White Goods (40 page)

I relished the
feel of the heat. Somehow, it made me feel completely clean;
cleaner than a normal bath with bubble bath, or washing up liquid
in it, when we’d run out of
Matey.
It was a burning sensation that left no trace, a
blistering heat with no blisters. I guess it felt like it was
burning away the dirt, inside and out.

Sometimes I
would be in there for hours, staying in the water for its complete
transformation from a boiling, bubbling pool to a cold, stagnant
pond. I’d get knocks on the door, people wanting to know
what-I-was-getting-up-to-in-there.
Or desperate for the loo, getting cross and
twitchy-legged about it all;
hurry-up-for-bloody-God’s-sake!

On that
Thursday, however, I was left alone. Everyone gradually got up and
the house came to life, but no one tried to come in. By some
miracle, bodily functions were being kept under control and there
was no desperate knocking, no
hurry-up-for-bloody-God’s-sakes
at
all.

They knew I
was in there and they knew I was doing my
weird-bath-thing
, but they wanted me
out the way. I’d seen too much and they all wanted a chance to
clear up the rest of their mess without me looking on. So, no one
bothered me, no one minded how long I spent in there and, if anyone
got desperate for the loo, they must have gone somewhere
else.

So, I was left in peace,
allowed to wallow in my specially prepared bath; given a chance to
think about what had happened the day before. Allowed to piece
together more of the puzzle.

There’s still some things
I should explain. Now that other people’s secrets are tumbling out
of their closets, I should release a few things I’ve held
back.

The day of
the funeral – Nan Buckley’s funeral – the police didn’t take Dad
down to the station because he’d done anything wrong. They took him
there because Mum had turned up. She had been missing for weeks;
just disappeared from the house one day, whilst the rest of us were
out. I now knew that Ian had been there, that he knew more about
her disappearance than he was letting on, but I didn’t have the
full details, just the bits I had pieced together from Della’s
ranting.
You were there! You were fucking
there! You’ve known all along, all along, and you’ve said nothing.
She’s gone because of you!
Nothing else
had been said to shed further light on this, but now I knew that
Jackie had disappeared too, around the same time, I couldn’t help
but believe that the incidents were linked.

Dad had never explained
why Mum had taken herself to the police station, instead of just
coming home, but we all knew something wasn’t right. Something
terrible had happened to her; a dreadful transformation that meant
she wasn’t safe to live with us anymore.

‘
She’s going
to stay in a hospital for a bit,’ Dad had explained to me, a week
later. I’d been distracted throughout his explanation by the clean,
pink scars on his face. Scars that had formed from the scratch
marks Auntie Stella had cleaned up in the bathroom the night of Nan
Buckley’s funeral
. ‘Those are nasty cuts,
Tony. Jesus. What you gonna tell the kids?’

‘How d’you get those
again?’ I’d asked, once he’d finished telling me about Mum, about
how she was still our Mum despite everything.

‘Coppers,’ he’d replied,
looking me straight in the eye, knowing I knew the truth but, like
me, not being able to say it. Instead, he found a more comfortable
truth and hid behind it. ‘Coppers,’ he repeated.

It wasn’t the
first time she’d been ill. She’d been up and down before; sad and
moody. And she’d acted strangely, too, like when we were on that
last caravan holiday and she’d dressed up in her fancy blue wedding
outfit for Ian’s talent competition, including the hat. Or when
she’d insisted on buying me that first, over-large parka, not that
I minded in the end. Acting over-the-top; that describes it best, I
guess. But usually she just popped to the doctor’s, popped a few
pills and everything was alright. Not this time, this was
worse.
Uncontrollable.
That was what Dad told Auntie Stella, not realising little
ears were listening.
Sectioned
was another word he used, which sounded like
she’d be chopped up into little bits in an experiment.

But it was something else
he said that really stuck with me. Something he said that night
Auntie Stella attended to his wounds, not knowing we were listening
in.

She’s better
off dead,
he had said, not really thinking
about it, not really meaning it. But I’d latched on; and that’s
when it started. That’s when I killed her off and brought Nan
Buckley back to life. It was easier; it made more sense. And it
worked for a bit. Like Dad, I had found a more comfortable truth to
hide behind.

As I lay in
the bath, letting the water slowly drop in temperature, I could
hear activity on the other side of the door. People were in and
out, milling about, dropping by to talk
business
with Dad; just like any
normal day in our house. Auntie Stella had come back and I heard
her confiding in Della.

‘
He’s gone.
All his stuff. Cleared out completely. Just like that.’

I had feared
that Auntie Stella would be moving back in with us, but it turned
out
Uncle
Gary
had handed over his keys, offering her a place to stay as his
parting gift.

‘
Just for now.
Just whilst I sort myself out.’

The night before, once the
drama had subsided and the blood had been washed away, she came to
see me. I was in the bedroom on my own, trying to get some sleep,
but failing. At first, I wondered if she’d come to kill me off
after all – seen her opportunity and sneaked away from the others
to finish what she had started hours earlier. But all she wanted
was a chat, an explanation.

‘
I just want
to understand,’ she had said, sitting on the edge of my bed, the
anger from earlier all spent.

And so I had sat up and
tried my very best, explaining the letters, the favours, the money
he’d started giving me. The fact I knew I had something on him;
just didn’t know exactly what. And the fact that I’d used him to
ensure she didn’t move in with us permanently, to stop her taking
over as our mum.

‘
I didn’t ask
him to marry you, though,’ I said, in my defence, wondering if this
would make her angry again. Instead, it made her feel
sad.

‘
Was it really
that bad, having me stay here?’ she’d asked, looking me straight in
the eyes.

