by Beth Miller
The ink runs thick as I write, leaving a string of little blots across the paper.
Congregant’s name: Laura Ellis
Name of deceased: Michael Cline
Age at death: 65
Relationship to congregant: Stepfather
Other relevant friends/relations: Wife, Olivia Cline. Granddaughter, Evie Ellis
It’s the first official form I’ve filled in for Michael. Mama and Danny dealt with everything else. It makes me realise, properly realise, that’s it. That’s the end of Michael. I won’t see him again.
‘I wish I did have time for confession, Father.’ Sweat slides down my back. Are there any other layers I can take off without scaring the bejesus out of him?
‘So do I. It’s been a long time.’ He smiles. ‘But I understand you’re very busy.’
It’s a relief to get out. A few more minutes and I’d be down to my knickers. Though Father Davies, being short, balding and the wrong side of 60, is not in any sense a fantasy figure, the thought of stripping in front of him turns me on. It makes me think of Danny’s erect prick against my body as we said goodbye, and I feel absolutely horny as hell. I get into the passenger seat and give Huw my best heavy-lidded look. It always used to work. ‘Is there time for, you know, uh, a quick lie-down when we get home? You could shower after.’
‘Ha ha, good one. Right, let’s get going.’ He starts the car.
‘I’m serious! I really feel like it. That doesn’t happen very often these days.’ With you, I add in my head.
He glances at me. ‘Bloody hell, cariad, what happened in there?’
I lean my head against the back of the seat. ‘Never mind, forget I spoke.’
‘Pregnancy hormones, is it?’
‘Forget it, I said.’
Evie’s at a friend’s, so Mama’s on her own in the house, and in a grump. She can’t stand being alone.
‘I organised the prayer for Michael, Mama.’
She nods. ‘Good.’
Thank you, Laura.
‘Father Davies is so kind. It didn’t bother him that Michael wasn’t Catholic.’
‘I should think not, bebita! It would be completely un-Christian to even have such a thought.’
I know I should leave it. ‘Quite a few Christians might have trouble with it, Mama. I’m only saying that Father Davies …’
‘That’s enough, Laura! It’s obvious who really had the problem with Michael.’
‘I don’t! I didn’t.’
‘I think you have always made your feelings crystal clear.’ She slams out of the room, and after a moment I hear the telly blaring.
Huw’s clothes are strewn across the bathroom floor. His blurred pink body shimmers behind the steamed-up shower door. I raise my voice so he can hear me over the noise of the water. ‘Mama just had a right old go at me.’
‘Oh dear, what about?’
‘It was stupid. She said I had a problem with Michael being Jewish.’
He turns off the shower and steps, dripping, onto the mat. ‘That’s crazy, you’ve never minded Yids.’
‘Huw! You can’t say that.’
‘Just trying to cheer you up.’
‘What, by being racist? Mama’s really upset me, it isn’t funny.’
He pulls me close to him, making my clothes damp. ‘I’m sorry, cariad.’
To my surprise, the stirrings of desire return. I really must be starting to forgive Huw for the New Year’s Eve tart; I haven’t felt like touching him for weeks, but now I can’t stop myself. ‘Huw,’ I whisper, ‘do you really have to rush out?’
He doesn’t move, so I unwrap the towel from his waist. Slide my hand down to his penis, slippery from the shower, and stir it into life with my fingers, pressing my face against his neck and kissing the drops of water from his skin. When his breathing gets faster I sink to my knees, a more difficult manoeuvre than I remember, kissing all the way down his chest, till my mouth finds the top of his cock, swollen, clean-tasting. I can easily bring to mind the memory of Danny’s circumcised teenage cock, and I kiss and lick it, teasing, before letting it slowly fill my mouth. Huw sighs, puts his hands on my head and pushes me gently, further down the shaft. I close my eyes and take more and more into my throat. Huw groans. The pulse is banging in my cunt, but he makes no attempt to stop and make love as he usually does, so at last it is I who pull away and lie across the floor, awkwardly as there isn’t quite enough room. Huw kneels between my thighs and pushes my pants down to my ankles. I arch my hips towards him, but as his cock, wet from my mouth, touches the edge of my thigh, he starts to shrivel. I reach for him with my hands, but he says, ‘Shit. Sorry, cariad, it’s no good, it’s gone.’
