The Whole World (23 page)

“But you became Susan—”

“We fled together, Susan Maud and I. Having the whole world to choose from, I named myself the character I’d created. I became my own, from start to finish. My own mother. My own child. I was completely my own at last.”

Is that what she’d wanted? Had that been her “pear”? Something worth sacrificing everything else for …

“You sent the photos to our house in Brighton. I have them.” She’d reused a box of her own. Someone had mailed something to her, here on Cantelupe Road, and she’d put a sticker over that address to mail the photos to me.

“That was years ago.”

She could have thrown them away. “Thank you for doing that.”

I hadn’t thought I’d thank her. I thought I’d bellow at her. I thought I’d push and cry and never forgive. But I hadn’t the energy. I was old. My mother wasn’t a girl, and neither was I. We were old and tired.

Her telephone had an old-fashioned bell, a jarring one. It shrieked four times. Then a click, a whir. “Leave a message.” Succinct.

“Hi, Susan, it’s me, Melisma. I’m … having a rather bad day, actually. A shitty day. Roger and I are done. Really done this time—he’s such a prick. I hate him. I’m sorry to be springing this on you, but, really, I need to get out of here. I’m taking all my stuff so he won’t have any reason to come by bringing me this or that, ‘Oh, Mel, you forgot your soap,’ or whatever stupid excuse he’d make. There are some things I’d like to leave but I won’t because he’ll think I want a reason to come back, which I don’t. I’ll just take everything and chuck what’s useless. Fucking men. I need to pack everything up here and then I’ll bring it over. I hope you don’t mind. ’Bye.”

“My stepdaughter,” she said heavily, before the machine had even clicked off. She got up and keys jangled. “You’ll have to leave now.”

Her stepdaughter. Another daughter. She was running to her now, to comfort her, to commiserate about her awful ex-boyfriend, to protect her, perhaps to put ice on bruises if he was a beast, and encouragement on her ego if he was merely horrid. This was a real daughter. Not one from inside her, but one for whom she’d instantly leap to action. She put her coat on. Shoes. Closet door, rustles, heel clicks, the bang of a purse hitting the wall as she bent over to … tie laces? Slip a finger between the back of her foot and tight shoe leather?

“You’ll have to go now,” she repeated. I remained in my chair. I was pinned there by the image. There must be photos of her in this room, lovingly framed. Hundreds of them, interspersed with lit candles. Scrapbooks too. Newspaper items, degree certificates. That’s what so crowded the room. That’s why there was only one seat in the lounge. It was filled with shelves and stacks and icons and altars dedicated to this one creature, this real daughter. This horribly-named creature. Melisma? Linda hadn’t named her. But she’d taken to her. I know that because of how she was running now, running to rescue her.

Together they’d carry boxes from flat to car. Clothes, books, bathroom things, kitchen things, art, photographs. Whatever had intertwined to make Melisma a couple with that rat, now uncoupled. Linda would make her tea here later, or get drunk with her, if she was that sort of mother. That sort of best-friend mother. Or perhaps she was a stern mother, a pull-yourself-together mother: Get a better job and stop throwing yourself at men who aren’t worthy of you.

I couldn’t match this with the mother I thought I’d figured out: defensive of her solitude to the point of terror. But here she was. The door was open. Melisma had phoned and everything in her jumped to attention.

Whatever this Melisma had done—been sighted, been of an independent age, been good and beautiful—she’d won. She’d swooped in and won. Now Linda was swooping to her. Rescue, rescue, with a metaphorical siren on top of her car.

I realised that I’d used Aunt Ginny’s image for Melisma in my mind. Pretty Aunt Ginny, so like Linda, but a little more forward, a little more willing to be crazy in public. I had to ask: “Did Aunt Ginny die on a boat? She”—the nanny-mother—“told me Gin died on a boat….”

“Gin married one of those Italian princes. I suppose she’s still there. In a villa.”

That’s good for Aunt Ginny. I felt such relief. Gin alive, and married. Probably skiing and sunbathing, and having affairs. She’d be old now, but still Gin. Heavy with jewellery and tight in a girdle, to lift and squeeze her body into remembered youth. I was suddenly happy, so happy. I think I was hysterical. I think I was making some noise. Linda shouted at me to be quiet and get out.

