by Louise Beech
The night before, during dinner, I’d thrown hot tea over my mother’s hands to let her see how it felt to burn day and night. It wasn’t a nice thing to do. I knew this even as I did it. But it just happened, like when swearwords jumped out of my mouth.
‘Bed,’ she’d said to me, wrapping her hands around a cool glass of water like I had so many times.
‘I’m fourteen,’ I’d laughed.
‘Well, behave that way!’ she’d shrieked.
Aunty Hairy had persuaded me to give them a moment. I found out afterwards that she’d stuck up for me – as always – and said how awful it must be always to be raking sore skin. Shouldn’t I have been taken to a doctor years ago? Perhaps feeling guilty at her negligence, my mother said Hairy could take me if she wanted to.
We got a last-minute appointment. I was glad to miss my chemistry lesson but nervous about being scrutinised. A boy of about nine sat next to me, covered in angry red spots. I wondered what had caused his disfiguration. The woman opposite us sneezed and studied my scarlet fingers. I lifted one in an obscene gesture, and she tutted and looked away.
My name was called: ‘Catherine-Maria,’ they said. With the name I was pure again. Perhaps they would cleanse my skin too. Stop my hands being clumsy and stupid.
The doctor was young and asked what was troubling me. Aunty Hairy, maybe seeing my furrowed brow, explained how my skin – mainly my hands but occasionally my knees and neck – flared up with hot welts, and cracked if I scratched.
‘When did it start?’ he wanted to know.
I wasn’t sure. Aunty Hairy looked thoughtful. ‘When she was about nine,’ she said.
‘Are you stressed?’ he asked me.
I shrugged. Aunty Hairy said life was always stressful at fourteen. He didn’t smile. He suggested an allergy test, which he’d book for next week, and said in the meantime he would prescribe some cream.
Afterwards Aunty Hairy took me for ice cream. She let me have the large one with all the flavours that my mother always said would make me fat. Then she bought me some new jeans and pink lip-gloss.
‘I know you don’t bother with make-up yet,’ she said. ‘But soon you will. Soon you’ll not want to hang around your old aunt. You’ll be interested in boys, and they’ll be interested in you.’
I shook my head. ‘I never want to get married,’ I said.
‘Of course you do!’ laughed my aunt.
I shook my head, insistent; I was going to live with a friend or on my own.
It turned out I wasn’t allergic to anything specific. Not grass or horses or cats or house mites. I said that they should have tested my reaction to my mother, and Aunty Hairy laughed and shook her head. I said I was allergic to Mother’s awful lemon meringue. None of the creams worked. The stronger stuff eased the eczema for a while. Then it returned with a vengeance. There would be times it faded, like a suntan, but it always came back.
Aunty Hairy had hugged me after the allergy results. She had squeezed me so tight I thought I would suffocate. Her chin hair agitated my skin, but she reminded me of my dad, her brother, and so the attention was worth it. In the garden behind us, leaves began to fall.
‘Your mother is trying,’ she said. ‘I know it must seem she’s harsh, but it was hard when your dad died and she was left a single parent to a … well, to a child she hadn’t given birth to. That must have been very tough, you know.’
I said nothing.
‘Everything will be OK,’ Aunty Hairy said, suddenly sad. ‘I’ll always be here. No one will ever hurt you. No one.’
I opened my eyes now and my adult face stared back in the bathroom mirror. It was four-thirty. I’d been standing there half an hour. What had Aunty Hairy been talking about? Who would never hurt me? Was she just talking about the world; the unfairness of me being an orphan? Or something else?
What though?
My hands were sticky with cream. I’d scratched and raked them since I was nine. Nothing soothed me. Aunty Hairy had looked out for me. Tried to get me well. Stood up for me. I wanted to call her and ask, What happened to me? Where the hell are my other memories?
But she was ill. It wouldn’t be fair. I wanted to look out for her now. Help her get well. Stand up for her. It would wait. She would live. She had to. She had to.
And then I would ask her what happened when I was nine.
