Swallowing Grandma (12 page)

–  Unless he’s been the victim of a terrible accident, every man has one.

I remember the day that particular truth dawned on me; about a week after the non-existent-dog chase. The idea sent me into shock and I could barely cross the doorstep for weeks in case I bumped into a man we knew, e.g. Mr Porter at the newsagent’s, Mr Rowland the vicar, the paperboy. Worst of all, that year at school I had a male class teacher called Mr Walker. So when he was settling on the carpet at storytime, I could see his penis flopping about with my X-ray imagination. And when he stood up to write the date on the board, I saw it again, swinging gently against the leg of his pants. I made it worse for myself by checking the back page of the Ladybird book Your Body every damn night and I think I’d have gone mad if it hadn’t been for the summer holidays, and the promise of dry old Mrs Kirtlan next term.

It all came back to me, that time of horror, as I started to run away from the gypsy boy towards the brow. He wasn’t going to rape me, I got that, but he kept shouting out for me to stop and talk, and that he knew me. He damn well didn’t. I’d have remembered someone like him. It was a scam, maybe for money, maybe just to make mock. I was too wise and also too out of breath to reply. How the fuck though did he know my name and my address? Part of me wanted to turn round and see how close he was, but I was too focused on making it up the hill.

At last, when my lungs were ready to rupture and I was seeing blood-pressure stars, I let myself pause and look behind. He was still there but a long way away now. He hadn’t made any attempt to pursue me at all, just stood there staring. As I watched, he raised his arm and waved. I turned and puffed on. But even as I gained the hall and slammed the front door, I thought, he still knows where to find me, any time he wants.

*

He read poetry when the pain got bad, and held my hand as she was being born.

‘I wouldn’t have missed this for anything,’ he said as we cradled the baby together. ‘Look at her. Our love meets in her tiny heartbeat.’

When I started crying for my mum, he wiped my tears away and said, ‘We have to suffer loss so that new love can come into the world. It’s the circle of Life.’

He always knew what to say.

*

He appeared again three weeks later, in the library. I was in the research corner, supposedly leafing through Job Opportunities in the
Bolton Evening News
, but really making a list of my all-time top-ten Emily Dickinson poems. I’d got ‘I Felt a Funeral in my Brain’ down at number one and I was debating which was better, ‘Heaven Is What I Cannot Reach’ or ‘I Heard a Fly Buzz when I Died’. Then, out of all the voices, internal and external, my brain picked out someone saying ‘Millar’. I jerked my head up and there he was, by the front desk.

He was standing chatting to Miss Dragon, and what was weird about it was her body language. Normally she’s very stiff and brisk, and she likes to hug a bundle of books to her bosom like a breastplate. But even though gipsy boy was casual in the extreme, with his longish hair and pierced lobes, his combats and his leather wrist bands, she was leaning towards him as though she’d known him for years. And she was smiling. At one point she touched her fringe, like I’ve seen the girls at school do when they’re talking to someone they fancy.

I tuned in more and heard her say, ‘It’s an unusual spelling,’ and ‘I had an aunt who lived in Nantwich. A beautiful church, I remember, with a square or a green in front of it.’

‘We’re not big church-goers,’ he said. ‘Mum’s a pagan, if she’s anything. But it is pretty nice, yeah. I like churches, they’ve got power. Specially the Gothic ones.’

As I watched, his eyes met mine and I started in my seat. I could have crawled under the desk, but too late, Miss Dragon was turning my way and nodding her head, then coming out from behind the desk in a purposeful way. He stood back for her politely and she noticed, and gave a tiny twitch of her lips.

‘Kath-Kat,’ she said, as she came up close. ‘I have a young man here who’d like to meet you.’

We could all have been at a cocktail party.

‘Hello,’ he said, standing at a careful distance. ‘My name’s Callum. Callum Turner.’ Big grin, eyebrows well up. I noticed he’d got a necklace or something peeping out of his collar.

‘Callum’s been doing some research into his family tree,’ said Miss Dragon, looking down at me kindly. ‘He’s been travelling round the country searching out distant relatives.’

‘Well, I’m going to. This is my, you know, first stop.’

I turned to Miss Dragon, excluding him. ‘I don’t know anyone called Turner, Poll’s never mentioned any Turners.’

Miss Dragon inclined her head, inviting him to speak.

He said; ‘I might be your cousin. I think, and obviously I could be wrong, but I think my mum was your mum’s sister.’

