‘Do you want to talk about it?’ asks Stanislaw softly.
‘No,’ I say, and then proceed to tell him everything. ‘I threw food at an old woman and shoplifted a dress and destroyed a priceless artwork – well, it wasn’t priceless, but it was worth over five thousand pounds – and I told my daughter to fuck school and she got arrested, and I made my mother throw a brick through a restaurant window, and broke into someone’s house, and dealt class A drugs, and drove a lawnmower through a yoga group, and nearly lost a million-pound commission, and oh God, I stole this from an arms dealer.’ I pull the golden finger out of my bag and wave it helplessly.
‘. . . thundery showers, occasionally good.’
‘Quite a day,’ says Stanislaw.
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘It was.’
All this time I thought what happened on the night of the Beatnik party was my fault. My fault for being feeble and naïve, and my mother’s for bringing me up to be that way. I felt it was a mess of my own making, and hers, when of course it wasn’t.
It was his fault.
His fault, his flaws, his mess. I did nothing wrong. Rose, despite her failings, is not to blame. Just him. Him and his entitlement; his monstrous hubris and casual cruelty. I thought that one thing led to another and everything was connected, but it’s not. Sometimes bad things happen, no matter how good you try to be, or how strong you are, or how many times you try to stop it. Sometimes kingdoms are lost, even if every last nail is in place. The realization makes me catch my breath, the most mindful breath I’ve ever managed.
‘Mainly fair. Good.’
‘I’m better now.’ I blow my nose on one tissue, and wipe my eyes with another.
‘Good. You rest a while.’
Settling back into my seat, I send my best friend a series of texts.
I’m really sorry, but I took Dubai guy golden finger. An accident.
Not an accident, but I wasn’t myself. Will return tomorrow.
Might have a house for SOjourn. Renovated church in Batheaston. Not finished yet, but could be beautiful.
Good bones, like that poem. Can’t remember it now.
Soz Sooz. Tx 4 everything. I luv U.
‘. . . Rising slowly. Moderate or poor.’
I see the dots pulsing, and eventually her reply comes through: Twat. You owe me a tenner.
I think that means we’re OK.
* * *
In the cocoon of my cab, I remember a day years ago, when our parents took us to the zoo. No, it wasn’t a zoo; it was a wildlife park, in the grounds of a country estate, rhinos roaming around outside a Victorian manor house, all a bit incongruous. We went because Rose had been given free tickets by a friend, and although she had no interest in going, she thought it might be construed as ungrateful and rude if she didn’t use them and report back. I would have been about ten, and Maz seven or eight. Dad drove us there, with the intention to send us round the park on our own while they sat in the car, but they must have had an argument or something because we’d barely got past the wallabies when Rose caught up with us, looking out of breath and irritable. She joined us just as we were approaching the reindeer. Maz always says they were alpacas but they weren’t because I remember the sign.
‘Don’t!’ was the first thing she said when she saw us. One of the reindeer was rubbing up against the fence, trying to scratch himself, and Maz was reaching out to help him. ‘They’re dirty.’
‘I’ll wash my hands,’ Maz promised, her little fingers itching away at his thick fur. The reindeer grunted in pleasure. As luck would have it, one of the caretakers arrived with a bucket of feed, and he let us have a handful, so Maz was able to let the animal snuffle at her palm, huffing and grunting as she giggled and squealed. She was enthralled and although my mother disapproved, she didn’t like to say so in front of the staff, just watched with slight anxiety as the herd gathered around us, sniffing and nudging. The food was soon gone, and therefore the reindeer, who don’t tend to stick around unless there’s something in it for them. They turned their attention to the caretaker, who had more of the good stuff. As he bent down to empty the bucket into their trough, one of the biggest reindeer butted him, caught him at a bad angle, and he tumbled, flat into the mud. It had been a rainy summer, and it was a proper pratfall. Rose fell about.
I’d never seen my mother laugh like that. Not her usual tinkly ‘how very amusing’ titter, but a full-throated guffaw that shook her whole body and flung her head back. We thought it was pretty funny as well, but mainly we were laughing at her; with her. Sharing the joke. When she finally stopped, her cheeks were pink and her eyes bright. She took us to the café to wash our hands, and then bought us an ice cream each, ones with a chocolate flake and sprinkles, and when Maz dropped her flake, rather than scold she just said ‘Butterfingers!’ plucked it from the floor and plonked it straight back in the cone. The laugh seemed to have relaxed her, and she sat with a coffee, listening to us talk about the animals, smiling when Maz said one day she would have her own farm. She even took us to the little park playground, pushed us on the swings, applauded when we came down the slide. I’d never had such a prolonged and focused interaction with her, and it was a revelation. When we got back to the car, she flopped into her seat with a happy sigh and said ‘Well, Jack, you missed a treat.’ And he grunted like the reindeer and started the engine. By the time we got home she was back to her normal self, tutting, preoccupied, wiping our finger drawings off the windows.
But at bedtime, when we were usually dispatched and left to our own devices, she put her head round the door to quell the chattering.
‘Quiet, please! Your father is watching television.’
‘That was the best day of my life,’ Maz said.
Rose paused, her hand on the light switch. ‘Mine too,’ she replied, and I saw Maz wriggle in delight just before the room was plunged into darkness.
It wasn’t, of course, but I liked that she said it. I didn’t have any dreams at all that night. Not a single one.
46
It’s half one in the morning by the time I arrive home, but there are still lights on inside the house. Robbie will have left a pint of water on the kitchen table – that’s what we do for each other when one of us goes out on the lash. I always think it’s a very tender form of passive aggression: ‘You’re drunk, drink this.’ Sometimes we leave tablets too, if we know it’s going to be a big night, though of course such nights are rare nowadays. I think of the Vicodin I took this morning – surely it will have left my system now? Along with whatever else assailed and fired me today – I can feel it all draining away with every breath. Back to normal. Whatever normal is.
I say goodnight to the lovely Stanislaw, who opens the door and helps me out, an anxious steward. We part by the front gate. He shakes my hand and says ‘Co się stało, to się nie odstanie.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘Polish saying. What’s done is done. How do you say, the phrase about milk?’
‘Don’t cry over spilled milk?’
‘Exactly. Co z oczu to z serca. Out of your eyes, out of your heart. Put it behind you.’
We should get this guy on TV; he could be an agony uncle dispensing his wisdom to the masses and make a fortune, instead of driving Ubers. But who am I to say that being a taxi driver isn’t just as fulfilling? So I don’t get out my business card, I just press his hand and say ‘Dziękuję.’ I can say please, thank you and sorry in many, many languages, because I like to be prepared. Some might say that’s crazy, but I think it’s just polite. You never know. As is being proved, this very moment, at my own front door.
Stanislaw bows and releases me and I walk down the path looking at our lintel, illuminated by the security light Robbie installed. 1680. All the drama that this house has seen. The births and deaths and shouting and laughter and dinners and sex and quiet contemplation. All the spilled milk. Whatever has happened to me today is probably nothing compared to what went before. He’s right: what’s done is done and it’s time to consign it to history.
I let myself in, quietly, bending to stroke Grizelda, who weaves around me miaowing, pretending she hasn’t been fed. Actually, she may not have been, because everyone in my household tends to assume someone else has done it, and by someone else, I mean me. Usually, this would pull out a tiny grenade pin, cause a little light fuming as I make myself a cup of tea flavoured with bitterness, but right now I think it’s nice to be the lintel in the Hendry family. Without me, they’d crumble. Also, Grizelda loves – well, tolerates – me best, so I win.
