The dream stops when I knock on Grace’s door to get her up for school. I never know what I’ll find: sometimes she’s buried inside her covers, rolled up in her blankets like a small hibernating bear, refusing to come out; or she’s already buttoned skew-whiff into the wrong clothes, down in the kitchen helping herself to a breakfast of chocolate cookies and ice cream. This morning she was naked, drawing over her wall with felt-tip pen.
I have a few hours during the day when I can breathe easy, knowing she’s safe at school. My duties are light: a bit of housework, nothing too strenuous, because a cleaner comes once a week. I shop for food. I bundle clothes into the washer in the utility room next to the big basement kitchen. No more dragging bags to the laundromat. There’s even a dryer for wet days, a line in the garden for sunny ones. Once I’m through with my chores, I’m free. Leo says I can read any of the books in the house, and he’s given me a list of museums and galleries he says I should visit. Often I sit in a café writing stories. Every day I go to Sam’s bench with a book. It’s kind of secluded because a hawthorn tree grows right behind it, but it’s on the top of a hill with a long view of the Heath and the distant city. Sitting bent over my book, I glance up each time a shadow falls, my heart singing with expectation. But it’s never him.
Grace’s primary school is fifteen minutes away on foot.
Today, halfway down the hill, she drops onto the sidewalk, hunching into a ball. ‘Come on, Grace,’ I say. ‘We’re gonna be late.’ I squat next to her. ‘Gracie, please get up.’
‘That’s not my name!’ She twists her head to peer at me with an angry expression.
‘Okay. I’m sorry.’ I sit down on the sidewalk next to her and start to hum. ‘Once,’ I say, slowly and casually, ‘there was a doodlebug who thought he was a butterfly.’
‘What’s a doodlebug?’ Her voice is muffled, her mouth against her knees.
‘One of those insects with an armoured shell on top. Tiny. Grey. They can roll right up into a ball, just like you’re doing.’
She uncurls herself and sits up, interested, despite herself.
‘Let’s walk awhile and I’ll tell the story,’ I say, getting to my feet and giving her my hand. Reluctantly she puts her fingers inside mine. ‘Well, he kept on trying to fly. He’d launch himself off the top of high things, like tree branches and park benches …’ I keep talking. We’re making headway now. The school gates are just around the corner.
Her room is large and pretty: a rocking horse by the window, shelves stuffed with plushies, and a giant doll’s house. Everything a kid could want. After dropping her at school, I settle on the floor with a bowl of soapy water and begin to rub at the marks with a damp cloth. She’s drawn stick people, but they’re missing arms and legs. Blood pours from cracks in their heads. Their mouths are open in silent screams.
Whenever anything like this happens, Leo always tells me, ‘Give her time. She’s still grieving.’
I got a book out of the library on how to help bereaved children, and it said to keep everything as normal as possible: familiar routines are essential; no big changes. I have no experience with children, let alone one who’s lost her mother. It’s a miracle Leo agreed to take me on. It was Grace who made the decision really. When I arrived at their hotel first thing in the morning, Leo asked me to wait outside in the corridor while he talked to his daughter. When he opened the door, he told me she’d like me to be her new au pair. They were leaving that day. I’d only just caught them. Eunice gave me a reference. And that was that.
On the way over on the plane a few days later, the hum of the jet engines under my feet, I was excited about finding Sam. I’d convinced myself there was bound to be an explanation as to why he never wrote: all I needed was to find him, and we’d straighten things out and carry on from where we left off. When he didn’t show up on the bench, I went through the phone book, flicking tissue-thin pages to the letter S, eager to hear his voice, his surprise when I told him where I was.
‘Wrong number,’ I was informed each time. ‘No one of that name here.’
I keep hoping to see him on the Underground train or sitting opposite me on a bus, standing outside a shop, walking along the sidewalk. I scan crowds, looking for his dark head. I didn’t realise how big London is; how it’s split by the river into north and south; how it can take hours to get from one part to the other.
I thought he lived in Hampstead, but I don’t have an address. I don’t know what his sister Mattie’s second name is, or how his parents died. He mentioned he went to Oxford University. But when I called up, I found it’s made up of different colleges. I’ve tried each one. None has a record of a student called Sam Sage.
