The Things I Know

by Amanda Prowse

‘What next?’ he asked.

  ‘I need to feed the chickens. Clean their coop out.’

  Again he followed her across the yard. ‘I don’t think I’d want the responsibility of all these animals. I’d be worried in case I got something wrong.’

  ‘You learn what to do, and no one knows anything without learning it, do they? Do you not have pets?’ She was curious about his home life.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you have a garden?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I can’t imagine not having a garden.’ She looked up at the endless sky, unfettered by buildings.

  ‘I live in a flat, in a block. With my mum. I’ve always lived there.’

  ‘Well, I’ve always lived here. I was born on the top floor, in the attic.’ She pointed towards the farmhouse.

  ‘I was born in the Royal London Hospital.’

  ‘Does your dad not live with you?’ The man who called him Gray.

  ‘No.’

  ‘So where does he live?’

  ‘I don’t know. I haven’t seen him since I was eight. He left us.’ He spoke with a look of such anguish that, had she not known the facts, she would have believed his hurt to be recent and raw.

  ‘Oh.’ She wished she hadn’t asked and felt her palms clammy with embarrassment at having touched on the subject. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Thank you.’ He looked at her. ‘I’m sorry too. I think my life would be much better with him in it.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘In every way.’ He kicked at the floor. ‘My mum’s . . .’ He paused. ‘She’s . . . she’s quite needy and it’s hard to break away.’

  She looked up at him. This she could relate to, and she felt the bonds of kinship and familiarity joining her to this quirky guest.

  He continued: ‘I kind of promised my dad and so . . . I look after her, really.’

  ‘Is she ill?’ She felt a flame of sympathy for the woman she pictured, who might be old or housebound, and a wave of respect for this man who cared for her.

  ‘No.’ He took his time, licked his dry lips and chose his words carefully. ‘Not ill, but I don’t know how to describe her, really. She’s preoccupied. I think she’s still angry at my dad. Even after all this time.’

  ‘Maybe she is.’

  He reached out and tentatively touched Buddy again. ‘I guess. She doesn’t really do anything, just sits with my aunties.’

  ‘Joan and Eva.’ It was her turn to show her skills of recall, liking how he had taken on board the details of her beloved Daphne.

  ‘Yes.’ He grinned. ‘They get a bit sloshed on wine and run my dad into the ground. Usually, I go to bed and leave them to it. They make so much noise. It upsets the man who lives below us with his family – Mr Waleed. He’s a nice man; his wife is quite fat and she has a shiny gold tooth.’ He tapped his own front tooth. ‘I always dread meeting Mr Waleed after their noisy nights. Every conversation makes me feel like I’m letting him down. I try to tell him the noise and their cackling is nothing to do with me, but it’s me he sees and me he shouts at.’

  ‘What does he say?’ It seemed a little unfair to her that Grayson should be shouted at by the neighbour for something that wasn’t his fault. She couldn’t imagine living somewhere like that, especially with junkies on the top floor and shits in the lift.

  ‘All sorts, and I hate it. He walks towards me with his fists coiled, as if he’s expecting trouble. I listen to the Waleeds of an evening. Their lounge is below my bedroom, and I hear his kids laughing; their giggles bounce up and hit the ceiling. I like the happiness.’

  ‘What do you mean, you like the happiness?’ This one phrase above all others had caught in the net of her imagination.

  Grayson again took his time responding. ‘I mean, I like the way they all laugh together, as if whatever they have and whatever they’re doing at that moment in time is enough. I think it must be a nice way to live – happy.’

  ‘Are you not happy then, Grayson?’ She was curious, knowing exactly what it felt like to wonder about the lives of other people who had what she did not.

  ‘I don’t know.’ He fixed his fringe and kept his eyes averted.

  ‘I think,’ she began cautiously, aware that, despite the ease and depth of their conversation, this man was still a guest and a stranger, ‘I think if you were happy, you’d know it.’

  ‘I suppose so. I try not to think about it too much. I just get through the day and then get through the night and then get through the day . . .’ He rolled his hand as if to emphasise the infinite nature of his plan. ‘Are you happy?’ he countered, looking up briefly.

