We All Live Here

Chapter Forty

Lila

Lila cannot focus on the first few minutes of the performance. She is struggling to take in what has just happened, the way that Gene just lied to Bill. She keeps thinking about what Jane had said: Infidelity I could have forgiven, the degree to which he was in love with her I could not . There must be some ulterior reason Gene did what he’d done, she keeps telling herself. There always is with Gene.

Jensen, perhaps detecting her distance from proceedings, leans into her. “You okay?” he murmurs.

“That was so weird,” she whispers back. “Because he definitely slept with Mum.”

Jensen looks at her. “But why would he lie about it?”

“I have no idea.” And then someone mutters, “ Do you mind? ” in an exasperated voice behind them, and Jensen shifts back toward his own seat. Violet has appeared on the stage. Violet, who is wearing an ill-fitting silver dress and is filled with the preternatural confidence she seems to have been born with, steps out without a moment’s hesitation into the spotlight and begins narrating from a large paper scroll. The Darling children are in their bedrooms, their parents about to go out for the evening.

Lila lets out a breath, tries to push the last few minutes from her head, and settles into her hard wooden seat, just as she has settled into dozens of such school performances, braced for their odd mixture of poignancy and boredom, the way as a parent you can want these moments to last five minutes and a lifetime all at once. As Violet describes the scene before them, Lila’s gaze flickers around the rest of the audience. Two rows in front, to the left, sits Philippa Graham, beside a balding man in a business suit, clearly just back from work. He has put an extra glass of red wine under his seat. She can just make out Gabriel Mallory down toward the front, seated beside his mother. He runs a hand through his floppy hair, checks his phone briefly, and then, perhaps aware he is being looked at, glances behind him. Lila makes sure her face is turned away. She feels almost nothing toward him now, oddly, except vague irritation that she will have to see him at the school gates for the next few years, like a bad meal repeating on you. A reminder of her vanity and stupidity, perhaps.

“He said I have to grow up and I don’t want to grow up, Mother!” Wendy exclaims, on stage, scratching at her leg distractedly.

“Nobody wants to grow up, Wendy,” says Mrs. Darling, in the exaggerated voice of a period-drama housekeeper. There is a low murmur of laughter in the audience.

And then, moments later, through a gap in the painted scenery, Peter Pan enters. Except Peter is not wearing green tights and a tunic. He is wearing…a burgundy two-piece uniform with silver epaulets and what looks like a ring of Saturn over his left breast. A low hum of surprise ripples across the audience. The uniform is oddly familiar. Lila stares at it. And then she realizes: it is a Star Squadron Zero costume. It is one her father used to wear on the television show. A few minutes later the Lost Boys appear, and they are in Star Squadron Zero costumes too.

When Captain Hook comes on he is an alien, wearing a scaly head with a green elephant-like trunk. Lila knows it immediately: this was a television alien that terrified her during her childhood. It was the point at which Francesca insisted she stopped watching her father’s show, blaming it for nightmares that lasted until Lila was almost ten. The entire production, she grasps now, is in Star Squadron Zero costumes. The script has been altered slightly—Captain Hook is an interplanetary villain, and the crocodile is a space lizard. The pirate ship is a space pirate ship and Neverland is now a planet, its backdrop one of those old-fashioned pictures of the moon’s surface, with craters and a flag.

Around them the audience of parents laugh as the Lost Boys, in their oversized uniforms (if one looked closely it was just possible to make out the safety pins and rudimentary stitching holding them up), fight back against the space pirates. Tinkerbell is a flying astronaut, her hair a silver beehive similar to Troy Strang’s once-recurrent love interest Vuleva.

Hugo is playing Michael, the youngest of the Darling children. Lila’s heart always gives a reflexive lurch when she sees Hugo, as if he is the symbol of so much she has lost. He has no lines—or if he has he has forgotten them. His role seems to be to be propelled gently from one end of the stage to the other while the children declaim their lines around him, or are prompted by Mrs. Tugendhat from the side. Occasionally someone whispers in his ear but he seems utterly frozen.

