by Alex Marwood
The others? I don’t know.
What I will do to keep you safe, baby. You must be the size of a kitten now. I wonder if you felt it all, buried as you are in the cushioning of my internal organs? You must at least have felt the adrenaline, must have jarred and bounced as he dragged me, dropped me.
You must trust me to keep you safe. I will do anything to keep you safe.
* * *
* * *
A road, another roundabout, another bridge. Two a.m. and I doubt I’ve gone more than two miles. I slide down the bank, jog across the tarmac with my head bent down, scramble up the other side, and in the adjustment from streetlight to moonlight through shadow I put my foot on something that rolls, wrench my ankle and hit my bad leg on something hard as I go down, and a supernova explodes inside my head. Something hard and sharp has stabbed straight into my scar, and the pain is so intense I can do nothing more than whimper. God, don’t let it have broken open. I roll onto my side and curl up in the foetal position.
I will not survive if I am this weak. We will die if I am this weak.
I breathe. In through the nose, out through the mouth, the way Vita taught us. And eventually I can open my eyes, and see that I’ve hit my leg on an old water tank, dumped among the stinging nettles. Hard edges, but not sharp, thank God. I lift my hands from where they’re clutching my thigh. The blue of my leggings is still uniform. A streak of mud on the grey marl of my hoodie sleeve. But no blood. No more blood, I mean.
I sit up. I hurt so much. Grazes and bruises, and now this. I think I’m still on the eastern outskirts of Slough. I will never make it to Hounslow before day. If I’m not careful, I won’t make it at all.
* * *
* * *
My walk lasts well into daylight. As we get closer to London the traffic builds and the motorway splits and splits again and I’m forced off it for fear of getting mown down, forced to use footbridges hundreds of hobbling yards up the subsidiary roads. My ankle throbs and my thigh throbs, and every piece of me is pain, and a blister in my other boot sings out a sharp note in my brain.
Fields give way to the remains of villages, built up, filled in, unloved and shuttered, their street plans a blow to my fantasy of walking straight home. Judging from the map on my new phone, staying to the left of the airport is pretty much all I can hope for. A plane passes over while it’s still dark, cruising in to land. Then another, then another, and then the villages join up into one long sprawl of roads and mean concrete houses and frustrating cul-de-sacs, and the lights start to come on, upstairs at first and then on the ground, at kitchen level. People start to emerge onto their weedy concrete parking spaces and notice me. Their eyes look up and see my face, and look hurriedly away.
They think I’m a Homeless, like the man outside Iceland.
I tighten the cord on my hoodie to cover as much of my face as I can, and concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. My blister is bleeding now, and that’s something of a relief, for at least it lends a slickness to the lining of the boot. But with each step I’m getting weaker – my thigh jars with every step and my ankle is screaming and I have to grind my teeth to hold in my keening.
I get to Bath Road at half-past nine, and I start to weep with relief as I pass the little café and smell the bacon, the coffee. We can lie down soon, baby. Lie down and take the pain away.
And then I see my mother sitting on my doorstep, and for a moment my heart leaps. And then I realise that it’s my aunt, and my hopes implode.
29 | Sarah
Pregnant. That’s something she hadn’t been expecting. But the pregnant young woman limping towards her in a stained hoodie is definitely her niece. She can tell from the way her pace breaks when she sees her sitting on the doorstep, and then from the way her hair falls over her face as she resumes her approach like a charging billy-goat. Alison used to do that. You’d see her coming down the street head-down and eyes glaring out beneath her fringe, and you knew not to get into a disagreement with her. It’s only now Sarah sees her that she remembers, and realises how much of it was just teenage bluster. She doesn’t see much other physical resemblance, but she recognises her as Alison’s daughter from that alone. She gets to her feet and waits.
She’s little. Four or five inches shorter than Eden, and light-boned, with a swirl of thick, shiny black hair. She’s chopped it off at chin level and hacked a rough fringe into the front, and it looks spectacular. As she gets closer, Sarah sees that she has the most beautiful almond-shaped jade eyes. And that her face is covered in livid bruises.
