Wake Up Happy Every Day

by Stephen May

  My phone is so futureproof, so resolutely advanced that it seems almost quaint that you can also make calls and send texts should you be into that retro kind of caper.

  This cheerful cheep-cheep turns out to be a text from Polly, the girl at Sunny Bank. It says: Just thought I should say your friend’s dad is now my lodger! How weird is that?

  ‘Very fucking weird,’ I say to the phone.

  ‘What?’ says Sarah.

  ‘It’s my dad’s care home,’ I say, ‘Sunny Bank. The old bugger’s done it again. Got some bird to wipe his arse for him.’ And I type ‘????’

  ‘No kiss?’ says Sarah. She’s moved so she’s looking over my shoulder.

  ‘I don’t put kisses. Not on texts to strangers.’

  ‘If you don’t put a kiss these days it looks rude. There’s been rampant endearment inflation in the last few years you know. You should probably put two. Or three.’

  Really? Sometimes I can’t tell if Sarah is messing with me. She just laughs and then Mary is in, telling us that our gorgeous daughter is ready for her story.

  Sarah and I take it in turns to read to Scarlett. It is the favourite time of day for both of us. Scarlett smelling deliciously of baby shampoo and talc, murmuring nonsense, her thumb snugly slotted into her mouth as though thumbs and mouths were designed to go together. Which maybe they were. Maybe thumb-sucking is a normal feature of human development which we, in our cruel and unnatural way, frown at and discourage. By ‘we’ I mean this cold, utilitarian world we live in, not we as in me and Sarah – because here in Nicky-and-Sarah World it is frowning that is frowned upon and discouragement that is discouraged.

  And even though she’s only three, even though she’s more or less mute, she has taste. Our Scarlett is proper old school when it comes to literature. Scarlett likes verse. It is rhyme and it is iambic, or it is nothing. So she’ll accept The Gruffalo naturally. She will sigh with appreciation at The Snail and The Whale too. But her favourites are darker hued than this. As long as there are pictures then she loves literary derring-do. Sabres gleaming. Cannons roaring. She loves flashes and bangs. Tennyson’s gallant 600 charging the Russian guns. The Highwayman with his dash and his finery. The section where the highwayman comes across the moor using the road that’s a ribbon of moonlit, tlot-tlot-tlotting on his horse. That, my friends, is our Scarlett’s very favouritest line out of the whole history of literature. Sometimes I have to repeat all the tlot-tlots several times.

  I like to think she doesn’t quite get all the sexual heat of the girl with her finger on the trigger – the landlord’s black-eyed daughter whose violent suicide warns her lover of the ambush of redcoats at the inn – but who knows? They grow up so fast these days.

  And I’m here to tell you there is an advantage to reading to children who can’t talk. There are no annoying questions to answer.

  In ‘The Highwayman’ our tragic heroine is undone because she has spurned the love of the ugly old ostler, but I’ve never had to explain what an ostler is or how exactly you ostle, never mind why the landlord’s black-eyed daughter is prepared to top herself for love of a car jacker – because that’s what the highwayman is, no matter how fancy the clothes.

  It’s usually me that does the old-school stuff. Tonight I think Sarah’s doing The Hungry Hen, a tragic morality piece where a fox watches and waits until the hen he’s had his eye on is fat enough for him to eat. Only he waits too long, and by the time he makes his move the hen is not only strong enough to fight him off, she’s big enough and ravenous enough to eat him up. In one gulp. A lesson in carping the bloody diem if ever there was one. Don’t wait while your enemies prepare, strike while they’re weak. Kick them when they’re down. Kicking your enemies when they’re down would seem to be the absolute optimum time to do it.

  Another fragment of exotic birdsong. I read the message: You should see how much better he’s doing here xx.

  I bet. And she’s right. I should see. England it is then. And then Everywhere. And then Anywhere, just as Russell planned.

  And I notice that Polly’s seen my one kiss and raised it another one. Maybe Sarah is right about the inflation in this area. So, while Sarah makes Scarlett giggle with her hen voices and her fox voices, I pop the question to Mary.

  ‘Ah, Mary. How do you fancy seeing my sceptred isle?’

