The Not So Perfect Life of Mo Lawrence

by Catherine Robertson

  He stepped backwards. His expression as he stared at her was shocked, a little dazed. But then it changed, hardened like cooled wax, and Aishe went immediately on her guard. Because the only emotion she could see now was anger.

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ he said. ‘What the hell is your game?’

  Never apologise, never explain — that was Aishe’s motto. ‘Why should it be a game?’

  ‘Because you don’t give a damn about me.’ He sounded calm, but Aishe could see his chest moving up and down with rapid, shallow breaths. ‘You never have.’

  Never apologise.

  ‘I’m not sure why you slept with me before,’ he said. ‘I suppose you must have been bored, and seen me as an easy mark. Which, God knows, I was. Or you had some other obscure reason, I don’t know.’

  He stared at the scrubby ground and kicked at a loose chip of concrete. ‘No, I don’t know what your reasons were then, and I have no idea what they are now.’ He raised his head. ‘And to be honest,’ he said, ‘I no longer care.’

  Aishe realised she knew exactly what he was going to say next, and while the top line of her thoughts carried on in nonchalant don’t-care mode, deep down something reached up for her heart and twisted it in a hard, cold grip.

  ‘I’m leaving,’ Benedict said. ‘I’m tired of living without dignity. I’m not sure I was anything much before this all started, but I’m damn sure I’m considerably less than that now — and if I don’t do something fast, I suspect I’ll cease to exist at all.’

  He paused. The anger had gone, replaced by a mildly embarrassed but resolute calm.

  ‘I’m sorry I can’t give you more notice,’ he said. ‘But I’m sure you’ll find someone else. Gulliver is well ahead in his studies, so a short break won’t set him back.’

  A swell of panic swept through Aishe at the mention of Gulliver’s name. How would he feel at being abandoned without a word? He was still her boy, her baby — how would he cope with a betrayal like this?

  ‘You’re not going to leave without telling him?’ Aishe became aware her hands were shaking. ‘Without saying goodbye?’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Benedict did look genuinely unhappy. ‘Tell him I’ll write to him and explain. Tell him—’ He seemed to reconsider what he’d been about to say. ‘Tell him he played like a boss.’

  What does that mean? Aishe railed to herself. What’s the point of that stupid phrase?

  Benedict was walking away. He wasn’t hurrying, but it wouldn’t be long before he’d round the corner and be gone. Aishe felt panic pile on alarm and dread. She began to ransack through her thoughts, searching for something, anything, that she could hurl at him — in attack or defence, she wasn’t sure.

  ‘What about Izzy?’ she called after him. Her voice sounded harsh, even to her. ‘Are you dumping her, too?’

  He didn’t stop, didn’t even slow. His shoulders hunched for a moment, as if someone had landed a light blow on his back, but Aishe was forced to watch him keep on walking. In less than a minute, he was out of sight.

  ‘Where the hell have you been?’ Michelle hissed when Aishe slid into her seat. The second half was under way. The children were playing Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Free Bird. The lead singer, Aishe noted, was a girl.

  Michelle gestured at the empty seats on the other side of her. ‘These two have bloody disappeared as well! Do you need to have one of those confidential talks with me about feminine hygiene?’

  ‘Good that they’ve got a female singing this,’ said Aishe. ‘Usually, it’s a paean to male bad behaviour.’

  Michelle gave her a hard look. ‘Are you all right?’ she said.

  ‘Fine,’ said Aishe, and added, ‘I wonder if they’ve got the chops to tackle the guitar solo?’

  Aishe wasn’t entirely sure how she made it through the rest of the evening. She felt a little like she was in an empty train, being carried along inexorably to an uncertain destination — or to no destination at all, only a relentless, endless click-clack onwards.

  Gulliver was fizzing — so much that he let Aishe give him a quick hug. Michelle shook his hand instead, and Patrick clapped him on the shoulder.

  ‘Fucking well done!’ said Patrick. ‘Well fucking done, indeed!’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Gulliver, standing tall for the first time since the onset of puberty. ‘Do I deserve a beer?’

  ‘No,’ said Patrick and Aishe.

  ‘But why don’t we go for pizza?’ Patrick added. ‘My shout.’

