The Year of the Ladybird

by Graham Joyce

  One day when the rain had stopped I passed by the reception and Edna, the sweet lady who worked there, came running out to say that I had visitors.

  ‘Who is it?’ I asked.

  ‘They’re waiting in here.’ Edna beckoned me back to the reception desk and I followed her indoors. Two plastic chairs had been drawn up by the desk and there, waiting patiently, were my mother and my stepfather. On seeing me they both stood up.

  ‘Here he is!’ my mum half shouted, flinging her arms around me and kissing me.

  Ken was all smiles, too. ‘Look at you,’ he said. ‘Striped blazer and everything.’ He turned to Edna. ‘He looks the part! Doesn’t he look the part?’

  They were all smiles. It was in neither’s nature to reveal to Edna or anyone else any of the tensions behind the fact that I was working there. So our reunion was a moment of laughter and high spirits.

  Edna smiled. ‘We’re proud of him,’ she said. ‘We’re all proud of him here.’

  ‘I’ll have to get one of those striped blazers myself,’ Ken said. ‘They’re quite the thing.’

  ‘You’ll have to lose a few pounds first!’ my mother said, laughing.

  ‘It’s okay, they have slightly bigger ones,’ I joked. ‘We can get you fixed up.’

  ‘What’s he saying about me!’ shouted Ken, his eyes bulging. He laughed. My mum laughed. Edna laughed. I went along with this jollity, but it was almost unbearable.

  Having taken me by surprise Ken said he wanted to take me to lunch, and did I know anywhere. I knew we could get something at The Dunes pub around the corner so I suggested that. I’d already arranged to have lunch with Nikki so I told them.

  They exchanged a look.

  ‘No, that’s fine,’ said Ken. ‘We’d love to meet her.’

  ‘Yes,’ my mum said a little too quickly. ‘We’d like to meet your girl, wouldn’t we?’

  We had to wait for about ten minutes before Nikki was through with her activities in the ballroom. I asked my parents to wait as I went off to get her. I wanted to cushion Nikki a little.

  ‘Really? They’re here? Now?’

  ‘Yes. In reception.’

  ‘Okay. Let’s do it.’

  I needn’t have worried about Nikki. She took charge. It was as if she’d been through this ritual many times before. She utterly charmed them. She asked if they’d come far and how was their journey; she smiled and laughed at their jovial comments and paid great attention to my mother’s words.

  ‘We thought we’d go for lunch,’ Ken said.

  ‘Great idea,’ Nikki said. ‘I’ll just go and freshen up. Mrs Barwise, do you need the loo?’

  ‘You have to call me Jean,’ my mum said, happily following Nikki to the ladies’ room.

  After they’d gone Ken took me aggressively by the elbow. ‘She’s stunning!’ he said. ‘Where the heck did you find that one?’

  ‘She works here.’

  ‘Well, she’s got good taste. And so do you. You lucky sod.’

  ‘I’m surprised to see you here, Dad.’

  ‘Look, son, it’s your mother. You know what she’s like. She worries about you.’

  ‘I’m completely fine. What is there to be worried about?’

  ‘Nothing by the look of you!’

  Pinky came by, carrying some cartons of Players No. 6. I introduced the two men. They were of a similar generation and they exchanged a few pleasant words. Pinky made my cheeks burn by saying what a good chap I was and how well I’d fitted in, and then went on his way.

  ‘It’s just that,’ Ken said, ‘your mum was a bit taken aback by that phone call the other day.’

  ‘What?’

  Ken looked at me hard and for the first time I thought I saw hatred in his eyes. No, it wasn’t exactly hatred: it was betrayal, and confusion, and the look of a man who had decided he’d had enough. It was like he’d tried hard with me all my life to get me to trust him, to give him a fair chance, and now he was ready to give up. He was probably right. I would never trust him. He was wasting his time.

  Before he could say anything Nikki and my mum reappeared. My mum was giggling. Nikki winked at me.

  I’ll say one thing for Ken: he was a good actor. ‘Come on then, ladies.’ He rubbed his hands. ‘Anyone hungry?’

  ‘Me me me,’ said Nikki.

  ‘Me me me too,’ went my mum.

