Phyllis edges the two of them near. Solemnly Molly taps Aurora against Simon’s cheek, accompanying the gesture with a kiss from her own mouth.
‘What about letting Blue Crocodile kiss his other cheek now, Luke?’
Karen gently guides Luke by the shoulder to the coffin. He is still tentative, but loath to be seen as hesitant compared to his younger sister, so follows suit.
‘Now, let’s give Daddy his dressing gown,’ she says, pulling it from the bag. ‘I think we’ll just put it here for the moment, round him, like this.’ She wraps the dressing gown loosely over Simon, tucks it around the suit. It might not be appropriate for it to stay like that, but she’ll discuss it with Barbara separately.
‘Will he be cosy?’ asks Molly.
Karen nods. ‘Yes, honey. Look, Daddy’s lovely and snug.’ Her voice cracks. Memories of Simon come rushing in . . . Countless mornings of him pulling on his dressing gown when he went to make the tea; weekends when he’d stand in the kitchen cooking breakfast in it; nights when he’d yank it on hurriedly because he’d heard one of the children crying and wanted to check.
If the drawings are the children’s gift, here, today, the dressing gown is hers, surely. It seems so little to give him in some ways, so significant, so intimate in others. Certainly it’s at odds with his surroundings: the shiny satin of the coffin interior, the respectable grey wool of his work suit. She’s not even had the chance to wash it, either. That’s a shame.
‘Karen?’ Phyllis interrupts her thoughts.
‘Oh, sorry, yes.’ Karen lets out a breath, slowly, and struggles to concentrate on the present. ‘So, children, is there anything more you would like to say?’ Both of them look at a loss, so she prompts: ‘Would you like to say goodbye?’
‘Goodbye,’ they say in unison.
Again Karen’s heart lurches. It’s a lot for them to deal with.
‘I tell you what,’ she says. She is finding it unbearable herself. ‘I think Granny might like a little while with Daddy on her own. So why don’t we go back home, and maybe she can meet us there?’
She looks at Phyllis to check if this is in fact what she would like.
Phyllis, who is still hugging Molly, is weeping noiselessly into her granddaughter’s blonde curls. She nods quickly.
‘We’ll see you back at the house, then. I’m sure Barbara can get you a cab, if that’s OK.’
A few minutes later, Karen is clipping Luke into his car seat.
‘Mummy?’ he says.
‘Yes?’
‘Are you going to die too?’
So many questions! Still, it helps to focus on their needs, not her own. She pauses to consider and then tells him, ‘Everything and everybody that lives will die some day, sweetheart. But most people can expect to live much longer than your Daddy. What happened to him was very, very sad because Daddy was still very young – he was fifty-one years old – and we didn’t know he was ill, so it has been a great big shock to us all. But most people live until they are seventy or eighty, so it is very, very unlikely that I will die for years and years and years. I promise.’ She thinks of how she can back this up. ‘I’m younger than Daddy, remember?’
‘How old are you?’
‘I’m only forty-two. So you’ll be very big and grown up by the time I am eighty.’
‘What about Granny?’
This is more awkward. Nonetheless, ‘I don’t think she was planning on dying right now.’
‘Good.’ Luke frowns. ‘So why did Daddy die?’
Jesus, thinks Karen, if only I knew.
The children are asleep. Phyllis has gone. It is just Karen and Anna, a glass of red wine apiece, sharing the sofa, end to end, just as they have shared sofas for over twenty years.
Sitting here in Karen’s home makes Anna remember: the house purchase. They still haven’t finalized what to do about it, but she’s worried it’s even more for Karen to consider, so broaches the subject with caution.
‘Let me get something straight, honey,’ she says. ‘We’ve put the place in Hove on hold for the moment, but you hadn’t signed the actual contracts yet?’
A pause, and then Karen says, ‘That’s what we were going to do yesterday morning.’
‘I see.’ Anna exhales. The next question is tough. ‘I was wondering . . . Do you still want to go ahead?’
‘I had been thinking about that.’ Karen frowns. Anna can feel her trying to assimilate. Big house, on the outskirts of Hove: large mortgage. Versus smaller house – but not that small – nearer to Brighton station: manageable – or at least not totally unmanageable – mortgage. The answer is clear, really – even if Simon did have life assurance, Karen may find it hard to afford it alone. But she is still in such shock it takes her longer than usual to make the connections. ‘I guess not,’ she says.