17
Writing words in the air
‘Flood Crisis, can I help you?’
The now-familiar syllables rolled off my tongue with ease. I shook a pen and scribbled on the pad; it refused to work. I knew remembering the words instead of writing them would prove difficult.
The caller had a Scottish accent and wanted to talk to a woman because men never understood him. They took the piss apparently, and he needed a sympathetic ear. Assuring him I could offer this, I knew I had no idea about what I was agreeing to understand. But then this was nearly always the case on a crisis line. If we knew beforehand, we’d never begin.
I asked what it was that men wouldn’t understand, and he said ‘his urge’, the accent making his words a growl. I looked out into the lounge, where Christopher was separating tinsel into colour-coordinated piles, and Condom Kath knitted something that was yellow and matched none of the tinsel. The tea I’d forgotten to carry into booth two grew cold on top of an open Woman magazine.
The Scottish man continued with his growly urge, describing how when his wife was out he locked the door and put on her clothes. Apparently the feel of lacy undies, of the pressure of bra wire against his chest, was exhilarating. I didn’t ask questions. I knew he just needed to talk about it.
But then he told me he was wearing them now. And was getting hard.
‘Were you flooded?’ I demanded.
‘What? I thought you’d understand me,’ he said.
‘This isn’t a sex line. There are numbers you can call where the women will understand you perfectly.’
‘I can’t afford those numbers!’ he cried. ‘You’re free, and my wife won’t know from the phone bill that I’ve called you.’
I hung up, glared at the blank page and the dry pen. In the lounge area, I threw it in the bin and replaced it with a Barbie pencil from the jar on Norman’s desk.
‘A man in women’s undies on a Sunday afternoon,’ I said to the room.
Christopher was standing on a chair, pinning threadbare gold tinsel to the ceiling; he paused to look at me. His mouth hung in an arc, like the decoration. Kath glanced up from her knitting for a moment but resumed the click-click-click of needles without demonstrating any curiosity. I wondered if she had given up on the silencing condom altogether, but wasn’t about to ask.
I flopped onto the sofa and grimaced at my lukewarm tea. ‘I didn’t give up my Sunday for this.’
‘But you did give it up to help me erect this Christmas tree.’ Christopher climbed down from the chair and produced a thin twig with six branches, each poorly sprinkled with glitter, the whole thing listing to the left.
‘I’m too tired,’ I said.
I’d woken up at eight that morning, unable to go back to sleep. Fern’s bedroom door had still been closed; it was easier to leave it that way. I couldn’t look at her empty wardrobe and half-open curtains. It was painful enough seeing my solitary toothbrush in the blue pot in the bathroom.
‘Sundays are usually quiet,’ said Christopher. ‘That’s why Norman said to sort the festive trimmings out. It’s rare one gets sexual stuff on the Sabbath.’
‘Trust it to be me.’
‘Wanna help me sort this lot out?’ He plonked a second box on the table. I peered into it; the garish colours made it look like a Santa had been massacred.
‘Isn’t it a bit early for decorations?’ I asked.
‘It’s the second of December,’ said Kath, no pause in the click-click-click.
I glanced at the steam trains calendar above Norman’s desk. Now the image was a black-and-white train – half light, half shade, like the Tennyson poem. Nove
mber had gone. It had sucked me into volunteering, given Aunty Hairy bowel cancer, added another year to my life and snatched Fern from me. December promised no better.
‘Three weeks until the big day,’ said Kath. ‘I’ve done my shopping. I’ve been doing buy-two-get-the-third-free in Boots, but it’s a pain if you only need five things. I’ll get some thermal socks to make up the amount.’
The phone rang, and Christopher abandoned a plastic Virgin Mary with overly exaggerated crimson lips and disappeared into booth one. I touched her carefully in case I broke her.
I made a second cup of tea and looked among the magazines for the article I’d started on Wednesday, curious about the man whose hand was eaten by a lion. It wasn’t there, so I did a quiz in Psychologies magazine to see if I was a pessimist or an optimist. Turned out I was an optimist, which surprised me, since the thought of Fern returning or my house being completed filled me with hopelessness.
