He started to rub lines of condensation off the cold glass, surprisingly delicately, with his chunky fingers. ‘Miss Armstrong,’
‘Maddie is fine.’
‘Maddie. In this line of work you have to be so careful, to stay the right side of hundreds of pieces of procedure, bureaucracy and budget constraints. You’re not allowed to use your common sense anymore…’
My heart tightened in my chest. ‘So you think something’s happened too?’
‘I’m not saying that exactly. Lets just say that sometimes I choose to do a little extra, to not break the rules exactly, but to put them to one side. I’d like to help you and I’m happy to put in a bit of extra time to do so.’
‘I don’t know what to say John. It doesn’t sound like you have much time to give.’
‘There’s not much for me to go home for.’
There was an awkward silence. I shared the last inch of wine in the wine bottle between our glasses, John nodded his thanks and seemed to gather himself.
‘Can I ask why you were in Italy and who you were staying with?’
‘I’m a gardener and garden designer. I was creating a garden for a holiday home in a place called Terranima not far from Rome. It was for a family friend, Fabrizio Amarena.’
‘And can you think of any reason why your brother would go to Italy?’
‘Absolutely none, he’s never been. I went on holiday there a couple of times when I was a girl but he didn’t.’
‘Can I ask why?’
‘The first time he wasn’t born, the second time I had a choice of going on holiday with my family or going to Italy on my own to stay with the Amarenas. Their daughter Collette had been a pen-friend for years. I was nearly thirteen and I decided to go on my own to Italy. It seemed like an adventure. Why do you ask?’
‘I’ve had a quick look at your brother’s bank statements.’
I smiled. ‘Is that an example of you putting the rules to one side?!’
‘You could say that.’
‘So what did you see?’
‘Your brother hasn’t used his credit or debit cards for two weeks, the last time he did was in a book shop, he bought some novels and an Italian phrasebook. He then went to his bank and took out £500 in cash.’
‘I don’t understand, I really can’t think what that means!’
‘We can check with all the flight operators if he officially becomes a missing person but that will take time, we’d have to do every airline, every airport, so you will let me know if you do think of anything?’
‘Of course.’
He nodded his head silently then drained his glass and got up. ‘Thank you Maddie. I’m sorry to have called so late.’
‘That’s OK, to be honest there was too much going on in my mind anyway. It was good to have a distraction.’
‘It’s a difficult time I know.’ It was something he must have had to say to people a hundred times. But he made it feel real, not a platitude. He turned, a little awkwardly, as he got to the door and caught me with his vividly green eyes. ‘Look after yourself Maddie.’ He made a second attempt at a smile then pulled the door shut behind him.
I felt exhausted and shaky. John’s decision to help me unofficially in this way was unsettling. Did he know something I didn’t? Was there some pattern in terms of disappearances that Dan fitted into? Something bad? Suicide perhaps? I couldn’t face thinking about it. I left our empty wine glasses on the table and dragged myself up to bed.
Darkness radiates around me like an ink spill, then gathers in whorls and eddies that I can feel but can’t see. It presses against me, impelling me downwards and I realise that I have had this sensation before. The darkness below my feet thins and dissipates until shapes start to coalesce and I recognise the approaching floor of polished tiles, decorated with serpentine dark green ferns and abundant Rhododendron flowers. Instead of waking as I did last time, I carry on descending, slowly and steadily, the darkness releasing me gently until my feet touch the ground. It takes my eyes a few seconds to adjust to the light, which I realise is hazy sunshine. The previous silence is replaced with a soft whispering.
My first impression is that I must be in some kind of lighthouse because the room is perfectly round with large windows set in thick walls only a few feet apart from each other. Under each window is a deeply recessed seat scattered with an eclectic assortment of cushions. The room is about 30 feet in diameter and the circle of tiles ends in thick olive green carpet. I look up and there is only darkness, as if I have fallen into a room at the end of the universe.
