by Chris Power
Joe felt, somehow, that he didn’t have any right to try and draw Eva out of her silence. It exasperated him, but he felt like he deserved it. He couldn’t tell her about Gwen. He thought he could explain why it had happened, but decided he would tell her later, when she was better.
It was during dinner, more than a fortnight after Eva got back, Marie in bed and most of a bottle of wine gone, that she said, ‘I’ll tell you something if you want. About where I’ve been.’
‘I’d love that,’ Joe said. ‘I didn’t want to ask till you were ready.’
She smiled in a joyless way, warping Joe’s hopefulness into aggravation. Did every little interaction need to be so fucking hard?
‘I was in Stresa,’ she said, emptying the bottle into their glasses, ‘on Lake Maggiore. It’s perfect. Like someone’s dream of what an Italian lake town would be like. All day long I could just walk the streets or sit on the shore. There was no timetable. No need to be anywhere.’
Joe felt the comment implicated him and Marie, but kept silent.
‘I met some people there, other tourists. We were all in the same bar a few nights in a row, two couples and a man whose wife had died the year before. It was the anniversary of her death and they’d been in Stresa together so many times that he wanted to come back. That sounds morbid, but it didn’t at the time. It seemed quite beautiful, actually.
‘We used to meet around ten. Someone suggested having dinner together, so we arranged it for the next night. It was all very easy, very sweet. But I lay awake all that night. I’d said something terrible at the bar, I realised, and now everyone was laughing at me behind my back. Not just my companions – the whole town was against me.’ Her eyes, unfocused, looked at the remains of their dinner.
What did you think you’d said?’
‘I have no idea, but what I was feeling was shame. Unbearable shame. And I heard this … this bell ringing somewhere in the town and I kept thinking how lonely it would be out on the lake, hearing that distant bell, and then I realised –’ she paused and stabbed the table with her finger, ‘– that was where I deserved to be, stranded somewhere out there.’
‘On the lake? Why?’
‘As punishment. Punishment for the crime I’d committed. It was horrific to realise. I cried and I couldn’t stop crying. If I hadn’t been so terrified at the thought of leaving my room I would have run immediately.’
‘What crime? What does that mean?’
‘Before Stresa I’d been walking about twenty K every day,’ Eva said. She massaged her temples and blinked once, twice. ‘Maybe I was exhausted. But that night I couldn’t sleep. The morning was a disaster. My body felt huge and slack. The sun on the lake was too bright. The water from the shower felt like nails in my skin. And there was that feeling of a punishment waiting just outside my door. Walking into the dining room for breakfast was like walking into court. I was convinced everyone was staring at me, and that they were disgusted by what they saw. It was unbearable. I took a ferry to the islands the town overlooks. Tiny, tiny islands, you’ve seen everything in an hour, but I spent the whole day on them, pacing up and down. I couldn’t sit down. Couldn’t be still. By the time I got back it was twilight, and all the windows of the town were yellow patches in this deep blue darkness they have there; it’s like the lake seeps into the atmosphere.
‘Of course I didn’t go anywhere near the restaurant – I couldn’t risk being seen. I found the grottiest bar, somewhere I was sure those people would never go, and I drank a bottle of wine. I felt calmer then.’ She raised her almost empty glass to Joe and tipped the last of the wine into her mouth.
‘Did you see them again?’ he said.
‘I made sure I didn’t. I paid my bill that night and left very early in the morning. I took a train to Locarno and stayed for a week. I felt better there, a lot better. I didn’t talk to anyone; it felt wonderful. Then up to Zurich, then home.’
There was a long silence. ‘Was it like Innsbruck?’ Joe said.
‘No, nothing like it,’ Eva said. She looked up to the ceiling, thinking. ‘In Innsbruck I was calm, happy even. I’d made a decision; I knew what I was doing. Here I felt … fear.’
‘Of what?’
‘Of who knows what,’ she said, slumping down with her fist supporting her head. It was difficult for Joe to tell if she was tired or just bored of the conversation.
‘You have to see someone,’ he said. ‘A doctor, no more avoiding it.’
