The Train

by Sarah Bourne

  ‘I didn’t know that. I’d’ve been round to his house with a cricket bat if I had!’

  Felice laughed. ‘Yes, Dad, you probably would. That’s why we didn’t tell you! You’ve always been overprotective.’ She looked at him as the laughter faded between them. ‘You’re at it again, aren’t you?’

  Trevor looked at his shoes. ‘Let’s go find some lunch,’ he said, knowing he wouldn’t be able to eat. The dragging sensation had returned.

  In one of the few establishments in the area that hadn’t reinvented itself as a gastropub serving expensive organic food art, Trevor watched Felice tuck into a ploughman’s lunch. She’d always had a hearty appetite. She was the person he knew best in the entire world and yet, he realised, there were parts of her life he knew nothing about and while he knew this was normal and natural, it made him ache. He had held her moments after her birth, fed her, changed her nappies, been there to witness her first steps, had marvelled at her first words. He’d encouraged her first attempts at reading and writing, praised her stories. He and Frostie agreed they had been sent the most beautiful, talented, perfect child on whom to lavish their affection and it was their job to nurture and guide her to independence. They’d done a good job. Too good, maybe. They’d looked forward to the time when Felice gave them grandchildren, lived nearby and asked them to babysit, to be involved in her life and that of her family. But her mother was gone and here she was living in London, working in her chosen career and not needing him anymore.

  Trevor sighed, ran a hand over his eyes, realising he was lonely.

  ‘You’re not eating, Dad,’ said Felice, glancing up, and then looking closely at her father. ‘Are you okay?’

  Smile, say yes, Trevor told himself. ‘I don’t know.’ He took her hand. There was a sticky spot where she’d spilt a bit of pickle on her skin and hadn’t licked it off. He had to stop himself from moistening the edge of a napkin and rubbing it away.

  Felice stopped chewing. A crease appeared between her eyebrows. It hadn’t been there before her mum died, Trevor noted.

  ‘Do you think of your mother much?’ he asked.

  The crease deepened. I’m upsetting her, thought Trevor and wanted to cradle her in his arms and take all her pain away like he had when she fell down as a little girl, or quarrelled with a friend.

  ‘I think about her a lot. I talk to her every day.’

  Trevor smiled. ‘She’d like that. I do too. It must be pretty busy for her up there, both of us chatting away to her.’

  ‘You’re lonely, Dad. You need to get out more. You’re still an attractive man, you should meet someone.’

  Trevor’s hands flew to his face. How could his own daughter say something like that? He’d thought they knew each other, but obviously his daughter didn’t know him at all. He wondered, fleetingly, if in loving her as devotedly as they had, he and Frostie had allowed their daughter to become somewhat self-absorbed – unable, or unwilling – to look beyond herself. He pushed the thought away quickly. That wasn’t it. She’d spoken out of concern for him. If she thought about it she’d know he would never find another woman like his wife.

  They fell into an awkward silence. Felice started eating again.

  Watching her, Trevor wondered if, perhaps, this was his daughter’s way of telling him she would never be moving back to Milton Keynes, that her life was now in London with friends he didn’t know and work he didn’t understand. She couldn’t be his little girl forever, nor his companion. His throat tightened at the thought but he knew it was right. He had to let her go, had to take what scraps of her life and her time she offered and be proud she was resilient and strong. If only it didn’t hurt so much. He carried her around with him day in, day out, tucked away in his heart but she carried other things, other people with her. It was what he’d wanted and he hated it.

  ‘So,’ he said, ‘tell me about this boy.’

  He saw Felice’s face soften and knew she’d been waiting for him to ask. ‘What do you want to know?’

  What he really wanted to know was how she could let herself fall for someone so obviously unsuitable. A young man with a mental illness.

  ‘How did you meet?’ he asked.

  ‘At a party. I was with my girlfriends and one of them knew him from school.’

  ‘And what does he do?’ When he’s not mentally ill, Trevor added to himself.

  ‘He’s back at university. He’s already got a degree, but it wasn’t what he wanted to do, so he’s studying again.’

