Bella lowered her eyes and said, ‘I want to start the New Year without him.’ She looked at her watch and said, in a panic, ‘No! He’s in the pub, but he’s coming home for dinner at nine. It’s eight now and I haven’t peeled a potato! I’ll have to go. He won’t like it if his dinner’s late.’
Eva shouted over Bella’s panic, ‘Where are your children?’
‘At my mother’s,’ said Bella, who had jumped up and was pacing from the bed to the door.
‘Gather some men together, phone them now. Tell them to meet here.’
‘I don’t approve of vigilantism,’ said Bella.
‘It isn’t vigilantism, it’s your family and friends protecting you and your children. Imagine living in the house without him. Go on, close your eyes and imagine.’
Bella closed her eyes for so long that Eva thought she might be asleep.
Then Bella took out her phone and started to speed-dial.
When Brian came back from the off-licence with six bottles of cava, a slab of Carling Black Label, a box of rosé and two giant bags of mixed crisps for seeing in the New Year, he was astonished to find a group of men sitting on the stairs and leaning against the walls in the hallway.
He nodded and said, ‘I’m afraid you’re too early for our Open House, the house isn’t open yet.’
Their spokesman, a man in a padded plaid shirt and slurry-covered wellingtons, said, ‘My sister has asked us to help chuck her husband out of the house.’
Brian said, ‘On New Year’s Eve? Poor chap. Isn’t that a bit off?’
A younger man, whose fists were clenching and unclenching, said, ‘That bastard’s had it coming I wanted to tear his head off at the altar.’
A man with a weather-beaten face and DIY haircut said, ‘The kids are terrified of him. But she would never leave him ‘cause he threatened to top himself. I wish.’
An older man with tired eyes, who was sitting on the stairs, said, ‘When he asked if he could marry my daughter, I should have kicked him into the bloody silage pit.’ He looked at Brian, a man he assumed to be of a similar age to himself, and asked, ‘Have you got a daughter?’
Brian said, ‘I have, indeed. She’s seventeen.’
‘What would you do if you knew your daughter was being beaten up on a regular basis?’
Brian put the box of wine down on the floor, tugged his beard and thought.
Eventually, he said, ‘I would gag and bind him, put him in the boot of my car, drive him to a quarry of my acquaintance and attach him by means of nylon rope, using mariner’s knots, to a loose rock. I would then roll him and the rock over the edge of the quarry, and wait for the splash. Problem solved.’
A nervous-looking man said, ‘You can’t do that. Where would we be if we went round murdering everybody we didn’t like? We’d end up living in a cooler version of Mogadishu.’
Brian retorted, ‘This chap asked me what I’d do, and I told him. Anyway, I’ve got the Open House to organise. But if you need the sat nav coordinates for that quarry…’
The older man said, ‘Thank you, but I don’t think it’ll come to that. But if it does, we’ve got a silage pit round the back of the house, and pigs that are always hungry.’
‘Well, I wish you all the best. Have a happy New Year,’ said Brian. He barged past with the alcohol, went into the kitchen and began to unpack it on to the table. Titania was already polishing the glasses.
Brian said, ‘Every time I open my own front door, I’m presented with other people’s dramas.’
Upstairs, Bella was talking to her husband on the phone. He was shouting so loudly that Eva half expected the phone to explode. Bella’s voice was trembling. She was saying, ‘Kenneth, I’m with my family. We’re only up the road. We’re leaving for home now.’ She switched off the phone and said to Eva, ‘I can’t do it to him.’
Eva said, ‘They get away with it because they know we pity them. They play on their weakness. If you go now, he could be out of the house by ten.’
‘But where will he go?’ wailed Bella.
‘Is his mother alive?’ asked Eva.
Bella nodded and said, ‘She only lives five miles away, but he never goes to see her.’
‘Well, it will be a lovely New Year’s Eve surprise for her then, won’t it?’
Later, Eva watched from the window as the seven men and Bella talked on the pavement.
They walked purposefully down the road towards Bella’s house.
