The Book of Ordinary People

by Claire Varley

  The thing is, none of it seemed a problem at the time. Not on its own. Not as a collection of discrete distinct behaviours. But now when I piece it all together like some kind of terrifying tapestry I see how these things wove together to bend my actions – muffle my choices – to shape the things I did or said so that I wouldn’t upset him. The way I retreated bit by bit until I had nothing left to control. The way I withdrew, shut off, became dependent. The way I let myself believe his concern came from a place of compassion and care, and that I was the one at fault. Because this is what they told me, those supposed sounding boards around me – my friends, my family, all assuring me that I was overreacting, imagining things, making mountains out of molehills and other damning idioms.

  I don’t know when I started drinking, or rather, when it became an issue. Or if it ever really was an issue in anyone’s eyes but Eric’s. I was fine during the day but what started as a gin and tonic as I prepared dinner eventually turned into a couple of glasses of wine over the course of the night. Never when it was just me and the children, and only after they’d been tucked into bed. It was never more than a glass or two to help me sleep, and when this stopped working, perhaps a glass during the day so I could manage a nap before picking up the children. Never anything dangerous, but of course why would Eric represent it as anything other than that? Easier to convince everyone I’m crazy, isn’t it?

  I fell pregnant again in 2012. Maybe it surprises you that I still had sex with him, but he was my husband. Often it was more out of a sense of duty – he would sulk and mope and make things miserable if I didn’t – but sometimes it was something we both wanted. The pregnancy wasn’t planned and I worried because of the drinking. I was a few months along and hadn’t realised because my period had been irregular since the boys, which meant a few months’ worth of drinking in that vital first stage. I told Eric one night, convinced he would share my worry and we’d work out what we needed to do to make things all okay. He didn’t say anything, simply rising from the outdoor setting where we had hidden ourselves from the boys, and walking back inside. I watched him, hugging myself against the cold, as he turned and stared at me through the sliding glass doors. Then he raised his hand and locked them. I froze. I was convinced he was joking. That he would unlock them, hold me and comfort me, but he turned his back and joined the boys as they played on the carpet by the fire. I watched them for a while, that while turning into minutes, and eventually I walked to the door and knocked. It was freezing outside and I was hardly dressed for it. Only the boys looked over; Eric continued to ignore me. He must have said something because they looked away quickly. I continued to knock and eventually he rose, made his way over and flicked off the outside lighting.

  I stood there for what seemed like hours, wanting to bang at the glass but anxious of startling the boys. Instead, I paced about the yard. We’d built ourselves a fortress, you see. High gates, secure locks that needed keys. Eric had even set up security cameras at the entries and exits which he could monitor live from his phone, ostensibly to keep people out, but he could also see if I was coming or going. As I paced the yard, I realised I couldn’t get out. I curled up on one of the pool chairs, too cold to sleep. Soon enough the inside lights went out and I stayed there until I could bear it no more. I started pacing again, shaking the fence, my bare hands numb. I was worried about the cold, you see, and what it might do to the poor creature growing inside me. Eventually I climbed my way up the high side gate, pulling myself up to the cast iron spikes lining the top. But my limbs were too numb and I stumbled, losing my footing and crashing back down to the ground atop the wooden outdoor chair I had used as a ladder. My chin split and a rib broke against the heavy furniture, and this was when Eric finally unlocked the doors. At the hospital they told me I had lost the baby. I don’t know if it was the fall or if in that moment the poor thing realised it was better off somewhere else, but Eric never spoke of it again. I told the hospital staff that I’d come home late, forgotten my keys and, not wanting to wake my family, had attempted to get in the back way. It seemed like the best thing to do at the time.

  I don’t want to suggest that Eric became a monster after this. He was still the same man who enjoyed playing with the boys, would smother me with attention and gifts, and promised me the world when he felt like it. But the time between his silences became smaller and smaller, and all those things that had once been so romantic morphed into obsessive and frightening. ‘I can’t bear to live without you’ became ‘If you leave I will kill myself and it will all be your fault’. I had stopped drinking when I found out I was pregnant but now there didn’t seem to be a reason not to. I could have a quick drink in the morning, sleep it off after lunch, then be back on my feet to pick the boys up when the school bell rang. I was very good at it, you see. What I couldn’t manage was my anxiety. It had started properly after the miscarriage, refusing to diffuse over the years. It didn’t help that a perfectly happy family activity could turn suddenly depending on Eric’s mood, and something that one day may have brought laughter and togetherness, the next resulted in mockery and abuse. I couldn’t read him anymore and this unpredictability was terrifying. When he was feeling loving, Eric would fret over me and encourage me to get psychiatric help for the anxiety. Then when he was upset he would use it against me, threatening to tell people about my drinking and mental health issues if I ever tried anything on him. Then he would become concerned again, telling me I was overreacting, that he’d never say things like that, that my anxiety was making me imagine things. This is what made it hard to leave, my own internal doubt that I was justified in making that kind of decision. Besides, my marriage wasn’t like my parents’, I told myself. Mine wouldn’t fail and my children would always have both their parents around. Because he was good with them, mostly, just like he was good with me, mostly, and it took a long time to realise this reason for staying was really the reason to go. This all led to the school incident.

