The swimming pool was completely round, with a diving board at one end. Lorna jumped up and down on the board, testing its bendiness, then dived onto the bright green surface of the water. It was like diving into pea and ham soup, but more tasty.
At the far end of the swimming pool was a red inflatable dolphin (not theirs) and she swam round the pool and climbed onto it, then lay on her back and stared upwards through shuttered eyes. Unusually, in that week of monsoon rains, the sun was warm, the sky cloudless. There was a faint breeze that shook branches on the trees surrounding the hotel, stirring up the green surface of the water into swirls. Half-dead insects buzzed feebly on the water’s surface. Suddenly she was being heaved upwards by a tidal wave, then falling through water. Lorna struggled to the surface and emerged spluttering. Her father had dive bombed her. He was now on the other side of the pool, wiping slime from his face and laughing.
‘Gotcha!’ he said and pushed himself backwards from the side wall, then floated, his toes pointing at the sky. His eyes were closed.
‘Dad, can I ask you something?’
‘Yes, Lorna,’ he replied, eyes still closed.
‘Why doesn’t Mum ever go swimming?’ It was something that had always bothered her because Lorna would have liked to live in the sea, or a swimming pool. If she died and was reincarnated, she’d choose to be a fish. Not a small fish, she’d reasoned, because they get eaten. But a large fish; a large, pretty fish, that doesn’t taste nice. Or a mermaid, that would be really cool. She would live in a sunken galleon and talk to dolphins. Not in a sunken galleon anywhere near Scotland, of course: somewhere with a warm sea, without sharks. Lorna didn’t know if sharks ate mermaids.
He didn’t say anything for a few moments, and she wondered if he’d heard her. Then his eyes opened and his toes sank to the bottom of the pool. He waded through the water and planted his forearms on the side of the pool. ‘Because she can’t swim.’
In Lorna’s experience, everyone could swim. Even fat people who weigh a ton and can’t walk properly. Like seals, they transform in water. Her mum even made Lorna take swimming lessons. Her father heaved himself out of the pool and sat on the side, his feet in the water. ‘Actually, I think she’s a little frightened of water,’ he said. ‘But don’t tell her I said that,’ he added, wagging a finger.
Lorna remembered how her mother never went walking in the rain, which was a bit of a problem in Scotland. She always looked at the sky before they ventured out. She said that she didn’t like getting her hair wet. ‘Frightened of water?’ Lorna echoed, not sure what he was telling her. They were on a boating holiday. Who would go on a boating holiday if they were frightened of water?
‘Anyway, she can’t swim,’ he said, flopping back into the water. He had a lazy but effective breaststroke and swum round and round the pool, emerging from the primeval ooze with a bright green wizard’s cloak hanging from him in lacy tendrils.
‘God Almighty!’ he said, looking down at himself. ‘Lorry, I think you’d better get out.’
‘You look scary!’ she laughed, climbing out as well and marvelling at her new green scales. Her wish was coming true. She was turning into a fish. Soon she’d be able to breathe underwater, like a real mermaid, and wouldn’t have to wear a stupid life-jacket.
‘Dad?’
‘Yes, Lorna.’
‘Can I ask you something else?’
‘Of course you can,’ he replied, picking off a large bit of slime and dropping it by the side of the pool.
‘What does redundant mean?’
He paused. ‘It’s complicated,’ he offered.
‘Does it mean we don’t have any money?’
‘Enough to buy you a new bike for your birthday,’ he said, knowing it was what Lorna absolutely wanted, but also looking a little sad, as if he was doing mental sums in his head, despite being almost as bad as her at arithmetic, which always made Lorna wonder why he worked in a financial institution, whatever that was.
It was then that one of the hotel managers rushed out and shouted at them, gesticulating at one of several absolutely huge signs saying that, because of technical difficulties, the pool was closed until further notice.
