TWENTY-THREE
Pamela stood waiting to be served. Ani Patel was in the middle of an argument with her son. ‘He has mock A levels coming up in January,’ she said, with eyes of fire, ‘And he does nothing.’
She glared at her son, who stared pointedly at a jar of sherbet lemons and fingered his infant moustache.
‘I tell him that nothing is a mockery in this game and that everything is real. If his father were alive, he would not be like this.’
Ari rolled his eyes.
‘Once a week,’ said Ani Patel. ‘Once a week I go. Now I shall not be able to do that. I must watch him all the time. And my old lady will suffer.’
Ari went very red beneath his smooth brown cheeks. He muttered what was possibly an obscenity.
‘I,’ said Ani Patel, ‘have given up everything for him.’
Mistake, that, thought Pamela, shaking her head. She was glad to be free of it. She knew this scene inside out, back to front, and with knobs on. If you go out, he will not work. If you stay in, he will not work but he will sulk at home. Or he will go out slamming the door. Whatever he will do, he will not work. She remembered Douglas’s perplexity and his conviction that if she stopped being so nice to Danny, he would soon learn to behave.
‘Yes,’ she had said. ‘But learn what else? That I only love him when he is good? You are asking me to stop loving parts of my son.’
Douglas never understood. The divide between those who have begotten children and those who have not is vast and understandable. How can a sane person allow themselves to be treated thus? She saw that question in Douglas’s eyes. She tried to explain. It is called unconditional love. It comes, if the child is blessed, as soon as it opens its little postpuerperal mouth to scream for attention. Time diminishes it, but it seldom goes completely. And, she thought, if it is the Kingdom of the Blind for those without children, for Douglas it was the Kingdom of the Certifiably Insane as well. What hurt him, and to a lesser extent Dean, and even, slightly, Peter, was that what they had to strive to win and keep from her, Danny got handed on a plate. Love, in all its complexities of loyalty and kindness and bestowal of happiness was his by birth. To the other men in her life it was theirs only by effort and good behaviour. ‘Who takes the child by the hand,’ she remembered from somewhere, ‘takes the mother by the heart. . .’
Poor Douglas. Worse for him. She guessed, though he never really spoke about it, that the only unconditional experience he knew, growing up, was unconditional rejection. When she tried to talk about it, he gave the perfect imitation of a clam, even down to the thin rippling line of his mouth as it clamped shut.
Poor Ani Patel, now. Unconditional was written all over her. The terrible thing about this situation, Pam saw, was that Ari could not give a fig what Ani Patel had given up for him. Why should he? It was his due.
She looked at the boy. Only the amber of his skin and the colour of his eyes distinguished him from her son at that age. The pose, the mouth-line, the expression of impenetrable contempt, was the same. Suddenly the doubts lifted. Two brassieres and four pairs of knickers lying lonely in the bottom of a basket seemed heaven-sent. Where were those Dorothy shoes?
She, Pamela, had come through. She could choose. If she wanted, she could choose. Or try.
Mrs Patel said, ‘And I want to take him to see my family for Christmas and he says he will not go. He wants to stay here on his own, he says’ – and then Ani Patel remembered herself. ‘Can I help you, Mrs Pryor?’ she enquired.
Ari took the opportunity to slip away.
Pamela picked up her newspaper and touched Ani Patel’s arm. ‘It will end,’ she said with feeling. ‘Or at any rate, it changes. You will not always have to be so strong.’
‘I do not think it will end for me, now,’ said Ani Patel, which Pamela took to be rhetorical and uncharacteristically gloomy. She looked at her customer. ‘For the likes of you, perhaps, but not for me.’
The sorrow and silence between them was broken by a sound like the rushing of wings. Miss Phoebe Glen entered the shop. Careless of any intrusion, she leaned against the counter, took several deep breaths, and began.
‘I had a visitor today,’ she said excitedly. Her hair was very much askew and her mittens were flying about all over the place, like birds fighting for the space.