Kath’s click-click-click monitored my growing headache like a stethoscope listening to a heart. I looked out of the window at the pinkish sky, which threatened more snow, and wondered what Fern was doing.
‘I thought you would have made some sort of nativity by now,’ said Christopher, back at the sofas.
He went to the kitchen, and I investigated the box of decorations. The phone rang in booth one and Kath picked up her wool and carried her knitting into the cubicle. She answered the phone, receiver wedged between shoulder and ear, and while talking she knitted very slowly and quietly. Christopher returned with two mugs and put one next to Kath.
‘Finally tempted you into my box?’ he said.
‘This stuff is even older than my mother’s crap.’
‘Let’s irritate everyone by bedecking every wall and surface with it.’
I shook a pine-cone garland and three fell off.
‘Did you see yesterday’s logbook?’ asked Christopher.
‘Shit, no.’
I knew I was supposed to read it; it had taken me months at Crisis Care to remember. Now I was forgetting all over again; we never forget how to forget.
‘I wasn’t having a go. A man called yesterday asking for you. Had a strange voice; Lindsey couldn’t understand him. All she got was that he was called—’
‘—Sid,’ I finished. ‘He’s had a stroke.’ I shook a snow globe with Rudolph inside, atop a frosty roof. ‘I’m glad he called. I know we have to be impartial but…’
Christopher shook his head. ‘Just be careful.’
‘I know: we’re not responsible for them.’ I put the globe on the radiator shelf near the two booths and watched as the white flakes settled on Rudolph’s crimson nose. ‘I guess you like Christmas?’
‘I throw myself into it to ignore it.’
‘And how does that work?’ I found a tiny baby Jesus underneath the tinsel, but he only had one eye, so I buried him at the bottom of the box.
‘If you join in the card-sending and all the other crap, it passes quickly and no one questions your misery.’
He pulled a toy Father Christmas out of the box. Santa wore reindeer antlers on top of a traditional hat and a thick leatherette belt; his trousers fell down, revealing checked boxer shorts. Christopher wound up the lever in his back, stood him on the coffee table, and we watched him chant ‘Jingle Bells’ and thrust his pelvis pornographically four times before falling onto the floor.
‘Where did this stuff come from?’ I laughed.
‘Volunteers have been bringing it in for weeks. I bet this came from Norman – it’s very him.’ He stood Santa back on the table.
‘Why don’t you like it?’ I asked.
‘I do. I might even take him home.’ He smiled.
‘No, why don’t you like Christmas?’
Christopher didn’t answer. He pulled at Santa’s matted beard and left him posed ridiculously, hips permanently thrust forward.
‘My wife left me on Christmas Eve,’ he said eventually.
I touched Santa’s rough felt boots and then fiddled with the plastic buckle because I didn’t know what to say.
‘I never liked this time of year anyway.’ He glanced at me before looking at the floor. ‘When Caroline decided she’d had enough and wanted to move in with a man from the gym, she chose the most cheerful day of them all to tell me: Christmas Eve. She’d loved Rick for three months apparently; I’d just thought she loved her new spinning class.’ He paused. ‘It was two years ago.’
‘I’m sorry.’ It was a phrase I hated.
‘Me too,’ he said. ‘She was good enough to give me a Christmas gift before she left. Said she’d bought it weeks before, and I might as well have it. A watch. Shows how well she knew me – I’d never worn one in my life.’ I looked at the watch on his wrist: red strap, black face, silver hands. He looked at the time; four-fifteen. ‘But I wore it because I believed it would only be a matter of time before she realised she still wanted me and came back. Now I guess it’s just habit.’
‘Do you think some people come back?’ I asked.
Fern had to. I searched through the remaining tinsel, not knowing what I hoped to find.
‘Maybe,’ he said.
I looked up; he was staring at me with slightly narrowed eyes.
‘You’re hoping someone will?’ he asked.
‘Not some man, if that’s what you think.’ I instantly regretted my harsh words.
‘Who then?’