  ‘There are happy moments in my day.’ She recalled those moments. ‘I like the first big breath I take outside, early in the morning when the rest of the world is still asleep. And I like collecting the eggs and talking to my girls and the sweep of dawn along the Severn.’

  ‘Daphne.’ He clicked his fingers.

  ‘Yep, Daphne and the others. And I like closing the door on a room that I’ve finished getting ready for new guests. So yes, little bits of happiness that I string together and they help me get through the not-so-happy bits. I guess, like you, I get through the day and then I get through the night and then I get through the day . . .’

  Hitch slid the door of Big Barn to fetch the wheelbarrow with the spade, bucket and yard broom.

  Grayson walked over to the dog sofa and slumped down on it. Hitch looked at the clock and figured a few minutes slacking off wouldn’t matter. She joined him and the two sat at either end, facing each other. It felt nice to have someone to slow her down, someone to waste time with.

  ‘I find you very easy to talk to, Thomasina.’ She got the impression that, for him, like her, this was a rare thing.

  ‘You too. I’m having a nice time.’

  ‘Me too.’ He drummed his fingers on his bony thigh. ‘My dad used to tell me it was important to find joy in the small things, as they were really the big things, and that they were what truly mattered.’

  ‘It’s good you remember the stuff he said.’

  ‘Yep, but only up until I was eight, when he left.’

  ‘I can’t imagine not having my Pops around.’ She thought again about the furrows of age he now sported and his deep sigh as he sat or stood, in direct response to the ache of bones which had known hard farm labour for more years than not.

  ‘You’re lucky.’

  ‘I am. How did he leave, your dad?’ She tried to imagine the man sneaking out and couldn’t decide whether a lack of a goodbye would be the very best or the very worst thing.

  ‘He woke me up early one morning and he was standing at the bottom of my bed. The only other time he’d done this was at Christmas to tell me that Santa had been, and I was half awake and felt really excited, like it might be Christmas and I’d forgotten, but then I noticed that his clothes looked crumpled, as if he’d slept in them, his eyes were red, as if he’d been crying, and when he kissed me goodbye, he smelled as though he hadn’t cleaned his teeth.’ He took a sharp breath. ‘And he said, “I’m sorry, Gray,” and I thought he meant he was sorry for waking me up, and I was just about to tell him it was okay, I loved seeing him any time, but then he shook his head and told me that he couldn’t do it any more.’

  ‘Couldn’t do what?’ she asked softly.

  ‘Well, he didn’t say back then, but I think he meant he couldn’t stand living with my mum any more. He told me I was a good boy and he asked me to look after her. I told him I would, even though I was too young to know what I was fully signing up for.’ He gave a small snort of laughter. ‘But I have looked after her and I think I fill a lot of the gaps in her life.’

  She felt a surge of empathy at his feeling that life would be better with one or two changes, one or two simple twists of fate beyond his control. He sounded a little trapped, and this she understood more than most, touching the tip of her finger briefly to her mouth.

  ‘How would it be different, do you think, if your dad
was in your life?’

  ‘I think he would have helped me more. I struggle a bit with . . . stuff.’

  ‘What kind of stuff?’

  ‘The big stuff that most people find easy. I’m a bit . . .’ He sighed. ‘Life is . . .’ Again he wrestled with the words. ‘I’m okay with the detail, so I spot the small stuff most people miss, but I miss the big stuff most people spot, if that makes any sense. It can make things difficult. It does make things difficult. I don’t usually talk about it.’

  She screwed her eyes up and cocked her head. ‘I don’t really understand what you mean. Give me an example.’

  Grayson looked up, as if trying to think of one that he was happy to share. ‘A good example might be when I went out on to the walkway, just outside the front door of our flat. I saw my friend Reggie.’

  ‘Your next-door neighbour. The one with the credit card.’

