sticking,’ she said. ‘Can you give it a shove from your side?’
Lewis pushed hard and managed to get the door half open. Looking down he saw the cause of the problem. The mosaic floor tiles were raised in places, as though they had been pushed up from below.
‘And where is your sister?’ Mrs Channing asked as she led him through to the back room.
‘Ummm, I’m not sure.’ The old lady raised her eyebrows and Lewis pre-empting any sharp observation carried on, ‘She’s out with a friend.’
‘Please make yourself comfortable.’ Mrs Channing indicated the armchair next to the fireplace. ‘If you’ll excuse me for one moment.’ She left and he heard her footsteps going slowly up the stairs.
To be sitting, once more, in this room filled him with a sense of achievement. He’d thought that he would never see it again, but here he was. At first glance it was as he had remembered – exotic and opulent, crammed with captivating objects – but, as he focused on the details, he became conscious that there were changes.
Blanche no longer surveyed the room, haughty and beady-eyed, and a cane-seated chair occupied the spot next to the fireplace where her perch had been. There used to be four black elephants, with removable ivory tusks, on the mantelpiece. Now there were only three. Dust had turned their backs grey and the smallest had lost a tusk. The knick-knacks – three wise monkeys in brass, a silver bell, a posy of flowers carved from soapstone, a peacock’s feather – had disappeared from the dresser shelves, replaced by the pieces of a rather ordinary dinner service. The walls that had been patchworked with paintings of camel trains and Indian dhows were bare apart from two insipid watercolours of indeterminate flowers.