We Own the Sky
Page 30
For the rest of the evening, through dessert and another glass of wine for Anna, we don’t talk about Jack—I think we deliberately don’t talk about Jack—but speak about old friends, their kids, divorces, new lovers. We pay the bill, and I walk Anna back to her hotel and it is an odd moment, with no clear idea of when or if we will see each other again.
“Please keep in touch,” I say, and we embrace awkwardly and she feels smaller than I remember, the jut of her collarbone palpable on my skin. I want to cry, but I feel as if all the moisture has been wrung out of my body. “I know I’m not allowed to say sorry again, but I am,” I say. “I’m so sorry I hurt you.”
“It’s okay,” she says, and we are still holding each other, but I sense that she wants to pull herself away.
Just as we are parting, Anna turns to face me, as if she has forgotten something. “Oh, I saw your website by the way. We Own the Sky. Your photos, they’re just stunning. Really beautiful, and it’s lovely to see all the places we went.”
“You saw the website? How?”
“Er, it has your name on it, Rob. I Googled you. I know, I’m brilliant, aren’t I?”
“I’m just surprised.”
“Well, don’t be. As I said, they’re lovely, and it brings back such happy memories for me. Actually, if you must know, your website was how I kept tabs on you—well, apart from all the Facebook messages you sent my friends when you were drunk. Every time you posted a new photo I knew you were okay. I always told myself that when you stopped posting the photos, I would come and find you. But you didn’t. Every week, every single week, you kept on putting up new ones, and I knew you were fine. I knew you were alive. You probably didn’t realize, but I always commented on every photo.”
The mystery commentator, the first ping I always received as soon as the panorama went live. Beautiful. Lovely. Take care of yourself.
“So you’re swan09?”
“Indeed, I am,” Anna says. “It wasn’t just about keeping tabs on you, though. It made me so happy to see your photos, because that was the man I fell in love with. Someone who would build things, create things.
“Anyway, I’m rambling on,” she says, taking a step back. She looks at her watch, still the same chunky Casio. “I’ve got to go. I’ve got to be up early tomorrow.” And with that she is gone, disappeared inside the lobby of the hotel.
6
At the front of the hall cupboard are the four shopping bags stuffed full of Nev’s letters. I take out the bags and go into the living room. Some of the letters have been bound together with ribbon and string, I presume by the man in Nev’s old house. Others are haphazardly slung inside. They are dusty, some a few years old, the paper drying out and fading. Some are newer, whiter, the pen strokes on the envelopes more clearly defined.
I hesitate as I start to open one. I think I know what the letters will contain. Appeals from desperate people whose children were dying. Requests for information, pleas to be bumped up the patients’ list. What was I supposed to do with them? Give them back to Nev? Write to them all and tell them that Nev is a fraud?
The Cedars
Firmtree Farm Road
Gedstone
Nr Barnstaple
Kent
Dear Nev,
I wanted to write to you to see if you could help us. I am writing on behalf on my grandson Antony, who has recently been diagnosed with an advanced brain tumor. We are potentially interested in receiving treatment at Dr. Sladkovsky’s clinic...
I look at the date again. Six years have passed. I take another letter from the middle of the pile. It has an elaborate Indian postmark, a winged elephant flying above a river bend.
Dear Mr. Barnes,
I am sorry to bother You, Sir, but I am writing on behalf of my father, Engineer Bhagat. My father is very ill, very ill indeed, I might add. We have heard...
I read a few more, and they are all the same. I do not feel anger toward Nev, just a feeling that time and lives have been wasted. I sort through more of the letters, and can feel a chalky film of dust on my hands. After a while, I realize that the handwriting on some of the envelopes is the same. It is a neat script, by someone who has been taught proper cursive. It takes me a while to realize that the handwriting is Nev’s. They are letters from him, addressed to people all over the world, that never arrived and were returned to sender.
I open one of the letters and a picture of Josh falls out. Even though I now know that it is not Josh, it still feels like Josh, and I so desperately want it to be Josh. The letter is long and I read it all. Nev was telling his correspondent about a trip to the zoo, but it is written as if Josh were seven or eight, an age he never reached, doing things older boys would do, riding the cable car on their own, swapping football stickers. Nev wrote in detail about how Josh loved the gorillas, how he wanted his dad to buy him a book from the gift shop. And then, when they got home, Nev described how they watched the sunset together, how Josh fell asleep in his arms, his gorilla book in his lap.
In another letter, Nev wrote about Josh’s ninth birthday party and how he was overwhelmed that so many people came and what lovely presents he got, the Manchester United jersey, the tickets to Alton Towers. I open more of the letters, and they are all the same. Page after page describing Josh’s life. Page after page describing a life that didn’t exist.
It was more than the scam. I know that now. The Minecraft; the football matches they went to; the cliff walks as the sun was setting. Nev wrote the letters because it kept Josh alive. They were his love notes. And in that, Nev was no different from me.
