She's Not There, page 15
The rain was still falling, and the air in the room was chilly on his shoulders. His tooth in his fist, he turned on his side and pulled the duvet over him. They’d dragged the duvets back onto their beds the night before. They hadn’t had a bath, though, because it was still full of Lucy’s oily water, with the hairs and even more dead flies. He gazed at the Oscar Pistorius poster, which had finally slid down the wall, so that Oscar was sitting, leaning against the skirting board, with his blade legs out in front of him. They’d seen him winning, getting his medal, at the Olympic Stadium – him, Emerald and Raff, and Dora on the end. His eyes were still sleepy, and he closed them, nestling into his own warmth.
It’s still the Best Day of my Life, but it won’t be for much longer. Do you know why?
Why, Joney? Her voice, so light and smiley.
Because when you come back, that day is going to be the Best Day.
Rainwater dripped, the bells rang and rang, and the ache of worry and of wanting her took hold. He sat up again and stared down at the tooth in his palm. He could show Raff. He looked at the clock – 07.49, time they were getting up anyway – and leant over the side of his bunk.
‘Raff,’ he whispered. There was no answer. The poem book was still lying open among the clothes on the floor, and he gazed at the picture of the Yonghy pleading with Lady Jingly Jones to marry him. ‘Your proposal comes too late, Mr Yonghy-Bonghy-Bò,’ he whispered. He leant further, to look at Raff. But Raff’s bed was empty.
Still clutching his tooth, Jonah slithered down from the top bunk. There was a dent in Raff’s pillow where his head had been. He ran into Lucy’s empty room, and into the bathroom, and then down the stairs.
‘Raff,’ he whispered. The front door was open again.
Outside, it was grey and glistening, and his feet made tiny sploshes on the pavement as he walked around the corner into Wanless Road. Raff was there, staring at the passionflowers on the Broken House fence, beads of water in his hair and on his shoulders.
‘Raffy.’ Jonah felt a raindrop hit his neck and dribble down his spine. He sploshed to his brother’s side. The flowers were even brighter in the wet grey light. A thousand Bad Granny masks, looking back at them.
‘What are you looking at?’
‘The council came.’ Raff pointed, his other hand keeping his pyjama bottoms up.
‘What?’
‘Didn’t you hear them?’
‘Oh, yes.’ The banging and drilling which he’d thought had been in his dream. Jonah stepped forward and touched the new silver screws. ‘Did you see them?’
‘No, they were driving away when I came out.’
The rain was gathering pace. Jonah pushed at the board. It didn’t budge. ‘Well, we can’t get in this way any more. We’ll have to remember the keys.’
Raff turned and walked around the corner, his pyjama bottoms dragging in the wet. Raindrops bounced off Jonah’s shoulders. He opened his hand and stared at his tooth.
35
The alarm clock was still ringing when they got back inside the house, and the wasps were buzzing quietly in the plum crate. Raff was upstairs, sitting on the toilet, muttering to himself. Jonah leaned in the doorway. ‘My tooth came out. Lucy won the bet.’
‘Lay down in ma bed with ma Shelly by ma head …’
Jonah sat on the edge of the bath. ‘Your hair is mad.’ The night before he’d tried to unravel it all and comb it through, but Raff had wriggled and cursed and he’d given up.
‘But I shoulda listened to what my mama said …’
‘The milk hasn’t come,’ he said, watching Raff’s dancing hands. ‘I think it’s because we haven’t paid the bill.’
‘Get me some arse paper, fam.’
‘There isn’t any.’
‘Fetch me some, fam!’ Raff aimed his imaginary catapult at him. ‘I need to wipe my bum, don’t I!’
Jonah went into Lucy’s room and turned off the alarm. In the deep silence he surveyed the room. It was much cooler and the light was softer, but everything was exactly as it had been the day before. He gathered some lipsticky tissues from the dressing table to give to Raff, but then he went to the window and leant his forehead on the rain-spattered glass, looking out at the Broken House. It looked different under the dark clouds, not just desolate, but sulky – angry, even. There were pigeons all clustered in the upstairs window, like flies on the eye of an animal. He imagined reaching across with a giant arm and brushing them all away. The broken voice of the Broken House whispered in his head. Please come, it said; why have you left me?
