Crustaceans

by Andrew Cowan

  TEN

  I woke from troubling dreams to Ruth’s soft tread on the boards, the creak of the wardrobe, her coat-hangers jangling, and rolled on to my belly, as though to embrace her. I raised one knee and stretched out an arm. I breathed her scent in the pillows and felt the warmth she had left there. She laid some clothes on the bed. Her underwear drawer slid open, clunked shut. She parted the curtains. It was a weekday morning, some time after seven, and the sun glared back from the clockface. It shone too from her jewellery, clustered next to the clock, her tangle of earrings and bracelets and chains. Heavy-limbed and lethargic, I tried to remember which day this was, and what chores lay ahead, and as I drifted again into sleep I heard you talking in the room next to ours, your nonsense. I heard the lift in Ruth’s voice as she went through to greet you. The first half-hour of your day was always spent in her company, before she went off to work. The rest, until six, would be mine.

  You were eighteen months old then, a handful, and constantly mobile, and as I think of you now it seems you ran everywhere, planting your feet as if breaking a fall, tilting, lurching ahead, forever trying to escape me. It seems I spent my days chasing you, and I remember the tantrums – your shattering screams – whenever I caught you. I remember the nights on end when we woke to your wailing, and the days of fretful complaining, your fevers and colds. Often, I know, I was bored, and yet rarely for a moment free of your needs, the work you demanded. There was the long labour of getting you dressed, and the mess that you caused, the smears and spillages and trails of food, the cupboards repeatedly emptied, and the bins and pot-plants upended. I remember the churn of the washing-machine, and the piles of clothes to be ironed, the mop in the hallway, your nappies. Every other task I began was left uncompleted – our walls half stripped of their paper, the ceilings half painted – for nothing much held your interest for long; soon enough I would have to return to you, abandon whatever I’d started. Our house was a shambles, and even when you were sleeping your presence remained – in your buggy and toys and discarded clothes, the scribbles and daubs that I’d pinned to the walls, the crayons I trod on. Everything then seemed to breathe with your energy, whilst I could barely stop yawning.

  I remember all this, and my frustration – the fits of complaining to Ruth – and yet I know too that I’d never been happier, more at home in myself. I liked being your father. I was what you’d made me, and often as I looked after you, played my part in your life, I would wonder what you’d later recall of these days, how much would stay with you. It was a time when you lost as much as you learned. A word spoken one day would be forgotten the next; a toy removed from under your nose would hardly be missed. One passing event succeeded another – leaving no mark, it seemed, on your memory – and of course I wanted to preserve it all for you. My camera, permanently cocked on the shelf by the fireplace, had caught the moment you first walked, aged almost one, your arms outstretched in your sleepsuit; and then later, wearing only your nappy, fleeing from Ruth in the garden. It had captured you naked, gazing down at your willy as you peed on the floor of the kitchen, and again as you stood on our bed, blotched all over with spots. There were photographs of you crying, and feeding from Ruth, asleep on her shoulder, and so many more of you smiling. But it is the photographs now I recall, and rarely the moments. One day’s traumas were resolved and forgotten; your sudden achievements were soon taken for granted. What remained was the continuing fact of our life together, and of course my camera couldn’t capture that.

  The albums now are with Ruth, and though I can remember the sequence of pages, and the notes I pencilled into the margins, what comes to me more often and clearly is waking again that July morning to find you standing beside me, cheerfully babbling, gesticulating, and the momentary pause when you realised I’d woken, the crease in your brow. You gave a sharp squeal, and ran to the end of the bed. You barked something at Ruth and returned. You widened your arms to be lifted. C’mon? you said, nodding; Daddy, c’mon? No, I replied, and rolled into the dip of the mattress, across to my own side of the bed. I heard the pat of your feet as you followed me round, and blearily watched as Ruth slipped out of her nightshirt, pulled it free in one movement. The tea she’d placed on the floor was stewed and lukewarm and it spilled down my chin as I drank. You were tugging my arm, clambering to get onto the bed, and when at last you started to whine I lifted you onto my belly; I held your chest in my broad hands. Your hair was soft and unruly and curled back from your collar. I saw Ruth’s blue-green eyes in yours, the dark arch of her eyebrows, her father’s cleft in your chin. You were no weight at all, and when I raised you into the air, held you over my head like a trophy, I remember Ruth smiled, her glance meeting mine in the mirror. I remember she zipped up her skirt, turned it round on her hips, and came over to kiss me, as she would every morning, though this time she lingered. She lay down on the bed and nestled against me; she made herself late for work.

