Cold Bath Lane

by Lorna Dounaeva

  Then came the day Miss Honey called. I was the one who took the call.

  “Hello, is Mr McBride there?”

  “He’s er…just out at the shops right now,” I said, looking across the room at Dad, who was passed out on the sofa. “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing to worry about. But Alicia has had a rather bad fall in the playground and it seems she’s chipped her tooth. Can you tell your Dad? He’ll need to collect her and take her to the dentist.”

  “Right,” I said, knowing that Dad would do nothing of the sort.

  I woke Dad up, but as I expected, he didn’t see the need to go.

  “Where’s Sam? He can take her.”

  “Sam’s at school,” I said, in exasperation.

  “You do it then.”

  “Dad, I can’t. They’re expecting an adult. A proper adult.”

  I eyed him up and down. He looked so crumpled and dirty, you could be forgiven for thinking he was homeless.

  “Here, I’ll make you some coffee,” I said. Then I went and found him a clean shirt.

  “Put this on. And you’d better use some mouthwash after the coffee.”

  Dad drove drunk all the time. The rules didn’t apply to him. But that day, I was more aware of it than usual, as he zigzagged all over the road, and his hands tremored on the wheel. He parked at an angle, the car sticking way out into the road. He tried to correct his mistake, but he made it even worse.

  “Don’t worry about it,” I said. “We’ll only be a few minutes.”

  “You do it, if you know so much,” he muttered, sliding out of the van.

  “Dad, you know I’m too young to drive.”

  He looked at me, surprised. “Are you?”

  I don’t think he had a clue how old I was.

  Dad walked into reception, while I waited anxiously outside. I didn’t go in with him because I didn’t want anyone to ask why I wasn’t at school myself. Miss Honey hadn’t said anything when I answered the phone, but if she saw me in real life, she might twig how young I was.

  Still, I didn’t like letting Dad go in there by himself. If the school knew he was an alcoholic, they’d get social services involved and that was the last thing we needed, or so I thought. It feels strange, looking back, but at that time I genuinely thought that we were better off keeping our family together, no matter what. I never considered that it might be a way out of our misery.

  After a few minutes, I got out of the car and walked up to the gate. I waited, and I worried. The longer it took, the worse I felt. A bead of perspiration formed on my head, and I realised that I hadn’t had any water to drink that morning. My legs felt weak and my body shook slightly. I thought guiltily of the cider I’d drunk the night before. I didn’t want to turn out like Dad. Anything but that.

  “What took you?” I asked, when Dad and Alicia finally appeared. Alicia looked happy to be let out of school early. She skipped along merrily beside me, singing some strange little song.

  Dad dropped us at the dentist and signed all he forms, but he refused to wait around.

  “Dad, you have to stay. They’ll notice…”

  “No, they won’t.”

  His gaze drifted to the shop next door.

  “Dad you can buy some beer after the appointment.”

  But Dad couldn’t wait that long.

  The dentist ushered us in straight away.

  “The school phoned to say you were coming,” he explained.

  Alicia sat down in the chair, and opened her mouth. He peered inside.

  “It’s not just chipped – it’s barely hanging by a thread,” he said of the damaged tooth. “A couple of days and it’ll be out. I don’t see any point in filling it.”

  He looked behind me, perhaps expecting a grown up, then his eyes settled on me.

  “She might need to stick to soft foods in the meantime, so as not to aggravate it.”

  I nodded my head, absently.

  “What about you? Shall we see how your teeth are coming along?”

  “Me?” I laughed nervously. “My teeth are fine.”

  “All the same, why don’t you hop up here and we’ll take a look?”

  I don’t remember being nervous about the dentist before, but then, I always used to have Mum with me. And Sam. I remember the two of us vying to be first in the chair, always wanting to get ahead of each other.

  I sat down, and hoped no one would notice Alicia rifling through the drawers.

  “Come on then, Jody. Open your mouth.”

  Obligingly, I did.

  “Hmm, it looks to me like you’ve been eating too much sugar.”

  “Not really,” I said, my mouth still open wide.

