The House We Grew Up In (24 page)
She dropped the tatty paperback and ran for her room. She noticed, properly, for maybe the first time, that in order to get to her room, she needed at two separate points to turn sideways-on in order to navigate her way through piles of bags and boxes that had formed the beginnings of a corridor. When had that happened? She was sure that was a recent development. And then she pulled open her bedroom door – the movement of which was impeded at ninety degrees by
yet another pile of her mother’s possessions, a cash-and-carry box of pink light bulbs – and slammed it hard behind her. She waited for a sense of relief to flood through her, a sense of disconnection from her mother’s madness, but as she glanced around her room she saw the truth for herself. Clothes left piled up and unhung. Thirty different mascaras on her dressing table. Shoes jumbled up in mismatching chaos inside an old cardboard box. There was nothing nice in here. Nothing pretty. No order. No control. It was a dumping ground.
She thought of her desk at work, of the neat rows of filing boxes, the tiger-stripe orchid in a shiny black pot, the sun streaming through the clean windows on to her light ash furniture, her manicured fingernails set above her newly vacuumed keyboard, her hair neatly folded up on the back of her head, and the lines of people who came in and out of her office all day at whom she flashed a sparkling smile of efficiency and self-assurance. What would they think if they could see her now? Who would they think she was?
From downstairs she could hear the sound of her mother wailing about a broken plant pot. She lay down upon her bed – she had not changed her sheets, she now realised, for nearly two months – and she stared up at the ceiling. She sighed at the strings of cobwebs hanging from the cornices and she thought of the cupboard full of unused dusters and brooms and sweepers and mops downstairs that exploded open every time you touched the door, and she thought about Bill and Meg in their Mediterranean idyll and this time she took not an iota of pleasure from the image of Meg oozing out of her sensible, size-sixteen swimsuit.
She saw herself, possibly for the first time in her life, objectively. She was a prisoner. But not, as she’d always told herself, because her mother needed her. Her mother didn’t need her. Her mother had Vicky, her mother had her house and her stuff. No, Beth was a prisoner entirely of her own making. And it was time to go. The only thing keeping her here, apart from her own guilt, was Bill. Her sister’s partner. Who barely even looked at her when he picked her up from the station these days. Who didn’t call for weeks on end. Who hadn’t taken her bra off during sex for over a year.
That had to end too
. It all had to end.
Right now
.
And at the very same moment that she felt her lungs about to fill up with self-hatred and drown her, she heard her phone buzzing from within her backpack. She pulled the bag towards her and located her phone and there it was: a life raft.
Hi there, hope you’re OK today. Feeling really guilty about pressurising you into drinking so much last night. Totally my fault. How do you feel about a re-run tonight, strictly orange juice and lemonade. I’d really like another chance to get to know you. Take care, Jase.
Six months later, on a particularly dark and long-shadowed October afternoon, Vicky, Maddy and Sophie hired a white van and moved all their things into a little flat around the corner.
When they shut their new front door behind themselves a few hours later, Maddy came to Vicky and encircled her mother inside her arms.
‘Thank you, Mummy,’ she breathed into Vicky’s soft sweater, ‘thank you.’
Vicky kissed the top of her daughter’s head and wiped away a warm tear from the side of her nose. ‘Darling,’ she said, holding Maddy’s face in her hands, ‘I did everything I could, I really did, but silly Lorrie did not want to be helped. No. So. Here we are, the three of us.’
‘Will you go back, if she tidies the house?’
Vicky sighed and pulled Maddy back towards her. ‘She’s not going to tidy her house, Mads. I know that now.’ Another tear spilled from her other eye. It was not in Vicky’s nature to give up on anything, least of all love. ‘Poor old Lorrie,’ she said. ‘Poor beautiful soul.’ The timing had been dreadful. Here they were, moving away and in two months Beth would be gone too, to Australia to try and make it work with that nice boy, Jason. Lorrie would then be completely alone for the first time in her life. The worry was overwhelming. But there you go. It had to be done.
Maddy pulled away from her then and smiled. ‘Can I invite Jade? To come over?’
Vicky blinked. There it was, the thing she hadn’t noticed for all those months and years. That most mundane of childhood requests which had been absent. She smiled and then she said, ‘Yes, gosh, absolutely, definitely. Tell her to come over now.’
Monday 3rd January 2011
Hello, lovely Jim!
I missed your emails these last couple of days. Sorry to hear you’ve been under the weather, and delighted to hear you’re all better now. Maybe it was something you had to eat on New Year’s Eve? One thing after another, isn’t it?!
I’m glad you liked the pics. Thank you for your sweet comments. I was quite a looker in my day, but not vain with it, if you see my meaning. Rather a tomboy, always running around barefoot, forgetting to comb my hair.
Anyway, you asked what I meant by Meg thinking I should see a therapist. Clearly I have alarmed you horribly! (I jest, Jim. From what little I know about you from our emails these past few weeks, I have very much taken the impression that you are an open-minded man, unshakable, to an extent – am I right?!) Well, here it is, the truth about me, or should that be: THE TRUTH ABOUT ME …?! You
have been very honest with me about your problems with drink and marijuana, you have used the language of a man who accepts what he is and can put a name to it. So I suppose it is only fair for me to do the same.
