Lullaby Girl (12 page)
‘Kathy!’ bellows Joyce. ‘Kathy! For God’s sake!’
I hear the plants swing behind her. Then she stops, an’ everythin’ goes quiet. Her hands touch my shoulders, an’ angrily I shake her off.
‘Sorry, lassie,’ she says.
I spit acid into the dark. My knees are hot an’ soaked, an’ it takes some time to clean myself up. By the time I’m ready, my heart has stopped hammerin’. I go back to the car an’ find Joyce leanin’ on the bonnet. Her hands are in her pockets. Her coat covered in seeds. For a moment I feel sorry for her. She looks like she actually does care.
‘You ready?’ she asks. I nod.
We get back in the car an’ drive to the top of the track. There, the car park is empty, but the sign says
Open
, so we go inside. The front porch is full of glass animals. I pause, thinkin’ we’ve strayed into someone’s home, but when Joyce opens the next door, we see the tables an’ chairs. An old woman in a housecoat brings two handwritten menus. We’re the only customers. Joyce shoots me a look as we sit down, but I don’t know what this means so I pretend not to have noticed. A plastic inflatable parrot in the window takes my fancy, an’ when the woman comes back I ask if I can have it. Again Joyce glares at me, so I shut up an’ look at the floor. The woman says no.
Joyce has a cheese sandwich an’ a cup of coffee, while I have tomato soup. We eat in silence. To my disappointment, there’s no milk on the menu. We have scones with pear jam that the woman says she made herself. Then Joyce pays an’ we head back to the car. I close my eyes as we drive down the path, to make sure I don’t see the house in the wing mirror. Iss nightfall by the time we reach Gille Dubh.
#
I dream of a dark, dense room with a paintin’ of a ship on the wall. When I wake up, Joyce is sittin’ by my bed. She’s brought me some tea an’ a plate of oatcakes with cheese. I’m impressed that Joyce brought the green-striped cup, even if it was by accident.
‘Thank you,’ I say, an’ she nods.
I take a sip, tryin’ to avoid her gaze. Iss strange to have her here in my room.
‘So,’ says Joyce. ‘Do you think you could tell me some more about your mother?’
I freeze. Suddenly I see the machine in her lap.
‘My … mother?’ I gasp.
‘Yes,’ says Joyce. ‘We were really getting to the bottom of that, I think.’
I look at the tape machine. Iss switched on. The little tape goin’ round an’ round.
‘I want to go for a walk,’ I say, an’ slam my cup down on the nightstand. Joyce’s eyes follow my cup. One large splosh heads her way, an’ she dodges to avoid gettin’ it on her dress. By the time her eyes return to me, I’m out of bed. Joyce shoots upwards as I reach the doorway an’ the tape recorder clatters to the floor.
‘Well you can’t!’ she commands, but by now I’m runnin’ down the corridor. My nightgown glues my legs together, slowin’ me down. At first I think I’m goin’ to get away. But Joyce comes crashin’ after me an’ wrestles me to the carpet at the top of the stairs. She pins my arms above my head, like a marathon winner.
‘Caroline!’ she yells. ‘Caroline! It’s Kathy!’
I raise my head an’ see faces.
‘I want to go
outside
!’ I scream, an’ wriggle free.
Joyce lunges an’ misses me. But jus’ then Caroline appears. Hands grab me, an’ the weight on my back becomes more than I can fight. My knees hit the ground, an’ all of us go down. Someone holds my head still, an’ a hand with a needle swings close. As I sink into the floor, I recognise the pattern of my bedroom carpet. The tape recorder – still runnin’ – on the floor. Then the sounds blur an’ stretch, draggin’ away from my ears, pullin’ me away, an’ around, an’ down.
When I wake it is dark, an’ I’m alone. I try my door, but find that – for the first time I can remember – it is locked.
#
I sit in the far corner of the dinin’ room, eating my toast an’ jam. I drink my tea from the mug with flowers on it, now that my green one’s broken. When no one’s lookin’, I put my arms round myself. My wrists are bruised, yellowish-tan. They don’t hurt any more, but the sight of them still upsets me. They’re the crownin’ glory of my awful, lost weekend in Inverness, an’ a reminder that sooner or later I’ll be dragged back up there for more. What will happen then? Will they make me talk about Magnus? Or my mother? Maybe they know where my mother is, an’ that’s what Joyce meant when she said we’d made progress. My memories of my mother are faint. I jus’ know she was thin, with short, black hair. No matter how hard I try, I can’t picture her face, but I do remember her dressin’ gown, which was flimsy an’ dark with a brightly coloured print of fruit on it. I remember her wearin’ it while cookin’, with her back to me. It breaks my heart to think of her sittin’ by her television now. Seein’ my story on the news. Not carin’ enough to pick up the telephone.