I saw no point in lying;
there had been too much of that already.

‘
It was a
bit,’ I told her and then, after staring at me blankly for a little
longer, she expelled a short, sharp laugh.

‘
Well, at
least one of you’s being honest,’ she said, standing up to leave.
Her comment prompted a question from me.

‘
Is someone
going to tell me the truth?’ I asked. ‘Can you tell me the truth?
About Mum? About Jackie?’

Auntie Stella
took a long in-take of breath, as if preparing herself and, for a
minute, I thought she just might take her place on my bed again and
tell me what I needed to know. Instead, she took the route
Uncle
Gary had hours
earlier.

‘
Someone will
tell you, Scot, but that person shouldn’t be me. It needs to come
from Tony.’ And with that, she had left my room, rejoining the
others below.

As well as
Auntie Stella coming back the next day, Adrian Tankard also made a
return. I was still in the bathroom, but I could hear him and Dad
talking. The bathroom window was open and they were standing not
far away – under the lean-to where much of their stock was housed.
Adrian mainly came about
Dontask
business, talking to Dad about some sandwich
toasters they were having trouble shifting and a shipment of hover
lawnmowers he could get at a good price. Yet he also came by for
something else.

‘
How’s the
boy?’ he asked Dad.

How’s the
boy?

It was a
reference to me, I knew. But it was out of character. Adrian
Tankard never asked about our family. Whilst he and his family had
attended Nan Buckley’s funeral and after-party in respect of our
families’ long-term association, we didn’t figure in their general
banter. I’d never heard Adrian ask after us before, not even when
he knew Mum was ill or missing. But there it was, on that Thursday
morning:
How’s the boy?

Dad told him I was fine.
That everyone was keeping an eye on me. And that he was going to
talk to me when the time was right.

‘
Just let me
know if you need anything,’
Adrian had
responded, another first, and that had been the end of it. Back to
business talk.

I was quickly distracted
from Adrian’s show of feelings by Dad’s declaration: he was going
to talk to me when the time was right.

It needs to
come from Tony,
Auntie Stella had
said.

So, feeling hopeful that
the truth was just around the corner, I hauled myself out of the
bath and wrapped myself in a bath sheet.

As I dried myself off,
rubbing the water off my now wrinkled skin, I realised there was
one person who hadn’t come back from the night before: Russell. I’d
last seen him ushered off by Della, whilst Auntie Stella had
organised the swift disposal of Adrian Tankard’s victim. For a
second, I wondered if that was it; if the events from the night
before had put Russell off for good. I hoped not. I liked Russell.
You could trust him.

When I came out of the
bathroom, Della and Auntie Stella were there to greet
me.

‘
Where’s Dad?’
I asked them both, hoping to nail down some time with him to
discuss the truth.
Nail down some
time.
The kind of phrase the old me
would’ve pulled apart, pretending I didn’t quite understand, taking
it literally on purpose. But my word games were over: from now on I
was playing it straight.

‘
Gone out with
Adrian,’ Della replied, grinning at me.

Auntie Stella simply
rolled her eyes and pursed her lips.

‘
You got
anything on under that?’ Della asked, and I shook my head, as I
passed through the kitchen on my way upstairs.

‘
That
bloody
coat!’ I heard
behind me: Auntie Stella. But she had said it with a
chuckle.

Upstairs, Ian perched on
the edge of his bed, pulling on trainers. He looked up at me when I
entered, his face full of hurry. I recognised that look in his
face, I’d seen it before on the day he went looking for Shirley
White’s flat.

‘
Where you
going?’ I asked, pulling a pair of pants up under my
parka.

‘
Nowhere you
need to know, okay?’

I said nothing, just
stared back at him through my furry snorkel hood.

‘
You listen to
me, Scotty. You need to stay out of trouble, okay? Stop asking
questions. It’s not helping. You listening?’

I shrugged. ‘I just want
to know the truth, Ian. Is it so much to ask? I have so many
questions. About Mum. About Jackie. About Dad and Shirley. And I
don’t understand why you won’t answer me. And I heard Dad tell you
to lie to me.’

He sighed deeply, and it
was a breath threaded with impatience: he didn’t have time for
this. Standing up, he put his hands on my shoulders and looked
right into me.

‘
Just do as I
ask. Just today. Stay here, okay? Out of trouble. Away from the
Tankards. Away from Roy Fallick and that nasty crowd. Just stay
away. Today. You’ll get the truth soon enough. Promise me you’ll do
as I say: stay here, keep out of trouble. Promise me?’

I let my head nod and I
let Ian think I had promised. But I had no intention of doing what
he said. He was still evading the truth, as was everyone else, and
I wasn’t just prepared to hang about whilst they thought out their
latest excuses, whilst they created new stories.

When Ian left, I finished
getting dressed, pulling on socks and trousers with the parka still
on, only removing it in order to put on a shirt. With the shirt
buttoned up and tucked in, I slipped my coat back on and descended.
Dad was rushing back in, just as I reached the bottom of the
stairs.

‘
You said
you’d talk to me. Heard you say to Adrian.’

Halting for a second, he
threw me a short, quizzical glance, and then continued on through
the house.

‘
It’ll have to
be later, Scotty,’ he said, picking up a couple of boxes from out
the back and taking them through to the front. ‘Without Gary, we’re
a man down. I’ll talk to you tonight. Properly. I’ll explain it all
then, okay? Just can’t do it now.’

With that, he
left. Seconds later, I heard his
Dontask
van rev up and zoom along
the road.

I wasn’t prepared to wait.
Everyone was telling me that in one way or another: wait, we’ll
tell you later. But I had my doubts.