There was so much to go wrong. There was the actual doing of it, which still baffled him, for all the pornographic images lodged in his brain. It wasn’t simple, like putting a key in a lock. You couldn’t quite tell where the lock was, for a start. And even if you found it there were certain specialized ways of proceeding which made it good for the girl, and other ways of proceeding, far more other ways, that left the girl entirely unmoved.
Then there was the matter of stamina. Judging from the intense few moments when they had lain together on the rug, once engaged in actual sex he would last about fifteen seconds. This was not enough. Rich was not sure how long was enough, but fifteen seconds wasn’t it. In the porn videos he’d watched, the banging went on for what seemed like hours.
Then there was the matter of contraception. He had got himself a pack of three condoms. He knew how to roll a condom on. What entirely defeated him was the question of timing. In a perfect world you would put it on in private, before ever meeting your date, as part of your preparations. Then come the moment all would be in place and nothing need be said. But this was not possible with a condom. Your cock had to be hard first. In theory you could make your cock hard and put the condom on and then go out on your date. But unless the date proceeded directly and rapidly to sex your cock would go soft again and the condom would drop off, and you’d never be able to get it on again. So really there was no way out. You had to wait until the critical moment and then call for a pause. But the act of putting on a condom was not erotic. There was something calculated about it that ran counter to the rising tide of passion. Rich was rather relying on the rising tide of passion to carry him along. He did not want to stop for an intermission, least of all an intermission prompted by thoughts of pregnancy, childbirth, and babies.
Then there was the matter of virginity. His own virginity gave him more than enough to worry about, but he must also consider Maddy’s virginity. She had made it clear to him that she had not had sex before. So what should he expect? Would there be resistance? Would there be blood? As soon as the word “blood” entered his mind he shut down the whole chain of thought. Don’t ask. Don’t look. Somewhere round that corner was a realm of biological detail that made him feel queasy. Maybe, it struck him for the first time, what he really needed to carry him through this formidable ordeal was alcohol. Once well and truly drunk nothing would seem all that alarming.
Add to all these real and practical concerns the fact that he would be negotiating them while in a state of almost frenzied arousal, and it seemed to him that he was certain to peak too soon. He would boil over like a pan of milk. Then what would they do? So much anticipation, so much preparation, all undressed, and nowhere to go. It really didn’t seem fair. Why was the one part of your body that was needed at this most sensitive and potentially embarrassing time so totally out of your control? Whose idea was that? What evolutionary purpose did it serve? It felt like a trick. Maybe it was God’s way of limiting the population. The incompetence method.
Rich didn’t believe in God. He believed in karma. Karma meant you got what you deserved.
Did he really deserve Maddy?
Not in a million years.
Then came the rush of gratitude. Rich felt this now a hundred times a day, it came over him in waves, the sensation of grateful wonder. She loves me. Unbelievable but true. She loves me.
Then he remembered that Gran was dying and he’d given her not a single thought. His father was sitting in faithful silence by her bedside all night and Rich was obsessing about sex.
I am evil. I am selfish. I am in love.
The next morning his father phoned to say Gran was still alive, and still asleep. Rich and Kitty were to go to school.
Rich found Maddy before the start of classes.
“Gran’s still clinging on,” he said. “I can’t make any plans.”
“No, of course not,” said Maddy. “I’m sorry. It must be hard.”
“It’s strange. At first it seemed like a big deal. But if something goes on long enough with nothing happening, it stops being such a big deal.”
“Until it happens.”
At the end of the school day Maddy and Cath and Rich walked into town together.
“I’m not being a gooseberry,” said Cath to Rich. “I’m being camouflage.”
Maddy told Rich about Grace: about how she was ill on a sofa, and about her bruises. Rich was deeply shocked.
“So you were right, Rich,” Maddy said. “You guessed there was something wrong with her. You saw what none of us saw.”
“I never guessed it was that bad.”
Cath left them at the turning to her street. Maddy walked on with Rich to his house. She waited outside while Rich checked for news of Gran.
“Mum says come in. She’s squeezing oranges.”
“Any news?”
“Nothing. Dad’s at the hospital.”
They took their glasses of juice up to Rich’s room for privacy. Rich sat on the bed and Maddy sat beside him. Then she lay down and put her head in his lap.
“I want Gran to die,” said Rich. “That proves I’m not a good person, doesn’t it?”
“I think it’s just natural.”
“I should be thinking about Gran. But actually I’m thinking about you.”
“Oh, well,” said Maddy. “That is quite bad.”
She gave him such a sweet upside-down smile when she said “quite bad” that he put down his glass of juice and pressed one hand to his chest.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Just a gratitude rush. I get them from time to time.”
She put her hand to his chest and felt his heart beating.
“I am selfish, you know,” he said. “All I want is you.”
“That’s not selfish. If you’re thinking about me you’re thinking about another person, so it’s not selfish.”
“Really I’m thinking about you thinking about me.”
