Lies Like Love

by Louisa Reid

  ‘Yes, these are deep. Quite nasty. I’ll clean and dress them. Although by the looks of things someone else has done a good job.’ She glanced up at Mum.

  ‘That was me. I’m a nurse.’ Mum smiled. ‘It’s the least I can do for her. I just want to help Audrey; I’m desperate for her to be happy. To have the things other girls her age have. Friends, some fun.’

  Mum, I cried in my head. Mum, please. Don’t you see that I want that too? Mum didn’t see. She was wiping her eyes on her sleeve.

  ‘Of course,’ Dr Caldwell murmured. Calm. Serene. How could she be like that? Didn’t she get it, that my life was a sheet of black ice, that I was slithering, sliding, out of control?

  The doctor worked quickly. I watched her light-brown glossy hair catching the sun, wished I smelled of summer and had soft clear skin like hers, sharp clever eyes. Her touch was light. She smiled at me as she dealt with the mess on my arms and chatted about nothing much.

  ‘So you don’t like school, Audrey?’

  ‘Not really,’ I said, and Mum sighed but I ignored her. I wasn’t speaking to her now, or for the rest of the day. Forever.

  ‘And why’s that?’ the doctor pressed on.

  There was no point moaning about Lizzy.

  ‘She’s being bullied. I’ve had the teachers on the phone already,’ Mum said. The doctor murmured something about talking to the school, sorting out my medication, referring me to some AMHT.

  ‘And how about friends? Is there anyone else you can lean on for support, Mrs Morgan? Is Dad around?’

  ‘Oh, no.’ Mum coughed out an angry laugh. ‘He opted out pretty sharpish. Aud was, what, six, seven? I have a son too to worry about. God knows the impact all this is having on him. I just feel so guilty, like I’m letting everyone down. Audrey included.’

  ‘You mustn’t feel like that. From where I’m sitting, it looks like you’re doing a pretty incredible job. But we’re here to help. Both of you. As I said, anything I can do, let me know.’

  The doctor started printing off prescriptions. She talked over the sound of the printer.

  ‘You should hear from the hospital soon, I’ll try and ensure things happen sooner rather than later.’

  ‘Thank you. You’ve been absolutely wonderful, Dr Caldwell.’

  ‘As I said, anytime. Pop back if you need me. I’m writing a paper on adolescent mental health, so I’m glad to be here for you. I’ll take an interest in Audrey’s progress. We’ll get on top of things – it may take a little time, but we’ll get there.’

  I turned back to look at Dr Caldwell as we left the surgery with the new prescription, but her back was turned, her fingers busy on the keyboard typing up the notes. I wondered what she was writing, wished I could see, put it right.

  Everything slipped over half-term. We didn’t really get up; if we did, then we didn’t get dressed. I was glad there was no school so I didn’t have to face Lizzy, but I missed Leo and Jen. Peter stared at the TV in the gloomy living room, his hand diving in and out of the sweet bag, eyes fixed, red-rimmed. Mum sat there too. The mould smell was back. When I pulled the curtains open, she told me to shut them, saying she had a bad head.

  Mum bought a new nail-varnish set. It arrived in the post on Wednesday. She sat in front of me, her fingers in bowls of water, softening her cuticles. She liked playing beauty parlour and it had been a while.

  I filed her nails, and Peter’s cartoons squealed in the background. Mum closed her eyes; a small smile lifted her face when I rubbed in the hand cream. I stared over her shoulder and out of the window, but couldn’t see much from here. Just sky. And clouds that looked like nothing today.

  ‘Audrey –’ Mum’s voice snapped me back; she shook a wrist – ‘come on.’

  I paid more attention. Dried off her skin with paper towels. Started with the base coat. Mum had all the paraphernalia. She’d want to do the pedicure next, I thought, and my hands felt tired.

  I thought about Leo, wondered what he was doing, if we should go over to the farm.

  Peter jumped up, wired on sugar.

  ‘I’m bored. I want to go somewhere.’

  ‘Off you go, then,’ Mum said. ‘Bugger off.’ She laughed, winked at me.

  ‘Where? Can we go somewhere, Mum?’ Peter asked, climbing on to the arm of the sofa before jumping off, then clambering up to do it all over again.