* * *
She woke with a start to find that the tray had been taken away, so too the empty jug of wine. She sat up and looked around. The light, as always, was turned down low. There was no way of telling whether it was morning, afternoon, or the middle of the night. She debated trying the voice-activated call system, then decided against. Perhaps the old man would see her again tomorrow. Perhaps, eventually, a doctor would see her. Maybe tomorrow she would have tests done, assessments made on her recovery. Maybe tomorrow she could go home, although she rather doubted it. She had so many questions to ask. Most immediately, how long had she been asleep? Why no visitors? And why waste taxpayers’ money on lamb cutlets and white wine?
Behind her eyes was a stab of tears and a glimmer of panic. Where the hell was she? Only the white walls of her room, and an aftertaste of the best meal she’d eaten in years. She rolled her tongue around her mouth, tasting chocolate and old memories and then heard a small scrabbling noise apparently coming from the ventilation shaft above her head. Come to think of it, she’d heard the noise before. She thought back to the old man’s entreaty and, squinting more closely at the recessed grille, saw two unblinking eyes looking back.
Birth
Lorna Jennifer Love was born accidentally not far from the family home in North Berwick. The town, famous for its golf course, is picturesque and quaint. Tourists take photographs along its beaches; the sandstone and granite buildings stand grandly on the shoreline. It has small streets filled with craft and coffee shops and the air tastes of salt, the sky filled with seabirds whose shadows weave patterns across the streets and fairways. She once saw some old pictures of North Berwick that were taken at the dawn of photography, and was surprised at how little had changed.
They had always lived in the same flat on the High Street. At the front was noise and bustle from the street below; at the back were views up the town to North Berwick Law, the conical plug of an extinct volcano. Below the view, washing was pegged in small patches of grass.
Her father was away at work and her mother had taken sandwiches and a flask of tea to spend a quiet lunchtime on a headland overlooking the Firth of Forth. Her mother later put Lorna’s birth down to a dodgy prawn sandwich. All she recalled was lying on her back and watching the clouds wash in, when almost immediately, stabbing pain, gut-wrenching and nauseous, paralysed her to the spot. She was unable to walk or crawl, marooned like a beached sea creature, open to the elements and churning clouds. Despite the intense pain and solitude, it was a straightforward birth. Once it was over, mother and new daughter were found by an American couple, Jack and Alice Brotherstone, on holiday from Ohio. He ran back to North Berwick to raise the alarm and an ambulance was called. They were taken to hospital in Edinburgh and pronounced well.
The local newspaper got to hear what had happened and took a photograph of the Brotherstones standing on the spot where Lorna was born, Jack Brotherstone with his chest puffed out, one arm around his wife, and looking pleased with himself, as if he had performed a heroic deed, like charging into gunfire or a burning building, rather than taking a short jog into town. The newspaper put the picture on the front page so that by the time Lorna was three days old she was already a minor local celebrity.
* * *
Her mother was Catholic and it was from her knee that Lorna first learned about Abraham and Moses. Fascinated by God’s appearance as a burning bush, but less happy about plagues of frogs and locusts, it seemed to her that God could be both nice and nasty; if you didn’t believe in him, he might not like you and, if so, the consequences could be pretty dire. From an early age, her mother would read Lorna stories from the Bible; how Jesus fed the masses with a few loaves and fishes, about the good Samaritan who didn’t pass by on the other side, the escape from Egypt with the pursuing soldiers obliterat
ed in engulfing water. The stories seemed inconsistent, fragmentary. At school, one of her first projects was on the ancient Egyptians. About how they worshipped cats; about Anthony and Cleopatra; how their civilisation eclipsed the rest of the known world. Why then could God plague them with so much misery? They’re just old stories, her mum would say. It doesn’t mean that God doesn’t exist.
‘He sounds like a real bastard,’ Lorna said.
‘Lorna!’ said her mother, shocked.
She didn’t really know what bastard meant. She’d just heard some of the boys at school say it. However, judging by the look on her mother’s face, it was a word she’d definitely store away for future use. It was then that she also stopped believing in God.