I feel strangely at home, I go over and sit down on one of the window seats and gaze out of the panoramic windows. Maybe it is a lighthouse, because through every window you can see a small shingle beach, suggesting the building is sitting on an island. The sky glows with a hazy wintry light, the sun shining through thin clouds and creating a pearlescent optical illusion, as if the sea and sky are the insides of some immense oyster shell. The sound of the waves is comforting, and I relax deeper into the jumble of cushions. It occurs to me that the water outside, has probably moved over the same stones for thousands of years, and there is something majestic and poignant about it.
I wonder why I am here. Are my faulty hormones playing games with my unconscious? Am I more vulnerable to the unexplained since Nonna’s extraordinary insights? I sit peacefully for some time, marvelling at the beauty of it, trying to suppress my instinct to over-analyse the experience. Then something dark passes on the other side of the window, just registering in the periphery of my vision. I spin round and there it is again – small, like the figure of a child, darting past the next window. I bolt over and look through the glass but the beach is empty. I go over to every window, my heart beating fast, but nobody’s there. ‘What is this place?’ I find myself saying out loud. ‘For God’s sake what is this place?
I wake up and am slightly disorientated and it takes a moment for me to process where I am. I hear one of the night buses rumble down the road and the light from the headlights sends tongues of yellow across the ceiling. The small dark head that had passed behind me in my dream makes me think, painfully, of Dan as a little boy. He was so eccentric, even then. In some ways he had been like a man stuck inside a little boy’s body.
Was my brother lost, like the little figure outside the lighthouse in my dream? Was he trapped somewhere, trying to get home? Or was he living it up on the other side of the world writing his next masterpiece? I had to know what had happened to him one way or the other. I didn’t know how I was going to do it, but somehow, I was going to find him.
Italy 1984
I Can't believe it, I've got a great big spot on my chin and I'm flying to Italy in a few hours! That's just my luck. It's huge and bright red. I bet Collette doesn't get spots. In the pictures she's sent me of herself she always looks perfect.
‘What’s the matter sis?’
I hadn’t even noticed Dan leaning against the door, watching me with his dark thoughtful eyes.
‘What do you think’s the matter?’ I shriek, jutting out my chin and jabbing at the spot.
‘Do you know,’ his voice is really calm and slow like he's reading from a book. ‘That the surface area of skin of an average human being is two square metres? So if you think about it, that spot is just two square millimetres of imperfection on otherwise very nice skin.’
'How do you know all this weird stuff? You're only six!'
'Where are you going again?'
'Italy, remember I told you, where Collette lives.'
'Is that why you're not coming to Cornwall?'
'Collette invited me over. She's having a big party for her 13th birthday.'
'I wish we could all go.'
'I know Danny boy, me too.'
'But Mum...'
'Yeh...but Mum.' I turn to the mirror and squeeze the spot.
There's this really old Olive tree in the Amarena's garden. It's all twisted and curling and sometimes it looks like its got a face like
one of those talking trees from The Lord of the Rings. It's really cool for climbing though. I can see the whole vineyard from up here. The rows of the grapes go on and on until they disappear into the green mountains. I can see loads of people working on them. Perhaps they're picking them. They look so tiny from up here and they wear big straw hats to keep the sun out of their eyes. It's like they're ants and Collette's dad is this big boss insect who's telling them what to do.
I felt really cross when I started to climb the tree, but I feel better now. Basically, ever since Collette's party I've hardly seen her. She snogged this boy called Lorenzo and now she thinks she's Madonna or something just because she's a teenager now. She promised me today that we'd go riding but she's gone off with him again.
'Ciao, Maddie.'
It's Collette's little brother. He's actually really cute and has the biggest black eyes, like a cat's. 'Ciao Sergio.'
'What you see Maddie?'
'I see the sea Sergio, mare.'
'Non possibile!'
'Si possibile! There's a big storm, and a pirate ship is coming. They're going to crash onto the cliffs. They want to come and rob us!' I'm not sure how much he understands. He's only little. His eyes are wide though, like he wants to believe me.
