It was three-thirty, and already the short midsummer darkness was becoming a smoggy haze. Aluminium barriers had been erected around the Balmoral, and on them a line of magpies was bouncing, as if they were sharing a joke. Behind her, she heard a footstep on the vinyl floor. She almost screamed. Al crossed the kitchen, bulky in her voluminous cotton night-gown. She moved slowly, as if drugged, hypnotized. She slid open the cutlery drawer, and stood looking down into it, fingering the knives and forks.
This is the last of it, Colette thought. A phase of my life ends here; the hidden clink, clink of the metal from inside the drawer, the conversational sound of the birds, Alison’s absorbed face. Colette crossed the room and passed her without speaking. She had to push past; she felt as if Al’s white gown had swelled out to fill the room, and the substance of Al’s flesh had swollen with it. In the distance she heard the sound of a car. My chariot, she thought. Gavin may not be much of a man, but he’s there for me in a crisis. At least he’s alive. And there’s only one of him.
From the kitchen, Al heard the front door close behind Colette. The letter box opened, keys dropped to the carpet, the letter box flipped shut. That was a bit dramatic, Al thought, there was no need for her to do that.
She limped to a kitchen chair, and sat down. With some difficulty, she raised one calf and crossed her ankle over the opposite knee. She felt the drag and pull on the muscle beneath her thigh, and she had to hang on to her shin bone to stop her foot from sliding off and back to the floor. She bent her back, hunched forward. It was uncomfortable; her abdomen was compressed, her breath was squeezed. It’s a pity Cara’s not here, she thought, to do it for me, or at least to instruct me in the proper technique; she must have got her diploma by now. I’ll just have to rub away and hope for the best; I’ll have to go back by myself, back to Aldershot, back to the dog runs and the scrubby ground, back to the swampish waters of the womb, and maybe back before that: back to where there is no Alison, only a space where Alison will be.
She felt for the underside of her toes, and delicately, tentatively, began to massage the sole of her foot.
thirteen
At some point on your road you have to turn and start walking back towards yourself. Or the past will pursue you, and bite the nape of your neck, leave you bleeding in the ditch. Better to turn and face it with such weapons as you possess.
Her feet feel more swollen than usual. Perhaps she’s kneaded them too hard. Or perhaps she’s just reluctant to walk down this road, back through her teenage years, fireside chats with Emmie, happy schooldays, kindergarten fun. She hears Colette drop her keys through the door. Back, back. She hears the engine of a small car, struggling uphill on Admiral Drive; it’s Gavin.
Back, back, back to yesterday. The police are searching the house. Colette says, what are you looking for, Constable Delingbole, surely you don’t think we’ve got another corpse? Delingbole says, rather self-conscious, would you not call me that anymore? I’m Sergeant Delingbole now.
Lovely house, the policewoman says, looking around. Alison says, can I make you a cup of tea? and the policewoman says, oh no, you’ve had a fright, I’ll do the tea.
Al says, there’s lemon and ginger, camomile, Earl Grey, or proper tea, there’s a lemon in the fridge and semi-skimmed, there’s sugar on the top shelf there if you want it. Sergeant Delingbole plunges a long stick down the waste disposal, fetches it up again and sniffs it. Just routine, he says to Al. By the way, that’s quite a set of knives you’ve got there. I love those Japanese ones, don’t you? So chic.
The policewoman says, what do these houses come in at, then?
Back, back. Her fingers are pressed to the door of the shed, feeling for Mart’s pulse. She is coming down the garden towards the Balmoral. Colette is gesturing that the door is stuck. She is standing at the sink swabbing the spilled water. The kettle is boiling. Michelle’s face appears. Back, back. They are closing the door on Mrs. Etchells’s house. As you sow so shall you reap. She is holding a piece of paper with a scorch mark. Her head is in the wardrobe and she is breathing in camphor, violets, a faint body smell persisting down the years. They always said to me, if anyone asks you’re sixteen, right? I can never remember my age when things were done to me or when things happened. I’m not sure how old I am.
With each step backwards she is pushing at something light, tensile, clinging. It is a curtain of skin. With each step the body speaks its mind. Her ears pick up the trickle and swish of blood and lymph. Her eyes turn back and stare into the black jelly of her own thoughts. Inside her throat a door opens and closes; no one steps in. She does not look into the triangle of shadow behind the door. She knows a dead person might be there.
She hears a tap-tap, a knuckle on glass. “Are you there, Mr. Fox?” she says. She always says mister: when she remembers. The men say, here, you bloody tell her, Emmie; tell her politeness costs nothing.
There is a noise that might be crockery smashing, and a chair being knocked over. A door in her mind opens, and at first, once again, no one enters. She waits, holding her breath. It might be Keef, or it might be Morris Warren, or it might be their mate MacArthur, who always winks at her when he sees her.
But it’s her mum who staggers in, rights herself with some difficulty. “Whoops!” she says. “Must be my new pills. Blue, they is. That’s unusual, ain’t it. Blue? I says to him at the chemist, are you sure these are right? He says, lovely shade, he says, not blue, you’d not call that blue. It’s more heliotrope.”
She says, “Mum, did Donnie Aitkenside leave you any wages when he went off this morning? Because you know that magic shilling, that we have to put in the gas meter? He took it with him.”
Her mum says, “Donnie? Gone?”
“Yes,” she says, “he was creeping downstairs with his shoes in his hand, and he took our shilling for the gas. I thought maybe it was his change.”
“What in the Lord’s name is the girl talking about now, Gloria?”
“If we don’t have that shilling we need real money for the meter. It’s cold out and I haven’t had my breakfast.”
Her mother repeats, “Donnie? Gone?”
“And if he’s not paid you, we’ve no money for my school dinner.”