38
Eva knew it was midnight by the sound of church bells ringing and rockets exploding. She heard corks popping downstairs and Brian’s voice booming, ‘Happy New Year!’
She thought about all her previous New Years. She had always expected more from the night. Had waited in vain for something extraordinary and magical to happen once the long hand of the clock moved away from the twelve.
But everything had always been the same.
She had never been able to join in with ‘Auld Lang Syne’. She liked the words We’ll raise a cup of kindness’ and she envied those celebrating, but she could not link arms and dance in a circle with the others. People would break the circle and invite her in to fill the space, but she invariably refused.
‘I like watching,’ she always said.
Brian would say, as he flung himself about, ‘Eva doesn’t know how to have fun.’
And it was true. She even disliked the word. ‘Fun’ suggested enforced gaiety, clowns, slapstick. North Korean parades where ranks of synchronised children danced with a fixed smile.
Now she was hungry and thirsty. She had obviously been forgotten again.
Earlier that morning, Brian had gone up and down the street delivering leaflets inviting the neighbours to an Open House party. The leaflet had said (she had shuddered at the word ‘pop’):
Please pop in, and have some fun.
Let’s get to know each other.
Bring a bottle.
Nibbles supplied, but I suggest you eat before coming.
Well-behaved children tolerated.
Our door will be open to you from 9.30 p.m.
PS: Dr Brian Beaver will conduct a short tour of his observatory and, depending on the seeing (or, as you non-astronomers define it, atmospheric conditions/cloud cover), it may be possible to view Saturn, Jupiter, Mars and perhaps the more minor planets.
Yvonne had bought Eva a charming brass temple bell from Bali via Homebase, as a means of communicating with others in the house, but Eva had yet to ring it. There was something distasteful about summoning others to attend to her needs. She would wait until somebody remembered her and brought her something to eat. Through the wall she could hear the twins muttering and tapping on their laptops. The speed of the keys was uncanny. Every now and again there was harsh laughter, and cries of, ‘High five!’
She heard her mother and Yvonne making their way up the stairs.
Ruby said, ‘I don’t know whether to go to the doctor’s with it or not. It could be a harmless cyst.’
Yvonne said, ‘As you know, Ruby, I was a doctor’s receptionist for thirty years. I can tell a cyst from something nasty.’
She heard them go into the bathroom together.
Ruby sounded uncertain of herself, for once. ‘Should I take my corset, vest and bra off?’
Yvonne replied, ‘Well, I can’t tell anything through layers of cloth, can I? Don’t be shy, I’ve seen thousands of titties in my time.’
There was silence, which was broken by Ruby gabbling nervously, ‘Do you think Eva is having a nervous breakdown?’
Yvonne instructed her, ‘Put your arm above your head, and keep still… Yes, she’s had a breakdown. I said it from the first day.’
There was silence again.
Then Eva heard Yvonne say, ‘Put your clothes back on.’
Ruby asked, ‘Well? What do you think?’
‘I think you ought to have an X-ray. There’s a lump the size of a walnut. How long have you known about it?’
‘I’m too bus
y to hang about at the hospital.’ Ruby lowered her voice. ‘I have to look after her.’
Eva wondered if she was having a breakdown.
A few years ago, Jill — a colleague of hers at the library — had suddenly started to talk to herself, muttering that she was unhappily married to Bernie Ecclestone. She then started to throw all the books with red covers on to the floor, saying that they were spying on her and relaying messages to MI5. When anyone approached her, she had screamed at them that they were agents of The System. Some fool had called security and tried to drag her out of an emergency exit. She had fought them off like a wild animal, all teeth, fingernails and snarls, and had run towards the public park that bordered the university grounds.
Eva and the security men had followed her. The overweight security men were soon out of breath. It was Eva who caught up with her. Jill had thrown herself face down on the grass and was holding on to the tufts, saying, ‘Help me! If I let go of the grass, I’ll float away.
