Bright and Dangerous Objects

by Anneliese Mackintosh

  My voice echoes around the chamber.

  Mum’s ashes ended up in the sea. Dad tipped them off the pier at Weston-super-Mare. He left me at home with my aunt Marie. I don’t remember that day, but I do remember searching for my mum in rock pools while I was on holiday in South Wales.

  I wonder when my next dive will be. Obviously, I haven’t quit diving yet—not now that everything’s so uncertain. If James is going to leave me, what’s the point? But I’m not missing it as I normally do.

  Soon, the water will rise so much that going back won’t be an option.

  I climb down the steps and emerge into the afternoon sunlight, flooded with unexpected relief.

  As I retrace my steps back towards the main beach, my phone vibrates. Is Rachel calling to check I haven’t killed myself? Is James ready to talk? No. It’s a London number.

  “Miss Dean,” says an unfamiliar male voice. “This is Pim Jansen. I’m a recruiting assistant at the Mars Project. I’m not sure if you realise this, but your online entry has amassed over one thousand votes. In addition to this, you impressed the moderator at the conference you attended.”

  “I did?”

  “We love your CV, Miss Dean. Your diving experience is of particular interest. I’m delighted to inform you that we have selected you for an interview, which will take place at the end of the month in Washington, DC.”

  “An interview? In Washington? I thought you were based in the Netherlands?”

  “The fantastic news is that we’ve recently entered into a partnership with a popular American soda company. This incredible dream of ours is very quickly becoming a reality!” The stranger informs me that he’ll send an email confirming my flight details. He wishes me good luck.

  Good luck.

  I’ll need it, although I’m not sure which direction to channel it in.

  I know it’s so unlikely, and it’s probably just a miscarriage thing, but my period is late again.

  31

  I’m at the Rumbling Tum. It’s an alleyway café between the high street and the harbour. Normally, if James were here, we’d go to one of the hipster hangouts like Beerwolf: a bookshop-cum-bar with retro arcade machines in the corner and creepy dolls hanging from the rafters. Or Espressini for a strong AeroPress coffee, brewed by our friend Issam.

  But I can’t risk seeing anyone I know. I expect James has told people what’s been going on between us.

  I’m not sure whether James has spoken to Anouk yet. I’m guessing not, because she hasn’t been in touch. Which means she doesn’t know about the pregnancy or the miscarriage or Evie. I think there’s a limit to how much you can hide from your best friend. If you keep too many secrets, you’re not really friends any more, are you?

  James came home last night and packed another bag. He took some nature encyclopaedias, which he uses for reference at work, plus some Kilner jars, because he says fermenting vegetables is his new raison d’être. He’s staying between his parents’ house and Eloise’s flat now. When he told me about Eloise, I felt a sudden, jubilant sense of vindication.

  “I knew you were sleeping with her,” I said.

  “Eloise is going out with Kensa,” James replied. “She’s a friend. You’re the one who cheated, Solvig.”

  I bite into my sausage and egg roll, feeling the yolk dribble down my chin. I eat hungrily, even though I feel sick. Really sick. Worryingly sick. The greasy food makes me feel better, if only briefly.

  It’s been six weeks since the miscarriage, and my period still hasn’t come. I can’t think about it right now. I flick through the Daily Mail lying on the table, left behind by the last customer. Same old stories: election fraud, Russian spies, gun control, Brexit. I turn the page, and a headline catches my eye.

  FIRST HUMANS ON MARS WILL DIE WITHIN THREE MONTHS

  The controversial Mars Project may soon have the funding to send humans to the red planet, but according to boffins at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), inhabitants would start dying after just 68 days.

  As I finish my roll, I drop a dollop of ketchup onto the article, smearing it with red. I’m about to close the paper, to hide the mess I’ve made, but I’m distracted by another story.

  MOTHER OF THREE SAYS FINAL GOODBYES TO HER CHILDREN

  31-year-old Sandra from Merseyside is suffering from a rare form of cancer, and has decided to travel to Switzerland to end her life with help from the not-for-profit assisted suicide organisation that has been running since 1998. There have been only 90 or so recorded cases of leiomyosarcoma of bone since its discovery in 1965. It is a particularly aggressive illness, and the survival rate is estimated to be around two years.

