by Wade, Calvin
The name meant nothing to me.
“I’m Kelly. Kelly Watkinson.”
“That’s it!” Anna announced excitedly, “you went out with Richie Billingham, didn’t you? I remember meeting you once on Clieves Hill, I was walking my dog with my Mum. We stopped to talk to Richie and he introduced us to you!”
I felt my cheeks flush. I remembered that day. Richie and I had been fooling around a little at the ‘Sunny Road’ and had spotted someone coming so had dressed in a hurry and then I was mortified when it turned out that Richie knew them.
“I went to school with Richie. He’s lovely Richie, isn’t he?”
“He is. Lovely guy.”
“I went to Primary School with him and the Grammar. I always had a bit of a soft spot for Richie! He was my first love! We used to chase each other all over the playground when we were in the infants! I remember kissing him behind the annexes on the school field! Sloppy kisser!”
I took the jibe personally, so defended Richie, “He’s improved!”
Anna Eccleston’s eyes suddenly lit up as the penny dropped regarding my family history.
“Shit! You had all that stuff going on with your family, didn’t you? Did your mother not die?”
Anna was not one to beat around the bush! I had two choices at this point, I could politely make my excuses and leave Anna or I could finally, after several years, find out what had been happening in Ormskirk since I had fled.
After Jemma’s arrest, I had phoned and spoken to Amy, but as time passed, paranoia kicked in. I kept thinking the police would be tracing my calls and wherever I was in the world, Interpol would catch me if I made a call home. In the first couple of years, it was particularly hard not to give in to temptation and phone Jemma on her birthday or at Christmas, but I had no idea where she would be living, I knew she could possibly be in prison and I feared any attempt to trace her would ultimately lead to my arrest too. For all I knew, Jemma may have had to tell the police exactly what had happened that night. In over five years, I had not heard any news about Jemma, Richie or Amy, I needed to know what Anna knew.
“My Mum did die, yes. She fell down the stairs.”
“That’s right or she was pushed. Your sister went to jail for it, didn’t she? Her name’s Jemma, isn’t it? She argued that she was asleep but the prosecution argued that she was pushed. I used to read about it every week in the ‘Ormskirk Advertiser’. The jury agreed with the prosecution, didn’t they? What did she get, three years?”
I felt numb. Jemma had been jailed for my crime.
“I don’t know.”
Anna Eccleston almost wet herself with excitement.
“Oh my god! That’s right, you disappeared, didn’t you? I have just found Ormskirk’s version of Lord Lucan!”
I was not delighting in my notoriety in quite the same way as Anna. Anna was having the same capacity to irritate as me as Brad.
“What are you going to do, Anna? Administer a citizens arrest? Call the local police and claim the reward money?”
Anna looked at me like I was deranged.
“No! But I will buy you a few drinks and you can tell me the whole story. I don’t think the police are overly bothered where you are these days, there will be a stamp on that file saying ‘Solved’, but I’m bothered. I’d love to know what really happened. I’d gladly buy a few drinks for the only living person, with the exception of Jemma, who knows the truth.”
If Anna was right and the police file was closed, there was no way I was ever going to tell her what really happened the night Mum died. Having said that, I fancied having a few drinks. It was a luxury I could not afford and a few drinks with someone from Ormskirk who could fill in a few gaps for me, seemed really appealing. I played along.
“Buy me a few drinks, Anna and I may well tell you! We’ll have to leave now though, my boyfriend will be back from the glacier in a minute and he knows nothing about any of this and I would prefer to keep it that way!”
“Deal!”
Anna helped me gather up my things and we ran off in search of the nearest bar. Poor Brad apparently waited for ninety minutes for my arrival, but we were only re-united once I stumbled back into the hostel at midnight. By then, Anna had told me enough for me to not care too deeply about how Brad was feeling. I did not want to hurt Brad, but in the whole swing of things, it mattered little. I knew it was time for me to start my journey home.
