by Maggie Gee
‘But Winston and Franklin are climbing the fence.’
In the split second in which Shirley was registering that the red-haired child knew the twins’ names, the boys were actually over the outer fence and making a bee-line for the male gorilla. It pivoted massively upon his haunches, and looked at them thoughtfully, then sidled towards them. Shirley screamed and with no conscious decision was suddenly hurting her back and arms as she yanked them both, violently, up over the barrier, with both boys kicking furiously. ‘Naughty boys,’ she shouted, frightened, and they stared at her with big surprised eyes, but her anger dissolved once she saw they were safe.
‘The butterfly will freeze, won’t it?’ asked Gerda. ‘Or drown. Unless summer comes tomorrow Can I take it home, Grandma, please? If it gets to summer it will be all right.’
‘Excuse me,’ said Shirley. ‘How do you know the twins?’
‘They’re always naughty,’ Gerda said.
‘That’s not nice, Gerda,’ her grandpa rebuked her.
Gerda thought about it for a second. ‘Winston isn’t,’ she added, untruthfully. Gerda had a soft spot for Winston.
‘Gerda’s not my friend,’ said Franklin.
‘I think they’re friends from school,’ contradicted the grandma. ‘Don’t worry about the butterfly, Gerda. There will be lots of new ones in summer.’
‘Bendy Rabbit is eating its poo,’ said Winston.
‘The twins are just nursery’ Gerda said. ‘I’m at big school. I do swimming. I like this butterfly. This one is special.’
‘Gerda? That’s an unusual name,’ Shirley commented. ‘Is it German?’
‘See, her mother’s a writer,’ the grandpa said, a gleam of pride behind his round wire glasses. ‘Angela Lamb. She’s quite well known. And she gave the child this fairy-tale name.’
‘From The Snow Queen, Henry’ the grandma said.
‘Angela Lamb? She’s famous,’ said Shirley. ‘I’m not a reader, but I’ve heard of her. There are lots of copies of her books in the library. I bet my mum’s read her. She lives and breathes books … You must be very proud of your daughter.’
‘She took her mother’s name,’ said the grandpa. ‘She’s a Ship, really, but she chose to be Lamb.’
‘We are proud of her,’ the woman asserted.
‘Bendy Rabbit is a rabbit-gorilla,’ Winston shouted. Everyone ignored him.
‘What happens to the butterfly?’ Gerda asked. ‘If it dies, where does it go?’
Her grandparents exchanged a strange, veiled look. ‘Very proud of this one and all,’ said the grandpa. ‘You’re our pride and joy, aren’t you Gerda?’
Gerda was bored with the butterfly now. ‘Come on,’ she said, darting off towards the lake. ‘I want to see the painting man.’ Winston and Franklin set off in pursuit.
The adults followed, chatting amiably, introducing themselves as they dodged the puddles. They reminded Shirley faintly of her own parents, trying to catch up with the new generation, proud of their daughter but puzzled by her. They said they had moved back from the coast to live with Angela and look after Gerda.
‘There isn’t a dad around, you see,’ the woman, whose name was Lorna, confided. ‘That’s the way of it, with this generation. My daughter’s busy with her career. Your little boys are lucky to have you.’
‘I’m not a perfect mother,’ said Shirley, hastily. ‘I’m trying to get a degree, you see.’
‘My daughter hardly leaves her study,’ the other woman said, sadly.
‘Hold on, Lorna,’ the grandfather said. ‘She does her best. It’s the pressures of fame.’
‘I worked,’ said Lorna. ‘As you know, Henry. Shop, factory, whatever I could get. But I tried to put the children first. Still, I wasn’t gifted like Angela. It’s what you have to do, if you’re gifted.’
The children were running headlong towards the lake, sending up sprays of water as they went. A lonely male figure in a long black overcoat stood by his easel near the willows. The sun had already set on the water, the shadows were deepening around the rushes, but higher up, the treetops were golden, the birds were roosting thick as leaves, and away in the lemon- and rose-rinsed sky others were circling, calling for sunset, herons trailing long reed-like legs, wood-pigeons whir-clapping their wings, a volley of white doves, palely gilded. The drenched grass round the lake was strewn with bird-shit and feathers, both of which Winston and Franklin were collecting, splashing about and shrieking with pleasure. Wherever they went, the birds flurried upwards.
