It was a lovely caravan park, Rockley Sands, and it was one of those weeks where the sun doesn’t stop shining and you wonder whether there could be anything better in the world than strolling through Bournemouth pleasure gardens, the band playing, your wife with her hand in yours, your son running on ahead.
I had the MG Magnet by then; Kathryn liked the leather seats. They didn’t get too hot in the sun, and that week the sun seemed to pour in every window, heating every surface. Each day we went on an outing in the MG, taking a picnic lunch with us. Robert was four years old.
Kathryn would make the sandwiches in the caravan kitchen, which was really a shelf and a hob in the living room – which was really a corner of the caravan with a cushion running beneath the window – but we liked it. When we arrived, Kathryn commented that the caravan was more modern than our house. ‘Look at that hob,’ she said. ‘Wipe clean. Electric. Lovely.’
‘You can’t control electric,’ I said. ‘Not like gas.’
‘And you’d know about ovens?’ she said, with half a smile.
‘I know about power supplies,’ I replied, but she was busy telling Robert not to run around the caravan.
He was exploring, which was something he liked to do – indoors. Opening cupboards, looking beneath cushions, swishing the
curtains back and forth. Kathryn raised her eyebrows at me as he rushed into the toilet, looked under the seat, and made a
close examination of the toilet brush. He liked to know the details of everything. ‘The toilet’s got a lock!’ he said, flipping
it so the little sign went from ‘vacant’ to ‘engaged’ and back.
‘Robert, are you all right?’ Kathryn knocked softly. ‘You can come out now. We’re going in a minute.’
Moments after we’d made the sandwiches, packed the picnic bag and got our sandals on, Robert disappeared into the toilet.
‘I’m coming,’ he called, as sunny as you like, but then he stayed in there for another five minutes while we tried to remain unconcerned. I picked up the MG keys and the picnic bag. Kathryn and I stood together outside the toilet door, waiting.
‘You try him,’ she said.
‘Are you all right, son?’ I called, rapping hard on the door but trying to keep my voice light. Most likely he’d broken something in there and was trying to hide it.
‘Yes.’
‘Come on out then, will you?’
Kathryn watched me with wide eyes as I leant against the door and listened for him. ‘What’s he up to?’ she hissed.
‘Robert. We’re going to go in a minute.’
‘Coming,’ he sang out.
But the door didn’t move, and there was no sound. ‘This is why we don’t have a lock on at home,’ I said.
‘Perhaps we should just leave him. He’ll come out when he’s ready.’
‘Right, Mum, let’s go,’ I said in a loud voice, winking at Kathryn. ‘Have you got the picnic?’
Kathryn looked blank.
‘We’ll see you later, then, Robert,’ I called as I walked to the door of the caravan, opened it and closed it again, shushing Kathryn before she could say anything.
We stood in silence for a moment before she said, ‘This is silly,’ and began to bang on the toilet door with her fist. ‘Robert!’ she shouted, ‘Mummy’s worried about you! Come out now! Robert!’
He came out then, his coarse hair sticking up at the back of his head, and rushed into her arms. At that moment he looked just like her, with his big eyes and curvy lips.
‘What were you doing in there?’ I demanded.
He buried his face into her waist and she stroked his head.
‘Robert?’
He spoke into Kathryn’s stomach. ‘I like it.’
‘Whatever can you like about a toilet?’
He didn’t reply.
‘Why don’t we sit down for a minute?’ suggested Kathryn.
‘But we’re going to Brownsea.’
‘There’s no rush, Howard.’ She led Robert over to the ledge of cushions beneath the window and sat him on her lap. He was wearing his T-shirt with a picture of the power station on the front. I’d bought that for him at the last open day. The picture had cracks running through it from so many washes; the towers were beginning to fade.
I stood at the window, the picnic bag still in my hand. ‘You had us worried.’
‘He’s sorry,’ said Kathryn.
Robert’s knees were pale and smooth, unnaturally so for a boy of that age, I thought. I was sure I’d had scabs and grazes at four, although I didn’t remember how I got them. I just remembered the pleasure of peeling back the congealed flap of blood, uncovering the fresh pink flesh beneath. ‘Don’t pick at it or it will never heal,’ Mum would say, offering a thick fabric plaster.