Where are you, Sam? I remember how you sounded up on the stage at Ally’s, the way my stomach dropped and lurched during your performance. Most of all, I remember how you made me feel when we were together: your fingers and mouth and tongue lit up my body. I was home at last.
I sit on your bench every day, waiting for you. I didn’t make you up. You were flesh and blood in my arms. I remember the smell of your skin. The feel of your lips on mine. I miss you.
Mom writes me on paper scented with rose water, telling me of her reclaimed life in the South. She never mentions Dad. His letters are infrequent, shorter. He seems convinced he’ll win Mom back as soon as he’s out.
No chance, my brother’s voice sighs. She needs him like a mule needs a steering wheel.
Frank. Since living in London, I hear him less and less. When I do, his words are a faint echo, as if they’re coming across miles of ocean, inside the whip of an Atlantic wind.
There are cliques at the school gates. At the top of the pack are mothers, and then nannies. The odd father loiters on his own, uncomfortable and uncertain. Au pairs are bottom of the pecking order. I guess I fall into that category. Dougie is the only male in the playground today, and the only ‘manny’ in the school. He’s wearing a trilby hat and long scarf. He waves when he sees me. ‘Thank God you’re here,’ he says, kissing my cheeks with cold lips. ‘I smiled at one of the mums and they closed ranks in military formation. Honestly, you’d think I’d flashed my ding-dong at them, not my teeth.’
‘Ding-dong?’
‘Quaint term for penis,’ he tells me. ‘Less sexual than cock. Less offensive than fuckpole. Cuter than knob.’ He adjusts the flowing tail of his scarf and tosses his head. ‘Tallywacker would have been a more flamboyant choice, I admit.’
‘Tallywacker?’ I laugh.
‘I know.’ He grins. ‘Isn’t it a lovely euphemism?’
Just then, the bell rings, and a percussion of clattering footsteps, banging doors and children’s voices fills the air. The two little girls that Dougie looks after rush towards him, pale blonde plaits flying behind them. They land in his arms in a whirlwind of satchels, knobbly knees, clutched artwork and empty lunch boxes. He arranges confusion into order, answering breathy demands and wiping runny noses. They each hold one of his hands. ‘Right, we’re off,’ he says. Then, looking around, ‘No Grace?’
I’m straining my gaze towards the infants’ entrance, searching for her dark curls, her green coat. I have a familiar sinking feeling. ‘I’d better go look. See you tomorrow.’
‘We’ll get a date for coffee soon,’ he calls over his shoulder. ‘We need a gossip.’
I find Grace just inside the entrance. She’s there with her teacher, a plump woman with oversized pink-framed glasses. Miss Fisher bends down and puts her hand on Grace’s back. ‘Sit quietly over there, Grace. I just need a quick word with …’
‘Catrin,’ I remind her.
She leans close enough that when she breathes out, I taste the leftover cheesy tang of her lunch. ‘I’m afraid Grace bit another child today,’ she says in hushed tones. ‘Luckily her teeth didn’t break the skin, but she’s left a nasty bruise.’ She glances over at Grace, sitting on a chair by the door, swinging her legs. ‘We can’t keep making excuses for her. It’s just one thing after another. We had to pun
ish her.’
‘How?’ I ask angrily. ‘How did you punish her? She’s only six.’
‘She spent a lesson on the naughty step. Excluding children is often enough. She needs to know right from wrong.’
I stand taller. ‘She doesn’t need to be punished. She needs help. She’s just lost her mom.’ I glance at Grace to make sure she can’t hear. ‘It’s hard for her to understand what’s happened. Acting out is her way of expressing it.’
I turn my back on the teacher. ‘Hey, let’s go, doodlebug. There’s ice cream for dessert. You can put sprinkles on too.’
At home, I grill her favourite fish fingers, only burning them a bit. When she’s finished eating, I sit beside her. ‘Grace,’ I begin cautiously. ‘Why did you bite someone today? Miss Fisher told me.’
She rubs her finger into the last swirl of ketchup and licks it. She shrugs.
‘Did they upset you?’
She shrugs again, not looking at me. ‘Can I get down?’
‘You mustn’t hurt other people.’ I place my hand over hers gently. ‘Even if they make you cross.’ Her fingers are hot and sticky. ‘I know life’s difficult right now. But things will get better, sweetheart. I promise.’