Sarah wants to turn tail and run. This isn’t what she’d envisaged at all. But the girl knows who she is – she clearly knows who she is – and it’s too late now. I shall be British about it, she resolves, and pretend I haven’t noticed a thing.
Romy stops six feet away and stares at her challengingly. Her skin has an unnerving yellow tinge. Jaundiced yellow, or at least, she judges from the sheen on her forehead, the bleaching of illness. The bruising must be more extensive than just on her face, if it’s causing her to turn yellow.
‘You know who I am?’ asks Sarah.
Romy nods curtly. ‘You’re my aunt. You look like my mother.’
She’s surprised. She has never thought of herself as looking like Alison before. But twenty years will change anybody. ‘Yes. Sarah. Sarah Byrne.’
She offers her a hand. The girl looks down at it with something like surprise, as though the gesture is unfamiliar. Then she slots her palm against Sarah’s and gives it a sharp shake. The hand is a bit damp, and there are brownish stains further up her wrist where her sleeve has slid up. Sarah wipes her own surreptitiously on the back of her coat when she lets go. She has a little bottle of anti-viral gel in her handbag; she’ll rub some on when her niece turns her back.
‘Romy,’ she replies. ‘Romy Blake.’ She fishes some keys from her pocket and eyes Sarah uncertainly. ‘Do you want to come in?’
‘If that’s okay.’
Romy shrugs, as though she doesn’t care much either way. Then she opens the door on to a dingy staircase covered in green lino and limps ahead without looking back.
* * *
* * *
The flat is grim. Low ceiling, windows covered in condensation, sad old broken-down furniture. It’s a little-old-lady flat. Probably died in situ or got carted off to a twilight home. Sarah bets there are hand rails in the bathroom. A little row of kitchen cupboards in olive-green formica. Miserable blue and yellow curtains that end a good inch from the windowsill, half-closed. Romy goes over and throws them open.
‘I need to pee,’ she says, and leaves the room abruptly. Sarah stays where she is, unsure whether her invitation extends to sitting down. A scratched little coffee table, one of those oval ones from the 1950s with the three spindly legs. Flowered wallpaper gone grey with age, a patch of damp high in one corner, a blackened Axminster carpet. It’s hot, from the launderette downstairs, and yet feels strangely, unwelcomingly cold.
How awful, she thinks, to be having a baby here. And then she thinks of Alison, caring for this very girl as a baby in a caravan in the middle of winter, and feels unspeakably guilty again.
She’s gone a long time, for someone who’s having a pee. Sarah hears the sound of water running in the bathroom, a door opening and closing in the corridor. She feels awkward, doesn’t want to touch anything in case doing so violates her welcome. Eventually she wanders over to the window and looks out at the street. Run-down, respectable west London, two tube stations conveniently close by. She could have fetched up in worse places.
Then a plane thunders past so close to the roof that she ducks and covers her head. Maybe not. It must be torture, living here.
The door closes in the passage again, and her niece comes back, with clean hands, and in clean clothes – leggings and a black jersey mini-dress with one of those flippy hems. Thoughtlessly stylish. But her fa
ce is a sight and she’s still limping on her bare feet.
‘Would you like to sit down?’ she asks.
‘Yes,’ says Sarah, ‘thank you,’ and lowers herself gingerly onto the sofa. It’s not dirty, at least. The girl clearly knows how to clean, like her siblings. But it’s a joyless place. She’s tried to cheer it up with a scattering of bric-a-brac on the mantel over the old gas fire, but otherwise there’s very little evidence that she lives here at all.
Romy, still standing, considers some more. ‘Tea,’ she says. ‘I have tea. Would you like some? I have milk too.’
‘That would be lovely,’ says Sarah. She watches as Romy fills the kettle and puts it on to boil, then gets a single plain white mug down from a cupboard, opens a box of PG tips and takes out a bag. ‘Aren’t you having any?’
‘No,’ says Romy. ‘I don’t drink it.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be a bother.’
The girl’s eyes narrow. She’s trying to work something out. ‘Oh, right,’ she says. ‘You’re not just meant to give it to people, you’re meant to have some yourself?’
