I hadn’t thought of Gilbert’s new skylight. I closed my eyes, trying to visualise the van. Hackney Construction. I’d put money on it. Tom was warming to his theme.
‘Bloody cowboys, they’re everywhere. Can’t find a decent trades- man for love nor money. I bet that’s it. Rain penetration. Dear old Gillie, show him a perfectly good roof, he’ll have it ruined in minutes. And I’ll bet he paid the earth, too. Damn fool.’
I found Hackney Construction in Yellow Pages. I phoned them the next day. A harassed-sounding woman took the call and as we talked I gathered that she must be the wife of one of the roofers. I could hear kids in the background and what I took to be the grumble of a washing machine. At her suggestion, I phoned again at lunchtime. The men were still out on a job. Why didn’t I call round after six? She gave me the address and said her husband would be back by then.
I spent the day, off and on, checking the kitchen. There was more water seeping through the ceiling and down the wall. The smell, too, was stronger, damp of a kind I’d never come across before. I looked out of the window, thinking about the skylight again. It hadn’t rained since the weekend.
The address the woman had given me was actually in Clapton. I recognised the big guy who opened the door. He’d been the one sawing lengths of timber in the hall. He invited me in, introducing me to his wife with a grin I didn’t entirely trust. I did my best to explain about the water in the kitchen. Not quite a leak, more a seepage. Might it have come from the attic? A problem with the skylight, maybe, or a pipe they might have damaged during the installation? Neither suggestion cut much ice, though he did promise to give Gilbert a ring when he had the chance and maybe drive over and take a look. Meantime, he agreed it would be best to contact the water board. He took the trouble to look up the emergency number in the phone book, scribbling it down for me on the back of an old betting slip.
On the way out of the house, I passed his wife again. She was working through a huge pile of ironing.
‘What’s it like then?’
‘What’s what like?’
‘This windsurfing?’
I stared at her, lost for words. Then I looked at her husband. He was standing by the front door, visibly embarrassed.
‘Them pictures,’ he mumbled. ‘In the old bloke’s flat.’
‘Pictures?’
I was still struggling. Then I remembered the photos Brendan had taken down in Jaywick, the day I’d tried to teach him how to windsurf.
‘You’ve seen them? Those shots of me?’
‘Not me, love, him.’ The wife was nodding at her husband. ‘Made a bit of a name for yourself round here. The lads couldn’t stop talking about it. Old boy like him. Young girl like you.’ She looked me up and down. ‘Still, no accounting for taste, eh?’
Her husband had opened the front door. He wanted me out before his wife made things even worse.
‘Take no notice,’ he told me as we stepped into the street. ‘She’s only jealous.’
Back home, I mopped up in the kitchen. The walls were wet again, the stuff running down behind the cupboards. I was almost glad when I heard the bell at the front. Brendan was waiting for me on the doorstep. He was swaying slightly and it took me several seconds to realise that he was drunk. Not just drunk but paralytic.
‘Cracked it,’ he beamed at me. ‘Fucking cracked it.’
I stepped aside. How he’d got the Mercedes round here in one piece was beyond me. I guided him along the hall and into the flat. The door to the front room was open. He headed for the sofa but missed. I helped him to his feet and he clung to me a moment, swaying again. Jaywick, I thought. The roles reversed. Brendan drowning. Me there to help.
I made him tea. He wanted Scotch. I had none. ‘What happened?’
‘Got pissed.’
‘I can see that. Tell me why.’
He was lying full-length on the sofa, his Burberry still on. Every time he tried to focus, his head fell forward and it took him an age to get it up again. I wondered whether he was going to be sick but decided that appearing with a bowl might be premature.
‘I love you,’ he muttered at last. ‘The rest of it is shit.’ He lifted an arm and made a floppy, encircling gesture. ‘Shit,’ he repeated.
I tried to make him drink the tea. He wouldn’t. He’d come to tell me he loved me, tell me he was crazy about me, tell me he’d changed, tell me everything would be all right.
