In the Falling Snow

by Caryl Phillips

  ‘Well, he’s not that for sure.’

  ‘Look, we got through it, didn’t we? And he didn’t say no to your spending the weekends and school holidays here, did he?’ He looked at the space between his feet and didn’t answer. ‘Oh come on, don’t give me the face. As far as I know, he’s still doing the same boring janitor’s job, and no doubt drinking with his mates. But look at you. You’ve made it to university, and you’ve got a lovely girlfriend, and the whole world is in front of you. Be kind to him, love. What’s to lose?’

  Annabelle put the tray down and began to pour the tea. Then she realised that she had forgotten the sugar, but Brenda waved a dismissive hand and said that she’d probably run out so not to bother.

  ‘Sugar’s bad for you anyhow. Ruin your teeth and rot your stomach, or so they say.’

  Annabelle finished pouring the tea, and then she handed Brenda her cup before sitting back down next to her boyfriend. He watched Brenda closely and could see that the suddenly aged woman was merely wetting her lips before slowly setting the cup back down on the saucer with a nervous clatter. Her hands were shaking and the loose-fitting housecoat could not disguise the fact that she had lost a shocking amount of weight. She asked Annabelle where she was from, and questioned her about her parents, and Annabelle answered politely and told Brenda more than she had ever told him. For the first time, he learned that her father was a keen golfer who had actually won some amateur tournaments, and that her mother had never worked for a living but apparently had earned a degree in French and Spanish from Durham University. As he listened to the pair of them, he realised that it was difficult for him to gauge the degree to which Brenda was genuinely interested in his girlfriend’s history, for he had never before introduced anyone to Brenda. The one relationship he had at school had never been serious enough for either one of them to risk family introductions. However, Brenda was not one to indulge in any pretence, and she seemed to be listening intently to Annabelle and so, as far as he could tell, she really did like his girlfriend. Annabelle edged forward and began to pour some more tea, but Brenda shook her head and covered the top of her cup with her newly frail hand.

  ‘No thanks, darling. However, I was wondering if you’d be a love and help me up to the bathroom. All a bit of a struggle for me these days.’

  He listened closely as the two of them made their slow way up the stairs, and then he heard the sound of the bathroom door closing. He looked around the room and noticed a child’s potty behind Brenda’s chair and his heart sank. Although she was only thirty-nine, her health was worse than he had imagined, but after a year at university he was simply relieved to be returning to a home which held only good memories for him. He was just six when his grieving stepfather took him by the hand and led him to a house where he was deposited with the man who was his real father. At this time his father and Brenda were living in a small back-to-back whose door opened directly on to a cobbled street. He remembers that people hung their washing out like bunting on lines that crossed the roadway, but they propped the laundry high so that if a car went by it wouldn’t dirty the clothes. But very few cars went by, for this cobbled street was effectively a cul-de-sac as three iron bollards had been installed at the far end to prevent any through traffic. For two years, the three of them lived in this rented house, but there always seemed to be arguments between his father and Brenda which sometimes grew so loud that Brenda was forced to turn on the radio or television set in an attempt to drown out his father’s raised voice. The problems invariably occurred at night, when his father had returned from his job as a cleaner, and their heated disputes frequently concluded with his father curled up in a corner and steadfastly refusing to listen to the pleadings of Brenda, or his son’s childish entreaties that he should put aside his book and acknowledge their presence. Eventually, he learned to leave his father alone once he picked up a book, but when his father gave up on books and began to conclude arguments with Brenda by stripping off his shirt and shouting at nobody in particular, even the eight-year-old son realised that something was seriously wrong.

  He remembers that it was a Monday. He came home from school an hour later than usual, for he had to stay behind for football practice. As he turned the corner at the end of the street, he saw Brenda on the doorstep talking with a small congregation of neighbours. They looked up and noticed him and, still in his football boots, he began to show off and he started happily to slip and slide from one smooth stone to the next. However, by the time he reached Brenda the neighbours had disappeared, and Brenda draped an arm around his narrow shoulders and ushered him inside. She didn’t waste time. ‘Listen love, your dad won’t be coming back for a while. He’s in hospital.’ He felt momentarily ashamed for he had almost forgotten the confusion of the previous night when the police had come and taken his father away.

