The Year of the Ladybird

by Graham Joyce

  At last I overcame my paralysis and managed to speak. ‘Isn’t it cold for that?’ I said. The balmy nights had given way to chilly evenings and even though I was fully dressed I was shivering and wet from the knees down.

  The man looked at me and in a voice that I knew he said, ‘No-one will bother us here.’

  I looked for the boy, but he had gone. The man reached for some ropes that were lying in the bottom of the boat. The ropes were secured to heavy iron weights, not unlike those weights that braced the flats backstage of the theatre. He made certain that the weights were properly secured to the ropes and then he tied one of the ropes tightly around his leg just above the ankle.

  He took another rope and a weight and he looped it around my ankle and knotted it tightly.

  ‘What’s that for, daddy?’ I said. My voice was tiny, child-like.

  ‘No-one will find us, even if they’re looking for us.’

  A surge of panic and self-preservation shot through me. Moonlight reflected in the glass of the man’s spectacles, preventing me from seeing his eyes. I looked for the little boy again. I was scared. I thought he must have fallen over the side of the boat.

  ‘Just you and me together and all the time in the world,’ said the man.

  The man was my father. I didn’t know what he was doing but I trusted him.

  He glanced back at the shore, as if expecting or perhaps hoping that someone would come after us. I looked over the side of the boat at the dark water. I didn’t like it at all. It looked cold. ‘I’m frightened.’

  ‘No need to be frightened, David.’

  I opened my mouth again to say Can We Go Back but something silvery and red flew into my mouth. It flew into my throat and I spluttered. Then the thing was on my tongue and I spat it out into my hand. It was a ladybird. It righted itself and crawled into the centre of the palm of my hand, where it stayed. Here we were in the middle of the night and a ladybird, painted by moonlight, had flown into my mouth.

  I showed it to my father. I said very clearly, but in my deep adult voice, ‘I’ve come here from another time.’

  He seemed thunderstruck, hunched forward in the boat staring at the tiny creature in my hand.

  But it was as if I couldn’t remember what I’d just said to him. That is, I knew as myself, as the older David exactly what I’d just said. But as the little boy I couldn’t remember.

  I held the ladybird in the palm of my hand up to the light of the moon. The great strontium-white ball of the moon seemed to expand massively in the sky. I blew on my hand and the ladybird, silhouetted, expanded its wings and flew in a dizzy pattern across the face of the moon before disappearing into the blackness.

  ‘Can we go back?’ I said. ‘I’m frightened.’

  My father seemed crestfallen, beaten. His brow was creased. In a kind of daze he gathered the oars and he dipped them in the water. He turned the boat around and steadily but firmly rowed the boat back to the shore. I sat opposite him and he didn’t take his eyes off me, not for a single stroke.

  When we reached the shore he untied the rope from around my ankle, then from his. He put his trousers and his jacket back on and lifted me out of the boat to carry me onto the sand. After setting me down he took my hand and we walked to the pier.

  The light changed and it was instantly daytime; the sun was shining, gulls were calling and wheeling in the blue sky and the pier was busy with people and music and with gaiety. We walked together to the end of the pier. ‘I’m leaving you here, David,’ he said. He took his wallet out of his pocket and he pressed it into my hand. ‘Someone will come for you. Wait here.’

  I watched him walk away, along the boardwalk of the pier. He didn’t look back at me. I could see him through the cross-hatch of railings as he got down onto the sand again, making his way back to the boat. He pushed the boat back into the water, climbed in and heaved on the oars, rowing steadily out to sea all over again. The tiny boat became a dot out at sea and seemed to become still. I watched it lift and fall on the swell for a long time.

  Eventually I became distracted by some music playing on the pier. I moved between the people. I found a penny on the boardwalk and I tried to put it into a machine, but I couldn’t reach. A young couple saw me and laughed. The young woman lifted me up so I could reach the coin slot, but then the young man said, ‘Oh, a penny won’t do it for Madame Zora.’

  He found the right coin and Madam Zora began to whirr and click and go through her routine but I kicked away from the young couple and ran down the pier, following my father. I ran onto the sand shouting his name. I think I knew he was never going to come back.