The production staggers forward, through Neverland, the death by space lizard of Hook (which prompts good natured cheers from the audience), a slightly shambolic dance with what had been American Indians but are now space crew from another ship (their uniforms are gold Lurex with a definite seventies flare). There are songs, “You Can Fly!” and “Following the Leader,” taken from the film, the musical accompaniment comically raggle-taggle and only occasionally in tune, the tiny musicians shifting in their seats and periodically breaking off to wave surreptitiously at their parents. Beside her, Jensen keeps laughing, collapsing into giggles, apparently enjoying the chaos on the stage. He was so ready to come along and be part of it, happy to shape himself into her world, instead of expecting her to orbit around him. She finds herself sneaking glances at him, wondering that she had ever found him less attractive than Gabriel Mallory. She can barely sit beside him now without wanting to touch him, and as they watch, she reaches her hand across in the dark and slides it into his. His fingers close around hers unthinkingly, and he glances briefly toward her and smiles, as if this has surprised them both.

Around her Lila listens to the parents coo, or murmur to each other, the proud exclamations of grandparents as their child appears on cue, the soft mentions of names and surreptitious holding up of phones to take photographs, and feels something in her soften, some long-held tension start to evaporate, replaced instead by a sense of wonder, of the impermanence of things and how that, too, can be blissful and heartbreaking at the same time. Lila watches Violet as she emerges repeatedly from the wings to explain what is about to happen or to fill in some gap in the narrative, her voice clear and unwavering, and wonders what kind of young woman she will become. Will she hang on to that confidence? Or is life going to batter it out of her, squeeze her into a role she never asked for, in the way it does so many of us? Stay the same, my darling , she tells her silently. Just stay who you are, fart jokes, inappropriate rap music and all.

In the final scene Wendy, back in her nightie, is telling her mother about their adventures. “Look, Mother, see how well he sails the spaceship? Off to another galaxy!”

For once, it seems, “Michael” must speak. He turns and gazes out at the audience. The girl playing Wendy turns to Hugo. “Tell Mother—didn’t we have an amazing adventure, Michael?” Mother waits attentively, Father hovering at her side, periodically adjusting his false mustache, which keeps slipping down the left of his face.

Nothing happens.

Wendy finally gives Hugo a vigorous nudge. Perhaps it is the reference to mothers that does for him. Perhaps it is the spotlight, or finally having to speak toward 150 rapt parents. But Hugo gazes out at the audience and his little face begins to crumple. Lila watches as, under the bright lights, a tear slides visibly down his face.

There is a certain kind of hush in a school hall that comes when it’s clear that a child is actually traumatized on stage and nobody knows quite what to do. The small boy stands in the beam of light, unable to move. He gives a great, visible gulp. Oh, no , thinks Lila. The poor child . And then Celie stands up suddenly beside her. “Go, Hugo!” she calls to him. “You can do it!”

She starts to clap him, blushing furiously with anxiety even as she does. Hugo looks up, and he registers her. “Go, Hugo!” Celie says again.

Lila can see Dan in the half-light, making his way awkwardly along the line of chairs, other parents standing, shifting aside to let him through. He crouches at the side of the stage, trying to call something inaudible to Marja’s son. The whole room is gazing at this small child for whom this night, perhaps these last few weeks, has clearly been too much.

“Yeah, Hugo!” says Celie. She glances anxiously at Lila, clearly afraid that this will be taken as a sign of her disloyalty. And something in Lila gives.

She finds she is on her feet beside her daughter.

“Yes, Hugo!” she says, and starts to clap. “Go on! You can do it!”

And suddenly a scattering of other parents are whooping and cheering, calling his name. A couple of the children step forward on the stage, encouraging him, murmuring at him, a swell of performative helpfulness rippling through the cast. Wendy steps forward and whispers in Hugo’s ear. He nods then turns back to face the audience.

There is a hush. It feels as if the whole audience is holding its collective breath. His eyes widen, and for a moment he looks as if he’s going to cry again. Then Hugo swallows, and his high child’s voice breaks into the silence, wavering a little: “I—I knew Peter Pan would save us.”

And suddenly Lila is clapping, and Celie is whooping, punching the air, and Jensen stands up beside her and shouts too. And the whole audience is clapping and cheering, so that whatever the last lines actually were are completely drowned in the applause. And Lila feels Jensen’s fingers close around hers and something in her chest is bursting, tears are brimming in her eyes and with her other hand she takes Celie’s, and their eyes meet, and Lila nods. Good job , she tells her daughter silently, and just for once, Celie smiles back, and takes it.