  ‘Are we going to visit?’

  Brenda ran her hand across the top of his head and assured him that they would visit. ‘Maybe over the weekend.’ However, when Saturday came she dressed him neatly in his school clothes, and combed his hair in silence, and he had a feeling that this wasn’t an ordinary hospital that they would be visiting.

  The pair of them were finally escorted into the sterile visiting room, but his father didn’t recognise either of them, or if he did he pretended not to. His father sat stiffly in a chair by the window and stared out into the garden. He remembered that the man looked old, and that while his hair was still black he seemed to be growing a grey beard. He tried to see what he was looking at, but apart from a line of tall trees in the background that blocked the view, and an empty lawn in the foreground, there was nothing. Nobody playing or relaxing, no birds or animals, and he didn’t understand what the man was staring at. He and Brenda stood together, and she talked enthusiastically to his father, and asked him how he was, and if he needed anything, while the male nurse who had escorted them hovered impatiently by the door and began to tap his foot against the linoleum floor. After a few minutes, he felt the tears beginning to well up and he started to cry, although he was careful not to make a sound. Brenda pulled him closer to her side and looked down. ‘Okay, honey, don’t worry we’ll go now.’ His nose had started to run, and he didn’t have a handkerchief, but he didn’t want to wipe his nose on the sleeve of his school blazer. Brenda reached into her handbag and pulled out a small packet of tissues which she pushed into his hand. When they reached home he told her that he didn’t want to visit again, for this silent man didn’t know who he was. Brenda listened sympathetically, and tried hard to persuade him to accompany her on the Saturday excursion, but once they were settled in the new house eventually she too stopped visiting, which made him feel better about everything.

  The man who knocked on their door on his thirteenth birthday was a stranger to him. He enjoyed living with Brenda, even though his friends at school thought it a bit odd, but he soon accustomed himself to telling everybody that his parents had gone back to the West Indies. According to his story, they wanted him to stay in England and get an education and so they had decided to leave him with a close family friend. Unfortunately, the sudden appearance of the cold-looking man standing at the door, who silently handed him a thirteenth birthday card in an envelope, and then a watch in a long, thin, transparent box, suddenly complicated his life. Brenda shouted through from the living room and asked who was at the door, but he just stared at the stranger and neither one of them said a word. ‘Well?’ shouted Brenda. He heard her walking towards him, and he turned as she stepped into the hallway. She had a half-washed saucepan in her hands.

  ‘Earl?’ The man said nothing in reply. ‘Bloody hell, why didn’t you tell me they were letting you out?’

  ‘I have to report to you?’

  He looked at Brenda, then back at this man who was his father, and he realised that even after all these years there was still animosity between them.

  ‘Look, do you want to come in?’

  ‘I just want to wish my son a happy birthday and let
him know that I want him living with me.’

  ‘Well, I’m not sure that this is the best time to be talking about all of this.’

  ‘And who are you to talk to me about my own son?’

  Brenda sighed and gathered herself. ‘Earl, I am the woman who has clothed and fed Keith for the past five years.’

  ‘Well, if you didn’t lock me up then I’d have done my duty by him. I don’t have no desire to come into your place, but I’ll soon be back for my son.’

  He watched as his father turned and strode down the short path to the pedestrian walkway before disappearing in the direction of the bus stop. He looked up at the sky, where the clouds were high and heavy with snow, and followed a flight of birds which dropped and fell, one after the other, as their leader banked and led them in the direction of a warmer climate for the winter. The birthday card and watch felt clammy in his hands. After what seemed like an age, Brenda slowly closed the door.

  Annabelle came downstairs so quietly that he didn’t hear her. She startled him as she opened the living room door, and he rubbed his eyes and realised that he must have drifted off. She flopped down on to the sofa next to him and hooked one leg over both of his knees.