  Michelle checked her watch. ‘I should really go home …’ Then she said, ‘No! Goddamnit! If he can’t cope with minding his own freaking children for one evening, then tough titty!’

  ‘You could text him,’ said Aishe.

  ‘I don’t want to text him,’ said Michelle. ‘It will do him good to feel that clawing desperation and panic that comes upon you when you’re all alone in the dark with a raging tot.’

  ‘I had to mind Tom once when he was about Rosie’s age,’ said Patrick, as they walked to the parking lot. ‘You’d think Clare was leaving him at home with a serial killer. I had instructions for everything, written down, with the key points underlined in bold. And phone numbers for every emergency service, including the poisons unit.’

  ‘How did it go?’ Michelle said.

  ‘Tom and I had a great time,’ said Patrick. ‘Until Clare came home and found me on the couch watching boxing and drinking beer with Tom on my lap. She said I was reinforcing negative gender stereotypes. I pointed out he was asleep. Then I got into ten different kinds of shit, including risk of smothering and conditioning him for pre-teen abuse of alcohol.’

  They stopped beside his rental BMW. ‘Come on,’ said Patrick. ‘Let’s save the planet and go in one car. I’ll drop you here on the way back.’

  Aishe, sitting in the back with Gulliver, found his proximity almost unbearable. He was relaxed and happy, full of chat, leaning forward so he could talk, mainly to Patrick but also to Michelle, confessing bum notes while bragging about the parts he’d mastered, telling funny stories about his band mates, making oblique references to girls — who he fancied and who he believed fancied him.

  Patrick and Michelle were laughing, bantering with Gulliver as they might with each other, with their friends. But Aishe couldn’t see Gulliver as he was. She could only see the vivid images in her mind of him as a baby: such a good sleeper, such a mop of hair; as a toddler, towelling him down after a bath, planting kisses on his peachy skin; as a small boy, triumphantly bringing her flowers he’d quietly purloined from the neighbour’s garden, climbing up on her lap and telling her he loved her because she had pretty hair …

  Aishe picked at the pizza she’d ordered. She wasn’t even sure where they’d driven to, where this restaurant was. She had no idea how long they’d been in the car. The click-clack, the swaying to and fro of this invisible train she was on had not lessened, but there seemed now to be some inevitability to this journey. It felt that she was racing to some kind of vanishing point, where she might finally stop — or disappear altogether.

  It was when Patrick said her name that she knew the point had been reached. It was the way he said it, and the way he was looking at her.

  ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I know you won’t believe this, but I didn’t come here to interfere. I genuinely did come here to see that winery. But when I met Gulliver, talked with him — I, well …’ Patrick screwed up his face apologetically. ‘I shouldn’t really spring this on you. But if I tell you in private, you’ll say no, I know you will. And I think this isn’t just your decision now. It’s a family decision — you, Gulliver and — well, the rest of your family. Us.’

  Aishe could not look at Gulliver, but could sense his eyes on her. There was a pendent silence, as if everyone had drawn in a breath — which, Aishe supposed, they probably had.

  Patrick went on. ‘I talked with Jenico. His daughters have all left home now. Tyso’s still there, but Jenico’s about to kick him out. Anyway — there’s a good private school not to
o far from there. Not a snooty one, one into arts and music and all that. The family, Jenico, me — we’ll pay the fees. Gulliver can live with Jenico, do a few odd jobs to earn his keep or a bit of busking, whatever. We’ll send him home for the holidays. Or—’ Patrick paused. ‘We’ll fly you over.’

  The silence was airless, a vacuum.

  ‘No,’ said Aishe.

  Gulliver made a noise, but Patrick held out his hand to quiet him.

  Then he said, ‘Aishe, look—’

  ‘No,’ she said again. She shook her head: small, distracted movements. ‘No.’

  ‘The boy wants to go,’ said Patrick softly. ‘If you keep him here …’

  I’ll regret it? thought Aishe. Regret is such a limp, flavourless word. Grey and flaccid and shrunken. Regret is a feeble, crippled old man in a wheelchair in the path of a twenty-ton juggernaut, a scrap of dry leaf in a kiln. Don’t try to suggest I’ll regret anything, thought Aishe. Regret won’t even touch the sides.