  She looks at me, uncertainly, her innocent eyes looking troubled. She is perhaps wondering if I’ve made an indecent proposal.

  ‘Do you want to have a butcher’s at my other Eden, my demi-paradise? Take a wander around our precious stone set in a silver sea?’

  ‘I’m sorry, what?’

  ‘Do you fancy meeting up with that most happy breed of men?’ I can’t keep it up any longer. ‘Do you want to come to England with us?’

  ‘Get out of here! Russell, are you serious? England? Like the UK?’

  ‘All expenses paid plus per diems. A per diem is—’

  ‘I know what a per diem is.’ She grins metallically. Her pigtails shake from side to side. She gives me the full radiance of her buttermilk face. ‘Thing is, Russell, can Jesus come too?’

  I think about this. And oh, what the fuck, why not?

  ‘Of course.’

  I’ve never seen a person look so delighted and she practically hurls herself into my arms. I’m distracted, attempting to reply to Polly’s last text and she squeezes so hard that I lose my balance toppling back onto the sofa, she lands on top of me, perky all-American breasts in my face and we’re all tangled up, but sorting ourselves out, laughing, embarrassed, when Sarah comes back in. She arches an eyebrow.

  ‘Just told Mary the good news,’ I say.

  ‘And what good news is that?’

  ‘About us all going to England.’

  ‘Sarah, thank you like a million. It’s just so, so awesome. I’m totally beyond thrilled and Jee is going to so freak!’

  She calls him Jee? I wonder if the disciples did that to the original Jesus? Hey Jee, great work healing the old sick today. Hey Jee, the thing you did with that Lazarus guy, like totally awesome, man. Way to go.

  Sarah submits to a more restrained hug from Mary – little in the way of squeezing and certainly no toppling her over, falling onto her, tits right in Sarah’s face. None of that. But then mothers and childminders always have an uneasy relationship, don’t they?

  And, later, when Mary is safe back home with Jee, Sarah and I have a tense tête-à-tête.

  And I tell her what I think, which is that across the whole world everyone is living just slightly beyond their means – except us. Teachers, rock stars, yak herders, tea pickers, Apple assembly line operatives, High Court judges, policemen – everyone worrying. Everyone feeling that the last week before pay day lasts a whole lot longer than all the other weeks of the month put together. But not us. Not now.

  We’re not like the common herd. Our every step is feather-bedded, cushioned, smoothed and soothed. Or could be. Taking Jesus and Mary to England, putting them up, feeding them, clothing them, buying them tickets for the London Eye and We Will Rock You – how much is it going to cost really? We could buy them each a house and not notice. A nice house. A London house. A Hampstead house. Each.

  ‘It’s only money, love,’ I say. ‘And Scarlett’ll be pleased. And it was you that wanted to go back to England anyway. What’s the problem?’

  ‘It’s just too much, Nicky. Too complicated.’

  ‘They’re just employees, Sarah. Staff. All rich people have staff who look after their stuff. Nothing could be more ordinary or more normal than servants.’

  ‘I’m not sure those particular servants are all that normal.’

  ‘Oh look, it’s done now. I can’t uninvite them.’

  ‘No you can’t. I guess. But it worries me, Nicky. I’ve got a bad feeling about it.’ And then she gives me the real reason. The obvious one. The one I should have guessed at.

  ‘I was looking forward to being a proper mum again, Nicky. I was looking forward to it being
me who did the worrying about Scarlett.’

  And I get that. But it’ll be fine. I’m sure it’ll be fine.

  And it’ll be good to have Mary as back-up just in case Scarlett continues to favour the second best kind of love.

  I go and check on our baby. I do this from time to time, just go and look at her sleeping. Wondering at a life that comes from nowhere and changes everything you think and everything you do.

  Scarlett is not asleep, she’s doing something complicated with two of her Sindys. Sindys, not Barbies note. This is a deliberate choice on my part. Sindy is British and much more demure and well brought up than Barbie, who seems like a brash, oversexualised gold-digger if you ask me. The sort of girl who would marry a minor Rolling Stone. Even in her air-hostess uniform she looks like a hard-eyed little pole dancer. And don’t get me started on the Bratz. At least Sindy looks like she might have some GCSEs.

