by Anna Hope
This is the house that Hannah built.
Here is the table she found in a junk shop in an old railway arch and spent a weekend sanding herself.
Here is the framed photograph of the garden of the house in Cornwall where Nathan proposed, each blade of grass frosted, whole.
Here is the bookshelf along one wall, filled with poetry, with novels, with Nathan’s journals. (She, who grew up in a house with no books, can spend minutes standing in front of it, letting it speak back to her, the spines arranged by author, alphabetical: Adiche, Eliot, Forster, Woolf.)
Here is the rug they bought on a weekend in Marrakesh. The night shopping in the souks, the haggling and then the final capitulation and the exorbitant price to take it back on the plane. But it is beautiful, Beni Ouarain – from the Atlas mountains. A thick cream wool. It will bring you fortune, said the seller, tracing the diamond patterns with his fingers, and was it her imagination or did his glance flicker to her womb as she took out her credit card and paid?
Here is the sofa they bought from a warehouse in Chelsea, and chose for its low mid-century lines, its dark slate-blue linen. The sofa on which she sat, two weeks after the first round of IVF, holding her test – the jubilation of those two clear pink lines. The sofa on which she sat cocooned in blankets while Nathan cooked – soups and risottos for his pregnant wife.
Here, a little way down the hall, is the bathroom. The white bevelled tiles. The lotions in their plain brown glass jars. Here is the place where, three weeks after that test, she writhed in pain, where after a day of bleeding she passed a clot. The fibrous sac which held the baby that did not live. That she and Nathan did not know how to dispose of. That, in the end, they took to the park late at night, where they dug a hole and buried it deep in the ground.
But wait, here – come, walk this way, down the hall to a little room – open the door and stand within, watch how the light falls, softer here, more diffuse. This room waits, nothing in it but a quiet sense of expectation.
This is the house that Hannah built, three floors above London, floating in light.
The stew is cooked and bubbling on the stove. There is crusty bread and a bowl of aioli. A bottle of white stands glistening on the counter and two glasses wait beside it. Hannah takes parsley and chops it, adding lemon and salt. She hears the front door and then Nathan is behind her, his hand on her back. ‘Hey.’ She turns to him – a brief kiss on the mouth. ‘How’s the chapter going?’ When he has writing to finish, her husband takes himself off to the British Library. He says he likes it there on weekends, when the Reading Rooms are quieter; says he finds it easier to work there than at home.
‘Oh, you know. Getting there, slowly.’
She hands him a glass of wine which he takes gratefully, then ladles out stew, sprinkles parsley over the top, and hands Nathan his bowl. She takes her place at the table before her husband, aware of a slight sense of ceremony. It is Saturday; she is allowed to eat and drink what she likes. She sips the wine. It is clean and hard and bright and she could down it in one gulp, but she puts it back on the table beside her plate. Discipline. This is what she has always had, and this is what she has brought to bear on this situation. No caffeine. No alcohol. Apart from Saturday nights.
Nathan looks up at her, catches her watching, reaches his hand across the table and takes hers. ‘This is delicious.’
‘Thanks.’
‘How about you? Did you work today?’
‘A bit, this morning. And then it was too lovely, so I walked to the park.’
‘Hey,’ he says, ‘I meant to tell you, I saw Lissa.’
‘Lissa? Where?’
‘At the library. Yesterday.’
‘The library? What was she doing there?’
‘She said she wants to do some reading, for a PhD.’
‘That’s funny. I’d never have imagined that.’
‘Well. You know Lissa. She seemed a bit haphazard about it all.’
He reaches for the bottle. She watches as he pours himself another glass.
‘Nath?’ she says softly.
‘What?’
‘I thought … it’s daft really, but I had this thought, earlier in the week, when I started the injections. When I was there with the syringes … I wondered about doing some sort of … ritual.’ The word tastes strange. As she speaks, a fresh wave of sweat breaks on her forehead. She lifts her sleeve to dab it.
‘What sort of ritual?’ Nathan puts down his spoon, folds his hands in front of his chin. Rituals are what he teaches – they are his butter and his bread.
