فصل 16

16

There was no way around it. The sleeping arrangements just weren’t working. Every weekend that Treena came home, the Clark family began a lengthy, nocturnal game of musical beds. After supper on Friday night Mum and Dad would offer up their bedroom, and Treena would accept it, after they had reassured her that no, they were not in the least bit put out, and how much better Thomas was at sleeping in a room he knew. It would mean, they said, that everyone got a good night’s sleep.

But Mum sleeping downstairs also involved her and Dad needing their own quilt, their own pillows and even under-sheet, as Mum couldn’t sleep properly unless her bed was just as she liked it. So after supper she and Treena would strip Mum and Dad’s bed and put on a new set of sheets, together with a mattress protector, just in case Thomas had an accident. Mum and Dad’s bedding, meanwhile, would be folded and placed in the corner of the living room, where Thomas would dive into it and on to it and string the sheet across the dining chairs to turn it into a tent.

Granddad offered his room, but nobody took it. It smelt of yellowing copies of the Racing Post and Old Holborn, and it would have taken all weekend to clear out. I would alternately feel guilty – all this was my fault, after all – while knowing I would not offer to return to the box room. It had become a kind of spectre for me, that airless little room with no windows. The thought of sleeping in there again made my chest feel tight. I was twenty-seven years old. I was the main earner of the family. I could not sleep in what was essentially a cupboard.

One weekend I offered to sleep at Patrick’s, and everyone looked secretly relieved. But then, while I was away, Thomas put sticky fingers all over my new blinds and drew on my new duvet cover in permanent pen, at which point Mum and Dad decided it would be best if they slept in my room, while Treena and Thomas went into theirs, where the odd bit of felt tip apparently didn’t matter.

Once you had accounted for all the extra bed stripping and laundry, me spending Friday and Saturday nights at Pat’s, Mum admitted, wasn’t actually much help at all.

And then there was Patrick. Patrick was now a man obsessed. He ate, drank, lived and breathed the Xtreme Viking. His flat, normally sparsely furnished and immaculate, was strung with training schedules and dietary sheets. He had a new lightweight bike which lived in the hallway and which I wasn’t allowed to touch, in case I interfered with its finely balanced lightweight racing capabilities.

And he was rarely home, even on a Friday or Saturday night. What with his training and my work hours we seemed to have become used to spending less time together. I could follow him down to the track and watch him push himself round and round in circles until he had completed the requisite number of miles, or I could stay home and watch television by myself, curled up in a corner of his vast leather settee. There was no food in the fridge, apart from strips of turkey breast and vile energy drinks the consistency of frogspawn. Treena and I had tried one once and spat it out, gagging theatrically, like children.

The truth of it was I didn’t like Patrick’s flat. He had bought it a year ago, when he finally felt his mother would be okay by herself. His business had done well, and he had told me it was important that one of us get on to the property ladder. I suppose that would have been the cue for us to have a conversation about whether we were going to live together, but somehow it didn’t happen, and neither of us is the type to bring up subjects that make us feel a bit uncomfortable. As a result, there was nothing of me in that flat, despite our years together. I had never quite been able to tell him, but I would rather live in my house, with all its noise and clutter, than in that soulless, featureless bachelor pad, with its allocated parking spaces and executive view of the castle.

And besides, it was a bit lonely.

‘Got to stick to the schedule, babe,’ he would say, if I told him. ‘If I do any fewer than twenty-three miles at this stage of the game, I’ll never make it back on schedule.’ Then he would give me the latest update on his shin splints or ask me to pass him the heat spray.

When he wasn’t training, he was at endless meetings with other members of his team, comparing kit and finalizing travel arrangements. Sitting amongst them was like being with a bunch of Korean speakers. I had no idea what any of it meant, and no great desire to immerse myself.

And I was supposed to be going with them to Norway in seven weeks’ time. I hadn’t yet worked out how to tell Patrick that I hadn’t asked the Traynors for the time off. How could I? By the time the Xtreme Viking took place, there would be less than one week of my contract left to run. I suppose I was childishly refusing to deal with it all, but truthfully, all I could see was Will and a ticking clock. Not a lot else seemed to register.

The great irony of all this was that I didn’t even sleep well at Patrick’s flat. I don’t know what it was, but I came to work from there feeling like I was speaking through a glass jar, and looking like I had been punched in both eyes. I began painting concealer on my dark shadows with the same slapdash abandon as if I were decorating.

‘What’s going on, Clark?’ Will said.

I opened my eyes. He was right beside me, his head cocked to one side, watching me. I got the feeling he might have been there for some time. My hand went automatically for my mouth in case I had been dribbling.

The film I was supposed to have been watching was now a series of slow-moving credits.

‘Nothing. Sorry. It’s just warm in here.’ I pushed myself upright.