Eva thought the kindest thing would be to sit on Jill’s back and pin her to the ground. When the panting security men approached, Jill had started to scream and struggle again. A police car had driven across the park at high speed, with its siren screaming. Eva could do nothing more to help her friend. The policemen and the security men finally managed to restrain her, and the car had taken Jill away.
When Eva was finally allowed to visit Jill in the psychiatric unit, she did not at first recognise her. She was in a featureless room, sitting on a plastic chair, rocking slightly. The other patients scared Eva. The noise of the television was intolerable.
‘This is bedlam,’ she thought. ‘It is actually Bedlam.’ As she walked through the hospital grounds, she thought, ‘I would rather be dead than be sent to a place like this.’
Years later, she had seen an amateur production of Marat/Sade performed by The Faculty Players. Brian had been a very convincing lunatic. For some weeks afterwards, she had been haunted by the thought that madness could be lurking just around the corner, waiting to sneak inside your head while you were sleeping and engulf you.
Eva did sleep for a while. When she awoke, she was startled to see Julie, her neighbour, sitting in the soup chair.
Julie said, ‘I’ve been watching you sleep, you were snoring. I came to wish you a happy New Year, and to get out of that madhouse I call home. I’m at breaking point, Eva. They don’t listen to me now. They’ve lost all respect for me. We spent a fortune on their Christmas presents. Steve bought the eldest boys a PlayStation each, and a television for Scott so he can watch his cartoons as he goes to sleep. They all had a big sack from Santa, full of toys, and half of them are already broken. Steve can’t wait to get back to work, and neither can I.’
Eva, who was feeling irritable due to lack of food, said, ‘For Christ’s sake, Julie, if they play you up, you confiscate their bloody PlayStations! Lock them away until they learn some respect. And remind Steve that he’s an adult male. That cajoling tone he uses with them isn’t working. Can he actually raise his voice?’
‘Only at the football on the telly.’
Eva said, ‘You and Steve are scared to discipline them because you think they won’t love you any more.’ Then she roared, ‘You’re wrong!’
Julie jumped and started fanning her fingers in front of her eyes.
Eva regretted shouting so loudly, but neither of them knew what to say next.
Julie looked critically at Eva’s hair. Want me to give you a trim, and do your roots?’
When the boys are back at school, eh? I’m sorry I shouted, Julie, but I’m so hungry. Will you fetch me some food, please? They keep forgetting I’m here.’
‘Either that, or they’re trying to starve you out!’ said Julie.
When Julie had gone back to her anarchic household, Eva felt a surge of self-pity, and almost wished she was downstairs grazing the buffet. She heard Brian shout, “‘Brown Sugar”! C’mon, Titania.’
When the music started, she imagined them strutting in the kitchen and singing along with The Rolling Stones.
39
It was New Year’s Day. Brian and Titania had been making love for most of the afternoon. Brian had ingested Viagra at 2.15 p.m. and was still going strong.
Every now and again, Titania moaned, ‘OMG!’ But the truth was that she’d had enough. Brian had explored most of her orifices and she was glad he appeared to be having a good time, but she had things to do, people to see. She drummed her fingers on his back, absentmindedly. But this only served to spur him on and before she knew it he had turned her upside down so that she was almost suffocated by the duck-feather pillows gathering around her face. She had to fight for air. ‘OMG!’ she shouted. ‘Are you trying to kill me?’
Brian stopped to get his breath back for a few moments, and said, ‘Look, Titania, can you go back to shouting “Oh my God!”? OMG does nothing for me.’
Titania, who was still upside down with her legs leaning against the wall, said, ‘We’re like two water buffalo yoked together, endlessly turning a bloody wheel. How many Viagra did you take?’
‘Two,’ said Brian.
‘One would have been sufficient,’ complained Titania. ‘I could have finished your ironing by now’
Brian made a superhuman effort, summoning up images that had served him well over the years: the cleavage of Miss Fox, who had taught him physics at Cardinal Wolsey Grammar; French women lying topless on a beach near St Malo; the woman eating a cream horn in the back of the bakery, the cream on the end of her tongue.