  “Maybe it’s in your drinks. Do you drink a lot of pop?”

  “Hmm…” I said noncommittally.

  Not pop, no. But I’d been putting away over a litre of cider a day. There had to be sugar in that.

  “Do you suffer from stress?” he asked, poking around my gums.

  “Hmm…”

  “You’ve been grinding your teeth at night. Quite badly, by the look of it. You might need to wear a mouth guard.”

  Alicia tittered.

  “Make another appointment and we’ll get one fitted.”

  “Hmm…” I sat up and rinsed my mouth. Alicia was now sitting nicely, good as gold. It was amazing how angelic she looked, considering that she’d just swiped a whole reel of stickers and a pair of sunglasses.

  “Great, we’ll see you both soon,” the dentist said, as we fell out the door.

  I kept the smile on my face until we reached reception. Then I shoved Alicia out the door and we never went back.

  “You’re grinding your teeth,” Alicia said, as I tried to sleep that night.

  “No, I ain’t,” I said, turning away from her.

  I drifted off to sleep, but a noise in the night woke me out of my slumber. I sat up sharpish. There. There it was again. Plaintive and pathetic.

  “Help!”

  I rubbed my bleary eyes. “Hold on , Dad, I’m coming!”

  23

  The smell hit me as soon as I ran into the room. Dad never smelled good, but this was different. The stink was raw and pungent and totally repulsive.

  “God, Dad!”

  My father sat up in bed looking totally bewildered. I switched on the light to reveal revolting, soiled bed clothes.

  “Oh, the bastards, what have they done to me?”

  “Get yourself in the shower!”

  “They came in the night.”

  He pummelled the wall with his fist. “You let them in, Jody Bear? Why did you let them in?”

  “Oh, so I’m Jody again, now am I? Look at this mess. You’ve no one to blame but yourself.”

  I hauled his disgusting sheets downstairs and dragged them out to the bin. I could have washed them, but I didn’t want to. I had dealt with Alicia’s accidents often enough, but this was on another level. Dad was a grown man. Every shred of respect fell away as I dumped clean sheets and blankets on the bed and left him a towel on the wash basin. But I didn’t do any more than that. I would not be involved with my father’s intimate care. Even I had my limits.

  I couldn’t sleep through the sound of the shower running. Even once Dad thought to turn it off, he sat huddled in the bottom of the cubicle. I flung the towel over him.

  “Get out!” I barked, shielding my eyes. He was like a crab without a shell.

  I returned to bed, but the drip, drip, drip kept me awake. I don’t know if Dad slept in the shower. I didn’t check.

  After that, it became a regular occurrence. I stocked up on cheap bedding. I didn’t want to wash his soiled sheets and I knew they cost money. But Dad disgusted me so much I could barely look at him. The most ridiculous part of it was that he didn’t even understand what was happening. Nothing was ever his fault, he couldn’t fathom that it was him, and his drinking, causing this revolting problem. He thought it was his enemies.

  “Heathens,” he would yell
. “Oh, those blighters!”

  All my life, I had heard him rage about his enemies, those evil people who were out to destroy him. It was only now that I realised they were probably all in his head.

  “Hand me my comb,” he said one day, as he stood at the mirror.

  He grinned toothlessly, his horrible bushy sideburns sticking out like hamsters on the side of his face. Evidently, he saw Elvis grinning back at him, where I saw Worzel Gummidge.

  Yet, even in the depths of my disgust, a tiny part of me understood. Dad didn’t drink for the fun of it, he drank because he was hurting. The only time he stayed somewhat sober was when we were out on a job. As soon as we got back, he went straight to the fridge, looking for a beer.

  Seeing what alcohol did to Dad, I felt even more ashamed of my own drinking, but I didn’t know how to stop, and I didn’t have anybody to turn to. I would throw it all down the sink, and promise myself that I wasn’t going to touch it again, only to pick up another litre once Alicia went to school.

  One night, when he was exceptionally bladdered, Dad started laying into Uncle Richard, properly yelling at him.

  “What’s up with Dad?” Sam asked.