‘Don’t frighten the birdies,’ Gerda instructed them. ‘Ian is painting them, aren’t you, Ian?’
‘It’s OK,’ the man said, in a strong Scottish accent. ‘It’s all in my head. It doesn’t bother me.’
‘Boys,’ said Shirley, but without conviction, ‘Your shoes will be soaked. Your hands will be filthy.’
‘They’re grand little boys,’ the painter said. ‘You have to eat a peck of dirt once in your life. That’s what my father said, any reet.’ He had a weather-beaten, world-worn face, a sensuous mouth, reddened cheeks, sharp grey-white eyes with something scary about them: the face, Shirley thought, of an ex-alcoholic, till he smiled, and she decided, ‘He’s handsome.’ But shortish, thickset, more builder than painter.
‘Do you come here a lot?’ she asked. ‘Aren’t you cold? You should wear a scarf. Gloves. A hat.’
‘He’s always here,’ Lorna told her. ‘I think he doesn’t feel the cold.’
‘I feel the cold,’ Ian corrected her. ‘But I like the animals to see I’ve got skin. I want them to know I’m an animal, see.’
Lorna looked puzzled, but Shirley smiled.
‘I’m an animal, aren’t I, Ian?’ Gerda asked, pulling at his coat-sleeve.
Ian nodded. ‘Correct, young lady.’
‘You aren’t really,’ Lorna insisted, but quietly, not to contradict the painter. ‘You’re a little human, aren’t you, dear?’
‘Animals shouldn’t be locked up. That’s what Ian says. Isn’t it, Ian?’ Gerda asked him.
‘Good girl. Now run and see the swans.’ He patted her arm, and she was gone. He had moved his body, while they were there, so his easel was invisible. The adults stood in a companionable group, talking about what everyone talked about, whether the endless rains would stop, but because today had brought some hours of sunlight and sun felt normal, once it returned, they ignored the predictions, they felt optimistic; perhaps it was over; they wanted to be happy. Ian said nothing, but he listened, nodding.
The children had run to the top of the bank and crouched there, bathed in the rich late light, the flame-haired girl, the golden-skinned boys. Now Gerda had hauled Winston on to her lap. The boy was nearly as big as she was, but she was trying to rock him like a baby, while Franklin was pulling him away by his feet.
Ian found his cigarettes, and offered them around. Shirley, who never smoked, took one.
‘Mummy’s smoking,’ Franklin suddenly shouted. ‘Mummy will get dead tomorrow.’ Both the boys came slithering down the bank, indignant. ‘Silly Mummy. You mustn’t smoke.’
‘I’m not really going to,’ Shirley yielded. ‘See, I’m giving it back to Ian. Sorry, Ian,’ she said, embarrassed.
‘You’re a nice woman,’ he said, smiling.
Painters, she decided, could say things like that. He tucked the cigarette in his jacket pocket, and Shirley found her cheeks felt hot. Above the lake, above the hill, the pinks in the sky were deepening, the smallest scraps and tatters of cloud suddenly burning an ardent red. Just for a few minutes the whole sky caught fire, the pinks and scarlets intensified to crimson, and then the sun slipped behind the bank; both clouds and circling birds turned black. Somewhere, a whistle blew for closing. ‘Make your way to the nearest gates…’
‘Do you like being outside?’ Shirley asked Ian. ‘My father always liked to be outside. He was a park keeper, you see.’
‘I don’t like cities,’ Ian told her. ‘I came here when I was a lad of seventeen.
My life went wrong. There were a lot of lost years. Too young to be a barman, I suppose. I went crazy. Tried to smash up a hotel. Then I kicked the bottle and went to art school.’
‘So why do you stay here, if you don’t like cities?’ Shirley asked him, half over her shoulder, turning to call the boys and go. Lorna and Henry and Gerda were leaving.
‘Dunno. Painting. I’ve done quite well at it. Complicated.’ He shrugged. ‘I should get out. We should all get out.’ His eyes were hard to read.
Shirley sighed, ‘In any case, we’ve got to go. Winston! Franklin! Time to go home!’ It was nice to meet an artist. She felt on the threshold of something important, one of those windows that opened in life and showed her things she had never imagined. Elroy and she didn’t talk much now, with the boys always there, and Elroy’s promotion. ‘So what are you painting, can I just ask you?’
