One Step Too Far (7 page)

How much are the fish and how much are the chips?

Emily half got up from her desk by the window and peeked down into the road – her father should be home soon. She turned towards the door and surveyed her room, with its neatly-made bed and over-sized cushions that Frances had covered in aztec-style fabric, arranged casually along the wall so she could lounge with her friends, like it was a sofa. She was happy with her new posters, of Madonna in a cone-shaped bra and Michael Bolton with his long angular face and flowing hair. She thought they were nicer than the ones Caroline had plastered all over her wall in the room next door, of grungy bands Emily had never heard of like Stone Temple Pilots and Alice in Chains, and shouty intimidating punk-rockers like The Sex Pistols – one thing she had been glad of in the past weeks was not having to listen to Caroline’s music through her bedroom wall, she always played it so loud, particularly when Emily was trying to do her homework. She sat down at her desk again and studied the equation. She'd just worked out that the chips were 50p (finding the price of the fish would be easy now) when she heard her father’s car in the driveway. She called downstairs brightly as she came out of her bedroom.

“Hi Dad! How was the conference?”

She paused on the landing, looking down into the open plan living room, with its new leather corner suite and sheepskin rug, as he stood there inert, shiny briefcase under his arm, desolation in his eyes. Then she came slowly down the two half-flights of stairs and put her arms around her father, as he buried his head against her shoulder, like she was the parent and he was the child.

“Oh Emily, what a pathetic father I’ve been to you girls. Seeing Caroline in that place is just...” Andrew stopped as his voice broke, and after all these years and years the release finally came.

Caroline looked hostilely at her mother, who sat at the end of the hospital bed in the institutionally-cheerful room, with its yellow painted walls and drab washed out pictures and vile green-checked curtains. A single vase of unopened daffodils stood nakedly on the formica table in the corner, beneath the window and next to the chair on which, in Caroline’s opinion, Frances should have been sat and
not
on her bed. She was surprised at the strength of her anger. Over the past months her diminishing weight had seemed to diminish her senses too, and all the effort of planning her calorie intake had until now deviated her thoughts away from more dangerous areas where painful feelings lurked – feelings like resentment of her mother, derision of her father, hatred of her sister. It was easier to decide whether to have a quarter or a half an orange for breakfast than choose to wish her mother or sister dead first. And now here was Frances snivelling on the end of her bed about how sorry she was, how she’d let her down, about how much she loved her, and Caroline knew she was LYING.

Caroline felt tired within her own skin. She wanted the whole world to just fuck off and leave her on her own private island of meal planning and calorie counting, a place where for the first time ever she felt safe and in control. She didn’t want to have to face her mother here in this revolting room. She’d spent so many years, tried so many strategies, yearned for Frances to focus on her instead of Emily, to accept her, to love her. And now that she, Caroline, had finally given up on the whole thing Frances was suddenly sniffing around, trying to be some ridiculous maternal saviour.

“I’m so sorry, my darling, I really had no idea.”

“You have no idea about anything to do with me,” said Caroline.

“I’m going to try harder, you’ll see, we’ll get you out of here, we’ll get you better.”

“Wouldn’t you rather let me just waste away? Then you’d only have Emily to worry about. Isn’t that what you want?”

Frances thought then of the dreadful day Caroline had entered the world, unexpected, alien, and how at the very moment of new life she had wished her youngest daughter dead. The memory had been buried for so long that Caroline’s question invaded Frances’s brain, hot and bright like a nuclear bomb, and jerked the whole horrible saga back to the surface. Caroline saw the expression on her mother’s face and understood unequivocally that the answer was yes.

Frances felt denial, then shame, and then an overwhelming relief that at last she had shared her secret. The fact that it was with Caroline of all people didn’t actually matter. The poisonous choking ball of hate in her heart was expelled into the room, as if physically, allowing the love to flood in. They looked at each other, Frances with love at last, Caroline with desperation. And then Frances fell into her daughter’s bony arms and held her tenderly, for the very first time, 15 years too late to save either of them.