  ‘I’m not a charity,’ she said to Patrick. ‘I’ll pay his way.’

  She heard Gulliver’s intake of breath, in which there was both shock and triumph.

  Patrick frowned. ‘I thought you were a bit strapped?’

  ‘I’ll sell the house.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Gulliver. ‘I like the house …’

  His voice tailed off as he realised that now was an excellent time to keep silent. As Aishe turned away from them, to gaze at the restaurant’s far wall, she caught a glimpse of Michelle’s face. Her expression suggested that she was inclined to give Aishe a hug, but was thinking better of it. If I had been anyone else, Aishe thought, she probably wouldn’t hesitate. But perhaps it’s obvious to everyone that all I have left is my little shield of spiky pride, and that if I lost that, I might collapse inwards like a punctured balloon and shrivel to nothing.

  ‘Well!’ Michelle clapped her hands.

  If an atmosphere needed lifting, Aishe thought, Michelle would be the one to do it. Not diplomatically, but effectively nonetheless.

  ‘I can’t speak for you good folk,’ Michelle went on, ‘but by jingo — I could really go for some dessert.’

  It was after midnight when Michelle got home. She’d assumed Chad would be in bed, but he was in the living room, waiting for her. Michelle felt her heart sink. Oh God, she thought. What the freak now?

  She flopped down into an armchair and briefly, wearily closed her eyes. Then she opened them, and said, ‘OK. Lay it on me. What’s the next bit of bad news?’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ Chad said.

  ‘No guessing games,’ said Michelle. ‘Haven’t the strength. Tell you what?’

  ‘About my father.’

  Slowly, Michelle sat up. ‘You’re freaking kidding me, right?’

  Chad’s jaw was taut. ‘You should have told me.’

  Michelle stared at him for a long, pointed amount of time.

  ‘Oh boy,’ she said finally. ‘If I wasn’t so bushed, I’d be yelling now. But I won’t. I’ll stay calm. I’ll spell it out calmly, one word at a time. Here we go. Ready?’

  She didn’t wait for an acknowledgement. ‘OK. You told me not to call you except in an emergency. You described an emergency as a matter of life and death. You were, in fact, very specific about that point. Life and death, you said. That is all.

  ‘Your father is not dying. He may be planning his death, but he’s not actually there yet. Your mother may be near insane with worry but she also is quite firmly alive. I know this because she calls me every day. Dead women don’t make phone calls, not even in The Lovely Bones. She calls me because she cannot get hold of you. Because you have consistently refused to take her calls ever since we arrived here. I did not tell you because you told me not to. The life and death thing again. Is there any part of this that is not crystal clear?’

  ‘I’ve been back since Sunday,’ said Chad. ‘You could have mentioned it between then and now.’

  Michelle knew he had a point. She’d kept it from him deliberately because she’d wanted to teach him a lesson. She had been motivated by nothing but revenge, and right now that made any moral high ground she may have attained feel shaky.

  ‘You’ve been at work,’ she said, feeling attack to be the best form of defence. ‘And besides, I only found out about the Viking boat palaver this evening. I haven’t had time to keep it from you.’

  Chad turned his head towards the television. The sound was muted, but Michelle immediately recognised a repeat of Inspector Morse. This is the one where the morally upright father is revealed as a molester of young girls, she thought. I know the ending of this one. I know what happens to him.

  ‘She’s standing by him,’ Michelle heard Chad say.

  ‘Who?’ Michelle frowned. ‘Your mother? Of course, she is! She has no identity other than that of Mrs Lowell Lawrence. How could she give that up? Who could she possibly be without him?’

  ‘You don’t think it’s because she loves him?’ said Chad.

  Michelle was suddenly wary. She’d had the same feeling a few times before, in arguments with other lawyers — a small, niggling warning that their questions were leading her unwittingly onto dangerous ground, wherein lay hidden mines or a bandit horde waiting to ambush.

  ‘I’d like to see you have this conversation with her,’ said Michelle.

  ‘She wants us to go over there for Thanksgiving,’ said Chad.