  ELEVEN

  Ruth’s home at the start was a barracks three miles from the coast. Fields of beet grew where once there’d been an airstrip. The students occupied buildings still painted for camouflage; a few grey pillboxes watched the horizon. She shared a kitchen and bathroom with four other girls, caught the same bus in the mornings, drank with them some evenings, but never felt sure that they liked her. Half-way through our first term she moved to a house in the town, and moved again in the second year, once more in the third. Each time she was invited, for Ruth always had friends, other people to be with, and wherever we went – trawling pubs for companions, calling unannounced at their houses, gatecrashing parties – she always slipped in before me. And then I would lose her. She wouldn’t speak to a crowd, but withdrew into corners, private conversations like ours, and sometimes – as I looked on – her eyes would catch mine and she’d frown, as though surprised to find me still there, or disturbed I was watching. I’d sense something then of how it might be when she left me.

  But I was happy to watch her. Ruth’s hair was fine and very straight and she tucked it repeatedly behind her ears as she listened. When she smiled she became self-conscious, dipping her head as she reached for a glass or her cigarette, allowing her hair to slide forward. Often she sat with one knee drawn to her chin, her arms wrapped tight round her leg, or else eased off her shoes and drew both legs beneath her, almost kneeling, even in pubs, as though curled up on a sofa at home. She made others feel comfortable, and interesting, but always claimed she felt awkward, burdened by what she was told and exposed by what she’d revealed. Walking back to my flat she would cling to my arm and fret about all she had said and not said. Then in my room she’d sit smoking in silence on the edge of the bed, until finally, with a sigh or a groan, she’d stub out her cigarette and come back to me. It was usually then that she’d tell me she loved me. I didn’t always want to believe her.

  When our time as undergraduates ended there was a party in her house near the college. A short while before it began we sat alone in a pub called the Hurricane, the door wedged open beside us, sunlight glinting from the barrels outside in the yard. Soon most of our friends would be leaving – returning home or travelling abroad, starting jobs, new courses, or moving to London. One couple was going to get married. Ruth had a place at the Royal College. I’d carried her portfolio down to the interview, and I’d helped to write her application. I hadn’t had any plans for myself, and hadn’t known what to say when she received her acceptance. The letter now lay on the table before us. I read it again, and folded it neatly, and pushed it back in its envelope. I propped it next to her glass. I really thought you’d be pleased, she said quietly, and I shrugged, then lifted my drink. I am, I replied; it’s good. It’s just what you wanted, I said.

  The lounge was narrow and empty, low-ceilinged, and as I gazed around at the walls, at the red leather benches and stools, polished tables and ashtrays, I thought of waiting rooms, the coach station, and wished all this could be over. I fixed my eyes on a painting near to the bar, a fighter-plane skimming
the sea, sandy cliffs in the distance, metallic grey waves. The frame was white, beaded gold, and it hung from a picture rail. It was slightly askew. I angled my head, and knew – from Ruth’s silence beside me, her stillness – that she was crying. We ought to get going, I said; but Ruth didn’t move. When she turned to face me I looked down at my glass. Have you ever loved me? she asked then; and surprised, I nodded. You’ve never once said so, she said. From the other room came a murmur of men’s voices, the click of the balls on the pool table. I was frightened you’d leave me, I finally told her.

