by Anna Maxted
“Tara?” I gasp.
“Yes! Why, are there any others I should know about?” As my mother tends to treat jokes with the suspicion that most people reserve for slavering dogs, this verbal frivolity suggests the extent of her delight.
“Oh, Mum!” I whisper. “What happened, what did she say?”
My mother turns away in a quick, practiced move and sniffs. Then in a matter-of-fact tone, she declares, “Your brother showed me all the letters and cards he’s received over the years. And the pictures. He keeps them in his kitchen drawer. The number was there—to ring—but I decided it would be more prudent to write. It doesn’t take long for a letter to reach Australia these days. Kelly rang me this morning—at 7 A.M.!—five in the evening, her time, she would have received my letter that morning. I knew who it was. We…we spoke for seventeen minutes. She’s an artist. She has her own little gallery. A soft-spoken young lady, knows her own mind—you can tell, and then she put Tara on, she has the same—it took my breath away—exactly the same energy that Tony has, had at her age, a very friendly exuberant little girl, very direct, terribly grown up. She likes body surfing and computer games, she told me. And she recently finished with her boyfriend. At the age of eleven!”
I stare eagerly at my mother, and nod for her to continue.
She smiles.
“And then what?” I say.
My mother looks thoughtful, as if searching for something. “Tara wanted me to e-mail her a photograph of myself,” she replies, “but I wouldn’t know how. I said I’d have to have one done, and then I’d have to post it.”
“I could help you with that if you like. What else did she say?”
“She wanted to know if it was raining here. And if she should call me ‘Grandma.’ She calls her maternal grandmother ‘Elizabeth.’ Imagine that!”
My mother’s voice has dropped to a husk. If I didn’t know her like I do, I’d shout: But what was it like, to speak to your granddaughter for the first time, how did it feel to hear her voice, to be addressed, for the first time in your life, as Grandma? What else did you talk about? You must be ecstatic, angry, delirious, mournful, joyful—a tutti-frutti of emotions!
But because she’s my mother and I’m me, I don’t ask. All I say is, “Will you…will you…would you be seeing Tara and Kelly at some point?”
My mother clears her throat and declares, “Australia is quite a long way away, and the flights are fairly dear.”
The use of “quite” and “fairly” tells me that she has been investigating the price and time of air travel from London to Sydney since roughly 7:25 this morning, and so has had a good fourteen hours to minimize the cost and distance in her head. For one silly second, I want to throw myself on the floor and blub.
I am brought to my senses by my mother saying briskly, “I’m not used to all this palaver, I feel quite worn out. And you look terrible, as usual. You must eat more, Natalie, you’re looking ill.”
This is a clear sign that the dangerously emotive subject of newfound grandchildren is now closed, at least for today.
“It’s been a difficult week, Mum,” I say. “But I have been eating more. I’ve been”—I try not to wince as I parrot a favorite expression back to her—“trying to feed myself up.”
My mother sighs in blatant disbelief. “Martin was disappointed not to hear from you,” she murmurs, “I know Eeesy-Kleen wasn’t ideal but I was only trying to help. I don’t suppose you’ve thought any more about what you’re going to do?” I am considering how to answer this question and not precipitate a silence, when the phone rings. My mother, whose relationship with the phone is one more commonly encountered in sixteen-year-old girls, races to it.
“Hello?” she says breathlessly, then “Jackie! Pronto! How lovely to hear from you! I know, you’ve been at the deli all day, don’t worry, I understand, yes, oh yes, that would be lovely, I’d love to pop in tomorrow, what time? Five-thirty, fine. How are you, how’s Robert? And the children? Mind you, I hardly need to ask, I’ve got Natalie standing right here, she can update me on both of them!”
Mrs. Edwards has a deep, sonorous voice, and while my mother presses the receiver tight to her ear, Jackie’s every word is clearly audible. She asks how I am. I feel myself blush.
My mother clicks to her default setting of wringy-handed mode. “Not too good,” she declares sorrowfully, her eyes running over me yet avoiding mine. “Still painfully thin, but what can you do, she won’t listen to me, I’ve tried everything”—hang on, I think, I’ve gained two whole wobbling pounds of flesh here, talk about ungrateful—“And what’s more, the ballet company gave her the elbow. It’s all so upsetting. Jobs are so hard to come by these days. I found a position for her in my friend’s dry cleaner, but no, no, she wouldn’t hear of it. I realize it was hardly ideal but surely it’s better than nothing? Oh, Jackie, do you think Natalie will get another job? You know I do worry.”