‘No.’ Anna shakes her head, feeling Karen’s grief at this second, more minor, loss so soon after the first. She knows one of the big appeals of the new house to Karen was the outside space; like many houses in central Brighton, their patio is tiny. She had wanted somewhere for the children to play and the chance to grow flowers and vegetables. Simon loved plants, planning; he had wanted a bigger garden too, and the house in Hove has a glorious hundred-foot one at the back. Saying goodbye to this would be tough under any circumstance. But truly, moving now isn’t practical. She’s got far too much to deal with – there is no way she could take on the stress. The house she is in at the moment is fine, all things considered.
Again, silence, save for the gentle swoosh of the gas fire in the grate. The kitten is stretched out on the hearth, basking in its warmth.
Eventually: ‘One of the main reasons we were buying that house was so Simon could have an office and work from home and stop that beastly commute.’ Karen snorts, derisive. ‘How ironic is that?’
Anna sighs. ‘I know.’ She and Karen had spent ages weighing up the pros and cons of Simon setting up his own landscape architectural practice. Karen had had one or two misgivings – ‘It’s hardly a good time, the economy the way it is, and he might drive me nuts around the house all day’ – but overall was keen for him to be able to spend more time with her and the children. ‘He’s an old Dad, Anna, with two little ones, but he hardly ever gets to see them. He wastes twenty hours a week on those damn trains.’
Ironic, indeed.
Anna reaches over, gives Karen’s hand a squeeze. Her heart contracts with the gesture. She so feels for Karen it is as if they are one being at this moment, sharing legs but with separate heads, like the Pushmi-Pullyu in Doctor Dolittle.
And as they sit, in silence, nursing their glasses, Anna thinks of Steve. What would she do without him? How would she cope? She imagines her bed, empty of his presence, a life devoid of sexual intimacy. What would it be like never to chat to him, laugh with him, share jokes and tease him again? She shudders. She is so glad he is alive.
Then, fleetingly, perversely, she wonders if it might have caused less pain if it had been Steve who’d died. It would be awful, yes, but primarily for her, whereas Simon’s death has impacted on so very many people. Certainly Steve would be missed; he has parents in New Zealand who love him, sisters, friends too. And she, of course, adores him, doesn’t she? Or she wouldn’t endure the behaviour he puts her through. But they’ve been together far less time than Karen and Simon; they are less rooted. She had a life before she met him – her home, friends, work; she could resume it all without such trauma.
But for two decades Karen and Simon’s lives have been intertwined; she has been able to depend on him, and vice versa; her identity is bound to his. He has fulfilled so many roles for her: he has not just been her lover, friend and confidant; he’s been her holiday companion, finance manager, handyman, gardener, playmate, car mechanic, sometime supermarket shopper . . . the list is endless. He’s been like the RSJ that holds up the living-come-dining room she and Karen are sitting in at that very moment.
And Karen is not the only one bereft. There is Phyllis, and Alan too. Simon?
??s work colleagues and friends. And there are Molly and Luke, who will never see their father again.
Anna thinks of her own father, now in his early seventies. She has had over forty years with him, and for the first twenty his role in her life was central. Her head is chockfull of memories – the Easter egg hunts he arranged for her and her brothers, the doll’s house he built for her, the arguments over which subjects she should study, the outfits he preferred her not to wear, the boyfriends he resented. Molly and Luke will have none of this.
Karen breaks the quiet. ‘It was my fault,’ she says, for the third time that evening. ‘I should have known.’
‘Dearest friend, you’re not Mystic Meg,’ says Anna, attempting to make her smile. It works, though all too briefly. ‘You did not know. I did not know. Phyllis did not know. Simon did not know. Even Simon’s bloody doctor did not know.’
‘But I’m his wife!’ Karen protests, as if berating herself more means that Anna, at last, will accept she is to blame.
‘Of course, of course.’ Anna picks at a loose thread on one of the cushions, struggling to find words of comfort. She knows guilt is inevitable – hasn’t she felt it herself? Yet she wishes she could ease the torture of wrestling with it.
