Home Truths

by Freya North

  ‘But there was never a cowboy,’ Fen said flatly, ‘there was just plastic tubing and now there's just a lonely widow. Who's currently cooking us lunch.’

  ‘I'm not hungry,’ said Cat and her voice was hoarse, ‘and I no longer want to be here.’

  ‘We'll go after lunch,’ Pip said.

  ‘Yeah right,’ Cat muttered. ‘I want to go now. Not after lunch.’

  ‘Well we can't,’ Pip whispered in a hiss.

  ‘Why the fuck not?’ Cat whispered back.

  ‘We can't,’ Pip said.

  ‘Don't tell me what I can and can't do!’ Cat objected. ‘You two bloody stay then – I'm not.’

  ‘Cat!’ Pip said.

  ‘Fucking hell, Pip,’ Cat said, ‘just because I can't be as big as you or react in your controlled way.’

  ‘Calm down, for goodness' sake,’ Fen said.

  ‘It's hard enough dealing with what I do know,’ Cat said. ‘It's like with Django – you two want to know all about the tests and the treatment and the prognosis. I don't. OK?’

  ‘I know it's difficult,’ Pip started.

  ‘Don't patronize me,’ Cat said, pointing her finger. ‘I'm going for a walk. I'll wait by the car. Or I'll go back to the hotel. I don't know. But I'm not staying here.’

  And she left.

  And when Penny heard the front door shut, she wondered if they'd all gone. She felt almost jubilant to find that two of her three wanted to sit at her table and eat lunch with her.

  ‘Cat's just—’ Pip paused.

  ‘It's OK, honey,’ Penny said, ‘you don't have to explain for her.’

  But Pip felt duty-bound to. ‘It's sort of hit her the hardest, perhaps,’ Pip said, ‘on account of her not knowing about – well, her father.’

  Fen was suddenly terrified Penny would say, Ah and how is Django? and she didn't want her to so she changed the subject urgently. ‘Gorgeous bread!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Bob's favourite,’ Penny revealed and from then on she talked only about Bob. She said she'd map out Bob's route to the Falls for them. She asked how the guest house was – because Bob had always said that the town lacked a really good hotel.

  ‘He'd say, “If you build it, they will come”,’ she reminisced.

  It was more exhausting than tedious – Pip felt obliged to nod sympathetically at every mention of this woman's late husband. They'd long finished eating but they remained at the table, which Bob had shipped over from Denmark where he used to do a lot of business, so Penny said.

  ‘Well, we ought to make tracks,’ Fen said after a coded glance to Pip.

  ‘Perhaps we'll take Bob's route to the Falls tomorrow,’ Pip said, standing, ‘if we decide not to take an earlier flight home.’ She gave Fen a little smile.

  ‘When you due to fly?’ Penny asked.

  ‘Monday evening at the moment,’ Fen sighed.

  ‘The red-eye? You know, Bob swore by Melatonin to combat jet lag. Wait – I'm sure I still have some.’ Penny disappeared upstairs, leaving Pip and Fen to stare at each other and shrug.

  ‘Thank you for coming,’ Penny said, giving Pip a pot of pills. ‘It's nice for me to talk about Bob. Feels like I can honour his memory by recalling the minutiae – like I'm bringing him back to life by describing him to folk who never met him.’ She paused, consumed by some deeply private thought. ‘Too bad you never met him.’

  ‘I'm sorry for your loss,’ Pip heard herself say, edging across the hallway towards the door.

  ‘Thank you,’ Penny said, opening the door and shivering a little though it was a warm soft breeze which trickled in.

  Fen stopped at the threshold. ‘How old was he?’ she asked. ‘And had he been ill for very long?’

  ‘He was seventy,’ Penny said, ‘and he'd been ill five months.’

  ‘Five months!’ Fen exclaimed. ‘That's terrible.’ She thought of Django and felt panic.

  Love at Long Distance

  ‘Marjorie? It's Dr York's wife – it's Cat. I'm sorry for phoning reverse-charges. I'm in a phone box and I want to speak to my husband.’ She began to cry. ‘I want to speak to Ben.’

  ‘My dear, he's consulting at the moment. The Saturday evening clinic is very hectic.’

  ‘But I'm phoning long-distance.’

  ‘Are you all right? Is everything OK? Is this an emergency?’