I stood in the garden. Linda got into her car. The door slammed but the engine did not immediately start. Was she waiting for me to go? I held my mobile up to my ear, to show her that things were in hand. I wouldn’t be here when she and the real daughter returned.

I kept the phone pressed to my ear for show, mouthing “Everything’s fine, everything’s fine, everything’s fine….” At last the car pulled away.

The garden seemed enormous to me, probably larger than it really was. Everything seemed stretched out, as if there were an impossible distance between me and the road. I could dial anyone, anyone in the world. Gin? Harry? God? I could dial anyone. What would I say to my first husband? What would I say to my old thesis supervisor? What would I say to Nick?

That name was sudden in my mind, and stabbing. Nick. He was just a child. I’d bellowed at him like he was some monstrous adult, a stand-in for those who’d let me down. I’d scared him off. I’d scared him, perhaps, to death.

For a moment it was as if I might find him in the bushes there, or the flowerbed, there. Hiding, relieved to see me, eager to emerge. I wanted to hold out my hands to him, and raise him to standing. I think that was the first maternal instinct of my life. I think that was the first moment of not being the child myself.

I dialled Harry. The ringing went on forever. Then, our machine. He would still be at the pub. “Harry,” I said. “Harry, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry. I’ve been horrible. Harry. I’m at this place. Rose Cottage. The directions are on the computer. I need a lift. I’ll wait for you to come. I’ll wait for you. Please come. I want to … I want to change everything. I want to be different. I want to … throw things away, and move house, and start something new. With you. We should start new together. I know what happened today. I understand it. I don’t care about it. I don’t care. I’m going to get rid of the money, Harry.” This decision surprised me to hear coming out of myself, but it was right. It was necessary. “I don’t want it anymore. I don’t want anything from her. We can put it all to charity. Tomorrow. Quickly. I want it gone. Oh, God—” I remembered. “Oh, God, your birds, Harry. I’m sorry. Oh, God—” But the machine had clicked off. A sixty-second limit.

He would never forgive me. It was impossible. When I heard the car an hour later, his car, I knew there was rage inside. That’s all it could possibly be; I’d waited for it. I walked toward the road; I stood on the last of the lawn before the dirt track. The headlamps angled to face me. I could see them, like the bright lights of the Centre for Mathematics. I regretted never having seen his face.

The inevitable acceleration hummed rather than shrieked. I thought about all the times in my life that that had been true: things that ought to rate a fanfare, or applause, some volume, some notice, but happen quietly, too quietly, without the yelling and pointing they deserve.

The bumper hit me lower than I expected, around the knees. I’d illogically expected more of a punch in the stomach. My legs bent the wrong way, like deer legs, bent backward. But instead of crumbling, I sailed.

This too stretched. My arc blazed long. At the top of it, my head opened up like a net, catching in it old memories and random thoughts from the air. I knew. Suddenly I knew everything.

Her name was Eleanor. That was certain, and clear. Eleanor. I’d called her that sometimes. Sometimes, even in Brussels, I’d called her Mummy.

Eleanor borrowed Gin’s perfume. Eleanor wore Linda’s clothes. She was soft-skinned but hard-boned; she stood up to Linda about me. She made rabbit shadows with her hands. She let me sit on her lap on the train to see out the window. She gave me sips from her cup. She loved me. She worshipped Linda.

She’d been pretty to me, in her gift clothes and borrowed cosmetics. Eleanor had been pretty to me. But Linda had been astonishing to both of us.

One night, Linda had modelled dresses for us. She was dressing for an evening out. I sat on Eleanor’s lap, and we clapped and cheered at each successive outfit. There was one that Eleanor had particularly admired: It was girlish, layers of skirt and tight on top. Linda stepped out of it and tossed it to Eleanor. “Try it on,” she said. “I don’t like it anymore.” Eleanor undressed, curling herself up modestly, holding the dress up so its skirt made an impromptu curtain. It fit in size but not in shape. The waist stretched too tight, the bust sagged. She looked terrified in it. Linda said, “It looks good.” Eleanor puffed up; the pride in her risen chest almost made it fit.

The doorbell rang, and Linda, in just a slip, said, “I’m too tired to go out with him. You go.” Eleanor cowered. She shook her head, hard.

