Chapter 8
8
H elen stuck a leg out from under the duvet, feeling the relief of cool fresh air on her ankle. Her t-shirt was soaked with sweat. How on earth Kay coped without HRT was beyond her. If she could, she’d sleep naked, but the marital bed had become disputed territory and she couldn’t risk so much as a brush of her pyjama-clad leg against her husband’s, let alone the frisson of bare skin. Such a misunderstanding could wipe out the minuscule progress she’d made, if she had actually made any progress. Judging by last night’s dinner table conversation and Lawrence’s blithe assumptions about the way she might put her life on hold, she wasn’t sure she was a centimetre further along.
She folded her hands over the top of the duvet and stared at the ceiling. Her mind had already sprung clear from the starting blocks and begun its now daily exhausting sprint: How to … Where would … What if … All those practicalities she knew she must start getting to grips with. It was halted only by a message pinging through on her phone.
Can we put lunch back half an hour? Have to fit in a quick meeting. Kay can’t make it. She'll meet us after. Problem with Alex. Caro x
Helen frowned at the message, momentarily confused, before instantly remembering the lunch and shopping trip planned. Her phone pinged again.
I’m not going to buy anything, I just want to look, it’s way too early to get excited.
So a shopping trip that wasn’t even a shopping trip. And no Kay for lunch. Helen yawned. At least it would give her a chance to talk to Caro, seriously, get some one-on-one advice, some indication of how to get this practical-shaped ball rolling. Caro would be able to help and yes, after last night’s dinner this was exactly the impetus she needed.
Her phone pinged again.
V. excited! Caro x
Well so was Helen. Just not about the same thing. She let the phone drop and rubbed her eyes. Babies. They were like buses. No sign of one for decades, then suddenly too many to cope with. Beside her, Lawrence’s arm flew out and slapped her shoulder. Gripping the duvet, Helen sidled away. This could not continue. She slept so close to the edge nowadays that two nights ago she’d fallen out. Silently she slipped out of the bed, padded her way to the bathroom and greeted herself in the bathroom mirror.
Helen, Helen, Helen, she whispered and the woman in the mirror, the woman with tractor lines between her eyes and droopy jaws echoed it back. Helen, Helen, Helen.
Ten minutes later she was in the kitchen, hands on hips, watching the garden and listening to the kettle, which as well as its customary whistling seemed to be making an odd shuffling sound. Helen flicked it off. The whistling piped down, but the shuffling continued and now that the sound was isolated she could hear better. It wasn’t the kettle, it was the utility room. 8:25am on a Saturday morning and someone was doing laundry? Either that or someone had broken in. It was crystal clear which scenario was the most likely and without thinking, she grabbed the bread knife and strode to the door. Something about the utter stupidity of breaking and entering on a Saturday morning filling her with unquestioned courage. Heart pounding, she flung the door back and there was Jack kneeling in a sea of clothes. He had a bottle of fabric conditioner in one hand, the cap in the other, like a novice priest about to perform Holy Communion. Relief made her legs wobbly. She blinked.
Jack?
Doing Laundry?
At 8:25 on a Saturday morning?
Helen clamped her mouth shut. Just throw it in! she would have barked to literally anyone else on the planet naive enough to think that fabric conditioner actually needed to be measured. To Jack she smiled, lowered the knife and said, ‘Want a cup of tea?’
'She’s really fucked things up, hasn’t she?’ Jack was leaning against the oven.
Helen was leaning against the sink.
‘Don’t swear,’ she said, but she didn’t mean it and he knew she didn’t. For the first time since she came home from Cyprus, her son was actually trying to have a conversation with her, and she understood how fucking difficult that was right now.
He dipped his head to the floor. ‘I want you to know something, Mum,’ he said, his voice hoarse.
‘Jack—’
‘No, Mum, listen. Please?’
‘OK.’ She clasped her mug to her chest and nodded and willed herself not to move across and hug him. He looked so forlorn. The face of a child, the six-foot frame of a man.
‘I want you to know,’ he whispered, ‘that I won’t let you down.’
Helen gasped. The words sounded so cruel. ‘Libby hasn’t let me down,’ she managed, but even as she said it, she didn’t really believe it. ‘She’s…’ Flustered, Helen looked across the room. What had Libby done, if not let her down? All those hopes and dreams she’d nurtured for her daughter. They were impossible now. ‘This is life, Jack,’ she sighed. ‘This is what happens. You know… stuff happens.’