‘It’s the second time you’ve fallen asleep in three days.’ He studied my face. ‘And you look bloody awful.’

So I told him. I told him about my sister, and our sleeping arrangements, and how I didn’t want to make a fuss because every time I looked at Dad’s face I saw his barely concealed despair that he could not even provide his family with a house we could all sleep in.

‘He’s still not found anything?’

‘No. I think it’s his age. But we don’t talk about it. It’s … ’ I shrugged. ‘It’s too uncomfortable for everyone.’

It felt somehow wrong, telling Will my problems. They seemed embarrassingly trivial next to his.

‘I’ll get used to it,’ I said. ‘It’ll be fine. Really.’

Will seemed preoccupied for the rest of the afternoon. I washed up, then came through and set up his computer for him. When I brought him a drink, he swivelled his chair towards me.

‘It’s quite simple,’ he said, as if we had been in conversation. ‘You can sleep here at weekends. There’s a room going spare – it might as well get some use.’

I stopped, the beaker in my hand. ‘I can’t do that.’

‘Why not? I’m not going to pay you for the extra hours you’re here.’

I placed the beaker in his holder. ‘But what would your mum think?’

‘I have no idea.’

I must have looked troubled, because he added, ‘It’s okay. I’m safe in taxis.’

‘What?’

‘If you’re worried I have some devious secret plan to seduce you, you can just pull my plug out.’

‘Funny.’

‘Seriously. Think about it. You could have it as your backup option. Things might change faster than you think. Your sister might decide she doesn’t want to spend every weekend at home after all. Or she might meet someone. A million things might change.’

And you might not be here in two months, I told him silently, and immediately hated myself for thinking it.

‘Tell me something,’ he said, as he went to leave the room. ‘Why isn’t Running Man offering you his place?’

‘Oh, he has,’ I said.

He looked at me, as if he were about to pursue the conversation.

And then he seemed to change his mind. ‘Like I said.’ He shrugged. ‘The offer’s there.’

‘You saw my dad in town the other day.’

‘Oh. Yes.’ I was hanging washing out on a line. The line itself was hidden in what Mrs Traynor called the Kitchen Garden. I think she didn’t want anything as mundane as laundry polluting the view of her herbaceous borders. My own mother pegged her whites out almost as a badge of pride. It was like a challenge to her neighbours: Beat this, ladies! It was all Dad could do to stop her putting a second revolving clothes dryer out the front.

‘He asked me if you’d said anything about it.’

‘Oh.’ I kept my face a studied blank. And then, because he seemed to be waiting, ‘Evidently not.’

‘Was he with someone?’

I put the last peg back in the peg bag. I rolled it up, and placed it in the empty laundry basket. I turned to him.

‘Yes.’

‘A woman.’

‘Yes.’

‘Red-haired?’

‘Yes.’

Will thought about this for a minute.

‘I’m sorry if you think I should have told you,’ I said. ‘But it … it didn’t seem like my business.’

‘And it’s never an easy conversation to have.’

‘No.’

‘If it’s any consolation, Clark, it’s not the first time,’ he said, and headed back into the house.

I looked up, blinking. ‘I got a tattoo,’ I said suddenly. ‘Of a bee.’

She hesitated, holding on to the side of the seat.

‘It’s on my hip. An actual tattoo. It’s permanent,’ I added.

Deirdre glanced towards the door of the bus. She looked a bit puzzled, and then gave me what I think she thought was a reassuring smile.

‘Well, that’s very nice, Louisa. As I said, tell your mum I’ll be round tomorrow.’

Every day, while he was watching television, or otherwise engaged, I sat in front of Will’s computer and worked on coming up with the magic event that might Make Will Happy. But as time went on, I found that my list of things we couldn’t do, places we couldn’t go to, had begun to exceed my ideas for those we could by a significant factor. When the one figure first exceeded the other, I went back on to the chatroom sites, and asked their advice.

Ha! said Ritchie. Welcome to our world, Bee.

From the ensuing conversations I learnt that getting drunk in a wheelchair came with its own hazards, including catheter disasters, falling down kerbs, and being steered to the wrong home by other drunks. I learnt that there was no single place where non-quads were more or less helpful than anywhere else, but that Paris was singled out as the least wheelchair-friendly place on earth. This was disappointing, as some small, optimistic part of me had still hoped we might make it there.

I began to compile a new list – things you cannot do with a quadriplegic.

