33
Leonard’s house is a couple of kilometres outside of Cordes, in a hamlet not far from Les Cabannes. He rented the one-bedroom stone cottage from an older couple, who lived next door. Jack and I park the car along the side of the road, where a woman in her seventies is waiting in her slippers with a set of keys.
‘It’s such a shame,’ she says, shaking her head as she opens Leonard’s front door for us. ‘Young people and their pills.’
Jack and I smile at each other. Leonard was fifty-seven. He’d get a kick out of that.
‘At least he was not obese,’ Mme Chave continues. ‘Americans, they do not know how to eat. It is all le fast food . No wonder they start wars all the time. Their brains are starved of nutrients.’
‘Fun fact,’ I say. ‘France has more McDonald’s restaurants than any other European country.’
Mme Chave scowls at me.
‘Well, thanks for letting us in, Mme Chave,’ says Jack. ‘We can take it from here.’
She’s about to demur when Jack disarms her with one of his gargantuan TV smiles. She softens and leaves us to it, firing a final look of disdain in my direction.
The first thing I notice about the cottage is the lack of light. There aren’t many windows and what windows there are, are tiny. The front door opens straight onto the kitchen-diner, a small room with a low, beamed ceiling and an open fireplace fitted with a wood-burning stove. Leaning against the wall opposite a spotless worktop is Leonard’s bicycle, the mud still fresh on the tyres, a hi-vis vest in the panier. In the corner is a battered-looking brown sofa covered in a tie-dye throw, and a coffee table, on which sits a half-eaten plate of crackers and blue cheese, and a glass of milk that’s started to yellow at the top. Leonard’s last supper. I feel sad, not at this dinner for one – I’ve had plenty of those over the years – but at the intimacy of the scene. I don’t know many adults who drink milk. It’s considered weird, not something you’d order in public anyway. But we’re not in public. This is Leonard’s private space and there’s a touching innocence to his choice of beverage.
I pick up a half-smoked joint from an ashtray on the shelf underneath the table. Did Leonard sit here and smoke this before going to bed the other night? Did he wait for the joint to kick in before taking the sleeping pills and the Valium? Or did he take them all at once? Did he go to sleep fearful, waiting for the pounding in his heart to stop and the feeling of dread in his stomach to subside? Or did he drift off peacefully in a medicated haze?
I should be helping Jack pack up Leonard’s things – he’s already started to clear out the fridge, disposing of food past its expiry date – but I want to stay a little longer in Leonard’s world, soak up the parts of him he didn’t let anyone else see. I walk over to the bookcase, a simple plywood structure with four shelves, in the corner of the room. They’re stacked mainly with vinyl – every one of Leonard Cohen’s fourteen albums, Patti Smith, Bob Dylan, Nick Drake and Lou Reed. There’s a bunch of incense sticks and a child’s drawing – three smiling stick figures holding hands beside an apple tree. On the third shelf is a framed photograph of an attractive woman with Princess Di hair, a little girl aged around six on her knee. They’re sitting on a mushroom-coloured sofa, a floral-print wallpaper in the background. Both are pulling silly faces – the mum crossing her eyes and making fish lips, the girl sticking out her tongue playfully. There’s another photo beside it. A man in a sleeveless checked shirt is standing on a vast stage, clutching a microphone in one hand and fist-bumping the air with the other. There’s a band behind him, their faces out of focus except for one guy on a bass, who looks like he’s having the time of his life. I pick the photo up for a closer look. What the …
‘Jack! Come over here!’
Jack crosses the room, bin bag in hand.
‘What is it?’
‘Check this out,’ I say, handing him the photo.
He holds it up to the light and squints. ‘Is that …?’
‘Yep, Leonard.’
‘Playing bass for …’
‘Uh-huh, Bruce Springsteen.’
‘Wow. So that was actually true?’
‘Wait, what’s this?’ I say, spotting a metal star on a blue, white and red ribbon tucked behind The Best of Van Morrison .
‘Jesus,’ Jack says, taking the object out of my hand. That’s a Silver Star. It’s one of the highest military awards in the US. It’s given to soldiers for exceptional bravery. Did Leonard ever mention he was in the army?’
‘He said he was in Iraq, but I took it with a silo of salt, like I did all Leonard’s stories.’
‘I guess we were wrong. What a guy! Leonard really lived, huh?’
Jack shakes his head in disbelief, laughing to himself as he returns to what we’re here to do – box up a life. I put the star back on the shelf, a wave of remorse washing over me. Did Leonard know we doubted him? I tell myself to keep it together, focus on what I need to do. I head into the bedroom and open the heavy damask curtains. A sliver of light enters through what I’m guessing was intended to be a window. I open the latch to air the space and look around for a bag for Leonard’s clothes. I spot a suitcase on top of the wardrobe and stand on my tiptoes to reach it. Lifting it down, I place it on the bed and start going through the chest of drawers, filling the case with harem pants and smock shirts. Bending down to empty the bottom drawer, I accidentally knock the case off the bed, its newly packed contents spilling out onto the floor. I crouch down on my knees and spy a manilla-coloured envelope sticking out from underneath the pile of clothes. It must have been in one of the bag’s interior pockets. I reach for the envelope and turn it over. It’s addressed to a Randall Zimmerman. Puzzled, I sit on the bed. I shouldn’t read it. I’ve never pried into anyone’s affairs, never pushed someone to confide information they weren’t ready to reveal. I value my own privacy too much. But I can’t shake the feeling that there’s something inside this envelope I need to know. The seal is already broken. I pull out a sheet of folded paper and read.