Richie
As a baby, Jamie was not good at going to sleep, in fact, that is putting it mildly, the truth is, Jamie was an awful sleeper. This was particularly hard for Jemma and I as we had been lulled into a false sense of security by Melissa, who was a terrific sleeper. We thought the phrase, “sleeps like a baby” was an accurate one until Jamie arrived. Jamie fought sleep. Every night Jemma and I took turns to battle with him, but for short term gain we made the ridiculous decision to rock him off. This set the mother of all precedents and from six months to twelve months old, Jamie would not fall asleep at night without a thirty minute rock session that Guns ‘N’ Roses would have been proud of! Every night, the routine was bottle of milk, wind his back, rock him off. If we did not persist with the rocking for at least thirty minutes and then attempted to put him down in his cot whilst he was half asleep, Jamie would kick, scream and howl and the half-hour rock session would need to be re-started. How a child that could not yet speak or walk could dictate terms to two adults, I really do not know, all I do know is that Jamie managed it.
The whole routine was tiresome. One night, Jemma or myself would have the privilege of bedtime reading with Melissa who was as loveable a three year old girl as you could possibly imagine. Fairy stories and handsome princes were always the order of the night, whilst by default, if we were not cuddling in with Melissa, we would be battling with Jamie. Melissa’s bedtime routine always lasted less than ten minutes, Jamie’s was always more than half an hour. If I had not been there at conception, I would have struggled to believe he was mine! On the nights Jemma put Jamie down, she would eventually come downstairs feeling exhausted, irritated, dismayed that she was not a better mother and at odds with herself. If it was my turn with Jamie, I had almost identical emotions although I obviously questioned my ability as a father. The fact that one or other of us was always trying to curb depression and high blood pressure, did not bode well for harmony in the late evening, child free slot. Our nerves were too frayed for rational and coherent conversations. Silently vegging out in front of some banal nonsense on the television became standard practice. We lost the art to converse.
On one particular evening, it had been my turn to deal with Jamie and, having emerged victorious but battle scarred after a particularly arduous routine, lasting almost an hour, with tears from one side and almost tears from the other, I arrived in the lounge seeking nothing like peace and quiet. What I walked into was nothing like peace and quiet!
Jemma was sat on the nearest two-piece suite to the television. She had changed into her pyjamas already. The days of skimpy, silk pyjamas had long gone, these were pyjamas designed to cover every ounce of flesh below the neck. It was sometimes hard to believe we were in our twenties not our fifties. I threw myself back on the other settee. We had two, two seaters. In the days before Jamie, we would have cuddled together on one, we now had one each. As soon as I was sat, Jemma switched the TV off with the remote. A tell tale sign. Switching the TV off in the evenings in our house was equivalent to taking swords out their holsters. It meant one or other of us was ready for verbal conflict.
“He’s a bloody nightmare at the moment, isn’t he?” Jemma began.
“Too right. We need to do this ‘tough love’ thing, Jemma. The controlled crying that Jim and Amy did with Gracie, when she was playing up at this age. It worked for them. We just can’t go on like this, Jamie’s eleven months old now, he’s getting too big to rock off. If we don’t get it sorted, we’ll still be doing this when he’s thirteen!”
“Lucky we’ve only got one like him,” Jemma said, “imagine
if we had two!”
“I know,” I replied, “thank goodness Melissa’s as good as gold.”
“I didn’t mean, Melissa. I meant, imagine how bad it would be if we had another baby and that baby was as difficult as Jamie? That would be hell on earth.”
I could feel the tremors coming, but was still unsure as to why this earthquake was about to erupt. I attempted to douse the flames but it was futile, a bit like standing on the edge of an erupting volcano with a bucket of water.
“Not really something we need to worry about right now, Jemma, given the circumstances.”
The circumstances I was referring to were our monk and nun-like existence. In the last few months, our once a month sex had dwindled to once every few months.
“I think you should have a vasectomy, Richie.”