  ‘No. Get down. I’m busy.’ She nodded at her hands. I was just beginning to apply the first coat of the bold red she’d chosen.

  ‘I’m sick of watching TV.’ Peter aimed a kick at the wall.

  ‘Go outside, play with your football,’ she told him.

  ‘You said you’d get me a bike.’ Peter was really fed up. Like he needed to punch something.

  ‘Yes, well. There’s no money for a bike right now. Wait for your birthday, like I said, and go and do something else for now.’

  The door slammed behind him.

  ‘How are you getting on?’ Mum said.

  ‘Nearly done.’

  She sat up, spread out her fingers. Nodded.

  ‘Nice job, that, love. You could go into this sort of thing, Aud – there’s a lot of money in it.’

  ‘I think I want to do something outdoors,’ I told her, staring out again. ‘Like, archaeology or something.’ She pulled a face. ‘Maybe explore the world. Go to loads of hot places, find really interesting stuff. Or maybe study different people, cultures – anthropology that’s called.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘It’d be fun.’

  ‘Forget it. I can’t think of anything worse. You’d be filthy all the time. Forever off and on planes, picking up God knows what. And think of all those awful men, foreigners, waiting to trap girls like you. I’ve read about them.’ She gestured at an old newspaper on the floor.

  ‘I don’t think it’s that bad.’

  ‘It is. And with your problems, well, it’s too risky. You stay at home, love, with me. I don’t want you disappearing off halfway round the world. What’d I do without you?’

  ‘You’d be OK.’ I started packing away, trying not to hear her.

  ‘You should be glad I care.’ She looked hard at me. ‘My mother didn’t give a toss what I did, the old bag.’

  I tried to remember Grandma, but my memory was like a page ripped from a paperback book, folded and then torn in random places, all the important words missing. Open the paper and the holes made no shape at all. Words started and stopped. Jagged rips gaped. I’d tried to find the missing letters, lying in bed at night and scratching at my memories like a nail at a scab. But I couldn’t decide what fitted where.

  I stared at Mum. Thought about it a bit more. Of course I’d met my grandparents, but it had been way before I broke my ankle; Peter hadn’t even been born and Dad still lived with us. Mum’s family seemed to seep out of the walls, although their faces were blanks, masks wearing bright lipstick, just like Mum’s, and dull smiles. It was Christmas or someone’s birthday, not mine. My head reached Mum’s waist and I held her hand, trying to listen to the conversation and work it out, watching Mum, seeing her fingers twisting in her necklace, then scratching, probing at something on her neck, squeezing, worrying. When she opened her mouth to speak I don’t think anyone heard, because they didn’t laugh when she did and her face fell like she’d dropped something, lost it forever.

  We were watching TV and I was squeezed between Mum and my grandma, whose hands were cold and clammy when she took mine and stared at the chipped nail polish Mum had put on the week before. Grandma tutted, examined her own hands, heavy with rings and freckled with age.

  My grandpa didn’t notice us at all. He pushed his glasses up his nose and turned up the volume – the programme was something noisy and fast. He smoked cigarettes, one after another, and drank coffee. His breath smelled when he said goodbye later, peering at me as if only just noticing I was there.

  I kept waiting for us to go, but Mum fell asleep beside me. Snoring, loud, through her mouth. Grandpa kept looking at h
er in this way that made me want to cover her up. Hide.

  No one really noticed when Dad finally arrived to take us home; no one stood on the step and waved goodbye or even came to usher us out. I remembered sitting in the back and the car was so quiet it felt like no one was even breathing or would ever breathe again.

  I finished the top coat and said, ‘Right, I’m done.’

  Mum held her fingers high, wiggled them. I turned on the heat lamp, stood and stretched.

  ‘I’m going to find Peter, OK?’

  ‘Yeah, get me a tea first though; I’m parched. And pass me the remote, would you?’

  I got her set up with everything she could possibly need for the next hour or so – tea, her cigarettes, a half-eaten pack of sweets, her bag in case she needed her phone – and dashed away. My stomach twisted as I went, but I ignored it and her voice, calling. It echoed down the stairs, following me, like a beating angry heart, but I couldn’t hear. I wouldn’t.