'Pirates!' he smiles the biggest smile. 'I give them all my money if they let me go on big boat!'
'Ho ho then me hearty! Climb aboard Pirate Sergio and up the rigging!'
He looks really excited, he's up the tree like a monkey, it must be his favourite too, I wonder how many times he's climbed it. When he's close I reach out and pull him up onto the branch beside me. He keeps hold of my hand, his fingers are sticky.
‘Sergio..’
‘Si Maddie?’
‘Is there anything wrong with your head?’
He pats his hair and frowns. ‘What you mean?’
‘Oh nothing, it’s just something my dad said once. Hey, I think I can see another ship approaching! Load the cannons!’
We stay in the tree until our bums are numb from sitting on the branches and our fingers are all rough from climbing. The pirates are a bloodthirsty gang and by the time we're called in by Rosa for our dinner we have conquered the whole of Terranima.
‘Maddie has changed a lot, hasn’t she Rosa.’
‘Yes Fabrizio, she is becoming a very pretty young woman.’ Rosa always agrees with her husband. And she always smiles when she talks to him like he’s so special that even just looking at him makes her happy. He’s gazing at me and it makes my tummy feel funny. I know I should smile, say thank you, but I can’t. Rosa’s mum is here, everyone calls her Nonna. She’s sitting next to me. She looks a bit like a witch, with really long white hair and she always wears black, but I think if she is a witch she must be a good one because she’s always really nice to me and she smells of cake.
‘Do you like Saltimbocca Maddie?’ Nonna’s eyes sparkle when she talks to you even though they’re really black.
‘Yes it’s yummy.’ I push my knife into the thin piece of pork in its ham wrapping and a pool of cheese and herbs oozes onto my plate. It is yummy. I’m hoping we get my favourite pudding. It’s a bit like rice pudding, but not like the horrible stuff I get at school, it’s really creamy and soft and it tastes of strange spices like Old English Spangles.
Nonna winks at me. ‘Good, you need to eat well if you are to climb more trees Tomorrow.’
‘Ah Nonna, abbiamo giocato tutto il giorno ai pirati.’
‘In English Sergio.’ Fabrizio almost snaps.
‘Pardone Papa, we played Pirates all day Nonna. Maddie was the Pirate Princess of the Seven Seas and I was One-Eyed Jack!’
Rosa smiles at me, but it doesn’t look like a real smile. ‘It is very kind of Maddie to play with you, but I am sure she would rather spend time with Collette who is nearer her own age?’
Collette looks at me with a guilty expression on her face then turns away. Up till now I would rather have played with Collette, but all of a sudden I realise I had loads more fun with Sergio. All Collette wants to do these days is paint her nails and talk about boys. I wouldn’t have got her up that Olive tree, not for anything! She would have been too worried about ripping her dress.
‘I don’t mind playing with Sergio, I play with my little brother Dan loads so I’m used to it.’
Fabrizio takes a big gulp from his drink and looks at me over the top of his glass. It has all these different shapes in it like a diamond, and the glow from the candles on the table shines through it and lights up his face with funny patterns. ‘Such a shame the rest of your family weren’t able to join you.’
‘Maybe next time Fabrizio?’ says Nonna and squeezes my hand under the table.
In the morning Sergio knocks on my door early. He seems a bit shy about talking to me, but he asks me if I want to go with him to see the estate’s animals – the chickens and goats are his favourites. He’s got names for all of them and he says I can try milking one of the goats – they make cheese from it, that sounds a bit weird to me, I thought cheese was made from cow’s milk, but Sergio says it’s really nice so I’m going to try some at lunchtime.
It’s really hot in the yard and the goats twitch their heads and their tails to shake off the flies. They let me stroke them. Their heads are really bony and their fur is scratchy and they have these funny eyes that don’t have round pupils, but weird oblong ones like an alien. They snuffle at my hands and rub their faces against my legs and they smell of warm hay.