‘It’s fine,’ I said as gently as I could. ‘You’ll be better in the morning.’
‘I’m better now. Much better.’
‘You’ve been drinking.’
‘You’re right.’
‘Something must have happened.’
‘It’s all happened. Everything’s happened. Everything’s…’ with an effort, he sat up, ‘… total shit.’
He ran a hand over his face then peered at it as if it belonged to someone else. The sale of Doubleact had gone through. He was a rich man. And he was out from under.
‘Mother hen,’ he giggled.
‘Who?’
‘Sandie.’
It was the first time I’d ever heard him call his wife Sandie. It sounded like someone else, someone I didn’t know. Brendan was trying to stand up. I didn’t think that was such a great idea. The moment I touched him, he collapsed backwards onto the sofa, his hands reaching up for me, exactly the way he’d fallen off the windsurf board.
He’d upset the tea. He watched blearily while I cleaned it up. ‘I don’t care,’ he said very carefully, ‘about the money.’
‘Of course you do.’
‘No I fucking don’t.’ He waved an admonishing finger very slowly in front of my face. ‘And I don’t care about the baby, either. I just care…’ he frowned, trying to concentrate,’… about us. I mean you. You down there. Missus.’
I ignored the comment. Getting him out of here wasn’t going to be easy but I was buggered if I was going to listen to this all night. I went to the kitchen to fetch a cloth and bowl of cold water for the carpet. When I turned the taps off I became aware of a dripping noise. I looked up. The stain was spreading in front of my eyes, water running down from the ceiling. I watched, wondering quite where to start, then Brendan appeared in the doorway. He was clutching the door jamb very tightly, like a man contemplating a long jump. When he finally got the words out, it occurred to me he was trying to say sorry.
‘It’s no problem.’ I gestured at the bowl of cold water. ‘It’ll wash out.’
‘I meant the baby… all that.’
‘Ah.’
That was something no amount of scrubbing in the world was going to shift. Soon enough there’d be two of us.
‘Three,’ Brendan insisted. ‘Three.’
I began to shake my head but I knew there was no point. He was beyond argument. I tried to change the subject.
‘I’ve got a problem,’ I pointed at the wet patch on the ceiling. ‘As you can probably see.’
Brendan nodded, emphatic. His eyes never left my face.
‘And l love you too.’
He gave me a lop-sided smile and then took a little half-step forward, abandoning the door jamb. For a moment, he wavered. Then, with a long sigh he collapsed face down, asleep at once, his face cradled in the towel I’d used to mop the walls. Hours later, when I finally tracked down the key to my bedroom door, he was still there, snoring gently, oblivious to the soft drip of water through the ceiling.
By the time I woke up next morning, he’d gone. A note on the gas stove told me how much he loved me. Instead of the usual sign-off, the distinctive ‘B’ he always used, he’d scrawled a single kiss.
I phoned the water board at eight o’clock, as soon as the office opened. I explained about the leak, and about my neighbour being away, and when I mentioned how pregnant I was, they promised to get someone round straight away. I stayed in all morn
ing, waiting. At noon, the phone rang. I thought it might be the water board. It wasn’t. It was Tom.
‘How’s tricks?’
‘Bloody awful.’
‘Why?’
I told him about Brendan staying the night, about the state he’d been in, about the things he’d said. I had to get it off my chest and telling Tom was oddly risk-free, like phoning one of those help organisations. Nikki, bless her, would have insisted on coming round and just now I didn’t want that.
‘He’s gone?’
‘Who?’
‘That Brendan chap?’
‘Oh yes, he went hours ago, before I even got up.’
I explained about him passing out. He’d spent the night on the kitchen floor, I said, unconscious.
‘When’s he coming back ?’
‘He’s not.’
‘Just as well, old thing. Best forgotten, eh?’
