Playing with the Grown-ups (24 page)
Read Playing with the Grown-ups Online
Authors: Sophie Dahl
T
he night before she left Tommy came over to say goodbye, and as he left he pressed a battered copy of his favourite book,
The Little
Prince
, into her hands. 'I'm sorry if I ever made you feel bad,' he said.
'You didn't. I'll write to you. Come and visit and fall in love with an American girl so I don't have to hear about the Fraulein
any more,' Kitty said, kissing his cheek.
'I'll come by and see your mother - I won't let anything happen.'
They stared at each other.
'I have to go. I'm crap at goodbyes,' he said.
She slept in her mother's bed. They played the alphabet game, and her mother made her laugh so hard her ribs felt like they
had been broken.
Her mother cooked her breakfast, French toast with maple syrup, and she laid the table with snowdrops from the garden, and
used her Irish linen napkins.
Nora, Sam and Violet slept, because it was early, early even for them, but she had said goodbyethe evening before. Her mother
carried her case downstairs, and on Kitty's head she placed her favourite hat, a tweed newsboy cap.
'Are you sure?' Kitty said.
'Yes. I need to know your head will be warm.'
'I'm not going to Antarctica, Mummy, I'm going to New York. The school's in Connecticut, they'll have central heating.'
'New York gets very cold,' her mother said. 'Don't you remember?'
As she stepped into the red beetle, Kitty looked up at the windows of the house. She saw Sam and Violet, their faces squashed
against the glass. She waved, and in her wave she tried to convey everything she knew of love. Swallowing hard, she sat down
and shut the door. Dusty Springfield sang from the radio.
'You don't have to go,' her mother said by the gate. 'Everything can be different, it can go back to how it was. We can ring
Elsie and tell her that we've changed our minds. It doesn't need to be this dramatic. Why are you going so far away?'
A voice announced the flight to New York on the tannoy.
'I think I sort of have to go. I don't think I have a choice.'
Her mother started to cry.
'I'm sorry,' she said. 'Please know that I love you more than anything, that it is infinitely easier to love you more than
I will ever love myself. Please know that always, that you are loved.'
Marina seemed to lose her words as Kitty kissed her and walked down the orange-carpeted tunnel, looking back at her mother
silently watching her. She waved, mouthing 'I love you', until she disappeared from view, teetering long-legged towards her
future.
H
er mother lies in a ward full of other people who have tried to hurt themselves in irrevocable ways. They are all women, twelve
of them. Kitty holds her stomach trying to fend off the communal despair of the room. Her mother's eyes are shut. She touches
her arm lightly. She finds it miraculous that her mother bears no ravages on her face. She is, in her hospital nightgown with
mascara staining her cheeks, still breathtaking.
'Hello, Mummy,' she whispers softly.
Her mother opens her eyes. Kitty doesn't feel the anger she thought she would; she looks at her mother small in the stiff
white sheets of her hospital bed, amongst these sad strangers, far away from home.
Kitty looks at the faces of her mother, brother and sister, feeling the tiny little life beating inside her, and she is overwhelmed
by compassion for all of them, including herself. She knows that tomorrow there will be another morning, and in that morning
their lives will continue to muddle along, as lives do. She prays for the baby girl within her, she prays that she won't fuck
it up, this all-consuming job that no one seems equipped for, however hard they wish and try.
'You all came.' Her mother's voice is small, but she smiles at them, and love burns from her. Turning her head, she shuts
her eyes, and says quietly, 'I'm so sorry.'
'I know, Mummy,' Kitty says, taking her hand. 'I know.'
Thank you and biggest love to my family: Tessa and Julian, for their unerring support, humour and love. Maureen for her wings,
wisdom and lentil soup. Clover, Luke and Ned, who share my history and make me proud. Bloomsbury's magic trinity of Alexandra
Pringle, a paragon of patience and encouragement, Victoria Millar for her sense and eye and Mary Tomlinson for understanding
the finer points of grammar and my writing. Ed Victor, my friend and agent. Felicity Dahl for letting me stay in the annexe
whenever I needed a dose of England. Daniel Baker Sr. for opening his doors and letting me write in the bliss of his garden.
Mary Conley for her cards, wit and love. Justine Picardie, heroine and surrogate big sister. And last but not least, Caitlin
Blythe, for her letter, which reminded me why I wanted to write the book in the first place.
Sophie Dahl is the author of
The Man with the Dancing Eyes.
She lives in England.
The text of this book is set in Linotype Guardi, which was designed by Reinhard Haus in 1986 following a visit to the Bibliotecca
Marciana in Venice. The labels on the old picture frames there inspired him to develop his own letter forms based on Venetian
Renaissance roman. The letters have the appearance of being formed by the stroke of a broad nib held at an angle. This is
reflected in the slanting axis, the minimum contrast between hairlines and stems and in particular the sloped bar of the small
e.