Sergio goes to each one and says hello to it, ‘Oh little Capra,’ he says like he’s singing, ‘keep your beard out of your dinner. Scontroso, no bite me, your dinner, it come too. Ah Tardivo, always the last one…’
An old man comes out of the barn, his clothes are scruffy and the same colour as the ground. He speaks to Sergio in Italian and points at one of the goats. Sergio turns to me and translates. ‘He says Lavanda is not herself today, she will not eat.’ Sergio talks to the man some more, the man looks surprised and goes over to the goat and feels her tummy. He nods at Sergio and shakes his head like he doesn’t believe something. ‘I told Paolo, it is because there are two babies in her and they make her feel sick.’
‘How did you know that?’
‘Don’t you know too, Maddie? Can’t you see them?’
‘No I don’t, do you? Do you see them?’
Sergio thinks for a minute. When he thinks he really frowns and clamps his mouth really tight so his lips become just lines. It looks really funny on a little boy’s face, but then, like Dan, Sergio isn’t like ordinary little boys. ‘Maybe I see them, or maybe I feel them. When I stroke Lavanda it is like I am in her tummy with the babies.’
‘What does it feel like?’
‘It’s warm and dark and they wriggle.’
Brighton 2006
It was a moment in a swimming baths, when I was about 28 that brought me the greatest grief I’ve felt at not being able to have my own child. There was a woman with a little boy – about two years old, in the showers. He had hair so curly that it stood up in little arches and cows-licks even though it was sopping wet. He sat astride his mother’s hips, his right arm draped complacently round her neck. Her arm came across his back and rested under his bum; and her muscles stood out at the effort of it. Her swimming costume was pulled down and she was soaping herself with her free hand and talking to the little boy at the same time. She was tall and strong looking, almost Amazonian, with broad hips and high breasts. At the bottom of her stomach, just before the point where her costume was folded back, I could see a line - about six inches across – like a faint smile. I realised it was a Caesarean scar. There was something so raw and beautiful and painful about their ownership of each other; a child and a scar. I’d never felt such envy before.
I remembered this moment as I felt the rough edge of the vinyl chair in the doctor’s room dig into the back of my thigh. The sensation was the only thing that reminded me I was in the real world. My heart was racing and I was short of breath,
all the oxygen that was in me shrinking suddenly into the top of my lungs.
‘You’re sure? There couldn’t be any mistake?
The doctor shook her head. ‘No mistake. We can do the tests again for you in a day or two if it would make you feel better but the result will be the same.’ She smiled, a little condescendingly. ‘You should start taking Folic Acid, research has shown it can dramatically reduce your chance of having a baby with Cystic Fibrosis or Downs Syndrome – something that at your age you’re going to be at a higher risk of. I also suggest that you make sure you go to Kings College Hospital in London and have a nuchal fold scan.’
I stared back at her blankly. She could see that she was getting nowhere.
She sighed. ‘Take a moment to think Ms Armstrong while I go and get you some literature.’ She got up and shut the door quietly behind her. I couldn’t move. I was totally at a loss to know how I was feeling. I’d only gone to the doctor because I was increasingly getting regular twinges of nausea and hoped she could give me something to deal with it. Instead, she had asked me a couple of personal questions relating to my love life then asked me to wee on a small cardboard stick. I told her it was impossible for me to be pregnant, that I wasn’t capable of it, but she just looked at the two little lines that had appeared on the stick, smiled forbearingly and explained that hormonal problems sometimes righted themselves. I told her about Italy, and she said that all the fresh fruit and vegetables, sunshine and exercise could well have been all my body needed to ‘re-align’ itself.
I walked home along the seafront in a daze. I had to have a scan the following week to see how far on I was, and half of me decided that I simply couldn’t believe I was pregnant until I could see it with my own eyes. The other half of me knew it was true. Not only did it explain the nausea, it also explained the occasional cramps I’d thought were down to anxiety, and the bone-deep tiredness that could overwhelm me without warning.
The Soul Room Page 6