‘I don’t know.’ She can feel herself begin to flush, the heat rising again. ‘Something to mark it. I mean, if we did … If we did do something, how would we go about it, do you think? What could we do?’
‘Well,’ he smiles, ‘you know, a ritual can be anything. It doesn’t have to be serious, even. We can do something simple.’ He reaches over and catches her hand. ‘We could light a candle or …’ Then, when she doesn’t respond: ‘Or we could just do nothing. We could just wait and see.’
‘Yes,’ she says, embarrassed now, releasing her hand from his. ‘Yes. Let’s just wait and see.’
Lissa
‘Sweetheart.’ Sarah opens the door, and immediately begins walking back into the darkness of the hall. ‘Come in. Got something on the stove.’
Lissa follows her mother through the hall into the kitchen.
‘I’m making soup, though God knows why. It’s still so bloody hot. Want some?’ Sarah goes over to the range and lifts the lid off a pan, giving it a stir. Her mother’s long grey hair is twisted on top of her head, held in place by two Japanese combs. She is wearing her work apron, ancient and brown and covered in paint.
‘Love some,’ says Lissa. She never refuses a meal at Sarah’s – her mother is a fantastic cook.
‘Ten minutes,’ says Sarah, putting the lid back on the pan. ‘And I’ll do a bit of salad to go with it.’
Lissa lifts the cat from one of the dining chairs and sits. The mess is, if anything, messier than usual: drifts of letters on the table, some opened, some not. Her mother’s periodicals: the New Statesman, old editions of the Guardian Review; missives from charities: Greenpeace, Freedom from Torture. One official-looking envelope is unopened and being used to make a list, Sarah’s elegant hand spidering across the paper.
Judy??
Cortisol? Ask Dr L.
Ruby – pills.
‘What’s wrong with Ruby?’ Lissa looks up.
‘Something with her tummy. Poor thing’s been puking and shitting for days. That vet. You wait years for an appointment, you really do.’
‘How’s your hand?’
‘Oh. You know.’ Sarah flexes her fingers. ‘OK.’
‘This one looks important.’ Lissa lifts a letter and waves it at her mother.
Sarah turns back to the stove, dismissing her daughter with an airy hand. ‘Not really. You can tell by the envelope.’
‘Really?’
‘It’s a charity asking for more money. Or someone wanting me to take out a credit card.’ Sarah plucks tobacco from the pocket of her apron and rolls herself a cigarette. ‘Cig?’
‘Sure.’
Lissa takes the proffered packet, enjoying the sweetness of the sugared paper on her tongue as she rolls – always the same brand, always the same liquorice Rizla papers, her mother’s fingertips, for as long as she can remember, orange-stained, her breath murky and low. Her mother is making work again, that much is clear; the apron, the mess, and a distant edge of manic energy to her, as though there is a gathering somewhere nearby, a better conversation happening in an adjacent room. Lissa knows enough not to ask, though, not this early in the game. Whatever Sarah is working on, it is new.
‘Cumin.’ Her mother is rattling in the cupboards. ‘Needs cumin. Course it does. Bugger.’
Lissa tosses the envelope back on to the pile where it triggers a minor landslide across the table, only stopped in its tracks by the fruit bo
wl. If her mother isn’t going to worry about unpaid bills, she isn’t going to do it for her.
‘Sweet paprika?’ Sarah turns, herbs in hand.
‘Whatever you think, Ma.’
‘I think it’ll have to do. It’s just – cumin seeds. I’m never without them. It’s odd.’
‘Can I do anything?’
‘I’m going to do something salady. You can chop if you like. Wait a bit, though. Here.’ Her mother chucks a greasy box of Cook’s Matches over to her, Lissa catches them and wanders over to the door, which is propped open to the late summer air.
The garden is the nicest thing about this place. Her mother is a fine gardener, and what feels like chaos inside the house makes sense when you step outside – her mother’s sensibilities; everything poised just on the edge of wild. Lissa strikes a match and smokes. ‘I got the part,’ she says softly, to the lavender and the honeysuckle.
‘Sorry, darling?’ her mother calls from inside. ‘What did you say?’