* * *
Her father, in contrast, was an affirmed agnostic. He didn’t believe in anything very much except getting out of bed, going to work, coming back on the train, and having supper, the four of them sitting around the small table while her mum said grace. Her dad would pretend to lace his hands but, sometimes, he’d wink across the table at Lorna or Tom. Also sometimes he’d have a pint at the Auld Hoose before watching the news on TV, after which he’d get up from his chair, yawn, declare himself tired, and go to bed. Every day the same, week after week, until the weeks became years and Lorna could no longer fathom his purpose. Like the gannets on the Bass Rock, indistinguishable one from another, her dad’s life seemed insignificant, perhaps even to him. Sometimes, she’d catch him by the window, looking out over the High Street, listening to the distant thud of waves on the beach. At those moments, he’d look pensive but lost. He was a big and solid man who wore a suit but said little. He didn’t accompany them to church on Sunday mornings; that was his golf day.
His one discernible gift was being able to conjure coins from Lorna’s ear. He’d come up behind her, twiddle with an ear lobe, then present her with a five-pence piece. Lorna thought it enchanting and an easy way to earn pocket money. Sometimes his breath smelled beery when he did this; his eyes sparkling with unusual mischief.
‘I’m a wizard, you know,’ he would tell her, and Lorna utterly believed him although, disappointingly, it was the only trick he could do. His height and shock of black hair made it easy to imagine him in a long wizard’s cloak emblazoned with stars and suns and moons and other magical symbols. Always a good wizard in her eyes, someone who could undo a witch’s spell or turn frogs into princes, except when he smacked her bottom for poking a knitting needle into an electrical socket. That was when she learned that even wizards have a dark side.
* * *
Her primary school lay in the shadow of North Berwick Law. From her school desk she would marvel at its symmetry, its bulk filling the classroom window. It seemed to her to be as big as Everest, although it was easy enough to climb without the need for Sherpas. During break time, she could outrun the boys – if she tried – making friends and enemies in equal measure. She was forever scraping knees or elbows, or once, memorably, her forehead. She’d been running flat-out, tripped, and woken in the sanatorium; her head was bandaged and her mother was fluttering nervously at the end of her bed. The experience frightened her; she’d never been knocked out before. It felt like a temporary death, although the scrape on her forehead, sore and unsightly, was also a badge of honour, a reminder that girls could beat the boys. But the absence of consciousness, of being unnaturally asleep while a doctor and her mother were summoned: that was unnerving. From then on, she let the boys win their races; instead, she turned her attention to her classwork. She was too young to understand about jobs and careers, but she did sense that everything had a price.
When she was nine, her parents gave her a hamster for Christmas. She hadn’t particularly wanted one, but didn’t know what she did want. If pressed for a pet, she’d have much preferred a cat or a dog, however, living in an upstairs flat with both parents working imposed limitations. The hamster arrived with a cage, a plastic wheel around which it ran, sawdust, feeding bowl, and a water bottle that clipped to the outside of its cage. She called the hamster Tonto and allowed it free rein down her school shirts, where it would crawl and chew her clothes, much to her mother’s dismay. Sometimes it would wake her in the night, galloping on its little plastic wheel. She’d lie in the darkness, snug and warm, just able to discern its small shadow against the wall. When it died a year later, they buried Tonto in a favourite picnic spot: a headland to the east of the town, with rolling waves stretching across the Firth of Forth. Her mother placed the cardboard box in the deep hole they’d dug and said a prayer. Lorna didn’t know whether hamsters went to Heaven, and neither did her mother. Close to the place where Lorna had been born, they laid her first and only pet to rest. After that, no more hamsters. The pain of final parting overshadowed what had been before.
But she still remembered little Tonto: a small bundle of cream and brown fluff, front paws holding a tasty morsel to be nibbled and stored inside cavernous cheek pouches, and its small, dark, and unblinking eyes. From across the years, Lorna immediately knew what was looking back at her from the other side of the latticed grille.