  You know what triggered it? You’d think after all this time it would have been something huge, but in the end it was a simple joke. I was driving the boys home from school one afternoon and they were sharing jokes in the back seat. Silly knock-knock jokes that had them in fits of laughter and had descended into them just saying whatever came into their heads. Josh: Knock knock. Leo: Who’s there? Josh: Daddy. Leo: Daddy who? Josh: Daddy’s home so we better run and hide! That was it. That was what pushed me over the edge. It bothered me all night and the next morning when I woke it was still there. It festered inside me all day until I could take it no more. This was one of the things the alcohol did – it made me brave enough to believe I was strong. That I could leave. So after two glasses that morning I was adamant I was leaving. I would go to school, take the boys and just run. But what I hadn’t realised was that the new medication I was on for the anxiety didn’t mix well with alcohol, and instead of brave and confident, by the time I got to the school I was a complete mess. Eric blamed the alcohol entirely, feigning concern like he had done for years, and promising I would get treatment as part of the plan agreed to with the Child Protection worker.

  I didn’t drink again for a long time. Until recently, actually, after everything that happened with the police. I hadn’t touched a drop the night he called the police. He knew I hadn’t. I made dinner that night, we ate together as a family, and once the boys went off to watch television I told Eric I was leaving him. No tricks or plans. Straight out told him it was over and I wanted out.

  When I tried to leave the kitchen he refused to move, blocking the doorway with his body. I asked him politely. I asked him again and again. I was leaving and he needed to move out of the way. He wouldn’t though. Planted his feet and crossed his arms. I was being unreasonable, he told me. I wasn’t in my right mind. I was a risk to myself and he couldn’t let me leave. He wouldn’t let me leave. Even if I tried, I would never be able to leave. And I would regret it, when he was finally through with me, if he ever let that happen. H
e smirked then, the way he always did, and that was too much for me. I yelled at him to move. I told him again that I was leaving. When he wouldn’t move, I started shoving him, but he didn’t do anything, just stood there blocking my way, and the walls of the house were suddenly closing in on me as he took a single step towards me. So I started throwing things at him, first plastic things then plates, glasses, anything to make him move. Scrambling about the kitchen, trying to get out. That’s where the bruises came from. Like I said before, he’s never hit me. He’s clever like that. Just stood there smirking, taking it all. Not fighting back. And it was bursting out of me – this fire I’d swallowed up for so long – until I winded myself, struggling against the counter to try to open the locked window, and as I stood there doubled over and panting he calmly pulled his mobile from his pocket and made a call. And in less than sixty seconds he managed something I had dreamed about doing for years, and it seemed so easy for him.

  When the police arrived I was momentarily relieved. I was so sure I would tell them everything and finally we would be free. But as my adrenalin wore off and reality set in, I recalled the words he’d told me so many times before: If you leave me I will take everything from you, including the boys. And what had seemed a hollow threat for so many years now felt more real and certain than anything else did. So I lied to them, covered it all up, because if I didn’t he would take everything from me. And despite all that, he’s done so anyway, hasn’t he?

  ‘What are you still doing here? They work you hard, don’t they?’

  Nell looked up from the computer, blinking slowly. There was a clatter of metal on metal and Lou, the office cleaner, emerged from the doorway.

  ‘Just reviewing something,’ she replied, minimising the screen. ‘I’m done now.’

  She emailed it to DB so he’d see it when he returned with the pizza. He’d review her notes and then they’d set about pulling Madeline’s story into shape.

  ‘I’m surprised, you know,’ Lou continued, hefting the vacuum pack onto his back and connecting the nozzle. ‘On account of me being late and all. Caught up in traffic. They’ve closed off the streets up by Fed Square again. Swanston and Flinders. Some candlelight thing for those poor bastards who died in the detention centres.’

  He tugged at the cord, wrestling it into the wall socket.

  ‘Poor bastards,’ he said again. ‘Every time you turn on the news it’s this, that and the other thing, isn’t it? All the killing and the war and the violence. But what you gonna do? State of this world, eh?’

  Lou adjusted the straps of the pack, shaking his head.

  ‘What you gonna do?’ he repeated to himself, the vacuum roaring to life as he flicked the switch.

  Nell watched him, her head suddenly overwhelmed by the hiss and thunder and everything else that ran rampant around the world. She laid her head on her desk, her arms shielding her ears, and tried as hard as she could to block out all the noise.

  Part 4

  23

  Aida

  As a teenager, my parents’ home in Yusefabad in Central Tehran was both the centre and the end of the world. My mother, who lived through both revolution and war, discovered in peacetime a newfound anxiety about the world outside her home over which she had little control. She predicted death and misfortune every time any of us left the building, the strength and fortitude of her war years gradually replaced by a fatalistic, year-round sense of foreboding that was nourished by the American detective series she had taken to watching late at night on the illegal satellite channels. This meant that it was not until my later teenage years that I was able to join my friends in exploring our bustling city, the cinemas, galleries and fast food restaurants in which we passed our time and tested the boundaries of our changing identities. How far back could we push our scarves and what gait best attracted the right kind of attention? Who were we at home and who were we among friends? Even then I would have to wait by the window until my friends arrived in convoy to spirit me away into the outside world, in case, as my mother seemed to fear, I would spontaneously forget how to cross the street on my own and end up flattened by an errant taxi or affixed to the front of a motorcycle like a shrieking masthead on a ship.

