The Bad Mother's Handbook (36 page)

‘God, really? Did you ever see her?’ It was fascinating,
this Nan I never knew.

‘Oh, no; it was only when I was very little. Apparently
she was very good, though. Had the audience in tears a
time or two, with laughter. Ask Maud, she’ll remember.’
She passed the moustache back to Daniel like she was
offering him a canape. ‘Here you go, lad, try it for size.’

Daniel took it politely and pressed it against his lip.
‘What do you think?’ he tried to say, turning to me, but
the moustache fell off and dropped down between his
legs in a spider-type action. I half expected it to scuttle off
across the rug.

‘Gerrross! You look like the love-child of Professor
Winston and Cher. Don’t
ever
grow one of your own,
promise?’ I bent double and fished it off the floor. ‘If you
do, you’re dumped, OK?’ I put the moustache to my lip;
it smelt of must. ‘Imagine Nan dressed as a man, though.’

‘Wherever did it come from?’ asked Mum, stepping
forward to shift some of the ancient pillowcases and
sheets. Some of them still had the cellophane wrappers
on. ‘Did it drop out of these? Oh, wait a minute, what’s
this?’

She lifted some linen and nestled in between the layers
was a pink raffia knitting bag with wooden handles. It
had been squashed under the sheets so long it had left its
shape imprinted in them, top and bottom, like a fossil.
A ginger moustache was sticking out of the top, and as
Mum picked the bag up, a thick wooden peg fell out and
rolled against my thigh.

‘And this is?’

Mum frowned. ‘A piggy, probably.’

‘You what?’

‘Some game they used to play in the olden days.’

The ghosts of Nan’s past crowded round to see.

‘I wonder what they did with it,’ said Daniel, attempting
to spin it on the bedspread.

‘Hit it with a bat and ran after it, I think.’ Mum
rummaged in the bag and brought out a little plaster
figure with a flat white triangle where its nose should
have been. She held it out for us to see.

‘They called these kewpie dolls, with their pot-bellies
and moulded hair. This’ll be old, you know.’

‘Worth anything?’

‘Wouldn’t have thought so. Seen better days, haven’t
you, love? Never mind, so have we all.’ Mum put the doll
on the bed and emptied the bag carefully between me and
Daniel, then she knelt down so she was on a level with it
all. Papers, cards, odds and ends had spilled out. A pair of
pink baby bootees caught my eye.

‘Oh, sweet! Were these mine?’

‘No. They were mine. And the lamb rattle.’ Mum
looked sad as she touched them.

‘These must be from World War One,’ said Daniel
flicking carefully through a bundle of postcards with
embroidered fronts. ‘Amazing. This is real social history.’

Mum handed me a letter to Santa she’d written when
she was about six or seven.

‘Purple felt tip? Bit sloppy, that. And what’s that
zombie-thing in the corner?’

‘Zombie?’ Mum imitated outrage. ‘That’s a drawing
of Barbie. My whole happiness hung on that doll, you
know, I thought it would complete my life. Even though
it was in the days before she had all these poseable limbs
and bum-length hair, what have you. It’s all gone completely
mad now, of course; they do Barbie Penthouse
Apartments and camper vans, and beauty salons, discos
. . . Takes all the fun out of it. I used to cut up shoe boxes
and line them with wallpaper, stop sniggering, Charlotte.
And you couldn’t get Ken outside the States, nobody
would import him, so I made do with an Action Man I got
from a jumble sale. His gripping hands came in useful
many a time.’ Mum smoothed out the letter wistfully. ‘Tell
you what, though, I wish I’d kept that doll, it would have
been really collectable. Nothing like those interchangeable
pink-and-blonde bimbos you had when you were
tiny. This one had black hair cut in a fringe and an op-art
dress, à la Mary Quant. Quite scary, actually, but it could
have been an heirloom.’

‘Cool,’ I said, then laughed. ‘God, Mum, how sad are
we?’

‘Do you realize, these cards have seen actual bloodshed,’
Daniel broke in. ‘This thumb-print here, it might
even be blood. Wow. You should take them into school,
Mrs Carlisle would love it.’ He turned one over and
started to read it.

‘No.’ Mum took it gently out of his hand. ‘Sorry. I
want to look through them first. They might be personal.
Nan’s grandad was killed out there, you know.’