  Of course, thought Trevor, a dissolute. The son of a wealthy family who never set any limits, who gave him to understand he need never do anything because there would always be money for him to indulge his little whims.

  ‘What is he studying?’

  ‘Photography. He’s very talented. You should see some of his work.’

  ‘I’d love to.’ Trevor smiled tightly. ‘What does he plan to do when he finishes?’

  Felice put her knife down, wiped her mouth and smiled. ‘What is this, the Spanish Inquisition? Don’t you trust me to choose my own boyfriend?’

  Trevor wanted to say, No, no one will ever be good enough for you, especially this one. He wanted to whisk her away to a place where all the young men were healthy and worked hard and knew the value of his little girl.

  ‘I just want to know you’re happy, that’s all.’

  ‘I am. I really am.’

  ‘So… what’s the nature, I mean, how is he… what’s he got?’

  Felice sat back in her chair, arms folded. ‘Why does it matter so much?’

  The ache in Trevor’s belly intensified.

  ‘I only want to know he can make you happy, that you’re not going to be held back by his…’ It was all coming out wrong. He’d put Felice on the defensive, the very thing he had wanted to avoid. ‘I’m sorry. Look, I’m your father, I only want what’s best for you.’

  ‘Attacking my boyfriend isn’t exactly helping, is it?’

  Trevor shrugged and shook his head. He was fighting a losing battle. If he didn’t concede defeat he might lose more than this argument.

  ‘I’m sorry, Sweetpea. When can I meet him?’ The words felt false in his mouth but they had the right effect. Felice smiled.

  ‘Tonight – you can stay, can’t you? He’s coming round later.’

  ‘I thought he was in hospital?’

  ‘He’s going to be discharged soon and he’s allowed out a bit before then. He goes to a day programme now.’

  ‘So what was the meeting this morning about?’

  ‘His future. We were talking about his support network and stuff.’

  So that’s what she was – one of a support network. The boy was so damaged he needed a web of people around him to depend on so he didn’t go mad again. It was even worse than he’d thought. He swallowed, ran a finger round the inside of his collar which suddenly felt too tight, and said he would love to stay to meet him.

  After lunch Trevor occupied himself by going to the National Gallery while Felice went back to work. He found looking at paintings soothing and went straight to the Impressionists. He loved Monet’s Giverny paintings; the colours made him feel so tranquil. He also liked his snow scenes. Another favourite was Goenuette’s Boulevard de Clichy Under Snow. There was something about snow, the way it made a place look clean and sharp. He had memories of taking Felice tobogganing on the rare occasions it snowed enough to do so – the flush of her face, the shrieks of excitement, the exhaustion at the end of the day as he trudged through the slush pulling his shivering little daughter home and the tingling of fingers as they warmed again near the fire. Maybe it was also that the scenes in the paintings were so different to the country he remembered as the place of his birth; Jamaica, with its lush tropicality, its verdant hills, its vibrancy. He had become so English that he was discomfited by the fecundity of the place, the overt sensuality.

  He sighed, moved into the next room and took a seat on one of the comfy leather sofas in front of the Constab
les. The Hay Wain evoked fond memories of the cycling holiday he and Frostie had taken in Suffolk. They’d gone to Willy Lott’s cottage specially to see the place where it was painted. They’d gazed at the cottage and walked in the fields along the River Stour, chatting about how different it must be now to how it was when Constable sat there painting. His favourite painting, though, was Stratford Mill which hung next to The Hay Wain. A group of young boys fishing, a little girl watching and the sky reflected in the wide, slow river. He sat for over an hour, his eyes on the pictures but most of the time his mind elsewhere.

  Did he really have any right to interfere in his daughter’s life anymore? She was twenty-two after all, had a good degree and a job she enjoyed and which paid enough for her to live in London.