‘I should have given him the kiss of life,’ says Karen. ‘I was in such a fluster . . .’
‘I wouldn’t know how. Do you?’
‘No, not really . . . Though I should do. Anyway, I could have given it a go.’
‘So could anyone else in the carriage,’ Anna points out. ‘But they didn’t. And anyway, from what I gather it was seconds – a minute or two at most – afterwards that those nurses arrived.’ At once, this makes her think of Lou. She’s not told Karen about their encounter in the taxi; yesterday she’d feared it would cause more distress. But she’s useless at secrets, as is Karen – or at least in terms of their friendship they’re useless – frankness and confession being the dynamic that’s evolved over the years. The last thing Anna wants now is the distance caused by unspoken truths.
So she says, carefully, ‘I didn’t tell you something yesterday. When the train stopped at Wivelsfield, I shared a taxi up to London with this woman.’
‘Ah, right.’ Karen looks uninterested, as if Anna is trying to distract her with irrelevancies, and it won’t succeed.
Anna plunges straight to it. ‘She was sitting next to you and Simon. Across the aisle.’
‘Oh.’ Karen pales. Then she says, ‘That must have been awful for her.’
Typical Karen: thinking of others and putting them first. ‘That’s not why I was telling you. She – Lou – was lovely, really lovely. You might remember her – short brown hair, parka, sort of pointy face, not that tall, slim.’
Karen shakes her head. ‘I don’t think so.’
Anna realizes this is a foolish thing to have said; of course Karen is unlikely to remember her. Anyway, this is not the point Anna wishes to make. ‘Lou told me in the taxi, before I knew it was Simon, what happened,’ she continues gently, not sure how Karen will react. ‘I can’t remember every word she said, obviously, and she didn’t go into every tiny detail, but nonetheless I do remember her saying there was absolutely nothing that she, you, or anyone, could have done.’
‘Oh,’ says Karen, gradually assimilating. ‘Maybe you’re right . . .’ she concludes eventually.
But Anna can tell that she is not convinced.
* * *
Gently, Karen closes the front door behind Anna. Now her friend has gone, she is without company for the first time that day. Anna had offered to stay, but Karen knew this would inconvenience her. Sharing a house for several years during and after college means Karen knows Anna’s likes and dislikes almost as well as she knows her own. Anna likes to look good, and she would miss the comforts of her own toiletries and clothes, not to mention bed. And Steve. So Karen has shooed her off home at a reasonable hour.
She returns to the living room. The real-flame-effect gas fire burns in the grate; it reminds her of Simon. Impressed by the fireplace at Anna’s house on Charminster Street, he had opened up the chimney breast and installed it himself, choosing a clean, simple, square surround with pebbles in a polished chrome metal basket. As flames lick rounded shades of pale grey, they make Karen want a cigarette. She locates a packet in her bag on the coffee table – she is not a heavy smoker, at all. She only ever indulges in one or two when she’s out without the children, which is very rarely these days, or when she’s exceptionally stressed. Simplest is to lean past Toby, who still slumbers, free from any anxieties, and light it from the fire, though it chars the white paper doing so.
She opens the window, inhales deeply, allowing the smoke to fill her lungs. Who gives a damn if it’s bad for her? Normally she suppresses the knowledge that her habit is lethal, but tonight she positively relishes it. She feels the poison curling its way round the alveoli, get drawn into the bloodstream and hit the receptors of her brain. She senses it bringing her closer to death, to Simon . . .
All at once, Karen feels wobbly. Maybe it’s the nicotine; more likely it’s because she’s alone. It’s as if she is a rag doll who’s been propped up by those around her – Molly, Luke, Phyllis, Anna – and now there is nothing to support her. Her legs are merely soft cream canvas filled with stuffing, her feet useless rounded ends of black felt, and stitched seams at the hips and knees mean that she cannot remain upright on her own. She sits down on the sofa before she falls.
