Striking a Balance

by Curtis, Norma

  ‘But when’s she coming back?’

  ‘Ah. Well, if I got another job fairly soon, we could ask her back then,’ he said.

  ‘Fairly soon?’ Bill asked, grasping the few words that could be taken as an answer.

  ‘Well, maybe. But for now...’ Larry shrugged. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I think the best idea for both of us would be to think of this as a sort of adventure. We can do what we like. We can go to the zoo again, or to the park — whatever.’ He was warming to the theme now — it was something he could work on, this idea of him and Bill going off together, doing things he wouldn’t normally do, going places Ruth couldn’t afford. ‘What would you like to do today, Bill?’

  Bill wriggled on the table and sank his chin onto his chest. ‘I want to go to the playgroup,’ he said.

  Larry nodded wisely. That was fine with him. The itsy-bitsy girls were back in play. In his mind he could see them in rows, like kebabed players on their metal rods in table football. ‘There. We’ve made a decision, haven’t we? That’s what we’ll do. We’ll go to the playgroup. Look, I’ll take my newspaper with me, here it is, on the table, like I said.’ The better to watch the bored young housewives over. ‘Now. Let’s get dressed.’

  Bill looked at him hopefully, shuffling to the edge of the table to get off and get dressed and go to the playgroup. Will Zoofie be there?’ he asked.

  *

  When they were ready and finally out, Larry was pleased to find it was sunny, a perfect summer day, the kind of day that looked warm and beguiling from office windows even through the blur of bomb curtains; the kind of day, he told himself with satisfaction, that made you glad you didn’t work.

  Walking along the dusty pavements with the pushchair, to the accompaniment of the traffic, Larry discovered the strange phenomenon of invisibility. He’d never been invisible before. He had never blended into the background, ever. People always looked at him. He was good-looking, he smiled a lot, he expected it. So why were they getting under his feet? It was as if people couldn’t see him. It didn’t take him long to work out the cause. He was now A Person With A Pushchair.

  Skirting a bus stop queue he suddenly remembered a boy he’d known at school who had turned up to their reunion in a wheelchair, suffering from MS. Sanderson, his name was. Drinking their beers in the pub they used to drink in under-age — poignant, that — they’d been wondering where Sanderson was and he was there all the time, in the midst of them, as it were, but the wheelchair had rendered him invisible. They’d registered the chair — it was hard to miss — but they hadn’t registered the fact that Sanderson was the person in it.

  Bumping the pushchair back onto the pavement Larry realised it echoed the premonition he’d had the day he’d driven home and had thought he’d disappeared.

  His heart rebelled and he came to a decision. ‘Okay, Bill,’ he said, ‘let’s get seen.’

  He manhandled the pushchair into a bicycle shop, a feat in itself. The shop smelled of rubber. The aisle was flanked by bicycle tyres and as he pushed him towards the counter Bill put his hand out to touch a wheel. It moved, ticking slowly on its axis.

  ‘What shall we have, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck?’ Larry asked, looking at the bicycle bells. ‘Or a horn? No, no, let’s have a bell. Everyone knows the sound of a bicycle bell. Let’s have Mickey Mouse,’ he said, picking one out. ‘Can I use your screwdriver, mate? It’s for the pushchair.’

  The thick-set proprietor grinned. ‘It’ll be too big for a pushchair. You need a smaller bracket.’ He ducked under the counter and came back up with a box and picked one out. ‘This should do it. You left-handed or right?’

  ‘Left.’

  The man screwed it on tightly. ‘Try that for size.’

  Larry grinned, grabbed the pushchair and did a wheelie. See? he thought, you never get women doing that. He rang the bell smartly and in the confines of the shop it was satisfyingly loud.

  ‘Great,’ he said. ‘What do you think, Bill?’

  Bill looked at him and laughed.

  ‘It’s just what we need,’ Larry said. ‘Let’s go.’ He paid for the bell and at the door of the shop he hit the step with the wheels. Bill was jerked as far as the give in his straps. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Will Zoofie be at the playgroup?’

  ‘Well — no. But all the children will be. All your friends will be. You’ve got friends, haven’t you?’

