Dreams Before the Start of Time

by Anne Charnock

  “Well, I’ve been asking you for ages.”

  Amelie had no intention of inviting Bethany. She’d be chatting all the time, and Amelie wants only her own thoughts in her head. She knows her dad will wander off around the gallery. He does that. Amelie supposes he wants his own thoughts too. Which is fair enough.

  It bugs Amelie that Bethany is forever saying, “You’re so lucky having a dad instead of a mum.” But Bethany’s mum is the odd one out. Amelie’s other friends have lovely mums, some especially lovely. Emma’s mum wears her hair in an elegant wrap like the Virgin Mary in Madonna of the Meadow. Amelie loves that picture. She found it in Nan Toni’s History of Western Art. It shows Mary with two toddlers; they look like twins. But Amelie is far more interested in the painting she’ll see today because it shows Mary with a biggish kid—Jesus, of course. People in the olden days were smaller, so Amelie classes the painting as a Madonna and Pre-Teen.

  Her dad stops to look over the embankment wall at the river traffic on the Thames. “Fancy a boat trip later?”

  “Er, yeah? S’pose.”

  She turns and makes a pirouette in the middle of the pavement. She’s thinking about her pinboards, how she’s going to reorganize all the images as soon as she gets home, and retitle each board:

  Madonna and Baby Paintings

  Madonna and Toddler Paintings

  Madonna and Pre-Teen Paintings

  Madonna and Child Advertisements

  Madonna and Child Celebrities

  Madonna and Child Films

  Amelie is impressed. Her dad heads straight for the nineteenth-century galleries without checking the floor plan. How many times has he been here?

  She knows that “the nineteenth century” means sometime in the nineteenth century, which begins not on the first day of 1900 but on the first day of 1800. After her first proper history lesson in high school, she told her dad, “If I say I’m in my twelfth year, then surely I’m twelve now.”

  He said, “That’s wrong. If a baby is in its first year, it’s zero years old. When you’re twelve, you’re in your thirteenth year.”

  And she said, “Well, you explain it better than my teacher did.”

  Amelie is wide-eyed as they enter the gallery. “It’s all super-detailed, isn’t it, Dad?”

  “I can walk around with you, if you like. I know a bit about the symbolism. The meaning of the lilies is innocence, fallen leaves is about death, and a poppy—”

  “I know all that. I’d rather look on my own.”

  “Let’s play that game. Pick the painting you’d like to take home. Hmm?”

  “Yeah.”

  Amelie wanders down the middle of the gallery as though she has no idea where to start. But she knows exactly where her painting hangs; she spied it as soon as they came in. It’s on the right-hand side, halfway along the wall, on the lowest row. So lucky. She’ll be able to stand right in front of it. She meanders along the left-hand wall of the gallery to kill time, because there’s an old man standing in front of her painting.

  She ignores all the labels because Nan Toni says you should decide for yourself if you like, or hate, a picture. You shouldn’t need to know the title or the artist’s name. Some people think that if so-and-so is the painter, it must be brilliant. In any case, Amelie is coming around to the opinion that it’s not so difficult to become famous in the painting business. Once you paint one good picture, you’re made for life. Especially if some important person buys the first one.

  The old man is still standing in front of the painting as though he owned the damned thing. She wants him to move. And why is he so interested anyway? Unless he’s religious. He must be a carpenter—he’s wondering what Joseph is making on the workbench, what tools he’s using, and checking if he’s a neat worker. It’s weird that this picture has two titles, because surely the painter said, “It’s called Christ in the House of His Parents,” or, “It’s called Christ in the Carpenter’s Shop.” Did the person who bought the painting invent a second title?

  The old man starts to move away, changes his mind and steps close up so that his nose is almost touching the painting. Amelie looks round to see if someone in charge is going to tell him off. He takes two steps backwards and walks away. Amelie grabs her chance; she stands in front of the painting with her feet planted wide apart, hands on hips, hoping to stop any adults from muscling in.