And then, seeing Pamela, she stopped. ‘You, of course,’ she said, peering at her, ‘have your own home? If I remember . . . Alas – your son. . .’
Pamela nodded.
Miss Phoebe flittered her hands about in a cheerfully impatient manner. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘no matter, no matter. I am all sorted out now. Or very nearly. Soon they won’t be able to touch me.’ She looked at Pamela. ‘Brave, brave woman,’ she said.
Pamela shrugged as if it were nothing, which indeed it was, so far as she knew anything about it, and excused herself. She was expecting a call from Daniel and she was due to meet Peter at eight.
She walked along the empty road looking up at the black, starry sky. What was it Oscar Wilde said? Children begin by loving their parents, then they judge them, and rarely, if ever, do they forgive them. Maybe it was the same for parents? She pulled her coat about her and hurried up the path. One day, she thought, I might go somewhere exotic and warm for Christmas – but not yet. One day it would be time for Egypt at last. She sighed for it. Floating down the Nile on a felucca, past temples and pyramids and palm trees. Eating fresh-picked dates.
But no, not yet. Christmas was for families and that sense of being warm inside while outside the elements raged. Of course, it also had the highest stress yield, drove you quietly potty in the run-up, was always exhausting and inevitably a disappointment. But Christmas just would not be Christmas anywhere else. Daniel relied on it. Of that she was sure.
Ani Patel tried to look interested and concerned. Which was hard, for Miss Phoebe was full of her story. ‘I shall have a little party,’ she said, ‘To celebrate. They came for me, you know. They came for me. But I have pre-empted them. Ha, ha! No little box of a place down by the M4 for me.’
Mrs Patel said she was very pleased to hear it. Humouring. She had spent all those Tuesday nights humouring. While Ari was humouring something quite different. She smiled as best she could and went to get a box of two-for-a-pennys. Better keep going while her customer unfolded her tale.
‘Norman has finally decided to move in and Lavender MacNamally is behaving very badly about it. I washed his jumper. I think that is what did the trick. He was impressed with the colour it came up.’
‘Norman?’
‘The man with the corporation and no budgerigars.’
Mrs Patel nodded, her mind only half-engaged. ‘Good, good,’ she said, absently.
‘And he is bringing his television,’ said Phoebe Glen excitedly.
‘So, no more radio serials,’ said Ani Patel flatly. It was too late anyway.
‘Probably not, dear Mrs Patel. I hope you don’t mind.’
Ani Patel said that she thought she could just survive without it.
Miss Phoebe rattled on excitedly. ‘But let me tell you the rest.’
Ani Patel went and fetched the chair. ‘Do sit while you tell me,’ she said.
Best to be safe.
Phoebe Glen sat. ‘Well, it was most unfortunate that the girl should have called again and today. I had been celebrating, just a little. Now that I have the lodger question settled. So I had a little treat. Mules they were called, on a special promotion at the off-licence. PACK A HELL OF A KICK, said the poster. Anyway, they were half-price. I bought six and I have to say they were very acceptable. Slipped down nicely. Made a change. Being teetotal as a general rule.’
Mrs Patel did not blink.
‘But I had a little difficulty getting up the stairs, so I thought I would lie down in the hall for a moment, just to get my bearings. And then she started knocking and calling and waking me up with rattling the letter-box because she thought I was lying there dead. She spoke to me through the flap as if I were a congenital idiot. I used to talk to children like that when they refused to come out of the lavatories. So I ignored her. I felt quite peaceful and relaxed. The hall floor is quite clean. I often have a little lie down in the afternoons. And where I have my little lie down is nobody’s business but mine. Is it?’
Mrs Patel obviously agreed.
‘I thought she would go away. And then I heard her say that the lock was a bit dicky and stand back. Well, I thought, if she can get the landlord to fix it, so be it. And went off to sleep again. One does get tired you know, Mrs Patel.’