He turned away, and his blurred gaze fell on Lucy’s denim shorts, with her pink pants inside them. The clothes still held the shape of her. He knelt down and laid his fingers very lightly on the denim. Then he noticed the dark stain in the pants again. Was it blood? The stain was brownish and powdery, like dried blood would be. As he stood and turned his foot scrunched on paper, and he saw that he was standing on the old letter from Roland. He crouched over it, smoothing it out.
Hello there, Lucy
I want you to know that I don’t blame you for refusing to testify. I don’t really blame you for anything, apart from leaving your bicycle outside.
‘Hurry up, fam!’
‘Coming!’ called Jonah.
If you had only taken it in with you, Raff wouldn’t have seen it, and we’d have kept on going, home in time for the Queen Anne Stakes. But there it was, your golden bicycle, in broad daylight, when you said you were going shopping with Dora.
It was strange, reading Roland’s words to Lucy. They were the words of his father to his mother, but it was like both people were strangers, like he was spying into their grown-up, private world. Forgetting about Raff, he started on the next paragraph.
You’ll have heard I got five years. Which means, apparently, that I’ll be out in three, maybe sooner. My sentence should have been much longer, given the life-changing nature of the injury, and I should be very grateful to my lawyer. It all turned on ‘mens rea’, which, in case you’re interested, is a legal term meaning ‘guilty mind’. But I don’t feel comfortable with my sentence. Why should it matter, whether or not I acted with intention, given the lives I ruined?
Although the writing was easy to read, lots of the words were difficult. He moved his finger underneath them, sometimes mouthing the sounds of the syllables.
The way the lawyer put it, I was like a ball, struck or flung by a force outside me. The implication was, of course, that you were the player, the cause of it all. But I don’t buy it, because if I’m a ball, then you’re a ball, and the world is just a giant snooker table, and there’s no point in anything, because we’re all just snooker balls, bouncing off each other in an endless momentum.
The next paragraph wasn’t as neat, and had crossings out.
Please be I know I can trust you to Be sensible about things, won’t you, Lucy. Watch your spending. Letting money flow is all very well, but I haven’t ever noticed it flowing back to you. I spoke to my mother this morning, and Lucy, she is very sorry for her attempts to take the boys from you. She was feeling so angry with in a terrible state when she did it, and she now knows it was a terrible thing to do. She accepts that she has always been never been fair on you, with her accusations and distrust, and she really wants to start building bridges. I know she has said some stupid vile things, over the years. But maybe you could try to understand the very protective feelings she has towards me. Lucy, please answer her calls. She wants to help financially, apart from anything else.
‘Jonah!’ Raff was really bellowing from the bathroom.
‘Coming!’ Jonah called again, but then he noticed the Martins’ name, further down the page.
I’m sure the Martins are being very helpful, and I’m glad you’ve got them as a support. But don’t get too entwined with them, Lucy. You’ll say it’s none of my business, but they treat you like their lame ducks, and I don’t think it’s healthy, for you or the boys. And please, Lucy, don’t take any more money off them. If you did ever fall out with them, owing them money could make things really unpleasant.
‘Fuckin’ Peck! Bring me some toilet paper, man!’
‘OK, Raffy!’ Jonah put the letter down and took the lipsticky tissues to the bathroom. ‘That’s it, that’s all there is. And don’t call me Peck, alright.’
‘Fuckin’ Peck,’ said Raff, looking dubiously at the tissues. Jonah sat back on the edge of the bath, thinking about money. How much had the Martins given them? They’d bought him and Raff the Wii player. They hadn’t been able to believe their luck. And they’d paid for the holiday in France. He’d heard Dora talking about how much it had cost. But had they given Lucy actual cash? And what did Roland mean by ‘lame ducks’?
Raff had flushed the toilet and was looking at himself in the mirror. ‘Where my hat?’ he asked, picking at the still-woven bits.
‘What hat?’
‘My trilby. I need it, for the show.’