  ‘She’s gone to sleep, poor woman. She’s exhausted. Does she have any friends or family that can come over and maybe just keep her company? Besides you, that is.’

  ‘Well I imagine she’s got friends from the hairdresser’s.’

  ‘Hairdresser’s?’

  ‘I told you, she’s a hairdresser.’

  ‘Well there’s irony. You know she has no hair. She’s wearing a wig.’

  He looked across at Annabelle. ‘I thought her hair looked strange.’

  ‘I know you’ve told me, but you used to spend weekends with her and the weekdays with your father, right?’

  ‘That was the arrangement they came to. He’s never forgiven her for having him sectioned in the mental hospital, but once he got custody he never tried to stop me seeing her.’

  ‘That’s good.’ Annabelle looked at him. ‘Well, it is good, isn’t it?’

  ‘So what do you want me to do, give him a medal?’

  ‘Well, from what you’ve told me she probably did the right thing getting him packed off to a hospital.’

  ‘Try telling him that.’ He unhooked her leg and stood up. ‘Are you hungry? I can see if there’s anything in the fridge.’

  Annabelle shook her head. ‘Don’t bother, I’ve already looked. If you tell me where the shops are I’ll go and get something. When she wakes up I’m going to ask if she minds my taking a picture of her. She’s got an amazing face. And then I should probably get going.’

  ‘Don’t you want to stay the night?’

  ‘I wanted to meet Brenda and now I’ve met her. The two of you should be together. And you know, the sooner I get started on the summer the sooner it will be over. Then I can join you again. Make sense?’

  He sat back down and leaned over and picked up both of her hands. He kissed the back of one, and then the other.

  ‘Thanks. I’m glad you’re here.’

  The Wynton Marsalis CD comes to an abrupt end and for a moment he thinks about going back into the kitchen and slicing off another hunk of Gruyère. He has not eaten dinner, but the truth is he isn’t hungry. It is still mid-evening, so there is time to do more work on the book, or at least re-read his notes. He looks across at his neatly organised desk, but he does not leave the sofa. He reaches out a hand and picks up the remote for the television. The book can wait. That’s enough work for one day, and the truth is he doesn’t wish to be reminded of the library or the girl. Tomorrow morning he will get up early and resume work on the book. He won’t set the alarm, but if he goes to bed at a reasonable hour he should be able to make a timely start. That much he is sure of. He points the remote at the television set.

  The following afternoon he waits in the doorway of Dewhurst’s, the butcher’s. It is half-day so the shop is locked, but the red plastic awning protects him from the drizzling rain. Cars slosh by, throwing thin sheets of water towards the pavements and causing young and old pedestrians to move quickly away from the kerb. He ought not to be here, he knows this, but he sat up until three o’clock in the morning with a notepad in his lap making notes about Wynton Marsalis and wondering if he should not at least consider including a jazz epilogue to his book. Something brief, a nod in the direction of the field, a half-dozen footnoted paragraphs that suggest familiarity without expertise. Around the edges of the pages in his notebook he found himself writing her name in neat black capitals: DANUTA. There was no surname to root the romantic, French-sounding, Danuta in Polish soil, but for some reason he was sure that hers would be the most jaw-breaking of Polish names; a chain of late consonants strung together with a total disregard for vowels. By the time he put down his notepad, and began to slouch his slow way towards the bedroom, he realised that the girl held some kind of grip on his imagination, although he was too fatigued to try and fathom the source of his fascination.

  The first students begin to walk down the steps of the bleak stone building, their bulky bags hooked over one shoulder, their hands forming visors against the rain. Somebody should tell these foreigners that it is always raining in England, and that they should buy an umbrella before they even think about a travel pass, or cheap jeans, or a copy of Time Out. After all, an umbrella is a key part of the English uniform. He glances at his watch. Four o’clock precisely, and so he seems to have guessed right. And then he sees her talking to a tall blond boy who is Germanic in appearance, but he could also be from anywhere in Scandinavia, or from one of the former Soviet countries. The boy is smiling, but there does not appear to be anything intimate about their encounter. As they reach the bottom of the half-dozen steps the boy punches her playfully on the arm and then peels off and dashes towards the bus stop where a double-decker bus, its headlights already bright in this late afternoon gloom, is about to depart.

