by Sanjida Kay
Nick makes a face and slaps a packet of salami next to the bowl of leaves.
‘It’s a shame you’re going.’ Amy smiles at Joe.
Matt’s right, she thinks. She’s worrying unnecessarily. If someone had broken in, they’d have taken more than just an iPad.
26
NICK
It’s late afternoon by the time everyone has finished eating and arguing about Chloe’s missing iPad. My step-niece’s lovely face was all puffy and blotched and she barely spoke to anyone. When Bethany finally emerged from her room, she was in a foul temper. We all went to the beach, even though most of us weren’t speaking to one another. What with Matt collapsing of heat exhaustion, losing it with Bethany and then Chloe’s iPad going missing, I haven’t had a chance to talk to Bethany on her own about Dad, and why there’s no record of his hospital appointment, and what the hell The Castle is. I wonder if I’m making a fuss about nothing: if he forgot to write it down, it shows how bad his memory is, and we ought to get him a follow-up appointment.
I decide to come back by myself. I can’t bear watching Joe leaping about with a Frisbee, flaunting his perfect abs, or take the tension crackling between Amy, Bethany and Matt. It’s not like I can join in with Joe’s game of Frisbee, either, as I can barely move after our run this morning. Luca doesn’t look that sporty, but he can run faster than me and catch a Frisbee as if he grew up playing Ultimate. I’ll speak to Bethany tonight, I decide.
As I’m leaving the beach, Matt jogs up the path after me. Four days in and he’s still pale, except for a savage red slash of sunburn across the back of his shoulders from this morning’s excursion into the hills.
‘Wait up,’ he says.
He winces and holds his side. He looks in as much pain as I feel, but I don’t want him to know that. His calves bulge with blue-green varicose veins. Christ, I hope I don’t get old. I also hope he’s not going to tell me something I don’t want to hear about Sara.
‘I’m worried about Chloe,’ he says when he’s got his breath back. I’m expecting him to go on about the bloody iPad or how miserable she is, but he says, ‘Have you seen the way she looks at Joe?’
‘What? Joe?’
‘Well, he is a good-looking boy, there’s no two ways about it. And she’s fifteen. You know what teenage girls are like.’
No, mate, I don’t.
‘Sixteen in a month. Thinks she knows everything.’
‘Oh. Yeah,’ I say, suddenly remembering Bethany at that age; well, before she walked out on us and went to stay with Dad’s friend in his big, posh house.
‘She’s still a child, Nick. And Joe isn’t that much older than her – he’s twenty-four. I googled him.’ He gives a gruff laugh. ‘But he must seem grown-up to her.’
‘I haven’t noticed anything inappropriate,’ I say, feeling foolish. And then I have a cold sensation that shivers down the nape of my neck as I recall the sounds coming from the shed in the garden. I’d assumed it was Joe and Bethany. Could it have been Joe and Chloe?
‘Really?’ he says, and his relief makes me feel like a complete tool.
‘He’s heading back home tomorrow.’
‘Not a moment too soon,’ Matt says, wiping the sweat off his brow. ‘Not that he isn’t a nice guy. But – look, could you do me a favour and keep an eye on Chloe? I’m going to be caught up helping Amy get everything ready for the… for the – you know…’
I nod, to put him out of his misery.
‘And it’ll be much easier if it’s you. If I ask Chloe what she’s doing or where she’s going, or make the slightest comment on what she’s wearing…’ He mimes a grenade blowing up in his face.
I feel sorry for him. The embarrassing dad with the beautiful teenage daughter, who is having an affair with his ex-wife and can no longer ask Chloe’s aunt to look out for her, because he’s called her a thick bitch, so he’s left with the kid brother of the family. But if ever I start feeling annoyed with my brother-in-law, I only have to remember the fishing trip.
It was about a month or so after Ruby-May had died. Matt texted me to ask if I wanted to go fishing with him. I’ve never fished in my life. It’s not exactly top of my list of ways to spend my leisure time, and kind of weird for Matt, when he used to spend his weekends surrounded by kids in football kits doing drills and keepie-uppies. I said yes. Obviously.