‘It’s all right,’ I said. I reached into the picnic bag and searched for a caramel wafer. ‘Is the toilet really your favourite room?’ I asked, handing him the wafer.
He nodded. I put the picnic bag down and knelt before him, placing my hands evenly on his knees.
‘Why is that?’
He shifted on his mother’s lap.
‘Robert? I’d really like to know.’
‘It’s got a lock on the door,’ he answered, biting into his biscuit.
It must have been around eleven by the time we boarded the ferry, and Robert had let go of his mother’s hand. The ramp clanked into place and grey smoke pumped out over the water. Kathryn said she would go and sit indoors, out of the sun. Gulls barked overhead and the salt in the air misted my sunglasses. I took them off and, squinting in the bright light, looked around for Robert.
He was sitting on deck with another boy. The boy wore a pair of red shorts, and his bare chest was darkly tanned, but he was smaller than Robert. He’d emptied a blue plastic bucket onto the wooden boards and they leant together, counting shells, their fingers sorting through the ridged lips. I remembered a shell I’d kept as a boy, how it had glinted on the beach, and how dull it had looked on the shelf back home.
‘Can I have a look?’
Neither one spoke.
‘Here.’ Kneeling by the bucket, I picked up a large mollusc. It was the wrong shape, but I held it to my ear anyway, tilting my head and closing my eyes.
‘Daddy – ’
‘Shush. I’m listening.’
The two boys looked at each other, Robert screwing his face up against the sun.
Reaching over to shield my son’s eyes, I said, ‘I can hear the sea. In this shell.’
‘Let me,’ said the boy in the red shorts. I handed the shell to him; he clamped it to his ear and shook his head. ‘I can’t hear anything.’
‘Let Robert try,’ I said. The sun was warm on my shoulders, and the sea air seemed to have cleared my head of all memory of this morning.
But the boy ignored me, threw down the shell and sorted through the others in his collection, balancing them, one on top of the other, in little piles.
I handed another shell, almost as big as the first, to Robert. ‘Try it.’
He took it and held it briefly by his ear before shaking his head.
‘Closer,’ I said. ‘You have to hold it closer. Or the sea won’t reach.’
Just then, the other boy upset his piles of shells. They clattered on deck and the boy began to wail.
But my son didn’t move. He kept the shell to his ear while I shielded his eyes and watched him.
‘I can hear it,’ he said.
The boat chugged beneath us; the sea was a calm pond. Brownsea was sandy, full of gorse. The rich smell of the shrub rose up in the heat, mingling with the sweat of hundreds of families searching for shade. Many of them, denied the use of cars, had flopped out on the nearest strip of grass by the harbour, and I knew they would still be there when we returned to the ferry.
But we would walk further. As we walked, we passed shirtless men in shorts, lying on what was left of the scorched grass. Women rested their heads on their husbands’ naked thighs, chests or stomachs, and stroked their exposed skin. Couples smiled and sweated together as their children played somewhere within earshot, their shouts softened only slightly by the fierceness of the sun.
I had read that the most beautiful part of Brownsea was the north-east beach, and I intended to take Robert and Kathryn there – it was about a thirty-minute walk – although I hadn’t yet mentioned it to them.
After ten minutes of walking along the gravel trail, Kathryn said, ‘Shall we stop here?’
‘Can I have an ice cream?’ asked Robert.
‘We’re not there yet.’
‘I’m hot,’ said Robert, and his mother knelt before him and wiped his forehead with her hand.
‘I’d like an ice cream, Howard,’ said Kathryn, standing up and touching my arm. ‘I think I saw a van back there.’
‘All right.’ I smiled. ‘One each, then.’
Kathryn had a Midnight Mint. It was her favourite, dark chocolate encasing cool white ice cream. She ate it carefully, as she always did, nibbling off a section of chocolate before licking out the ice cream within.
I had a 99 cone, as did Robert. When I asked him if his was good, he nodded without bothering to stop licking.