9

I wake up in my new room and it smells of paint. My sleep has been full of emulsioned visual canvases, splattered and raw, Pollock-like, and I can’t seem to get rid of them unless I open my eyes. My bed is comfortable enough although I’m not used to a single, and it feels strange not to lie with my back to my husband, apart from him, not touching yet knowing he was there, our marital bed having felt like the loneliest place in the world by the end. I try not to think about him or our son, instead I focus hard on my new surroundings and notice that the bedding is still stiffly new and feels almost good. The sun is leaking through the sheer white curtains and when I check my new phone it's still only six o’clock – they may look great but they’re useless at keeping the room dark. I wonder dully what I can do today. I’ve had such clear deadlines for the two days since I left – find somewhere to live, make my new room habitable – that today stretches in front of me, expansive, boyless, empty. I know I need to get a job soon, open a bank account, but somehow it all feels too much. My body tells me I’m tired, that I need time to recover from the upheaval and stress, from this latest trauma. I’m a survivor at heart, I guess. It’s too early to get up but I’m wide awake, so I scrabble under my bed and find Monday’s paper, the one I bought at Crewe. I prop up my new pillows against the white bumpy wall and open the pages. I read about a disease affecting yellow finches, making their throats swell so they can’t eat: half a million of them starved to death last year, it says. I try not to think about this, try not to picture them, but still my eyes fill and so I move on to the next story. A man has raped and killed his twelve year old niece, she only went round to watch the football and her aunt happened to be out, surely she’d be alive otherwise. I turn the page. A merchant banker has been convicted of murdering his wife’s lover, whilst they were all camping together in Brittany. A woman in a shop has been beaten by robbers with batons, it’s been caught on CCTV – it’s probably already available to watch on YouTube.

I stop reading. The news is making me feel depressed again, adrift. I try to go back to sleep but my mind is too active, wired, thoughts of my golden boy keep drifting in, uninvited, and I’m worried that any progress I've made in the last two days will be dissipated here, in this blank white room. I didn’t bring a single one of my books from Chorlton and the novel I bought at Crewe is trashy, what was I thinking. I can’t face the bathroom again, I’d rather not even bother this morning, although I’m sweaty from the night. I’ll make sure I buy some flip-flops today to use in the shower, and maybe a wash bag that hangs on a peg and folds open, so I don’t have to put it down on any of the surfaces – that will help make the bathroom bearable, give me something to do. I’m restless still so I try the paper's review section this time. My mind won’t concentrate on any of the articles, and as I go to put it down I notice the Sudoku on the back, next to the crossword. I’ve never done Sudoku before, it always seemed such a total waste of time, yet that’s exactly what I want to do now, waste time, help make the gaping minutes go by. The level is moderate, it says, but although I try and try I can’t fill in a single number. It’s something to do with patterns, I remember my sister telling me (forget about her), and I keep staring until the random numbers swim, and then finally I’ve got it and I fill in my first number and I’m off. I’m good at maths but this has nothing to do with maths really. It's strangely compulsive and I keep going and it takes me ages and I’m on a roll now and then in the very final box I find I have two 6’s but no 3. I must have made a mistake, somewhere along the line, but although I try for ages it’s too hard to unravel, and that’s how my life feels – it was all going along so beautifully and then I got two 6’s and no 3 and now it’s fucked up, irreparable. The tears come again, silent, gliding, ominous, and I see the room for what it is – a grotty horrible little room in a grotty horrible house in a grotty horrible part of London. I see myself for what I am, a stinking self-centred coward who has run away from Ben and Charlie, rather than stay and face up to things. I miss Charlie in particular right now, the still-baby smell of him, the feeling of holding him tight, despite him trying to wriggle out away from me, and us both enjoying it anyway – me for trying, him for knowing that I’ve tried, that I love him.

There’s a soft knock on the door. I startle and wipe my eyes, and Angel pokes her head around.

“Oh, you are there babe, just checking you were OK.” She looks around. “Jesus Christ, have you been on Changing Rooms? This place looks amazing. Can you do mine next?”

“Yeah, I went on a bit of a mission yesterday,” I say, as brightly as I can manage. “Chanelle seems OK about it too – it’s better isn’t it?” I look at her glitzy top. “Are you going out?”

