Yesterday, I heard her close and lock Robert’s door behind her. She slid the bolt home, and I sat all afternoon, listening to the sounds of my wife in our dead son’s bedroom. I sat and listened, and, outside, it snowed. I didn’t notice this until it was quite dark and I’d stood up to draw the curtains. A thick layer of white had fallen over my garden. Even the stumps of my roses were covered. The reflection of the street light on the snow cast a yellowy light over everything in the living room, and I stood for a moment, looking back at my own imprint in the cushions of the chair where I’d sat all afternoon, and I heard the bed springs above me moan again, and I knew that she would spend the night in his bed.
In the morning, I knock on the door of his bedroom, and there’s no response.
‘Kathryn,’ I say. ‘Can I come in?’
I hear the bed springs go. After a few moments, she slides the bolt over and cracks open the door.
‘What do you want?’
‘Can I come in?’
She sighs and rests her head on the doorframe. Her hair sticks out to the side. I think of our son’s cockatoo touch. She closes her eyes and her dark lashes rest on her cheeks. Her cheeks seem dark, now, too. They have a hollow look.
‘Why do you want to come in?’ Her voice is a quiet monotone.
For a second I feel a terrible urge to shake her.
‘Please,’ I say.
She turns and sits on the bed, leaving the door open. She’s wearing her maroon dressing gown. It has a zip all the way up the front and an embroidered tulip on the pocket. I chose it for her years ago, thinking of the book on tulips that she’d held to her chest on the day we’d had our first real conversation in the library.
I look around the blue room. Robert’s old Midland Bank schoolbag is still crumpled in the corner. A pile of glossy, brightly coloured magazines is stacked by the bed. His two brushes are on the table, beneath his mirror, leaking dark hairs. The woman standing on the shell looks down blankly from the wall.
I bring the model Somua tank from behind my back and place it on his bedside table. I’d left it in my coat pocket for weeks, not knowing what to do with it.
‘I wanted to return this,’ I say.
We both stare at the khaki plastic.
‘Do you remember that day?’ I ask her. ‘The day at the Tank Museum?’
She looks at me.
‘You waited for us in a café. I took him round those awful tanks. And all the time, I wished you were there with us.’
She lifts the model tank and weighs it in her hands. She turns it slowly, examining the tyre treads, the cockpit, the gun. She peers at the tiny face of the soldier. With one finger, she flicks the turret round and round. There isn’t a chip or a scratch on it. It is still perfect, despite being painted almost twelve years ago.
‘I wished you were there, Kathryn.’
She puts the tank in her lap, covers it with her fist, and closes her eyes.
After a moment, I crouch down before her and place my hands on her knees. Through the soft maroon material that covers almost every inch of her, I can feel a slight warmth.
Then Kathryn lays a hand on my head. ‘I know,’ she says. ‘I know.’
acknowledgements
I am grateful to the Arvon Foundation and the Jerwood Charity for their Young Writers’ Apprenticeships Award, which enabled me to get on with this novel, and to Stephanie Norgate for putting me forward for the award. Andrew Cowan was never less than brilliant as a mentor, editor and friend during the apprenticeship, and I can’t thank him enough. Thanks also to The South and the Arts Council for awarding The Pools a place on their Free Read Scheme. I am also indebted to David Swann, who was there and enthusiastic from the start; Lorna Thorpe, Naomi Foyle and Kai Merriott for their good advice; my agent David Riding, for not giving up; and my editor John Williams.
Nothing would have been possible, though, without the love and support of Hugh Dunkerley.
The Pools Page 23