I struggle to a sitting position. ‘Why? What happened?’
‘I’m really sorry. I don’t know.’ He is holding his limp dick, staring at it. ‘Useless fucking thing.’
This has almost never happened before. Once or twice back during the worst of the split from Carmen, but he can usually do it even if he’s completely smashed.
‘Oh dear, poor you. Don’t worry.’
We are formal and awkward. He starts to get up and I realise he thinks that’s it; that’s the end of the session.
‘Um, Huw. Can you, would you, I mean, I’m still sort of turned on here.’
‘Oh, yes, of course,’ he says politely, and pushes me down again onto my back. As his tongue darts in and out of me, I swim back into my mind. This is Danny; this is Danny giving me head. I come violently, a sharp series of spasms. The last one makes my stomach hurt again like it did in the church, and I yell out.
‘Was that an ecstatic shout?’ Huw sits up on his haunches and wipes his mouth on a piece of toilet paper. ‘It sounded a bit weird.’
‘It hurt a little. I’ve had a tummy ache today.’
The pain subsides once I get to my feet, and I sit on the edge of the bath, adjusting my clothes. Huw brushes his teeth.
‘We need a bigger bathroom if we’re going to start having sex in it,’ I say, in an attempt to dispel the weird atmosphere.
He rinses and spits. ‘Cariad, I’ve been meaning to ask. Carmen’s going a bit bonkers with Glynn. Could he stay for a few days? We haven’t had him for months.’
Oh, Christ. Glynn moping round one circuit of the house, Mama moping round another. I’m about to say absolutely not when I think of some advantages.
1. Glynn will give Mama someone to fuss over when Evie’s at school.
2. Huw will owe me a favour.
‘Oh, all right.’
Huw grins at his reflection and pulls dental floss through his front teeth. ‘Thanks, cariad,’ he says, slightly indistinctly. ‘I knew you’d be okay with it, so I’ve told Carmen he can come on Friday.’
‘That’s the day after to-fucking-morrow!’
‘It’s not a big deal, is it? He’ll be light relief compared to the Merry Widow.’
I force a smile. I am going to keep the peace if it kills me. ‘Yes, of course, that’s fine.’ I’m about to say more but he goes back into the shower and starts washing me off him. For a moment, I don’t care, because that’s the first time we’ve had sex since the twenty-ninth of December – not that I’m keeping count or anything. Then as I go downstairs it occurs to me that we still haven’t technically had sex, not if you mean actual penetration – sorry to sound like Shere Hite. And Huw, like most men, does only mean actual penetration. Shit, he didn’t even come! Now I feel worse than before.
Evie’s back and she and Mama are watching the news. Mama’s tutting loudly at every item. ‘Have you seen this, Laura?’ she calls indignantly. ‘This business in Iraq?’
‘Yes, awful,’ I call back, the grown-up equivalent of ‘whatever’.
I ring the midwife but she’s not there. I’ll try again tomorrow. I start making supper. Huw breezes in, wearing a dark shirt I’ve never seen before and which is far too trendy to have been bought in Bangor. The slate-grey colour makes his eyes seem more blue.
‘Where�
�s that from?’
‘I got it in some designer place in Great Yarmouth, that day Evie and I went to the cinema.’
‘You look lovely, Daddy,’ Evie says.
Huw gives me a kiss on the forehead, whispers, ‘That was nice, upstairs?’ Then says more loudly, ‘I’ll be back pretty late. See you in the morning.’
The door slams behind him.
10 MARCH 2003
First Mama, filling the place with gloom; now Glynn, six feet two of smelly hormones, lumbering round like Lurch. The house has never felt smaller.
For lunch I heat tomato soup. Glynn’s not just a sodding vegetarian; he’s a sodding tinned-soup-and-macaroni vegetarian. He mooches in, wearing a bedtime fug and jeans halfway down his arse, and lopes about, inefficiently assembling a cup of coffee. Mama asks him how he slept, in a bright youth worker voice. The answer must surely be ‘extremely well’ as he’s been in bed more than twelve hours, lazy fucker.