She leaned back in her seat and rubbed her eyes. ‘You’re right,’ she said through a yawn. ‘You’re right, you’re right. No point running away, right?’
*
The next day Marie’s nursery called Joe to say that Eva hadn’t collected her. He tried calling her when he was on his way, but it went straight to voicemail. When he and Marie got home the house was dark. There was a note on the kitchen table, a few lines in pencil on a torn piece of paper:
I need to be somewhere else for a while. You’ll hear from me.
Eva
They didn’t see her again for seven years.
*
Dr Järnfors’s voicemail is brief. ‘Eva has requested to see you and Marie, Mr Dewar. Will you come?’
*
Marie didn’t understand what had happened. At bedtime she would ask if her mamma was coming home tomorrow. ‘Not tomorrow,’ Joe said, ‘but hopefully soon.’ She developed a superstitious attachment to the couch. ‘That’s Mamma’s place,’ she said if anyone else sat on it. Joe would have liked to burn the thing.
When it had become apparent Eva wouldn’t be working for a while Joe had set up a direct debit to cover her expenses, so he knew she had access to some money. But it wasn’t enough to pay for the travelling she was doing. A couple of months after her disappearance a postcard from Japan appeared on the doormat. A month later another arrived, from Canada. Sometimes two came in a month, sometimes one in half a year, but always from somewhere different: Mexico, Vietnam, France, Norway. He wondered what kind of work she was picking up along the way. The cards never said anything about it. They never said much at all.
Slovenia 21/04/12
You two,
The woods here are full of yellow morels. Mornings
are the best time.
Love, Eva
Rome 03/06/14
I hope London is behaving itself and being good to you both. Rome is OK.
I am well.
Eva
Istanbul 19/02/16
Happy new year, have an amazing 2016 Marie & Joe.
Eva
None was any longer or more informative. When the first card arrived Joe thought about going to look for her, but knew it would be folly.
‘Where’s Mamma now?’ Marie asked at bedtime, in the dim glow of her nightlight.
‘Well, the last postcard was from Greece, wasn’t it?’
‘But that was ages ago. Where is she now?’
‘I don’t know, Pluff, but she’ll let us know.’
‘Why is she away?’
‘Mum’s not very well,’ Joe said. ‘She needs time to get better.’
‘But why is she going to all those places?’
‘She’s looking for something she needs.’
‘What is it?’
‘She isn’t sure. I don’t suppose she’ll know until she finds it.’
A pattern developed. When a card arrived, whichever of them found it on the mat would leave it propped on the kitchen table where the other would see it. Joe never brought it up but waited until Marie wanted to talk about it, usually a day or two after it came. ‘Mum’s in Finland,’ she’d say, or Gran Canaria, or Warsaw. Then they would discuss whatever morsel of information the card contained – The beach is always windy; I saw a firework competition; In the morning there is ice on the inside of my window – and these became the only times they spoke about Eva. Marie was a thoughtful girl who had never chattered much, but Joe thought her reticence when it came to her mum was different. Deeper. An inability
to speak more than unwillingness. He would never say it, but he sometimes thought it would have been better if Eva had died, like her own mother had. Then Marie would have been able to get on with getting over it.
But Eva had not died, and the day came when a postcard arrived with a picture of an apple orchard on the front. Joe thought it looked like an English scene, and as he turned it over the familiarity of the stamp sent a shock through him. Eva was living in Sussex, the card said, and she wanted Marie to come and visit her there.
*
Joe thinks the shock then was greater than what he is feeling now. Back then he thought, briefly, about not going to see her at all, but knew he couldn’t do that to Marie. Now, though, he is certain he won’t tell her he knows where Eva is. If he tells her that he’s going away he’ll make something up. He is convinced that it’s better this way.
*
Eva didn’t say why she had come back, or how she came to be living in Hurstpierpoint, a village at the foot of the South Downs. The house she was renting was near the station, a shabby end-of-terrace two-bed with the crisp remains of a dead ivy snaking across its exterior.