Mrs Patel had been listening with her eyes closed, leaning against the ice-cream chest. ‘You certainly do,’ she said.
‘And then she broke the lock. Just like that. Bang. Threw herself at the door and the lock came away. Well, of course, I could have told her there was a trick to it – you only have to lift and push. The landlord knows, too, but he doesn’t care.’
She smiled and tapped Mrs Patel lightly on the arm. Mrs Patel opened her eyes.
‘I expect he does now,’ she said. And closed her eyes again.
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Miss Phoebe Glen. ‘Anyway, bang she went against the door. Which, of course, flew open. And she came through it like a torpedo and landed head first right up against the banisters. She was out like a light. And there we both were, stretched out on the hall floor with the door wide open to the street and a whole crowd of gawpers peering in. It was like having no clothes on. Someone said it was the bailiffs, at which I stood up and pointed out that it was not. Certainly not. Well, we’ve had those once and they wear bowler hats. Then someone else said I had knocked her out cold. I kept quiet at that. I quite liked the idea. Though, of course, it was the banisters, not me, to be perfectly correct.’
‘You always are most correct.’ Mrs Patel smiled.
Miss Phoebe returned the smile graciously. ‘Then I asked them all if they wanted an encore, to shame them, and slammed the door, but it just blew open again. And when the girl came to, she had thankfully lost all that infernal brightness and good cheer and said I should be locked up for such behaviour. So I said, Well, if you will go breaking people’s doors down when they are having a nap, what can you expect?’
‘Not this, she said, very shrilly, indicating the lump on her forehead. It did rather resemble an egg. I pointed that out as rather amusing. We need to keep a sense of humour at such times, do we not, Mrs Patel?’
‘We do,’ said Mrs Patel, sadly. ‘Oh, yes, we certainly do.’
‘She went off very shakily and said she would return. Rubbish, I said. Rubbish, I called out after her. I said, Who will pay for a new lock? To which she said something extremely appropriate to the gutter. So now I have to prop the door closed with a board from the fence in my back garden. I’m next to one of those big houses, you know. The Baldwins. Complainers. Not very satisfactory. One side is mine, the other side is theirs, and I am never sure which is which. They are quite unfriendly, so I would not like to give them the opportunity to accuse me of stealing. Would I?’
Mrs Patel shook her head. That was the other worry about Ari, which she did not like to dwell upon. The till. His girlfriend liked films and drinks.
‘They don’t like the idea of a rented house in the road. Dress it up as for my own good. An old woman living on her own. They’ve been to the Council before. So they will no doubt try again. True, I did once end up in their front garden by mistake. But it was a mistake anybody could make, and it was only for half an hour while I rested. As I said to the girl from the Council, I am not a statistic, a number is not a person, and I do not know what my social security code is. What is wrong with a mule now and again? I said. She had absolutely no answer to that. Social security? I told her. I am not a number, I am real – I am old but I am real. I told her, You will be old and real one day. That’s if that lump on your head clears up. I thought that was quite funny. Anyway, she stood on the doorstep and she said she would be back. You and whose army? I asked. Letting my language slip a little in the heat of the moment, I am afraid. Anyway, I shall have my lodger soon. Then we will be an army. A united front. All for one and one for all. Norman will mend the lock.’
She laughed.
Mrs Patel dutifully joined in.
‘It certainly taught her, that bump on the head did.’ She laughed again and tapped her mittened finger against her nose. ‘Feeling mulish,’ she said, and had to hold her sides.
Mrs Patel nodded. ‘Will there be anything else?’ she asked wearily.
‘No, thank you, Mrs Patel. Except that I hope you will come to the little party.’
Ani Patel said, very graciously, that she would love to come.
Miss Phoebe Glen opened the door of the shop, thought, turned, and added discreetly, ‘You may bring some wine with you, if you wish.’
And then, nodding, she went off into the cold, starry night.