  “The pain is already unbearable,” said the mother of three, who will be ending her life with assisted suicide next week. “As the cancer grows, my bones will start to fracture, and I’ll have trouble breathing.”

  Five months ago, Sandra underwent surgery for her condition, but it was unsuccessful. She has decided not to put herself or her family through the heartache of undergoing chemotherapy, which leiomyosarcoma is generally resistant to in any case. Her eldest child, Leila, aged 11, said, “Mummy is very brave. I will miss her.”

  How could Sandra do that? Not even try? How could she voluntarily kill herself without trying every single other option first? Her children might think she’s brave now, but I bet they’ll resent her later.

  If my mum had been in that situation, she’d have tried everything to stay alive. Acupuncture, crystals, religion, the lot.

  Saying that, my mum did have options. She didn’t have to go out to a work party that evening. She didn’t have to leave the nightclub at 2:00 a.m. without her colleagues. She could have got a taxi home, instead of walking. She could have not been drunk. She could have looked where she was going. She could have avoided the subdural haematoma which killed her almost instantly. She abandoned us. Just as Sandra is doing with her kids.

  I take my phone out of my pocket and call my dad.

  “Sol. How goes it, kiddo?”

  I walk out of the café towards the water. “Dad, can I come and stay at yours for a bit?”

  “Sorry, love. Can you speak up a bit?”

  “Can I stay with you, Dad?”

  “Oh, listen. Normally, I’d say yeah, right? But, thing is, Reveka’s on strike. She’s refusing to make the bed or cook. Bit of a bomb site up here. How abouts I come and stay at yours for a few days? Been feeling a bit under the weather lately, anyway. Sea air’d do me good, I reckon. Be nice to see your neck of the woods again.”

  “Just you, then? No Reveka?”

  “Just me, pup. That okay?”

  I cry and say yes. Yes, please. Come as soon as you can.

  32

  “Got my disability money,” says Dad, edging down the stairs. “How about we go down the pub? We could take Cola. What do you say, Hokey Cokey?”

  Cola is asleep. We already went for a walk today.

  My dad reaches the bottom step and pokes the dog with his foot. “Come on, boy. Can’t get past you when you’re lying there, can I, you big lug?”

  I’ve often wondered why my dad won’t get a dog. It’d do him good to have a companion other than one of his carers. One that he could look after, instead of vice versa.

  “How’s your back, Dad?” I ask, sliding Cola along the carpet to make room for my dad’s feet.

  “Oh, you know,” he says. “Totally annihilated.”

  We go into the kitchen, and I grab the dirty cups and plates off the counter and put them in the sink.

  “Come on then, Sol. What do you say? It’ll be dinnertime soon if we don’t get a wriggle on. Couple of swifties?”

  “Fine,” I relent, “but we’ll eat out. I can’t be bothered to cook when we get back.”

  “Right you are,” says my dad, rubbing his hands together. “Fish and chips it is.”

  I grab my jacket and scarf, and we leave the house. It’s surprisingly balmy for a November evening, but the weather can c
hange rapidly here. We make our way slowly down the hill towards town.

  “This is the life, isn’t it, eh?” wheezes Dad. “Fresh air. Seagulls. Does you good being in a place like this. No wonder you look so healthy, kid.”

  I bite my lip and point out some local landmarks: art gallery, maritime museum, plaque commemorating a visit by Charles Darwin.

  “Very nice,” Dad says. “Very nice indeed. Hang on a mo. The pharmacy is still open. I’ll just nip in for my meds.”

  We go into the pharmacy, and an old-fashioned bell rings above the door. Dad makes a beeline for the dispensary at the back of the shop. He certainly doesn’t fake his pain, but I can’t help noticing that he’s hobbling more than usual now that he’s surrounded by medication. He takes a slip of green paper out of his pocket and talks to the pharmacist.

  I stay by the door, looking at the boxes and bottles on the shelves beside me. I wonder how you’d go about organising the products in a place like this. Alphabetical order? Heads, shoulders, knees, and toes? By the looks of it, they’ve squeezed stuff in wherever it fits. For example, beside a packet of suppositories, there’s a First Response pregnancy test.