  What he couldn’t convince himself of was that she really knew what she was getting herself into with Liam; life with a man who would never earn a regular income in his chosen profession. Trevor stopped himself. Income didn’t matter, as well he knew. He and Frostie had never been well off, with him a teacher and her managing a dress shop but they had been happy. And anyway, he reminded himself of the meeting with his in-laws that morning. They were odd people. They’d never accepted their daughter marrying a black man but they preferred to talk to him about their granddaughter’s inheritance rather than directly to her. They’d said it was because they wanted his assurance he would guide her in how to invest the money, but he thought it was more about rubbing his nose in the fact that Felice would be getting no money from his family – there was none to be had. He thought how little they knew their granddaughter if they thought she needed help in that department. She was far more financially savvy than him.

  She’d be comfortably off with what they’d put in trust for her and for that he was grateful. And even though he believed most difficulties could be overcome if two people loved each other, he couldn’t convince himself that was the case with mental illness. Felice clearly didn’t understand the magnitude of the problem. The revolving door they called it. In and out of hospital, getting a little worse each time. And what if he became violent when he was psychotic, if his voices told him to kill Felice? It had happened before – he’d read about it in the news. The very idea made him shake with anxiety.

  He dragged his attention back to the painting, tried to imagine himself holding a fishing rod, sitting on the bank or the flat barge, listening to the twittering of birds and the buzzing of insects. His heart rate slowed and a smile lifted the corners of his mouth. How beautiful, how uncomplicated a life like that would be.

  He turned to an elderly man who had sat beside him.

  ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’

  The old man said nothing, and Trevor noticed he had his eyes closed. He nodded to himself; a gallery was a good place to take a rest but he felt slightly let down, cheated out of a bit of human interaction. His nod turned to a shake of the head. What had things come to when he needed to talk to strangers to make the time pass?

  At half past four he left the fields and rivers of the Suffolk countryside in the art gallery and plunged into the chaos of Trafalgar Square. Tourists climbed onto the lions to take photos, pigeons plucked at the ground feeding off the scraps of fast food and its wrappers, suited men and women rushed by carrying briefcases and furled umbrellas. A mother screamed at her toddler who was teetering on the edge of the fountain. Ah, London, he thought, and realised he missed it now. He never had before. He’d had everything he wanted in Milton Keynes – a loving wife, a gifted daughter, a job he never grew tired of, his garden, his bicycle. It all seemed meaningless without Frostie and Felice to share it with. He went through the motions, but his heart wasn’t in it anymore.

  He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. No use getting maudlin, he told himself and launched into the stream of humanity that was London foot traffic.

  An hour later, bearing a bunch of roses and an M&S cake as peace offerings, he approached Felice’s flat. She lived in a tiny one-bedroom apartment in a large house in Lewisham that had been divided into seven flats, some of them, she’d told him, even smaller than hers. It was the first time he’d visited her in London – she usually came home to see him. If Frostie was still alive they would have been down before now – she was the organiser, the one who made arrangements for both of them. He would need to start making more of an effort. He sighed at the weight of the realisation.

  Standing before her door in the brightly lit hall he became aware of a feeling of awkwardness, as if the easy camaraderie of their relationship would be tested by this change, by her being the hostess and him the visitor. By the fact she was familiar with this place and he wasn’t. When he rang the bell she opened the door almost immediately.

  ‘Did you check the spyhole?’ asked Trevor. He had wanted her to live in a more secure block, one with video security and an entry phone. Felice had told him he was being ridiculous, that London wasn’t an unsafe place to live. Anyway, she liked this flat and even if she didn’t, she couldn’t afford anything else.

  ‘Da-ad,’ she said, drawing the word into two long syllables like she did when she thought he was being overprotective.

  He shrugged. ‘I can’t help it. There were riots here, you know.’

  ‘Yes, I know, but I wasn’t living here then and it’s all been quite calm since I moved in. Anyway, there were riots in Brixton when you lived there.’

  ‘Indeed, and they were one of the reasons we decided to move out of London. We didn’t want to raise a family in an environment like that.’ Trevor looked at his daughter sternly, but he knew nothing he said would sway her. She’d always had her own mind and there was no good trying to change it now. He’d learned over the years which battles were worth fighting and which weren’t and this one was a lost cause. He had to start trusting her judgement.