Purely so as not to run out the door, I employ my Pilates breathing technique (same as normal breathing except each breath lasts five times as long, thus after you’ve slowly expelled one lungful of carbon dioxide, the possibility of suffocation is so grippingly imminent you swiftly forget all secondary concerns). I take a deep desperate gasping gulp of air and nearly miss Jackie’s reply. Happily, her words are emphatic enough to penetrate the wind-suck.
“Of course Natalie will get a job!” she booms. “She will get a wonderful job, she is such a clever girl! Sheila, it is crazy to worry, you must have faith in her! Ah! Uno momento, Barbara is here, she wants to have a word.”
My mother’s face falls and reluctantly she passes me her precious phone. I stare at it, in terror. “Take it,” exclaims my mother, waving the receiver like a rattle. “It won’t bite you!”
30
GUILT IS A PUNISHMENT APERITIF. A SORT OF misery to begin with, until the full-blown three-course punishment is served. It makes you rue the day before the day even arrives.
When my mother hands me the phone, I know the game is up. My legs go floppy and I have to sit down (thank heaven for my mother’s hallway pride and joy—a gaudily upholstered Louis XIV chair from Harrods). If only I was…that china basket full of china posies over there, if only I enjoyed confrontation: some people relish it—to me, that’s like enjoying your own execution. Or sitting through an evening of experimental dance.
“B-Babs?” I stammer, as the nausea laps at my throat.
“Natalie,” says Babs. At her stony tone my entire digestive tract spasms in fear. It’s like an anaconda squeezing a goat to death in there.
“Yes?” I croak.
I hear Babs take a deep breath. Then she says, “I’m very angry with you.”
My stomach heaves and I drop the phone and speed to the toilet—“We don’t say ‘loo’ in this house!”—and gag and gag until there is nothing left to eject.
“Natalie! Are you okay?” shouts my mother, rapping gently on the door.
“Fine,” I gurgle.
“Babs says to phone her when you’re feeling better,” bawls my mother. “Would you like me to call Dr. Eastgate?”
“No thanks,” I squeak, wondering if “when you’re feeling better” is code for “when you’ve atoned for your crime.”
I stagger out of the toilet three minutes later, trembling. Andy must have stropped straight round and told her.
My mother feels my forehead and tuts. “You’re all clammy. You must be sickening for something. I knew you weren’t well. I think you should go straight to bed. Why don’t you sleep here? Your bed’s made, and I don’t feel comfortable with you driving home in this state.”
Normally, the thought of sleeping in my old bedroom would not appeal. My mother hasn’t redecorated and it remains cloyingly pink and frilly: the lacy eiderdown, the neat row of bears and Barbies, the dollhouse, the tea set, the play cooker, the Sleeping Beauty night-light—a spooky shrine to Natalie Miller age seven, as if I’d died in a car crash.
Even spookier, all evidence of my te
enage self has been silently removed—the Duran Duran posters, gone, replaced by a Holly Hobbie height chart, my modest collection of nail varnish, vanished, replaced by a clutch of pottery animals, the sort you once got free with petrol. She must have ransacked the attic one wet weekend after watching Changing Rooms—her mission, to return my childhood possessions to their original home. Tony’s bedroom received the same treatment (blue decor, toy trains, Lego, plastic guns, cowboy hat, water pistols, etc.—all intact). As Babs would say: Ker-eepy!
And Babs is the reason that I am delighted to accept my mother’s kind invitation. If I go home Babs might bash the door down—it’s her job—except she won’t have to because her brother has a key. I shudder. For a capitalist turned hippie turned loud emotional incontinent, Andy is a force to be reckoned with. Or, in my case, to be avoided.
“If you need something to wear, your Snow White nightgown is under the pillow,” trills my mother as I climb the stairs. Then, quietly to herself, “And it’ll still fit, more’s the pity.” And louder, to me, “Shall I bring up a mug of Horlicks?” “Yes, okay,” I say, planning to tip it down the sink.