  Cat cried silently while Marjorie said Hullo? Hullo? down the phone.

  ‘How long will Ben be? How long will Dr York be – do you think?’

  ‘Is it an emergency, dear? I can call through if it's an emergency.’

  Cat thought about this. And she thought about her husband, with some rugby player's prize tendon in his hands. ‘It's not an emergency,’ she had to sadly admit, ‘I'm just lonely. I miss him.’

  ‘Can I take a number for you?’

  ‘This is a pay phone,’ Cat said, ‘in Vermont. I can't remember the stupid place I'm staying.’

  ‘And when are you coming back?’ Marjorie asked in her best soothing voice.

  ‘We fly Monday night.’

  ‘That's lovely and soon,’ Marjorie enthused.

  ‘But I miss him now,’ Cat stammered, crying again. ‘Is he almost finished? Do you think?’

  ‘I'm afraid not,’ said Marjorie. ‘All these sportsmen with their strains and pains from today's games. Why don't I send him a nice message for you – like that other time.’

  Cat brightened a little.

  ‘I could say, “Dr York, your wife says absence is making her heart grow fonder,” or something along those lines.’

  Cat thought about it. ‘Will you tell him I called, Marjorie? Tell him I miss him. Tell him I love him. Tell him it's rubbish here. But tell him I'm fine. Tell him I can't wait to see him.’

  ‘I've written it down,’ said Marjorie, ‘word for word.’

  ‘And tell him that for me, family means him,’ Cat said. ‘Tell him I love him.’

  When she stepped away from the hood of the pay phone and turned to consult her whereabouts on the edge of town, Cat saw that the hire car with her sisters in the front seats had pulled up and was waiting. As she regarded them, tears still wet on her face, Pip wound down the driver's window.

  ‘Hullo my pretty girl,’ she said in a commendable Bill Sykes voice. ‘Want to come and see my kittens and puppies?’

  Cat was at once helpless not to giggle.

  ‘Get in the car goddammit!’ Fen leant across Pip, drawling in a deep American accent, as if they were about to start a cops-and-robbers chase. ‘Get in the goddam car goddammit.’

  So Cat got in the car, drying her eyes on the way.

  For there is no friend like a sister,

  in calm or stormy weather,

  to cheer one on the tedious way,

  to fetch one if one goes astray,

  to lift one if one totters down,

  to strengthen whilst one stands.

  No-Brainer

  Bob's route was certainly scenic and the view from the Falls was postcard wonderful the next morning. Fen stood with her eyes closed, her hands clasped behind her head, breathing deeply, the air feeling thinner, finer, than down in town. Cat murmured that Ben would love it.

  Pip thought to herself how Tom would too. ‘They look like Hornby model railway hills,’ she said, gazing at the spread of tree-clotted hills, ‘like great big sponges dipped in green poster paint.’ Her voice faltered.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Fen asked her, eyes still closed.

  ‘Yes,’ Pip said, with some busy blinking, ‘I'm just tired. Yesterday is seeming more and more bizarre. I'm fine. Fuck it.’ But then she squatted down and took her hands to her face, her shoulders heaving with her tears long before she made a sound.

  ‘Pip!’ Fen dropped down beside her and put an arm around her back.

  ‘Pip don't cry,’ Cat implored, crouching to the other side of Pip.

  It was horrible to see Pip cry because she so seldom did. She was, after all, the great Mopper of Tears; a role neither
of her sisters felt they could fulfil anywhere near as well. Pip had goose bumps on her forearms. It had been T-shirt weather on the lower part of the hike but the breeze at the top was insistent in its chill. Fen rubbed her sister's arms.

  ‘Don't cry,’ Cat continued to plead, as much for her sake as for her sister's. ‘What's wrong?’

  Pip gave one vigorous sniff, then took the sensible deep breaths she always advocated to others. In through the nose, out through the mouth, in through the nose, out through the mouth. She cleared her throat, stood up with her hands in the small of her back and had a good stretch. ‘Fuck it,’ she said, her voice now strong and surprisingly indignant, ‘fucking hell.’

  Cat and Fen looked at each other, a little bewildered. Something was coming and they couldn't anticipate what.