“Oh, okay. That’s definitely selfish.”
A knock on the door. Kitty’s voice from the other side.
“Rich? Are you in there?”
“We’re talking,” said Rich.
“Fine,” said Kitty.“Go on talking.”
They heard her footsteps going away down the stairs.
“Maybe she needs you,” said Maddy. “She’s so fond of you.”
“She’ll be all right.”
“Anyway, we are just talking. You don’t mind, do you?”
“No. I love talking to you.”
“I mean, having to wait.”
“No, I don’t mind.”
“It’s just that sometimes I think I don’t understand boys at all. They’re so different.”
“Don’t judge all boys by Leo Finnigan.”
“You don’t want to hurt girls, do you, Rich? Not even secretly?”
“Not in any way at all. I don’t get that one.”
“Grace says it’s because of sex. Boys want sex from girls, so girls have power over them, so they want to hurt them.”
“But that’s not how it feels to me. Not at all.”
“Boys do want sex.”
“Yes, of course. But boys want girls to want to have sex. If you think the girl doesn’t want you, that’s a turn-off right there.”
“What about rape? Men do that.”
“I don’t get that. It must be all about hatred. You’d have to really hate women to do that. If you love someone you don’t want to hurt them. You want everything to be good for them.”
“The thing is, I think you may be nicer than most boys.”
“I don’t see why. Most people just want to be loved.”
“But sex isn’t the same thing as love.”
“It feels the same to me.”
There it was, the big question.
“Listening to Grace was so horrible,” said Maddy. “And so sad. Sometimes I get the feeling that the world is full of pain. I watch the news and it’s all about people hating each other
and being greedy and destroying the planet and nobody caring. And then I think, what am I doing that’s so great? What makes me any different? My life isn’t such a big deal either.”
“It is to me. Your life’s a big deal to me.”
“Maybe that’s why we all want to be loved so much. Because we’d feel so useless otherwise.”
“I’ve never thought of it that way,” said Rich. “I always thought I wanted someone to love because without it I wasn’t finished. Like, I wasn’t complete. But maybe you’re right. Maybe we want someone to need us.”
“No, I like your idea better.”
“I’ll tell you what it is.” Rich was thinking it out as he went along. “There’s two kinds of love. There’s the love you get from someone else, and there’s the love you give to someone else. People think the best part of loving is to have someone love you. But I think the best part is having someone to love. Someone who lets you love them.”
“You got that from Pablo’s book.”
“It could still be true.”
“But lots of people might let you love them. It doesn’t mean you can. Cath would let you love her if you wanted to.”
“That’s different.”
“You don’t want to love Cath?”
“I want to love you.”
“What if I died?”
“Don’t say that.”
“You’d forget me and love someone else.”
“Maddy, you just have no idea.”
“I’m not that special, Rich. Really.”
“You’re the most special person in the universe.”
“Only to you.”
“You can’t believe that.”
“I do. Truly. I can’t see what difference my life makes to all the important things. I can’t stop wars, or cure diseases, or slow down global warming. I can’t even make my mum and dad happy. So what’s the point of me? And don’t say to make you feel good, because that’s not enough.”
“It feels enough to me,” said Rich.
“You’re just one person. One’s just not enough.”
“How about four? Suppose four people needed you. Me, your sister, your parents. Is that enough?”
“Well, no. Not really. I mean, they’re my family.”
“Okay. Suppose we add in another six. Friends and neighbors. If ten people needed you, would your life have a point?”
“I don’t know. Which ten people?”
“Just anybody.”
“I don’t see where you’re going with this.”
“Okay,” said Rich. “Let’s start at the other end. At the big end you’ve got the world. Seven billion people. If you did something that made a difference to the whole world you’d say your life had a point, right?”
“Right.”
“But it doesn’t have to be all seven billion people, does it? Suppose you found a cure for AIDS and saved a billion lives. That would do it.”
“Sure.”
“How about a million?”
“A million’s good.”
“How about fifty thousand? A whole stadium full of people whose lives have been saved by Maddy Fisher.”
“I’ll take that.”
“Ten thousand?”
“Okay, okay.” Maddy raised her hands in protest. “I see where this is going now.”
“I’m just trying to find out how many people’s lives you need to affect for you to feel your own existence has a point.”
“That makes me sound so crass.”
“Don’t you see? One’s enough. None’s enough. Your life has value, full stop. Every breath you take changes the atmosphere of the planet. Every word you speak goes on forever. Sound waves never die, did you know that? Every single thing you do makes a difference.”
“Same for you. Same for everyone.”
“Is that a problem? Do you want to be more important than everyone else?”
“I’m not sure.” Maddy thought about that. “I’d like there to be at least some people who are less important than me.”
“Okay. I nominate Grace.”
He was smiling down at her, stroking her hair.
“Rich,” said Maddy. “You are an amazing person. You get more amazing all the time. I’ve never talked to anyone the way I talk to you.”