‘Yeah, good.’ He slops his mug to the table and hunches over his mobile, texting violently. He’s supposed to be on a gap year before university, God help us. He had a job at the start of the year in a call centre, but not any more. We’re not supposed to mention it.
Mama circles her spoon round a tiny portion of soup. Glynn eats the rest, and I make myself a ham sandwich. I love eating meat in front of him. Childish, I know, but his pained expression amuses me. The phone rings as we’re finishing, and Mama starts piling up the crockery. I can’t face her stacking the dishwasher all wrong again, so I let the answerphone pick up. Then I hear Miffy’s voice and snatch the receiver.
‘Hey, Miff!’ Too loud. ‘Nice to hear from you!’ I feel a little unsteady as I take the phone upstairs.
‘How’s it going?’ Her voice is warm.
‘Oh, you know, I’m being ground down by vile ungrateful offspring.’
‘Offspring plural? Has the sprog come early?’
I explain about Glynn, and she laughs. ‘Boy, I’ve sure missed out on teeming family life.’
I reach my room, puffing, and sit on the bed.
‘All went well with the scan, I hope?’ Miffy asks.
‘Yes, thanks. Everything seems fine.’
‘And I hope Olivia’s doing okay? She’s lucky to have you looking after her. You were always so close weren’t you, such a tight little unit of two.’
And now we’re back to being two. I say quickly, ‘So how was your mum?’
‘Surprisingly upset. She still calls Dad her “bastard ex-husband”.’ Miffy laughs. ‘But she was really affected by it. Anyway, I was just phoning to give you the details of Micah’s party.’
‘And your party.’
‘Oh, yes, I suppose it is mine too. I keep forgetting. So it’s this Saturday. Most people are making a long weekend of it. There’s loads of room. Bring Evie and the lovely Huw. Glynn too, if you like.’
I think not. She says she’ll email a map, and I’m about to ask her something, anything, just to keep her talking, when she says, ‘Bye,’ and hangs up.
In the kitchen I see Glynn’s gone, leaving a splash of soup on the table. Mama’s gazing into space. The dishwasher’s running on the wrong cycle.
‘That was Miffy,’ I say.
‘I know. I heard her voice on the machine. Meanwhile your other telephone has been going beep beep, driving me loco.’ Mama slides my mobile across the table. I’ve missed three texts from Ceri: Looking 4ward 2 c u, Hop u not 4got, and where u r!! Probably even Glynn’s texts are more lucid.
I’d forgotten tonight’s grim plan for Huw and I to meet Ceri and Rees for a drink. Rees’s idea. I’ve been putting it off for weeks, worried he’s going to suggest a wife swap. I ring Huw to remind him.
‘Sorry, cariad, no can do. Going straight out from work. Wining and dining.’
‘Again?’
‘I know, love, but this professor’s important. This collaborative work might put our department on the map.’
Yeah, like a Welsh History department is ever going to be on any kind of map. I don’t argue. Hopefully Ceri will cancel if we can’t both come. When I hang up, Mama says, ‘I’ve been thinking about Melissa’s celebrations. Do you think I was too hasty, saying I would not go?’
She is pottering mournfully around, sniffing and making coffee. Oh God, I so don’t want to have to nursemaid her at this party. I really need to let my hair down. With Danny, hopefully. Kidding!
‘I don’t think so, Mama. You felt it was a bit much, and I’m sure your instincts were right.’
‘I just had a tiny thought that Michael might want me to go. But it would be silly, it is far too soon.’
Phew.
‘I am so glad you and Melissa are friendly again, after all this time. It was so crazy’ – she says ‘crazy’ with a Spanish roll – ‘it was so cerrrrrazy for you two not to be friends, and Daniel also, I could never understand it.’
And with that little bombshell, she calmly takes her mug and moves to the door.
‘Mama, hang on a sec. Don’t you remember why I haven’t seen them for more than twenty years?’
‘Well, bebita, that is all water under a bridge, you know.’
‘Not to them!’
I stare at her. I don’t realise I’m clenching my fist till I register dimly that my palm hurts: my nails are digging into it. I can’t remember the last time I felt so enraged. Yes, I can: aged fourteen, dragged away from my life, my friends, my boyfriend, fobbed off with a stack of false promises. Of course Great Yarmouth will be lovely! Of course you’ll be able to go on seeing Danny! Of course Melissa will still be your best friend!