Go on a tube train (most underground stations don’t have lifts), which pretty much ruled out activities in half of London unless we wanted to pay for taxis. Go swimming, without help, and unless the temperature was warm enough to stop involuntary shivering within minutes. Even disabled changing rooms are not much use without a pool hoist. Not that Will would have allowed himself into a pool hoist. Go to the cinema, unless guaranteed a seat at the front, or unless Will’s spasms were low-grade that day. I had spent at least twenty minutes of Rear Window on my hands and knees picking up the popcorn that Will’s unexpected knee jerk had sent flying into the air. Go on a beach, unless your chair had been adapted with ‘fat wheels’. Will’s hadn’t. Go shopping, unless all the shops had got their statutory ramps in place. Many around the castle used their listed building status to say they couldn’t fit them. Some were even telling the truth. Go anywhere too hot, or too cold (temperature issues). Go anywhere spontaneously (bags needed to be packed, routes to be double-checked for accessibility). Go out to eat, if feeling self-conscious about being fed, or – depending on the catheter situation – if the restaurant’s bathroom was down a flight of stairs. Go to friend’s houses, unless they had wheelchair ramps. Most houses have stairs. Most people do not have ramps. Will said there was nobody he wanted to see anyway. Go anywhere hilly in heavy rain (the brakes were not always safe, and that chair was too heavy for me to hold). Go anywhere where there were likely to be drunks. Will was a magnet for drunks. They would crouch down, breathe fumes all over him, and make big, sympathetic eyes. Sometimes they would, indeed, try to wheel him off. Go anywhere where there might be crowds. This meant that, as summer approached, outings around the castle were getting harder, and half the places I thought we might be able to go – fairs, outdoor theatre, concerts – were ruled out.

When, struggling for ideas, I asked the online quads what was the thing they would like to do most in all the world, the answer nearly always came back as, ‘Have sex.’ I got quite a lot of unsolicited detail on that one.

But essentially it was not a huge help. There were eight weeks to go, and I had run out of ideas.

A couple of days after our discussion under the washing line, I returned home to find Dad standing in the hallway. This would have been unusual in itself (the last few weeks he seemed to have retreated to the sofa in the daytime, supposedly to keep Granddad company), but he was wearing an ironed shirt, had shaved, and the hallway was filled with the scent of Old Spice. I am pretty sure he’d had that bottle of aftershave since 1974.

‘There you are.’

I closed the door behind me. ‘Here I am.’

I was feeling tired and anxious. I had spent the whole bus journey home talking on my mobile phone to a travel agent about places to take Will, but we were both stumped.

‘Are you okay getting your own tea tonight?’

‘Sure. I can join Patrick at the pub later. Why?’ I hung up my coat on a free peg.

The rack was so much emptier with all Treena’s and Thomas’s coats gone.

‘I am taking your mother out for dinner.’

I did a quick mental calculation. ‘Did I miss her birthday?’

‘Nope. We’re celebrating.’ He lowered his voice, as if it were some kind of secret. ‘I got a job.’

‘You didn’t!’ And now I could see it; his whole body had lightened. He was standing straighter again, his face wreathed in smiles. He looked years younger.

‘Dad, that’s fantastic.’

‘I know. Your mother’s over the moon. And, you know, she’s had a tough few months what with Treena going and Granddad and all. So I want to take her out tonight, treat her a bit.’

‘So what’s the job?’

‘I’m going to be head of maintenance. Up at the castle.’

I blinked. ‘But that’s –’

‘Mr Traynor. That’s right. He rang me and said he was looking for someone, and your man, Will there, had told him that I was available. I went this afternoon and showed him what I could do, and I’m on a month’s trial. Beginning Saturday.’

‘You’re going to work for Will’s dad?’

‘Well, he said they have to do a month’s trial, to go through the proper procedures and all, but he said he couldn’t think of any reason why I shouldn’t get it.’

‘That – that’s great,’ I said. I felt weirdly unbalanced by the news. ‘I didn’t even know there was a job open.’

‘Nor me. It’s great, though. He’s a man who understands quality, Lou. I talked to him about green oak, and he showed me some of the work done by the previous man. You wouldn’t believe it. Shocking. He said he was very impressed by my work.’

He was animated, more so than I had seen him for months.

Mum had appeared beside him. She was wearing lipstick, and her good pair of heels. ‘There’s a van. He gets his own van. And the pay is good, Lou. It’s even a bit more than your dad was getting at the furniture factory.’

She was looking up at him like he was some kind of all-conquering hero. Her face, when she turned to me, told me I should do the same. It could contain a million messages, my mother’s face, and this one told me Dad should be allowed his moment.

‘That’s great, Dad. Really.’ I stepped forward and gave him a hug.

‘Well, it’s really Will you should thank. What a smashing bloke. I’m just bloody grateful that he thought of me.’

I listened to them leave the house, the sound of Mum fussing in the hall mirror, Dad’s repeated reassurances that she looked lovely, that she was just fine as she was. I heard him patting his pockets for keys, wallet, loose change, followed by a brief burst of laughter. And then the door slammed, I heard the hum of the car pulling away and then there was just the distant sound of the television in Granddad’s room. I sat on the stairs. And then I pulled out my phone and rang Will’s number.