I had a hot flush while his words sunk in. I must have gone a funny colour because Miss Dragon said, ‘Come in the back office. You’ll be private there for half an hour or so.’ I didn’t move. ‘Come on. It’s not an offer open to everyone.’ She went behind me and took the back of the chair in her hands. I got to my feet.

‘My mother isn’t here,’ I said, swallowing. ‘We don’t know where she is. She ran off eighteen years ago. When I was a baby— Oh Christ, do
you
know where she’s living?’

‘No,’ said Callum. ‘God. Sorry about that. Bummer.’ Miss Dragon glanced from me to him, and ushered us towards the Private door.

When we were nearly there, Miss Dragon put her hand on my arm and drew me away. ‘Excuse us for a moment,’ she told Callum. Then she lowered her voice. ‘If you don’t want to speak with him, Kat, say. I thought you’d be excited to meet someone who knew some more about your family, but I didn’t realize he was going to come out with something of that magnitude. I had absolutely no idea. I may have acted precipitately. So please don’t feel you have to talk to him.’

‘No, I do.’

‘It might be, well, disturbing if you don’t hear good news. You don’t know what he’s going to tell you. Or he might not tell you anything.’

‘I know.’

Miss Dragon nodded. ‘Would you like me to stay, then?’

‘You can’t, can you? You need to be on the desk.’

‘Miss Ollerton could . . . No, you’re right. I do need to be out front. But I’m only just outside if you need me. Yes?’

‘Don’t tell anyone what he just said, will you? No one
at all
.’ I heard the tremor in my own voice.

‘Of course I won’t. It’s not my secret to tell.’ She showed us through the door, and scanned round the room quickly. ‘Make a coffee if you want one, the kettle’s in this corner, and there are some chocolate digestives in the Ryvita tin. Don’t touch that bag of bananas, though, they’re Miss Ollerton’s. Shift those catalogues, that’s it. I’ll pop back in twenty minutes or so.’ Then the door was closed behind her, and we were on our own.

‘This is a big privilege,’ I heard myself say.

‘What, talking to you? I know it is. I’m honoured.’

‘No!’ I was gabbling. ‘I mean being in here. It’s Miss Stockley’s territory. The whole library belongs to her, well not really, but she thinks it does. So being in here’s like the Inner Sanctum.’

‘Procul, o procul este, profani,’ said Callum.

‘You know Latin?’

‘My mum taught it me. That’s from Virgil. I know some Greek too. Are we having a drink, or what?’

He got up and put the kettle on, while I thought about clashing rocks and whirlpools. If the situation got out of hand, all I had to do was open the door and walk out.

‘OK, me. I’m seventeen, and I’m in the sixth form at Crewe College.’ He was moving round the room, opening the coffee jar, rattling spoons, teasing open milk cartons. ‘I live in Nantwich, which is in Cheshire, with my mum Jude. Our flat’s above a book shop where I sometimes do casual work, although mostly I sit and read the stock instead of serving customers. Luckily the owner fancies my mum, although she doesn’t fancy him because he’s so old. My dad exited the scene when I was still little, and I don’t care because my mum’s so cool about everything. She doesn’t bother much with men, it’s me and her, we’re pretty close. My best friend’s called Sam Haslam, my favourite film of all time is
Reservoir Dogs
, I hate McDonald’s and my ambition is to buy a croft in north-west Scotland.’ He picked up the kettle to pour and paused. ‘That’s about everything. My life in fifteen seconds. What you see is what you get; I’m the straightforward type.’

My heart rate was slowing a little. It was a small, safe room we were in. Install a bed and I could have lived here quite happily. You could tell everything was in its right place; the marker pens snug in their plastic wallet, the files on the shelves in alphabetical order with their fronts all flush, even the row of pencils had been arranged in order of height. This was the kind of environment I could imagine working in, one day, maybe, with Miss Dragon to watch over me.

‘I’m sorry I ran off, before.’

He gave a short laugh. ‘Christ, no, don’t apologize, Kat. That was my fault, I did it all wrong, what a dickhead. You must have thought I’d escaped from somewhere. I’m amazed you didn’t ring the police. The trouble with me is I just jump in.’

‘You were quite scary.’