We met at Tesco’s and walked through the underpass beneath the M32. We passed some graffiti on the side of the motorway of a boy blowing a horn; out of the end fluttered a cloud of purple butterflies. It filled me with a dull rage that someone, somewhere, had such hope. We continued through Eastville Park to a large pond, and Matt led us down a muddy track to the far side. Opposite a wooded island he set out two canvas chairs, two rods and all the paraphernalia that goes with fishing. Flies. Hooks. An ice-cream tub of writhing maggots. He helped me cast and then we propped our rods up and sat in our khaki chairs. He handed me a can of cider. The pond was dark green and filmed with a layer of scum. Bedraggled swans, coots and geese ploughed up and down. Mallards, seagulls and pigeons fought over crusts passers-by scattered. The roar of traffic was an angry hum. It was a grey, cold day. We were overshadowed by the trees behind us; their dying leaves dripped water on us, in fat drops. There was a constant parade of people on the other side of the pond, with buggies and dogs and bikes; most of them in shredded jeans and Adidas hoodies. The smell of skunk mixed with the stench of decaying vegetation and the stink from the maggots. At some point that afternoon, maybe after two cans of Thatchers, I started to cry. I haven’t cried since I was a child, but I sobbed until my ribs ached and my eyes burned.
We didn’t catch anything and Matt didn’t speak. Not even once.
‘Of course,’ I say to him now. ‘Anything to help.’
‘Thanks, mate.’ He claps me on the arm. I can feel the heat radiating from his palm.
When I get back to the house, I lie in semi-darkness on the sofa, drinking a beer and watching my favourite Star Wars movie, The Empire Strikes Back, enjoying the peace and quiet. I can’t concentrate, though, because I keep thinking about Chloe and Joe. Would he have sex with an underage girl? Would she have let him? Should I say anything to Matt? It’s not like I know for certain. I’ve just got to the bit where Yoda is trying to persuade Luke Skywalker to go into this cave beneath a tree and he says, A domain of evil it is. In you must go. Luke doesn’t want to, and he asks what’s inside. Yoda replies, Only what you take with you.
‘Only what you take with you.’
I say it at the same time, doing my best Yoda impersonation, but I’m not enjoying it like I normally do. I ought to talk to Chloe, but what the hell would I say? Plus Joe is about to leave, so maybe I don’t need to say anything. Coward! I pause the film and get up to fetch another beer, and that’s when I see it. A triangle of neonpink. It’s on a side table under a couple of books.
How did we all miss it? I feel stupid now for suggesting we should have called the police. I open Chloe’s iPad to check it’s okay. It turns on immediately and I swipe the home screen idly. There’s no passcode. Chloe should be more careful. The device opens straight into Photos, as if that was the last app she was using, and I’m faced with a number of albums. One of them is labelled Ruby-May.
I click on it and see around fifty thumbnail-sized pictures of my niece, from when she was born until… I shouldn’t be looking at Chloe’s iPad, I know, but I’m caught between wanting to be reminded of Ruby-May and not wanting to think about her. I leave the album as it is, as I don’t want to see any of the photos full-size. That would be too much. I can’t get rid of the images of Ruby-May I have in my head: her little fat feet with their tiny, perfect toes, white and wrinkled and dotted with pond weed; or her lips, with their Cupid’s bow, slightly parted and purple, the colour of the flowers she wanted to pick. As still as a doll, when she’d never been still in her life.
It’s good to be reminded of what she looked like before. Some of the pictures are of Chloe and Ruby-May. Chloe’s birth
day is coming up soon; I could print one properly and frame it as a present. Without opening the images, I attach three to a text and I send it to myself, then delete the text from Chloe’s iPad. I want it to be a surprise.
As I try to close the app, it reverts back to all her pictures. I shouldn’t look, but I’m intrigued by what all the fuss was about. What kind of shots was Bethany taking of Chloe, to get Matt so worked up? I assume they’ll be of my niece in her bikini and shades by the pool, prepping to be an Instagram star. The first ones I see are of her and Carlo, goofing about at his farm. No sign of Dad, so it must have been one of the times she went on her own. I scroll through them.
The last pictures on the iPad aren’t what I was expecting.