  Scarlett glances up, puts the dollies down and holds out her arms. I give her a hug and then sit on the edge of her bed telling her that she ought to be asleep now, which is a bit rich I know, seeing as I’ve come in completely heedless of whether she was asleep or not. But I had a sudden urge to see her little face which, if you’re a parent, you’ll completely get.

  I get up to go and Scarlett shakes her head. So I sit down and talk some more – just blether – and then I get up again. And she shakes her head again. And I sit down again and talk again. And on it goes. For about an hour. And when I do go, I leave her crying and Sarah goes in to comfort her, shooting me a frankly hostile look as she does so. And she’s in there another hour. Then it’s my turn again. And I’m about to phone Mary and fuck paying her the earth to come to England, I’ll pay her a million bucks just to come over from Protrero Hill, when Scarlett suddenly collapses into sleep.

  When I come back into the living room Sarah is watching women’s tennis from Dubai or somewhere. She is also stuck into the fifty-year-old Scotch. Not her first glass by the looks of things.

  ‘Job done,’ I say. ‘Finally.’

  ‘It was a job we never needed to start,’ she says, which is a fair point. I don’t say anything, just head for the fridge because I’ve noticed that it is protein shake o’clock.

  Then she says, ‘You know that Jesus totally wants to shag me.’

  Her eyes don’t leave the screen. The grunts and gasps of the players sound oddly sexual now she’s said that. What am I meant to say? I know I’m in a minefield here. She’s already pissed off about my disturbing Scarlett. She’s already pissed off about my asking Mary and Jesus to England. And she might be quite drunk. I’m not just in a minefield. I’m in a minefield while actually sitting on a ticking bomb wearing a suicide vest. Best go careful, but what can I say? And, of course, my nerves are also jangled from what we’ve gone through. I just wanted to watch my kid sleep for fuck’s sake.

  I say, ‘That’s nice, dear.’ And tense myself for the bomb going off. Drunk, Sarah can produce a fully authenticated Celtic temper to go with the hair. But this bomb is a dud and fails to explode. She just sighs. And on the telly some Swedish teen prodigy explodes instead, rocked by an orgasmic spasm as she achieves an impossible cross-court volley.

  And suddenly I find myself telling Sarah about being asked out by the jogger, Catherine. And I tell her about agreeing to go for coffee. And I tell her about phoning to cancel the date. And to all of this she says nothing. Which is not an especially good sign, though the game between the Swede and her Venezuelan opponent, a veteran of the tour at twenty-five, does seem to be a particularly prolonged and fascinating one – lots of deuces – so it might just be that.

  ‘Do you want to have sex with Jesus?’ I say eventually, a sentence that sounds wrong on so many levels.

  She waits until the point is over and the crowd cover themselves in whooping and applause and the commentator declares it to have been the rally of the tournament, possibly of the year.

  ‘Not really,’ she says.

  Not really is not no, is it? Not really sounds quite like yes.

  And we sit in silence while the plucky Swede is now comprehensively demolished by the savvy veteran, that cross-court volley proving to be the very pinnacle of her game, a golden age at sixteen that lasted a microsecond and yet is now the place to which all her memories will return. She’ll be watching holographic reruns of that shot over and over in her dotage, in whatever version of Sunny Bank lies awaiting her in her future.

  And now the Venezuelan destroys her as though that volley was a grotesque personal insult that must be avenged. Our Swede doesn’t win another point. Clearly, it is not a day for giant-killing. Not in the world of televised games anyway. In that world the giants can all sleep safe. And these are southern hemisphere giants too. Giants going places.

  And I wonder how I feel about Jesus’s designs on my almost-wife. Should I feel flattered? Should I feel enraged? Should I call the jogger and cancel my cancellation? Get my retaliation in first. It’s surely what Brazilian beach-volleyball players would do. What champion tennis pros would do. What life’s winners would do.

  I’m at a loss here; before the money we never used to have this spiteful sort of interlude. Not even in the angry, grieving, sighing weeks after Scarlett was born. What to do? Should I reclaim my place in my almost-wife’s heart by making furious love to her. Is that what I’m meant to do? I could try that. I’ll try that.