  The evening was warm, a scent of blossom and tar in the air, gulls perched on the rooftops. We trailed towards a main road, our steps sluggish, unsteady with drink, and Ruth said, I just thought you’d want to come with me, Paul. I wouldn’t have applied otherwise. It doesn’t make sense. You can’t just go back to your grandma’s. You can’t go back to all that and spend the rest of your life waiting for the next thing to happen. It’s stupid. We’re supposed to be an us. We paused at a crossing, my hand clammy in hers, and she said, I’m not going to walk out on you, Paul. I’m not. You have to take a chance on that … The sun was bright in my eyes, her face indistinct, and I felt the dry blast of a truck as it passed us, breathed the exhaust. I looked down at my feet, the splats of glaze on my boots, the moss dividing the kerbstones. Paul? she said then. What? Say something, she said. I hear you, I murmured, and stepped into the road.

  But of course I had not heard her, I was not listening, for always I’d assumed the future would decide itself for me – there would be no choices, no need to act; Ruth would move on and I would not prevent her – and when at last we reached the door to her house we separated, nothing more spoken between us. In each of the rooms there were people, packed boxes, empty bookshelves, and spaces on the wall where once there’d been posters. As I stood amongst the crowd in the kitchen, watching the slow twist of beer from the keg on the table, Ruth reached across me, her hand touching my shoulder, and took away a bottle of wine. When later we crossed on the stairs I smiled, or tried to, and she stroked my arm as she went by, quickly descending. In the press of the hallway we came face to face, and I turned sideways, her back brushing mine as she edged through. In the living room I watched as she listened to one of our tutors, his arm outstretched to the wall, pinning her in, and I felt sorry for her. Then some time after midnight, making my way to the toilet, I passed her bedroom, heard laughter, several voices, and realised how sorry I felt for myself.

  The party had begun in bright sunshine, and as the sky darkened, the pubs emptying and more people arriving, it had spilled out to the garden, on to the flat roof of the kitchen extension and down the front steps to the street. I was by then very drunk, and should have left earlier, but continued to wander from one room to the next, picking up cans where I found them, drinking whatever there was and speaking to no one, until finally, late on in the crush of the kitchen, I found myself standing with Rachel, Ruth’s housemate. She smiled when she saw me, a sympathetic crease of her eyes, a tilt of her head, and I guessed they’d been talking. She smelled darkly of perfume, and the mustiness that often also clung to Ruth’s clothes. We had to shout into each other’s ear. Rachel’s hair was thick and long and tickled my face as we talked. I felt the soft pressure of her breast on my arm. She said she didn’t like parties, hadn’t wanted there to be one. And I told her, Me neither, I don’t know why I came, I can’t stand anyone here. I slumped back on the wall, bumped into it, and Rachel said something inaudible, her gaze drifting away. I leaned closer, felt myself tipping, falling against her. Rachel gripped me under the arms. What’s that? I asked her. Not even Ruth? she said. And frowning, I said, No, Ruth’s gone now. I rested my head on her shoulder. She was shorter than Ruth, and much plumper, and I wrapped my arms around her, held on to her softness. The noise of the party receded, everything distant, and I was comfortable then, softly breathing. I closed my eyes, and felt the dark slowly turning, Rachel’s legs against mine, her belly, and when at last she eased me away I tried clumsily to kiss her. Perhaps you ought to go home now, she said; and touching her hip, I said, Come with me. Her gaze was steady, appraising. I started to grin, and she smiled. She took hold of my hand and led me out from the kitchen, along the dark hallway. She drew me upstairs. Some girls were descending, and stood aside as we passed. Through the banisters as we climbed I saw into her bedroom, the Indian drapes on her walls, a red lampshade, her mattress. But we wouldn’t go in there, already I knew that we wouldn’t. She knocked on Ruth’s door and let go of my hand. She guided me in. Ruth was sitting alone on the end of her bed. Her face showed no surprise. She tapped some ash into a beercan and swilled it around. She looked down at her feet. Little boy lost, Rachel said, and quietly left us.