  ‘It’s my daddy!’ I shouted. ‘It’s my daddy!’

  In an instant I was crying and screaming and there was no-one to hear me. I wanted someone to help me. The sun was high and hot in the sky as I ran over the sand. I slipped and I fell. The loose sand scraped my face; it seemed not to want to let me get help for my daddy. I fell again and scrambled along the beach, screaming for him to come back.

  But there was no-one there. I couldn’t even see the boat out on the distant swell of the water. Tears stung my ears. I couldn’t breathe. The beach had become a vast and hostile wilderness. No-one came. ‘It’s my daddy!’ I screamed, and the sea just groaned and shifted its obstinate and infinite weight. ‘It’s my daddy.’

  I sat down on the beach and I sobbed, gulping, trying to breathe.

  Then I saw the young woman from the pier rushing towards me. She put her hand on my shoulder. ‘Who are you with?’ she asked me. ‘Tell me who you are with?’ Then she took both of my hands.

  ‘Hush! Hush!’ she said. ‘Here you are! Here you are!’ And the person holding my hands was no longer a young woman on the pier, but Dot, in the laundry room. ‘Hush now. Here you are.’

  ‘It’s my daddy,’ I cried to her.

  I cried openly and unashamedly before this hardened old woman as she sat quietly and held my hands. Finally she got up and she found me a clean handkerchief and told me to blow my nose. ‘Don’t worry, I’ve seen a lot of tears,’ she said. ‘A lot of tears.’

  When I’d recovered enough, Dot said, ‘Are you all right? I’ve got a lot of work to get on with, duckie.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s hard, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s hard for a lot of people. You know that.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Anyway, at least we know who they are, don’t we?’

  I said, ‘But why are they haunting me?’

  ‘Oh no duckie,’ she said. ‘No no no. They’re not haunting you. You’re haunting them. They don’t want to be here.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘It’s not your father; it’s what he was. That boy isn’t you; it’s what you were. Leave them alone. Why don’t you leave them alone?’

  My eyes wanted to fill with tears all over again. I managed to stop it. Someone tapped on the door. She ignored it.

  ‘He was very, very confused,’ she said.

  ‘Yeh.’

  ‘He wasn’t much older than you are now.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You can’t hate him.’

  ‘No. I don’t.’

  ‘You have to forgive him. That’s important.’

  I nodded.

  ‘You have to forgive him. I pull the stopper out. That’s all I do.’

  I stood up. ‘I’m ready to go. Thank you.’

  She got up stiffly, pressing a hand to her arthritic hip, and moved to the door, where she lifted the latch. I thanked her a second time and made to go outside. ‘Hold on a moment,’ she said, ‘there’s something else.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I’ve had some new shirts and trousers in as will fit you now.’

  22

  Oh there will be time for sweet wine

  Can someone hold your hand and make lost memories come tumbling down? Nikki and I fell asleep that night drugged with sex and folded in each other’s love. But new force
s were dragging me back. I had a dream that looped horribly. It played over and over. If I woke and went back to sleep it would start again. It was just a dream of being in a small boat out at sea, but a hole had appeared in the boat. Instead of water running in, grains of the boat were running out and into the water like sand running in an inverted egg-timer. At first the grains appeared not to move at all, then a hole collapsed in the boat and the grains appeared to run faster, running towards some groaning terror that would cause me to wake up.

  I spent the next day curled up in bed like a foetus. Nikki went into work and told them I had a stomach bug. In breaks between activities she came back to the flat above the bucket-and-spade shop and fed me soup or got into bed with me and made me talk about these things.

  ‘I can see why your mother never wanted you to come here,’ she said. ‘But you must have known. You must have known that this is where it all happened.’

  ‘I was three years old. I didn’t know anything.’ Perhaps that wasn’t entirely true. Clearly some dark and secret place inside me knew everything perfectly. But those events had accreted a shell and burrowed under sand to be covered with water. Not everyone with lost memories can swim their way back to remembering. The muscle will perish; the shell will be picked clean; the waves will break the shell and pound it into sand.

