Everything Has Changed

by kendra Smith

  ‘Hey, how about this picture?’ Lulu held up a silver-framed photo of her with James on what was clearly her wedding day. Right, memory, come on. She screwed up her eyes, tried to focus. Images were there somewhere, she just had to find them. It was like ploughing through a vast picture file but they were all foggy, the pictures out of focus. She looked up at Lulu. ‘No,’ she said shaking her head.

  She looked back at the photo. She was in a cream satin figure-hugging dress, spaghetti straps over her shoulders and, from what she could see, a delicate, shoulder-length veil and daisies in a ring resting on her hair, which had been tied up in a messy bun. But it was her face that she noticed most – staring up at James, radiant. And James, in a grey morning suit and purple tie, had both his hands clasped around hers and was bending to kiss her fingers, eyes fixed on the camera. It was such a sweet moment, James looked not conventionally handsome, but there was that cheeky smile, the dimples, the way his neck curved round. She remembered him, she just couldn’t remember the wedding. None of it. She quickly wiped away a tear from the glass frame and looked up at Lulu, then out to the garden.

  ‘Have a look at this.’ Lulu held out a wooden frame with two surly teenagers glaring at the camera. ‘Last summer. You went to Florida.’

  You could see the girl’s bright orange bikini top tied round her neck, her hair pulled back in a high ponytail, arms folded and – oh— Victoria peered closer. ‘What’s that in her ear – and, er, eyebrow?’

  ‘Oh, yes, Izzy’s piercings. You weren’t very keen on them. Especially the eyebrow.’ Lulu raised her own eyebrow at Victoria as she processed this information. As images of a ten-year-old in a pink gingham hairband flashed through Victoria’s mind. Something told her Izzy would no longer be wearing gingham. Anywhere.

  The boy frowned at the camera from underneath a long, dark fringe. He was in a black T-shirt and his skin was pale. ‘Is— is that Jake? My ten-year-old? The one who’s just collected all the football stickers from M&S?’

  Lulu nodded. ‘Well, yes, no. He’s nearly sixteen, Victoria.’ She put a hand on her knee. ‘Look, I’m going to get you upstairs for your nap, James and the kids will be back soon. And you don’t have to come tomorrow, really, I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Of course I’ll come to your wedding dress fitting!’ Even Victoria could hear the faux joy in her voice. ‘I just can’t believe it, that’s all.’ Victoria tried to smile as she pushed back her chair. Something was niggling her. She could remember some things. ‘Lulu, what about the West End? Wasn’t there an audition?’ The last proper memory Victoria had was of a Lulu who was too excited to tell her down the phone that she’d secured an audition for Mamma Mia at the West End. Lulu had been screaming at her, yelling ‘I did it, I bloody got the audition!’ The unstoppable Lulu, the force of nature, the girl who came alive behind a microphone.

  A look flashed over Lulu’s face. ‘Didn’t work out,’ Lulu said with a tight smile as she placed a hand on Victoria’s elbow to help her up. ‘I’ll explain it all later.’

  She heard the car before she could see it. She clutched the windowsill and stared at the huge grey Land Rover as it headed confidently into the driveway and stopped just outside the garage door. Land Rover? They hated four-wheel-drives, didn’t they? Used to make jokes about people who owned them, didn’t they? Her hands were trembling. It was two o’clock. She’d been asleep for an hour and had come down to the kitchen to make a cup of tea.

  She felt like an extra in her own movie. James got out of the car, and rolled his broad shoulders, the ones she used to rest her head on. He was wearing a navy ski jacket and beige chinos. Two, tall, lanky kids got out the back. Her kids. Her teenagers.

  It was still a sunny day, a glimmer of spring in mid-February, but the air was bitter. She shivered at the window. As James slung the strap of his bag over his shoulder he glanced at the house and she could see him sigh, the mist of his breath swirling round his face. Was he taller than she remembered? Had her memory played tricks on that too?

  He opened the boot, and they all grabbed various duffel bags and headed to the door. Her legs suddenly felt weak. She sat down at the kitchen table with a thump and looked around her wonderful, tidy, foreign kitchen.