Linda said, “Tell him to go away, then.” She went into the bedroom and closed the door. The doorbell chimed on. It was a nice doorbell, not one of those harsh ones. It had a ring, a real ring. I sang along with the tune as it repeated, and swung my short legs back and forth under my chair.

Eleanor said, “Gretchen, you tell him. Tell him I can’t go.” Then she locked herself in the bathroom.

I stayed in my chair. The bell sang me songs. Then it stopped. Later, Eleanor came out. She still had the dress on.

She read to me from a storybook illustrated by Marc Chagall. I was still young enough to see. I put my face right up to those pictures. His happiest people always float in the air. Goats too. Happy people, floating goats.

Eleanor loved books. She made me love them too; it was inevitable that anyone who lived in our house would become an expert in literature, whether they wanted to be or not. She loved adventure in books. She loved men in books. She was in awe of people who created books the way religious people are in awe of God.

Chagall contained happiness like that: colour and captured motion, tethered by a frame or windowpane. His figures aren’t limited to feeling happiness inside; they float and fly, arc through the sky. And their goats fly with them.

The downward half of my arc sped up, rushing me toward the rutted road. I passed a goat. I trailed colour. Suddenly I was in the Fitzwilliam Museum, and the paintings were all Chagalls, from that storybook. Eleanor was there. Wearing that dress.

CHAPTER 10

N
ick became a calendar.

Wednesday December second became: The Day Before Nick Was Gone.

I carried around his gloves most of the day; I finally got a chance to hand them over to him at Gretchen’s house. Then Gretchen and I had a fight, and he stayed to fix it. He was gallant. I had to go, and he was doing something else later. It was all, “See you tomorrow!”

Then, tomorrow, Nick was gone. That was Thursday, which became Day One, but we didn’t know that yet.

It was the choir dinner. I knew he’d be there. It was black tie, not academic gowns. I had secondhand dresses I’d gotten cheap from the charity shops on Burleigh Street. Old May Ball dresses from last year. That’s where I shopped with Polly when we were friends. Then we’d eat at the café of the public library, outside on the high-up deck: cheap baked potatoes, cups of tap water, and the tower cranes building the Grand Arcade swinging not too far overhead. We’d read our borrowed books. It had been enough. Someone’s old clothes, borrowed books, and cheap potatoes. It was very
La Bohème
, a starving-student sort of thing. It was fun. I didn’t mind.

But there’s a boutique on Magdalene Street, just by the entrance to college. They have shoes and purses, and dresses. Not Cinderella-type fuss, just real modern, feminine dresses, in my face, every day.

There were two other customers in the shop: a tiny elderly lady indulging in a really great pair of shoes, and another Magdalene student whom I’d seen around. I knew she had money. She was buying three dresses and a purse. I could tell from the conversation that she knew the sales clerk.

I waited for her to leave. Then I asked the clerk, who had beautiful straight blond hair, if she had the dress in the window to fit me. She took a long time to consider, and all I could think was: She’d fit into the bitty one in the window. Finally she went in the back and there was one in a normal, human size for me. I tried it on behind a curtain. The dress was knee-length and white, with a splash of red poppies clustered at the hem. The top was ruched around my chest, with smaller flowers scattered there. A skinny red ribbon traced the waist. I’d never had on anything so pretty.

I had to get shoes as well.

I keep my cards in a little zipper thing that fits in my pocket: credit card, ATM, public library, student I.D. The zipper thing is only just a little bigger than the cards themselves, and it kind of holds on to them when I try to pull one out. The bag and I had a little fight about the credit card. In the end I snapped the zipper pull and now it doesn’t close anymore.

I might have stopped myself. I could have stopped somewhere between the dressing room and punching in my PIN on the little machine. I needed to make it through to Christmas, when my dad would pay tuition and top up my living expenses again. But when my own purse tried to stop me I just got defensive. I’m not going to let a stupid bag tell me what to do.

The price came in just three pounds under my limit.

I wouldn’t be able to return the shoes; they would show scuffs. But I’d return the dress. So long as I was careful with it, I could return the dress, saying I hadn’t used it, and get the money back.

After all that, Nick didn’t come to the dinner.

It was held at Magdalene, with the usual formality. All the men looked alike, and the women looked different: different hems, different colors, different hairstyles. Except for the girl I’d seen in the shop, who was wearing the same dress that I was. Poppies on white.