  I didn’t blame my mother or Ken, even though they should have spoken to me about these things. They were already busy blaming themselves. They simply could not bear to prise open the subject.

  After the events I have described, other memories came tumbling back to me. I remember being at home and playing in the front garden. The wooden gate opened and there was my natural father in a smart, blue suit. I hadn’t seen him for some weeks and when I ran to him he swept me up in his arms. I loved him and I’d missed him. I didn’t know why he’d been away so long.

  He was wearing spectacles. I hadn’t seen him wear them before and I didn’t like it. He seemed not to be quite like my father. But then he looked up the path and asked me if I wanted to go to the seaside. I said yes. He put me in his car and he drove us to the seaside. He hadn’t told my mother. He hadn’t told anyone. When we got to the seaside we were hiding out while he made his plans.

  Nikki encouraged me to go back into work the next day. Even though I was in a fragile state I was mindlessly efficient. I smiled when I needed to smile. It can be done, and is done often. I sometimes think that half of humanity is smiling across a profound agony. Nikki and I were in every sense professional. We didn’t tell anyone about what had happened.

  One evening Nikki was dancing in the Variety show at the theatre while I was calling the giant bingo session in the Slowboat. Between intoning Two Little Ducks or Kelly’s Eye Number One into the microphone I medicated myself with beer and stood at the bar, chatting to Eric the Brummie drummer. Someone tapped me on the shoulder.

  I turned round and I almost dropped my stein of beer.

  ‘Awright?’

  I felt the blood drain from my face, and then rush back again. ‘Colin. How are you?’

  ‘I’m all right. You?’

  I stared at him as if he were the ghost of Macbeth. ‘Can I get you a drink?’

  ‘Just the one. I’m not staying. I’m up for poker night. Last time.’

  I moved over to the bar and ordered a pint of Federation Ale for him. I was afraid of my hands shaking again, just as they had when he’d taken me for a beer at The Dunes. I took a breath, composed myself and carried his beer over to a table. He joined me, but he kept looking out of the corner of his eye, as if he was scanning the room for someone.

  ‘Is Terri up here with you?’ I asked.

  ‘Na.’ He took a sip of beer and the foam printed a moustache on his upper lip.

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Dunno.’

  We sat in silence for a minute. He scanned the room constantly. Then he volunteered some information. ‘I took her off to Marbella after last I seen you.’

  ‘Marbella.’

  ‘Yeh. It’s in Spain.’

  I wanted to say I knew where Marbella was but I thought better of it.

  ‘Thought that would suit her. We used to go there in the old days. We was alright for a while. Then she ran away.’

  ‘Ran away where?’

  ‘I’ve a good idea.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘With someone from ’ere.’

  ‘I don’t believe it,’ I said.

  His eyes flared open and he tipped back his head. I saw the back of his upper fillings. ‘I nearly catched her at it. In that feater over there.’

  ‘What, this theatre?’ I was incredulous for him.

  ‘I followed her in one day. It wasn’t that Italian cos he was ’aving a smoke with Pinky. When I gets in there she’s in the dark with that scrote, your mate.’

  ‘My mate?’

  ‘That fuckin’ soft Mancunian. Whatsisname?’

  ‘Nobby? Are you sure?’

  ‘He was wearing that kit like you wear.’

  ‘But are you certain it was him?’

  ‘Less it was you, or that prat with the wig.’ He flashed me a half-smile. ‘Na, it was him all right. I know cos he disappeared off the scene straight after.’

  ‘I don’t know, Colin,’ I said helpfully. ‘Nobby? It doesn’t add up. He’s not her type.’

  ‘Her type? Anyone with a hard cock is her type. Maybe I’ll go up to Manchester. See if I can’t find ’em both.’

  It occurred to me that Colin might just do that. I don’t know what it was about Nobby but he always fitted the bill. I suddenly felt emboldened. ‘Colin. Why do this to yourself? Sometimes you have to let it go. Walk away.’

  He sniffed. ‘Listen to you. Givin’ the advice out now, aincha?’