  The key turned in the lock with a click at the same time as her heart rate sped up. She shoved the letter from the lawyers about mediation that she’d found on the pile in the hall under a stack of free magazines on the kitchen table – she’d tackle that later.

  And then there he was. Standing right in front of her, the man she had ached for in hospital, the only person she had wanted to see, whose skin she’d wanted to feel next to hers, the only shoulders she had dreamed of leaning her head on: her husband, his eyes boring into her, standing in the kitchen doorway. His face was tanned; he leant it to one side, summing her up. His sandy-blonde hair was still short, but there was that funny bit poking out at the front. It made her want to laugh. Sort of. He was looking at her. ‘Victoria.’ One hand in his pocket. No wide grin. He looked older, slightly stockier, but still her James. Still him.

  ‘James. Good to see you.’ She smiled her best smile and started to get up, then sat down again as her legs felt strange and her breathing was tight.

  He nodded at her then walked stiffly over to where she was sitting. ‘Don’t get up, I expect you still feel very shaky.’ He pecked her on the cheek. Soap and a smell of the outdoors, stubble. No arms finding her waist, telling her it would be alright, no fingers laced through her hair. He towered above her. He’d clearly brought some frostiness from the slopes with him: he could barely look at her. He took his glasses off the top of his head and placed them on the counter. ‘How are you feeling?’

  Awful, nearly came out of her mouth. Lonely. I want you to embrace me, call me Squishy Vicky. Anything but this.

  ‘Better,’ she lied.

  ‘Good.’ He walked back to the door and then turned around. ‘I’m going to take a shower.’

  ‘Hey, Mum.’ Izzy was standing next to her. She looked up at her now-teen and blinked. She was willowy and, well, grown up… What had happened to those gorgeous chubby ten-year-old cheeks, the ones she’d pinch sometimes to squeals of ‘leave me alone!’ – where was her girl who’d worn plaits to school, who’d still sucked her thumb, had stolen Victoria’s nail polish one night, waking up in the morning with it smeared all over her duvet because she ‘wanted to look like Mummy’? Her chestnut-brown hair was long, in one single plait resting on her shoulder, her eyebrows were dark brown semi-circles framing her eyes – and there was that tiny diamond eyebrow stud. Victoria shivered involuntarily. Izzy had applied thick, black eyeliner across each lid and finished it off with heavy mascara, a dramatic contrast to her alabaster pale skin. Victoria smiled up at her, this woman-girl of hers.

  ‘Hey, sweetheart, how are you?’ Victoria stood up and put a hand on the back of the chair to steady her and started to give Izzy a hug. Izzy froze.

  ‘Mum, weird!’ She pushed her away, then cocked her head to one side and their eyes met. ‘You don’t normally, like, hug me,’ she mumbled.

  ‘Rubbish! Come and give Mummy a hug!’ Victoria pulled her closer, but Izzy was motionless. Reluctantly, Victoria released her.

  ‘Mummy?’ whispered Izzy. ‘What’s with “Mummy”. What, like, has happened to you?’ Izzy stared at her as if she had green hair and two antennae. Victoria’s heart was pounding. She felt alone – very, very alone. This was her daughter, for chrissake.

  Just then, Jake popped his head round the door. ‘Yo. Mum! Alright?’ he looked at her from under his fringe.

  ‘Yes, well, Izzy and I—’

  ‘Yeah, girls’ stuff.’ He held up his hand like the traffic police. ‘I won’t interrupt. Don’t worry.’

  ‘Who says don’t interrupt?’

  ‘You!’ they both chorused, as she tightened her grip on the back of the chair.

  ‘No, Jakey, it’s OK.’

  ‘Jakey? Mum, hey, that’s just weird.’ And he flicked his
fringe off his face. ‘I mean, nobody’s called me that since I was about ten.’ He screwed up his nose and looked at her. ‘You OK?’

  She fought the urge to shout ‘No!’ at about the same time she reminded herself that ‘Jakey Wakey’ standing in front of her really was nearly sixteen. She used to call him that in the mornings, his hair sticking up, legs akimbo, strewn across the duvet and pillows as if he’d been wrestling all night. She’d never known a messier sleeper – that was a strong memory. She could recall his face, breaking into a beam as she chided him it was time to get up. There was no beaming right now. ‘I’m fine,’ she managed.