  Joseph is making a door, which lies face down on the workbench. In front of the workbench is a scruffy Madonna—that is, Mary the Virgin. She’s kneeling, and at first glance she seems to be praying, palms almost together. But Mary has curled her fingers inwards so that her fingernails are touching. She’s definitely not praying. She’s anxious about the boy, Jesus, who’s standing next to her, leaning towards her so their faces are nearly touching. He’s had a workshop accident—there’s a trickle of blood in the palm of his left hand. He’s holding up his palm like he’s swearing an oath, and his right hand supports his raised arm at the elbow. It’s a weird way to stand.

  There’s another boy, dark-haired, much better looking and stronger than Jesus, who seems a bit of a weakling. This other boy is walking around the end of the workbench with a bowl of water. He’s taking a tiny step so he doesn’t spill anything. Amelie knows the secret story here, the symbolism. The boy is John the Baptist, but he probably doesn’t know it yet.

  Amelie is not interested in John the Baptist. She looks all around the picture surface—like her dad taught her—but she’s actually saving her gaze for the most important part of the painting as far as she’s concerned. She steps closer and stares into the sad face of the Madonna. Jesus looks pretty calm about the whole accident. But his mother is frowning and tilting her face towards his. Their faces are close but not quite touching, as though he’s so unbelievably precious he might break if their skin makes contact. Amelie steps back to look at Joseph’s face. He’s worried too. He’s leaning over from the other side of his workbench. His right hand is touching Jesus’s shoulder. But Joseph doesn’t look anywhere near as anxious as Mary.

  Amelie stares back at Jesus’s face, Mary’s face, their hands. It’s like . . . it’s like Jesus and Mary are oblivious to everyone else. No one else matters. Amelie nods to herself. Maybe mothers are best.

  Marco sets down a tray with tea and scones. “Well? Which painting are you taking home?” The café in the Tate’s basement is crammed with chatter and the clashing of cutlery on crockery. Amelie slumps, feigning she hasn’t any energy for the game. “I’m taking Ford Madox Brown’s The Last of England,” Marco says.

  “Which is that one?”

  “There’s a man and woman, wrapped up in shawls. They’re sitting at the back of a boat that’s setting sail. They’re wide-eyed, as though they’re scared.”

  “Where are they going?”

  “Australia. The artist made the painting after his best friend emigrated. They’re scared about the long sea journey and because, I guess, they’re worried they’ve made a bad decision. Then again, they probably had no choice.”

  She hesitates over adding a lump of sugar to her tea. “Why didn’t they have a choice?”

  “Short of work, most likely. That’s why most people emigrated.”

  “If they don’t like it in Australia, they’ll come back to England, won’t they?”

  “Not in those days. One-way ticket.”

  “So that’s why they look so worried?”

  He nods. She sits back in her chair and frowns. “That’s a big decision, isn’t it?” They sit quietly as Amelie mulls over her dad’s story, the story of the painting—a one-way ticket to the other side of the planet.

  She sits forward and spreads butter across the cut surface of her scone.

  “I know which painting you’re taking home,” says her dad.

  “You don’t.”

  “That one in the carpenter’s workshop. I saw you looking at it. I like it too.”

  “Yeah. I like it.”

  “Why’s that?” he asks.<
br />
  “I just like it.”

  “That’s not the game. You’ve got to say why.”

  “I like the two boys.”

  He laughs. “You serious?”

  “No. I like the cosiness. They’re all in the workshop, and they’re all looking after Jesus, who’s cut his hand.”

  Her dad says, “Did you notice—they all have dirty feet and dirty fingernails?” She shrugs. “People thought it was disgusting, disrespectful, when it was first exhibited. It had to be hidden away. Then a collector bought it, and Queen Victoria actually asked to see it—burning with curiosity, no doubt. So the painting became the talk of the town.”

  “That’s mad. Because of dirty fingernails?”

  “That was the whole point—to upset everyone. Shock tactics. The artist wanted everyone to see him as a modern painter.”

  Amelie runs along the gangway of the riverboat, climbs the steps to the top deck and runs to the back of the boat.

  “Come on,” she shouts back to her dad. “Let’s look over the back of the boat.”