  TWELVE

  The air was damp and still and I could hear a grave being filled, the slice of the shovels. Browned conker cases lay on the ground, last year’s brittle leaves. A squirrel skittered through the undergrowth. It leapt on to a headstone, and from there to the trunk of a tree, spiralling upwards. The sky through the branches was vaporous and grey, and from somewhere far off came the sound of a plane, its engine booming, subsiding. I heard the rush of the ring road; I heard Bridget calling my name. She was nearer now than before. I saw the flash of her yellow cagoule, her black shiny hair. In a moment she’d find me. I stood before the grave of Emanuel Cooper and waited. He had died in 1905, aged seventy-eight, whilst Florence May – devoted wife of the above – hadn’t fallen asleep until 1918. Reunited, it said.

  Paul! Bridget smiled, climbing towards me; I thought I’d lost you. She patted her chest; she was breathless. I’m not lost, I told her. Eleven years old, I passed through the cemetery daily on my way to and from school. I came also at weekends, school holidays, and I remembered the inscriptions – the names and dates of the dead – as effortlessly as I recalled capital cities, chemical formulae, my times tables. I thought I knew every corner. The next stone was crusted with lichens; dark tendrils of ivy crept over it – Cornelius Tuck, whose end was peace, and Elizabeth Tuck, not dead but sleepeth. An angel, green with moss, its features dissolving, rose from a tangle of bushes nearby. Bridget removed the cap from her camera and went closer, adjusting the focus, the aperture. She wore hiking boots, thick socks. She bent her knees and leaned forward. I looked at the spread of her buttocks, and remembered how my father would touch her, standing close by her side in the kitchen. Laughing, she’d push him away with her shoulder. They seemed to be happy together. Where to now? she asked then, cringing as the plane passed above us, its roar like a furnace. I pointed the way.

  We had come to visit the bust of Horace John Thirkle, amusement caterer to this city, who had died in 1915. I’d said I knew where to find him. Bridget was Irish, a student at my father’s college, his girlfriend, and she was taking pictures of the modern-day Thirkles. Twice a year they erected a fair on the Racecourse at the back of our house. They wintered in caravans on the outskirts of town. Bridget had been there to see them. She had followed their trucks around the county that summer, and some of her photos were going to be shown in a gallery. My own face, pasty-white and determined, appeared at the edge of one frame. A carousel spun in the background, a blur of colour and horses and children. It looked like I was running away, though in fact she had told me to stand there, walk quickly on when she said so.

  Horace Thirkle lay close to the top of the rise. I led Bridget past obelisks, shrouded urns, decapitated cherubs, and a plain four-square building in a railed enclosure, the mausoleum of Jeremiah Winter, surgeon and benefactor. The gravestones around us, weathered and tilting, were laid to no obvious grid. Brambles grew wildly, creepers and thistles, and there were beercans too, plastic carrier bags. I saw a pair of soiled underpants, and kicked over a fungus. Bridget wound on a new film as we walked. I hadn’t thought she would want to take so many pictures. I was hoping for one more of myself, though I hadn’t yet told her. Cautiously I asked, How many’s left? and she answered, Thirty-six now
, her voice gentle, distracted. She pronounced the thirty as turty. I nodded and said, That’s him over there, and she gave a sharp sigh. Would you look at that, she said.

  The bust was mounted on a plinth of black stone, four pillars around it, a roof like a temple. Twice life-size and bearded, its eyes were dark hollows, gazing out on the streets of the old town, the cathedral spire and the college. I’d seen it too often before. Down to our left was the crematorium chimney. In a few weeks, when the last leaves had fallen, the white regimented rows of the war graves would show through the trees. Half an hour earlier Bridget had paused there, and lingered too at the Garden of Remembrance, then again where the children were buried. She’d watched the paper windmills fitfully stirring, rain-bleached and dirty, and I’d thought she was going to cry, but still she had taken some photos. It was then that I’d left her. And as she peered now through her lens at the bust of Horace John Thirkle I turned and wandered away, clambered up to the old boundary wall. I found the stones of Dear Little Joe, not dead but gone before, and Precious Jemima, only sleeping. There was a woman called Ede Ede, and a man named William Hamlet Denmark. The path was narrow and cobbled and led on to an archway, a black iron gate. On the other side the graves were more recent, and orderly, the grass precincts bisected by roads, dotted with flowers. The gate creaked on its hinges as I went through.