  “Dunno. It’s the alcohol talking.”

  Dad slurred his words so much it was impossible to understand what he was saying.

  Richard stepped out of the way as Dad swung at him, smashing his fist on the chimney breast.

  “Ow!” he moaned in pain, cupping his injured hand, which was now purple and pulsating.

  “Serves him right,” I muttered under my breath, as Sam fussed over him.

  “Your old man’s gone nuts,” Richard said, shaking his head. “It’s about time he cut down on the booze.”

  “You tell him that,” I said, my cheeks crimson as I thought about how much I’d drunk that day.

  Dad stopped nursing his injured hand long enough to grab an ornament from the fireplace and hurl it in our direction, narrowly missing his brother.

  “I’ve had it up to the back teeth with him,” said Richard, grabbing his coat. “I’ll see you kids later.”

  I thought he’d be back. He always was. But a week passed, and then a month and we didn’t see hide nor hair of him. He wasn’t in the Halfway House of a Sunday and he didn’t come for Dad’s birthday, even though I left a message on his answerphone, inviting him.

  “Glad to see the back of him,” Dad would mutter. “Good riddance to bad rubbish.”

  “But Dad,” Sam said. “Uncle Richard is the only family we’ve got.”

  “Why don’t you tell him you’re sorry?” I suggested. “It ain’t the same around here without him.”

  The look Dad gave me could have turned wine to piss.

  “I am not sorry! Haven’t you been listening at all? He wants to take all my dough and give it to the government. He’s out to get me.”

  His mad-dog eyes grew wider, as if he had stumbled on a sacred truth.

  “I don’t know why I didn’t see it before,” he said slowly. “He worships the dark one, and he’s going to take us all down to hell with him.”

  “And I’m the sacred Mother Mary,” I muttered.

  “Don’t,” Sam said, digging me in the ribs.

  “Couldn’t we ring him?” I said, when Dad was in the kitchen. “I want to see him, even if Dad doesn’t.”

  “I’ve tried,” Sam said, “but he’s as stubborn as Dad is. He’s not going to come back until Dad apologises.”

  “When hell freezes over, then,” I said, with a sigh.

  Dad got ugly drunk again, soon after that. I had crushed the sleeping pills into his beer as usual, but they weren’t having the desired effect. Perhaps I needed to up his dose.

  “It’s all Thatcher’s fault,’ he said, spitting on the floor. It irritated me, the way he couldn’t take responsibility for his own actions.

  “What is, Dad? You not being able to say sorry?” I felt my heart pump in my chest as I confronted him. “If it weren’t for you, Uncle Richard would still be around. I wish you’d gone instead of him.”

  I knew I’d gone too far, but I couldn’t stop myself.

  Dad rose up to twice his height. He was three sheets to the wind and spoiling for a fight.

  “Oh, you’d like that, wouldn’t you, Mary Jane?”

  “I ain’t Mary frigging Jane,” I said, for the millionth time. “I wish you’d stop mixing me up with her. It’s downright creepy.”

  “Don’t lie to me!” he yelled. “You’re always feeding me porkies! Don’t think I don’t know what you get up to, whenever you think my back is turned.”

  He lurched at me and grabbed me by the hair.

  “Hey, get off me!”

  I flailed wildly as he dragged me off the sofa.

  I glanced around in desperation. Sam and Alicia must have heard me. Hell, the whole of Cold Bath Lane must have heard me, but no one came to my defence. I kicked out at him as he ripped chucks of hair out of my skull. I screamed louder than I had ever screamed before.

  “Get off me! What did I ever do to you? You crazy bastard!”

  His only reply was to slam my head against the wall. And still he did not let go. I blinked, disorientated. I was seeing stars in front of my face.

  “I know what you did, Mary Jane!”

  “Dad, stop!”

  The words frothed on my lips as I hurtled through the window and plummeted down into the street below. I lay stunned in the darkness, as the glass rained down on me.