Subject: Hello
Sent: Mon Jul 22, 2017 10:05 am
From: Rob
To: Nev
Dear Nev,
Thanks for your note and I appreciate your apology. I’m glad you’re trying to make it up to people. I think that’s the right thing to do.
Believe it or not, I do understand. I know how grief can do terrible things to people. And to be honest, I’m no better. I hurt my wife, Anna, very much and I am very ashamed of how I behaved.
I think what you did was wrong, but I do understand why you did it. You were desperate and doing what you thought was best for your family. You have lost two people you love in the most horrible way. No one should ever have to go through that.
The truth is that you helped me a lot when Jack was dying. You listened to me when I needed it and, despite everything that happened, you were a good friend to me.
I’m going to be up in your neck of the woods next weekend, at the Plover Scar lighthouse, to take some pictures, so if you’d fancy a coffee or something then do let me know. It would be good to meet.
I hope you and Chloe are well.
Rob
It is strange to walk through Hampstead graveyard with someone else. We walk closely, our arms touching, and there is something formal, funereal, about the pace of our walk—like the slow march of a ceremonial soldier. The graveyard always seemed like a wintery place—even in summer it was dark and dank, the trees forming a shroud, blocking out the light. Today, though, it is different. There is a lightness here, an orderliness, as if the place has been spruced up.
“I always knew you came here,” Anna says. “The grave was always nice and tidy.”
“When did you come here?”
“Normally Sundays. It seemed proper, like going to church. And you?”
“Early mornings, in the week.”
“Hmm,” Anna says. “I don’t like it here much, if I’m honest. That probably sounds awful, but I don’t find it to be a place of peace, or anything like that.”
“Yeah, me too,” I say, and we walk on in silence.
At Jack’s headstone, we put down our flowers and stand in silence. The sandstone was a good choice. It is hardy, and will endure the weather. We look at each other, unsure what to do.
“S
hall we get out of here?” Anna says. “Sorry. I just...”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t like saying goodbye or anything like that,” Anna says. “I don’t like even thinking that he’s here.”
“I know,” I say. “C’mon, let’s go,” and we walk, quicker this time.
We go to a pub in Hampstead, one of the places I used to come to before I took the train back to Cornwall.
“Are you okay coming here?” Anna asks.
“You mean with the drinking?”
“Yes.”
I laugh nervously. A little pulse of shame. “Yes, I am. But thanks.”
“Did you talk to anyone about it?” Anna says quietly, as we are waiting at the bar. “The drinking I mean.”
“No. I meant to, but I thought I would try to do it on my own. It’s been difficult but, well, I’m managing so far.”
Anna smiles approvingly. “Well, I’m very proud of you. I’m sure it’s not easy.”
“Thanks,” I say, and I realize I don’t like talking about my drinking because it makes me feel weak.
We order two roast dinners and two tonic waters and find a seat in a wood-paneled alcove.
“I see you’re doing a lot more on Hope’s Place,” Anna says.
“Yeah,” I say. “I enjoy it, if that’s the right word. It’s so sad, though, from the minute they post, you kind of know that for many of them, for their kids, there’s probably no chance.”
“Yes,” Anna says, and then shakes her head. “Just like Jack. It was just too aggressive. He didn’t stand a chance.”
She looks away from the table. A couple with a small child comes in and sits at the table next to us. The mother fusses to get the child in a high chair, to take off his coat, to arrange his toys and sticker book in front of him. Anna smiles at the boy, and he smiles back and holds out a little plastic dog.
“To our beautiful little boy,” I say, looking at Anna and raising my glass.
“To our beautiful boy,” Anna says, and we softly clink our glasses. “To Jack.”
We sit for a moment in silence, listening to the happy chirp and chink of Sunday lunchtime. I want to reach out across the table and hold Anna’s hand, the way I used to make a small cocoon around her fist in our old, cold Clapham flat. But I don’t. I keep my hands down by my side.
“I’m so sorry I was awful to you,” I say again. “I just don’t know how to...”
“Stop bloody saying sorry,” Anna says, laughing a little, and she can’t keep her eyes off the little boy, who is babbling and batting away the spoon his mother is holding out for him.
“Oh, there’s something I wanted to show you,” I say.
“Really? Exciting.”
I reach down into my bag and pull out my laptop. I log on to the Wi-Fi and load up We Own the Sky.
“Ah, your website. Any new ones?”
“Yes, that’s what I wanted to show you actually. Some photos. I think you’ll recognize them.”
“Excellent. Can I see?”
I pass the laptop to Anna, and she starts to scroll through the new photos. The view from our garden in Hampstead. A blinding shot into the sun from Jack’s bedroom window. The lighthouse in Swanage, gleaming a bold and brilliant white. And then Greece, the panorama from our terrace; Jack, the human tripod.
“What, I don’t understand. Did you take these?”
“No. They’re Jack’s, from his camera. The one we bought him for his birthday.”
“Wow, they’re amazing, they really are,” Anna says, pulling the laptop closer. “That was a lovely day wasn’t it, Swanage.” She keeps scrolling through the photos as if she is looking for something in particular and then looks at me. “I thought we had lost the camera, though. You have it then?”