  He reached a second bus stop and rang the bell. Accusing faces stared at him. See? He was no longer invisible.

  ‘Smug bastard,’ a man growled at him.

  He speeded up, he could see the playgroup at the end of the street.

  It looked like something out of Toy Town.

  It was square, squat and basic and with its startling primary colours it looked as though the children had made it them-selves.

  It looked like a toy box surrounded by a fence.

  And held, Larry thought as he got nearer, real-life Barbie dolls to play with.

  He pushed his hair back, smoothing it as he looked at his reflection in the glass doors. And ready for action, he turned the handle. Nothing happened. The doors were locked. He pressed his face against the security glass and saw a grimy red carpet and no signs of life. ‘It’s locked,’ he said to Bill.

  ‘There’s a bell, Daddy.’

  ‘Ah, a bell.’ He pressed his palm against it and heard its muffled ring inside. Suddenly behind the glass he saw the largest woman he’d ever seen, her smooth, black hair held back by the Alice band James had promised him.

  Larry took an involuntary step back. The Alice band was in fact the only point of resemblance. He knew there was some mistake.

  The woman stood like a guardian behind the door, disapproving and silent.

  ‘Is this the playgroup?’ Larry mouthed through the glass. His breath obscured her face. He wiped the glass and the woman made sweeping movements at him with her hands.

  ‘Bill,’ he said, ‘let’s go. We’ve cocked it.’

  The woman lowered her gaze and for a moment she didn’t move. Then she reached for the latch on the door and opened it.

  ‘Hello, Bill,’ she said matter-of-factly. And to Larry, disapprovingly, even coldly, ‘Are you Bill’s dad?’

  Bill’s dad. His new job title. ‘Larry,’ he corrected her, giving her his dental practitioner of the year smile and holding out his hand.

  She ignored the hand, looked him in the eyes and her expression didn’t alter. ‘It’s through there. Leave your buggy in here out of the way. I thought you’d grown out of a buggy, Bill.’

  Bill was looking up at this mountain of a woman as though he was fearless. ‘Daddy put me in it,’ he said. ‘I’m too slow to walk.’

  Larry pushed his hands into his Chinos. ‘Thanks, son,’ he said, smiling to show it was a joke.

  The woman gave him another cold look, the kind of look usually saved for something dead, that smells. She turned her back on him as she went along the corridor to the door of the playroom, with Bill following her close behind.

  Larry folded the pushchair just as she opened the door —and the first thing he noticed was the noise. The noise shocked him — the incredible, high-pitched noise of children chirruped out so loudly that he winced. It was like an amplified aviary —a high-decibel budgie cage. Bill and the woman slipped inside the noise and the door closed slowly on them, leaving Larry standing in the renewed peace of the hall with the pushchair dangling on his arm.

  He propped the pushchair against the wall of a doorway on the right and looked at the playroom door. He realised that the noise had made him hold his breath. He took a few deep gulps of air. Behind the door, somewhere, were the bored young mothers, ready to mother him. It was not all bad. He grinned, to stretch his mouth and limber up his gone-stiff face, and he walked to the door. He was a male in female territory. The star? Modestly, he wouldn’t let himself think so just yet. Soon, though, he thought. Soon.

  As he opened it the blackboard squeal of small voices drifted out agai
n and he fought the impulse to close the door and run.

  He stepped inside the noise and suddenly felt like Gulliver. All the occupants were knee-high, playing wildly in this tremendous din. Not together, though. They were either playing by themselves, or fighting. He looked for the bored young mothers and spotted them sitting at a round table: his harem, he thought, but was confused, as they too were unnaturally small.

  He was aware of a smell — the smell of a dirty nappy. Now he had that and the noise. The noise!

  He looked again at the bored young mothers. They were, he could see now, sitting on midget chairs. Instead of miniskirts, they were wearing skirts and leggings, and they were talking with their heads together — smirking, it seemed, smirking at him!

  The big one, the one who had opened the door to him, looked up, straight into his eyes, with open hostility! And he looked away.

  To hell with the bicycle bell, he suddenly longed to be invisible. Their disapproval was obvious. It was like walking into a bar and having everything go quiet — it was as obvious as that, only it wasn’t quiet at all, the noise continued unabated.

