Chapter 19 Before
Before
The hours after the fall were like a surreal pantomime.
The humanity switch seemed to flick back on in our father at the sound of our collective screams and the sight of my little body in a heap.
He ran to me, scooped me up in his ham fists, poking and prodding through tears, asking if I was okay.
I was not. But beyond a cut lip, it seemed the worst damage that was done to me was psychological. At least, he hoped it was.
My father was no doctor, and my mother, a part-time nurse whose split brow was gushing blood into her eye, was determined to get me in to see one.
That humanity wavered in Dad then, and he raged, screaming blue murder about Mother trying to get him “done in.” But when the conversation was dropped, when it was agreed my mother knew enough to know I was okay, that we wouldn’t be going anywhere, he was all apologies, tears, and kisses again.
It wouldn’t happen again.
He was so sorry.
He wished she wouldn’t drive him to the edge like this, it killed him.
She’d heard it all before. Although to my young ears, it sounded like maybe he meant it this time, that he was capable of change. After all, the way Dad would cuddle me, toss me in the air, play dinosaurs with me…he couldn’t be a bad guy, could he?
My little brain and bruised body didn’t know how to compute these thoughts, and I just screamed, as did Claire.
Screamed as he tried to hug us; screamed as he set down ice-cream bowls adorned with our favorite sprinkles; screamed as he waved our most-played-with toys before us and tried to get us to engage.
With Mother little more receptive to his attempts, even the gentle dressing of her injuries, he eventually gave up, wailed that we didn’t love him, and left with a slamming of the front door.
I took my little sugar-sick belly over to Mother, who was still cowering on the floor. She’d hardly moved from where she’d fallen at the foot of the stairs. She put her arms around me and pressed her nose into my hair.
“Ouch, sweetie. Not so tight there,” she said, pulling my tiny arms loose from her waist.
“Are you okay, Mommy?” I asked. In retrospect, I know how stupid a question that was, but I didn’t know which other questions there were to ask.
“Of course, baby. Mommy just might need you to watch Claire for a few hours, and maybe get the two of you something from the fridge to eat at dinnertime.”
I blinked. Watch Claire, dinner. I’d watched Claire plenty and helped Mother with dinner before, but this was the first time I was being charged with both on my own. I simply stuffed a small fist into my mouth and nodded.
Looking back, I’m not quite sure how we managed it, but Claire and I spent the next couple of hours, and then days, looking after ourselves and looking after Mother, too.
I couldn’t cook anything for us, but I managed to find some bread buns, crisp packets, and chocolate, which tided us over for the first day.
And when that ran out, I messily cobbled together some bowls of cereal.
Mother had crawled to her room on the first night and stayed there since.
Claire and I would run in to check on her, but she didn’t want to speak.
This was and wasn’t new. I was used to Mother sometimes hiding in herself when Dad’s screams were in her ears and his hands were on her body.
That vacant look in her eyes always told me she’d gone away.
I slowly learned that this disappearance was pain relief; she let someone else take the blows while she went elsewhere.
Eventually, I would learn to do that, too. It helps, I think.
On the third day, life began to leach back into her.
She came downstairs, still slow, still wincing, but she came down all the same.
Her bruised eyes took in the chaos, the stream of crumbs and souring milk on the floor, the scattered pages and broken crayons.
Neither Claire nor I had bathed, and we both looked as dirty as the room smelled.
We had been doing our best, but we were still so small.
Mother straightened a little at the sight of us. Early-morning sun was flooding the living room, illuminating our sorry states.
“Right, girls. Let’s get you a proper breakfast and then bath time.”
I do remember crying at this point. Crying because the woman who had been living in my mother’s skin and didn’t want to talk to me was gone, and our real mother was back. Flaws and all.
Again, hindsight is a useful thing, and looking back, I should have known that this was too abrupt a recovery.
Emotionally, I mean. I should have known at that point that she was planning something.
In any case, I simply rejoiced as she set down steaming plates of eggs in front of us.
They came with cold glasses of orange juice, condensation beading on the glasses, and sides of hot, freshly buttered toast.
I sort of recognize that eerie calm now, the peace after the storm. She’d grabbed onto a lifeline, the only one she could find, and it had a dangerous edge.
The house over the next few days was the most peaceful I remember it being.
The three of us stayed at home, Mother’s wounds slowly healing.
She read to us, we built forts in the kitchen and the garden, we ate okra and banku and all the other things Dad said he couldn’t stomach when he was around. But he wasn’t, not for a whole week.
I’m not sure if Mother called around to ask where he was. I’m not sure exactly where it is that he stayed. All I know is that a week later, he came stumbling into the house, a faint whiff of whisky wafting over the perfume of the obscenely large bouquet of flowers in his hands.
There were no harsh words from either parent, simply a wary sizing up as they locked eyes until Dad eventually grunted,
“I’m sorry.”
More silence. The flowers were placed on the dining table and then: “I’m going to bed.”
The festivities ended then. We didn’t quite cower in his presence, but we all tiptoed around the land-mine-infested soil of his feelings. He was still somewhat contrite, it seemed, so it was easy enough not to set him off. How long that would last, however, was uncertain.
One evening, a couple of days later, Claire and I sat cross-legged in front of some cartoons while Mother and Dad lay on the sofa behind us. Mother was feeding him whisky, one glass at a time. With each glass, his mood turned more and more sour, and his words became meaner and meaner.
“Off to bed now, darlings—it’s past your bedtime,” she said.
It was rare for us to give up TV time in any hurry—it was a real treat—but with the storm clouds gathering, we were only too happy to comply. Mother followed us upstairs, tucked us into bed, and kissed us on our cheeks.
“Everything’s going to be okay, promise,” she said.
We both let our eyelids close and our minds drift to sleep with that promise echoing in our ears.
It was the loud crash that eventually woke us. Our room was still dark, so I knew it was still nighttime, my body eager to get back to sleep. But little Claire was scared.
“It’s okay. Wait here, Care. I’ll be back.”
It’s a big sister’s job to look after her little sister, no? Even when you’re just as scared as she is. Even if you just want to get back under the covers and chase the thought of nightmare monsters away.
But I was going to be brave.
I inched out of the bedroom and slowly made my way to the landing. Mother was standing at the top of the stairs, back pumping up and down with heavy breaths, fists clenched tight by her sides. She looked at once ready to spring into action and frozen. Totally frozen.
“Mommy?” I asked.
I walked my little legs over to her, small hands reaching up into the folds of her nightdress and yanking. “Mommy?” I asked again.
When no response came, I followed the track of her eyes, staring down the narrow hallway into the near distance.
As I followed her line of sight, I realized that we weren’t alone.
Dad was sprawled at the bottom of the stairs, one arm and his neck at an unnatural angle.
His eyes were staring, unseeing, back at Mommy.
I wonder if she was the last thing he saw, or if he was already dead when his gaze fell that way.
In any case, he never saw anything else again.