  ‘Thanksgiving. Holy cow! I’d forgotten all about it …’ Michelle sank back in her seat, then sat bolt upright again. ‘That’s next week.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Chad. ‘A week today.’ He checked his watch. ‘Yesterday.’

  ‘What did you say to her?’ said Michelle.

  ‘I said I’d talk to you.’

  ‘For fuck’s sake, Chad!’ Michelle felt a wave of fury. ‘Could you not take responsibility just one freaking time?’

  ‘I know what my responsibilities are, Michelle. And I’ve not reneged on any of them.’ Chad’s voice was low and measured, but there was a distinct tremor of anger in it. ‘But I’m not sure whether my definition of responsibility and yours agree.’

  He stood, ready to walk out of the room. ‘And I’m not sure they ever will.’

  37

  The next morning, Michelle got a call from Benedict. Friday was his day off, so she was a little surprised to hear from him.

  ‘Where did you get to last night?’ she said. ‘You missed the big finale.’

  ‘I know.’

  Benedict sounded unusually terse.

  ‘Everything all right?’

  ‘Look, I’m sorry,’ said Benedict. ‘I can’t look after the children any more — I’m leaving. I apologise for the notice being so short, but — well, circumstances must.’

  ‘You broke up with Izzy.’ It seemed the most logical explanation.

  ‘Among other things.’

  Benedict was clearly impatient, wanting to keep the call as short as possible — and Michelle had enough on her mind as it was, so she didn’t press him.

  ‘Do you need any money?’ she said.

  ‘No. Thank you,’ he added. ‘Say goodbye to the children for me. I enjoyed my time with them.’

  ‘My mothers’ group will be bereft,’ said Michelle glumly.

  ‘They’ll survive,’ said Benedict. ‘That’s the theory, anyway.’

  He said, ‘Thanks again. Goodbye.’ And hung up.

  ‘Bugger it,’ said Michelle, as the ringtone hummed in her ear. ‘They’re scattering like quail.’

  She thought briefly about how she was going to explain Benedict’s disappearance to Harry — then realised that was probably the least of her worries.

  Aishe had decided the Band-Aid approach was the only way to break the news about Benedict to Gulliver. Quick and brutal. It was supposed to hurt less.

  As it happened, Gulliver was surprised, but nowhere near hurt. Aishe realised that her son was so buoyed up with excitement at the idea of his new adventure that the only thing that mi
ght dampen his sprits was the sight of her bloodied corpse on the kitchen floor. Even that wasn’t a given …

  Gulliver frowned, ‘What am I supposed to do today then?’

  Aishe was about to leave for her waitressing job. On Fridays, Benedict usually tutored Gulliver all day, with a break for lunch. In the early days, all three of them had eaten together, before Aishe went to the shelter for the afternoon. More recently, Benedict had chosen to leave her and Gulliver to lunch alone. He didn’t want to see me, thought Aishe. I’d like to blame him, but I’m not sure I can.

  Aishe gave her son a look. ‘You could always pack.’

  ‘Pack?’ said Gulliver, as if the word was some obscure Baltic dialect.

  His mother picked up her car keys. ‘You’re leaving next Friday. One week today.’

  ‘That’s like four hundred years away.’

  No, it’s a nanosecond, thought Aishe as she got into her car. But what stretches out afterwards will feel like eternity.

  Michelle desperately wanted to talk to somebody. Connie wasn’t leaving until the following day. But she’d be busy, reasoned Michelle. Confirming bookings, checking the taps were clean, that sort of thing. If I were a good friend, I wouldn’t bother her. And I want to be a good friend, I really do.

  Aishe, Michelle knew, was at work. And she’s got enough on her plate, Michelle decided, plus I’m not sure she’d let me talk to her about personal stuff, anyway. We’d likely end up getting slaughtered at a bar, thought Michelle, which would be fun only temporarily.

  Darrell had not returned her call, and Michelle didn’t know whether to be concerned or offended. The best way to find out was to call her again. And besides, who else was there?

  Michelle dialled Darrell’s mobile and got the same message.

  ‘Look, I’m sorry, but where the fuck are you?’ Michelle said after the beep. ‘I’m worried and I’m pissed off and I need a friend. Call me! Or at least call me to tell me you’re never going to call me again. That’s what friends do.’