  ‘Good. I’m just going round to Blake’s house. Leave you two to catch up – OK?’ But without waiting for an answer, he just shouted, ‘See ya.’ She stared at his ripped jeans as he walked out the kitchen, heard the front door bang shut, then, seconds later, a screech of tyres as he whizzed by on his bike, a flash of black against the grass.

  ‘Does he, erm, always ride that fast?’

  Izzy glanced over her shoulder. ‘Dunno. Yeah, suppose so,’ she said, and clicked the kettle on. She turned round and folded her arms. ‘So. Mum,’ she shrugged, ‘like, what happened? One minute we were all skiing down this red run, then at the bottom Dad was waiting for us with this weird look on his face. He said you’d been in an accident with Aunty Lulu, that you were in hospital. He seemed really odd about it. Me and Jake said should we go home,’ she flicked her plait over her shoulder, ‘but he said he’d spoken to the doctor and you’d be fine. That hospital was the best place for you.’ She poured some water in two mugs, then turned back round. ‘I was kinda worried. You weren’t replying to my WhatsApp messages. Dad said he wasn’t going to cut short his ski trip coz he’d badly needed the break.’

  What’s-what messages? Izzy placed two mugs of tea on the table as she sat down and Victoria looked at her daughter’s pale blue eyes, at the smattering of freckles across her nose, just like her father’s, and frowned. Needed the break. How bad had things become that he’d rather stay skiing than come to her side at hospital? Bad, said a voice in her head.

  ‘Mum?’ Izzy leant in towards her and she caught the scent of her daughter’s perfume and suddenly she was overwhelmed with a memory – it was, where was it? James shouting at her, Izzy in the kitchen, her shutting the door to the garden outside. James turning to her, his face, it was – it was haunted, Izzy’s voice asking her ‘Mum?’ and tears, hot tears, streaming down a face – her face or Izzy’s? And the perfume, the embrace, the wet tears sliding down a cheek. A hand, a wedding ring. She glanced down at her left hand and noticed with a shock she wasn’t wearing her wedding ring. Where was it?

  ‘Mum?’

  She needed to be cool in front of Izzy. She could see that. She didn’t want to scupper any fragile relationship they might have had. Only, what relationship did they have? ‘Sorry darling, I don’t know, that’s the problem, Izzy. Me and Aunty Lulu were driving back from a Wedding Fayre, it was dark, Aunty Lulu was laughing a lot, I just remember headlights, Aunty Lulu screaming. Then suddenly it was the paramedic, trying to get me out. I don’t remember the actual accident or much before it – that’s probably a good thing.’ She could hear her voice break, so coughed instead.

  Izzy took a sip of tea. Victoria did a double take. Long, red talons were wrapped around the mug. Her daughter stared at her and she felt herself prickle under the scrutiny. ‘You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.’

  Izzy was right, it was probably too much for her. Victoria wracked her brain for something to say. She studied her daughter as she tilted her head, looked at the fluffy pink jumper and didn’t know what to say. ‘Show me some photos, of your trip, I’d like to see.’

  Izzy smiled briefly then pulled her phone out of her back pocket and started swiping; on the screen were shots of a perfect slope, sun shining on the runs with the snow glistening as if someone had laced diamonds through it; the three of them, grinning madly, slightly out of focus. Izzy must have given someone her phone to take the shot. Jake in an all-black ski suit with a snowboard under his arm, sort of smiling. Izzy in a sky-blue ski suit, cream woolly hat, holding up a glass of – what? – wine? She decided to tackle that later. James waving his ski poles in the air, and grinning. Waving his poles in the air and grinning as she lay in hospital with amnesia. Why was there this distance between them?

  ‘Izzy, I know this is going to sound weird, but what happened – to me and Dad, I mean, my memory – I just can’t—’

  Izzy rolled her eyes. ‘Seriously? Ask Dad. I’m done with the moods between you two. I need to unpack.’ She pushed back her chair, grabbed her bag and walked out the kitchen.