I switch on the pink lightbulb, which transforms the room into either a fairy grotto or a cheap brothel. I slowly undress, wash my face, and crawl into my ludicrously soft bed and close my eyes. It’s strange to be in a single bed again, I feel like I’m lying in a luxury open coffin. I decide not to add to the illusion by putting on the Snow White nightie.
As it happens, I develop a violent migraine and stay in bed till Friday. The day that Matt assigned for my farewell drink. He suggested we meet outside the Coliseum at 4 P.M. and that I “keep the rest of the afternoon free in case it turns nasty.” This is a not a problem as, currently, all my afternoons are free for the rest of my life. I ring him to check it’s still okay with him. “Front of house, at four, unless you’re standing me up,” he says. I smile for the first time in days.
I should also ring Babs. I know I should, but I physically cannot. It’s like that moment with a home sugaring kit, where your bikini line is smothered in sticky gunk, the cotton strip is smoothed over it, there’s no way out, you’re braced to rip a forest of hardcore hair out of its roots and and and—your arm refuses to budge. Of course it does! It knows that to obey the mad brain order: “jerk sharply backward” will cause intense eye-watering pain. It’s deserted the obviously defective mother ship to exercise independent sense.
So I don’t ring. To ring Babs would be suicide! Fight or flight?—what rubbish, there’s no option! I’m surprised I wasn’t born with wings. Babs has always told me off for being self-destructive—and my decision is a glowing example of how far I’ve progressed. Or so I tell myself. In fact, I am a porridge of angst. I think, Call her, go on, call her, and my heart shrivels and I don’t. I can’t bear to face up to what she thinks of me. Maybe I’ll write a letter.
Matt takes one look at me and pronounces me the image of heroin chic. I’m pleased, until he adds, “Put some weight on, girl.” I scowl and tell him I’ve had a bug. Then I bend to pat Paws, and feel a potatolike object—my brain perhaps—roll ominously toward the front of my cranium. I hurriedly stand straight again. “Are, er, Belinda and Mel not coming?”
“Don’t be daft,” says Matt. “They’ve got some things to sort out. They’ll join us in the pub in a few minutes.” I nod, and try not to wonder at the irony of being booted out, then having my ignoble departure joyously toasted. But as we troop down the road to the Chandos, the ridiculous nature of the situation booms louder and louder in my head until I’m mute with humiliation and unable to think of a word, let alone say it. (Not strictly true—I could ask, “So, has Paws had any ear infections lately?” but even I have some pride.)
“What’s the problem?” demands Matt.
I give him a look. “Which one?”
He grins as I hand him a beer. “I knew it had to be more than a bug. Tell Auntie Matt all about it. By the way, Stephen loved the book. He sends a big kiss.”
“I send it back, if you know what I mean.”
We slide into a booth, and I pick a problem. Not the Babs one, it’s too private, too raw. Tony? What the hell. I tell him about Tony. His eyes pop, and every so often he squawks, “Blimey!” I don’t want to burden him with the full weight of my woes, so I also tell him about the Ikkle Lambkin/Big Daddy Bear exchange. He nearly ruptures laughing. “She’s an exhibitionist,” he gasps, “but that’s obscene!” Then he adds, “As for your brother, someone wants to be a dad more than they let on.”
“They do?”
“Natalia, what else do you think all that googly woogly stuff is about?”
“I thought it was about trying to repulse bystanders.”
“Darling. A basic psychology lesson. There are all sorts of roles one fulfill’s in a relationship, and being a parent to your lover is one of them.”
I try not to look stupid.
“Partly,” Matt continues, “because one’s biological parents tend to botch the job, so we search for a partner who can fix their mistakes. It’s a secondary concern, obviously, as our primary quest is for a partner who isn’t a founder member of the kennel club. Paws, you didn’t hear that. You ever met Mel’s parents, Nat?” I shake my head.
“Her mother is Bronwen West. Now she was an exceptional dancer. Mel can put on a show but, well, there’s no comparison. Or rather, unfortunately, there is. As for Mr. Pritchard. Not what you call a hands-on dad. Threw a lot of money at her, got her into ballet school, presumed his job done.”
“I didn’t know any of this. Poor Mel.”
“Not at all,” declares Freud, draining his beer. “Clara has found her Drosselmeyer, and Tony likes being a daddy more than he thinks he does.” I jump, guiltily, as a figure in a fifties screen siren coat smacks a hand on the table and crows, “It’s all sorted!”