The workmen have built a plain brick wall across the hole where the conservat’ry door used to be, but iss not insulated yet, so the house is still freezin’. Who decided to build a wall instead of a new conservat’ry? It feels like somethin’ Joyce would do to punish me. I mean, it was no secret how much I loved the conservat’ry. I spent every single morning out there. Evil witch. I bet iss her idea to keep me inside, too. Caroline took people out for a walk earlier, but I wasn’t allowed to go.
The workmen’s voices echo through the house. They talk about football an’ pop stars whose names I don’t recognise, an’ sometimes without warnin’ they bark with laughter. When their voices get loud I throw my arms up to protect myself. I know they talk behind my back. I’ve seen them lookin’ an’ dread what they might be plottin’. I wish they’d jus’ finish an’ go away.
When I’ve eaten I take my dishes upstairs an’ push them under my bed. If I wash them later on, I won’t have to bump into the men.
I sit draped in my mustard bedspread an’ watch Caroline’s walkin’ party from the window. Every so often I lose sight of them behind dips in the slope. Mary walks two steps behind the others, clutchin’ handfuls of wild flowers. Each time she passes, the bunch of flowers is bigger. She sees me one time, an’ waves. I wave back. By the time I hear the front door, iss dark.
January 19th, 2005.
Everything around me is still so exotic. Six days since my arrival, I remain thrilled by the unfamiliar brands. The champagne-flavour pop. The tins of ‘Bog’ and ‘Sodd’. The lighter fluid I mistook for mouthwash. The ridiculously long tri-language ingredient listings. Those three, cheeky extra vowels. The strangely named chocolate bars. The weird, dense little cakes, the open sandwiches and the elk jerky. The fruit soup and the sour cream porridge. It’s all so bloody exotic. The supermarket has become my church, and I bow to its novelties with ceaseless delight. In the daytime, when I am alone, I cross the main square to Rema 1000, just to gawp at the products. On the first day, I learnt to gawp rather than buy. The prices, by British standards, are seriously high, and if I bought everything that took my fancy, my savings would be gone in a week. For now, Magnus buys our food. It’s not something I’m comfortable with, and I certainly don’t intend to become a kept woman, but I content myself with the knowledge that it’s a temporary arrangement. The petrol, van hire and ferry tickets depleted my meagre life savings, and now I’m down to my last three hundred pounds. It’s the poorest I’ve been in my whole adult life, but with Magnus by my side I’m not afraid. When I get a job I’ll treat him in return. Teamwork! Isn’t that what marriage is all about?
For the first week we play house. In the morning Magnus puts on clothes and goes to work. In the daytime I scour the Internet for a job. In the evening Magnus returns and we climb back into our tiny loft bed. Occasionally we remember to eat. Night after night we meld and contort, hot skin glued together in the freezing air. Sometimes in the light, and sometimes in the dark, hours fly past like seconds. I doze in between, his heart thudding strongly beneath my hand, and feel happier than I ever thought it possible to be. Sometimes a lock of hair tickles my neck, and when I go to brush it aside I realise it is his, not my own. At night, I truly feel we have become one.
Magnus works at a teen community centre where they have bands and a café and all this other cool stuff. Loop the Loop, the place is called. He’s like the Godfather to those kids. On Saturday nights he works late, and originally we’d planned for me to hang out there during his shift. I’d looked forward to seeing the place at night-time, after months of hearing how great it is. But on Saturday he comes home at six with a bottle of aquavit. ‘I pulled a sickie,’ he grins, and pours me out a massive shot. By midnight we can barely walk, never mind scale the loft ladder. Magnus drags some coats from the wardrobe instead and we build a makeshift bed on the hall floor.
My job hunt is not going well, and this is largely to do with my language skills. I learnt it all from a book, you see. The Queen’s Norwegian. It looked so easy on paper. Paul and Eirin and their delightful conversations about verbs. Their jaunts to Aker Brygge to order coffee in perfect Bokmål. The reality is more daunting. The book never warned me about the dialects people speak up north. It never warned me how
fast
people speak, and the fact that though most of them speak English, they don’t particularly want to. I was naïve to think I could just continue speaking English. I see that now. But it never once struck me that the Norwegian I’d learnt would also largely be useless. Maybe if I pretended to be deaf, things would be easier. If I could have my conversations slowly, on paper, I might get by. But my God … even then I wouldn’t understand the colloquialisms.