  ‘Yes, him, I saw him, and he looked really scared. His pupils were wide and he was breathing quickly and he didn’t have a top on and he was sweating, but it wasn’t a warm day; in fact, it was quite cold. I smiled at him, and he looked at me as if he needed help, and I said, “Are you okay, Reggie?” And he shook his head briefly and still didn’t speak, but stared at me as if he needed some help. I was watching his face, trying to figure out how to help him and what might be wrong, and saw him look down briefly, and when I followed his eyes I noticed he didn’t have any shoes on. I thought I’d figured out what he needed, so I shouted, “Oh, your feet! Do you want me to go and find you some shoes? Your trainers? Or I can lend you my slippers?” As I said, it wasn’t a warm day and I thought it couldn’t be nice to be standing there in bare feet on the concrete. And then he smiled at me and, even though he didn’t answer, he looked happy that I’d asked, grateful. And that was what I noticed. That’s what I remember about that day. What I think about.’

  He paused. ‘But I think what other people might have noticed or might remember most is that the whole sky was lit with the on–off bright blue light of the sirens that coloured the darkness, or the fact that Reggie had his arms up behind his back and was being held still by two police officers in stab vests. And that there were six other police officers on the walkway. But I didn’t really see them, not at first. I only saw my friend and that he was frightened and that he had no shoes on. I wanted to help him. I wanted to figure out what was wrong, like a puzzle. That’s what I do for my job – I solve problems, puzzles.’

  Hitch had known someone similar to this man in primary school, a boy who had extra lessons, like her, a boy who did not know why it was important to keep his clothes on in public but who could do maths. Any maths. He’d had Asperger’s, she remembered. Did Grayson?

  ‘Shit! I’ve never seen that many police officers. What had he done?’ She sat forward on the sofa, entirely rapt.

  ‘Oh, he killed someone.’

  ‘He killed someone?’ She gasped and laughed at the same time. ‘Well, I wasn’t expecting that!’

  ‘Yeah, well, he says he didn’t mean to, so it was an accident, really, but we have a legal system and he was found guilty by a jury.’

  ‘How long did he get?’

  ‘Twenty-six years.’

  ‘Shit!’ This story was as exciting as it was shocking. Mr Grayson Potts came from a whole other world.

  ‘Yep, it’s a long time. I keep thinking I should go and visit him. I’ve written to him, and I thought I might wait until I get a letter back before I turn up. You know how some people are about visitors.’

  She paused before she answered and stared at him. ‘I think you seem like a kind man, Grayson – kind and a bit weird.’

  ‘So I’ve been told, especially by Liz, who sits next to me at work. She calls me the expert puzzle-solver and she thinks I’m so good at it because of my weirdness.’

  Hitch laughed, and he smiled at her.

  ‘What do you mean by “puzzle-solver” – like crosswords and things?’

  ‘I can do those, but that’s not really what I meant.’

  ‘Rubik’s cubes?’ She was running out of ideas.

  ‘No, I mean general problem-solving; it’s part of my job. I can look at lines of data and spot patterns and it feels important to me. I don’t know why, but I need to turn the data into a straight line in my mind and find the pattern.’

  She blinked at the man. ‘I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.’

  He turned to face her and his expression was pained, as if it was too hard for him to explain – and not for the first time. ‘If you think about a page of facts – columns and columns of dates, prices, quantities, percentages or whatever – I can look at it and, after a period of time, I can change the way I see it in my mind until it looks like one of those puzzles where you have to guess what number comes next or what’s missing. I don’t know how I do it and I don’t know why I do it, but I’ve always done it and, in my job, guessing those missing numbers, seeing the gaps, or knowing what comes next is very important because it’s classed as a prediction, and that means I know before most other people what’s going to happen.’

  ‘Like magic! Like a trick!’

  ‘Yes, I guess it is if you can’t do it. But it’s not a magic trick. It’s just that every single line of data is like a circle, a cycle.’ He drew the shape in the air with his finger. ‘The only variant is how long it takes to repeat that cycle, but I open up the circle, lay it flat in my mind and, as I say, I can see a pattern and spot the gaps.’

  She stared at him and hoped she was managing to disguise the crease of confusion that tried to form on her brow. He looked at her face and began again with renewed enthusiasm.