  Victoria sat there in her marble-topped kitchen with its Neff appliances and stared around the unfamiliar room. Where had the wooden floors gone? Who had chosen a tiled floor? Where had the old Ikea kitchen table gone, where were her wonky cupboards that didn’t quite shut properly? Where were her ten-year-olds? Where was her life?

  James was standing by the French doors looking out to the garden when she went into the sitting room. It was one of the memories she could just about recall about the house. Her and James looking through brochures and poring over which way to have the patio built. They had a half-acre west-facing garden, which caught all the afternoon sun, and a view over the Sussex Downs in the distance. She studied the white shirt collar beneath the navy jumper. It had a small fleck in it. Had she bought that jumper? She had an overwhelming urge to go over and straighten it, then wrap her arms around his waist, smell his smell. But instead she curled her fingers into fists and looked at the view. It was not the time. He had made it perfectly clear that his whole body – his mind – was out of sync with her. She shivered. How had they ended up at opposite sides of their marriage?

  She stared at the petite moss-green ceramic pot plants lining the edge of the patio, housing pansies, Christmas roses and daffodil stems poking through. The paving stones were wet from an earlier shower and the weak sun was casting a shimmer across them. James rolled his shoulders then suddenly turned around and leant against the door frame. He caught her eye. He had his reading glasses perched on top of his head, a tuft of hair caught in them, poking out comically, like Tintin.

  ‘James, can we—’

  ‘Victoria, I really don’t want to have a row now.’ He turned back round to look out at the garden. Why such acrimony?

  ‘Neither do I,’ she said quietly. ‘I’m just trying to piece things together; I need your help.’

  James walked towards her, but then turned and sat heavily on the blue velvet armchair. When did they buy blue velvet? It would be a nightmare to get yogurt stains out of that. ‘Since when?’ His voice was quiet. Before he worked for Town and Country Architects he’d had a job with the local council, she did remember that. And he used to tell her about his boss there, ‘The Incompetent One’. He was using the same voice with her.

  ‘James?’

  ‘I don’t know where to start,’ he said quietly. She cast her eyes over the shelves behind him; they housed a gallery of photos chronicling their life as a perfect family: baby shots, some black and white, toothless toddlers grinning at the camera; holiday snaps of the twins with buckets and spades in their hands, squinting in the sun, curls escaping from sun hats; James skiing, the twins at a festival with ear defenders on, grinning on top of James’s shoulder – where was that? Then the wedding photo Lulu had shown her; him looking at her tenderly under a stone archway. The man looking at her now did not seem to be the same man who had looked adoringly at her – ever. He rubbed the heel of his hands into his eyes and looked up at her.

  ‘James I’ve been wracking my brain – so much is gone, and yet other parts are crystal clear, like the twins’ seventh birthday, here in the house, the big party we threw, the bouncy castle, that kid throwing up in the garden, what was his name, Ben? And you wearing a silly hat. I—’ she hesitated. ‘I just can’t remember some bits before or after that; I mean, som
e things are there, like the birth of the twins, some fragments of the accident, the lights coming towards us. Then suddenly it’s now, today – I seem to have lost nearly six years of my life, and it’s awful. When I charged my phone I was sure my screensaver would be the twins grinning at me, ten years old, like I remember. Only—’ She chewed her cheek, ‘it’s not. It’s some dumb picture of me in sunglasses. Someone must have taken it for me, it’s weird.’

  ‘It’s a selfie.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘When you take a picture of yourself,’ James sighed loudly.

  She had wanted to remain calm but it was proving too hard. Who took pictures of themselves? And how would you do that, anyway?

  She glanced at the photo of the twins in the pearl frame and her mind went back to that special party. Izzy and Jake had been wearing matching fancy-dress bumble bee outfits. For some reason that was a craze. Izzy with little black antennae bobbling from a glittery hairband, Jake in his black and yellow socks which kept falling down. They’re adorable, James had told her, his phone poised capturing them on the side of the bouncy castle.

  ‘Yes, and we made them. Not one, but two! Imagine! Remember when we couldn’t even get pregnant?’

  ‘Yes, and you surpassed yourself, Mrs Allen. Not only did you get pregnant, you gave us two for the price of one.’ And he’d leant down and kissed her, right there, right in front of Lulu and she’d gone quite pink.