‘I don’t know. Where did you put it?’
Raff shrugged. He hadn’t worn it for ages. ‘I’m hungry,’ he said. ‘We need some cash. We need to sell something.’
‘At least we’ve got my tooth.’ Jonah showed it to him. Raff turned and looked down at it, frowning. ‘So we’ll have some money tomorrow. Definitely one pound. Maybe more.’
‘Peck! Don’t tell me you believe in that tooth-fairy shit! Seriously!’ Raff slapped his hand and the tooth fell to the floor.
Jonah’s eyes filled, and he got up and went back into her bedroom.
36
‘Who teefed ma toof, Mr Fairy!’
Raff came and sat on the edge of the bed. Jonah turned away from him.
‘I brought you your tooth, fam.’ Raff put his hand on his shoulder, and Jonah wriggled it off, but then Raff shuffled up close to him. ‘You can put the tooth under the pillow if you want to, Joney boy,’ he whispered. He stroked his face, the way Lucy did when he was sad.
Jonah rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Lucy had always said that you had to believe in things, or nothing would be true. But did that mean that it was the believing in the thing that made it true?
‘Raff, do you believe in God?’
‘Nah.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because we come from chimps, innit?’
‘God could still exist, though. Even if the Bible is wrong.’ He closed his eyes. ‘I felt him, once.’ In Richmond Park, very hot, and they were lost and thirsty. Raff and Lucy had been ahead, Raff on Lucy’s shoulders, and he’d followed them into the trees, all cool and green and mysterious, like they’d gone underwater. The feeling was of a current, running through his body, very strong in his hands.
‘God’s different from the tooth fairy, anyway,’ Raff said.
‘Why?’
‘God’s about the whole world. Tooth fairy’s about toofs.’
‘Teeth.’
Raff sighed. ‘I know, fam. Just toofs sounds better.’ He got up and went over to Lucy’s chest of drawers. ‘Anyway,’ he said, dropping to his knees and pulling out the bottom drawer. ‘Look.’
Jonah went and squatted by his brother. The drawer was amazingly neat, probably the only neat part of the house, and a sweet, forgotten smell rose out of it, like a loving ghost. On the left there was a pile of baby clothes, all carefully folded. On the right were cardboard boxes of various sizes, from shoebox to matchbox, some of them lidded, some open.
Raff picked up one of the smallest boxes and opened it. ‘Look, fam,’ he said.
Inside the box were some small white lumps, like pearls. Jonah gazed at them for a moment, his heart in his throat. He put a finger in the box and counted them. ‘Eight,’ he said. ‘Six are mine and two are yours.’ Raff opened his hand to let the seventh tooth drop into the box and closed the lid.
Jonah surveyed the drawer, a secret container of order. It was like the things inside were her precious jewels. He pulled out another box – red, battered, very old. It had a few pieces of folded-up paper in it. He opened one. The paper was thin and dry. It was a child’s writing, but not his or Raff’s. The ink was faded, and it was hard to read.
Today was quit fun we went to the zoo we sow crockodils and aslo a snak in a tanck it was asleep and next to it was a tinny berd. The berd wos so fritened.
There was a drawing of the bird, and the huge snake. The bird was just two circles, with dots for eyes, little crosses for its feet and a ‘v’ for a beak, but it did look frightened.
It is crool to put the berd in with the snak wot do yu think mayo sinserly
LUCY NSANSA MWEMBE PS I miss yu xxxxxx
‘Who wrote that?’ asked Raff, pulling it off him. ‘Was it you?’
‘Be careful, Raff! No, it was Lucy. When she was a little girl. It’s a letter to her Mayo.’
‘What, but she never sent it?’
‘I suppose …’ Jonah thought, drifting his fingers among the folds of paper. ‘Maybe when her Mayo died, she got given it back.’
‘The writing is rubbish. She should of done finger spaces.’
Jonah pulled out another piece of paper. A grown-up’s writing, but not joined up: the writing a grown-up does for a child.
Dear Lucy
I hope you are being a good girl for Auntie. A little bird told me you won your race in the Gala! Well done, and keep it up. Maybe one day you will be a World Champion! I am tired today, malaika, so just a short one today.