  ‘When . . . when I look at a list or a spreadsheet, it’s a bit like reading music to me. I can spot the rhythm of the numbers, like notes on a page, and just like with a piece of music, if a note is wrong, out of tune, a misplaced number, a gap, something odd or interesting . . . it jumps out at me and I can work it out from there.’

  ‘So, you hear the numbers? Like music?’ It was a difficult concept.

  ‘No, no, I can’t hear it.’ He laughed softly. ‘I can’t hear it,’ he repeated, ‘but I can feel it.’

  ‘And that’s why your boss wants you to come down to Bristol and tell other people how to do your magic trick.’

  ‘Yes, because what I can do is very valuable.’

  ‘Can you teach other people how to do it?’ She held his gaze.

  ‘No. No, I can’t. I did try to tell Mr Jenks that, but he wouldn’t listen. He wants to think it’s a formula or a knack, but it’s more than that for me. It’s how I am and how I’ve always been, and it’s all to do with my puzzle-solving.’

  ‘Who’s Mr Jenks?’

  ‘My boss.’

  ‘Right, and why is it so valuable?’

  ‘Because if you think that, with something like gold, which brokers like my firm buy and sell to make money, they buy when it’s cheap and sell when it’s expensive.’

  ‘Got it so far. Like us with grain and seasonal produce.’

  ‘Okay, yes. So if I can fill in the missing number, if I can see a pattern – which I can for everything – then I know when to buy and when to sell, or, more accurately, I can buy and sell the option to buy and sell. It’s complicated.’

  Hitch stared at him. ‘D’you know, I think you might actually be the cleverest person I’ve ever met in my entire life, Mr Grayson Potts.’

  Grayson looked at her with an expression of pure delight and she got the feeling that he only rarely got compliments. The thought filled her with warmth.

  ‘I think words like that are the greatest kindness. Thank you. And when you say I might be the cleverest person you’ve met, I was wondering, have you met a lot of people?’

  ‘Not really. But more than seven.’ She liked the honesty in their exchange.

  ‘I know that some people think the things I do are odd.’ Grayson looked at his feet. ‘Even my mum. But to me, they’re not – to me, they’re normal and
so that makes them fine.’

  She pictured holding her chickens, her friends, close to her chest and whispering confessions into their feathery heads. ‘I know what you mean.’ And she did. ‘You want to go for a walk along the river?’ It seemed bold to ask and yet, at the same time, almost free of risk. Hitch felt entirely confident that she could predict his answer.

  Like magic.

  ‘Sure.’ Again the rather nonchalant response, but Grayson’s easy smile and the way he leapt up from the sofa in eager anticipation spoke volumes.

  Hitch knew as they walked along the ridge of the riverbank with the wide River Severn stretching out in front of them and the low autumn sun glinting on the water that she would not forget this day.

  Not ever.

  It was unusual for her not to be alone, lost in her own thoughts, silently pondering and reflecting, and yet, far from finding this new situation fearful, nerve-racking, it felt surprisingly easy, ordinary, natural. And it was something she had wished for on so many occasions: to have someone here with her, someone to talk to. She found it calming being with him, as if she didn’t have to overthink things and could just be. As ever, there was a clear view of the land on the other side of the water, to Wales, where people walked with their dogs along the opposite riverbank, no doubt looking back at them. She hoped they could see her and this man strolling along together like a couple. The very idea made her tummy jump.

  The day felt like an adventure, a holiday even, as they combed the stretch between the two grand bridges rising like curved highways sprung straight from the water, as if raised by the gods. She hadn’t felt this way since Jonathan was still at home, when the two of them had occasionally had a similar adventure.

  ‘This is very strange for me,’ Grayson began.

  ‘Strange how?’

  Grayson stopped walking and looked out over the water. ‘I didn’t expect this, being here in the countryside – it’s as if my thoughts are freer, as if they’ve been lifted up in the air and can float on the breeze instead of being hemmed in, rebounding between the high walls and buildings like a ball looking for escape in a maze.’

  She thought his words were like poetry and was captivated. He wasn’t finished.