Karen
It takes me a while to spot her. The TV is blaring and they all sit in mis-matched armchairs and stare and rock and look, some of them, like they’re going to dissolve. She’s half asleep. Peaceful, almost. But thinner than last week. Her collarbones stick out too much. Her blouse is starting to hang loose across the chest.
I pull up a chair and sit opposite her, knee to knee. She sees me eventually. Her eyes flutter. She smiles. Like when Alex was little and he’d wake up from a nap with a face full of love.
‘Finally,’ she says, sitting up a little, ‘have they sent you with my medicine?’
It must be the uniform or the way I’ve got my hair scraped back. ‘No. It’s me Mum, it’s Karen.’
She narrows her eyes and looks away, out of the window at the plastic pots full of mini daffodils all starting to go brown and crispy at the edges.
‘You never come to see me,’ she says, ‘and your lips are too bright.’
‘I was here last week.’
‘And they put sugar on the vegetables.’
‘Yes, I know.’
‘Sugar,’ she whispers, leaning forward, ‘on the vegetables. Like they’re trying to fatten me up.’
‘Well, you could do with putting on some weight. I might have a word.’
She rubs her hands together. Dry and chapped. She has that look on her face. Just like old times. Like when she saw me in the bus shelter with Simon Williams. Like when she found the packet of pills in my drawer.
‘Your lips,’ she says, pointing.
I should’ve known better than to wear the bloody lipstick. I try to blot it on the back of my hand, but it’s a new long-wear formula. The colour’s going nowhere.
‘If you’re looking for a man around here you’ll be disappointed.’
‘I’m not looking for a man.’
She keeps doing that thing with her hands. The noise it makes. It drives me mad. If she doesn’t stop it she’ll rub the skin right off. I reach out to hold them still and she jumps like I’ve given her an electric shock.
‘Don’t!’ she says, ‘you’re always trying to meddle in my affairs.’
‘Your hands are sore.’
She folds her arms and leans back. ‘There’s nothing whatsoever the matter with them and I don’t need any help, thank you very much.’
‘Ok!’
‘And if you’re looking for a man you won’t find one around here. Not one with all his faculties at any rate.’
‘I think you’ve made your point now, Mum.’
‘Your body’s a temple not a colouring book.’
‘For God’s sake!’
‘I don’t like that kind of language.’ She’s shifting in her seat now, looking around for someone to back her up, or a way to escape. I need to change the subject but I can’t think of anything to say. I want to tell her all about Alex. I want to say, That grandson of yours is messing up his life. But who knows what she remembers? Knowing my luck it’d only make things worse.
There’s an old episode of Top of the Pops on the TV. The Bay City Rollers jiggling about on stage with their bare chests and stupid half-mast flares. Bye, bye baby, baby bye, bye. The man in the next chair starts to groan and swear. The care assistant seems to materialise out of nowhere. The pretty one. Pretty and foreign-looking. She helps the man to stand up and walks with him over to the door. She has a nice way about her. Not like some of the others. She touches Mum’s shoulder as she walks past and the way Mum looks up at her. Kindness and trust. Mum leans back in the chair and starts humming something with her eyes closed. Like she’s trying to imagine me away.
‘Tell me about Ned,’ I say, just on the off chance.
She stops humming. She opens her eyes. She says, ‘I don’t think I’m allowed to talk about it.’
‘You’re allowed.’
She shakes her head. She starts to rub her hands again and look in every direction but at me. ‘He won’t be able to find me here,’ she says, ‘even if he was looking he’d never know where I was. And I’ve got nothing to give him if he comes.’ She holds her hands out then tries to push herself up out of the chair. It’s no use. Her wrists are so thin. Her arms shaking with the effort. ‘Look at this!’ she says. ‘Look at what you’ve done to me!’
‘Calm down, Mum. It’s alright.’
‘It’s not. You put me here to hide me away.’
‘That’s not –’
‘I think you’re very rude and your lips are too bright.’
She starts humming again. It’s familiar. Slow and sad. Words scattered in here and there. Very far, very far, over land and sea. I can’t place it.
‘That’s it then is it?’ I say, ‘conversation over?’
‘If you don’t mind there’s somewhere I have to be at three-fifteen.’
‘Is there? Where’s that then? An urgent appointment with the commode? An especially good episode of Antiques-fucking-Roadshow?’ I say it under my breath but she glares at me. There’s nothing at all wrong with her hearing.
I go to sign out and my hands are shaking. The corridor is soupy with chemicals. The smell of meat and over-boiled vegetables. Someone’s chewed the end of the pen by reception. Teeth marks in the cheap plastic. The door buzzes and clicks.
When I get home it’s quarter to seven. The porch is full of takeaway leaflets, money-off supermarket vouchers and junk mail. Saturday night. I can’t bear to go in. Alex is already at work. Holed up in the pub kitchen, scraping gravy off the plates, stacking beer glasses in the big dishwasher. I’m past hunger. My toenails feel like they’ve been pushed too far into my skin. I could curl up on the sofa and let the night wash over me, wait for Alex to get in. He wouldn’t thank me for it.