···

She is about to head outside for some fresh air when Mrs. Tugendhat stops her, her face flushed, a hand pressed to her chest. “Oh, Lila, what a night. What an amazing job your father did. You know the children have adored working with him.”

Lila doesn’t need to ask what she means this time. She feels suddenly hollowed out from the evening’s events. “I—It was an amazing production, Mrs. Tugendhat. Well done. I’m just so sorry I wasn’t able to help more.”

Mrs. Tugendhat is clearly giddy with relief that it has all gone off as planned. “Silver linings, my dear. Your father is a born teacher. The children were so enthusiastic to do it his way. They loved the costumes, even if some of them were a little full of moth! I don’t think we’ve ever had a better production.”

Lila is almost reluctant to ask. “How—how long has he been helping?”

“It must be four, five weeks now? It was very kind of you to suggest it, Lila. Him bringing the costumes in was a blessing. But really it was the acting and the enthusiasm that brought it all to life. It’s not often you get a genuine Hollywood star on your school production! And using actual Hollywood props! My old colleagues at St. Mary’s are green with envy, I can tell you!”

She glances over the heads of the parents toward the back of the stage. “Now I must go and find Mr. Darling. Apparently there has been a little accident. Overexcitement, I think. Or maybe it was too much apple juice. Do excuse me.”

···

Bill is tired after the drama of the performance, and perhaps still digesting what he’d been told before the show, so after he and Penelope have made their way carefully to the end of the row of seats he tells Lila, clasping her arms, that they have had a lovely time but are going to head for home. “Please tell Violet I’m immensely proud of her. She was faultless. Faultless!”

Lila hugs him, breathing in his familiar old-man scent of tweed and soap. “I’ll tell her, Bill. She’ll be so happy that you came.”

Around them people are making their way to the back of the room, grabbing final glasses of wine while their children change out of their costumes, comparing funny stories about the performance. Lila is grateful to have her family there. Just for once she doesn’t feel like the awkward person who doesn’t really fit, and she’s shielded from the likes of Philippa Graham and Gabriel Mallory. She sees Dan, with Marja’s mother, and he catches her eye and raises a hand, perhaps in thanks, perhaps just in greeting, she isn’t sure. He looks, she thinks suddenly, like someone she doesn’t really know anymore. Then she sees him register Jensen beside her, the faint flicker of something passing across his face, and realizes that perhaps, from now on, she is not the only one who is going to have to adapt.

Jensen has offered to take Bill and Penelope out to the car, just to make sure they’re okay, and Lila tells him she’s going backstage to find Violet. But it isn’t just Violet she wants to see.

···

As usual, you can hear him before you see him. He is in the backstage area, moving scenery with some of the bigger year sevens and eights. He’s congratulating the children as they filter past, sporadically straightening up to give them high fives.

“Hamoud! My man! That was some guitar you were playing out there!” He stoops to pat a small alien shuffling past in an oversized costume, small trails of glitter in its wake. “Nancy? You were such a cool alien! I’ll bet your parents didn’t even know it was you in there!”

Lila stands and watches him, this man who can apparently be to other children what he never was to her. She has to move to the side as the pirate spaceship is carried past by two enormous boys and a caretaker, huffing slightly with the effort. And when it passes she sees Gene is looking at her, his expression a little wary, as if he’s unsure what is about to happen. He fixes a smile on his face. “Hey, sweetheart. If you’re looking for Violet, she’s just getting out of her dress.”

Lila takes a couple of steps closer to him. “You lied to Bill,” she says.

“No, I didn’t.”

“I know you did. You’re not that good an actor.”

They stare at each other, like two prize fighters facing off.

And then Lila says: “It was…a nice thing.”

Gene tilts his head, rubs at it with his right hand. He relaxes a little. “Huh.” He shrugs. “Well, she did only want Bill. It seemed like the right thing to do.”

“How long have you been seeing the girls? I’m guessing you’ve been coming here the whole time.”

He grimaces. “Every day. Don’t be hard on them. It’s my fault. I just…I knew you had your hands full. I didn’t want them to think I’d deserted them. But I should’ve said. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” She stares at him, at his saggy, apologetic face. At his I’m Sorry, I Was Probably High T-shirt. At the way he clearly doesn’t know what to do with any of his limbs.

“God, Dad.” She throws up her hands. “Why can’t you just let me hate you like a normal person?”