I heard him laughing. Then, without saying goodbye, he hung up. I returned to the kitchen, mystified. Why the interest? Why the questions? I shook my head, bewildered. My eyes kept straying to the damp patch on the ceiling. It was like a spot I couldn’t leave alone. It represented decay, things falling apart. I felt completely powerless, utterly vulnerable, waiting for an engineer who never came, fielding calls on the phone from the wrong people, answering my door to an ex-lover who’d probably be back within hours. It was a nervy, out-of- control feeling, horribly close to panic.
I was on the point of returning to the front room and shaking up the water board with another phone call when there was a huge crash. I heard myself screaming. It was so loud, the noise, so physically close, I thought the ceiling had collapsed. There was dust everywhere. I looked up, my hand to my mouth, coughing. The ceiling was intact but where the cupboards had been there was nothing but bare plaster, scabby and pitted around the holes drilled for the supporting screws. The cupboards had been full of crockery - plates, cups, saucers - and I reached for the table, supporting myself, staring down at the wreckage.
There were shards of china, much of it my mother’s, all over the floor. I backed slowly towards the door, feeling behind me for the handle, swaying on my feet, trying to keep the room in focus. My pulse was beginning to slow again but I felt physically sick. The smell, quite suddenly, was overpowering.
In the bathroom, I bent over the toilet bowl, retching. Then I turned round, lowering myself onto the seat, forcing my head between my knees. This was far from comfortable but it was the best I could do. I was close to fainting, and I knew it. Minutes passed while I fought fresh waves of panic. What had happened? What had I done? Why was everything disintegrating?
I got a flannel, turning on the tap in the handbasin, sponging my face. The cold water made me feel a little better. I washed my mouth out, then walked unsteadily back towards the kitchen. The last ten minutes, I seemed to have lost touch with reality. Had I really been there in the kitchen? Or was I in some fantasy world? A nightmare of my own making?
The kitchen was a mess. A big bottle of olive oil had smashed and the floor was slippery underfoot. I knew I had to get a grip on myself. I knew I had to cope. I owed it to myself, to the baby. Breaking down, giving up, just wasn’t an option.
I hunted half-heartedly for the dustpan and brush and I was on my hands and knees, working clumsily around the edges of the wreckage, when I heard a knock at the front door.
It was the man from the water board. I stood in the hall and reached sideways to the wall for support. He was old, as old as my dad would have been. He took one look at the state of me and when I gestured wordlessly back up the hall, he found his own way to the kitchen. I told him about the leak from upstairs, gesturing feebly at the stain on the ceiling, but he was over where the cupboards had once been, examining the plasterwork. At length, he ran a finger across the wall then lifted it to his nose. I was still talking gibberish about Gilbert’s skylight. The roofers must have upset the pipework, I muttered. There was definitely a leak.
The man from the water board glanced back at me. It was obvious he didn’t believe a word.
‘Begging your pardon, miss,’ he said, ‘but someone’s been pissing through your ceiling.’
I had the baby that night. I went into labour shortly after six and Nikki drove me to the hospital. The contractions went on until the small hours and the baby arrived around half past three in the morning. Nikki was there to hold my hand and all the nurses said how marvellous I’d been. The baby was a little girl. I called her Billie.
I stayed in hospital for five days. Something had gone wrong with my end of the umbilical cord and it took a minor operation to sort it out. Nikki came to see me and my mum took the train up from Petersfield. I got visits from mates at Doubleact and from Metro as well, and my corner of the four-bedded ward ended up looking like a flower shop. I tried to get hold of Tom a couple of times, to tell him the news about Billie, but his mobile wasn’t answering. Of Brendan, to my intense relief, there was absolutely no sign.
Gaynor came on the third day. I’d phoned the police station from the ward and we’d had a brief chat but she’d been too busy for me to go into real details. Now, she settled herself beside the bed. She’d brought a big box of chocolates as well as her notepad. Billie was asleep in a cot beside the radiator. Gaynor thought she looked smashing.
I told her about the cupboards falling down, and what the engineer had said. I gave her the water board’s number, and the key to the house. No one would have touched the kitchen. She could take a look for herself.