  My mother was the moon. Waxing and waning. Sometimes bursting, glowing and full. And then so thin and mean, needle sharp. And I could only move as she permitted, my body like the tide, tied still to her strings. I broke away now, but soon I’d go back to her; she’d call me, as only she could.

  Leo

  Half-term. He’d looked forward to this, to meeting his mother and to catching up. So when he saw her he hugged her, way too tight, and she laughed, before sweeping him towards the taxis, striding on soft leather pumps that matched her handbag and her camel coat. They faced each other and he could see her making a real effort not to mention school. Leo had made a bet with himself, reckoned that the longest she’d last was fifteen minutes. But he’d overestimated her again. She managed a full ten. And then: the inquisition.

  ‘Well, how’s everything?’ she began. Full-beam headlight attention. Her eyes bright. Focused. He didn’t want to talk about that. He wanted to ask her other things, talk about what was real. He supposed he never would; it wasn’t the way they worked.

  ‘Good, thanks.’

  ‘Good? What does that mean, Leo?’

  ‘I think it means fine.’ She raised her eyebrows – they were impressive: perfect, almost architectural. Leo elaborated on his theme: ‘No problems, all well. No need to start getting stressed out. That’s what good means.’

  ‘It’s hardly a specific form of measurement though, is it, darling?’ She was keeping it light, pretending to banter. Mum’s banter was pretty dangerous. Almost as dangerous as Mum’s lectures. She brought new meaning to the word polemic. Should have gone into politics.

  ‘Not really. But then again, what is?’

  ‘Well. A percentage, for example. You might like to tell me what percentage you achieved in your last Biology test. We haven’t had a report from the school, although I’ve emailed several times. I can’t say I’m surprised. The place is clearly designed to babysit inbred farm hands.’

  ‘Mother. Stop it.’

  She pursed her lips and put her hand out and held Leo’s. She had really delicate hands, small and soft. Audrey’s felt a bit dry and sort of colder too, and her fingers were longer and very gentle.

  ‘Sorry, darling. You know it’s because I care. And because I miss you and want you to do well, that’s all. Despite everything, it’s still incredibly important that you leave school with a decent set of qualifications.’

  ‘So, leave me alone, then. OK? I thought we’d been through all this.’ He didn’t want to remember the hideousness of it. Not getting out of bed. His housemaster calling the doctor. The doctor calling an ambulance and then weeks of silence, medicine, his mother green and sick with guilt. It looked like she’d managed to forget though. Forget what had driven him to the edge. Leo tried to forget it too. Most kids did their GCSEs no bother, but he’d buckled. Thirteen GCSEs, Graham silently reminded him, not to mention your Music A Level, when you were only fifteen. Hell of a lot of pressure, Leo.

  ‘Yes, you’re right. We did. And I will try to be less interested in my only son’s life and education. After all, a good mother lets her son go to the dogs, right?’

  ‘Right.’ He’d rather go to the dogs, his own way, than end up back on antidepressants, hers. He was prepared to spell that out in words of no more than one syllable if need be.

  ‘Did you think about what you might like to do this week? I’ve got meetings back to back Monday to Wednesday, but on Thursday we could take some time,’ she said.

  This wasn’t a surprise. Leo had already looked up events in that week’s Time Out. He was going to catch a couple of films they hadn’t shown in town, browse the big bookshops, go to the theatre. Lear was playing and he wanted to see how they did Gloucester’s eyes. If he told his mother that, she’d be straight on the phone to Graham. Unhealthy obsession with violence.

  His mum was on her BlackBerry. She hadn’t even considered that he might be gutted that her week was taken up, that he’d been granted a measly seventh of her time. Perhaps he should present her with that fraction, see if it made more sense.

  ‘Dad says hi, by the way. He misses you.’

  ‘Sure. I miss him too.’

  ‘Oh, Leo.’ She looked up, took his hand again. ‘Don’t sound so sad. I can’t stand it.’

  ‘I’m not sad, Mum.’ The taxi swung past Buckingham Palace. Leo yawned and picked up his phone. He checked his messages, email. Plugged in his headphones and searched for the right song.

  ‘You’re very distracted, darling.’ The implicit criticism was there.