  So this jolly group of us left the camp and headed round to The Dunes. The infamous Skegness breeze had picked up and we braced against it. Ken wore a trilby, which he pressed to his head as we walked. My mum had tied a floral headscarf round her tight perm. Nikki’s hair whipped in the wind.

  The Dunes was busy and the only table free happened to be the one I’d sat at with Colin the time he’d brought me there. Nikki was terrific again. ‘Pull that chair up for your mum, David; it’s more comfortable. I’ll get the drinks.’

  ‘You will not,’ said Ken, standing up.

  ‘Sit down and talk to your son! You haven’t seen him in a while.’

  He looked flustered. He took his wallet out of his pocket and found a large banknote. ‘Well, you can get them but I’m paying.’

  Nikki accepted the banknote. ‘And what’s everyone eating?’

  With Nikki away at the bar my dad said, ‘She’s lovely.’ He was clearly smitten.

  My mum took off her headscarf. ‘She’s quite a bit older than you, isn’t she?’

  I looked out of the window. I wondered if it might rain again.

  ‘Well I’m older than you!’ Ken said to her. ‘What difference does that make?

  Mum sniffed and affected to look critically at the upholstery and the curtains in the pub.

  ‘What do they pay you here, then?’ Ken wanted to know.

  I didn’t name a figure but I told him that you had to take into account that you got lodgings and three meals per day in with your wages. Then Nikki came back with a tray of drinks. She took them off the tray and placed them in front of us. ‘Babycham for mother. Pint of bitter apiece for the boys. And half a lager for little me.’ She leaned the tray on the floor against her chair and sat down. Then she picked up her lager. ‘Cheers.’

  ‘Cheers,’ said Ken.

  ‘Good health,’ said Mum. ‘Isn’t this nice?’

  We talked about the hot weather and the drought conditions, and how it had been here, and how it had been at home. Ken made a joke to Nikki about saving water by taking a bath with a friend. We discussed the ladybird invasion, which obviously hadn’t been as intense at home as it had here on the coast. They were amazed to hear about it. I was surprised how light Ken could be in different company. I was seeing a different side to him. My mother meanwhile stroked her throat and looked around the pub a lot. Her smile seemed to ache by contrast to his.

  Our meals arrived. Chicken-in-a-basket with chips. Gammon and pineapple. ‘Have you been to university, Nikki?’ my mum asked, apropos of nothing.

  ‘No. Not bright enough.’

  ‘Me neither,’ said Ken. ‘And it hasn’t stopped me putting away a bob or two.’

  ‘Ken!’ said mum.

  ‘Well,’ he said genially, ‘there are all these students out of work. Graduates, stacking shelves in the supermarkets. What’s the point?’

  ‘But education is a great thing, isn’t it, Ken?’ Nikki said. Searching him with her dark brown eyes. When she said that I thought: I want to marry you.

  ‘Of course it is; of course it is. But there have to be jobs at the end of it.’

  ‘What will you do, Nikki?’ asked my mum. ‘Now that the season has nearly ended.’

  The three of us had Black Forest gateau for dessert while Ken smoked a cigarette. The conversation stalled and there was the sound of forks on plates and crumbs of cake being scraped together. When we’d finished, Nikki got up to go to the ladies’ room and when she’d gone my mother suggested we go outside.

  ‘What for?’ I said.

  ‘You’ll stay here with Nikki, won’t you, Ken?’

  ‘Wh
at’s this about?’

  ‘I’ll buy her another drink,’ Ken said. ‘Don’t you worry. I’ll keep her company.’

  ‘Can we step outside, David?’ My mum looked at me, pleading.

  Mum put her coat back on again, and her headscarf, and out we went into the stiff breeze. We walked away from the pub, but slowly, the way people do when they have no direction in mind. She linked her arm in mine. The fine sand blew across the path under our feet. ‘Why did you come here, David?’

  ‘To work, obviously.’

  ‘I know that. But why here? Why this place?’

  ‘I heard there was a job going, that’s all.’

  She looked at me with sadness. I noticed for the first time that her eyeballs were slightly jaundiced at the sockets. ‘I don’t know how much you know and how much you don’t.’

  ‘You’re talking in riddles, Mum.’