The light in the room shifted and the air in the
chimney sighed. Daniel gazed at his knees in embarrassment,
so to make him feel better I undid the safety pin on
the crepe bandage I’d found and began to wind it round
his wrist. He didn’t seem to object so I carried on up his
arm, tying a neat knot at the shoulder. After a minute he
shook himself out of his mood and started a retaliatory
action with a bobbin of thin pink ribbon. His fingers
wove the satin in and out between my fingers, his long
bony fingers mixed up with my thin girly ones, and I
thought, I love you, you daft sod.

*

A
ND THEN
E
MMA
was leaning into me, I could almost
hear her breathing at my shoulder. So I reached under the
papers and there was a New Testament with a black cover,
very plain, but with a gap in the gold edged pages like
a half-closed eye. I opened it up a fraction and caught a
glimpse of a pink slip of paper,
Certified copy of an entry . . .
General Register Office . . . caution
. My adoption certificate.
They didn’t see anything, the pair on the bed; too busy
mucking about with ribbons. Well, let them. It didn’t
matter anyway. I closed the book and pushed it back in the
bag. Next to me, Emma sighed again.

*

Mum came over
all moony suddenly and said she
wanted to be on her own for a while, so I took Daniel
back to my bedroom. There was even less space than
usual but he managed to wedge himself into the corner
nearest the door; I didn’t tell him that at the bottom of the
bin bag by his elbow was all the memorabilia from six
months with Paul. I’d squirted hair mousse over the handful
of cards, notes, photos and tickets before dumping
them; now the room smelt like a cheap salon – The First
Cut, perhaps. Daniel’s nose wrinkled but he didn’t say
anything. I picked up a dog-eared magazine article
entitled ‘Perfect 10: Nails to Die For’. ‘God, look at this!
Imagine having
time
to paint your fingernails!’ I dropped
it in the plastic sack. ‘A lot of this seems totally out of date
now. From another era.’

‘I can see what you mean. Oh, this is no good; if I
don’t move soon I’ll seize up.’ Daniel uncurled himself
awkwardly and picked his way over the mess on the
floor to install himself on the bed. He lay down and
put his hands behind his head, very at home. ‘So, now
the dust has settled, what are you going to do with your
life?’

I shrugged. ‘There’s only so much dust
can
settle with
a baby. Mum still wants me to go off to uni but it seems
impossible at the moment. Mrs Carlisle thinks I should
have a year out to retake the modules I missed; she has
this idea that she can send me assignments through the
post and I could just come in for a few lessons a week.
Apparently the Head’s OK with that.’

‘And you?’

‘I really want those As. I worked hard enough for
them. But it’s going to be a bloody funny year.’ He caught
my rueful gaze and held out his hand. I stepped over and
sat next to him.

‘Come here.’ He pulled me down, wrapped me in his
long arms and kissed my hair. ‘Listen. I won’t go, I’ve
decided. I’m not leaving you, Charlotte.’

‘Don’t be daft,’ I mumbled into his chest. ‘You had
your heart set on Oxford.’

He snorted. ‘Some chance. With an offer of three As
it’s not very likely. Dad can pull all the strings he wants,
it’s not going to get me in unless my papers get mixed up
with some other poor sod’s. Anyway, that’s not important
any more. You and Will are what matter.’

I moved away and touched his face. ‘It
is
, Daniel.
If you don’t get into Oxford, somewhere else’ll take you,
you’re too bloody clever. I bet Durham or Manchester
accept you. You’ve got to go and get that degree.
I’d
go if
it was the other way round.’

‘Would you?’ He looked surprised.

‘Oh, I don’t know.’ Faintly from downstairs we heard
Will begin to cry. I tensed to go to him, but then he
stopped; Mum must have nipped down and picked
him up. I let my muscles relax again, but my mind was
racing. ‘It’s all too difficult. My brain’s not what it used
to be.’

‘How about I defer my place and take a year out? I
might be able to swing some sort of job at the engineering
works; could your dad put in a good word for me?’

I laughed. ‘My dad? That really would blight
your chances. No, don’t. We’d still have to part at the
end of the year, unless I got in at the same uni and
there’s no guarantee of that.’ Daniel looked mournful.
‘Come on, it’s only what happens to thousands of couples
every year. And in the end they either make it or they
don’t—’

‘We will.’

‘Yes.’

‘I don’t want to leave you.’