‘Yes, that’s sort of normal,’ says Sarah, and now she sees the children in her. Half-feral and trying to work out the mystery rules – only Romy is having to do it all alone, with no one to help. ‘It’s like a custom. To share a drink, or some food.’
‘Oh, the breaking of bread,’ says Romy, and turns back to the cupboard. When she reaches for a second mug, Sarah notices that her hand is trembling.
‘Are you okay, Romy?’ she asks.
‘Yes,’ says Romy. ‘Bad night, that’s all.’
‘Can I ask what happened?’
‘I got – what’s the word? Mugged. I went into London a couple of days ago and I got mugged.’
‘My God. Jesus, are you okay?’
The girl shrugs. ‘I will be.’
‘Where did it happen?’
She gulps, as though she hadn’t been prepared to be questioned so closely. ‘I’m not sure. I went to King’s Cross, just to see. It was somewhere near there.’
‘I’d thought it had got better up there, with the regeneration! What did they get?’
‘Not much. Some money. They seemed to be angry because I didn’t have anything else.’
‘Not your phone?’
She shakes her head.
‘Did you call the police?’
A what’s-the-point face. Just like Ilo’s when she offered to get the amulet back. God, Sarah, she’s living in a different England from you. The England you see on the news, not the one most of us live in. It’s weird, in a place like Finbrough, how easy it is to forget that for other people robbery and stabbing and damp walls is just another day at the coalface. Actually real, not drama designed to make the comfortable feel happy with their lot.
That face looks nasty, as though someone has punched her full in it.
‘I know you probably get a lot of opinions,’ she says, hesitantly, ‘what with the baby and all. I know everyone has unsolicited advice to offer when you’re pregnant ...’
‘How do you know that?’ She doesn’t turn, just stares at the empty mugs. ‘Have you been pregnant?’
Crikey. Defensive or what? ‘I – no, I haven’t,’ she says.
Liam has two children now. Probably thinks that the little girlfriend’s fecundity is just more proof of her own emotional coldness.
‘Best keep yours to yourself, then,’ Romy says, and Sarah shrinks into the couch.
The kettle boils. Romy pours water into the mugs and stirs vigorously. ‘Do you have sugar in it?’ she asks. ‘I know some people drink tea with sugar.’
‘Sure,’ says Sarah. ‘One, if that’s okay?’
Romy opens a drawer and produces a sachet of sugar from a café. Rips it open and dumps the full contents into one of the mugs, then adds the best part of a quarter-pint of milk to each. Brings them over. ‘Do you need something to eat? I have apples.’
Sarah suppresses a smile. ‘No.’ She sips gingerly from her lukewarm milky drink and fights to hold back a grimace. ‘This is lovely, thanks.’
‘Okay,’ says Romy, and lowers herself slowly down beside her. Something’s hurting, thinks Sarah. She’s off balance because of the baby, but it’s more than that. She’s moving like an eighty-year-old.
She sees Sarah notice, shakes her head. ‘It’s not as bad as it looks,’ she says, and winces as she leans forward to pick up her tea. Turns to face her. ‘So why are you here?’
‘I’m sorry,’ says Sarah. ‘I would have given you some warning if I could. But I only had your address and I didn’t know how else to contact you.’
Romy nods. ‘Do you know where my brother and sister are?’
‘Yes. They’re with me. That’s why I wanted to find you.’
She blinks.
‘Oh, no, I’m sorry.’ The words rush out. ‘I mean, that’s not the only reason I’m here. But I didn’t know. About what happened. Not till a couple of months ago. I didn’t know you were there.’
Romy looks away. ‘Never mind,’ she says, and sips her tea. Pulls a face and puts it back down on the table.
‘Well, I’m sorry anyway,’ says Sarah. ‘You’ve had a lot to deal with all alone and I should have thought of that. And, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry I never tried to find you before. You and your mum. I know I was a kid when you were born, but I’ve been an adult a long time now.’
Another blink. Her big eyes are such a vivid green and the lashes so thick and dark that she looks for a moment like one of those animatronic dolls that sad men buy for pleasure.
‘Yes, well. I had a family.’
Had.