They’re dark, grainy and there’s a certain beauty in the strips of light and shade between doorways and walls. Chloe is in all of them, but as a distant and indistinct shape. Sometimes she’s a silhouette, and in others her bare skin is the only glimmer of brightness in a dreamy, underwater darkness. The second-to-last photograph takes me a while to decipher: it’s all curved lines, pale gold and white, urban-grey and black. And then I realize. It’s Chloe’s back. She’s naked to the waist, the sheets pushed down and draped around her hips. She’s lying in bed and the picture has been taken from outside her bedroom window.
Who the hell took these photos? Bethany? Joe? Chloe herself? I’ve noticed her taking the occasional photo of herself using a selfie-stick and a timer. I swipe through to the last one. It’s of her face; it’s so close, though, she’s out of focus and looks like an abstract painting. There’s a trace of a smile on her lips. Did she know whoever took this picture – all these pictures – intimately? Or was she completely unaware that someone was stalking her?
I snap the iPad shut.
15 AUGUST, ITALY
27
NICK
Matt is hovering in the kitchen when I get up and he greets me like a long-lost friend. It’s not like I’m up really late or anything, but I was woken shortly after I’d gone to bed by Bethany and Joe having an argument outside. Bethany isn’t good at selfcensorship, so she was pretty loud. I couldn’t hear Joe’s replies clearly. I put earplugs in, but I still couldn’t get back to sleep. It’s good in one way, though, because it probably means it must have been Bethany, and not Chloe, I overheard having sex with Joe earlier in the week. If my sister has started sleeping with him and now he’s heading home – maybe back to his girlfriend – that would make her annoyed. You don’t yell like that at a personal trainer you’re paying by the hour. But I definitely should have taken Bethany up on her offer of sleeping pills. At least Dad’s stopped wandering around at night since she’s been giving them to him.
‘Mate,’ says Matt, pouring me a coffee, ‘can I ask you a favour?’
‘Um, yeah,’ I say, rubbing the sleep from my eyes. I have a queasy feeling as I remember what day it is. I should tell him about those photos on Chloe’s iPad. He’ll go ballistic, though. Maybe I ought to have a word with her first…
‘Joe’s left – he’s on his way back to Bristol.’ Matt interrupts my train of thought. ‘Bethany isn’t up, not that she’s speaking to me any more. Luca isn’t here – no idea where he is.’
‘Probably out for a run.’
I notice he hasn’t mentioned my father, but that isn’t surprising. I don’t think Matt will ever let Dad look after his children again. Dad is sitting outside, reading under the shade of a parasol. He looks lonely, but to be honest, I’m struggling a bit, not wanting to think about how frightening it must be for him, now that he’s aware he’s losing his memory, and at the same time my old anger is resurfacing, ever since Amy told me how he drove Mum away.
‘I really need some time with Amy before… you know, before…’ Matt runs his hand through his hair and it stands on end like a bristle-brush. He looks thoroughly miserable. ‘I lost it yesterday. Said some things… Anyhow, I thought we could go into town for a coffee, just the two of us.’
‘Good idea,’ I say, pulling some bacon out of the fridge and then, as my stomach clenches, I change my mind and grab the jam instead.
‘So you’re okay looking after the kids?’
Ah! Nick Flowers, you can be so bloody dense.
‘The bread’s finished. Chloe’s gone up to the farmhouse to buy more. She’ll be back soon.’
‘Right.’ I take a sip of coffee. I wonder why she didn’t go with Dad this morning. I must remember to nab her when she gets back, for a chat about the photos on her iPad.
‘Yeah, if you could keep an eye on her, but basically she’ll look after herself. Lotte and Theo are in their bedroom. Meant to be getting washed and dressed. We won’t be long.’
I look at Matt properly. His thin face is ashen, in spite of a few days in the heat, and his stubble is grey. He’s aged about twenty years in the last one.
‘Happy to.’
Maybe this will get me back into everybody’s good books, since they all think I’m such a waste of fucking space for bringing Dad here. And maybe, just maybe, after today everyone will start acting like a family again.
Matt jiggles his keys in his pocket. ‘I once drove out of a multistorey car park with Ruby-May – you know the one at Cabot Circus that’s a really tight corkscrew? And she said, “Careful, Daddy, don’t break the car.” I told her we’d be okay because I’m good at driving and she said, “Good boy. Well done!’”