‘Let’s sit for a while,’ said Kathryn, pointing to a grassy area beneath some trees.
Kathryn sat with her head in the shade and her legs in the sun. I propped the picnic bag against the trunk.
‘Can I have a sandwich now?’ asked Robert.
‘You’ve only just had an ice cream,’ said Kathryn.
He contemplated this for a moment before touching me on the leg. ‘Would you like a sandwich, Daddy?’
Just then a high screech seemed to bounce right round our heads and back again.
‘Did you hear that, Robert?’
‘Can I have a sandwich?’
The cry cut through the air again, clear and loud, and then I knew exactly what it was.
Robert reached for my hand. His fingers were sticky and hot.
‘Shall we go and see what it is?’ I said.
He hesitated for a moment, looking in his mother’s direction.
‘You two go,’ she said, with a nod and a smile. I thought how beautiful she looked then, with her bare legs stretched out on the grass, and her face calm and cool in the shadow of the branches.
We walked towards a clearing. Robert kept up with my step, his fingers almost glued to mine with ice cream and sweat. Then we heard the cry again.
‘Look at that, Robert.’
A peacock was standing in the middle of the dusty grass, feathers shivering in full sunlight. That bird made everything around it look bleached-out and tired. A fan of blue and green and purple spread out from its back and shook once, twice, three times. Its head glinted as it darted from side to side. I immediately wished that Kathryn was there to see it, too.
‘Isn’t it lovely, Robert?’
But he was looking off to the right. Peeling his fingers from mine, he pointed. ‘What’s that man doing?’
A man was crawling towards the bird on his hands and knees, open palm outstretched. His jeans were baggy, and with every shuffle forward they seemed to work their way that bit further down his backside. A streak of sweat darkened the back of his T-shirt.
‘What’s he doing, Daddy?’
By this time, a little crowd had gathered behind the crawling man. He managed to stay perfectly still as the bird shook its feathers again and took a step towards his open hand.
‘He’s feeding the peacock,’ I said.
‘Can we watch?’
‘Just for a minute, then.’
A few people had come to stand behind us, waiting to see whether the bird would take the bait. I held Robert’s shoulders as the man edged closer, his hairy arm stretching towards that little jerking head.
Then something else caught my eye. Beyond the bird I saw what must have been his wife and their child, a little girl. The wife was kneeling down, pointing and smiling, and the girl was watching, entranced. She wore a floppy sunhat just like her mother’s, and their teeth were very white in the sun.
When the bird’s beak finally dipped into the man’s palm, mother and daughter began to clap, and, hearing this, Robert joined in. Of course, this caused the bird to take fright and hurry away over the parched grass, feathers bobbing. But Robert was smiling so much and clapping so hard, that I, too, began to applaud; together we clapped for at least a minute as we watched the peacock disappear into the trees.
‘Can you do it?’ Robert asked, grabbing my leg and looking up at me.
‘Can I feed it?’
He nodded. His eyes were bright and wide.
I crouched down and looked into his face. ‘I’ve got a better idea,’ I said. ‘You can feed a peacock. When we get to the other part of the island. The best part.’
‘Can I?’ Robert looked at me with a little frown, not quite believing it.
‘Yes,’ I said, lifting him up onto my shoulders and carrying him away from the clearing, back to his mother. ‘You can feed as many peacocks as you like.’
‘They might bite me.’
‘They won’t. I’ll make sure.’
We never made it to the north-east beach, but I didn’t mind because, towards the end of that afternoon, two peacocks found us.
Kathryn spotted them first. I’d thought that perhaps I wouldn’t be able to keep my promise to Robert, that I’d have to tell him we’d feed some birds on another day, but just as we were about to pack up our picnic things and head back for the ferry, my wife nudged me.
‘Over there.’
Robert was standing up, stretching and rubbing his eyes. It had been a long, hot day; he was tired, and I expected some trouble – perhaps a few tears or a little tantrum – soon.
I caught hold of his hand and drew him close to me. ‘Look,’ I whispered. ‘Look.’
They were just as magnificent as the first bird: their tiny heads made me think of clusters of precious gems, winking in the late afternoon light.