* * *
Her small shriek quickly brought the good-looking male nurse to her room. He stood at the end of her bed, hands laced behind his back, rocking on the balls of his feet. He seemed concerned, a small frown creasing the corners of his eyes.
Lorna pointed upwards with one finger. ‘I may be mistaken,’ she said, feeling suddenly foolish, ‘but I could have sworn I saw a hamster.’
The nurse peered at the grille. The hamster, if that’s what it was, had already scampered off, scared into flight by Lorna’s yell. It hadn’t been a shriek of terror; rather, a yelp of absolute surprise. Lorna had heard the swift progress down the ventilation shaft, speeding paws reminding her of Tonto, just as her door had whooshed open to reveal the nurse.
Instead he sighed and shook his head. He didn’t seem in the least disbelieving. ‘I’m afraid this facility does have a small problem with them,’ he explained, rocking on his feet and now dangling his arms at his side. ‘I will of course inform Maintenance at once,’ he added more brightly. ‘I’m only sorry that it gave you a fright.’
‘Not a fright exactly,’ replied Lorna. ‘Actually, they’re rather cute. I used to have one. As a pet,’ she added, rather unnecessarily. ‘Look, could I please see a doctor? I need to know what’s happened to me.’ He’d said this facility. Did hospital employees call their place of work facilities? The nurse said nothing; pursed his lips. Once again, she felt a wave of panic.
‘OK, then why can’t I see a doctor?’ Lorna was aware of a rising timbre to her voice. This was no ordinary hospital, with orderlies and cleaners bustling about, doctors with stethoscopes hanging over their shoulders; the crash and din of trolleys down corridors. Nor did it smell medical – it smelled distantly of roses and lavender. ‘Look,’ she said in a lower tone, catching her breath, ‘Why can’t you answer me? I just need to know what’s going on.’
The nurse found trouser pockets in which to deposit his hands. ‘I realise you must have a lot of questions, young Lorna,’ he said, not quite meeting her eye. ‘Only understandable, given the circumstances.’
‘Circumstances? What circumstances?’ There was real fear in her voice.
The damnable man even had Sean Connery’s Scottish burr and slicked-back hair. The only thing missing was a dinner jacket and bow tie although, Lorna thought unkindly, he probably puts them on at night to perfect his act in front of the mirror. ‘I know that all this has been a bit of a shock,’ he continued, staring intently at the grille to avoid looking at her. ‘However, it’s best that you talk to Irene. Believe me, she has the answers. From now on, she’ll be looking after you.’
‘Is Irene a doctor?’ Lorna’s tone was almost pleading. Why all the bloody secrecy, as if she was a child again? ‘And has anybody thought to phone my parents?’ She felt suddenly alone; she wanted to be small again and feel comforting arms around her shoulders. Or the HappyMart; she had a jo
b to go to. Or the university. Did her professors know? ‘People will have been worried,’ she said, a catch in her throat.
‘If you don’t mind, I think that I’d better fetch Irene. She’ll know more than me, believe me.’ Given he’d answered none of her questions, Lorna did believe him. ‘Anyway, Irene’s been designated to look after you,’ he concluded, looking genuinely upset.
‘Designated? What the hell does designated mean?’
‘It means that she’s been assigned to you.’
‘I know what designated means!’ shouted Lorna, now at her wit’s end. ‘I just want some straightforward answers to some straightforward questions. Why in God’s name is that too much to ask for?’
The nurse was again rocking on the balls of his feet, hands clasped behind his back. ‘It’s not quite that simple,’ he offered, frowning.
‘I’m not a child!’ she retorted, utterly exasperated by the man’s evasiveness. For Heaven’s sake, what was there not to understand? ‘OK, I’ve had an accident. But I’m better now. What’s so fucking complicated about that!’ Lorna bit her lip. ‘I’m also a lawyer,’ she added, hoping that this might alter his view of simplicity.
‘Were,’ he said.
‘I beg your pardon?’ Lorna couldn’t have heard him properly.
The Things We Learn When We're Dead Page 3