I was angry. Nick was supposed to be there. Instead—what? I didn’t even think of him being with Polly. I assumed him to be at some sort of family event, something to do with his sister, or maybe something with the Chanders. Some performance or presentation at their school. Because he’d spent his whole life going to dinners like this. They weren’t special to him, so he had no respect that they were special to some people.

I was so angry I couldn’t eat. I didn’t want to risk dropping anything on the dress anyway. Dinner was roast beef. Even one drip would force me to keep the dress. I was careful with the wine, careful with the water even. I was between someone named Mark and another guy. Mark asked me if I’d ever sung Scarlatti’s “Stabat Mater,” which I hadn’t. He said it had more than thirty-part harmony. I told him he was full of shit. The girl on his other side said it does have that many parts, and what was my problem? I was really mad from Nick being so cavalier about where he bothers to show up, so I told her to fuck off. And she said, “How very American of you.” Five or six people laughed at that. The girl who said it wasn’t even English; she was Canadian. I wanted to leave but everyone would have looked at me walk out.

I picked up my wineglass, which was still full because I’d been avoiding it. Mark reached for his water at the same time, and our arms knocked lightly. If my glass hadn’t been full, it wouldn’t have been any big deal. But the wine was close to the top and sloshed over the side. Just one plop of it, but it hit my plate with momentum enough to send a drop sliding up over the edge. It hit my lap, on the linen napkin there, which I grabbed up quickly, to keep the purple from soaking through onto the dress. That’s when Mark’s water spilled onto the dress instead. Clear water, but any wet at all would ruin the fabric. It could be dry-cleaned away maybe, but not enough to make it look like it had never been worn. Two hundred and eighty-nine pounds. I gasped. Mark apologized, but the girl on his other side covered a laugh.

I was too angry to move, and if I swore again that would just set off the Canadian girl. “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “It doesn’t matter.” I thought,
It’s Nick who should be apologizing
. And,
It’s Polly who would be laughing, isn’t it
.

There was nothing Mark could do; it’s not like he could dab at my crotch with his table napkin. He stopped saying sorry eventually. Now I really couldn’t get up; it would have looked like I peed myself. The guy on my other side finally said something to me. He said, “These things go on forever.” What did he mean? Did he kindly mean my skirt would dry into a wrinkled mess before I’d have to get up? Did he obnoxiously mean that he hated being stuck next to me and my problems?

None of it even mattered. The hard rains had come. When I stepped outside, the dress got soaked.

We found out that Nick was gone on Day Two, which suddenly made sense of him missing the dinner. I heard it from the porter. I was worried, but in a light way, thinking he’d gotten a flat tire on his bicycle or had lost track of time in the library stacks. I went to tell Polly, who already knew.

Polly had been interviewed by the police.

I had to call them myself to tell them I was Nick’s friend too. This was Saturday, Day Three. The man said he was glad I’d called and that I was on his list, which was bullshit. He just said that to cover up that he didn’t think I was much of anything to Nick. I made an appointment to go down to the Parkside police station, to tell them everything that had happened and let them decide who the girlfriend was.

“Hi,” said the policewoman. Polly had talked to a man. “Thanks for coming in. You’re at Magdalene?” I nodded. “The porters tell me there was a little party Tuesday evening.”

“Oh, totally,” I agreed. “I saw Nick collecting his mail and invited him over. He needed a break.”

“Was there any alcohol at this party?”

“Just some beer. I think he only had one.” He wasn’t drunk, if that’s what she was implying. He didn’t need to be drunk to do what we did.

“When did he leave?”

“He stayed in my room for a while.” I smiled.

“How long is a while?”

“I guess half an hour.”
Long enough
, is what I meant. “He had to see his supervisor.” It was important to explain why he hadn’t stayed over.

“Richard Keene? No, he didn’t.”

“What?”

“We’ve spoken with Dr. Keene. They had no interaction on Tuesday night.”

I know that Nick saw him. He went around to O building and didn’t come out.

“Why would Dr. Keene lie?” I asked.

She leaned back. “Why do
you
think Dr. Keene would lie?”

I held on to the seat of my chair with both hands.