‘You’re the Geordies of Norway!’ I tell Magnus, but instead of laughing with me he rasps, ‘Well, get used to it.’ At first I’m enraged by that comment, but as the days go on I realise he is right. Sure, I’m more of an outsider in this place than I’d anticipated, but I can’t hide under Magnus’s wing forever. I’m not a child. Why should he go out of his way to help me settle in?
So much for my glittering art career. Things were supposed to have been different out here. I’d imagined landing an art director job at a magazine or museum or whatnot, and doing my own paintings on the side. Becoming a famous expat artist, with Magnus by my side. But suddenly it’s not that simple. There are plenty of arts sector jobs, but all of them require experience, or some form of vocational training. As a native university-leaver, I might have found a company easily, but as it stands I require a dictionary to carry out the simplest of transactions. It says so in the adverts –
all
of the adverts actually – ‘Fluent Norwegian essential’. I’m beginning to know that phrase by heart. Right now, even the kebab shops wouldn’t hire me.
‘Have you considered … um … moving to Oslo?’ I ask Magnus one night.
Without looking at me, he shakes his head.
‘You could ask for a transfer or something,’ I press. ‘They must have community centres down there. Or some other council job …’
‘I’m staying here.’
‘It’s just … it might be easier for me to get a job down there.’
‘Mn,’ says Magnus, and I can tell he is not really listening.
‘You see, my Norwegian’s not good enough for—’
‘Speak English then. Everyone speaks English. They
love
to speak English.’
‘But all the ads say—’
‘So speak Norwegian. Do a course.
I
had to, when we moved up from Aarhus.’
‘You were a kid then! You’ve had plenty of time to—’
‘Just do the course! It’s not
that
hard!’
‘I can only do the free course if I’ve already got a job …’
‘Uff. So get a
dictionary
!’
The shortness of Magnus’s tone stings me. I fall silent against my pillow, and watch him trying to pluck a hair from the smooth desert of his chest. With every failed attempt, his skin grows pinker. I consider slapping him in the face, or at least telling him I already have a dictionary. That if people here spoke normally, like Paul and Eirin, I might be able to understand them.
‘The way they speak on TV,’ I say. ‘Do they speak like that in Oslo?’
‘Hmn.’
‘Magnus, I’m serious. If I don’t get a job soon, I’m fucked. I can’t tell NAV I’m here until I’ve got a job. I can’t get a doctor until NAV know I’m here. I can’t renew my prescriptions until I’ve—’
‘I can’t leave town,’ smiles Magnus. ‘What would the kids do without me?’
He has turned around now, but instead of looking at my face his eyes are fixed on my body. Under the covers, his hands move across me. I flap a hand at him. But it’s hard to stay mad when he turns on the charm.
‘I’m sure the kids will be fine,’ I whisper as he kisses my hands. ‘Rock ‘n’ roll will find a way to survive without you …’
‘Hysj,’ he murmurs, and touches his mouth to mine.
‘I’m serious,’ I repeat. Then his kiss flows into me, and the real world swoons into pieces.
#
In the blink of an eye, another week passes. By now, my job hunt has taken on a different slant. Having been refused by the local newspaper, art gallery and tourist magazine, I’ve adopted the hope that a hotel – with its yearly influx of foreign tourists – might welcome a native English speaker onto their staff. I present myself to each major hotel, wearing the cheap skirt suit I begged Magnus to buy me. One after the other, I lay my heart on the line, and one after the other they turn me down. After this I try the English pub and the Irish pub. I try the tourist office, the museum, the cinema and the library. I even try to sell some paintings in the cafés. Everywhere, the answer is no, and with every rejection a little more spring goes out of my step. ‘I’m scared,’ I tell Magnus, several times. I need him to understand my predicament. To realise this is not working and open himself to the possibility of a Plan B. But every time he kisses my tears away, we somehow just end up having sex.
#
Saturday comes round again, and Magnus is due to work the evening shift. It’s now five days since my meds ran out, and the side effects are kicking in. I sit below the dark skylight, crying into Magnus’s pillow, and for one whole hour it feels like I am going mad. This morning Magnus left without waking me and took the single set of house keys with him. This basically means I can’t go out, because once the door has closed I have no way of getting back in.