Something has to change. I put my bag down on the bottom step and lean against the banister. The primary school photo of Alex is wonky again. He does it on purpose. He used to turn it to the wall if Lorna was coming over. Embarrassed by the way his hair clashed with his maroon jumper. His gappy-toothed smile. I straighten it and stand back. The ticking of the boiler firing up. The hum of the fridge. Outside there’s a siren getting louder and then fading away. There’s no reason to waste another weekend. There’s nothing here to stay for. I think of the gang from work, out for their usual weekend drinks. There’s always room for one more.
On the bus into town. The driver is too hard on the brakes and I can feel the nausea starting. Root in my bag for an extra-strong mint. The rush of it, scouring out the inside of my head, pushing any other taste away. The seats are still ingrained with fag smoke even though smoking’s been banned for years. There are lights on in all the houses. All those perfect families sitting around their dinner tables eating second helpings of steamed vegetables, discussing sports tournaments and outstanding school reports.
One of the bouncers salutes me as I walk into the club. I smile at him but he’s not familiar. It’s been years. He’s just being friendly. For a minute the colours are blinding, glittering spots of light making everyone look golden and manic. The queue for the bar is five people deep. I can’t see anyone from work. Stand on tiptoes and try to get a good view of the seats by the dance floor. Somebody pushes from behind. Sorry, love. It’s all beer froth and sequins. I don’t recognise the music and the bass is too loud. Hemmed in by bare arms, and shoulder blades. A fruity perfume I recognise from trying the tester at work. And the customer who turned her nose up when I tried to recommend it. Do some people actually like this? She said. Do some women actually want to smell edible?
And then Gary’s hand is on my arm. I might have known it would be Gary. He’s saying something, but I can’t make it out.
‘What?’
‘I can’t believe you actually made it!’
‘Where are the others?’
‘Come on,’ he says, ‘I saw you from the bar. I got you a rum and coke.’
He leads me around the dance floor to a dim corner, the edge of a long curved purple sofa near the toilets. It’s almost full. There’s barely enough room for two. A line of empty beer glasses on the table.
‘Where are the others?’
Gary shrugs and waves towards the dancefloor. ‘Last time I saw Donna she was admiring some Rugby players by the bar.’
The group of girls next to us stand up and push past in unison. They head towards the toilets together. One of them goes right over on her heel and falls against the wall. The others stand and laugh.
‘I’m gonna piss myself!’ she says sliding to the floor, ‘fucking bitches.’ But she’s laughing too. One of her friends bends over to help her up.
Gary shakes his head. ‘Mike and Jonsey are here somewhere. Half-way to shit-faced last time I checked.’
‘I hope Mike’s looking after him.’ I can’t imagine Jonsey drunk. He’s so timid. He doesn’t seem old enough to be in a place like this.
Gary shrugs. He leans in closer. Always too eager. Right up in my personal space.
‘Have you heard the news?’ he says. But I can’t concentrate. I can’t see anything but his receding hairline and greasy skin. Spots on his neck. His forehead shining under the lights. And all I can think is how am I back here? How come I never got out of this shit-hole when I had the chance?
‘Sorry? What?’
‘The news,’ he says, louder this time. ‘They’ve gone and sold Blackpool tower off for scrap.’
I don’t know what to make of it. For a minute I think I must have misheard. He’s waiting for my reaction.
‘Really?’ I say.
‘Scout’s honour. Lancashire County Council signed the deeds this morning.’
I take a sip of my drink and try to make sense of it. He’s grinning at me like a maniac. Like he’s waiting for something. The truth is I don’t really give a shit. They can melt it down and send it to the moon for all I care. There’d be a big crowd of tourists if they were really skint enough to do it – scratching their arses and taking photos, sucking sugar dummies and sticks of Blackpool rock. The creaking metal, and all the bolts wrenched out. The brown sea behind them. Full of God-knows-what.
‘April fools,’ he says, poking my leg to get my attention.
‘Oh God, Gary. How many times?’ Mike is back from the bar standing over us with a pint in one hand and a shot glass in the other. ‘Do us all a favour and find some new material.’
Gary’s smile fades.
‘Oh, right,’ I say, I’d forgotten about the date. ‘Right. You really had me going there for a minute.’
They argue after that. I shuffle along so Mike can sit down. They push and jab at each other like lads on the playground. And then talk about football and the new sales targets and how useless the security guard is at work. I join in every now and then. Nod in the right places. But I’m thinking about Ian. I can’t help it. That night we met. The same drink. The first year we lived together when he was building the business up. Storing the stock in the spare room. And me doing the books in the evenings. He was all gung-ho and high on ambition. If he could’ve been paid just for talking about it we would’ve been millionaires. I’d get in after work and there’d be no sign of him. Walking through the flat calling his name and I’d feel something on the back of my neck and there he was, creeping behind me with the severed plastic arm from one of the shop dummies. Or another time it was the shape of someone in our bed and him hiding in the wardrobe, waiting for me to lift the covers. He got a kick out of it, out of scaring me shitless and then making up for it after. Falling onto the bed together and the sound of him pushing the naked dummy onto the floor.