  He couldn’t go over to their table. It was unthinkable. It was also unthinkable to sit on one of those tiny chairs. What if it gave way beneath him? What if he fell backwards on the floor, an object not only of dislike, but derision also? Torn by indecision he glanced at the table again. They were ignoring him now, all except the big one. She continued to stare at him. She made a comment — how they heard it above the noise he didn’t know — but a face here and there looked back at him, reappraising.

  Larry forced himself to feel casual. He strolled over to a wall and leaned against it. Maybe his son would rescue him. He looked for him amongst the Lilliputians but all the small heads seemed identical, he couldn’t see Bill there at all. He felt a wave of panic wash over him.

  Then a small blue plastic pedal car stopped by his feet. Bill was looking up at him and he kneeled down, partly to hide himself from view. ‘Good car,’ he said.

  ‘Where’s Zoofie?’

  ‘Son...’ Larry looked round. ‘Son, don’t you remember?’ He had to keep the conversation going and he racked his brains for something to say. ‘Look, Bill, if you want anything, you can ask me. I’m doing Ruth’s job now. Anything that Ruth did, you ask me and I’ll do it the same way. I’m not just your father; I’m like Ruth as well.’

  Bill climbed out of the car and looked doubtful.

  ‘Do you want me to push you?’ Larry asked.

  Bill shook his head. He hurried across the room.

  Larry was on his own again. He remained crouching for a moment or two. He checked his shoelace while he was down there. He checked the floor. And finally he forced himself to stand up. Towering up he was unmissable!

  Sure enough, out of the corner of his eye he saw the women looking at him again.

  At a table in front of him a small girl was hitting a lump of dough with a rolling pin. The dough was resting in a bank of flour and each blow sent small puffs up off the table. Larry watched her with a sense of envy. He would have given a lot to have been able to take the rolling pin from her so that he could do it himself.

  Still towering, deserted by his son, he thought it was time to test a chair.

  He chose an empty table, checked the women — who were ignoring him now — and quickly sat down. His knees were practically under his chin, but it was the best place for them — straighten his legs and these Lilliputians would have to design a bridge to negotiate them.

  From quite close to him there was movement; a head raised and grew. It was not a child but a woman. Her hair was impossibly blonde — he could see now it was dazzling white, as white as her shirt. Rising up amongst the primary colours she looked ethereal, transparent. And she was, most definitely, pretty.

  She walked towards him, dodging the children effortlessly. ‘Can I get you a coffee?’ she asked in a normal, earthly voice.

  He made to get up. ‘Yes — yes,’ he said, appallingly grateful. He could think of nothing else to add. For a moment he looked into dark eyes fringed with thick dark eyelashes and then she was gone. He looked across at the group but they were involved in their own conversation.

  He looked towards the kitchen and already she was coming back.

  ‘Here you are,’ she said, handing him a mug. ‘It’s hot.’ She pulled up a chair next to him.

  ‘You’re Bill’s father, aren’t you? You look like him. Apart from the hair.’

  Larry put the mug on the table.

  ‘Keep hold of it. Emma’s very careful where the children are concerned,’ she said, and smiled, to show that the words had not been meant as a criticism. ‘I’m — Lily’s mother.’ She laughed, and he realised it was a joke and that she was teasing him. ‘Actually, my name’s Helen,’ she added. ‘Mind if I join you?’

  Larry glanced at the huddle of women near the door, the in-crowd. Mind? He was weak with relief. ‘I’m Larry,’ he said. ‘Who is the big woman over there?’

  ‘Emma’s the play leader. Her grandson, Damon, is the boy on the slide, in the red t-shirt. Jean, the one who is just nipping out for a smoke, is a childminder, and so is Janet with the red hair. Becky, over there with the baby, is a nanny. She used to be Ruth’s friend. There are others who come and go, but the regulars are all here.’

  No pretty young mothers, Larry thought sadly. No itsy-bitsy Barbie dolls with their interchangeable wardrobes, lying around bored, waiting to be played with. Not that he would have, he thought, imagining Megan, but he was never averse to the possibility.