My natural state is calm. Admittedly though, when pushed, I do have a tendency to overreact. I don’t just think I was being pushed here, I was being manhandled! I became as prickly as a porcupine sandwich.
“Is this your idea of a joke, Jemma, as I’m not finding it very funny?”
“No, I’m serious, Richie. Jamie has changed us. We’re always on edge these days, but we are just about managing, we wouldn’t manage if we had a third child though. You need a vasectomy.”
My ears were now doing their own opinion of a volcano. Lava was spilling out along with the steam.
“Am I missing something here, Jemma? Surely a vasectomy is a measure that allows sex but protects against the risk of pregnancy. Given we have a ‘no sex allowed’ policy in this household at the moment, what is it that we are protecting against? Are you fearful of landing on the wet patch if I have a saucy dream?”
Jemma switched the TV back on. This annoyed me even more. “What do you think you are doing, Jemma?”
“I wanted a reasonable conversation,” she said, “if I’m going to have to listen to your ‘poor celibate me’ speech again, I may as well watch TV.”
“Hang on! I have the ‘Poor celibate me’ speech because I AM CELIBATE!”
I stood up and switched the TV off again from the power button then returned to my settee.
“On that basis,” I continued, “my argument is a consistent one. Your argument, however, is a completely shit one! Your argument is,
‘Richie, given we never have sex, how about you have a vasectomy?’”
I do not know if it is all women or just Jemma, but if an argument is being lost, Jemma has an ability to make it about something completely different, to somehow attempt to shift the balance of power back in her favour.
“I know very well why you don’t want a vasectomy,” Jemma announced moodily.
“So do I, because we don’t have sex!”
“No, no, Richie, do not pretend that’s it!”
“I am not pretending anything, sweetheart.”
I used the word ‘sweetheart’ in derogatory tones.
“Yes, you are! The real reason you do not want a vasectomy is because you want more children.”
“Believe me, Jemma, the last thing that I want is for you and I to have more children.”
“Oh I know that,” Jemma said, “you want children with someone else.”
“Jemma, you are just being fucking balmy now!”
Neither Jemma nor I tended to swear. If you swear all the time, its impact is diminished. If you rarely swear, when you do, whoever you direct your profanities towards knows you mean business! I was at the end of my tether. Jemma persisted with her non-sensical logic.
“I know you, Richie. Better than you know yourself. The reason you don’t want a vasectomy is in case we split up and you end up with some young, pretty, childless woman.”
“That’s just complete crap, Jemma! The reason I don’t want a vasectomy, is because I do not want some doctor to take a pair of scissors to my balls, to inflict unnecessary agony, rendering me spermless, a result which you already inflict painlessly every night by your abstinence.”
“Your ball.” Jemma stated heartlessly, reminding me that one of my testicles was as real as the tooth fairy.
“Thanks!”
“Richie, as well as the fact that we are always shattered, have you not considered that the fear of pregnancy may also be playing a part in my lack of sexual appetite?”
“Don’t use that as a new excuse, Jemma! Once I was snipped and there was no going back, I am sure I would end up discovering that the bedroom was still passion free. You would not be interested whether I was a Jaffa or not!”
“Why would you want to go back to being a sperm maker? See, you’re planning ahead! Planning life with your second wife.”
“Jemma, you are just insane!”
“No, I’m not. We don’t want more kids, so if you had a vasectomy and it did not result in more sex, why would you want it reversed? Not for more kids with me, we’ve established that!”
“Jemma, let’s get one thing straight. Having kids with someone else had not crossed my mind for one single second until you brought it up. That is not what I want. What I want is to get our marriage back on track. To be like we used to be. To enjoy each other’s company, feel very positive about life and yes, sometimes, have a bit of passion. Is that too much to ask?”
