The Light of Amsterdam (22 page)

Eight

She had pretended to be sleeping, lying with her face to the wall when the other two girls arrived back in the room, and in the whispers she heard no trace of Shannon's voice. Out of kindness they had undressed in the light from the bathroom and apart from one stumbling and almost falling on top of her, they had managed to get themselves into bed with as little disturbance as might be expected from two girls returning from a hen night.

When she woke in the morning she was momentarily confused about where she was and thought she had slept late for work but the unfamiliar seep of light through the poorly curtained window and the unusual combination of noises from outside reminded her of what had happened the night before. She sought at first to feel remorse but immediately her anger flared again and with it came an unchanged belief that she had been in the right and that her daughter had betrayed her in a way she could never have imagined possible. If she had been sure how to do it she would have gone home as soon as a plane could take her but understood she would have to stay until Sunday as planned. She didn't want to be there when everyone woke and knew also that there was little chance of anyone stirring before mid-morning at the earliest. The room was heavy with the stale smell of alcohol and perfume and one of the girls was snoring in a rhythmic rise and fall that already felt as if it was drilling inside her head. She knew she had to get up and out and if the prospect of spending more time on her own in a strange city intensified her already sharp sense of loneliness, it was to be preferred to staying in the mildewed tent of a room and then having the embarrassment of engaging with bleary-eyed, hung-over companions.

Showering as quickly as she could she checked to see if every trace of the previous night's make-up had gone and then dressed in the bathroom. At least her own clothes gave her some possibility of blending in and she would hopefully no longer be the focus of everyone's amused attention – the journey from the bar to the hotel had been the longest, loneliest walk in her life. She didn't want to repeat it. As she searched the pockets of her coat she found the list Mrs Hemmings had insisted on giving her but in truth she didn't care where she went so long as she was out of the hotel and in the cleanness of the morning air.

As she walked there was a comforting recognition of a city wakening itself into the life of a new day and, if it wasn't exactly the same, there was enough in common with what she encountered each morning at home to increase her sense of confidence. She walked with an assumed sense of purpose and told herself she didn't stand out or look much different from others. But the city did feel different and it wasn't just in what she physically saw but how inside her head everything felt rewired in some way that allowed new currents of sensation to course through her consciousness. She wasn't sure at first, exploring and still savouring the city like some new taste on her tongue, and then gradually there came an awareness that she liked it and with it came a sense that she was welcome as no one looked at her as if she was a foreigner or an affront to their sensibilities. So she didn't really care where she was going as long as she was walking and giving herself time to breathe and think about what must be done.

After a short hesitation and much looking in the window she went into a small bakery and bought a coffee and a bagel, surprised at how simple the transaction proved, that there was no confusion of language or incomprehension about what she was asking for. She told herself that perhaps a different country wasn't so big a deal as she had always thought, that really anyone could do it. Taking her coffee and bagel down a side street she stood at a railing overlooking a canal. The light was beginning to play on the surface of the water, teasing it with ever sharper reflections until the sky itself began to press its face against it. A barge went by, cracking wrinkles across the smoothness of its skin. She wondered if it was ever possible in the world to be anything other than on your own and whether that wasn't the best way to be. She had thought she understood Shannon and believed all of her daughter was encompassed by that understanding, so she was shaken now by the realisation that there was part of her own child that was unknown and secretive. And in that knowledge Shannon felt less like her child than some adult who had an independent life to which she was only allowed partial access. What else might be found in that secret life? On either side of the canal the houses looked stiff and formal, rich in history, rich in wealth.

When she had finished she walked on and kept walking until she crossed a bridge and passed the entrance to Vondelpark where a black choke of cyclists spluttered through the throat of the gates. She hadn't ridden a bicycle since she was a small girl and even then it was a sister's hand-me-down which she outgrew not long after she got it, her knees soon scraping the handlebars. Seeing a sign for the Rijksmuseum and remembering it was on Mrs Hemmings' list she followed it in a businesslike way because it seemed important to her to look as if she had a purpose to her journey. She hadn't been in a museum since Shannon was young, taking her there some wet Sunday afternoons in the winter when there was nowhere else to go, drifting round familiar exhibits and spending a long time in the shop and the café. But when she reached the Rijksmuseum she saw that there was no comparison in size to what she knew in Belfast. It looked more like a palace or a cathedral and for a second she felt intimidated but knew it was part of taking a photograph, even if it was only in her head, the type of photograph that decorated the desks in the offices and asserted themselves as evidence of a life being lived. So she waited patiently on a seat outside, near the kiosks that sold art prints and wooden clogs, and decided that when it opened she would go through the doors and look at whatever was inside and when she went back to work it would be one less lie she would have to tell Mrs Hemmings. And then slipping her hand in her pocket she took out the bracelet and studied it. Why had she taken it rather than simply slipping it back in the dressing-gown pocket where she had found it? It wasn't like any of the other stuff because its value was evident in every aspect of its appearance. She had never done anything like that before and she didn't understand it.