  ‘I didn’t mean to –’

  ‘It’s alright, son. I’ve heard it. It’s alright.’

  It was impossible to tell if he was lying about Terri’s fate. I tried to look deep into his eyes. It was like looking down a mine shaft.

  He drained his beer glass and stood up. ‘Might see you here next season, then?’

  I got up off my stool. He dug his hands in his pockets, almost as if to tell me that he didn’t want any handshake ritual. ‘Might well do, Colin. Might well do.’

  He nodded briefly, turned and left. It wasn’t until he’d passed through the doors that I let out a big sigh.

  I rejoined Eric the drummer at the bar. He was chatting with one of the bar staff and, when the barman moved across to serve someone, Eric said to me, ‘I didn’t know he was a friend of yours.’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  The Saturdays came and went, the sea turned the grey of gun metal and the infamous and bracing east coast wind grew squally and bitter. Most people had gone back to work and for the last couple of weeks the resort was populated by special groups: disabled people, children from care homes and the like. It was actually more fun to work with these groups but the numbers of holidaymakers were already well down on the peak season and I was aware that many of the staff had already left.

  The performers were signed off and a rudimentary programme was offered for the rump of the season. A goodbye party was held for the theatre people. Luca Valletti made a brief appearance. He arrived late, had one drink and then went round solemnly but punctiliously shaking hands with everyone equally.

  When he came to me he blinked, smiled and offered his hand. ‘I wish you every success with your studies.’

  ‘Thank you, Luca. I learned a lot from you.’

  He blinked and regarded me rather strangely, I thought. Then he offered me almost a bow and moved on to the next person.

  Nikki, meanwhile, was already thinking about her next job. She had an audition in Coventry for a part in a Christmas pantomime production. Puss in Boots, where the chorus line wore leather boots up to the top of their thighs. I saw her off at the train station and went to meet her when she came back. She didn’t know whether she’d got the part or not. We avoided discuss
ing the future.

  In the final week we had a party of disabled children from a special home and Nikki, Gail and I threw ourselves into designing a fresh programme suitable for kids in wheelchairs. Even Tony – yes, Tony the fascist – got enthusiastic about whether we could make it all accessible and high energy, so that we could give the kids our very best.

  And then it was all over. I said goodbye to Pinky and he made me promise that I would come back the following year. ‘Your face fits,’ he said.

  Tony shook my hand manfully and apologised for not being able to knock some political sense into me. He pointed at me with a big tanned and nicotine-stained index finger. ‘Don’t let them commie professors fill your head with nonsense, mind you. And don’t forget about us.’

  They were all wonderful with the sweet wine.

  I talked Nikki into shacking up with me in Nottingham. We scoured the local newspaper and we found another flat together near the town centre of Nottingham. We bought paint and freshened the place up and she gave it some feminine touches. We were playing at being a couple. One day she came home with a little gift for me.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Open it.’

  I unwrapped some tissue paper and I found it was a heavy glass paperweight. The glass was red with black spots and bifurcated to look like the carapace of a ladybird.

  ‘It’s to remind you. Of the summer.’

  I weighed it in my hand. ‘It’s lovely.’

  ‘It’s for your studies.’

  Perhaps I looked confused. I don’t know what type of student Nikki thought I was: maybe she had a notion of me at a big desk with a brass telescope and a silver engraved pen and a huge blotter, with a pile of maps and scrolls.

  ‘It’s a silly present, isn’t it?’ she said, suddenly losing confidence.

  ‘No it’s not. It’s beautiful.’

  ‘Silly.’

  ‘I’ll treasure it.’ I weighed it in my hand for her to see. ‘Really.’

  Nikki was entertained and amused at being part of the student scene. She met my friends, and we drank in the union bar. We even sneaked her into a few lectures, completely unnoticed, just so she could get a sense of what we did. She was three or four years older than my contemporaries and though she never criticised them I could tell that their immaturity bored her. Nonetheless she became excited by the lectures; she always wanted to discuss what she’d heard; in fact she was more interested in learning than ninety per cent of the student population. She hungered for learning.