“I guess he wasn’t in. But Nick went to see him.” And didn’t come out from around the front of the building for at least forty minutes. After forty minutes I went to bed.

“We’ll investigate the discrepancy,” she said. “Did Nick go to a lot of parties?”

“I don’t know.” Maybe he did. Maybe this was a normal thing for him. Maybe lots of girls put their faces there.

“What did you and he do for half an hour?”

She was asking everything backward. She was supposed to have asked that before she told me that Nick hadn’t really gone to see Dr. Keene.

“Like, we talked and stuff. About … school.” I shook my head. That was stupid. Why would we talk about school? But she believed me. She didn’t even try to get it out of me that we hadn’t talked at all.

“Do you know Polly Bailey? Was she at this party?”

“No!” I said.

I let them take my fingerprints, like they were doing with everyone who knew him well. “For elimination purposes,” this policewoman said. That’s right; someone had trashed his room.

My prints wouldn’t be there. I’d never been in his room. Whenever I went over to the Chanders’ house, we’d sat in the kitchen. I’d never even been upstairs.

By the time I learned about Polly being sick in Nick’s office—and when—it wasn’t really a surprise at all.

Since he’d lied about needing to see Dr. Keene, and lied about liking me, and lied about whether I’d done it right and if it felt good and if I mattered, maybe he’d lied about everything. Maybe he hadn’t tried to smooth anything over with Gretchen. Maybe, instead of calming down her freak-out over the handwriting thing, he’d urged her on, picking apart my index line by line….

Never mind. I had to try. I had to get it done. I had to get paid.

She wasn’t even in. And Harry was away for a bird competition, which was actually kind of perfect. I have my own key for just this kind of situation, and I thought,
Great, no distractions
. But Gretchen had moved the photos. The whole box had been put away somewhere. Maybe she’d taken them someplace to get scanned or preserved, but I thought it was really rude to not have told me.

I’d set aside two hours to be there. I turned on the computer. What else was I supposed to do? It’s not like she’d left me the ability to do my stupid job. I looked at some sites that I like and just felt really frustrated. Then I flipped through her bookmarks a little. Why not?

Polly thinks it’s wrong that I looked at what was on Gretchen’s computer sometimes, but I didn’t even do it on purpose. It
talked
to me and that’s literal. The first time it happened I freaked out. But then I got used to it, and it was like having a conversation. I’d press buttons and it would say stuff. It was funny.

One time when Gretchen had been using the computer, and I waited my turn out in the hall, I’d heard her. I wasn’t really paying attention, but I noticed it spell out “brussels1958.” I thought that was funny. I realized it was her password. It recited a series of numbers too. It was the password to her bank account. It’s just funny to pay attention to stuff like that. One time I watched a friend of mine dial her locker combination and freaked her out for weeks after by putting stuff in there. Nothing mean, just funny, like stupid toys from the dollar store. It just makes sense to pay attention in life.

So, when I was alone in Gretchen’s house, with absolutely nothing to do—which wasn’t my fault—I logged in. I just wanted to see how much she had. The checking account was normal; the investment account was enormous. Big to me anyway. Not like what had been kicking around Silicon Valley when I was a teenager, but still, it was a lot.

The thing is, I needed money for things, stupid things. Shampoo and food, stuff that I would have charged if I hadn’t hit my limit. It’s not like I could make it to Christmas. I was supposed to get a check today, and even then it would take time to clear. Now I’d have to wait even longer.

Since they had so much, it didn’t seem any big deal to take a little from the cash in the top drawer. Just three twenties. Queen Elizabeth looked at me all judgmental until I crinkled her into my pocket.

Polly’s mother was arrested on Day Seven. I was back at Gretchen’s house one last time, trying to not have a fight with her. “What do you mean you told Nick to ‘dispose’ of them? What does that even mean?” I’d come one last time to try to finish with the photos, and they were gone. Just gone. She’d gotten rid of them.

“I’m suspending the project. You may return the house key. I’ll get you your check. Harry!”

He was in the kitchen. His hands were covered with flour.

“What did Nick do with them?” I demanded. “You can’t just—”

That’s when the doorbell rang. Polly was hysterical, which isn’t really surprising. We knew by then how she’d reacted to Nick touching her. Who knew how she’d cope with anything else?

Everyone forgot about my check. Only Polly mattered.