  ‘I think she truly believes we've come all this way to offer our condolences on the death of her husband,’ Pip laughed caustically. ‘Don't you remember, Fen? When she thanked us for coming and said how nice it was for her to talk all about Bob to folk who'd never met him? Do you realize, she never once asked us a single thing about ourselves?’ She put her hands on her hips and glared at her sisters. ‘She's a self-centred old bag!’ Pip rarely spoke ill of anyone, let alone with such a crude insult, and the sound of it was so out of character that Fen burst out laughing. ‘It's not fucking funny,’ Pip seethed, ‘it's fucking sad. The whole thing. Our whole history. The fact that we've spent a small fortune coming out here. What's the prize?’ She looked from Cat to Fen. ‘Do you feel better? Either of you? Do you think it was a good idea? You were right yesterday, Cat. I should have followed you out instead of sitting politely and being Miss Maturity, Mrs Stupid Fucking Level Head, Mrs Pathetic Giver of the Benefit of the Doubt.’ And with that she marched off.

  ‘For fuck's sake, Fen,’ Cat said under her breath, ‘what are we going to do?’

  ‘Come on,’ murmured Fen, automatically stepping into the role as next-eldest and leading the way after Pip.

  Pip stomped down from the Falls. ‘I'm starving,’ her only comment, called over her shoulder. Fen and Cat shot each other worried glances as they tried to keep up. She headed directly for the diner, which had provided their hearty breakfast for hiking a few hours earlier, and slumped down at the table they'd appropriated as their own these past three days. DeeDee, embroidered as Betty again, was delighted to see them so soon, charmed by the flush of their reddened faces.

  ‘Joe – the hikers are back!’ she called through. ‘My, you girls must have made quick work of our Falls,’ she marvelled while cleaning their table unnecessarily, straightening cutlery and presenting the menu though it already stood to attention before them, laminated and clasped between two steel blocks. ‘No specials today, on account of it being Sunday, but if you need refuelling, you'll be wanting the burgers. We make them ourselves and the beef is from the Holstein herd just up at Brook Farm.’

  ‘Sounds super,’ said Fen, with an anxious look at Pip.

  ‘Super duper,’ Cat added, for Betty's pleasure.

  ‘We'll have three, then,’ said Fen, ‘and a pot of strong tea too, please.’

  Cat and Fen sat next to each other. Then leant across the table and took Pip's hands in theirs.

  ‘It's OK,’ Fen said to her.

  ‘Pip,’ Cat all but pleaded again.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ Pip growled under her breath. ‘The point is – I didn't cross the frigging Atlantic in search of an apology and it may have been a bit hopeful to even expect an explanation. But Christ, to be asked nothing?’

  Fen wondered what to say. Should she try and calm Pip or bolster her? ‘I know,’ she said, ‘I know. I can see exactly what you mean. I now know all about tubing – but she hasn't a clue I have a sodding MA from the Courtauld Institute.’

  ‘I told her I lived in Denver for three years,’ Cat said, ‘but she didn't ask me a thing about that.’

  Pip buried her head in her hands and tugged hard at her hair. ‘It's amazing we're as normal as we are,’ she said hoarsely, with a burst of hollow laughter. The burgers arrived and she took great snatching bites. ‘Christ, this is fucking delicious,’ she said. ‘Sorry about my language.’

  ‘You swear as much as you fucking like,’ Fen encouraged her, anything to restore her sister.

  With blood sugar levels raised, stomachs full and nerves settled, they took stock of the situation once more.

  ‘You say we didn't come here for an apology,’ Fen said to Pip, ‘but you know what, I think we are entitled to an explanation.’

  ‘I sort of wish we'd never come,’ Cat said quietly, ‘but I suppose I'm pleased we are actually here. Thing is, I don't know what I came for – and I'm not really sure what it is I'll be taking home with me.’

  She looked at Pip intently, willing her to respond. ‘I mean, I'm sorry for her loss,’ Pip said in her more usual voice, ‘it must be ghastly – but for God's sake I don't even know if she was interested in telling us apart. I tell you something – we're not going home until we've had our say.’

  ‘Are we going back?’ Cat whispered. ‘To the house on Emerson?’

  ‘Yes,’ Pip declared. ‘God, don't look so scared, Cat – you're coming too this time, all the way. She's only human. We should use this trip to bury the mystique of her, once and for all.’

  From the outside, the house on Emerson Street looked as empty as it had on their first visit. But to the sisters, they sensed it was brimming with information. They rang and they knocked and Penny seemed quite pleased to see them on her doorstep.