‘What, me? Ha ha, I like it.’ He waved a teaspoon triumphantly in the air. ‘My mates would piss themselves if they heard you say that. My nickname’s Mary at college. My motto is, if there’s any trouble, leg it. Anyway, I’m sorry for frightening you. I just really wanted to speak to you about the family. Do you take sugar? Oh, there isn’t any. Here you go.’

He placed the mug down in front of me, slid into his seat opposite and then pushed the tin of biscuits into the middle of the table. I shook my head. Even one would have choked me now. Up close I could see the dark bristles on his chin and the hairs on his forearms, the way the necklace chain rolled across his throat when he spoke. What was he seeing when he looked at me? Was he disappointed? He didn’t seem it. I tried hard to sit still and not keep shifting in my chair.

‘So your mum’s a teacher?’ I asked, more to break the silence than because I wanted to know.

‘You must be kidding. Well, except in the sense she taught me. I got six GCSEs and I never set foot in secondary school. But I’m at college now just to see if I can bag a couple of A2s at the end of next year. Mum doesn’t believe in formal education, she reckons it stifles individuality. School stifled her; she spent all her time rebelling against the system. Then she went off to uni and totally went off the rails.’

‘What did she do?’

‘Well, she had me, for a start.’ He laughed. ‘Big surprise for everyone.’

I shivered at the coincidence. ‘Is she older than my mother? Why aren’t they still in touch?’

‘I don’t know anything about her, not a thing. Sorry. Mum won’t say a word. I managed to get out of her about your mother being involved with a man called Roger Millar, and his mum’s name being Pollyanna – there aren’t many Pollyannas around. That’s how I tracked you down. But I guess they had some kind of major row before that because Mum won’t even talk about their childhood together. It’s like a closed book. I don’t think she’s got any idea her sister disappeared, what did you say, eighteen years ago?’

‘Will you tell her?’

‘I don’t know. This family tree is something I’m doing for myself and I don’t want to go upsetting Mum unnecessarily. There’s something really hectic in the past that she just won’t discuss.’

A sepia Philip Pullman looked kindly down at the back of Callum’s head. You know, I’m normally dead shy with strangers, I felt like saying. But the situation here was so extraordinary. My heart was beginning to slow, I felt ready to tell him something back.

‘Well, we don’t talk about Elizabeth in our house ’cause my grandma hates her. Loathes her. Won’t have her name mentioned.’ How to convey to him the emotions attached to my mother.

‘Because she ran away and left you?’

‘That, and . . . Poll – my grandma – feels Elizabeth was responsible for my father’s death.’

Callum’s jaw dropped. ‘Shit. That’s terrible. Was she?’

‘Yes, basically. God, do you really want to hear this?’

‘If you want to tell me.’

Through the pane of glass in the door I saw Miss Dragon give me a little wave. I felt a surge of excitement that he was going to listen to every word I said. For once I’d be in control of the narrative.

‘Yeah, it’s all right. I mean, if you’re family, I suppose you should know. It’s not like it’s a big secret, everyone in this village knows the bare bones. But we don’t ever discuss it now at home. Poll told me the once what happened, then whenever I asked again she’d just clam up. My great-aunt Cissie’s filled in some of the details.’

I took a deep breath.

‘They were in his car, coming back from Sheffield, when they started arguing. I don’t know what about; Poll says they were always at it. Elizabeth was very bitter about having to give up university and stay at home with a baby. Because
she
got pregnant while she was still at school, which is weird – and she resented Dad his freedom, so it was probably that they were rowing about.’

Callum was leaning forwards, frowning. ‘So what happened? Did they crash?’

‘Yes. She grabbed the steering wheel and a lorry was coming the other way . . . She admitted it all at the inquest. She didn’t try and hide her guilt. Apparently she wasn’t injured at all, not one scratch. And luckily I was at home in my cot, with Poll. I was only a few months old.’

‘My God,’ Callum breathed. ‘So your dad was killed outright?’

‘I think so. In his new car that he’d got for his eighteenth. Poll’s world more or less fell apart, and she took it out on her husband Vince, and on Elizabeth.’

‘Why on Vince?’

‘Because he’d bought the car, I suppose. I expect she hated everybody. Mostly she hated my mother. I’m not surprised Elizabeth ran off, rather than live in that house of venom, but you’d think she’d have taken me with her, wouldn’t you? What sort of sick mind leaves her baby in the care of a woman she detests? Anyway, sorry, she’s your aunt, maybe you can see a better side to it.’

Callum was looking dazed. ‘I don’t know what to think,’ he said.