  ‘They all thrive on maggots,’ she said, and laughed at his reaction. ‘Bits of gossip, that sort of thing,’ she said. ‘They live off it.’ But the look she gave towards the table was one of longing.

  Larry sat on his too-small chair and wanted, nevertheless, despite the maggots, to be on the table with the others. Despite the maggots he wanted to get up and join them, even if it meant hanging about on the outskirts, charming them slowly with his smile and his humour. He wanted to be on the inside.

  That was what he wanted. That was where he belonged. ‘Don’t you want to sit with your friends?’

  The whiter-than-white-haired Helen smiled at him. Through her tanned skin he could see lilac-coloured veins reaching from her eyes to her temples. Her dark eyes and eyelashes were at odds with her hair and she seemed as though she’d had a shock. Those staring eyes were that bit too wide. They reminded him of pictures he’d seen of soldiers in the trenches.

  She too glanced at the round table. ‘Yes,’ she said wistfully, ‘sometimes.’

  Larry saw, too late, that the trap had sprung on him. He’d made things worse! He was the new boy at school! And on this, his first day, he had labelled himself an outcast! He’d allied himself with the kid that smelled, or was bullied, or was unusually thick! Those women, the inner circle, they would have accepted him in time — they would! But he’d joined the wrong side.

  He tried, as he thought this, not to look at Helen, but when he did her shell-shocked stare had gone and she just looked gentle and faintly amused, as though any minute she expected something funny to happen.

  Familiar though he was with being stared at, he knew that she had the upper hand and it irked him. She knew what he thought. He didn’t like being controlled. He wanted to ask her why, if she wanted to sit with them, she didn’t; but he didn’t want the others to see them chatting. It didn’t matter. It wasn’t that important to him.

  He cupped his hands around the mug. The coffee itself was instant but it was hot and strong and bitter and he rather liked it. He looked round for his son. It was easy this time — Bill was in the Cozy Coupe.

  The yellow roof lent a jaundiced cast to his face and Larry, looking harder, thought he could see his lips move. Probably he was making car sounds as he stared into space. Bill turned the car suddenly and Larry could see his face no more.

  But his heart sank.

  Even as he repeated the scene in his head he knew tha
t the words his son was whispering were Zoofie, Zoofie, Zoofie.

  22

  On their way home from the playgroup Larry and Bill stopped off at Sainsbury’s, mindful of Megan’s instructions to get them something for supper. Bill was tired and fretful. Larry said, ‘What shall we have for supper?’ He was exhausted, resentful, and well into overtime now.

  Bill didn’t seem to care much what he ate.

  ‘All right,’ Larry said, putting Bill in the trolley, ‘let’s educate your palate while we’ve got the chance. Smoked salmon and scrambled eggs?’ Then he remembered he was off fish and the flesh of smoked salmon seemed particularly goldfish-like.

  Of course he hadn’t only to think of himself and Bill, but Megan too. He had to get something for Megan. This was what a househusband’s life was all about: the feeding of the breadwinner.

  He looked at the rows of shelves, conscious of Bill’s restlessness as he sat swinging his legs in the trolley. He began tugging at his sleeve.

  ‘Don’t do that, son.’ The noise in the supermarket wasn’t all that different from the noise in the playgroup. Larry blinked; the lights were so bright, he seemed assailed by a barrage of colour and noise. But no music, he noticed. He was thankful for that.

  Bill grabbed at a can. It was standing in its cardboard pallet on the shelf, three cans left. They fell onto the floor with a clatter and Larry wheeled round, frowning.

  he said sharply, ‘I told you to stop it.’ Bill’s face seemed to collapse slowly in front of his eyes and yet he still wasn’t able to stop. ‘We’ll just get something for tonight,’ Larry said, ‘and we won’t worry about tomorrow.’ He wasn’t talking to Bill, really; he was talking to himself. What did Megan buy? He couldn’t think. He tried to remember meals or menus — quail, trout — and felt he was getting there, just getting there, when Bill kicked out at the trolley next to theirs. It veered sharply, hitting Larry, causing him to bump into Bill. He felt his elbow catch Bill on the chest. Bill looked at him, shocked, and tears flooded his eyes.