At first she wandered aimlessly in the museum, looking at the other visitors as much as the work, and in some of the galleries she found the formidable size of the paintings and their subject matter ugly and oppressive. It was too old and dead to her and the sitters seemed ridiculous in their plumed hats, wigs and elaborate costumes, their portraits all to do with money and show, and she couldn't pretend to find much that interested her. She wandered on, sometimes sitting on the seats and wondering what the other people saw when they viewed the same things as her, but she couldn't detect any outward sign that they had experienced some profound insight. Most like her simply drifted along, nothing holding their gaze for more than a few seconds, and then she wondered if she had hired the headphones whether that would have made sense of everything. Sometimes she came across a painting that told a story and she found things to like about these but
The Night Watch
meant nothing to her and seemed not much more than men with guns and spears showing off. She was glad to slip past its crowded audience and the guides pointing and explaining. But then she saw some quieter paintings which she thought were very beautiful and there was something strange about one in particular. It was a portrait of a woman and looked as if all the light was shining out of the painting and the light was so real that it almost tempted her to lift her hand and let it touch her skin. She didn't understand it and as she walked away she glanced at it over her shoulder to check whether the light had faded but saw that it was still there.

Moving on she found herself in front of a painting that made her stop and stand and stare for a long time, oblivious to the other viewers who stood on her shoulder or brushed across her vision. It was a young woman, dressed in a kind of blue smock, reading a letter that she held in both hands and it looked as if she was pregnant. Then she read how in 1691 when sold at auction the catalogue noted ‘the changing light and dark suggest a splendid wellbeing'. They hadn't understood the painting, hadn't looked at the way the young woman held the letter tightly in both hands as if trying to keep her balance, hadn't seen the stiffness in her arms. She knew she was going to cry. She had to get away but she stood perfectly still, wanting to do what she knew she couldn't and reach out her hand and touch the figure in the painting, somehow comfort her for what she was reading. Instead she raised her fingers to her eyes and tried to stifle the tears that might come at any moment. Everything was loosening and falling away. A letter never brings good news, her mother had said, as if that supposed piece of wisdom was enough to impose a simple acceptance of everything. Her father had gone looking for him but came home angry and drained of colour saying she was better off without him and never all the rest of his life uttering a single word about what had passed between them, or if he had even found him.

Three months pregnant and the letter stuffed through the front door without an envelope like some local flier or cheap piece of junk mail. She'd already had the first scan and he'd come with her, taken an afternoon off work and driven her to the hospital in his van. The same van where the baby was conceived. Parked in the Craigantlet Hills, the city all sparkly and amber-beaded, spread below them like diamonds sprinkled on black cloth. He had a blanket which he stretched across the floor and they made love in the space cleared of work tools and debris from his last job. He was her first and if she didn't think it was true of him then she hadn't asked because everything was about the future and how together they might shape it.

She had been working in a bakery when he and his mate had arrived to fit new windows and doors. Right from the start when he had rubbed his hands as he inspected the counter display he was full of laughter and chat. She knew at once that he fancied her because he was happy to let it show and even exaggerate and play it up so she was never sure what was for fun and what was for real. He was about to go out on his own and set up his own business now that he had learned the ropes. Often when they went out they would walk along the seafront at Cultra – the Gold Coast, he called it – and while she looked at the sea he would look at the large expensive houses that faced it, all fronted by landscaped gardens, and he would try to get her to play the game of choosing which one they were going to own. It was only a matter of time because according to him the whole world wanted
PVC
and even in big houses like the ones they were passing who might turn their noses up at the idea of plastic, they were making ones that looked like mahogany and ones in Georgian style. It was guaranteed, a sure thing.

So he was going places and although he never said it openly it was clear that he saw her as someone who might share everything that was coming. And she didn't want to disappoint him or dampen his enthusiasm by telling him that none of it really mattered to her deep down so long as she had the richness of love. The night she had told him that she was pregnant every part of her was alert and sensitive to his reaction, searching his face for the truth of what he felt but even by then less sure of her ability to read what he could mask with a smile and lightness of speech. But outwardly at least he had welcomed the child and announced that they would be getting married and she had chided him for the assumption that he'd made and insisted on receiving a proposal. He'd proposed there and then and made a little joke of giving her a metal ring out of the toolbox and she'd worn it all that night as happy as if it was a diamond because the lights in the city below were bright as polished pearls strung on the current of the night.

The girl in the painting had no ring. Always postponed with some plausible excuse centred on the idea that he only wanted her to have the very best. So now as she stands in the hall of her parents' home with the light slanting across her through the front door coloured by the stained glass she too holds a letter in both hands. It's written on the paper he uses in his work and so he has made a business of her and her child. And he's not ready to be a father or to be married, as if his readiness is a requirement that must be met before he will allow himself to become anything other than what he is now. When she was a child she liked to press a clear sweet paper against the glass so that it changed colour. Turn the paper red or green. Turn it yellow or green. Magic the light. And of course he's sorry, so sorry to have let her down, but even this is his kindness because he thinks it better for this to happen now than later. She turns the letter over thinking there must be more on the other side but there's nothing and she wants to take it and press it against the glass, let the light shine through so she can see its true colours and try to understand it. The edge has little flecks and curls of white where it has been pulled from the spiral book he uses for his orders and there is the faint indentation of whatever was written on the previous page and now she wants to take the child that is growing inside her and rip it out and away from every memory of him. She wonders if there's still time and she sits on the bottom stair and listens while her father gets ready to do his taxi round. In the kitchen her mother busies herself in making his breakfast and as the smell of egg and bacon seeps down the hall she feels sick. Everything feels stalled in time. The girl in the painting is frozen too, always trapped in the moment amidst the darkness of the furniture and the heavy table fixed in front of her. There is a map behind her head. That's what's needed now – a map to show the way. She leans forward and angles her hand against the glass so that it colours a little of her skin and then she hugs the child that grows inside her and tells her that she's sorry and that she's no one now but her own and that they will only have each other. After time unfreezes, too, this young woman in blue will sit at the table and set the letter down for a moment as she tries to shape the words into meaning, because already they have sprung apart and become jumbled in her head.