‘That part.’ She blows out smoke in a thin line, turns back to the kitchen. ‘The one I told you about?’
‘Tell me again.’ Her mother’s face is in shadow.
‘Chekhov. Yelena.’
‘Oh, wonderful. That’s wonderful.’ Her mother comes to embrace her and Lissa inhales her smell of paint and herbs, the dry crackle of her hair.
Lissa laughs, feeling again the bubble of excitement she has been carrying in her stomach since she heard the news. ‘Thanks. It is. The director – she’s a woman. She’s good, I think. Tricky, they say, but good.’
‘But how wonderful. We must celebrate!’
Before she can object, her mother is rooting in the cupboard where she keeps the booze. ‘Hmm. White wine. Lidl Pouilly-Fuissé. Supposed to be OK. Not cold, though. Or there’s a bit of Gordon’s – what about a G and T? Hang on. Not sure I’ve got any ice. I can chip a bit off the roof of the freezer. Shall we start with that? See how we go?’
‘Sure.’
‘Chuck me a lemon then.’
Her mother hums as she pours out large measures of gin and splashes a bit of tonic on the top. ‘Bit flat but it’ll have to do. Here.’ Sarah hands her the glass with a flourish. ‘Come and sit in the garden. The salad can wait.’
Sarah leads the way down a crooked stone path, through lavender bushes, past tomatoes and squash and herbs to where a small weather-aged table and chairs stand beneath a wooden trellis.
‘You’ve gone out, darling.’ Her mother leans forward and re-lights Lissa’s cigarette. ‘Cheers. Goodness. Here’s to you.’ She raises her glass. ‘Here’s to Chekhov. So Yelena – that’s …’
‘Vanya.’
‘Vanya. Marvellous. Hang on, remind me, is that the one with the gun?’ Her mother picks a stray strand of tobacco from her lip.
Sarah taught English before she retired. English and Art at the local comp; a good North London school, the sort that middle-class parents fought with their elbows out to get their kids into.
‘That’s The Seagull.’
‘Ah yes. The Seagull. The one with the failing young actress. So – Vanya?’
‘He’s the failed … well, he’s just failed. Failed at life. They’re all failing, aren’t they? It’s Chekhov.’
‘And you’re the wife of the …’
‘Failed academic. Serebryakov.’
‘That’s right. Oh gosh, yes – I think I saw Glenda do it, back in the day.’
Glenda Jackson is her mother’s touchstone for all things good and wholesome about the acting profession.
‘Or no – wait, it was that gorgeous one – Greta something or other.’
‘Scacchi?’
‘That’s it. She was wonderful. So will you be.’ Sarah leans forward and grips Lissa’s wrist. ‘Goodness, well done, darling. A proper part. About time too. You should tell Laurie. She’ll be thrilled.’
Laurie, her mother’s oldest friend, who taught drama at Sarah’s school, who gave up her time to coach Lissa to get her into drama school all those years ago.
‘You tell her,’ says Lissa.
‘I will.’ Her mother sits back and regards her through the smoke. Sarah’s gaze. Nothing escapes it. How many hours has she suffered it? She used to model for her mother as a child – hours and hours for years and years of sitting in that battered old chair in the attic. Until one day she refused to do it any more.
‘I must say,’ says Sarah, ‘it’s wonderful you can pass for … whatever it is she’s supposed to be. I mean, they’re never more than thirty, are they, these women in these plays? Unless they’re fifty. Or the maids. They shuffle on and off a bit, don’t they, the maids?’ She waves her cigarette in the air. ‘Light a samovar or two.’
‘Yes,’ Lissa says, though to what she is saying yes she isn’t quite sure. All of it, she supposes. Yes, it’s wonderful she can pass for thirty. Yes, there’s bugger all between thirty and fifty, not just in Chekhov, but in everything else. Perhaps in life. Perhaps this is it – Womanhood. The Wasteland Years.
‘Gosh.’ Her mother takes a healthy swig. ‘This is fun, isn’t it? Haven’t drunk in the day for aeons. So who’s the director then?’
‘She’s Polish. Klara.’
‘I can’t believe you didn’t say anything.’