“Belly!” says Matt.
Belinda smiles, and I thank god my name isn’t Belinda, the trauma of “Belly” would have me hospitalized by now. She slides into the booth and in the name of decency (although it’s a bit late now) Matt and I abandon our dissection of Mel and Tony’s relationship.
“I’ve missed you, Bel,” I say. “Shielding me from friends and family. I don’t suppose anyone’s rung for me? Anyone who doesn’t know I’ve, er, left?”
Belinda looks heavenward, in a parody of deep thought. “Ooh, no, not as I recall.”
“If there were any messages, might you”—I say the words, knowing their futility—“have written them down?”
Belinda grins. “Yeah, right!” Matt arches an eyebrow and she deletes the grin. “I would of, if there were any,” she says. “But I ’aven’t, so there couldn’t of been.” Silence falls as we ponder this, until Mel bursts in—freezing briefly at the door so that everyone can admire—walks over, an elegant duck, and starts talking. Last night—saw the Kirov—Swan Lake—and oh!—feels like a buffalo—all so tiny, so slender, no muscle bulking, the girls—steel wires (“thteel wireth”), so strong, so well rehearsed—GL Ballet—never given time to rehearse—and the corps!—like watching a ballet through a kaleidoscope—the lines, immaculate—not a toe out of place, not a wobble—apparently drilled, poked with sticks, from the age of seven—the elegance—drummed in—the GL Ballet, dumplings, amateurs—this pain in her back—murderous, and GL Ballet—doing Swan Lake in July—the nerve to follow the Kirov!—costume—a white all-in-one—horrifying, you look ten times fatter—ridiculous that the GLB doesn’t have a full-time Pilates coach—needs to trim her thighs—so selfish, Julietta—a private coach—
“I know a Pilates teacher!” I cry, thrilled to be of use. “She teaches at my gym.”
“Doeth she teach privately? I can’t train with ordinary people. I need to debulk, and Pilates is the best way.”
“Is it? I mean, you don’t sweat that much.”
“Natalie. It streamlines, it debulks, it elongates the muscles! That’s why dancers do Pilates!”
“I thought it was to help them r
ecover from injury,” I say humbly, using my Pilates breathing technique to take an efficient drag of nicotine. I’m pleased. I shouldn’t say it. But it’s like discovering that smoking is good for you.
“You two do not need debulking,” growls Matt. “You’re as bulky as a pair of pipe cleaners. You make old Belly here look like a prize heifer, no offense, Belly.”
Belinda—henceforth known as Miss Rhino Hide—cackles.
“Belly,” coos Mel. “What’s the time? I’ve got to warm up for, you know.” Belinda glances at her watch. “Five-thirty. I’ll come with ya.” They kiss me good-bye, and leave.
Matt says, “I’d better get back too.” He pauses. “You wouldn’t do me a huge favor and look after Paws for ten minutes? I’ve got some running around to do.” I hesitate.
“Rehearsal’s over by now,” he adds. “The place’ll be empty.” “Of course,” I reply. “No problem.” We trot back to the Coliseum. When I become aware that we are clicking along the road in foolish unison, I give in and bleat, “So, has Paws had any ear infections lately?” (I’m rewarded with the gratifying answer, “Yes, two.”)
I sit in row E of the deserted auditorium, and Paws—blithely unaware of our dual illegality—falls asleep. The stage is bare, and the blue material on the seat in front of me is worn through. The place is so much smaller empty. But I can’t suppress a shiver of excitement. It’s a house of dreams. I look at the ceiling. Beige and blue. A bit like my color scheme at—
The stage lights shine, and the silence is broken by a pianist striking up a suite from The Nutcracker. I recognize it as the buildup to the Sugar Plum Fairy’s solo. I gulp, and shrink in my seat. The last thing I want is to come face-to-face with Julietta. Matt promised me rehearsals were over. I stare, torn between enchantment and dismay, as a porcelain figure glides to center stage in full luscious costume: a deep fuchsia tutu, its stiff frilly layers paling to the lightest pink, white tights, pink satin pointe shoes, and a starry tiara. I sit bolt upright. Mel! It’s Mel. She looks straight at me, stretches out an arm, smiles, and curtseys.