‘The end and the beginning of the world,’ Ian said.
Four
Lola and Gracie – just back from school, giggling with delight at the boys on the bus who had stared at their legs and asked for e-mail addresses; yelping with glee at the boys’ total hopelessness, hopping from one coltish leg to another as they dragged huge school-bags up the path, shrieking with panic as they splashed into the puddles – were ecstatic to discover that no one was home, in the cavernous house Lola’s mother had inherited. Faith, though too late to harry Lola in the morning, had come in later and filled up the fridge. That meant they could eat mountains of ice-cold cheesecake, sample the juices, the smoothies, the thickies, plunder the chocolates, catch up with their e-mails, and watch TV at deafening volume.
(Elsewhere, south and east of the city, children come home to cold houses, rattle the tin for cheap biscuits, care for other, younger children, put the washing on to please their mothers, then watch TV at the same volume. TVs blink and blare all over the city.)
Lola had been raised with lots of money; Lottie’s wealth had come from fur, her father having made millions in the trade long before people disapproved of it. Money was the air the Segall-Lucases breathed; fur was something soft and scented that Lola’s pretty mother wore in winter, something Lola liked to put her face against.
Then adolescence hit, with its souring knowledge. Some of her friends at private school had got in on scholarships, through brains, not money. She began to understand the whole world wasn’t rich.
Her best friend changed every month or so, but for several months now it had been Gracie, though they quarrelled vividly every other fortnight, and made up with fleets of passionate notes, secretly launched across the classroom.
This friendship, like Lola’s other friendships, seemed to be about shopping and music. In fact it worked at the deepest level – they liked the selves they had found with each other. Gracie, less rich and indulged than Lola, could take a brief dip in consumer paradise, spray herself with musk-rose and lily-of-the-valley and other, sharper, more elegant smells from the continental masters of perfume; riffle through Lottie’s delicious handbags – the strawberry suede, gold-embossed Verso, the ultra-slender cream clutch by Parade – and be, for an evening, teenchild in paradise, glossy, an It-girl, Gracie the Ditsy.
In fact she had dimensions Lola lacked. Gracie’s mother Paula was a radical journalist who’d made her name investigating the security services. A single parent, a nag, a bore. Mysteriously, though when Gracie was home she couldn’t bear her mother’s carping, her predictable, puritanical opinions, her arguments with the television news – though Paula as a mother was faintly ridiculous, a potential source of public shame in tracksuit bottoms and turquoise anorak – mysteriously, when Gracie was away from her, at times when she felt she was on the line, her mother’s opinions leaped to her lips, her mother’s world-view became her own.
Now Gracie and Lola sat in Lola’s bedroom, listening to hundreds of decibels of hip-hop, picking out, biting into, and discarding the expensive chocolates they’d filched from Lottie’s dressing room. ‘This one’s disgusting … Banana praline.’
‘This one’s good. It’s sort of brown.’
‘A bit of brown never lets you down.’ Both of them instantly fell about laughing, till Gracie remembered she didn’t understand it.
‘It’s something my dad used to say, you know … I haven’t seen my dad for two years. Mum had a row with him. I miss him. He was much nicer than that byaatch my mother.’ Gracie was still giggling, but her eyes, which were large and black, were sad. Her dark curviness came from her father, who most people thought of as big and fat, but to Gracie he was the missing hero. And her lucky big sister lived with him, whereas Gracie had got stuck with her mother.
‘I like your mum,’ said Lola, cautiously. It never did to criticize mothers. Friends had to like them, though you did not. But Lola didn’t really like Gracie’s mother. Her clothes were shameful. Her hair sagged down like a couple of sandbags. Unlike her own mother, she was always depressed.
‘You’re lucky,’ Gracie said, throwing over a praline, which Lola liked and Gracie hated. It missed, and fell on the cream wool rug, and when Lola went to pick it up, she trod on it. She scraped up half of it, and left the rest. ‘Yuck! These chocolates are so disgusting!’
‘Shall we put back the rest of the box?’
‘No, my mother will never notice.’ That was nice about Lottie, her not noticing. The worst kind of parent noticed too much.
They began to dance, frantic, to the music, their hips gyrating, fluid, slick, their faces parodying ecstasy, their big feet beating time on the carpet, long hair whirling out like mermaids, stamping the chocolate into the mat, singing along with the Hesperican voices that took them over when they sang, and when they bought, and when they ate, for the city was part of the satellite lands of the Hesperican empire, in its final decades.