‘I’ve stopped. I mean, it’s hardly worth it, is it, any more?’ She picks at a stray piece of skin on her thumb with her opposite nail.
‘Oh no, don’t say that. You must let me know, when things come up. I can wear my lucky earrings.’
‘Yeah, well. I’m not sure they’ve been that helpful. In the grand scheme of things.’
‘They helped when you got that telly part. And when you were ill.’ Her mother points the cigarette reprovingly in Lissa’s direction.
The sun rounds the corner of the wall and falls on to the grass beside them. Lissa angles her face towards it. The cat winds itself, mewling, against her mother’s calves.
‘So when do you start?’
‘Week on Monday.’
‘So soon? And how long do you have?’
‘Four weeks.’
‘That’s decent then. And are they paying you well?’
‘Not really. Enough.’
‘Good,’ says Sarah, putting her cigarette out in the nearest plant pot. ‘Good.’ She claps her hands together. ‘Right. Hungry?’
‘I’ll help.’ Lissa goes to stand, but her mother waves her away.
‘You sit. Enjoy the sun. It’s just coming round the house. Lovely this time of day.’
So she sits while her mother clatters in the kitchen. Sarah is singing snatches of opera. In the sky above, contrails purl and lace against the blue. It is hot. Lissa looks up at the house; three storeys of Victorian brick. She can see the window of the room that used to be her bedroom. The attic skylight. Her mother bought the house with the settlement from Lissa’s father, thirty years ago now. She has never spent any money on it, never had any money to spend, only a teacher’s salary, enough for good food, for paints and materials, a holiday now and then. If she sold this house, her mother would be rich.
‘Salad’s coming.’ Sarah brings two steaming bowls to the table, heads back up the path and returns with a large wooden bowl. Bitter red leaves mixed in amongst the green, walnuts and goat’s cheese crumbled on the top. There is olive oil in a separate bowl, with a pool of balsamic at the bottom. Good, chewy bread with salty butter. They eat for a while in silence, the sounds of the neighbourhood around them: kids in paddling pools, barbecues, people laughing, the dusty, easy end of the holidays; summer in the body, sun on the skin.
‘And how’s everything else?’ says her mother when she has finished, pushing away her bowl, rolling and lighting up again. ‘How’s Hannah? How’s Cate?’
‘Cate’s in Kent. I’m not sure, really. I haven’t spoken to her for a while.’
‘Why?’
‘Oh, you know. It happens like that sometimes.’
‘Like what?’ Sarah’s gaze is hawk-like.
Lissa shrugs. ‘We’ve sort of lost touch.’
‘You must keep hold of your friendships, Lissa. The women. They’re the only thing that will save you in the end.’
‘I’ll remember that.’
‘Do,’ says Sarah. She regards Lissa through the smoke. ‘I always admired Cate.’
‘I know.’
‘She has principles.’
‘Really?’ says Lissa. ‘I suppose she does.’
‘And Hannah?’ Sarah says.
‘Hannah’s OK. I saw her the other night.’
‘Is she still …?’
‘She’s doing another round of IVF, yes.’ Lissa presses a hunk of bread into the bottom of her bowl.
Her mother tuts. ‘Poor Hannah.’
‘Yes,’ says Lissa.
‘That poor woman,’ Sarah says again.
‘Hannah’s not poor.’
‘It’s a figure of speech.’
‘I know,’ says Lissa, ‘but it’s an inaccurate one. She’s pretty successful. She and Nathan. They’ve done pretty well.’
Her mother puts down her spoon. ‘Goodness. You’re testy suddenly, Melissa.’
‘I’m not testy, I’m just – you might as well be accurate, if you’re going to pass comment.’
‘I say poor Hannah, because I know she’s been trying to have a baby for years. Trying and failing to have a baby. And I can’t think of anything worse.’
‘Really? What about trying and failing to have a career?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Nothing.’
‘No, really.’ Her mother’s eyes are sharp now; she has caught the scent of something. ‘What do you mean? Do you mean yourself? Is that how you feel, darling?’
‘Yes. No. Actually, no. Forget it. Let’s just forget it. Please. This is nice. Let’s not spoil it.’
