Recovery and the Return of Ethan Hart (28 page)

(Yet at the same time I found it consoling I could still hear a whisper in my mind:
appreciate the present
! You're sitting here in bright September sunlight, in a haze of ever-swirling chalk dust, facing a man who's deeply well-intentioned but ridiculed and unhappy and who'll have killed himself in less than twenty years' time. Don't let this moment pass you by.)

“Well, do you?” he persisted.

“Only one,” I said. “Occasionally.”

“What do you dream?”

“I dream I'm drowning someone.”

“My God. Why? Do you know why?”

I bit my lip but then said carefully: “I once saw a man drown.”

“And is this the person who figures in your dream?”

“Yes.”

“And did you believe
you
were responsible?”

“Partly. But, sir. I'm coping with it. If you told my parents it would only upset them and there'd be nothing they could do.”

He stubbed out the cigarette. We watched its thin, expiring gasp of smoke. He almost took another, then looked at me, decided not to.

“I will say this. You certainly have the air of somebody who's coping. Except for…” He tapped the book on his knee.

“And please don't mention it to Mr Saunders.”

“No. If I do speak to the headmaster it will only be because I think you have exceptional gifts.”

“Because of that one essay? No, sir, you'll soon find out it wasn't typical. Some kind of aberration.”

I wasn't being modest. I didn't have exceptional gifts, other than the one I'd received nearly twelve years earlier. Neither in this life nor in my last had I shown any particular aptitude for writing, nor ever possessed the sort of imagination which could reach out beyond the limits of my own experience. (Except to have me flying on a magic carpet and suchlike.) The only card I still had up my sleeve was the shape of things to come—and even then I wasn't sure I could describe it well enough to interest readers unaware it was a bona fide revelation.

“Well, anyway,” he said, “we'll see. Whatever happens you mustn't feel pressured.”

He stood up and put his smoking materials back in his pocket.

“I suppose you wouldn't like to talk to a doctor about this other thing—this drowning? You don't think it might help?”

“No, sir.”

“Fair enough. But if ever for any reason you want to change your mind…” Then, oddly, he held out his hand. As I shook it he said: “Sorry about all the unpleasantness in class. I hope you'll be able to forgive that.”

I told him with conviction that it hadn't been his fault. “And you know, sir…in a way I'm even glad this happened.”

“Yes, I am, too.”

I held the door open and we said goodnight.

11

If only he had died more gently…

A terrifying notion came into my head. In March of 1992 would I be called upon to drown him for a second time?

I couldn't.

I wouldn't.

So I made a decision.

I should have to make sure I was a long way from Nottingham during the days surrounding my birthday.

12

It was the forty-first wedding anniversary of my mother's parents. (My father's were dead.) The year before, we'd had a slap-up celebration at the Golden Hind but today would be a somewhat quieter affair: Nana and Gramps and my mother's widowed sister and unmarried brother and our three selves. Also, it would be a daytime, not an evening, do. The anniversary this year fell on a Sunday.

In fact, it was to be no more than a glorified Sunday lunch, made special by having chicken in place of a joint and white wine instead of water. The chickens, two of them, were to be eaten cold, with salad and new potatoes, because it was July and for the past week the weather had been sultry. In a bucket in the bathroom—on a bed of melting ice beneath a deepening, gentle sea—the four bottles of wine clinked pleasantly.

That morning, while putting out the breakfast things, my mother was laughing but prepared to panic.

“Do you realize they'll be here in three hours and I've hardly done a thing? Such an idiot! What
could
I have been thinking of, yesterday?”

“But yesterday you made the cakes and the trifle and you and Ethan enjoyed your picnic in the woods. You weren't just standing idle.”

“Thank you. So I've now got half the pudding prepared and maybe half the tea. Oh, wonderful! What about all those potatoes which need to be scrubbed, the salad which needs to be washed, the chickens which need to be cooked, the nut roast which needs to be seen to? What about the table which needs to be laid, the eggs which need to be beaten, the chickens which need to be carved? Bethel, remind me, please, what have you done with that magic wand?”

“You know,” said my father solemnly, “I think they could have done with you ten years ago as Mr Churchill's speech-writer. Have we ever heard such rhetoric?”

“There's also the present to be wrapped, the card to be written. I'd also like to have a bath and wash my hair and spend a bit of time on getting
myself
ready. There are probably dozens of other little also's that I've overlooked.”

“I don't suppose his trifle would compare with yours, either.”

“I wish you'd be serious for a moment.”

“You know you'll get through it all just fine.” He lightly smacked her bottom as she leant across the table to position the Post-Toasties. “You know you have a highly domesticated husband and at times a semi-domesticated son—”

“Yes, I do have a domesticated son, thank God.”

“I shall ignore that. And after all it's only your mum and dad and brother and sister. It isn't the King and Queen.
Then
you might have had reason to worry.”

“It isn't funny,” said my mother. “I happen to believe I should try to treat my family as if it
were
the King and Queen. And if you hadn't…” (she glanced in my direction) “kept us awake last night…reading…I'd have been up a couple of hours ago, possibly three, getting on as busily as I had meant to. It's all very well for you to make jokes.” She herself was half joking. But only half.

Even at fourteen, even with the accumulated experience of—give or take—seventy years, I found it oddly disturbing to know my parents had a sex life. I ought to have been pleased, and in a way I was, and yet it was by no means as simple as seventy years should have made it. And I wondered if Dad saw a suggestion of this in my expression.

“You're very quiet, my son.”

“Just thinking.”