  I steal a look at my dad. He’s making a fuss about having to sign the back of the prescription, as if he hasn’t had to do that a million times before. The pharmacist is patiently pointing out the line he needs to put his signature on, perhaps wondering if the years spent at university have all been a bit of an anticlimax.

  As nonchalantly as possible, I pick up the pregnancy test and walk over to the counter at the front of the shop. A gingerhaired girl, sixteen at the most, takes the box and scans the barcode. “Chocolate for a pound?”

  “No thanks,” I reply, wondering if she offers this to everyone or if I’m getting special treatment because I might be pregnant. I look over at my dad, then take a lipsalve from a plastic jar and give that to the girl too. She rings it through the till, and I hand over the cash. I push the test deep into my coat pocket and go outside.

  Most of the shops are closed now. The lights of KFC look oddly romantic in the early evening. Families huddle around tables at the windows, exchanging stories over their red buckets of fried chicken.

  My dad comes out of the pharmacy waving a paper bag. “The good stuff.”

  I make a big show of putting on the lipsalve I bought. “Mmm, strawberry,” I say. “Couldn’t resist.”

  We walk on until we reach the ’Front. I don’t come here often, as it can get a bit rowdy. There’s always something happening: funk and soul night, quiz night, Breton folk music night. Not my kind of thing. But it’s on the harbour, and it serves decent beers.

  Last time my dad came down to Falmouth, I took him to the specialist craft ale bar, Hand. He had a 7 percent saison beer called The Emptiness Is Eternal, and he told the barman it tasted like piss. Didn’t stop him from ordering two more and then chanting football anthems so loudly James and I had to take him home.

  The ’Front bar is much more traditional: Cornish flag bunting and pints of Betty Stogs on tap. It has a low, vaulted ceiling, giving it the air of a smugglers’ inn. It’s tucked away beneath Trago Mills, a discount department store with a UKIP billboard nailed to the side of it. I’m trying to block out the fact that on the way here, my dad looked up at the billboard and said: “Not long now till we get our country back, eh?”

  “Well,” Dad says, settling into his chair with a pint. “This is nice.”

  I’ve ordered myself a red wine. After all, I don’t know for sure that I’m pregnant. Drink till it’s pink, so they say.

  “Dad?” I ask. “What was it like? You know, after Mum died? Did you ever feel angry with her?”

  “Angry, pup?” He opens the paper bag he got at the pharmacy and takes a blue tablet out of the box inside. I’m not sure he should be mixing pain medication and alcohol, but if I say anything, he’ll tell me I’m nagging. “Wasn’t her fault she died. Or do you mean angry at her for something else?”

  I fiddle with the stem of my wine glass. “If she hadn’t gone out drinking . . .”

  “Accidents happen, Sol. You know that, in your line of work. So do I, that’s for sure.” He opens a packet of pork scratchings.

  “But she didn’t die doing something worthwhile.” I swallow a large mouthful of wine. “She tripped over a post.”

  Dad chews thoughtfully on a piece of pork. “Your mum made mistakes, like all of us,” he says. Then, his voice cracks: “She’d be so proud of you now.”

  “I don’t know. Mum was a genius. I mean, you’re really talented too, Dad, but—”

  Dad bursts into laughter. “Your mum was a bright woman, yes. But not as clever as you, chuck.”

  I shake my head. “But Mum was always working on something. Like that notepad you said she kept by her bed, where she’d write down ideas in the dead of night. I can go for months without working.”

  Dad takes a long draught of his pint. It leaves a moustache of foam on his upper lip. “Your mum was a workaholic,” he says, wiping his mouth. “She was an insomniac too. When she woke up in the wee hours, it wasn’t quadratic equations she was scribbling down. It was shopping lists, or reminders to record Mastermind off the telly. Sometimes she’d write down targets, things she wanted to achieve. She could never just relax and enjoy the moment, your mum. Always worrying about what was to come. The only way she could chill out was with a drink. But she’d always take it too far. Especially after she had you.”

  “I . . . was too much for her?”