  We made it onto the promenade. The wind was gusting out there. The sea looked choppy. Maybe a squall was coming in. The gulls were all floating in a tight colony on the bobbing grey tide. ‘You were three years old, David. He’d brought you here. He hadn’t told anyone.’

  ‘Who? My Dad?’

  ‘Yes, your father. Your natural father. He kidnapped you away, you see. He brought you here. I didn’t know where you were. I was going out of my mind. The police got dragged in. Everything. We’d broken up, your dad and I. I wasn’t happy. He was a difficult man.

  ‘At first I thought that by coming here you were punishing me. Punishing me and Ken. Making a big point. Because that’s what you do, David. You don’t say what you’re thinking. You just do things. But now I know you weren’t. Weren’t making a point, I mean. I really believe you don’t know about this place.

  ‘We should have talked about it. All those years when you were growing up, we should have told you. But we felt so bad, David. You have to be easy on us. We felt so deep down bad. Because Ken and I had got together and that seemed to be the thing that drove him over the edge.

  ‘This is where they found you David. On the pier. This is where it happened.’

  I stopped dead. ‘Where what happened?’

  And she told me what she knew.

  She opened her handbag and she pulled out a small leather wallet. ‘He abandoned you, David. He left you wandering alone on the pier. Three years old, and he left you. You were holding this wallet, which he must have given you. There wasn’t much in it. A few pound notes. The photograph which you took from me. Some bus tickets. The police took you in. Then his body was washed up. I’d reported you missing. Ken and I came to collect you and I had to go and identify him. I should have told you all this before. I tried to, many times. But I couldn’t.’

  And then she cried. The wind gusted around us, blowing sand at us, gritty sand that blew in our faces and stung. I tried to comfort my mother as the wind gusted and dropped, gusted and dropped; but I was numb, and all I could think of was that east coast advertising slogan: it’s so bracing.

  Before leaving, Mum and Ken made Nikki promise that she’d come with me to visit them at home. We waved them away. When they’d gone I ventilated a huge sigh.

  ‘You all right?’ said Nikki.

  We’d got duties to attend to. Nikki was in the Slowboat and I was due in the Games Room. ‘I’ll tell you later,’ I said.

  Nikki scuttled ahead and as I walked back across the car park I was intercepted by Rosa, who called me from her caravan. ‘She’s ready to see you,’ she said. ‘Any time this afternoon.’

  I managed to steer the table-tennis and snooker through to their respective finals. I wrote down the names of the winners. I told them stage jokes. With the right amount of training and practice . . . you might just be able to hit that ball. Eventually I made my way to the path between the offices and the bowling green. My appointment was with Dot, the grizzled ogre of the steam-cave that was the laundry room.

  I had to wait in line behind a couple of the cleaning staff who were sorting and folding white sheets. There was some kind of dispute. Clouds of steam settled on Dot’s shoulders as she demanded to know why they needed extra sheets when they’d already been issued. The argument went on for some time. I shuffled my feet nervously.

  Finally it was resolved. Without acknowledging my presence Dot moved a pile of sheets from the counter to the deeper recesses of her lair. From the back a strip light flickered on and off at irregular intervals. At last, and with no gesture or word of recognition she said, ‘I don’t like doing it; but if it’s to be done let’s get on.’

  ‘You’re Rosa’s sister?’ I said.

  ‘Twin. Pull up that chair.’

  It seemed astonishing to me. They hardly looked alike. Rosa was buxom with ample, swinging hips whereas Dot was rake-thin. I pulled up the chair and Dot was pulling up one for herself when another cleaner poked her head round the door.

  ‘Shall I come back later?’ asked the cleaner. ‘I see you’ve got a young man in here with you, Dot.’

  Dot got up, waddled to the door and closed it sharply, almost in the woman’s face. She dropped a latch. ‘I can’t be doing with foolishness,’ she said, motioning that I should sit down. I took it as a warning.

  She pulled her own chair up opposite mine and sat down. Our knees were almost touching. ‘What is it, then?’ she asked.

  ‘Well, Rosa said I should see you.’

  ‘We know that. What do you want?’

  I must have looked vacant.