“No, I’ve just come in babe. I keep funny hours in my job. I’m starving, though. D’you fancy going out for breakfast – there’s a cafe round the corner that’s not too bad?”

“I’d love to,” I say, instantly feeling better.

“I’ll just get changed then, give me two secs.” She disappears.

I jump out of bed and survey the clothes in my new wardrobe: two pairs of jeans, one interview outfit, two T-shirt dresses, some linen trousers, expensive belted grey jacket (ruined), a few tops, a denim skirt, a cable knit jumper. Nothing feels right anymore. I choose jeans and a mid-blue jersey cowl-neck top and I feel boring, un-Catlike, although I don’t know who Cat is yet. Ten minutes later Angel reappears. She has changed from her short black skirt and red satin blouse (is that her uniform?) into a floaty white Indian cotton dress and she has tied her ash blonde hair back, it’s just long enough, and gentle tendrils escape. She looks effortlessly casual and stylish and innocent. Her heart-shaped face is small and guileless and she doesn’t look like she should work in a casino. I realise I don’t know what a croupier does look like, apart from in Oceans 11 and that doesn’t count.

“Come on, babe,” says Angel and I follow her quietly, gratefully, down the steep threadbare stairs, through the trainers- and coat-stuffed porch, past the debris-filled front garden, onto the sallow early morning street.

10

Angela shoved her way through people’s legs, past the stools that were as high as her, away from the bar, towards the stage. As she moved the odd hand came down and ruffled her hair affectionately, as if she were a dog. The punters were used to seeing a small blonde girl in here these days, and Angela had grown used to them, mostly. She still hated the choking smoke and the
adultness
of the club, dimly aware that this was no place for a child, and some of the men looked at her in a way she didn’t yet understand but knew she didn’t like, and sometimes they even squeezed her bottom as she passed. But she’d worked out how to pass the time in here now – sitting on a bar stool drying beer glasses when her favourite barmaid Lorraine was on, she seemed to really appreciate the help; or playing with her mummy’s make-up in the tiny dressing room behind the stage, being careful to cover her tracks in the lipsticks and rouge so Ruth wouldn’t find out and go mad; or sometimes playing dominoes with Uncle Ted, if she could persuade him. It wasn’t fun coming here anymore though, she was bored of it and it made her tired for school – but now she was older her mother had started bringing her along to jobs more often, she wouldn’t shell out for babysitters, and she supposed it was better than being left at home alone.

By the time Angela reached the front Ruth had disappeared and the pianist was already packing up his sheet music. It was quicker now for Angela to get to the dressing room via the stage than cut round the back of the bar. As she raised her arms to climb onto the too-high boards one of the customers said, “Need help, sweetheart?” and he lifted her above his head and she clambered up on her hands and knees. She stood up, straightened her red spotty dress to cover her knickers, and ran diagonally to the left, as fast as she could.

“Hello Mummy,” said Angela shyly, as she poked her head around the dressing room’s curtain. She adored her mummy but was never quite sure what mood Ruth would be in, what reception she'd get.

“Hello angel!” said Ruth, as she bent down and hugged her tight. “Have you been a good girl for your Uncle Ted?” She was wearing a tight sequined midnight blue dress and had big hair and kohled eyes and Angela thought she was the most beautiful mummy in the whole wide world, with the most beautiful heart-breaking voice that even Angela recognised cracked with sadness and a life lived.

“Yes, Mummy. Can we go home soon, Mummy? I’m tired.”

“I know, sweetheart, I’ll just get out of this dress and then we’ll have one drink with Uncle Ted and go straight home.”

“But I want to go home now, Mummy,” Angela said.

“I told you darling girl, one quick drink and then we’ll be off. Mummy’s thirsty after all that singing.”

“Please Mummy, I want to go home. I want to go to bed."

“I said no, Angela,” said Ruth. “Shall I get you a lemonade?”

“NO!” yelled Angela, out of control suddenly as the tiredness took hold. “I want to go home NOW.”

“Don’t you talk to me like that, young lady,” said Ruth. “We’ll go home when I say so.”