“Sometimes it is. Life is a struggle sometimes. Most of the time. Richie, you have an escape, you go off to work every morning and can completely forget about everything at home for eight or nine hours. I can’t. I have to clean the dishes, clean the toilets, wash and iron the mountain of clothes, vacuum, change nappies, struggle to get Jamie off for his afternoon sleep, entertain Melissa, feed them both, which is a battle in itself and then when you arrive home, I have to feed you and be all happy and cheery and act like a dirty little whore if you are up for a shag! Get real, Richie! You need to start taking a dose of reality every day!”
“Does our life have to be this miserable?”
“Richie, our life is not miserable. We have two beautiful children, one of whom is very hard work. He is not doing it because he is a vindictive little sod, he is doing it because he knows no different. I don’t think our life is miserable, it’s just pretty tough, but it will get easier once we sort Jamie out. It would also get easier if you started helping me more around the house, instead of just playing on the Playstation and complaining that I’m not wanting sex every day.”
“Jemma, if you need more help around the house, all you needed to do was ask.”
“I shouldn’t have to ask, Richie.”
“I’ll help.”
“Good. And the vasectomy?”
“I’m not having a vasectomy. I’ll tell you what, once we start having sex three or four times a month and we are actually running a risk of pregnancy, then I’ll have a vasectomy.”
I don’t know how we managed it, but sometimes, just when it looked like the argument had finished, we managed to kickstart it again. Jemma did not take kindly to this suggestion. Her mouth sagged at both ends.
“Is that your way of blackmailing me into sex, Richie?”
“If I have to blackmail you into sex, Jemma, I would rather not bother.”
“Good!”
On cue, Jamie started crying again. I dragged myself up off the sofa and was all set to go to tend to him, but could not resist one parting shot.
“You know what, Jemma, maybe you are right. Maybe I should preserve my sperm for my second wife, some young beauty who is happy to see me each night rather than be sick of the sight of me like you.”
Jemma did not take the bait, she just struck back.
“Best of luck finding a young beauty who would be interested in you! Divorced, two kids, lazy, crap in bed! They’ll be queuing up!”
Kelly
“So she did just fall!”
“Absolutely.”
“But Jemma did play her part, because she did have a knife.”
“Only to keep Mum away.”
Anna and I were sat next to a roaring fire in the bar area of Anna’s hotel, drinking Sambucas. I had
told her the whole story of Mum’s demise, from the very beginning, Mum’s life of drinking and partying, the various one night stands and stepdads, how she had turned on Jemma and began regularly beating her. Every minute detail was discussed. I just changed one little bit. In this version of events, I managed not to charge out of my room like a wild bull, I just stayed in there, frightened and sobbing.
In this parallel universe, Mum fell as she had been drinking all day, so had lost her footing and tumbled, she did not die because I had pushed her. I preferred this version! Anna seemed to like it too. Hopefully, she would be as much of a gossip as she appeared to be and when she flew back home, she would spread the word that Jemma Watkinson was innocent and so was her sister, Kelly.
“Do you not feel guilty?” Anna asked as she made circles on the table with her Sambuca glass.
“What about?”
I needed to clarify what Anna was asking. I did feel guilty, incredibly guilty, about killing my mother, but Anna didn’t know she died at my hands, so I had to establish what else I might be feeling guilty about.
“Abandoning your sister. From what you have told me, Jemma was the main victim throughout. She had to endure the beatings, she had to protect you from your mother, yet when the chips were down and she needed you most, you abandoned her. You let her face the trial alone. If you had testified, told the court everything that you’ve told me, Jemma would not have gone to jail.”
I thought about the question. I had to dilute my real answer, as my real answer was that I did feel guilty, but given the circumstances, I really should have felt a lot worse. It was all my doing, yet Jemma went to jail. I should have been far more supportive than I had been and I should have made more effort to right my wrong, but I had done nothing. I had made no effort to contact Jemma at all. If I was completely honest, I would have confessed that I did not even think about Jemma all that often, I had just tried to put the whole incident out of my mind. For the first time in many years, I was overcome with a sense of guilt and a desire to see Jemma. A burning desire.
“Are you OK?” Anna asked. I hadn’t answered her question and probably wore a troubled expression.