by Andrew Cowan
I can remember these things, but never quite the sound of her voice. Susan didn’t talk much. Our time together passed quietly. Most evenings we sat in my bedroom, or hers – doing our homework, reading, or watching her television – and always when we made love there’d be silence, her hands touching my shoulders, accepting, as remote from me as I was from her. She was very pale, I remember, round-featured, her pallor emphasised by her hair and her eyebrows, which were black and grew thickly. Often she braided her hair, the heavy plait splayed out at the end, sweeping the small of her back. She said I’d once pulled it, in primary school, though I had no memory of that. Susan had always been there, a girl in my class, someone I might pass in the street, and it wasn’t until I was fourteen, thirteen perhaps, that I’d noticed her, as most of the other boys had. She’s a well-developed girl, my father had said, the first time I returned from walking her home; big for her age. He seemed to approve, but Susan was regularly taunted in school for her size, for her breasts, and when I think of her now I see the dark crease of her frown and the way she tucked her mouth at the corners, annoyed and defensive. I cannot picture her smiling.
We were together for almost a year, and it was shortly after my sixteenth birthday – old enough now, said one of my cards, to get married, have sex and start smoking – that she told me she thought she was pregnant. Within a few days we would learn that she wasn’t – she’d got her dates wrong – and soon after that we’d agree to stop seeing each other. But her tears that first evening had made it seem certain; she was a week overdue and she’d been sick in the night. My dad’ll kill me, she said bleakly, sitting up in my bedroom. He’ll be livid; he’ll make us get married, I just know it. My own father’s response, I guessed, would be more scornful, dismissive – the problem would be mine alone to sort out – and wary of approaching him, I skipped school the next morning and caught a bus to see my aunt Rene, his sister, who lived then in a new town some miles from ours.
It wasn’t the best time to call. As I came through the door my feet squelched on the carpet. A length of bright copper piping sloped down the staircase, bits of plaster littered the floor, and there was dust in the air, a large hole in the ceiling. My aunt and uncle were shouting upstairs. In the curtained gloom of the living room I found my cousin Colin sprawled out on the sofa, reading a comic. What’s going on? I asked him. Nothing, he shrugged. Why aren’t you at school? I said. Suspended, he told me, and switched on the television. I sat down in an armchair and waited, and when at last my uncle descended the stairs, still shouting, and slammed the front door behind him, my cousin turned towards me and said, He’s got another woman, dirty bastard. He was grinning, and I nodded, attempted a smile. A few moments later I heard Rene’s footsteps and followed her through to the kitchen.
It had always been my aunt’s manner to talk to me as if I was older, more of a friend than a nephew, and on the long journey over I’d rehearsed in my mind what I would say to her and how she’d respond. We’d be alone in the house, sitting in the quiet of her dining room, and I would admit to having no strong feelings for Susan, secretly to liking other girls more, and she would agree that we’d been foolish, we’d made a mistake, but to get married now would be a worse mistake still. A child, she would say, deserved parents who loved one another, and we were anyway too young, even at sixteen, to take on such a burden, not much more than children ourselves. There’d be concern and sympathy, wry smiles, and finally she would offer to speak to my father, perhaps even arrange to visit Susan’s parents. Leave it with me, she would say; I’ll see what I can do.