  “She loved you to bits. She really did. Having a baby was overwhelming for her, though. She’d start playing with you or feeding you or whatever, and she’d get so frustrated. You’d spend ten minutes together, and then she’d be calling to me out in the studio, begging for me to take over. I didn’t mind. Quite liked it. Cuddling a baby instead of working.”

  My face feels tingly. I feel so disgusted by my dad so frequently. Not to mention confused about how someone like my mother could have married him. I’ve often felt angry with Mum because she was the one to die and not my dad. Maybe I’ve been angry with my dad for not dying.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” I say, heading for the toilets, still wearing my coat. I go into a cubicle and take the test out of my pocket.

  First Response. If the test is positive, I honestly can’t predict what my first response will be.

  I’ve done this so many times now. I know exactly what angle to place the stick at, how many seconds to keep it in my urine stream, how long to wait afterwards. I replace the cap and lay the test across my thighs.

  I’m not ready to do this again.

  I’m not ready for so many reasons.

  I look at the graffiti on the cubicle walls: “Trans rights NOW.” “Do what makes you happy!” “This is the closest we will ever be.”

  Whatever the result is, I don’t want to feel emotionally connected to it. You can’t fall in love with a line, or grieve over the lack of one. I want to be able to look at the test, acknowledge whether there’s one band or two, throw it in the bin, and then figure out what to do next. It’s just a series of processes. Simple as that.

  I close my eyes and exhale slowly. “Do what makes you happy!”

  I open my eyes.

  Two lines.

  The test line is darker than the control line. It’s much, much darker than it was last time around. With Lucy.

  “This is the closest we will ever be.”

  I put the test in my pocket, flush, and head back into the pub.

  Dad has lined up three coasters along the edge of the table. He flips and catches them one by one.

  There’s Granddad, up to his old tricks, I think.

  “Another pint, Dad?” I ask.

  Dad sighs, as if he has the weight of the world on his shoulders. “Yeah, why not?”

  I could answer this question. I could answer it at length. I don’t.

  I get us some drinks and sit down. I’ve still got half my wine left. Fuck it. I’m goi
ng to finish it before moving on to the soft drink.

  “What you got there?” Dad looks at my lemonade.

  “G and T. Fancied something refreshing.”

  Dad nods and sips his pint.

  I feel weird drinking my wine. A pregnant woman on the sauce. I know that, technically, it’s not like pregnant women are banned from booze, but it does feel transgressive. Not in a good way. How much can it affect a baby at this stage, though? It’s not like the baby has taste buds yet. It’s not like the baby has a liver or a brain. Maybe it does. How many weeks am I now? I’m further along than I was with Lucy.

  I put down my glass and glance at my pocket, making sure the test isn’t poking out. I can feel its presence as though it were red hot. I want to scream or be sick. I grip the table like it’s a cliff edge. “So, how are things with Reveka?” I ask.

  Dad wrinkles his nose. “Reveka? Says I don’t show enough interest in her sprog. Wants me to go to this music recital he’s doing. Plays the bassoon, apparently.”

  I don’t remember my dad coming to any of my choir performances when I was younger. I only really went to choir practise because Chris Fox was an alto. I’d have hated my dad to have seen me gawping at Chris as I sang cantatas. Or at least, that’s what I told myself, because Dad never came.

  My jealousy must be written on my face, because Dad says: “Couldn’t stand all that stuff when you were little. Recitals and plays and whatnot. Sitting there on me tod, while all the other mums and dads played happy families.”

  “I thought you didn’t come because of the ‘pomp and ceremony.’”

  Dad throws a pork scratching into his mouth. “Yeah, that too.” He chews for a long time before swallowing, and then says: “You know, I got really down in the dumps last year. Remember when I said I couldn’t come to yours at Christmas? Told you I had the flu? I went to Wetherspoon’s for a turkey pie. Just me and my shadow. Didn’t feel like company. But then I met Reveka. She made me feel better. I haven’t treated her right. I never get it right.”

  That’s not true, I want to say. It’s me that keeps messing up.

  I listen to Dad as he discusses what went wrong with all his old carers, and why Reveka is different. I listen as he talks about women and how complicated they are for two more rounds.