The Death of Bees: A Novel

by Lisa O'Donnell

  “Who the fuck are you?” snaps Julie.

  “I’m Marnie’s grandfather. Who are you?”

  “Well your granddaughter’s a whore. A. Whore.”

  Robert T. Macdonald scans the room and sees Mick skulking in the background, he looks right at me and stunned he goes, “This guy?”

  I nod.

  “For gawd’s sake, lassie,” he says in this disapproving tone and that pisses me off, it’s not like he’s earned it yet. I want to tell him to fuck off, I want to tell him it’s got nothing to do with him, but I need him to stop everything, I need him to help me ’cause there isn’t anyone else.

  I nod and hear myself say, “Sorry.”

  “It’s not what you think,” says Mick.

  “And what do I think, Mister?” says Robert T. Macdonald.

  “I’m just looking for Gene.”

  “He’s in Turkey with Isabel.”

  “And how did they get there? With a raft?” says Mick and produces the passports. Robert T. Macdonald grabs them, opens them, and examines them, and then he stares at me, looking guilty as fuck.

  “I don’t know where they are,” I whisper.

  “She’s still a whore!” yells Julie.

  “Leave,” commands Robert T. Macdonald.

  “He’s got my money. Gene, he’s got it,” says Mick.

  “Then you shouldn’t have given it to him, should you?”

  “I’m not leaving here till I know where he is,” says Mick.

  “Lassie says she doesn’t know.”

  “Well somebody knows.”

  “Out of here,” says Robert T. Macdonald.

  Mick feels brave now. “And who’s going to make me?”

  That’s when Robert T. Macdonald leaps across the table and takes him by the throat, squeezes his neck like it’s a tube of toothpaste. Mick’s mouth widens and his eyes water and it looks like Robert T. Macdonald’s going to kill him, but then Julie smacks him with the frying pan, knocking him unconscious to the floor. Thinking they’ve killed him, Julie and Mick take off in Mick’s ice cream van. Next thing Lennie arrives on the scene and thinks we need to get Robert T. Macdonald to a doctor, but Robert T. Macdonald comes to and says he’ll go himself. Lennie makes him tea and tries to tidy up, but there’s no point, everything’s broken or torn and there’s no mending to be done, just damage, everywhere you look.

  “Where are they?” demands Robert T. Macdonald.

  “They took off in Mick’s van,” I say.

  “Not those fools, where is Izzy? Where is Gene?”

  And I want to tell him everything. I want to tell Lennie everything. I want to tell him Gene and Izzy are buried in the garden. I want to tell him I’ve been selling ice creams and drugs and shagging a married man. I want to tell him how tired I am and how I wish I was the one buried in the garden and let it all go, but as soon as I open my mouth Nelly turns up and goes, “Whose child is this?”

  Mick and Julie forgot their baby.

  Half an hour later Julie hurls herself through the front door and grabs her child gurgling in his car seat and then flips us all the finger.

  “How unladylike,” says Nelly.

  “Fuck you,” says Julie. “Fuck all of you.”

  Lennie

  As always, Marnie was fast to explain their absence, although not fast enough for Robert T. Macdonald.

  “They’ve just gone,” said Marnie. “I don’t know where.”

  “But you knew about the money,” said Robert T. Macdonald.

  “Mick told me.”

  “S’drug money, isn’t it?” he said.

  She nods.

  “You get about, don’t you?” spat Robert T. Macdonald.

  “What fucking business is it of yours?” screamed Marnie.

  “Like it or not, young lady, I am your grandfather and this lying won’t stand, the company you keep won’t stand, and living here in this guy’s house won’t stand either. Where are they?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I could go to the authorities,” he said.

  “You’ll get Izzy done if you do that. Is that what you want? She could go to jail.”

  “How could she just leave you like that?” There was hurt in his voice, disappointment.

  “You can talk,” spat Marnie.

  “I left her with her mother. S’not the same.”

  “Her mother died. She was completely alone in the world. No wonder she dived into Gene’s arms. S’all your fault this.”

  Marnie was close to tears. The day’s events had been too much for her I could tell and I can’t pretend I didn’t enjoy the attack on Robert T. Macdonald.