She came back next day. She’d been round to Napier Road with a colleague whose job it was to collect samples for scientific analysis. He’d scraped away at the plasterwork behind the cupboards and with luck the results should be back within twenty-four hours. She’d also phoned a couple of lads she knew who owed her a favour and they’d be in first thing tomorrow to tidy the place up. When I tried to thank her, I found myself in floods of tears. She fetched some Kleenex from the nursing station out in the corridor and sat with me for an hour or so, just chatting. The smell in the kitchen, she agreed, was dreadful.
By the time the results came through, Billie and I were down in Petersfield, tucked up with my mother. It was obvious from the moment we arrived that she was out to make a tremendous fuss of us, and it was equally obvious that the arrangement wouldn’t survive more than a week or so. My mum was kindness itself but I felt hopelessly claustrophobic. Billie was the new start I’d been praying for. The sooner we were out on our own, the better.
On the phone, Gaynor came to the point at once.
‘Urine,’ she said. ‘Definitely.’
I asked her what would happen next.
‘I’ve already been up there. Talked to him about it.’
‘What did he say?’
‘He admitted it. He said he’d had a little accident.’
‘Really?’ My heart sank. ‘How many little accidents?’
‘Just the one. Though he was a bit vague.’
‘But he’d been up there? All the time it was happening?’
‘Probably, but we can’t prove it.’
I half-listened to her explaining the legal situation. Technically, Gaynor could arrest him for criminal damage but to do that she had to establish intent. Gilbert’s little accident proved no such thing.
‘What about these stalking laws?’
‘It’s still tricky.’
‘Why?’
‘He’s not really done anything, not on purpose, anyway. Nothing we could stand up in court.’
‘He’s barmy,’ I said. ‘Isn’t that enough?’
‘No, I’m afraid not.’
I heard my mother returning from the garden. Billie was beginning to stir. I thanked Gaynor for everything she’d done, especially cleaning up the kitchen. She said it was no problem.
‘There’s one other thing,’ she added.
&
nbsp; ‘What?’
‘I phoned your old number. That one you gave me in De Beauvoir Square? I thought you’d be there.’
‘And?’
‘I talked to your partner, boyfriend, whatever he is. Brendan.’
I could feel the blood thudding in my head. This wasn’t Gaynor’s fault at all. When we’d last been in touch, back in the summer, Brendan and I were practically glued together.
‘What did you tell him?’
Gaynor hesitated a moment, unusual for her.
‘I mentioned the kitchen,’ she said. ‘You know, what had happened.’
‘And what did he say?’
‘He sounded very interested.’ She paused again. ‘I got the feeling he was hearing all this for the first time. Bit late, I know, but it’s better I tell you.’
I thought about it for a second or two. Then I shrugged. What’s done’s done.
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘And thanks again.’
The baby and I returned to London in the New Year. Christmas had been a non-stop succession of relatives queuing for a glimpse of my beloved Billie, and what little time I had to myself who wholly devoted to being a mum. Nature, I’d concluded by now, was truly miraculous. In three short weeks, Billie had transformed my life. The bond between us was quite extraordinary. We slept together, awoke together. I had no trouble breastfeeding and afterwards she’d lay peacefully in my arms, making gummy little noises that signalled the purest contentment. Now and again she’d yawn, and flex her little fingers, and smile a private smile and, watching her doze off again, I came to the conclusion that - despite the traumas of the last few months - I was the luckiest woman alive. In every respect I could think of, she was perfect. Just looking at her made everything seem possible.
Nikki loved her. She’d already agreed to be godmother (my brother was godfather) and she drove down to pick us up. That night, at her insistence, we pitched our tent at her flat. Next day, we’d go back to Napier Road.
The evening at Nikki’s was a riot. Billie was on her best behaviour, farting softly when we took it in turns to serenade her, and the three of us had Christmas all over again. We ate turkey, opened presents, drank loads of wine. Afterwards we had mince pies and brandy butter, neither of which would do much for what had once been my figure. That night, all three of us slept in Nikki’s huge double bed, and when Billie needed changing, it was Nikki who did the honours.
Nocturne Page 24