On that first visit Eva came to the door with a tin holding a charred square of sponge. ‘I baked you a cake,’ she said, talking to Marie. ‘A recipe of my mamma’s, only hers was edible.’ They went to the pub on the high street for some food, and for an hour mostly listened to the talk of people around them. But despite the awkwardness it was friendly enough, particularly between Marie and Eva. They were so obviously alike now Joe was seeing them together again.
They went back to the house for a cup of coffee, and before they left Joe asked Marie to explore what she could of the overgrown garden so he could have a word with her mum. He watched Marie from the window, talking to herself and peering into the brambles.
‘You look well,’ Joe said.
‘Thanks, you too,’ Eva said.
‘You feel well?’
‘Good as I look,’ she said, laughing a little.
‘I need to know you’re better, Eva. I need to know you’re not going to run away again.’
‘I am. I won’t.’
Joe turned to look at her. She was smiling at him. ‘You’ve felt better before,’ he said.
‘I don’t like the way you’re speaking to me, Joe.’
‘Well I’m sorry about that, but she’s what I care about,’ he said, pointing out of the window and struggling not to raise his voice. ‘She loves you, and I won’t let you abuse that.’
Eva shook her head and looked away. ‘You’ll see,’ she said. ‘No point in talking.’
‘Did you enjoy that?’ Joe asked Marie on the drive back up to London. It was dark, the red stream of the A23 flowing ahead of them through the night.
Marie didn’t say anything for a long time. Joe began to think she was asleep, but then she turned her head towards him. ‘I loved it,’ she said, before turning back to the dark fields beyond her window.
Joe remained wary, but everything Eva did indicated she was sticking around. She found work at a production house in Brighton and she got a puppy, a Boston terrier she named Loki.
Marie was an independent eleven-year-old: on weekday evenings she had to be at home, but at the weekends she made day-long plans with her friends. Each time an invitation to Hurstpierpoint came, though, she cancelled them.
After a few of these day visits, during which Joe stuck around to make sure Eva was well enough to look after Marie, he agreed to let her stay over every other weekend. In London he would only see her for a few hours between Friday and Sunday night; she was staying over at her friend Harriet’s house, or sleeping half the day and rushing out of the front door as soon as she had dragged herself from her room and showered. In the evenings, when she was home, she was in her room or gazing into her phone, oblivious to anything else. But there was no Harriet to lure her in Sussex, and Joe suspected that even the excitement of her phone paled beside the novelty of Eva’s return. He told himself he was being ridiculous, but as he drove down to Hurstpierpoint on a dull, cold Sunday afternoon – Marie complained she could take the train, but he insisted – he first envied then resented the mother– daughter bonding ritual he felt he was about to disrupt.
He called when he was getting close and beeped the horn when he pulled up. He didn’t feel like going in today. The house depressed him, with its render that flaked like diseased skin and windows opaque with condensation in cold weather. Now the garden was a brown wasteland, while in summer it transformed into an impenetrable thicket of hairy nettles. Inside there was almost nothing of Eva’s on show beyond some trinkets on the gloss-tiled mantelpiece and a few postcards stuck to the fridge door.
He wondered what she did when Marie wasn’t with her. Was there a man? Men? She was still attractive. But Marie would have told him if there was anyone she knew about. He wouldn’t ask Eva himself; since she came back they had both kept their distance. Marie was their common ground, a boundary beyond which neither of them, he was sure, wanted to stray.
The only other thing they spoke about was money. Eva asked Joe to cancel the direct debit he had left in place for years, and said she wanted to repay what she had spent. ‘It was never a loan,’ he said, ‘I wanted you to have it.’ But she insisted.
*
The drive from London to Sussex became so familiar that even now, so many years later, Joe feels he could do it blindfolded. He never let Marie take the train. ‘It’s our quality time,’ he said, although the drives often passed in near silence, Marie absorbed in her phone. Sometimes, mostly on the Sussex-to-London leg, they argued. Joe wouldn’t have admitted it at the time, but he was jealous. He had stayed and Eva had gone, so why did Marie want to be with her more than him? Now Eva is back, and wants to see Marie again, the old wounds are reopening. He is surprised at how keenly he feels them, and how relentlessly they drag him into the past. He remembers that autumn afternoon when his arrival felt like an indefensible intrusion. Whether it was real or not he felt waves of resentment coming off Marie, and neither of them spoke for the first part of the drive home.