  “Come come, Marnie, too late to be throwing stones now,” says Nelly from the quietest corner of the room and holding a suitcase.

  “They’ll be back. They always come back. Chin up, old girl,” she assures her.

  Marnie looked incredulous and as stunned as I was by Nelly’s impromptu bravado.

  “I say we all sit down, have a nice piece of cake, a cup of tea perhaps. Would you oblige us, Lennie?”

  “Of course,” I said. “It would be my pleasure,” but it was no such thing.

  Nelly

  I didn’t know what to do with myself or my suitcase.

  There was Bobby, bringing what looked like a knee into Lennie’s front room and my sister selling confectionery to the dismay of an unbalanced spouse.

  I was a nervous wreck, surely I was. Retrieving the bone and burying it again was no easy feat. I didn’t even know which grave he’d pulled it from.

  Thank goodness for Lennie’s tea and cake. It certainly took the edge off what had been a horrific day for us all. Marnie eventually simmered down and Robert T. Macdonald requested we spend more time with him until Izzy returns. Since Marnie knows this will mean a lifetime she was somewhat reluctant to agree, but I was more enthused in this respect. He had saved the day after all. It couldn’t hurt anyone to spend a leisurely afternoon taking a walk for example and our breakfast together had been a great success and so we made arrangements. Marnie made her excuses of course and I was very disappointed. He’d stood up for and protected her, heaven help us all if he hadn’t.

  Marnie is not the strength she has been in my life; in fact she is failing me in too many ways. I hardly see her around these days. I can’t imagine what occupies her, not when there is work to be done, secrets to be kept, and people to account for. Grandfather is evidently a liability, and if his daughter doesn’t show up soon then we’ll all be in hot water. Piping hot!

  Marnie

  Handle with care is the line I’m taking with Robert T. Macdonald. One false move and we’re done. Nelly was wide eyed and question free for a change. She didn’t want to know about Julie and Mick, for example, or any of the things I know she heard like the drugs or the affair with a married man, although she did want to know how long I had been selling ice cream.

  “I’m not selling it anymore,” I told her.

  “Excellent news,” she says. “It’s fattening, isn’t it, and terribly bad for the complexion.”

  “But Gene liked it, didn’t he?” I say.

  “I couldn’t exactly say,” she whispers.

  I could have screamed.

  Now she wants to make cozy with Robert T. Macdonald just because he played Batman for the day and when she doesn’t know the first thing about him. None of us do.

  Nelly

  Lennie is entirely bothersome. Always taking off somewhere. Very secretive. Perhaps he has a girlfriend? Fortunately we have our gramps to keep an eye on us. He’s always around and with a helping hand. How badly I feel for the lies we must tell him to keep our own secrets.

  We’ve had a jolly nice time of late and have been so many wonderful places together. He knows Glasgow like the back of his hand. He likes to go to St. Mary’s. It holds an especially important place in his heart with its vaulted ceilings and handcrafted oak pews. I am permitted to play on the altar by Father McKeown, a true Irishman and a real cha
racter. He says the music is positively celestial. This fills Gramps with such pride. How he glows. Father McKeown says I have a great deal to offer the church, as does Gramps, who had apparently considered the priesthood in his youth. Such a shame for I believe he would have made an excellent priest. Excellent.

  Lennie

  The ice cream vendor’s wife called round yesterday afternoon while I looked for my shoes. Your shoes. I can’t find them anywhere and I can’t go outside without them, it’s wet and it’s cold. I’ll freeze. She was a little haughty to tell the truth and I wasn’t best pleased to see her, though it took me a while to place her, most vexing. I thought she’d come for another go at Marnie but that wasn’t the case at all. Her husband has gone missing and it seems he has wiped out what remained of the money they kept in their bank account. A real gent. She made sure not to call while the girls were at home and was secretly hoping I’d seen him around. He’s obviously running from someone and I hope they catch him; he doesn’t deserve to breathe, a man like that. All she has left is their little baby and the van of course. I told her to run it herself, branch out a little. She seemed quite taken by the idea, not that it’s my business. I couldn’t care less where the blaggard’s hiding. I’ve got my own problems.