  He steps out from beneath the red awning and strides across the road, and he can now see that she is dressed in the same clothes as yesterday, including the uninspiring black woollen tights. Her rucksack dangles casually from one hand, and he notices that she has about her a distinct air of general dishevelment that he is beginning to believe is carefully cultivated.

  ‘I thought you might like to go for a coffee. Or a drink if you prefer.’ She turns to face him and is unable to disguise her surprise. ‘There are quite a few pubs around here. I can’t guarantee that they’re much better than the Queen Caroline, but we can try.’

  Confusion clouds her face, as though suddenly the English language has abandoned her. He can see that she has no words to place on her tongue.

  ‘Think of it as another free conversation class. Better than going through the Evening Standard in that grubby library, right?’

  She waits at a table by the window while he loads a handful of pink sachets of sugar, and some small plastic containers of milk, on to a tray. He edges around the crush of uniformed school kids and slides into the bolted plastic chair. He shakes his head as he lifts both coffees clear of the paper-lined tray, and then he unloads the sugar and milk on to the table before shoving the tray to one side.

  ‘Let’s be honest. It’s all McDonald’s is good for. Coffee and the bathrooms. At least they try and keep them clean.’

  ‘The bathrooms do not clean themselves. Somebody has to clean them, do you know this?’

  ‘Okay, fair point. At least somebody keeps them clean.’

  He watches as she rips open first one sachet of sugar, then another, and eventually she pours the contents of three envelopes into her cup. She finds a thin red straw among the superfluous sugar and milk, and she quickly stirs with it and then tosses the straw on to the tabletop. Like him she takes no milk, but unlike him she takes sugar; plenty of it.

  ‘How was the language school today?’

  ‘It was the same as yesterday.’

  ‘And how was it yesterday?’

&n
bsp; She shrugs her shoulders and stares out of the window. It has begun to rain heavily and the raindrops tattoo loudly against the window. Umbrellas have mushroomed everywhere, but he is sure that she is looking at nothing in particular.

  Has he made a mistake? If so then he is sorry, but he is keen to make everything all right, that is all. He knows that he should not have tried to kiss her, but right now he just wants to spend some time with her. Yes, in a sense, win her over. She takes a loud sip of her coffee. What should he say? Danuta, I like you, but I am sorry. She glances at him, then quickly turns back to the window. The words are in his head. Danuta, I just want to say sorry for last night, but if you want to finish your coffee and leave then that’s fine with me. I’m not being pushy or anything. She turns from the window and looks at him quizzically, as though baffled by his uncharacteristic silence. He feels compelled to speak.

  ‘Was the blond guy your boyfriend? I didn’t want to embarrass you, or cause you any difficulty, so I backed off until he ran for his bus.’

  ‘You were spying on me?’

  ‘I wouldn’t call it spying. I’m not the secret police, you know.’

  ‘You are not funny. In my country this is still not a joke, Mr Keith.’

  ‘Ah, so at least you remember my name.’

  ‘Of course I remember your name. I met you yesterday. How can I forget your name?’

  She shakes her head and once again stares out of the window. The puddles reflect red and white light from the cars, and red, amber and green from the traffic lights. The slack water rainbow is surprisingly beautiful. He has to take charge, yet be sensitive, otherwise he realises that the whole encounter will quickly descend into argument and she will leave. She seems to like it when he leads, for this perhaps gives her the space to be quirky and witty. This being the case, he understands that now is not the time to let the conversation drift. He takes a sip of the bitter McDonald’s coffee and then he places the plastic cup back on the tray. He stares at her, but still she will not meet his eyes, so he picks up the discarded red straw and drops it into his abandoned coffee.