  I cough. ‘So, Missus. Fancy having a bit of a cuddle? Celebrate going back to dear old Blighty?’

  On the telly they’re doing post-match analysis. That cross-court volley varispeeded and from all sorts of angles. And the girl crying at the end, suddenly looking six not sixteen, while the cruel Venezuelan punches the air from the other side of the net.

  ‘Not really,’ says Sarah. Which is a relief in a way, because it does mean that not really can still mean no.

  At least it can sometimes.

  Thirty-two

  POLLY

  It is a cool September afternoon and, on Daniel’s orders, Polly is picking blackberries, so that he can make jam. It’s chilly now but it’s been a good summer generally and the bramble bushes along the lanes behind her house are groaning with fruit. It’s hard work getting it all, but she’s enjoying herself. She’s already filled three old carrier bags and now she’s on to her fourth and last. She’s also eaten loads. She wants to get a wriggle on though, because it definitely looks like it’s going to rain. She’s just got her fingertips to a particularly dense clump of berries hidden deep in the midst of the brambles when her phone goes.

  It takes her a while to answer, what with having to struggle out of the thorns, put her basket down, fumble with gloves and the zips on the pocket of her parka and the phone is never in the pocket you think it is, is it? And of course by the time she has located it and pressed the button, the music has stopped. She calls back though, and it’s the man himself.

  ‘Hello?’ Daniel sounds cagey, suspicious. He also sounds oddly echoey.

  ‘Daniel, it’s me, Polly.’

  ‘Oh hello, poppet. How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine. I’ve picked loads.’

  ‘Goodo. Loads of what?’

  ‘Blackberries – for jam.’

  ‘That’s a good idea. I used to make blackberry jam you know. Every year.’

  ‘I do know, Daniel. You said you were going to do it this year too. That’s why I’ve been out picking the sodding things.’

  ‘Well I will then. Yes, definitely. I’ll do that. Jam. Yes.’ There’s a pause.

  ‘Daniel. You know I’m returning your call, don’t you?’ Another pause.

  ‘Yes. Absolutely, of course.’ Another pause.

  ‘So, er, why did you call me?’

  A sigh. And a strange gurgle. Daniel trying to gulp a bit of brightness into his voice. She can hear him engage that gear.

  ‘Well I guess it might be because I seem to have got myself into a bit of a jam myself actually. Or a pickle maybe. Yes, perhaps more of a pickle than a j
am.’ And he laughs, but not convincingly.

  ‘Daniel, that’s lame even for you.’

  ‘Lame. Yes. And that’s the thing. I’ve, er, I’ve been having a bath. Good long soak, you know and now, well . . .’

  ‘Well, what Daniel?’

  ‘Well,’ a deep, deep sigh and then a rush. ‘Thing is, I’m lying here in the bathroom, legs akimbo, just a little bit awash in my own blood I’m afraid.’

  ‘Daniel!’

  ‘I was getting out of the bath, and I seem to have slipped, cracked my head on the sink maybe. A bit.’

  ‘Oh God. Where’s Mum?’

  ‘Out, I guess. Anyway I don’t actually seem to be able to get up. It’s lucky I left my trousers on the floor with my phone in the back pocket.’

  ‘You can’t get up?’

  ‘Head’s a bit bloody sore, you know. Hip’s a bit bloody sore too, but I think I’ll live. It’s just the old standing up thing that is proving problematic.’

  ‘You should call 999.’

  ‘Good heavens, no need for that. I’ll just get my breath back and have another go at this getting vertical malarky.’

  ‘Daniel, stay where you are. I’ll come straight back.’

  ‘Good girl. And, Susan?’

  ‘It’s Polly, Daniel. Polly.’

  ‘Of course. Absolutely, yes. But Polly, don’t call an ambulance or anything mad like that.’

  ‘OK, Daniel.’

  ‘I just think that once I’m in hospital I won’t be coming out.’

  ‘I said OK, Daniel. See you in a minute.’

  ‘Don’t forget the blackberries.’ She clicks off. Blow the blinking blackberries she thinks, and then finds she’s staring straight at a naked man.