“That's my boy, and don't I know what you're thinking about! Why, about how you're going to take over and solve all your mother's little problems.” He pinched my cheek in imitation of Alec Guinness's Fagin. “
Jewel
!” he said. “
Treasure
!” he said. “
Angel
!” he said. Three pinches in total, although I tried to duck away. “Now all you've got to do, young prince, is keep your reputation alive for just one more morning, earn yourself three bob into the bargain and let your mum retire to beautify herself, put on her regalia, practise her curtseys…and for a further two bob let me have my own bath in peace and read the News of the World in time to get that scandalized look off my face before our royal visitors arrive!”

Today, though, his humour was falling flat. Inwardly—and uncharacteristically—I railed at the awkwardness of life. I'd had literally years in which to remember the importance of this date and I had actually only remembered it while listening to the crystal set less than thirty minutes earlier. Listening to, of all things, the weather forecast!

“Dad, this is rotten. I was going to tell you both. I've got to go out.”

“Oh, Ethan!” cried my mother, and now the last sign of her being able to laugh had totally vanished. “Oh, no, but you can't! I've been relying on you! Where have you got to go?”

“Aylesbury.”

“
Aylesbury
!”

This wasn't just down the road; it was about fifteen miles from Amersham. And although the train service wasn't bad, even on Sundays, there'd also be a lengthy bike ride at the other end. There was no way I could hope to get home before the arrival of our guests.

“Son, you can't,” said my father. “That's all there is to it. Who were you going with? Well, whoever it is, give them a ring and explain that your mother needs you.”

“I can't.”

“Of course you can.”

“I mean, I'm not going with anybody and there's no way I can put it off.”

“You aren't making much sense.”

“Dad, I have to see someone.”

“Who?”

“I'm afraid I don't know her name.”

My father looked at my mother.

“No, it isn't like that,” I said. “It's—”

“Ethan, frankly I don't care what it's like. Not now. The thing is—you're not going.”

“I've got to.”

“Sorry.”

“But I shall have to, whether or not
you
allow me.” This was miserable. At fourteen I was already much taller than my father.

“Ethan, be careful. I feel tired. I'm not in any mood to mess about. Walk out of here this morning and you need never bother to return.”

“Bethel!” screamed my mother. “No, obviously he doesn't mean that, Ethan. But all the same—”

“I'm sorry, Mum. Dad. I really am. But look, I'll make a start on the potatoes. And I'll be fast. They may not take much more than fifteen minutes.”

My mother looked as if she were about to cry. “No, you haven't eaten any breakfast. Whatever happens, I want you to sit down again and eat your breakfast.”

“Yes, sit down again and eat your breakfast,” said my father. “And while you're doing so, you can tell us what this is all about!”

But I didn't sit down. Now that he was struggling to recover his temper I became aware of losing mine. I, too, was feeling tired; I, too, had been having orgasms. (I didn't much like the thought of Zack knowing, nor indeed my Granny and Granddad, but the drive at times was just too strong.) I had lost my temper before, of course, by no means the saintly individual I had hoped and prayed to be, yet at least it hadn't occurred often and at least I'd always done my best to make amends. Each time it happened, though, I hated it—hated it.

“No, I can't tell you. You've simply got to accept my word that it's important. I'd have thought by now you might have learnt to trust me.”

I could have said worse. I was relieved I didn't actually say, “Sometimes I think you're apt to take advantage,” because I knew my parents depended on me for dozens of things that fourteen-year-olds didn't normally get asked to do (from mending fuses, replacing washers, cleaning windows, to wallpapering and painting, and digging the allotment) and I was really glad this was the case—in theory I wanted to be made use of, always, and as fully as possible—but nevertheless I wished I could sometimes get round things by resorting to a meaningless white lie, the sort that hurt nobody and simply eased away the complications.

“All right! Go off on your little jaunt,” said my father.

“It isn't a little jaunt and I can't see why there has to be this huge to-do about it, why you're overreacting as you are. As you said, it's only
family
for heaven's sake, and all of them would be only too happy to pitch in if necessary. I know they would. Honestly, Dad! I
know
it!”

But by this time my mother was actually crying. On the one hand I was tempted to put my arms about her but on the other I felt it was all so unnecessary; and in any case my father was there to put his arms about her.

He called after me. “Next time someone says how wonderful you are, I think we may have to reconsider!”

“Yes, I'm sure,” I shouted back. “Why don't you tell them how you always like to take advantage?” I had to have the last word.

Already, though, as I was cycling down to the station, teeth uncleaned, hair unbrushed (and this was a day we'd all been looking forward to), the tears were welling up in my own eyes; and would have been easier to hold back if only they'd been due to frustration. But they weren't. Inevitably they'd been brought on by remorse and shame. I should have handled it far better—that whole silly scene which had sprung out of nowhere! If only I had been less tired! If only I had been more prepared! I would have liked to ride back right then and there and throw my arms around the two of them and confess I'd spoken wholly out of turn and without having meant a word of it. But I hadn't got the time and, besides, what could I have offered that would have made the situation any more acceptable? I wished I could have spoken to Zack.

I often wished I could have spoken to Zack. Zack, whom I had seen only once since infancy. And even that had been four years ago.

I'd been wandering on my own round Woolworths, or, more precisely, standing at one of the long counters looking a little aimlessly at cigarette cards.

“I hope this isn't how you normally spend your time,” he'd said. It was as though we saw each other every day; there was absolutely no need for formalities or catching up.

“Why? What should I be doing?” Then I put my arms around his legs for a moment and held my head against his stomach.

“Reading something improving, not gazing at pictures of Susan Hayward and Jean Kent.”

“I'm always reading something improving.” But my grumble was as counterfeit as the reproach it was in answer to.

“Like what, at the moment?”

“
Confessions of St Augustine
.”

“And before that?”

“Bertrand Russell.”

“Where do you find such things as
Confessions of St Augustine
and Bertrand Russell?”

“There's a secondhand bookshop in—” But then I saw his face and realized he knew perfectly well.