  “Like the painting?”

  “Yeah. The Last of England.”

  They stand at the back railing, watch the water churn as the riverboat pushes away from the landing stage and heads into the middle of the Thames. She imagines leaving London, knowing she’ll never come back. Leaving her friends. They pass the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben. Marco puts his arm around Amelie. She turns and hugs him tight.

  “Hey! What’s the matter?” he says.

  “Nothing. It’s windy. Keep me warm.”

  “Have I been slow? A good-looking boy in a painting? I’ve an inkling . . . there’s a cute boy at school?”

  “No way. Don’t be an idiot, Dad.”

  “Just wondering.”

  “Well, don’t. Give your brain a rest.”

  As her dad opens the front door, Amelie ducks under his arm and runs up towards her bedroom. At the top of the stairs she twists around, looks down at him and says, as though prodded, “Thanks for the day out.” And she’s off again.

  In her room, she lifts from her coat pocket the postcard she bought in the gift shop. It’s the Madonna and Pre-Teen. She stands it on her bedside table, flops down on her bed and tries to copy the weird way Jesus is showing his bleeding hand.

  It’s not exactly the same thing as Jesus’s workshop accident, but when she stayed off school with a sore throat, her dad took a day off work. He ran up and down the stairs bringing milkshakes and lukewarm soup—basically anything that wouldn’t make daggers when she swallowed. Twice she had to bang on the floor for attention because he started watching cricket, which is why—she reckoned—he wanted to stay at home.

  Amelie waits until Monday morning when she’s in the car with her dad to ask the burning question. Sometimes you have to be brave. Make the big decision. She asks him as soon as he instructs the car—“School”—and before he opens his messages.

  “Dad?”

  “Hmm.”

  “Why did you make me, you know, on your own?”

  “Blimey. I thought we’d gone through that.”

  “When? I don’t remember.”

  “When you were smaller.”

  “I don’t remember. Well . . . why did you? Why don’t I have a mum?”

  “Look, I have to drop you off in three minutes.”

  “Talk quickly, then.”

  He throws back his head. “Jeez, Amelie. I didn’t need a mum. You know that.”

  “I know. But a gay dad can use a gifted egg. You didn’t have to make your own.”

  “I thought it was the simplest thing to do.”

  “But why didn’t you ask one of your friends to give you a few eggs? What about your friend Suzy? You’ve known her forever. Why didn’t you ask her?”

  “Amelie!” He takes her hand and squeezes. “A guy can’t walk up to a woman and ask for an egg. It’s not like placing a grocery order.”

  “You know what I mean. Why can’t I have a mum like my friends?”

  He’s stumped for a couple of seconds. “You’re all worked up, aren’t you?” He pats her hand. “Let’s talk it through after school. In a grown-up way. Okay?”

  She nods. As they roll up to the school gates, he says, “You had two dads for a while.”

  “Colin wasn’t a parent though, was he? Just a boyfriend.”

  “But he still comes to see us. It’s you he misses.”

  “Well, he doesn’t count. And I don’t miss him.”

  “But you do like him. When he visits, the two of you are always laughing.” He tickles her gently in the ribs with his forefinger.

  Amelie can’t stop herself. She grins. “Yeah, I know.”

  “Okay then?”

  “Yeah. See you later.”

  Amelie feels jittery bad all day at school. In geography, her teacher asks a question about glacier calving; no one knows the answer except Amelie. She doesn’t raise her hand because someone might notice the red pen mark she’s scribbled in her palm.

  During their afternoon break, she tries to scrub off the red mark. Her friend Emma is hanging around by the sinks. Amelie shifts so her friend won’t see the stupid stigmata. Emma is oblivious and asks her if she wants to come round to her house when classes finish. Amelie says, “Can’t.”

  “Go on. You can stay for dinner.”

  “Can’t. Dad’s expecting me home.”

  Truth is, she doesn’t want to see Emma’s perfect mum in her perfect headwrap. Not today, anyway. She says, “Come on, let’s have a walk around outside.”