She blinks, pulling away. ‘Can I get down now?’
I sigh. ‘Wipe your hands first.’ I give her a damp dishrag. Expressionless, she rubs it between her palms, then clambers off her chair and walks out of the kitchen. With a hollow feeling in my chest I listen to the thump, thump of her feet as she climbs the stairs to the next floor.
Framed photographs of Elizabeth are propped on dressers and sideboards; they hang from walls, sit on mantelpieces. Wherever I look, she’s there gazing back at me. In private moments, I’ve picked one up and held it close, as if Elizabeth might whisper words of advice. I remember her in her coffin. The woman in the pictures is animated, smiling, with her dark eyes wide open. She’d been an actress before she married Leo. She has the radiant look of a star.
I dry my soapy hands on a towel, and glance at the clock on the wall. I’ll make a start on Leo’s supper, have it ready for when he gets back from the hospital. I’m teaching myself how to make English food from cookery books stacked on the shelves next to the oven, bizarre-sounding things like shepherd’s pie and liver and bacon, recipes earmarked, stained with splashes, and scribbled on in Elizabeth’s handwriting. I try and follow the instructions, but somehow I over-salt dishes. Onions blacken in frying pans. Water boils dry. But Leo keeps a sense of humour, says if he’d wanted a cook, he would have employed one.
This is not how I imagined life in London when Sam invited me to stay. I wonder where he is now; if he’s even here, in this sprawling city. From my bedroom window, I have a glimpse of distant rooftops and tower blocks. Sam could be in one of those buildings. I could walk past his front door, and never know it.
TWENTY-TWO
Sam, February 1984
Sam’s bed at Ben’s place is a broken-down settee covered in old rugs. Most evenings, the air is thick with nicotine and the sweet stink of spliffs. Loud punk music plays on the stereo. Sam can’t stop himself from imagining Lucinda’s horror if she saw this place, her poor opinion of him plummeting even lower.
After another rowdy party, he wakes from an uneasy sleep and finds that he’s curled uncomfortably on the sofa, a moth-eaten rug draped over his shoulders, the ancient fabric stained with alcoholic spillages, cigarette ash and God knows what else. He must have passed out at some point in the evening. He turns onto his back, rubbing his calf muscles. He’s too cold to go back to sleep. He wraps the blanket closer and stares up towards the ceiling, remembering.
It was his mother’s birthday. He and Lucinda, Mattie, Luke and River were all at his parents’ house, sitting around the table. There was an iced cake with candles, and cucumber sandwiches. He was accepting a slice of Victoria sponge when the doorbell rang. The dogs barked.
Everyone looked at everyone else. ‘My goodness, who can that be?’ his mother asked.
‘I’ll go.’ Sam put his plate down.
He opened the front door to a tall young man about the same age as himself, eyes glittering with some unspoken, deeply felt emotion. He was a hefty, rugby-playing type, red-haired; meaty hands dangled at his sides, clenching and unclenching. Sam wondered if he was unhinged, even dangerous. He tightened his grip on the doorknob. ‘Yes?’ he said warily. ‘Can I help you?’
The man kept on staring with that intense gaze. His broad freckled face flushed. ‘Are you Jack?’
Sam frowned, leaning back. ‘Who are you?’
The man took a great shuddering breath. ‘I’m George,’ he said. ‘Your brother.’
His father came to see what was happening. Then George was jabbing his finger and shouting that he’d followed him home, explaining in a garbled rush that he’d spent the previous day crouching in the rhododendron bushes observing his father’s double life. ‘Peacocks,’ he shouted. ‘Bloody peacocks on your lawn. You live in a mansion with your other children. What about me and Mum? Weren’t we worth this?’ His voice became hysterical as he told them that he’d returned to London and found out that his mother had known all along about the other family: a wife, children. His half-siblings, for God’s sake! He started to cry. ‘I’m the bastard, though, aren’t I?’
Instinctively, Sam moved to his mother to protect her, but he understood at once by the look on her face. ‘You knew?’
