Veronica
LOCKET ISLAND
Dad is here, and Mum, dancing together in the kitchen, the “Lambeth Walk.” Their footsteps clack loudly on the floor. The window is open, and a vast sapphire sky stretches beyond it, blurry and fluctuating slightly. A gust of wind blows in and lifts both of them off the floor as if they’re tiny twists of paper. I try to grab hold of them, chase them round. But they slip through my fingers like ribbons and sail out of the window again, dancing shadows sucked into the endless blue.
I hear a voice, calling. “Ver-on-ee-cah!” First it seems as though the sound is coming from ahead of me, then behind. I spin round and round. Then it thunders down on me from above: “Get thee to a nunnery, go!”
Now I can see Janet, Norah and Harry. They are not quite real but seem like huge doll versions of themselves, leering at me, pointing mocking fingers at my swollen belly. They circle like wolves. Norah lunges at me. I am bleeding, bleeding. But it isn’t blood that is flowing out from my veins; it is strawberry jam.
Suddenly, there are nuns, a river of nuns in black and white, flowing past. Each one is holding a baby out for me to inspect, but each one snatches it away again before I can see if it is my Enzo. I can’t handle this anymore. I hurl myself into the river, screaming. The black-and-white flow closes over me. I wait to be trampled under the nuns’ feet but . . . they are not human feet. They are webbed feet, soft and light. And I realize the nuns have sleek, tightly packed feathers and little stubby tails. They are not nuns at all. They are Adélie penguins.
Is it Giovanni, here with me? I can’t see well, but I think he is bending over the bed. He is about to kiss me. I try to speak his name, but my mouth is too dry. He pulls back. There is no kiss, no touch. And no, I see now it isn’t Giovanni. It is some uncouth young man with unshaven skin and messy hair who mutters and smells of fish. I don’t know him at all. Or do I?
“Patrick!” somebody calls. It is a woman’s voice, clear but coated in gentleness. “I’m just heading out to the rookery. You’ll be all right, won’t you?”
“Yeah, no probs,” answers the man whose face is above me. I feel a hand placed on my forehead for a moment. Then a “Blimey, you’re hot!”
Is it Giovanni? The hair is a similar color, and there’s something about the eyes . . . But no. I’m sure it’s not him, not as I remember him anyway. And my memory is as good as . . . as good as Hamlet’s.
I move my lips again and try to speak but it’s useless.
Patrick. That name is echoing in my head. I think there was a boy called Patrick. Yes, a boy who I’d hoped would be an oasis, but he ended up being just another mirage in the thirsty desert of my soul. I grapple with fear once more. I have this unpleasant notion that somebody I once pinned my hopes on turned out to be an awful, dirty lout who smoked dope. The image in my head seems to match this man who is here now.
I can’t focus very well. I’m trying to force my thoughts into order, but they are a knotted mass. Wait . . . something is coming. The words Patrick and grandson are linked. But that is ridiculous! Patrick is a bird, a small, fluffy penguin. I am sure of it. My grandson cannot possibly be a penguin.