He stares out towards the swimming pool. I try and make my mind blank. There’s a long, awkward pause. I have no idea what to say.
Matt clears his throat. ‘Anyway, thanks, mate. Suncream’s there. Give them a snack at some point.’
I drink my coffee and stand in the sitting room, looking through the tips of the olive trees and out at the pure blue sky over the sea, and I think about this time, four years ago.
I don’t remember either of the other two being born. I’d like to say I was too young, but obviously that would be bollocks. I was still with Maddison then, and she was ridiculously excited that I had a new niece. I went to the Bristol Royal Infirmary the day Ruby-May was born. Amy was in a ward on the fifth floor, her bed next to the window. She was as white as PVC, but had this sheen, like she was so happy… I swallow uncomfortably as I remember. Matt looked knackered, but ecstatic. He took the kids to the cafe, promising them juice and biscuits, leaving the three of us alone. Two babies were wailing, a woman was sobbing quietly, people were talking, the TV was on in the corner, nurses banged in and out with metal trolleys. I couldn’t image how anyone slept there.
Ruby-May was in a Perspex box on wheels, next to Amy’s bed. She was curled up on her front, with her bottom in the air and her fist in her mouth. I could imagine my father exclaiming: She’s bald as a coot.
‘You can hold her, if you want,’ Amy said.
She looked improbably tiny. I was about to say, Nah, you’re all right, and then I realized I did want to.
‘I might drop her.’
‘Don’t be an idiot. Of course you won’t,’ said Amy, smiling at me. Her voice was like sandpaper, as if she’d been yelling at a football match. ‘Just support her head. She can’t hold it up by herself.’
I held Ruby-May against my chest. Her whole cranium fitted into the palm of my hand. She made little sucking noises against my collarbone. She smelt hot, earthy, like a sun-warmed mushroom. I stood at the window and looked out at Bristol spread below me: the office block with the bowler-hatted man graffitied five storeys high, the skyrise hotels, the glint of the river and the jostle of boats, serried rows of red-tiled roofs and, in the distance, the green fields and hills of Somerset. It suddenly struck me that this was what life was about; this was what life was for. Something surged through me, fizzed like electricity. Maybe it was love, love for Ruby-May. Four red balloons drifted across that perfect blue sky and I laughed out loud. For a moment it was like I held the secret of the universe in my hands. I felt both strangely energized and calm – like this baby was the key, and now I knew what the meaning
of everything was and I just needed to rush home and tell Maddison, Yeah, let’s do it, let’s have a family! Maddison would probably have laughed at me; we hadn’t been dating for long. And by the time she was ready and wanted us to move in together, that feeling had ebbed away, along with whatever it was I thought I’d felt for my girlfriend. Or my life in general.
Matt salutes me as he and Amy walk past the window of the holiday house. After they’ve driven off, I go upstairs and rap on the children’s open bedroom door. They’re both sitting on one of the beds, playing on the iPad.
Theo says, ‘Did you know there are five hundred billion galaxies in the universe?’
‘Wow, that’s a lot.’ I join them. ‘How far away is Andromeda?’
‘Two-and-a-half million light-years from Earth.’
‘Well recalled, young Padawan.’
‘Uncle Nick,’ says Lotte, ‘why is everyone being so strange today?’
I’m not sure what Lotte is wearing, but it makes my eyes hurt: everything clashes and is a riot of spots, stripes and flowers. She must have got dressed by herself.
‘I guess it’s because it’s the anniversary.’
‘The anniversary of what?’
Oh, shit!
‘Well, this time last year is when your baby sister died. We’re going to have a party later on.’
‘Why would we have a party when she’s dead?’ asks Theo.
Good point.
‘Like, with pass-the-parcel and musical chairs?’ asks Lotte.
‘Er, I don’t think so, but I don’t know what your mum’s got planned.’
‘Do you remember when Ruby-May wanted a baby?’
I shake my head.
Lotte says, ‘For ages and ages she walked around with a toy dragon stuck up her jumper and said she was going to have a baby! She went to nursery with it. She cried every time the dragon fell out. She said when baby Cinders was born, she was going to grow up to be a human bean!’