Instead of which she was furious. Her face tight and pale, she began stuffing some bedsheets into the washing-machine, but the bundle was too large, it wouldn’t go in, and exasperated she gave up; she turned and suddenly shouted, You idiot, Paul! You total bloody idiot, what were you thinking of? I wasn’t, I said lamely; it just happened. No, Paul, she snapped; it doesn’t just happen, it never just happens – it’s the same bloody story, isn’t it? It’s your mum and dad all over again, the same bloody story. I stared at her, I said nothing, and shaking her head, perhaps realising then what she’d told me, my aunt gestured to the mess in the hallway, to the sheets on the floor, and wearily said, I’m sorry, Paul, it’s been a bad day for me, I shouldn’t have shouted. What story? I asked her. Never mind, she replied. There isn’t a story; I just lost my temper. She plucked at the sleeves of her sweatshirt, rubbed her arms as if she was cold, and then sighed and picked up the kettle. But there wasn’t any water – not until her plumber returned – and she called for Colin to come away from the television. She gave him the kettle and sent him next door, and as the gate rattled behind him she quietly said, It was all a long time ago, Paul. I don’t see the point in dragging it up now; I think you just ought to leave it. But of course I could never do that. I got from my chair and persisted; I stood where she couldn’t ignore me. Is that why they got married, Aunt Rene? Because Mum was pregnant, because she was forced to? No, she said sharply; your mum and dad were in love, Paul; they got married because they wanted to. I shook my head. I don’t believe you, I said; I think that’s just rubbish, Aunt Rene. I think you’re lying. And she glared at me then. She tightened her mouth and pushed past me, flung open the back door. Well, there’s the fucking gate, Paul! she shouted, waving her arm. Go and interrogate your father. Better still, ask your bloody grandad. Because it has nothing to do with me, it never bloody did, and I won’t be called a liar in my own fucking house! Her face and her arm were shaking. And though I knew that I ought to apologise – and still wanted to talk about Susan – I picked up my jacket and went; I turned for the hallway and left by the front door, slamming it after me.
EIGHTEEN
On the patio outside the Golden Sands Cafeteria there’s a fibre-glass ice-cream, two metres tall, and a board saying Leisure Fun Pleasure. A gifts carousel turns in the wind. The white plastic chairs are stacked up in fours, the striped parasols lowered, and a line of plump gulls sits perched on the railings. We often came here as students, and once I took a photo of Ruth standing next to the ice-cream, hunched beneath an umbrella in her fur-hooded parka, sipping tea from a styrofoam cup. That too was December, and later, much later, when we began to visit with you, I tried to take another just like it. I remember the afternoon sun was sharp in your eyes, and the cornet I’d bought you melted on to your hand, then you complained you were seasick. You wouldn’t stand still, refused to smile when I asked you, and in the end I gave up; I said we were leaving. But this café, you insisted, was your favourite. A square wooden shack with windows all round, there was the beach below to the right, a small playground behind it. The old man inside sometimes remembered your name. You said you wanted to stay – you wanted to play on the swings – but I was not listening. I walked on ahead, and it was Ruth who promised we would come here again. Maybe tomorrow, she said.
There are no other customers. The old man sits smoking at the table nearest the counter and doesn’t glance up as I enter but carefully extinguishes his cigarette and folds over a newspaper. He slowly comes round to serve me, his face netted with wrinkles, deep pouches under his eyes. The food cabinets are empty, the steel surfaces bare. Buckets and spades hang down from the ceiling, beachballs and cricket sets, kites. A fan-heater churns in one corner. My face pricks in the warmth, and when I pull off my hat, my scarf and my gloves, he looks at me briefly, seems for a moment uncertain, then lays out a tray, a saucer and cup, and quietly says, That’s tea with no sugar. It isn’t a question and he says nothing more. He adds a chocolate bar to the tray and shakes his head at my money, stares away to the door, wiping his hands on his apron. I place some coins by the till. The chocolate, I suppose, would be yours.