Love Mayo xx
‘Who’s that one from?’ asked Raff.
‘From Lucy’s Mayo.’
‘I thought she was dead.’
‘She is. It’s from when she was alive.’
‘“Dear Lucy”,’ Raff read, over his shoulder. ‘Why is it in English?’
‘She spoke English. She was white. Don’t you remember the photograph? In Lucy’s necklace?’
‘Oh yeh. But why is she called Mayo, then?’
Jonah shrugged. ‘She must have spoken Zambian too.’ Not Zambian. There were lots of Zambian languages. The one Lucy’s family spoke was Bemba.
Raff squinted at the faded letters. ‘“A little bird” … What kind of bird?’
‘A little one.’
‘Weird.’ Raff tried to read some more. ‘You can’t even see it, fam! Did she write it with invisible ink? Was she a spy?’
‘It’s just old, Raff.’ Jonah took both the letters and put them back in the red box. He looked at the baby clothes. On top of the pile was a pale blue sleep suit, dotted with yellow elephants. He picked it up and sniffed it. The forgotten, powdery smell, from when Raff was a baby and he was a toddler.
‘I can remember you wearing this,’ He shook it out and held it up. ‘You used to crawl around, but your legs didn’t stay in the legs, so you had these long empty legs trailing after you like tails.’
Raff took the sleep suit and sniffed it too.
‘Do you remember it?’ Jonah asked.
Raff shook his head.
Jonah reached across into an open shoebox, and pulled out two tiny white plastic bracelets. ‘“Raphael Bupe Armitage”,’ he read out. ‘Raff, this was your one. They put it on you so you wouldn’t get mixed up with any of the other babies.’
Raff took it. He could only get two fingers into the bracelet. Jonah looked down at his own. ‘Jonah Kabwe Armitage’. Kabwe meant ‘little stone’, but he couldn’t remember what Bupe meant.
‘What’s this?’ That little rattling sound. The stripy monkey! Tiny. Raff was dangling it from between his finger and thumb.
‘That’s what I gave you. When you were born.’ In that big hospital room, Raff just a little bundle. ‘I gave it to you, and you held it. You were a very strong baby, Raffy.’ Strong and fierce.
Raff snorted and dropped the toy back in the shoebox. ‘That’s just what Mayo told you. You can’t even remember.’
‘Yes I can!’ Could he? Or was it that Lucy had told him the story of Raff being born so many times that he had pictures of it in his head as strong as memories? He dipped his head to catch more of the smell that was coming from the drawer. ‘What about ghosts, Raff? Do you believe in them?’
‘Like the ones by the pond?’
‘Yes, dead people. Their spirits. Waiting to go to Heaven.’
Raff shrugged. ‘Maybe. Sometimes.’
‘Have you ever seen one?’
‘Have you?’
‘Maybe.’ Jonah thought about seeing his three uncles. ‘I’m not sure.’
‘That’s it.’ Raff sighed. ‘How do you know if it’s God, or spirits, or fairies, or if your head’s just making them up?’
‘Lucy says you can make things true if you believe them.’
‘Yeh, but she’s full of shit.’
‘Don’t say shit, Raff! And anyway, she’s not.’
‘What’s this?’ Raff had picked up the letter from Roland.
‘It’s from Daddy. Just after he went to prison.’
‘Oh.’ He passed it to Jonah, and started leafing through the pile of printed papers.
Jonah turned to the last page.
Time is going very slowly, which is changing the way I think. Maybe it’s just that I think more about the past. For example, right now, I am remembering the first time I saw you, in Dahab, up in the yoga room, with the sunset streaming in. You arrived late, I was already lying on my mat, and I stopped breathing, because you were floating in the doorway, all lit up, and your face was like a Chinese lantern. You took the space next to me, and I watched your feet, and your toes had gold rings on them, and red nail paint. When you crouched down to unroll your mat, you smelt of seaweed and coconut. I lay very still, waiting for you to look back at me, waiting for our eyes to touch. But when you looked, there was nothing. I was nobody.