His face collapses a little. “Ah, don’t hate me, Lila baby. You’re killing me.” He steps forward, and she feels his big arms surround her, the resoluteness of his hold on her. She feels, suddenly, as if she’s four years old, before she knew he was leaving, before she felt that nothing would be reliable ever again. She stands and grips her father, ignoring the people moving stuff around them, the excited squeals of the children emerging from the changing rooms, Mrs. Tugendhat’s urgent demands for kitchen roll from somewhere in the distance. She lets herself rest against him, holding him as tightly as he is holding her, wondering at the fact that finally, thirty-five years late, she may have been able to rely on her father more than she had realized. Finally she pulls back, and wipes at her face, trying to pull herself together.

“So. What’s this about a Comic Con?”

Gene’s face lights up. “Oh. Yeah. It’s going to bring in some money, hopefully get my profile up again. First one’s in Seattle in a couple of weeks.”

“Seattle? America? You’re going back to America?”

They gaze at each other awkwardly. And there it is, gone. Lila feels the familiar ice close around her, the shell once again taking hold.

“Well, yeah. I mean it’s good money.”

“Right.”

Gene’s eyes travel across her face. “Oh…no! But it’s only a week. I’m—I’m going to need somewhere to stay when I come back.” As Lila stares at him, he continues, “I mean, ideally, I’d want to keep on hanging with everyone…my family…I—It would feel pretty crappy to have got to know everyone just to disappear again.”

Lila makes sure she has heard him right. “You’re coming back?”

“Oh, sure. These fan conventions are only a few times a year. I’m going to have to find some work in between times. Ideally, right here.”

Violet appears between them, beaming and wearing her normal clothes. She has located a packet of Walkers and is stuffing her face with cheese and onion crisps.

“Great job, kiddo!” Gene’s voice is suddenly booming again, filled with confidence. “You rocked that narration! You carry on like that, and we’re going to have to find you an agent!”

Violet, still chewing, accepts his praise as her due, and takes Gene’s hand with casual possessiveness. She registers Lila standing there, and turns back to him. She waits until she has finished her mouthful then says, “Are you coming back with us?”

Gene looks at Lila. She sees her father’s uncertain expression, Bill’s relief, Violet’s fingers inside her grandfather’s hand, the whole familial mess of it all. “Yes,” she says. “Gene is coming back with us.”

Violet throws her arms around him. “Yay! We can watch that episode of Star Squadron Zero where you and Vuleva meet the sexy aliens! I found it on YouTube.”

Gene’s gaze flickers toward Lila. “Ah, maybe not that one, honey. I’ve seen that one too and that—that one was not, strictly speaking, a Star Squadron episode.” And then he quickly changes the subject and starts sweeping up the excess glitter.

···

It is almost half past eight when they walk out into the lobby area, where a multitude of parents are still milling around waiting for stray, overtired children and drinking the dregs of their wine. The air is thick with congratulations, exclamations, mothers trying to locate coats and bags, the odd father studying his watch and murmuring that they should go. She spies Celie, saying goodbye to Dan, who is carrying an exhausted Hugo, and Lila lifts her head, trying to see over everyone, to locate Jensen. “I think he must be still in the school hall,” she tells Gene and Violet, but they are deep in conversation about Mr. Darling wetting his pants, and she isn’t sure they hear her. She’s just about to walk into the hall when she hears a sudden commotion behind her, a kind of collective whoo! Something makes her turn back.

She feeds her way through the thin crowd and there is Gabriel Mallory, bent over in a small semi-circle of people. He is wiping red wine from his face. Standing a few feet in front of him, Jessie is wearing a denim dress and a pair of orange Cuban-heeled boots. “You,” she says, into the stunned silence, “are an absolute knob.” She turns to his mother, who is staring at her, aghast. “Honestly, I hate to blame other women for the abysmal behavior of men but you really need to have a word with your son.”

Jessie puts down her empty glass and starts walking back through the crowd, apparently oblivious to the shocked stares of the other parents. It is as she reaches the coat pegs that she spots Lila, who is standing open-mouthed. She does a small double-take, as if it is the nicest of surprises to find her there. “I hoped I’d see you. Want to go for a drink sometime?”

Lila closes her mouth. “Yes. Yes, I do,” she says, nodding. “Definitely.”

Jessie flashes her a grin, then reaches for her coat on the peg. “Great. I’ll give you a call.” And then she walks off backstage.