What Karen wants to do – needs to do – is cry, but she can’t. For some reason the tears come when she is with others, as if then has she permission to weep. But here, alone, when she could howl, beat the sofa cushions, scream; now, somehow, she is unable. It is not even because she is worried about waking the children. It’s for fear that if she gives in to it, she’ll lose all sense of who she is. She is afraid that if she falls apart in private, then she’ll fall apart completely, and won’t be able to look after Molly and Luke, or organize a funeral, or care for Phyllis, or anyone else. That if she crumbles, like a house in an earthquake, she will disappear down some deep, dark crevasse, and never be able to pull herself out and put herself back together again.
* * *
The door is double-locked when Anna gets back: Steve is not home. Moreover, he has not told her where he’s going, which means she knows exactly where he is. The pub. Probably the one down the road – not that it makes much difference. Odds are, this means trouble. If she is lucky she’ll get away with it – if he’s drunk enough to be near comatose when he returns, he’ll crash out on the sofa, snoring, fully clothed. More worrying is if he has drunk marginally less; then he’ll be lairy, energized, wanting to talk.
She is just unclipping her bra when the door slams. She pauses mid action, waiting to hear where he goes. Thump. Pause. Thump. Pause. Thump. Here he comes, up the stairs, footsteps so much heavier, more cumbersome than when he is sober.
Rapidly, she pulls on her nightdress – she is vulnerable enough, without being naked too.
Within moments he has flung open the bedroom door; the brass handle bangs against the wall, where there is already a dent in the plaster. Such force is unnecessary, but bevvied up, Steve can’t gauge his own strength.
He won’t start off angry, Anna knows that. She has been through this before; she has learnt the pattern. The descent is usually rapid, and there’s something so much worse about the fact she can feel it coming.
She is braced, every sinew in her arms rigid, legs taut; even her stomach muscles are tense. She knows what’s on its way: verbal abuse, fierce, vitriolic, self-righteous. Then again, maybe, for once, she’ll be lucky. Hasn’t she been through enough today? Doesn’t God, Steve, Fate, whoever, owe her this small favour? She’s drawn on so many emotional resources already with Karen. She hasn’t the strength for another ordeal. Maybe, just maybe, Steve will appreciate this.
Tentatively, persuasively, hoping to appeal to his better, sober, nature, she ventures, ‘I just got back from seeing Karen
.’ She thinks the mention of her friend might jolt his memory and understanding.
‘Ah . . . right.’ Clearly he had forgotten. His visage clouds. It is astonishing how Steve’s features transform when he is intoxicated. Gone are the handsome proportions, the heroic cheekbones, the sensual yet masculine mouth, the kind, thoughtful eyes. Instead, his face seems soft, unformed, his lips full and blubbery, his eyes unfocused, misty, small. His body too, is different; his stance is less upright, his paunch more noticeable, his shoulders hunched.
He sits down on the bed, leaden, clumsy. But then he surprises her. Instead of inconsequential burble, followed by recriminations, accusations, criticism, he is quiet. His mouth is a cartoon of upset, an upside-down semicircle. Then his eyes spring giant drops. He is crying.
Anna is surprised, touched, and more than a little relieved. She sits down next to him. ‘What’s the matter?’
He wipes away the tears with the back of his fist, toddler-like. ‘I’m useless,’ he shrugs.
‘No, you’re not!’ she insists, indignant. However much she hates his excess drinking, she knows it stems from self-loathing.
‘I am,’ he retorts. ‘Look at me!’ He lifts his hands up, turns them this way then that, despairing. ‘Covered in paint. What am I? Just a bloody decorator.’
‘You’re a very good one,’ she says, and it’s true. Steve is a perfectionist. Yet he’s also a fast worker, a rare combination. Clients often ask him back and frequently recommend him to friends.
‘Yes, but . . . not a career, is it?’ Though addled with booze, he is strangely coherent, and, actually, right. His job doesn’t bother Anna – she is not the type of woman who likes to bask in the reflected glory of a successful man. But that is not the point. What matters is that he is not fulfilled by what he is doing; he considers himself too bright, worth more. ‘Simon had a career,’ he adds, his voice mournful.
He starts crying again, and although she has seen him weep before, Anna can’t get over how disconcerting it is to see a grown man shed tears. Then, finally, out it comes, the thought that’s troubling him through the fog of beer and spirits. He bangs his head with his fist. Hard. It must hurt. ‘It should have been me.’