  These were the same young women I would soon attend university with, me studying English and journalism while they stuck to engineering and the sciences. Headscarves at all angles, makeup sneakily applied after leaving our parents’ sight, we would charter our teenage course through the chaos of cars towards Tehran’s artistic hub. Young men in uniform patrolled nearby, their eyes more interested in us than the streets, completing their two years of compulsory military service and keen to be anywhere else. Stuck in our final years of schooling, we felt the same way, our eyes and shoulder muscles enjoying the break from study as we laughed and joked our way through the crowded city.

  Of all Tehran’s streets, Valiasr is my favourite. A predictable choice you might say, but watch as it snakes its way for nearly eighteen kilometres through the city like a tree-lined backbone. It starts in northern Tajrish, nestled at the foot of the Alborz, where the cool mountain air in summer makes for expensive real estate, home to Tehran’s elite and the former summer estate of the Shah. It ends at the railway station in downtown southern Tehran, amid the bustling hole-in-the-wall stores and the shabby slums housing the unemployed and vulnerable: Afghan refugees, stateless Feyli Kurds, and the city’s poor urban drift. To travel it in its entirety is to journey through the many faces of this smoggy metropolis. The maze of off-white apartment complexes stacked like boxes, as if the mountains are a machine churning them out and spitting them across the city. Buildings half-complete, construction halted by the unpredictable economy that monies and bankrupts people with equal abandon. High-rises cloaked in graffiti honouring the martyrs, exulting the Ayatollah and, until it is noticed, calling for freedoms the whole world should have. Drivers beat at their horns, motorcyclists risk their lives and traffic lights flash a constant amber just to keep you company. Driving too has its own unique rhythm, Peugeots and Paykans and the Saipa Pride – our home-grown ‘moving coffin’ – weave and wheeze and create more lanes than the painted lines suggest. Horns bleat a chorus of complaints – Watch it, idiot! Green light, you fool! Congratulations on your wedding, friend! Often in winter, my friends and I would simply find a starting point and set sail along Valiasr, enjoying the chill on our cheeks as we forgot about our studies and anxieties.

  One day during a rare break from studying for our upcoming exams we thought to go see a movie at the Artists’ Forum. It was myself, my best friend Shirin, our classmates Sonila and Maryam, and Shirin’s cousin Leila whose religious parents only let her out of the house if Shirin was with her. When we arrived, the line for ticket sales stretched almost as long as Valiasr itself, so instead we purchased plastic cups of tea from an enterprising young man and sat watching the line as it heaved and crawled towards the ticket stall: director types in thick square frames and clean-heeled boots, artsy older women in flowing tunics and muslin scarves, young couples defiantly holding hands, and worried moustachioed men clutching brown-suitcased lives.

  Soon we grew hungry and made our way down Valiasr to Ferdowsi, tracing our fingers along the rough brown brick of the British Embassy as we walked in the footsteps of our parents and their long-gone days of activism. Inside Café Naderi, we ordered soup and tea, shadowing generations of writers, artists and intellectuals who had talked of different revolutions from the safety of these red-tableclothed confines. We’d taken to coming to Naderi as often as we could, spurred on by our burgeoning realisation that soon we would be free of our parents, coupled with the youthful desire for meaning. We talked of art, thinking ourselves smarter and worldlier than we were, discussing the work of Farideh Lashai and the Picassos, Warhols and Lichtensteins we’d seen at the Contemporary Art Museum. Shirin told us she had understood entirely what Picasso was trying to say and we all nodded in agreement with her. At t
his, laughter erupted from the table behind us. I looked around, embarrassed that we’d been overheard. A group of people sat there, older than us but still young. The women’s scarves were pushed far back on their heads, delicately hanging at the curve of their crowns with casual indifference. The men were tall and thin with holes proudly marking their dark sweaters. They smiled at us, not unkindly, and my cheeks blazed red.

  ‘Do you think they’re intellectuals?’ Shirin whispered far too loudly, causing them to erupt with laughter again.

  I doubted it – none of them looked like my father or his sombre-faced friends.

  ‘Only Afshar,’ one of the women replied, pointing to the solemn-looking man opposite her. ‘He thinks he’s an intellectual because he smokes and wears black, but I know for a fact he listens to pop music. He only says it because he thinks it will help him get more girls.’

  Laughter rippled around the table again. Afshar ignored them, attempting refined dignity from behind his coffee cup. I watched, absorbed, their confidence unsettling and exciting me, wanting to be noticed and ignored in equal measure.

  ‘What brings you here?’ the same woman asked, her bright red lips smiling encouragingly.