‘Like in Cyprus?’ Jack mumbled and lifted his chin to look at her from under the flop of his dirty-blonde hair.
Helen's shoulders rose, tensed and then dropped again. She wasn’t being attacked. There had been no accusation in her son’s voice and there was certainly none in his stance. ‘I suppose so,’ she said. ‘It’s complicated, Jack.’
‘Are you and Dad getting divorced?’
And what could she do but nod a silent yes, watching as he turned away, face flushing. It was like ripping a plaster off his scratched knee, only much, much worse. She was tearing her boy’s soft untried heart and in doing so, tearing her own. Hurting your children, it was true, was the most brutal kind of torture. For one blow landed, two came back. After all these weeks, just as he was turning toward her again, she was making him turn away. Her throat was hard and it hurt to force the words out, but she did. ‘I don’t want you to worry, Jack,’ she said. ‘About me, or your dad. We’re always going to be your parents. We’ll always be there when you need us and… You have your own life now. You’ll be off soon?—’
‘That’s what I said to Libby,’ Jack whispered as he turned back to her.
Helen stared at him.
‘Last night,’ he pushed through, his voice scraping and his eyes shiny with tears. ‘After you’d gone to bed. I told Libby that it wasn’t fair of her to expect you to look after the baby. That you have your own life.’
‘You said that?’
‘Yes, Mum,’ he mumbled. ‘ I said that.’ He blew his fringe clear from his eyes and as he did a tear escaped, wiped clear with a swift embarrassed movement.
Helen didn’t speak. She couldn’t. Her throat was raw with the concrete sob she was trying not to let out. It had been such a long time since Jack had revealed this much to her. Memories flooded back. He was still there. Under the hormones and the unspeakable debris of his room, her tender-hearted, good-natured boy who held the pegs while she hung the clothes was still there. And the idea that she was the source of his pain wasn’t something she could even look at. How could she ever have known? And if she had, if she’d known that she was capable of hurting her children so, would she ever have started this journey?
For the longest time they both stood, sight-lines like laser beams, crossing but never meeting.
‘I’m always going to be your mum, Jack,’ she whispered finally. It was all and everything she could offer. ‘Wherever I am, is your home.’
‘I know,’ he whispered in response, lip trembling.
She hesitated half a moment before saying, ‘Do you want a hug?’ Her whole world pinned upon him saying yes. That he would give her permission to hold him, like she used to.
He didn’t move, but his head bobbed a tiny movement up and down.
She was barely as tall as his shoulder, her hands not quite meeting around his back. The baby she’d strapped to her chest for months and months, the tiny tot who sat on the counter while she buttered toast soldiers.
‘Everything’s going to be OK, Mum,’ he whispered, as he hugged her back, those same words she’d comforted him with so many times before. ‘Everything’s going to be OK.’
Later, with one child showering, and another child (with child) sleeping, Helen set about the kitchen. She emptied the dishwasher and re-filled it, cleaned the sink and sorted the recycling, swept the floor, fed the cat, cleaned the sink again. Wiping benches, her pace slowed and she leaned back against the counter to look around the room she had spent such a large part of her life in. What would she take? The clarity of the thought surprised her. It’s clean practicality, a cool relief. Her nose wrinkled as she squinted up to the top shelf of the dresser. Obviously, the rose teapot that had belonged to her grandmother. And that pottery pencil holder beside it that Jack made at school, and the set of…
With zero warning Lawrence materialised in the doorway, splintering her chain of thought into useless pieces. He was dressed in neon green cycling shorts and an orange and green lycra top. In one quick movement he was at the fridge, pouring a glass of juice and knocking it back. ‘I’m going for a ride,’ he said, lowering the glass.
‘Really?’ She nodded at his shorts. ‘I thought you were on your way to Tesco . ’
But Lawrence had already turned to the dresser and was fiddling with a watch or a sat nav, or a heart monitor thingy. She didn’t know if he’d even heard her joke, and what she noticed was the vacuum of emotion she felt. It didn’t matter. Suddenly it didn’t matter any more that he didn’t listen to her jokes, or that he didn’t find them funny, that he was and always would be hopelessly absorbed in his own Lawrence-centred world. She watched him strap the thingy on and make his energy drink – 500ml of water, three scoops of (very special) powder. God, once upon a time she used to stand and make the mix up for him.