‘Do you think they’d like some sandwiches?’ I said.
Robert gave me a big smile.
Kathryn sat and watched as I ripped up the last of our crusts and handed them to Robert.
‘Quietly,’ I said. ‘Just let them come to you.’
Moving as slowly and carefully as I could, I scattered a line of crumbs along the grass, starting from a spot close to the birds and ending at the point where Robert was crouched, ready.
We waited. Robert licked his lips; his face settled into a determined frown. He stared and stared at those peacocks until, eventually, one began to strut towards him, following the trail of bread. Its beak stabbed the ground repeatedly, and Robert studied its every move as it came closer.
‘Do you think he’ll be OK?’ Kathryn hissed.
‘He’ll be fine,’ I whispered.
When the bird was almost close enough to take the bread, Robert looked back at me; I simply nodded to him, and he resumed his position.
He remained absolutely still as the peacock bent its head to his palm and took the food. He watched that bird with wonder, his mouth gaping and his eyes wide, but he didn’t make a sound. Only when the crumbs were all gone did he straighten up and let out a squeal, which made the bird scurry away on its spindly legs.
But he’d done it.
I looked at Kathryn. ‘You see?’ I said. ‘He’s tougher than we think.’
On the last night we decided to treat ourselves. We’d leave him asleep in the caravan for an hour while we went to the park club for a drink.
Gin and tonic for Kathryn. I had a Mackeson. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d been out on our own like this. Kathryn’s flowered sundress showed the curve between her breasts, which glowed a little pink; her cheeks were brown from the sun, her lips full with lipstick, her hand rested on my knee. I kissed her there and then, sitting on our squat velvet-covered barstools, the smell of old beer all around us.
The jukebox was playing the oldies, The Miracles, Roy Orbison, things we heard before we were married.
I don’t remember speaking at all, I just remember the kisses she gave me, which were full and open and in front of everybody. We sat there together for over an hour, and I kept buying the drinks; the Mackeson’s dense brown liquid was both savoury and sweet as I glugged it back, and she didn’t say anything to stop me.
As we walked to the caravan we must have been a little drunk, because Kathryn took off her sandals and wandered barefoot in the grass. I watched her as she meandered between the caravans, swinging her sandals by their straps.
‘It’s so cool, Howard,’ she called. ‘You can feel the wet between your toes. You should try it.’
Looking round to check no one was watching, I unstrapped my sandals and joined my wife on the grass. She took my hand as we walked together back to our caravan. Kathryn joined in with some Diana Ross song that was drifting across the site.
‘Why did you marry me, Kathryn?’ I asked.
She stopped singing.
‘What sort of a question is that?’
I looked into her face. Her skin had taken so much sun that her teeth seemed to glow white in the darkness. At that moment, she looked like a new, exotic Kathryn. I waited for her answer.
Eventually she squeezed my forearm. ‘Because I wanted to,’ she whispered. Then she added, ‘And you asked me.’
‘I asked you?’ I searched her face, but she was staring in the direction of our caravan, and her mouth had fallen into an open ‘O’. She dropped her sandals on the grass and pointed frantically towards our plot.
‘The bloody door’s open,’ she shouted. It was the first time I’d heard her swear.
We ran to the caravan. There was nothing in his bed, and he wasn’t in ours. Kathryn leant out of the door, her knuckles white on the frame, and called into the night.
‘Robert! Robert! Where are you?’
I had to stop her because lights were going on in the other caravans.
‘I’ll never forgive myself, Howard, never,’ she said, but I knew she meant that she would never forgive me.
Then I noticed that the sign on the bathroom door read ‘engaged’. ‘Kathryn,’ I called, ‘he’s in here.’
Before I could stop her, she threw herself at the door, breaking the lock.
He was sat on the pan, asleep, his soft brown pyjama bottoms round his ankles, a silver line of drool hanging from his chin to his chest.
I carried him back to bed.
‘Don’t wake him,’ I said, laying him on top of his crumpled sheets. But she held him so tight that he woke, and when he saw her frightened face, the tears came.