  ‘I don’t do mumbo-jumbo,’ Dot said sharply. ‘There’s no fortunes to be seen or told. You have to tell me what it is, and I see what I can do for you.’

  I glanced round the gloomy laundry cavern. Clouds of steam were still thinning under the ceiling and the light in the back of the chamber was flickering. Dot had her eye fixed on me. Her thin bleached grey hair seemed almost like a hood. I took a deep breath and told her everything my mother had told me at lunchtime.

  ‘I see. And what else?’

  I said that was it.

  ‘You’re holding something back.’

  I thought about it for a second, and then I told her about my dreams and hallucinations and the boy and the man in the blue suit.

  ‘Give me your hands,’ Dot said firmly.

  I gave her my hands and she held them in each of hers. Her own hands were surprisingly warm and soft but her knuckles were big and chafed, and it was at her knuckle bones that she seemed to look rather than at me. ‘Oh I see. There we are. Oh dear. Oh no. Oh dear. There we are. That’s the way. Poor duckie. That’s the way.

  ‘I feel very nervous. I feel it all the time. Like something bad is going to happen.’

  I was about say something bland but she carried on speaking in a way as if I wasn’t even in the room there with her.

  ‘I feel very small,’ she said, ‘and very lonely and I think that all the trouble may be because of something that I have done, though I don’t know what it is. I’m too small to know these things. I love him, but I feel something bad is going to happen.

  ‘There’s a moon,’ she said, ‘very very bright over the water. There’s a movement at the water’s edge. I see it. Two figures, where the waves are foaming. They’re holding hands, these two, and looking out across the sea. What are they looking for? What do they want?

  ‘I’m going to the sea wall. I’m going to see what they want, these two. I’m walking the promenade for a short way and – here we are – the concrete steps down on to the beach. I can smell salt and sea-gas. They’ve moved on, these two, but there they are, still silhouetted in the moonlight. Look at them holding hands. So tightly! So tender!’

  I was still holding Dot’s hands, or rather she was holding mine. Her eyes were half-closed as she said all this. The extraordinary thing was how clearly I could visualise everything she said.

  She went on. ‘It’s a boy and a man, isn’t it? A boy and a man. That’s strange: their eyes are like clear glass. I see moonlight – or is it the phosphorescence in the water – reflecting where their eye
s should be? It’s strange. I’m going to hurry a little. Catch up with them. Oh, but the sand, you see, the sand is sucking me down, slowing me. I can’t catch up. They’re going towards the town. I’ve got to hurry to keep up with them.

  ‘Look. Look. We’ve come to the pier.’

  ‘We’ve come to the pier,’ I heard myself say.

  I looked around and I was there, at the water’s edge. I seemed to have arrived there in mere moments. Dot’s voice had gone and I inhaled the brine and heard the lap of the water and felt the soft sand under my feet.

  I followed the man and the boy to the pier, and there was a boat drawn up at the water’s edge. The man looked around him nervously as if he didn’t want to be seen. He still wore his blue suit and it too foamed with gentle phosphorescent light, like it was made of water. Eels of blue light swam and sparkled in the threads of its fabric. It was beautiful. He took the boy by the hand, and together they walked into the water and climbed into the boat.

  As the man pushed off with the oars I ran and caught up. I hurried into the water, splashing and soaking my shoes and my trousers and I climbed into the boat beside them. The boy smiled at me briefly but the man didn’t so much as acknowledge me.

  The man rowed steadily. The bright moon shone on his face and for the first time I was able to see him clearly. He no longer had eyes of clear glass. Now he wore spectacles. The boy too: now instead of eyes of glass he had ordinary wide, trusting eyes of nut-brown. Though I had an aching dread inside me, I sat in the boat quietly as we moved deeper out to sea. We cast a moon-shadow on the calm water behind us.

  The little boy watched me carefully. He turned sharply to look at his father, then back to me. It was as if he was asking one of us for an explanation about the presence of the other. I tried to speak, but some paralysis had me by the throat and I struggled for the faculty of words. Still the man showed no interest in me as he rowed steadily.

  About two hundred yards out to sea the man stopped rowing and shipped oars. He looked back at the shore and decided to take off his shoes and socks. Then he stripped off his jacket and his shirt and trousers. He wore swimming trunks underneath.