This was getting out of hand, I felt.

‘Daniel!’ I shook him by the shoulders, pushed him
against the mattress and climbed astride him. His eyes
were wide and miserable. I blew in his face but he
only turned away. ‘Right, you!’ I growled, putting my
mouth close to his ear, ‘Stop being such a silly bugger.
It’s not till next September, anyway! You might meet
some fancy piece and run off with her long before then.
Snap out of it! Lighten up! Because if you don’t I’m
going to have to take your trousers down and interfere
with you.’

There was a pause.

‘Did I tell you how depressed I’ve been?’ he said.

Afterwards
we lay quietly and I combed his hair with my
fingers.

‘You really should get this chopped, you know.’

‘Do you think? I’ve always thought of it as my finest
feature.’

‘Get off.’ I ruffled his mop. ‘You look like Young
Einstein.’

He gripped my wrist and kissed it. ‘I know you think
I was being over the top before, but this is the first time in
my life, well certainly the first time since I left Guildford,
that I feel like I belong with someone. Does that sound
mad?’

‘No, ’cause I think I feel like that too. It’s . . . trying to
find out where you fit in. I’ve never felt very good at that.
Mind you, this household hasn’t been exactly conducive
to forming settled relationships. It’s been such a battleground,
and with the three of us it was always two against
one, different combinations. You won’t have had that
with there being four of you.’

‘No, but I know what you mean about the rows.’ We
shuffled into spoons and he put his arm across me and
talked into the back of my neck. ‘About a year before we
left Surrey there were shouting matches every night, and
actually there were just the three of us then because my
sister had left home. Then, after the rows came the freezing
silences and the “Tell your mother that I won’t be in
for dinner” and “Tell your father that he’ll have to cook
his own, then” routine, with me in the middle. I never
want to go through that again. If they ever start up I shall
leave, I’m old enough now.’

‘Move in here. See how the other half live.’ I reached
back and dug him in the ribs.

He sighed. ‘All us damaged adolescents, all over the
country, trying to create our own families. I hope to God
we succeed.’

*

T
HE FEELING
hit quite suddenly; perhaps post-natal
depression’s catching. I’d spent a long time going through
Nan’s bag, although I didn’t look at the certificate again.
There were four suspender ends, and seven Robinson’s
Golly vouchers bulldog-clipped together, and an empty
cotton reel with nails hammered in for French knitting
(Nan had drawn a smiley face in biro on the side); an
award for long service at the paper mill with my dad’s
name on it; there was a Temperance Society newsletter
dated 1899, God knows whose that was; there was my first
baby tooth folded in greaseproof paper in a BunnyBons
tin; and a scraggy binker mat I’d made in the juniors, all
lumpy knots underneath.

I thought of Nan as a young woman, a girl, then as she
was now. The present didn’t wipe out the past, she had
been those other, young, people.

Then Will began to cry again so I gathered it all
together and took the bag downstairs with me. And as I
hoisted him up and held his squirmy bulk to my chest, it
seemed to me that time split clearly down the middle and
I realized what I’d so nearly done.

Once, when I was about seven, I’d found a sparrow’s
nest in one of the bust-up garages on the edge of the estate.
There were three blue eggs, perfect as a painting, against
some white fluff and grey-brown feathers. The mother bird
was going frantic, chip-chipping at me from the rafters
above, so at first I just looked, but finally the urge to cradle
the smooth warm shells against my palm became too much
and I picked them up. They felt precious and thrilling.
I carried them carefully back home and took them straight
to Dad. I assumed he’d be as excited as I was.

His face went angry, then sad when he saw what
I had. Deep lines came from his nose to the corners of his
mouth; it was much, much worse than if he’d shouted
at me. He marched me back in silence to the nest and
made me roll them gently back in, then we stood for a
while waiting to see if the mother bird would come. ‘You
see,’ he’d whispered, ‘she might be able to smell you on
‘em, then she’d be too frittened to come near.’

‘Does that mean the babies’ll die?’ It had only just
dawned on me that that’s what the eggs were; I mean,
you buy eggs in the supermarket like a packet of
biscuits, don’t you? Then when you eat them it’s yellow
and white goo inside, not tiny birds. I felt terrible. Dad
nodded almost imperceptibly and I burst into tears.
We waited a good thirty minutes but no mummy bird
appeared.