‘I’m so sorry,’ says Sarah. ‘About your mum. About your ... friends.’
‘Family,’ she corrects, with an edge of defiance. That eye looks really painful. It’s swollen half-closed. If that’s two days old, she must have been close to death. She’s really ill, thinks Sarah. They’re made of tough stuff, my sister’s children, but I don’t think I’ve come at a good time. Or maybe I have. I should think she could do with some support, however prickly she is.
Romy coughs. ‘So tell me about Eden and Ilo,’ she says.
‘They’re fine. Well, as fine as you could expect – I don’t know. I have no idea what you would be expecting. I’m sorry. I’m making a hash of this.’
‘Yes, well.’ She coughs again. She really doesn’t look well. ‘I don’t suppose this is a commonplace experience for either of us.’
Sarah smiles. ‘No,’ she says. ‘I’m glad you understand.’
A superstorm of suppressed emotions passes across her niece’s face. Then she pulls herself together and goes blank again. ‘I’m not sure how much there is to understand. It is what it is. Thank you for taking them in. Where do you live?’
‘Finbrough,’ she tells her. ‘It’s a little town a bit of the way up the—’
‘I know where Finbrough is,’ she snaps. ‘Are you telling me you’ve been there all along?’
‘I – well, I left for a bit, when I was married. I lived in Reading, but – oh, you mean with the children. Yes. Well, not all along. But once Social Services released them to me, yes. Have you been looking?’
She looks miserable, as though she’s being crushed by an unseen hand from above. ‘Yes.’
‘Presumably you tried the church?’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘But I couldn’t get through. There’s a website, and I called the number there, but nobody answered.’
‘I’m sorry. It’s been closed for a couple of years, since your grandfather died.’
‘So I gathered. About the church. I didn’t know he was dead though.’
‘And you didn’t know where the house was? Your mother didn’t tell you?’
‘Well she told me about it,’ says Romy. ‘But she didn’
t exactly give me an address and directions, no.’
‘No. I suppose she wouldn’t.’ She thinks of those letters and feels a surge of rage. ‘I don’t suppose Alison wanted you to have anything to do with them.’
‘Somer,’ Romy corrects.
She checks herself. ‘Yes, I’m sorry. I’ve just been thinking of her as Alison all these years, and it’s hard for me to shift. Bear with me.’
Another of those thunderous looks.
‘Anyway,’ she continues, trying to act as though she hasn’t noticed, ‘they’re well. But they miss you.’
The look goes from thunderous to thunderstruck. ‘They said that?’
‘In so many words. They talk about you.’
A flicker of the eyebrow. God, these people are so hard to read. Blank walls with hairline cracks in the plaster. ‘And I think,’ she continues, ‘that I might need your help.’
‘My help?’
‘Yes. If you ... I know I have no right to ask you for anything ...’
‘No, you’re right. But I’m listening.’ She puts her hand on the sofa arm and bends backwards, as though she’s trying to clunk something out in her spine.
‘I ... look, I’m glad to meet you, and honestly, if there’s anything I can do ... but I need your help. You’re the only person who ... well, you know. Knows. Knows them. Knows what they’ve been through. Knows about the way they grew up ...’
‘And me,’ says Romy. ‘It was the way I grew up, too.’
‘Yes. I get that. That’s why I thought maybe you ... I just ... they’re having trouble fitting in. I can see it. And I wondered if maybe you ...’
‘You think I know?’
She’s brought up short. ‘I ... gosh. I don’t know. I’m sorry if that was offensive.’
She shakes her head. ‘Not offensive. Just a bit stupid.’
‘You’re older,’ she says. ‘When they’re not at school they’re at home all the time, with no friends. I mean, I only moved back to Finbrough quite recently—’ she’s embarrassed to admit that it’s been three years and she’s still a virtual recluse ‘—so I’ve not really got much of a circle myself, and anyway, people my age, you know, they’re mostly just starting out having babies. It’s rare for someone my age to have a fifteen-year-old ... and I don’t see how they’re ever going to learn to fit in like that. And they need to fit in. They’re out in the real world now and they need to learn how to negotiate it.’