  The best thing about walking around the playing field is that no one can listen in. You can talk about who you fancy and who you hate. After they’ve dismissed half the boys in their year, mainly for being pathetically juvenile, Amelie says, “You know when you had that sore throat, the one I caught off you?”

  “How do you know you caught it off me?”

  “Only joking.”

  “Well, what about it?” asks Emma.

  “Did your mum stay home? Give you loads of attention?”

  “My mum? Take a day off work? She never does that. She dumped me at my gran’s. I got even sicker because I had to listen to Gran’s putrid music and eat her disgusting pea and ham soup. Why do you want to know?”

  Amelie didn’t like to say, so she improvised. “You only took one day off school. I had a Friday off, but I was still sick over the weekend. So my sore throat was worse than yours.”

  “No it wasn’t. I told my mum I was well enough to go back to school. But I wasn’t.”

  When Amelie arrives home, there’s a message alert on the kitchen wall: Won’t be late, picking up takeaway. She loves an early meal. Her dad knows that. Whereas, at Emma’s, they have to wait until her older sister gets home, and she’s alpha sporty, so it gets ridiculously late.

  An hour later, her dad rushes into the kitchen and pushes the takeaway across the worktop. He always does that. Like he’s a barman in a cowboy film, sliding a glass of whisky.

  “Hungry?” he says.

  “Dad?”

  “Come on, get the plates out, Amelie. I’m starving.”

  She stoops to lift plates out of the cupboard. “I’m sorry about this morning.”

  “No need to be. We should talk more, but not when I’m hungry.” He laughs.

  “I don’t need to any more. I just want you to know, I think about it sometimes.”

  He’s unpacking the takeaway. Chinese—her number one favourite. “You’re bound to. I’m always happy to chat. Anyway, I’ve got some news.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve asked my friend Suzy to come on holiday with us this year.”

  Amelie hugs her dad, then charges off. She runs up the stairs. He calls after her: “Where’ve you gone? Amelie!”

  In her room, she picks up the postcard of the Madonna and Pre-Teen from the bedside table and leaps across to her desk. She opens the desk drawer, then lingers to gaze once more at Mary’s sad, creased face. She’l
l get over it. Amelie chucks the postcard in the drawer, slams the drawer shut and calls up her Madonna pinboards—because it’s time for a big decision.

  “Delete all,” she says.

  THE RIGHT THING TO DO

  I’m looking out for Rudy Dack—it’s our first face-to-face contact. He’s always known that he’s a donor-conceived child.

  Before I meet one of my offspring, I ask, straight-out: “When did your mother tell you?” That way I’m prepared.

  I’ve positioned myself at a good vantage point; I can monitor anyone approaching the café. I’ve taken a table in the outside eating area, in the shade of a scarlet oak, one of the more unusual trees in St. James’s Park.

  It’s my theory that a mother will wait, more often than not, seven or eight years before making the big revelation about her child’s true parentage. She waits, I reckon, until the child has lost the cherubic looks of infancy, and then asks herself: Will this child pass as my own? In my experience—now that several of my children have come calling—the longer these parents delay in making their revelations, the more screwed up the children are in the long run.

  One of my offspring coped just fine even though his mother broke the news well into his adulthood. In that instance, I assumed he’d inherited placid genes from his mother because I’m sure, in his position, I’d be angry. Really angry. I mean, everyone wants to know where they come from.

  So, here I go again. It’s several years since the last one, and quite frankly I wasn’t expecting to meet any more. I’m a bit niggled. Why has it taken Rudy so long to make contact? I haven’t asked him yet. I’ve learned it’s best to talk about personal motivations at the first meet-up, when we can read one another’s facial expressions and body language. Potentially, it’s a volatile moment, though I’ve never encountered any awkwardness I couldn’t handle. Ha! I should be a psychiatrist.

  I’ve arranged our meeting in St. James’s Park because I’m in London for a couple of days’ meetings and the weather forecast is good. I find, after the initial small talk, it’s easier to get into deeper issues while taking a stroll, when we’re not looking directly at one another. Especially with a man. But then, they’re all different.