  Marnie

  Mick’s disappeared and everyone is looking for him including Vlado, but he’s gone. Vlado has passed the matter on to his associates and the search is wide. If he so much as sets foot on Glasgow terrain it better be with a bagful of cash or he’ll get the shit kicked out of him, maybe worse. I’m glad he’s gone. I hated having him around reminding me what love isn’t.

  Kirkland and I are having the time of our lives. We’re like a French movie, a black-and-white one, a sixties one and we wear macs and take walks in the rain, except we don’t wear macs, but we did take a boat ride in the park once.

  I decided to give Gramps a break. He’s actually all right even though he choked Mick with a relish I found unnerving. He’s certainly strong.

  Nelly and Gramps are having a great time. They’re always out taking trips, they certainly get on well and he loves her violin, no surprise there. He also met Kim but she doesn’t like him. She said, “There’s something about him I don’t like.” I must admit Kim’s pretty insightful about these things so I took it on board, though it’s hard to figure out what the hell could be wrong with the saintly Robert T. Macdonald these days, he gives goodness a new dimension. He took in Sandy and gave him a trade and got him off smack, he can’t walk past a beggar without throwing a few coins at them, and when he speaks of Lennie he only has the best things to say. I’ve drawn back from church visits, however, but Nelly goes every Sunday, he even has her playing while everyone gets themselves seated and comfy for the word of God.

  Only problem we’re having at the moment is Lennie. He’s a bit of a growler right now and obviously has no time for Robert T. Macdonald, which is a shame ’cause Gramps really likes him. I’m kind of disappointed to be honest; I thought Lennie was better than that, but what a sulker. We all had a roast together last Sunday, as tradition commands. We’d been out with Gramps in the city, buying a few clothes; he’s a very generous guy, like super-generous. He took me to Topshop and he got Nelly all these DVDs with Bette Davis, like a library of them, which we’re going to watch together with popcorn next weekend at his house, an official sleepover. I guess it’s time to check his place out and I’ve been promising for weeks. He was so pleased. Anyway dinner was a disaster, Lennie brought out wine and Gramps said he didn’t drink, a lie, because he took us out to a restaurant recently and ordered himself a glass of red. He said so long as you were drinking wine with a decent meal then it was okay, it’s when you’re drinking it in a park with reprobates it’s a problem.

  Gramps has also taken over the rent of our house for when Izzy gets back. I feel bad about that ’cause there is no Izzy. I wonder a lot if Nelly wants to tell him the truth. They’re so tight right now. He’s so kind to us and sometimes it feels like we’re thieves taking so much from him and calling him Gramps when we know his daughter is buried in the garden. We’re afraid of course because the question of her whereabouts is in his pending tray. Now he thinks they’re in the country somewhere. And they are, just not where he thinks.

  Nelly

  Being with Gramps is so much fun and Lennie’s being such a good sport about it all. He even invited Gramps to dinner last Sunday though Gramps was a little disapproving of Lennie’s alcohol intake and even remarked upon it. I assured him Lennie was no drunk, but he said I’ve to keep an eye on it and I jolly well will, truth be told Lennie’s been a little wobbly on his legs of late, almost collapsed in the supermarket last week. I suppose he’s not as young as he likes to think and it’s true, he does like at least two glasses on a Sunday. “It’s not beef without a good glass of red,” he says, but if he should hurt himself on account of it I’d never forgive myself. It was very good of Gramps to mention it at all, subtly of course and avoiding any kind of offense. Such good pals they’ve become, they get on like a house on fire. Of course I invite Lennie wherever we go, but he’s so darn busy. He’s actually a bit of a loner these days and likes his own company. I suppose it was like that for a long time before we barged into his world with all our needs and wants, he’s such a good man, it must be quite a relief to have someone else to share the burden with and perhaps take us off his hands, not in a mean way but Lennie is rather old and he most likely wants his home back, have a quiet evening playing his piano without feeling obliged to duet with my violin. Maybe he’ll bake again, not much of it going on at the moment. There’s so much to do I suppose, our laundry and the mess we leave behind each morning, I never tidy my bed. He even irons our clothes, although not so much recently on account of the burned shirt incident. He’d left the iron on top of it while he had a cup of tea. He must be tired. We certainly have taken enough of his time, whereas Gramps is full of energy and has a place of his own. He has a large garden, lots of room for weekend stays. I’ve organized one for next weekend and won’t Lennie be pleased about that. I can’t think of anything I’d rather do, to have a family again and a real one. Gramps even has a car, a warm car he can pick us up in. I always envied the girls being picked up in cars. In rain or snow. Parents reaching for snacks from bags in the front seat. Polished girls happy to be going home to gently lit houses, warm houses, the smell of dinner making its way to dining room tables where they sit and enjoy home-cooked meals. Homes like Lennie’s I suppose. I think Gramps must be terribly lonely. I suppose he’s as much in need of family as we are. I know it’s what he wants. To be with us until Izzy comes back, except Izzy isn’t coming back. Not ever. Whatever shall we do?