  He put his phone away. Didn’t sigh or shrug. Remembered his manners. His damn manners.

  ‘Sorry. It’s wonderful to see you.’

  She reached out and smoothed his hair neat, like he was a little boy, then tsked and said he needed a good cut and that she’d book him in with her stylist. Leo was about to say that he liked his hair the way it was, but shut his mouth as his mother looked away. What was the point?

  ‘Here’s the hotel. Let’s get settled, have tea before my conference call at six. Over dinner I want to hear all your plans.’

  ‘Plans?’

  ‘Yes, university plans. You have made your application, haven’t you?’ He shrugged, but she was insistent. ‘There’s a lot to prepare for, interviews and so on. We’ll talk about it. Don’t worry. We’ll do lots of practice.’

  He followed his mother inside. She walked fast, talked fast, thought fast and Leo was already looking forward to getting back to the farm.

  Audrey

  Mum was working nights, then on Thursday she was back at six in the morning.

  ‘Audrey,’ she yelled, waking me. I’d only just got to sleep.

  ‘Hi.’ I stood on the landing, bleary-eyed.

  ‘I’m knackered,’ she said, heading straight up to bed, so I took her tea and biscuits before going back down to get Peter’s breakfast and to make plans.

  ‘Baking? A cake?’

  Peter nodded. He stood on a chair and helped measure out the ingredients, laughing when he got flour in my hair.

  ‘You look like an old lady, Aud,’ he said, and I tried to smile.

  The cake didn’t rise but it smelled good and we covered it with strawberry jam. We sat and ate it all and my belly ached.

  Eventually, on Friday, Mum got up.

  ‘I need a bath, Audrey – run the bath.’

  It took six lots of boiling water to turn the lukewarm bath hot. I ran back and forth with the spitting kettles.

  ‘That’s better,’ she said at last, taking off her nightie, lowering herself in. I looked away.

  ‘Pass the soap.’

  I handed it to her and made to leave.

  ‘Hang on, love – you have to scrub my back, remember?’

  Kneeling by the bath, I picked up the flannel, soaked it, scrubbed her skin.

  ‘That’s good, love. That feels better.’ I dropped the flannel, stood up again.

  ‘No, hang on, I need help with my hair.’

  She lay down, immersing herself; I sat on the loo and waite
d. After a while Mum pointed at her belly; I hated looking.

  ‘See that, Aud? My scar.’ It was long and ridged. Red, still, after sixteen years, which seemed wrong to me.

  ‘Yeah, I know.’

  ‘Funny to think you came out of there, isn’t it? They had to cut you out, otherwise I could have died. I wanted a nice natural birth, you know. But it was an emergency; you could have died too. Both of us. But the doctor, he was amazing. He saved our lives.’

  ‘Yeah? Good.’ I hated this conversation. It cropped up every couple of months. The whole giving-birth thing was basically revolting and I didn’t want to be reminded.

  ‘Thank God. I think about him a lot, that doctor,’ She looked at me from under her lids.

  ‘You thinking about that lad again, Aud?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Come off it, I know you are.’ She took the flannel, started to wash her stomach, breasts, under her arms, then held it out to for me to take over. ‘I know you fancy him, Audrey.’

  ‘I don’t.’

  ‘It’s normal, at least, to have a crush. You shouldn’t be ashamed of it. But you know you can’t do anything, don’t you? You’d better not, anyway.’

  I dropped the wet cloth and stood up.

  ‘I’m going to go and iron Peter’s school stuff now, Mum. OK?’ And I walked away before she could say anything else.

  I was sick that night. Puked in the toilet while Mum held my hair back from my face and stroked my skin, wiping it with the flannel that was still damp from her bath and beginning to smell. I heaved again.

  On Saturday evening, the night of Leo’s bonfire party, I sat staring at the telly with Peter, trying to keep still, calm, not let my legs judder and jump, not check the clock or stare at Mum with a hopeful smile. I kept my mouth shut and my fingers crossed and then –

  ‘Here,’ Mum said, around seven, ‘we’re going out.’

  I jumped up; she handed me her old black fake fur and I pulled it on, and felt instantly different. Like a kid playing dress up. Like a girl who could be someone else. Because I couldn’t go on like this, sitting in the Grange, just waiting.