I sit facing the beach, the waves breaking grey on the shore, the sands mottled with snow, and hear the click of his lighter behind me. I take out my tobacco, my papers. The vague blur on the horizon is a gas-rig and the sky has no colour. A young family is walking a dog on the strand. They’re all
wearing wellington boots and the children are searching the tideline. The dog races on, weaves and runs back. My tea is scalding and tasteless. A couple of girls pass by on high clumpy heels, dressed in short skirts, black padded jackets, and I shift in my chair to watch them. They go through to the playground, across a mossy humped bridge, a green narrow stream, and join a group of boys by the swings. One sits drinking a beer, his arms looped round the chains, a sports-bag by his feet. He stands and flexes his arms, scuffs a foot through the snow, then grabs for one of the girls, holds her tight from behind. He tries to lift her, arching his back, and she screams. You were bored being five. You wanted to be a teenager, play out on your own. The old man turns a page of his paper, and I reach again for my tea, but I’m wearing too many layers; my sleeve catches the cup and it topples. I gaze at the spillage, watch it drip to the seat where you ought to be sitting, and then I find I am crying, the tears sudden, surprising. I get to my feet; I don’t know what I’m doing. The old man is coming towards me. He lays a cloth over the tea and touches my shoulder. Take your time, son, he says, and gives me a handkerchief. He guides me to a different table, and mops the tea to a bucket, drops the cloth after it. I’ll get you a refill, he says. My things remain where I left them. Outside the gifts carousel squeaks as it turns. I hear the dog barking, the teenagers shouting, and I stare at our two empty chairs.
NINETEEN
Christmas Eve, nine years ago, and a gale was blowing. The wind moaned in the chimney, troubled the fire. Rain lashed the windows. Ruth was sitting astride me, drinking a beer, one hand splayed out on my chest. Her face was pink and she wore a pink cardigan. It was a gift from her father that morning – the padded envelope still lay on the carpet, a ball of scrunched wrapping, his card. I’d asked her to wear it. The wool was soft and thin and the sleeves were tight on her arms. A single button was fastened, her breasts loose beneath. I smoothed my hands over it. I think this suits you, I said; it’s sexy. You’re very sad, Paul, she told me, and lowered herself to her elbows. She dropped the can to the floor. Quietly she said, What’ve you got me, though? I want to know, Paul. A ring, I said; I’m going to propose to you. She bit my chin. You’d better not, she said. The door rattled; something fell from the scaffolding over the road. I twitched inside her. Are you still cold? I said. I’ll light the oven, she murmured, closing her eyes, moving against me. In a minute, she said.
Ruth’s flat was a bedsit, a room in a basement – it’s a bit of a dungeon, she’d warned me; it’s a death-trap, I’d told her – but we were never unhappy down there. A strip of linoleum marked out her kitchen. The cooker and sink backed on to the windows, a fridge in one corner, some shelving above it. The textured paint on her walls was grubby and coarsely applied, the ridges sharp on my arm as I slept, the bed too narrow for two. In the summer, she said, the sun would set behind the buildings that faced us, slant into her room by tea-time. But it was dark all through that winter and we kept the lights on, rarely opened the curtains. The traffic outside was constant. Planes passed overhead, tube-trains beneath us. We felt them coming, a change in the atmosphere, the faintest of rumbles. We heard her landlady, too. She lived on the floor above ours with her son – a man in his fifties, a builder and drinker – and rented the rest of the house. The ceiling creaked with their footsteps, and often they argued. They were bickering now. Ruth sighed. She lifted her head.
What’s the time? she asked me. Twelve, I said; just gone. The wind blustered and howled. Happy Christmas, she said, and eased herself from me. She slipped out of the bed and crouched by the oven, and as she pressed the ignition – a rapid series of clicks, the gas jets igniting – I gazed at her bottom. She took another beer from the fridge and swayed as she stood, bumped into the sink. Oops, she said, and pulled back the ring, sipped the froth as it spumed. She left the oven door open. The flames were blue and burned softly, suddenly flared. Are you sure that’s safe? I asked her. Unless it blows out, she grinned; or we’ll be gassed in our sleep. Then remembering, she covered her mouth. She widened her eyes. Sorry, she said, and climbed in beside me. I took the beer from her. She kissed my cheek, my eyebrows, my ear, and whispered again, I’m sorry. I guided her hand to my penis. Her fingers were cold. But it’s gone all soft, she complained. You need to inflate it, I said, and pouting, half smiling, she burrowed under the bedclothes, curling around me.