‘Did you get out with Loki much?’ he eventually asked. It had been a wet weekend.
‘Of course,’ Marie said. ‘An hour each day.’
‘You and that dog must have covered every inch of the Downs,’ he said. ‘Canny move, getting him.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘What?’ Joe said, playing dumb.
‘What, you mean she got Loki for me? As, what, bait or something? That’s twisted, Dad. Mamma loves that dog. She’d be all alone in that house if it wasn’t for him, you know.’
‘What did you get up to, anyway?’ Joe said.
‘Stuff.’
‘That’s not very informative, Marie.’
‘Things!’ she sighed, putting her foot up on the glove box and looking out at the twilit countryside. The way she pushed her jaw forward in anger reminded Joe of Eva.
‘Foot,’ he said. She returned it heavily to the floor. ‘What things?’
‘Which things.’
‘What, which, whatever,’ Joe said. ‘What. Did. You. Do.’
‘Went for walks,’ Marie said, exasperatedly. ‘Drank coffee. Talked.’
‘What did you talk about?’
Marie didn’t answer right away. Joe glanced over. She wasn’t frowning or rolling her eyes as he expected, she was simply looking straight ahead. ‘She told me about a trip to Spain. Catalonia.’
‘When she was away?’ ‘Away’ was the word they used. Joe was trying to think if a postcard came to mind.
‘No. Before you guys met.’
His resentment flared. Something she’d never told him about.
‘She’s a really good storyteller, Dad.’
‘She is,’ he said, nodding.
‘No,’ Marie said, ‘I mean really good. When she was talking it was like I was there.’ She laughed. ‘You know, there was this man,’ she began, then stopped.
‘
What man?’ Joe said. ‘In Spain?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘Tell you another time.’ She leaned back in her seat. Soon she was asleep, and didn’t wake until they got snarled in traffic at Mitcham. When they got home she flopped on the couch, in her own world, messaging her friends – Eva among them, maybe, Joe thought. Later she stood, stretched, and with a mute wave went to bed.
*
Joe calls Marie but she doesn’t pick up. He remembers the call he took from her a few months before. It was August and she and her boyfriend Matt were still in Edinburgh. They had decided to stay for the Festival, but even as he asked her if they’d seen anything good he saw how nervous she looked, and she interrupted him before he could finish.
‘Dad. I’m pregnant, Dad. We’re going to have a baby.’
Joe knew it was his turn to speak, but no words came.
She winced. ‘Sorry. I was going to say it a bit more … measuredly than that.’
‘Oh, Marie,’ Joe said.
‘That doesn’t sound happy. Can you sound happy for me?’
‘Of course I’m happy. But your studies. You aren’t going to be a doctor?’
‘Yes. I mean … I’m still going to be. Just, like, not as quickly or, I guess, uncomplicatedly as I thought.’
Joe covered his eyes with his hand and massaged his temples.
‘Listen, Dad,’ she said, stern now, ‘this wasn’t a mistake or something, OK? I wanted this to happen. This was my idea.’
She stabbed the screen, leaving Joe staring at his reflection.
*
Eva cancelled the next visit to Hurstpierpoint at short notice, and a week later sent Joe an email explaining that she wanted Marie to have Loki, whom she had left with a neighbour. She had given notice on her house and paid her bills. I feel something coming, she wrote, and I need to get away before it arrives. Joe had never wanted to hurt someone so much. Fifty-three years old and running away. He didn’t know how he was going to tell Marie, but when he saw her he realised she already knew. He tried to comfort her but she wouldn’t let him. Nor would she show him what Eva had written to her. For several days they barely spoke, and when a parcel arrived for Marie containing Eva’s old travel guide – with no note – she didn’t talk about it. He never saw her look at the book.