‘My friend, Fern. We fell out. She left.’ I fiddled with gold tinsel. ‘If you say that she won’t come back I might hang you with this.’
I thought Christopher was scratching his arm until I realised he’d undone his watch strap. Once free, he held it out. It curled up in his palm like a scarlet snake. He said he wanted it back when Fern returned.
‘Don’t be silly,’ I said. ‘It’s yours.’
‘It’s not my colour – red plays havoc with my complexion.’
I thought of the red dress still waiting to be fixed and wanted to say that red gifts only brought me bad luck, and that, anyway, my mother frequently told me the colour aged me. But something about the spontaneous way he offered it made me wordlessly hold out my arm, palm down, in order to hide the raw skin.
‘It’s only a watch.’ With warm fingers, he held my wrist and tried to turn my palm upwards so he could fasten the strap.
I resisted, embarrassed about its coarse appearance.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
I ignored him and silently displayed my wounds.
If he thought they were ugly he didn’t show it; he secured the clasp and let me go. The telephone in booth two rang. We both looked towards the cubicle. Condom Kath was still in the other, knitting quietly with the telephone lodged between shoulder and ear.
‘My turn,’ I said.
‘You sure? I can go.’
I handed him the gold tinsel and went into cubicle two.
‘Flood Crisis, can I help?’ I picked up the pencil – it was blunt. The blank page challenged me to find a way to record the call.
‘I think this is Katrina. Am I right?’
It was Sid. My third call with him; already I found it so easy to decipher his words.
‘Yes, it’s Katrina,’ I said.
‘I lost my glasses again,’ he said.
I smiled. ‘And?’
‘They were on my head.’
‘How are you today?’ I asked.
‘I think it’s a good day. Do people ring you about the good days?’
I should ignore the question, bring it around to him. ‘Why is it a good one?’
Condom Kath returned to the sofas, her knitted creation trailing after her like a tail. A phone started up immediately and Christopher got to it in three rings.
‘I finally slept,’ said Sid. ‘Well, for five hours. I think it’s because…’
‘Why?’ I asked.
‘Can I tell you something I remembered last night?’ he said.
I was always interested in memories. ‘Of course,’ I said.
‘I’ve forgotten a lot so I’m always delighted when a memory comes back to me.’
I was usually nervous about randomly returning memories. ‘Tell me,’ I said.
‘It doesn’t happen often,’ he began. ‘But last night I had this clear vision of my daughter. She was running in the garden, dancing around in circles in a checked green dress, with the leaves floating around her, all pretty, like. I lost her years ago, you see, and can hardly recall what she looked like. But last night I saw her vividly. Memory is cruel, isn’t it? Just giving you snapshots of the past and nothing more.’
As Sid described the image his voice seemed to purify. I thought I’d imagined it and listened more intently; definitely his ‘t’s were unmistakable, his ‘o’s more concise. I understood completely his frustration with memory. Mine teased me too – a pretty child who showed me her new Barbie and then ran away and hid before I could play with it.
‘I can’t see her clearly now,’ he said, sadly. ‘I could tell you her hair was mousy and her eyes were blue, but I can’t actually see her.’ He paused. ‘I think I’ll have soup for tea again. Were you flooded, Katrina?’
I could ignore the question, as trained, but I answered, as required.
‘It must be annoying for you to sit and listen to others complain,’ he said.
Christopher ended his call and returned to the lounge.
‘I might take a sleeping pill tonight.’ Sid’s words slurred now he wasn’t reminiscing. ‘My friend Bill gave me some. He has a generous doctor – maybe I’ll try and get on his books. This cough keeps me awake so anything would be good.’
‘You should see someone about the cough.’ I could hear a Crisis Care trainer in my head – ‘We’re not here to give advice, we’re here to listen.’
‘I’ll rest now, dear, if that’s OK,’ said Sid. ‘Thanks for listening, Katrina.’
I returned to the lounge area after a while. Kath looked at the red watch and then at Christopher’s bare wrist but just continued knitting. He was writing in the logbook.