I listened to the rain, the voices upstairs. Cold air poured in through a vent near the ceiling. The door beside us was bolted and shook in its frame. It opened on to a lobby of brickwork and pipes, junction boxes, cables, Ruth’s toilet and shower stall. A flight of stone steps led up to her landlady’s kitchen and a door to the garden. We weren’t allowed to use the front entrance. We came and went by the dark sloping passage at the side of the building. The nearest tube was a quarter-hour walk, and no one we knew lived near us. We would meet them in cafés and parks; pubs, galleries, their flats. It seemed we were always going to meet someone, and often I came late on my own, the directions written out on the palm of my hand, an A–Z in my bag and some cakes to pass round. I had a job then in a factory – Uncle Sam’s Cake and Cookie Company – from five until eight every evening. Dressed in blue overalls, the top tied round my waist by the sleeves, I scrubbed and scoured the long metal benches and the sinks and the ovens. I scraped and mopped the cake-mix from the floors and emptied the bins into a skip. The women I worked with liked to tease me; I was slower than they were, and sweated far more, though the sweat seemed to make up for my slowness. Women’s work! they called from their aisles. In our tea-breaks we sat in a cloakroom, just next to the toilets, and they talked about sex and the uselessness of men and asked questions about Ruth – what she liked and how often she liked it – that I never knew how to answer. They scolded each other for making me blush; they called me the boy.
I was nervous in London, never quite sure where I was, how the parts all connected, and on the tube trains too I would blush, as if my newness was obvious. Wherever I went I walked quickly, a ten-pound note folded into my shoe, my cashcard and wallet in separate pockets. I spoke to no one and didn’t often look up. It was a relief to arrive, to find Ruth and her friends, their familiar faces, and to feel I was welcome, expected. You’re talking a lot, Ruth once told me, touching my hand; you’re doing very well. But it wasn’t an effort; I liked being in company then, though I liked leaving it more, returning home on the night-bus to our basement.
We called it our home. There was nowhere else. Ruth’s parents had long since divorced and remarried, and both had moved house several times, a succession of entries scored out in her address book. They lived now two hundred miles apart, in towns Ruth hardly knew. A few of her drawings, she said, were framed and displayed in the guest room at Polly’s, but there was little else in the house that she recognised, and nothing at all in her father’s. It was nearly a year since she’d last seen him. And though she sometimes replied to her mother’s brisk letters – another arrived most Mondays, composed on blue headed notepaper and posted first class – she wrote only to thank Jim for the money he sent her, and the gifts she always discarded. Her thanks were cursory, and she didn’t include any news. I said I felt sorry for him – it seemed he could never do right; either he was trying too hard, or not hard enough – but Ruth refused to discuss him, and sulked if I pressed her.
There was silence upstairs. A taxi thrummed in the street; someone shouted. The rain had eased off. Ruth knelt on the bed and unbuttoned her cardigan. She shrugged it from her shoulders and peeled the sleeves from her arms. She drank the last of our beer. Your turn now, she said, and lay down on her belly. She lifted her hips and as I slid into her warmth, my hands tucked under her breasts, she murmured, Be careful, her face close to mine. We hadn’t any contraceptives; we hadn’t left her room for two days. You’re sure? I said. Yes, she said, smiling. Then, Maybe, I don’t know …
From my father, too, there’d been money – five twenty-pound notes at the end of October, another five notes for Christmas.
He didn’t write letters. His cards were signed with just his initials, his monogram, and I hadn’t yet written to thank him. Now and then I would remember my grandmother, and sit down at Ruth’s desk, though I struggled each time to fill much more than a page. Her replies were equally brief, her handwriting shaky, and often she repeated what I’d already told her: I see the weather’s been cold; I’m glad to hear you’re both keeping well; I hope things have improved for Ruth at her college. And always she enclosed a few stamps – a strip of four, sometimes ten, as if for my trouble. I passed them to Ruth. Her course, she felt, had been a mistake, and already she was looking elsewhere, circling jobs in the paper, writing off for more details, three and four times a week. She wasn’t an artist, she’d decided, and never would be. The other students had more talent and more confidence. She said they were glamorous; she was sure that she wasn’t.