‘You’ll give me nightmares, you daft bastard.’
He was kissing my neck, then, fumbling one-handed with my bra strap. Him still laughing and me trying to remember if I’d taken my pill.
‘Please tell me that’s not the only thing you’ve been doing today.’
‘Shhhh,’ he said, ‘shhhh,’ and I wanted to kiss him and kill him in the exact same moment.
‘You’re not Jeremy fucking Beadle, you know.’
‘Let’s get out of here,’ Gary says, and it’s the first piece of sense I’ve heard from him all night.
Mike knows somewhere round the corner with 80s music and cocktails so we rescue Donna from the bar and head across the square.
‘I deserve better,’ she keeps saying to anyone who’ll listen, ‘I’m not just a piece of meat.’
‘You’re beautiful,’ Mike says, ‘You’re an absolute catch. Now lean on my arm and shut the fuck up.’
Gary is singing Electric Dreams. He takes me in a ballroom hold and I’m not drunk enough yet but I can’t be bothered to fight it. We trot across the road. All those dance classes in the church hall. I knew they’d come in handy one day. His hand too tight across my back. But he can hold a tune. I’ll give him that. We’ll always be together, he sings, however far it seems, and Mike is on backing vocals and Donna is laughing and my throat is dry. I need something sweet to keep me going.
‘It’s round this corner,’ Mike says.
Gary stops dancing, and starts walking, but doesn’t let go of my arm.
‘Wait,’ he says, stopping in his tracks. Donna bumps into me on the other side. ‘Where the hell is Jonesy?’
We all look around but he’s not behind us. He’s nowhere near.
‘I haven’t seen him all night.’
‘You lost him?’ Donna says, ‘you just left him there?’
Mike starts laughing so hard he’s bent over with it.
Gary shrugs. ‘I’m not his bloody father.’
‘You’re old enough,’ Donna says.
‘Says you, Mrs Mutton.’
She comes forward to slap him but trips on a loose paving stone and slams against me.
‘Ow!’
‘I’m sorry,’ she says, and her words are slurred, one strap falling down across her shoulder, ‘but he’s a bastard.’
‘Everyone just calm down,’ Mike says. ‘He probably just found someone he knew and buggered off like usual.’
‘You better hope so,’ Donna said, ‘or it’ll be on your head.’
I try to picture Jonsey in detail. His scruffy hair dyed a couple of shades too dark for his skin. The way he lets it hang over one eye. The quietness, the way he blushes when he’s put on the spot. He’s not really cut out for customer service. I can’t imagine him alone in the club.
‘Stop over-reacting,’ Gary says. ‘He’ll be reet. He’ll have gone somewhere more suited to his tastes.’
‘What do you mean?’ Donna says.
‘Oh come on,’ Gary says, looking to Mike for support, ‘I can’t be the only one who thinks it?’
‘What?’ I say, but I know what he’s getting at. It’s dawning on me and I can’t believe it’s never occurred to me before.
Gary rolls his eyes. ‘It’s obvious isn’t it? His best friends are all girls but he never has a girlfriend. He wears eyeliner. Do I need go on?’
‘Yes,’ Donna says.
‘Ok then. He’s dancing at the other end of the ballroom. Batting for the other team. Packing fudge for a living. Is that clear enough?’
I pull my arm away from him. I feel sick.
‘Oh come on!’ he says, ‘just because I say what everyone else is thinking!’
‘I’m going back,’ I say and turn and start walking.
‘Oh, come on!’ Gary says, ‘he’s a big boy!’
Donna stumbles after me. ‘He’ll be long gone by now,’ she says, ‘don’t leave me with them.’
‘I can’t stay.’
‘You coming, Donna?’ Gary shouts.
She shrugs and lets me go.
I can’t face going back to the club. And it’s not Jonsey I’m thinking about. It’s Alex. A fucking light bulb throbbing right above my head. His whole life, everything has been pointing to this and I just didn’t want to see. I get into a taxi and try to block out the music from the radio. Everything becoming clear. The way he was with Lorna. The way he hides himself away. Never quite fitting in. We stop at the lights. There’s a billboard at the junction by the prison. Personal finance, maybe or life insurance. A girl wearing a graduation gown, standing next to her parents, her hat in mid-air. They’re all looking up at it and smiling as though it’s the proudest day of their lives. It’s like someone planted it here just for me, just to rub salt in the wound. Look at what you could have won. I feel sick. I’ll have to ask him about it. I’ll have to shake all the secrets out of him. I root in my bag for another mint. Catch my wrist on the edge of a tube of hand cream. Mum’s hands. I could have gone back and sorted them for her. I could’ve asked the girl to do it for me.
It’s too late now. It’s all too late. The lights are turning again, amber to green. One last look before we turn left. The girl’s teeth are too perfect. Her parents look like ageing catalogue models. I know it’s staged. I know it’s only marketing. But oh God, I want it to be real. That’s all. I just want it to be possible.