Somewhere in the house they heard the phone ring. Then came the sound of Kitty’s footsteps running up the stairs. She pushed open the door, eyes wide with the importance of her role as the bringer of news.
“Gran died,” she announced. “Dad just called. Gran died five minutes ago, while I was watching Neighbors. Mum says we’re to go.”
Rich and Maddy got up from the bed. Rich’s mother appeared in the doorway behind Kitty.
“Over at last,” she said. “Dear Gran.”
Rich hugged them both, and Kitty started to cry. Rich didn’t cry. He found he didn’t really feel anything very much.
“She never woke up,” said his mother. “It’s a good way to go.”
Rich saw Gran before they moved her from the hospital bed. She was lying there as she’d lain for the last three days. She looked the same and different. There was no change to her appearance, but it was quite obvious that she was no longer there. Whatever made her be the Gran he knew was no longer in the room.
His father hugged him and Kitty.
“She just slipped away,” he said. “I was here but I didn’t even notice. You know how Gran never made a fuss.”
Only when he was back home and climbing the stairs to his room did Rich suddenly catch the true feeling that Gran was dead. It was the sight of her stair-lift standing faithfully at the foot of the stairs, and her Zimmer waiting at the top. She wouldn’t be coming back, ever again. That familiar shuffle-clunk as she pushed her Zimmer across the landing would never sound again. He’d never hear her funny scrambled speech again.
The absoluteness of death struck Rich then with a deep cold horror.
He opened his diary and wrote:
Gran has died. I don’t understand. I want her to come back again. Other things come back. Leaves on trees. Sunrise. Christmas. I want Gran to come back when the clocks change, or with the spring. This death thing is a bummer. I’m against it. Come home, Gran. We love you.
Then he lay on his bed and cried.
32
Reconciliations
Imo was waiting for Maddy when she got home.
“You. Up in my room.”
The door closed behind them.
“What the fuck do you think you’ve been doing?”
Maddy was caught by surprise.
“I say tell no one,” said Imo, her voice cracking with fury, “which to me means no one, and you tell the whole fucking world! Are you totally insane, or do you just hate me so much you want to shame me in public? Is that it, Maddy? Have you always hated me?”
“No—of course not—”
Maddy tried to stop herself, but tears were pushing at her eyes. It was so unfair. She’d done it for Imo.
“You want the whole town to laugh at me? Well, you’ve done it. Well done Maddy. I’m the town joke.”
“I don’t want that. I swear, Imo. I was just so angry.”
“You think you’re angry? Have a go at being me.”
“I had to do something. He just didn’t care. He just laughed at me.”
“Why did you have to do something? Why? It’s got fuck all to do with you.”
“That’s not true, Imo.”
“Just because you’re my sister. You’re not my guardian. You’re not my protector. I don’t need protecting, okay? I need leaving alone.”
“He did it to Grace too.”
“What?”
“Leo did what he did to you to my friend Grace. He beat her up.”
“Grace who?”
“She’s in my year at school. Grace Carey.” Maddy hesitated, and then went on. “He’s been seeing her for over a year.”
“Over a year?”
“She’s with him in his flat now.”
>
Imo fell silent.
“She showed me her bruises. She told me not to tell anyone, just like you. I couldn’t stand it, Imo.”
“What a shit he is.” She was talking to herself. “Over a year.”
“I had to do something,” said Maddy. “I wanted to hurt him back, so I did. I made him bleed.”
Imo stared. Evidently this part of the story hadn’t reached her.
“How did you make him bleed?”
“I hit him on the head with a beer mug.”
Imo’s mouth twitched.
“And there was blood?”
“Lots.”
“What did he say?”
“He laughed. All the men in the pub laughed. Like being hit over the head by a girl was fun.”
“Oh, the fucking bastard! They’re all fucking bastards!”
“I’m sorry about telling your secret, Imo. I wasn’t thinking straight. I’d come from seeing Grace. I wanted to kill him.”
“I wish you had. God, I wish you had. Kill them all while you’re about it. Christ, I need a drink. Do you want a drink?”
They went downstairs together, reconciled. Their father was in the kitchen, wine bottle in hand, pouring himself a glass.
“Me too, Dad,” said Imo. “A big one.”
“Me too,” said Maddy.
“What’s up, girls?”
“Just the usual fear and loathing of the male sex,” said Imo.
“Excluding Dad, of course,” said Maddy.
“No. Not excluding Dad. The last I heard you were about to do a runner.”
Their father took a long pull at his glass of wine.
“Actually I’m not running away,” he said.
“Does that mean you’re staying?” said Maddy.
“Yes. For now. Jen and I have had a talk.”
Maddy went to him and hugged him.
“I’m really glad, Dad.”
He kissed her.
“Me too,” said Imo. “But I’m not going to cry about it. I’ve had it with crying.”
She hugged him too.
“You just better watch yourself, Dad. Step out of line and Maddy’ll hit you on the head with a beer mug.”