‘Do we feel like a smoke?’ Lola asked.
‘Weed or tobacco?’ Gracie said.
‘You know I don’t do weed, disgusting, though my stupid dad has always got some … Shall I go and get some from his dressing-room?’ Lola asked.
‘Are you serious? Your dad smokes weed? That’s really cool,’ said Gracie, uncertain.
‘No it’s not, it’s pathetic,’ said Lola. ‘My mum says it’s pathetic, too. Not that my dad is pathetic,’ she rushed to say, just in case there was doubt. ‘My dad’s really clever. He knows everything.’
‘What does he do, exactly?’ asked Gracie. ‘He goes to an office somewhere, doesn’t he?’
‘It’s kind of a study, actually. He’s writing a book,’ said Lola, defensive. ‘It’s about philosophy. Time. Things happening,’ she said, to prove it, and then regretted having said so much. She had only recently grown defensive. Until she was thirteen or so, she was convinced that her father, Harold Segall, was the cleverest man in the universe, and one of the handsomest, as well, though it was a pity he had gone bald. Then something her mother had said sank in. ‘Why don’t you do something, Harold?’ she had shouted, in the middle of a row they had one evening. ‘You’ve been writing this book for nearly twenty years. Don’t you think perhaps you should get a job?’
‘You don’t believe in me,’ Dad had said. ‘But I’ll finish it in the next few years. My book might actually be important.’ ‘Oh poppycock, Harold, you’ll never finish it.’ His face became ashen, awful with hurt, and Lola ran in and put her arms round him, but she heard her mother, from the edge of what was bearable, say, ‘Really Harold, don’t be so pathetic. And you, Lola, stop making a fuss.’
‘I hate you, Mum,’ Lola had shouted. The first time she’d said it; it felt horrible. But now she said it every week. Though the one time her mother had said it back, furious, desperate, ugly with tears after Lola called her a hideous old cow (which she should have been cool enough to ignore), Lola remembered it for weeks, and swore to her mother that she’d never forgive her.
But actually, Lola adored her mother. She was very cuddly, and wore nice clothes, and smelled exquisite, and laughed a lot. She handed out money on requ
est. She told Lola she was beautiful, which Lola needed to hear daily. ‘You look exactly like I did at your age. Everyone was in love with me.’ She didn’t complain when Lola borrowed her tights, her pants, bras, shirts, makeup, partly because she had so much of everything, though she once got cross when Lola tipped a bottle of her favourite perfume in the bath, the one Babe Grimaldi wore at her wedding, which cost three hundred dollars an ounce. She wasn’t virtuous, like Gracie’s mother. Her good points far outweighed the bad, or so Lola thought on the happy evenings when she and her mother curled up in bed with pizza and chips and ice-cream and videos.
But now Lottie was doing something quite out of character, a City Institute course in the History of Art. Lola was convinced this wouldn’t last. In some ways Mum was very stupid, not half so bright as Lola’s dad. Lottie didn’t understand about school work, and said the wrong things at parents’ evenings. ‘I don’t think children should work too hard. There’s plenty of time for her to learn things. I am just starting, and I’m middle-aged,’ was her robust reply to a form teacher who thought that Lola should work harder. ‘Don’t turn her into a boffin, please,’ when the head of science suggested A-levels. ‘Lola is artistic, like me,’ she asserted. ‘I hardly think she wants to do science.’ ‘No, you like art, Mum,’ Lola had hissed. ‘Ignore my mother,’ she told Ms Tansy. ‘We’re not the same person,’ she screamed at Lottie later.
They did look alike, though. Everyone said so. This wasn’t too bad, since Lottie was pretty. Though Lola was taller and slimmer, thank God. She must have got that from Harold, her father. Together with her brains, hopefully.
‘So what did you say your dad’s book is about?’ asked Gracie. Gracie was a reader.
‘Time’ sounded rather a weedy subject, so Lola decided to avoid it. ‘Non-fiction, I think.’
‘Is it political?’ In Gracie’s house, most things were political.
‘He’s quite political. Yes, he is. He definitely says he’s a socialist.’ Lola lost confidence in that. He didn’t actually do anything socialist. ‘Let’s look at the web-site again,’ she said.