Hey Randall,
I wanted to say thanks for the gift for Casey. She loves the rabbit and insists on bringing it to bed with her every night. It’s hard to believe she’s four already. We had a little party to celebrate in the back yard. Just family and close friends. Mom made her world-famous chocolate cake with raspberry frosting. You remember it? I insisted on it for all my birthdays.
Casey started preschool recently and I guess I’ve had a lot of time to think with the house being so quiet and all. I still don’t fully get why you left. I was ten – old enough to be owed some sort of explanation. But you didn’t say anything. You didn’t even try to help me understand. You just came into my room to kiss me goodbye and tell me you were sorry. I’ve asked Mom, so many times, why you walked out on us. She said she never really knew either, that you’d stopped confiding in her years before. But she’s never said a bad word against you, not once in all this time. I’ve thought badly of you. Plenty of times. I’ve been so mad. So jealous of all my friends, watching them with their perfect families at graduation, their dads giving them away on their wedding day. It felt like you took something from me, like I lost a part of myself that day.
Now that I’m a parent myself and a bit older, I’m not angry anymore. I get that life isn’t as straightforward as we’d like it to be. I guess what I’m saying is, I forgive you, Dad. And if you ever decide to come back home, you’ve got a place to stay and a grand-daughter who’d love to meet the man who voiced Theodore the chipmunk.
Take care,
Christina
PS: Here’s a photo of Casey. Mom thinks she looks like you.
My hand starts to shake as I try to take in what I’ve just read.
‘What do you want to do with all these LPs? Should we donate them to a vinyl store?’
Jack is standing in the doorway. He furrows his brow when he sees me.
‘What’s the matter?’ he says walking over to me and crouching at my feet.
‘Leonard’s real name was Randall,’ I say flatly, handing him the letter. ‘He walked out on his family.’
Jack stands up and reads the letter, frowning. When he finishes, he looks down at me.
‘Leonard was the voice of Theodore in Alvin and the Chipmunks ?!’
He immediately registers my lack of amusement.
‘What I meant to say is, poor guy. That’s intense.’
‘Poor guy? Poor Leonard?’ I say incredulously.
He looks surprised at my reaction. ‘Well, yes. He obviously had a complicated past.’
‘Don’t you think he did a shitty thing?’ I say, stand ing up and brushing past him to get to the window. How did Leonard sleep in here? It’s like a prison.
‘I think we don’t know his reasons for doing what he did and it’s not our place to judge,’ says Jack.
‘But like, he left his daughter when she was ten with no explanation and he clearly hadn’t seen her in the intervening years. What kind of person does that?’
Jack tilts his head to the right and looks at me with confusion. ‘Erm, the kind of person who gets a medal for bravery in combat? Who transformed your garden into a haven for wildlife for the price of a couple of plums? Who made a life-sized bicycle out of garlic ?’
‘Oh so he’s some kind of saint because he has a talent for sculpting with vegetables?’
‘I don’t understand why you’re doing this,’ says Jack. ‘It’s not like you to be this judgemental.’
I scoff. ‘What do you know about what I’m like? We’ve been in each other’s lives for all of five minutes.’
He looks hurt, but doesn’t rise to the bait.
‘All I know is, Leonard could have had any number of reasons for leaving his family. If he spent time in Iraq, it’s highly likely he struggled with PTSD. And even if he did walk out on his wife and kid for some less sympathetic motive, like, I don’t know, a midlife crisis or an affair, should that one action define the guy? Take away all the good things he did? Most people aren’t saints, Fiadh. Most aren’t assholes or psychopaths either. The majority of us are treading water somewhere in the middle.’
‘You would say that,’ I say.
‘Excuse me?’
I know I’m veering into dangerous territory, but I can’t control it. This build-up of emotion that’s been quietly simmering since Jack got here or maybe since we arrived in France. Perhaps it’s been there much longer than that.
‘Are you talking about Leonard or yourself?’ I say, my voice shaking. ‘It feels like you’re trying to justify your own actions. Square your lack of principles with yourself.’
‘My own actions being what exactly?’ Jack says guardedly.
‘Being the inflammatory nonsense you spew on your show. Being not being around for your dad when he needed you.’
The minute I say it I wish I could rewind. Stuff the words back into my mouth and swallow them whole. I force myself to look at Jack, see the impact of my cruelty. Jack colours, clouds collecting on his face.
‘I realise the way I make my living is unpalatable to you,’ he said scornfully. ‘And sure, there are times I feel I’ve crossed a line, that I’m not living in accordance with my values or whatever, but for the most part I enjoy what I do and I stand by what I say. I’m not perfect, but neither is the world. At least I’m contributing. You have all these lofty ideals, but what are you doing with them, Fiadh? How are you changing the world? You blame others for your life not turning out the way you wanted it to, but you can rewrite the script at any stage. Or at least make a fucking stab at it.’
He sighs in frustration and leaves the room.