  24

  I’ll say this for Cold Bath Lane. You could commit a murder out there, and no one would bat an eyelid. I lay on the pavement, my body quivering and bruised. There were fragments of glass in my hair, down my shirt and in my bra. Hundreds of tiny cuts pricked my skin, and ripples of blood streaked down my arms and legs.

  “Bloody hell,” said Sam, appearing in the doorway.

  “Call me an ambulance?” I croaked.

  “You won’t get an ambulance up here,” he said, nodding at all the cars double parked all over the place.

  “You take me then,” I said, brushing the glass out of my hair.

  I tried to sit up, but every movement hurt. I felt as if I had run a marathon. Sam hoisted me to my feet. He didn’t have the gentlest touch, but it would have to do. He helped me hobble towards the van.

  I stopped. “What about Alicia?”

  “She’ll be alright at home in bed, won’t she?”

  “Over my dead body!”

  “Alright, we’ll bring her with us.”

  He helped me into the van and went back into the house to get Alicia. I heard him talking softly to Dad inside. I pictured him, ushering him up to bed. Dad sounded as bewildered as I felt, as if all this had been caused by somebody else.

  Shaken as I was, I felt a lot better when Sam returned with Alicia. She was wide awake, and full of beans. He loaded her into the backseat.

  “Wow, look at your head, Jody!” she said, as we drove off. “You look like a mutant.”

  The staff at A&E were very nosey about how the accident had happened, and the fact we had a young child with us. They eyed Sam suspiciously, but I thought he came across quite well. He looked quite manly these days, big and buff. He looked every bit the responsible adult. It was me they disapproved of. They must have smelled the scent of cider on my breath and drawn their own conclusions.

  Presently, a nurse came over to see me. She had fluffy blonde hair, and smelt of powder and hand soap.

  “Hello, I’m Mary.”

  Mary, like my mum.

  “Here, take these for the pain, love.”

  She handed me some tiny pills and a glass of water. I swallowed them fast, and then she helped me onto a soft, clean bed.

  “I’m sorry about the wait,” she said, but I really didn’t mind it at all. Someone brought me a hot cuppa and some biscuits, decent ones with jam in the middle.

  Mary was very kind to me as she stitched me up.

  “You’re going to feel a bit of a sting,” she said. �
�Try and think about something else. Are you going anywhere nice on holiday?”

  “Yes,” I said, wracking my brains for a nice-sounding destination. “We’re off to the seaside.”

  “Little Hampton? West Wittering?”

  “Er, West Wittering,” I said, picturing myself lying on the beach.

  “Lovely,” she said. “You’ll be able to have a paddle in the sea. Now, hold still, this next bit is a little tricky. I need you to be a brave little soldier, OK?”

  Tears welled up in my eyes. It had been so long since anyone had mothered me.

  “It’s OK, love,” she said, obviously thinking the tears were from the pain. “Not long now.”

  I bit my lip, and lay as still as I could as she continued to tend to my wounds. I wished I was on the beach, feeling the waves come in and out. I hadn’t been to the beach since Mum died.

  “There, all done,” Mary said brightly. “You can go home now but take it easy, OK? No BMX stunts or any of that malarkey.”

  I nodded, sadly. I’d been praying they were going to keep me in, even for one night.

  Mary gave me some more pills to take with me and I swallowed half of them as soon as I got outside the door. My stomach churned as I thought about returning home.

  My blood was still splattered all over the floor when we got home, the shards of glass twinkling in the moonlight. Alicia picked one up before I could stop her, and ran her fingers over the jagged edges.

  “Give me that,” I said, trying to take it off her, but she clung to it like it was a precious gem.

  Dad was passed out on the sofa, his arm hanging down like a dead man’s. There were drool drops on the floor, and his legs twitched as he slept. I stood over him, feeling a surge of anger – and power. I wanted to hurt him as he had hurt me.

  Sam looked at me and shook his head.

  “He has a disease. It’s not his fault. Not all his fault, anyway.”

  “Stop making excuses for him. You know what he did.”

  Sam put himself between us, blocking my path. “I ain’t going to let you hurt him. It ain’t right.”

  “Ain’t right for who?”