“I do, yes. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No, goodness, not at all. It was your thing. You boys. Going up tall buildings, taking pictures from the heath.”
“Yeah, he loved it. There’s something else I wanted to show you,” I say, shuffling up next to her. “So, when I’m coding the pages and uploading the panoramas, I write these little messages to Jack.”
“What do you mean, messages?”
“They’re just memories, things about Jack that I remember from that particular place where we went. They were hidden before, buried in the code, but I’ve made them all public now. Look, if you mouse over the photo, the text comes up.” I take a deep breath. “I suppose it’s all the things that I would say to him if I could, if he was here now.”
“Oh, Rob, that’s so lovely.”
“But look, this is what I wanted to show you. I made a version of the site for you. You just have to log in as you, and it means that you can also add to them, add your own memories of Jack.”
“Thank you, Rob, that’s wonderful, but you didn’t need to do that...”
“I know I didn’t need to, but I wanted to, because this has all been about me, hasn’t it? My sadness, my drinking, my grief, and I let you down in the most horrible way. I didn’t once think about you, how all this affected you, how you were dealing with things. It was just about me, and I’m so sorry for that...”
Anna is staring at one of the photos, one Jack took of the two of us, wearing our raincoats on a Dorset beach.
“There was something you said the other day,” I say, “that made me feel so low. You said you were ashamed of how you were with Jack, that you wished and regretted that you hadn’t done more and I understand that, I really do. But it’s not true, because he adored you, he really did. Fathers and sons are one thing, but it’s different with a mother. He needed you in a special way, a way he could never need me.
“Do you remember in the mornings sometimes, the times he slept late and we were already downstairs in the kitchen and he would come, still sleepy, his hair standing up, and he always wanted his mom first, to come and rest his head on your lap. Never me. He always had to go to you first. And I always loved that. I loved watching the way he so obviously cared so much about you.”
I can see Anna’s bottom lip begin to quiver, so I put my arms around her. She doesn’t pull away and buries her head into my neck.
I have a sudden and desperate urge to be with her, to know her once again, to discover the person she had become, the person she’d been even before we had first met. Because that was love. To feel sorrow that you had no part in someone’s past. To be with her when she was washing paint pots, or running through sunflower fields, or sitting at her desk, trying to make sense of her sums.
That Christmas when we went to Suffolk to visit her parents, Anna took me to her secret place. We were bored, wanted to escape the house, so we went for a walk. It was, she said, the place she would come as a child when she wanted to be alone.
We walked deep into the woods around her house, until we came to a dense thicket of trees and shrubs. It seemed impenetrable, but Anna said there was a way through, a way she had to learn. She went first and I followed, twisting and turning, getting down on our hands and knees. After the last part where we had to crawl, we came to a huge clearing, the trees and shrubs forming an awning, as if it had been hollowed out by a giant machine.
She came here to read, she said, to escape her parents. She would bring a blanket and some fruit and cheese and stay here all day. It was pristine, untouched, a place where no human apart from Anna had been, and I don’t think—then and now—I had ever loved her more. I wished I could have seen her as a child, her knees pulled up to her chest, needles of sunlight pricking through the canopy of branches and leaves.
I pull her close to me and kiss the top of her head, and it is inadequate as a gesture, but I do not know what else I can say or do.
“Did you see this one?” I say, pulling over the laptop, wanting to divert her, to make her feel better. She clicks on a photo of Beachy Head, the day we had a picnic.
Anna closes the laptop. “I’m sorry, though. I can’t look at them here, or I’ll be an absolute mess. More to the point, I had forgotten what a huge geek you are.”
“We all need a project, right?”
“Right. So are you working on something new?”
I smile nervously, not sure whether to mention it or not.
“What?” Anna says, looking at me sideways.
“Well, don’t laugh, but I’m actually still trying to do something with my drones.”
Anna smiles at me, as if she was a teacher reprimanding a naughty but favored child. “I think you just need more time, Rob, more time to perfect it. How long has it been now, nearly ten years?”
Her eyes sparkle and, because we are still a little brittle with each other, she nudges me to let me know she is joking.
“Fuck off,” I say, smiling back at her. “It’s gonna be huge.”
“Actually, that reminds me, I have something for you,” she says, opening her handbag and rummaging around inside.
“Here it is,” she says to herself and hands me a small flash drive. “It took me a while, as I couldn’t bear to look at them for so long. But I finally went through all my old photos and videos of Jack. There’s something in particular you’ll like on there. Something I watched, and then the name of your website suddenly made sense.”
“How do you mean?”
“Just take a look. You’ll like it. There’s a lot of the Greece holiday on there, as well. Jack loved that holiday, every single minute of it.”
“Yeah,” I say, “he did.”
Jack, my boy. Our boy.
* * *
On the train back to Cornwall, I settle at my table with a coffee and open my laptop. I plug in the flash drive Anna has given me and see that she has made folders: Birth, Christmas 2010, Christmas 2012, Spain, Brighton.