‘Lawrence,’ she said, turning her head sideways to look at him. ‘I think we should start things moving.’
‘What do you mean?’ The pointy point of his helmet was like that huge pointy finger on those war posters, accusing. She wanted to laugh, but now was absolutely not the right time to laugh. With effort she continued.
‘I think we should start sorting things out. You know, financially at least.’
Lawrence snapped the lid of his sports drink shut. ‘We’re not doing anything until Libby has had the baby,’ he barked and shook the drink violently.
We’re not doing anything. We’re not … The words winded her. So much so that unconsciously she took a step sideways, away from him. He’d grabbed the reins again. Taken control, when it was her life too. Her own life as Jack had said less than ten minutes ago. She swallowed hard. ‘What I’m saying,’ she began in a voice that sounded oddly loud, ‘is that I think we should start getting the finances straight. Separated. Get the house valued.’
‘I can’t believe you!’ Lawrence spun to face her, his face as orange as his sports drink. ‘What kind of a mother are you, Helen? You’d see your daughter homeless, when she needs you the most? You… you’re…God, Helen!’
Helen’s jaw dropped. Half shock, half disbelief. What kind of a mother was she? A good one, she thought. A devoted one if the last two decades were anything to go by.
And with another two enormous strides he was out of the kitchen.
She didn’t move. Back to the counter, she stood and stared across her empty kitchen for long and silent minutes. The clock ticked on, its brassy hands showing IX something and outside of the window the forsythia swayed, flashes of vibrant green scratching at the window, the flowers long gone. Helen turned to the sound. So what kind of a mother was she? The kind with a teenage son who still talked to her! The kind with a grown daughter who still sobbed on her shoulder. She was every kind of mother, depending on the time of day and the state of their rooms and the last row, but most of all, she was the kind of mother who was there . She had been present and no one could take that away from her. Especially the one person who had, so often, been absent! It wasn't fair of Lawrence. But then nothing about the way he ran his life, she understood now, was fair. He went whenever it suited him and always had. A month here, two months there. Weekends year round. Helen pressed her hands to the counter, leaned forward and closed her eyes. If she did wait, how much longer could she wait? Another six months? Because that’s what it would be with a baby coming. The chaotic aftermath as everyone found their feet. Could she go through all that with no light at the end of the tunnel? Or was it more likely that she’d lose her way again, give up, allow herself to fall between the cushions once more? The weight of the stone at the small of her back was as real as it had been on that day, on that beach with Kaveh. And the moment of level-headed clarity she'd experienced a few minutes ago felt suddenly as rare as a completed to do list. One of those precious light-filled moments in which she could see beyond the landscape of this house. She turned back to her kitchen, went to the dresser and took down the little rose teapot. Then hugging it close to her chest, she ran up the stairs, two at a time.
Straight into the small walk-in cupboard – home to the most precious and the most useless objects in the house. Dusty photo albums, where her mother lived again as the first woman in Whitley Bay to wear a bikini. Red booklets that spelled out in centimetres and kilograms Jack and Libby’s first twelve months. An ice-cream maker, whose duplicate sat in a kitchen cupboard, equally unused. A set of cut-glass whisky tumblers, next to her wedding album. And there, the grey box file labelled in her own hand. Important Things. She pulled it down, took out her passport, and what else? Marriage certificate, that should do. She slapped them onto the bed and stood looking at the open file, struggling with the temptation to pick up the Certificate of Stillbirth, which lay on the top of the pile. Resisting the urge to carry it across to the bed, curl up under the duvet and allow herself to once again become submerged in a quicksand that was equal parts nostalgia and grief. Her hand reached for the certificate, memories flooding back. Caro was there. It was Caro who had held her hand as she went through her first labour, with her first child, who had already died. And it was Caro who just last week at Kay's house was telling her to get busy.
With infinite care she ran the tip of her finger across the printed name, whispering it aloud: Daniel Andrew Winters. A calm settled, silent and fragile as the first snowfall. She’d been every kind of mother she could possibly be, to all her children.
Courage, Helen, she whispered as she pressed her finger to her lips and touched it once again to the first name, of her first child.
Then she threw off her dressing gown and stepped into the shower. If she left soon enough she’d have time to get at least one ball moving before catching the train. One ball to push down the hill, after which everything else would follow.