  Lennie

  The cheek on this one, let me tell you. He invites himself to dinner and he sits across from me the whole time giving me the eye and then he pipes up, “Two glasses of wine, Lennie? We celebrating?” Who the bugger does he think he is and in my house telling me what to do and what to drink and all the time cracking jokes with his grandchildren, buying them with gifts and the things they’re weak for. If only they knew the danger in him.

  I never saw it coming. It’s all “Gramps” this and “Gramps” that. They’re like little strays when you think about it, being fed scraps from strangers’ tables, and strays never leave after scraps, do they? They’re always hanging around for the next fishbone. I never fed them scraps. I fed them love, I fed them things they needed and from the heart. Oh … I’m an arrogant old fool, maybe they’re the ones who gave, feeding my loneliness and perhaps they’ve been burdened by it. A desperate old man on his own needing company and faking family for them. Pretending to be their grandfather, until this liar shows up. Perhaps they feel the need to move on and of course I’d let them go; I swear I would, Joseph, if only I knew he wouldn’t hurt them and I don’t know that. Truth is I don’t know anything right now. I’m so confused.

  Marnie

  Kirkland never returns calls. It really bugs me, I mean he call
s but not in response to any call I’ve made. It’s all “When can we meet?” “When you coming round?” “I’ve been waiting hours.” “Fuck’s sake, Marnie, move your hole.”

  Seriously, he treats me like an unreliable friend instead of his girlfriend. He’s also swallowing a lot of jellies and I don’t know where he’s getting them but it’s not from me, Vlado’s seen to that. He says it makes sex better, which doesn’t make me feel great; I mean why can’t I be enough? He also says it makes his art richer, although I haven’t seen anything except his dick in his hands these last few weeks.

  Anyway Gramps meets me after school the other day and wants to have dinner but I have to give him the bum’s rush ’cause Lennie’s made dinner and Gramps gets all angry at that, I mean really angry.

  It was pissing with rain at the time and I don’t know what it is about the rain but your stance changes and you crouch and suck your face in and watch your shoes slapping on the concrete and in my case wishing I hadn’t left my fucking brolly at school. When it rains the world changes and people change, it’s like there’s a rain etiquette all of a sudden. Glasgow gets quiet in the rain, no one talks, everyone is just trying to escape the rush of water and looking about for shelter or places to kiss or talk, maybe fight, puke, or fuck. Some people like to snog in the rain, it’s considered romantic, especially in cheesy movies, but to be honest if someone kissed me in the rain I’d think they were a bit affected. I suppose you can cry in the rain but what’s the point, no one would notice, which is a good thing if you don’t want anyone to see you crying and of course Gene Kelly says you can sing and dance in the rain, but I won’t be doing that any day soon on account of not wanting to look like a giant knob.

  Anyway Gramps goes all mental about Lennie’s mince and potato dinner with crumble ’cause it’s Tuesday and Lennie always makes crumble on a Tuesday. Gramps was fuming, that’s when I notice he’s wearing a denim jacket as if it’s not raining at all and it’s not like it just started raining, it had been pissing down for days, people were bobbing about in boats in some parts of the country. Also his hands aren’t in his pockets, they’re waving about and he’s standing straight, not crouching and the rain it’s like tracing his anger lines, his frustrations and I’d never seen that in wet weather before, to be honest I don’t think I’ve even looked at someone in a storm, unless I was on a train and like everyone else had escaped the rain. Mostly when it rains you’re running, but Gramps is standing like a priest at an altar ranting about Lennie.