It took him a while to answer. I pictured him heading to the hands-free device, depressing the button with his thumb.

‘Hello?’

‘Is this your doing?’

There was a brief pause. ‘Is that you, Clark?’

‘Did you get my dad a job?’

He sounded a little breathless. I wondered, absently, whether he was sitting up okay.

‘I thought you’d be pleased.’

‘I am pleased. It’s just … I don’t know. I feel weird.’

‘You shouldn’t do. Your dad needed a job. Mine needed a skilled maintenance man.’

‘Really?’ I couldn’t keep the scepticism from my voice.

‘What?’

‘This has nothing to do with what you asked me the other day? About him and the other woman?’

There was a long pause. I could see him there, in his living room, looking out through the French windows.

His voice, when it came, was careful. ‘You think I’d blackmail my father into giving yours a job?’

Put like that it did sound far-fetched.

Sorry. I don’t know. It’s just weird. The timing. It’s all a bit convenient.’

‘Then be pleased, Clark. It’s good news. Your dad will be great. And it means … ’ He hesitated.

‘It means what?’

‘ … that one day you can go off and spread your wings without worrying about how your parents are going to be able to support themselves.’

It was as if he had punched me. I felt the air disappear from my lungs.

‘Lou?’

‘Yes?’

‘You’re awfully quiet.’

‘I’m … ’ I swallowed. ‘Sorry. Distracted by something. Granddad’s calling me. But yes. Thanks for – for putting a word in for him.’ I had to get off the phone. Because out of nowhere a huge lump had lodged itself somewhere in my throat and I wasn’t sure I could say anything else.

I walked to the pub. The air was thick with the smell of blossom, and people smiled as they passed me on the street. I couldn’t raise a single greeting in return. I just knew I couldn’t stay in that house, alone with my thoughts. I found the Triathlon Terrors all in the beer garden, their two tables pushed together in a dappled corner, arms and legs spilling off the ends in sinewy pink angles. I got a few polite nods (none from the women) and Patrick stood, creating a small space for me beside him. I realized I really wished Treena was around.

‘I wasn’t expecting you. Do you want a drink?’

‘In a minute.’ I just wanted to sit there, to let my head rest against Patrick. I wanted to feel like I used to feel – normal, untroubled. I wanted not to think about death.

‘I broke my best time today. Fifteen miles in just 79.2 minutes.’

‘Great.’

‘Cooking with gas now, eh, Pat?’ someone said.

Patrick bunched both his fists and made a revving noise with his mouth.

‘That’s great. Really.’ I tried to look pleased for him.

I had a drink, and then another. I listened to their talk of mileage, of the skinned knees and hypothermic swimming bouts. I tuned out, and watched the other people in the pub, wondering about their lives. Each of them would have huge events in their own families – babies loved and lost, dark secrets, great joys and tragedies. If they could put it into perspective, if they could just enjoy a sunny evening in a pub garden, then surely I should too.

And then I told Patrick about Dad’s job. His face looked a little like I imagine mine had. I had to repeat it, just so he could be sure he had heard me right.

‘That’s … very cosy. You both working for him.’

I wanted to tell him then, I really did. I wanted to explain that so much of everything was tied up in my battle to keep Will alive. I wanted to tell him how afraid I was that Will seemed to be trying to buy me my freedom. But I knew I could say nothing. I might as well get the rest of it over while I could.

‘Um … that’s not the only thing. He says I can stay there when I want, in the spare room. To get past the whole bed problem at home.’

Patrick looked at me. ‘You’re going to live at his house?’

‘I might. It’s a nice offer, Pat. You know what it’s been like at home. And you’re never here. I like coming to your house, but … well, if I’m honest, it doesn’t feel like home.’

He was still staring at me. ‘Then make it home.’

‘What?’

‘Move in. Make it home. Put your stuff up. Bring your clothes. It’s about time we moved in together.’

It was only afterwards, when I thought about it, that I realized he had actually looked really unhappy as he said this. Not like a man who had finally worked out he could not live without his girlfriend close by him, and wanted to make a joyous union of our two lives. He looked like someone who felt outmanoeuvred.

‘You really want me to move in?’

‘Yes. Sure.’ He rubbed at his ear. ‘I mean, I’m not saying let’s get married or anything. But it does make sense, right?’

‘You old romantic.’

‘I mean it, Lou. It’s time. It’s probably been time for ages, but I guess I’ve just been wrapped up in one thing and another. Move in. It’ll be good.’ He hugged me. ‘It will be really good.’

Around us the Triathlon Terrors had diplomatically resumed their chatter. A small cheer went up as a group of Japanese tourists got the photograph they had wanted. Birds sang, the sun dipped, the world turned. I wanted to be part of it, not stuck in a silent room, worrying about a man in a wheelchair.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It will be good.’