‘It’s not water under the bridge to me either,’ I say, and still Mama stands in the doorway, ready to run the minute she might have to face up to something.
‘I don’t think this is the time for arguments, Laura.’
‘Oh, yes, it’s never a good time for me to say how I feel.’
‘That’s very rude.’ She looks down at the floor. ‘It makes me very sad.’
‘Yes, well, it is sad.’ My stomach twinges. ‘Fucking sad.’
Mama starts crying, and her coffee splashes onto the quarry tiles. I take the cup from her and get a cloth, but she says, ‘I’ll do it,’ and pulls the cloth from my hand, as though that’s what we are fighting about. Very slowly, she mops up the mess, then drapes the cloth super-carefully over the taps. Finally she sits down. She doesn’t look at me.
I try to keep my voice steady. ‘Mama, I’d love to have been in touch with Miffy and Danny all this time. As their stepsister, if not their friend. But I couldn’t. I’d really like to talk about why.’
There’s a long silence, during which I endure a wave of pain, tell myself it feels nothing like a contraction, remind myself to bloody well phone the midwife again.
Finally she says, ‘It was all such a long time ago.’ Her eyes are dark and wet. She is still beautiful with her heart-shaped face, thick hair, perfect cheekbones. I hope I look like her when I’m nearly sixty.
‘I don’t want to upset you.’
‘Upset? Yes, I am upset. You talk to me as though I am a stranger, not your mamita who bore you from her own body.’
Yeah, yeah. I make a big effort. ‘I don’t mean to talk to you in a funny way. Please, can I ask you about it?’
She shrugs, so I carry on. ‘When we lived, you know, back in Edgware?’
She gives a theatrical sigh.
‘Sorry, Mama. This is hard to ask. Okay. Did you. Um. Did you. Encourage me towards them?’
She says nothing, but I can see from her face that she knows what I mean. I speak fast. ‘Encourage me towards Miffy and Danny. To be friends with them. I’m asking because I remember lots of times. Times I didn’t have a choice about seeing them. I seemed to be in my room with Miffy an awful lot, feeling I couldn’t go downstairs and disturb you. And I remember, once, I wanted to go to a disco and you wouldn’t let me because Miffy was coming over, even though I hadn’t asked her.’
‘But she was your
amiga, of course you wanted to spend time with her.’
‘And you were always saying what a lovely boy Danny was.’
‘So this is a crime now? To approve your daughter’s friends?’
‘Mama, Miffy and Danny have always blamed me for breaking up their family.’
‘Oh, bebita, they didn’t blame you.’
‘They bloody did!’
‘Please stop swearing, Laura. They might have blamed me for a while, but I’m sure they never blamed you.’
‘So why didn’t they want to see me all these years?’
‘I don’t know. It made your stepfather terribly sad.’ She starts weeping again, and can’t find her tissue. It’s on the floor at her feet, and I’m about to pick it up when I decide not to help her. I have to physically stop myself from bending down. I take a breath and say, ‘What I’m asking, Mama, is did you encourage me to be friends with them? So that you could, you and Michael could, have an excuse?’
‘An excuse? An excuse for what, exactly?’
‘I mean a reason. Excuse is the wrong word, sorry. A reason to see each other.’
She is on her feet. ‘You are asking me, would I use my own child, would I do such a thing? How can you think it is acceptable to ask me this? Qué insulto!’
She is furious, her eyes properly flashing, like a flamenco doll I used to have. I haven’t thought about that doll in years. It had a black and red lace dress and lovely black hair. A red comb. A mantilla, Mama called it.
‘Mi marido, he is still warm in the ground and you say these dreadful things.’
She always did have a touch of the melodramatics.
‘It’s just – seeing Miffy and Danny again, realising that all these years I wasn’t being paranoid, they really were avoiding me …’
She snorts. ‘You talk like a cerrrazy person. I am worried for your mind. You ought to see somebody, a professional.’
‘I’m not crazy, Mama. They always made sure I wouldn’t be there when they visited you and Michael.’
‘Believe what you like, Laura. I know what I know. And now, if you will excuse me. Tengo un dolor, my head aches. I am going to have a lie-down.’