Nothing worked. They battled on and on.
Titania kept looking at her watch. Her head and torso were now hanging over the end of the bed. She saw a rolled-up pair of her socks she had thought were lost under the chest of drawers. ‘OMGIH!’ she shouted. ‘How much longer?’
Brian whispered, ‘Let’s have angry sex.
Titania said, ‘I’m already having angry sex, I’m totally pissed off! If you don’t get off me soon, I’m going to —’
She didn’t need to finish her sentence. Brian ejaculated so violently and noisily that Ruby, who was in the garden standing over a drain and rinsing the fetid head of an old-fashioned mop with a garden hose, thought that he had started keeping wild animals in his shed.
Nothing could surprise her any more. She’d once thought that paying L’ .70 for a bottle of water from Iceland was about as daft as you could get — especially when there was nice cold water in the tap. But she’d been wrong.
Somehow, while her attention had been elsewhere, everybody in the world had gone mad.
Alexander let himself into Eva’s house — the door was usually on the latch these days — and shouted, ‘Hello!’
Nobody apart from Eva answered.
He walked upstairs, rehearsing what he was going to say. It was a long time since he had declared his love for a woman.
Eva said, ‘Happy New Year. You look cold.’ He said, ‘I am… and Happy New Year too. I’ve been on Beacon Hill, painting. I’ve never tried a snowscape before. I didn’t know how many shades of white there are in snow I made a dog’s dinner of it. I passed Ruby on the main road and gave her a lift. She said that Brian and Titania were doing very noisy animal impressions in his shed.’
‘I can hear the neighbours sharpening their pencils for the petition.’
They both laughed.
Eva said, ‘I’m mystified by their relationship.’
‘At least they’ve got a relationship.’
‘But they don’t seem to like each other.’
Alexander said, ‘I like you, Eva.’
Eva said, holding his gaze, ‘I like you, Alex.’ There was a fragility to the space between them, as though their breath had frozen and could easily shatter if the wrong word were said.
Eva knelt at the window to check on the snow ‘Fresh drifts… good for snowmen, sledging. I’d love to —She stopped herself, but he was quick to jump in and say, ‘You could, Eva! You could speed down a hill with your arms aroun
d my waist, I’ve got a sledge in the back of the van.’
Eva said, ‘Don’t you start trying to get me out of bed!’
Alexander said, ‘A few years ago, I was working hard to get a woman into bed.’
She smiled. ‘I think my first New Year resolution is to avoid having a new man in my life.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. I’ve come here to tell you that I love you.’
Eva moved from the middle of the bed to the edge, pressing herself against the wall.
Alexander asked, ‘Have I got it wrong?’
She said carefully, not wanting to hurt his feelings, ‘Perhaps I gave out the wrong signals. As the sacked railwayman said.’
‘Perhaps we both gave out the wrong signals. Shall I just say what I feel?’
She nodded.
‘I love you,’ he said. ‘I want to live with you for the rest of my life. You wouldn’t have to get out of bed. I’d push you round Sainsbury’s in it, take you to Glastonbury.’
She shook her head. ‘No, I don’t want to hear this. I will not be responsible for another person’s happiness. I’m no good at it.’
Alexander said, ‘I’ll look after you. We can still be together. I’ll sit in bed with you. I’ll be Yoko to your John, if you like.’
‘You have children, and I have children,’ she said. ‘And you must know that Brianne is in love with you. I wouldn’t want her as a love rival.’
‘She’s a kid, it’s just a crush. The love of her life is Brian Junior.’
‘I’ve finished the daily routine of looking after small children.’
He said in amazement, his voice going up an octave, ‘You don’t like my kids?’
‘They’re lovely, funny kids,’ Eva said. ‘But I’m finished with child-rearing. I can’t bear to watch their disillusionment when they find out what sort of world they live in.’
Alexander said, ‘Shit happens, but it’s still a fantastic world. If you’d seen the sun shining on the snow this morning … and the trees, with the ice falling off them like silver rain …’