  Inside, the flat was tastefully decorated. Felice had a flair for colour and lighting. Trevor was taken by how different her taste was from her mother’s. Frostie went for three-piece suites in floral fabrics, muted colours, a clutter of ornaments and photos on every surface. Felice tended towards the minimalist – a few bright, textured cushions on the navy sofa, pictures on the walls, lamps rather than a central light, no clutter. Just the one photo on the mantelpiece of her and her parents, taken the day she’d received her university offer, their faces full of joy and pride and anticipation. Trevor picked it up, ran a finger along his wife’s face and put it down again with a sigh. He hoped Felice hadn’t seen; he didn’t want his daughter to know how lonely he was.

  ‘Drink?’ she asked.

  ‘I’d walk to India and back for a decent cup of tea.’ He rubbed his hands together.

  Felice laughed. ‘You and your tea, Dad. I meant a glass of wine or a gin and tonic. But tea it shall be.’

  Gin and tonic. His daughter was so sophisticated these days. That’s probably what working in an advertising agency did to you. He felt the tug of another apron string releasing. Those strings did that one by one he’d found, as Felice grew up and needed him less and less, made her own way in the world, started living a life that wasn’t the mirror of his.

  While Felice made the tea in the tiny kitchen, Trevor looked at the pictures on the wall. One in particular drew him. It was a black-and-white photograph of an old man, his face wrinkled and weathered by a life lived outdoors. There was a faraway look in his eyes as if he was thinking not of the photographer, or even the present moment. There was a shadow over half his face making him look wistful, not quite sad. His jacket was worn, threadbare round the collar, his jumper frayed. In the background were fishing boats. What made Trevor linger over it was the sense of calm he felt, as if the old man was reaching out to him and reminding him that life was all right. Next to the portrait was another photograph, also in black and white, of a pair of hands, the gnarled, weather-cracked fingers interlinked, resting on a stained wooden table.

  ‘They’re amazing, aren’t they?’ Felice nodded at the pictures as she came in with two mugs of tea. �
�Liam took them in Portugal when we were there last year. They’re of a fisherman we met in this tiny village in the north.’

  Trevor raised his eyebrows. ‘I didn’t know he went to Portugal with you.’

  Felice settled herself on the sofa and motioned to her father to take the chair. ‘We weren’t an item then, just friends. Six of us went.’

  ‘I knew you went with friends, I just didn’t know he was one of them.’ He sat, the mug of tea burning his hands. ‘So, how long have you been “an item”?’ And why haven’t you told me about him, he wanted to ask. When had she started shutting him out?

  ‘Since that trip. We’ve known each other since first year at university, but that trip changed everything.’

  ‘I thought you said you met him at a party.’

  ‘I did, in Oxford. He was at Keble, I was down the road at Wadham. There were always parties.’

  Trevor considered that for a moment. The boy had been at Oxford. He must have been okay then, not suffering from a mental illness or taking too many drugs. He wasn’t naïve enough to believe that any teenager these days was entirely straight.

  ‘What did he study?’

  ‘Politics, philosophy and economics. He got a first. He’s very bright.’

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘What do you mean, what happened? He finished his degree, realised he didn’t want to do any job available to someone with those skills and decided to do what he loves. He’s at LCC now.’

  Trevor realised he must have looked blank because Felice went on, ‘The London College of Communication. Doing photography. Or did you mean, what happened to make him end up in hospital?’

  Trevor looked down at his feet, the scuffed shoes, mismatched socks he only now noticed. He didn’t know what he meant by the question. He wanted to know everything and nothing about this boy, Liam; why she loved him and whether he deserved her love in return, why he felt so jealous. Trevor knew his relationship with his daughter would never be the same again, that the special place he had held in her heart now belonged to another. He took a deep breath to let the pain of that realisation pass. When he looked up, Felice was staring at him with such softness his throat constricted and his eyes stung with unshed tears.