  ‘Hi! How were the Falls?’ she greeted them. ‘Did you take Bob's route?’

  All the confrontational power, the burning right to feel cross and cheated which Pip had amassed, simpered away in an instant in the presence of this woman. For the first time in her life she stood on a precarious threshold, wishing her younger sisters were in front of her, and not behind.

  ‘Won't you come in,’ Penny asked.

  But Pip eyed the open door with suspicion. Bob was in there. This amazing man who looked so nice and who had loved their mother with all of his great big heart. Instinctively, she knew if they went in and sat in the kitchen and said yes to tea or coffee or cranberry and apple, they'd be back in Bob's space where the hurt and the anger that were justifiably theirs would be banned from the home of this widow. Pip reminded herself of her manners, her sense of decorum; both fastidiously instilled by Django.

  ‘Are you OK?’ Penny asked her, looking to Fen and Cat who both avoided her gaze. ‘Are you OK, all of you?’

  Pip was distraught at her emptied mind, her stupid silence. But suddenly Fen was alongside her. ‘I have a daughter,’ Fen proclaimed with slicing calm. ‘Cosima is eleven months old.’ Fen locked eyes with Penny. ‘I have chosen to leave her for four days and five nights. You chose to leave us full stop.’

  Fen observed Penny bristle and though she remained motionless, Fen could detect her pull back. ‘It must seem that way,’ Penny said, a guarded hostility edging into her voice.

  ‘How did you do it?’ Fen asked, genuinely flummoxed, slightly incredulous. ‘I just don't know how it is possible, what with all the hormones and the love. Christ – the love! I've never known such love! It's so exquisite it's almost painful. The emotion I feel for my partner is strong and stuff, but the emotion I feel for my child is. Is. God. It's primal.’

  ‘You must be a very good mother,’ said Penny, an unidentifiable tone to her voice.

  ‘She is,’ Cat parried in her sister's defence, ‘she's amazing.’

  Fen shrugged. ‘I'm all right,’ she reasoned, ‘but I'm nothing special and that's the point. I'm just a normal mum – slightly neurotic, a bit dippy, mostly tired. But you see, I actually don't really care about why you left – it's irrelevant. You ran off with some cowboy from Denver, or the tube man from Vermont – the rest is history. But I've come here – I've left my baby thousands of miles away – because I would like to know how. How did you do it?’

  Penny did
not look discomfited and it irked Fen. In fact, it seemed her mother was thinking about these questions for the first time herself.

  ‘How did I do it? I guess I felt I had no option,’ Penny said at length. ‘This man was my destiny. Being a mother – glaringly – was not. A man in my situation might have doubted himself to be the real father, on account of not feeling paternal. A man in my situation might have questioned DNA, might have said Are you sure I'm the father. But I couldn't exactly say, Are you sure I'm the mother – though actually, that's how I felt. My body conspired against me. Babies born to the wrong person.’

  The sisters were too hurt to respond.

  ‘Did you ever think of us?’ Pip finally spoke. ‘Did you never miss us? Did you never waiver? Or wonder?’

  ‘No one ever challenged me,’ Penny told them. ‘You three were never a challenge – you were, all of you, good as gold. You ate, you slept, you were never ill or fretful. You weren't demanding, you didn't need me. It was easy. Nicholas never tried to stop me. Derek never tried to stop me. No one begged me to stay. It didn't seem to matter to any of you if I stayed or if I went; I wasn't needed. I never felt I made much impact on your lives. But I changed Bob's from the moment he set eyes on me. And that changed me. I found my calling. Does that make sense?’

  ‘So if we'd been colicky nocturnal babies who didn't eat, things might have been different?’ Fen posed, thinking of her little daughter's peculiar appetite for all things orange. She remembered how Cosima loved to lie, stomach down, over the boughs made by her mother's arms, like a little leopard in a tree. She recalled her own pure panic when Cosima's temperature rocketed to 104. She thought how, right at this very minute, on the other side of the ocean and the other side of the day, Cosima would be fluffy and fragrant and snuggly in her babygro, ready for bed. ‘I don't need to feel needed,’ Fen qualified. ‘I'm a mother and by definition, that's a sometimes thankless task.’ She paused. ‘But I don't need to think about the level of love I have for my child. It overrides all else.’