Eventually their father persuaded George to leave, bundling him into the Daimler. Their mother, sitting before her crumbling birthday cake, lit a cigarette with trembling fingers. ‘I’m sorry,’ she sobbed. ‘I thought it was better for you not to know.’ Mattie comforted her, but all Sam could think of was the hollow sham of his life, the assumption that he would do his duty, the obligations put upon his shoulders, his miserable school days, a career he didn’t want.
His father had been living with George and Maureen, his ex-secretary, from Monday evenings to Friday mornings, before returning to the country to be with his official wife and three other children. He’d split his time between the two families during the holidays, keeping the charade going for over twenty years. It made it easier for him, Sam supposed bitterly, that both women accepted the situation. But none of the children, or relatives, or friends, or work colleagues had had a clue. He’d been a conjuror of lives, juggling names and places and dates without a slip. Until now.
He must have fallen asleep again, because he wakes to a trickle of light through fabric draped over a grubby window. He can see his breath, smoky in the cold air. He’s fully dressed, apart from his shoes. He fishes them out from under a chair and pads into the kitchen, finding Ben at the table drinking from a tin mug.
‘Hey,’ Ben says in a raspy voice. ‘Tea?’
‘Thanks.’
Ben sniffs the milk bottle before sloshing some into a cup. ‘Listen, we need another guitar in Slaughter,’ he says. ‘How about joining the band?’
‘I’m not really into punk.’ Sam accepts the grubby mug full of hot liquid. ‘Thanks for the offer, but I’m going to stick to my own music. I’ve got some songs ready.’
‘Just you and your guitar?’
He nods. ‘I’m going to try open-mic nights, local pubs. Try and get some momentum going.’
Ben makes a noise through his teeth. ‘You’d better get down to the dole office then.’ He puts his feet on the table.
Sam shakes his head. ‘I’ll get a part-time job to keep me ticking over. Anything will do. Barman or waiter.’ He takes a sip of tea and grimaces at the taste of curdled milk.
It feels like an age ago that he was kneeling on a bed with Cat’s hands clasped in his. I believe in you. Her tears wet on his cheek. He has a stab of pain in his chest. Missing her comes in waves, when he’s least expecting it. He grips the edge of the sink, staring out into the rainy Brixton street. He’s miles away from Hampstead here. He doesn’t go to the Heath any more. There’s no point. He’ll never show her the bench, sit with her there,
watching kites dancing above the hill. But he has his songs, and the task of getting them into the world, finding a way to make people listen. He and Cat only had three weeks together. He’s got a lifetime of making music before him.
TWENTY-THREE
Cat, August 1985
I’ve stopped going to the bench to wait for him. He’s not going to come. Something has died inside me, but I’m not going to die with it. I’m in a city I always wanted to visit, so what can I do but try and make the most of it?
On our days off, Dougie takes me to his favourite places: the Victorian hothouses at Kew, where we climb spiral staircases in jungle heat, and Portobello Market, browsing for old records and chipped china, vintage scarves and ropes of beads. Weekends we ride the Tube to Knightsbridge, waltzing past men in dark glasses guarding shop entrances. Dougie stalks around with his nose in the air, picking out clothes for me to try. The clothes don’t even have price tags. A look-don’t-buy situation. He has an amazing skill for knowing what looks good with what; he says he wants to work on a fashion magazine. In Soho, we sit on high stools to drink espressos in an Italian coffee bar, men arguing and waving their arms while a football match plays across a screen.
I’ve missed swimming in the Atlantic. The cool, reedy water of Hampstead Ponds couldn’t be more different; it’s grittier and heavier than any water I’ve been in, strands of slimy weed waiting to catch in toes and fingers, the silt on the bottom stirring up muddy clouds. I go to the Ladies’ Pond, enclosed by thick foliage, where some women strip off and swim naked. It’s not the wide expanses of the Atlantic – it’s contained, intimate – but when I summon up the courage to swim without my bathing suit, I feel a rush of freedom. The water is noisy with ducks and coots. Sodden feathers stick to my skin when I pull myself out. Elderly ladies do backstroke, staring into the sky.
They’re calling it a heatwave on the news. Long, dusty days and sultry, sticky nights have turned London into an unrecognisable city. Windows stay propped open, letting out snatches of conversation, the rattle of meals being prepared, the blare of radios; people walk more slowly, smile more often. Ice-cream vans traverse the streets, trailing mechanical chimes.
The Bench Page 11