I am a hoarder, Jim. I only use this word as using any other word might be misleading. I could say that I am a COLLECTOR, maybe. Or a MAGPIE. I could, perhaps, describe myself as a person who does not like to throw things away. But none of these would be at all sufficient. Because I can only assume that once a social worker has been to your home to assess it in terms of health-and-safety considerations (not for me, you understand, but for my next-door neighbours, the shame, the shame!!) and referred to you over and over again as being a person having a Hoarding Disorder, then really, you just have to hold up your hands, sigh, and say, well, OK. You got me. So. Yes. I am. But remember, Jim, that just as alcoholism carries myriad implications, so the Hoarding Disorder covers a trillion different variations on a theme. I am not dirty. And nor is my house. I just have too many things. Almost to the extent that there is no room for dirt. Ha, ha!
I have heard about people who hoard rubbish. Their own actual litter and filth. That disgusts me. And people who hoard animals. Now that is particularly awful as obviously there is suffering involved. Those poor animals. Me, I just buy too many things. I also like to keep what I call souvenirs, of moments from my life, objects that I can pick up and look at and remember something that may have been forgotten to me otherwise. The human memory is such a cruel, frustrating thing, the way it just discards things without asking permission, precious things. At least here, in my house, I have control over my memories.
Of course, nobody understands. When I say that Meg and I argue,
this is what we nearly always argue about. She thinks it is a matter of TIDYING UP. Of having a CLEAR-OUT. She has absolutely no idea … and she, I fear, has gone too far the other way. I would call her a neat freak. She is mad about cleanliness and order and minimalism. And she has four children! It confounds me! So I have asked her not to come to my house any more. In fact, since we’re being so frank, you may as well know that no one has been to my house. Not since the funeral. Something happened at that funeral. It was the most appalling day. I’ll tell you about it another time. Let’s keep this bite-sized for now!! But I made a decision that day that I needed to batten down the hatches and be on my own. Don’t misinterpret that though, Jim. I am still quite social. In the shops I visit I am a loyal, beloved customer. I wave and say hello to friends and neighbours. I take phone calls and send emails and accept invitations (within reason!!). But here, in my home, I am best left alone. I am happy.
Well, this has been a long one. But I suppose it was quite a BIG one.
Much love to you, lovely Jim, please write soon. I am finding your emails to be absolutely the brightest stars in my day.
L xxxxx
Molly and Meg sat in silence in the fridge-like cool of the people carrier, absorbing the facts that had just been gently ladled over them by a lady called Stella Richards with a sweet-toned voice in a wood-panelled office in the County Offices in St Georges Road.
Lorelei had died of undiagnosed and untreated tuberculosis, brought about by severe malnutrition. She had weighed six stone eight pounds at the time of her death, had lost all but five of her teeth and had been brought in mainly bald. The contents of her stomach had been hard to identify as they had been more than a week old. But it appeared that her last ‘meal’ had been a rice cake and a mouthful or two of orange juice. They had also found a small cancerous tumour inside her lung cavity, but this was not being recorded as related to her cause of death.
There was more, but Meg had stopped listening at the realisation that her mother had starved herself and then died a terrible, painful, protracted death, in her car, on the lay-by of an A-road twenty minutes from the village, all alone. While Meg sat in her comfortable home, surrounded by her hearty (and in one particular case, worryingly overweight) children, watching
The Great British Bake Off
and drinking nice wine.
‘Shit,’ said Molly.
‘Mmm,’ said Meg. She wanted a shower now. A really long one, with scalding water, one that left her pink and raw.
‘That was totally the saddest, worst thing I’ve ever heard.’
Meg glanced at her daughter, covered her hand with hers. ‘I’m really sorry,’ she said. ‘Really sorry. Christ, if that doesn’t constitute “inappropriate for a teenage girl” then it doesn’t bear thinking about what else they’re dealing with in that place.’
‘It’s fine,’ said Molly. ‘I’m glad …’ She paused, then squeezed Meg’s hand. ‘I’m glad you didn’t have to listen to all that by yourself.’
‘Bloody woman!’ said Meg, suddenly filled with the old sense of exasperation and impotent fury she’d been filled with for most of her life. She bashed the steering wheel with the heel of her hand. ‘Bloody ridiculous, stupid, awful woman!
A rice cake
. A fucking
rice cake
! Like an anorexic teenager, for Christ’s sake. Aagh!’ She took her hand from Molly’s and slammed them both down hard against the steering wheel. She shouted out again and then exhaled, calmed herself. ‘Sorry, darling,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry. I’m just so cross about all this. So cross. She never had a clue, never had any idea how to care for people. Including herself. She knew how to love them, but never to care for them. And if she’d had a shred of normal, decent – God, I don’t know – humanity, she would not have left me with all this. All her disgusting filth and shit and mess! It’s all just so, so,
lurid
. My whole revolting family. Just one disgusting lurid thing after another.’ She brought herself to a sudden halt. Too much. Way too much.
Molly looked at her. ‘You OK, Mum?’ she said.
Meg exhaled again, forced a smile. ‘Yes,’ she said, running her hand down the side of Molly’s cheek. ‘Yes. I’m just …’ She sighed. ‘I’m just dealing with a toxic family. I’ve managed to keep them away for all these years, and now they’re all drifting back and I know it has to happen but, still, it’s a lot to take on board.’
And as she said these words her phone rang. Once again, the number was unknown. She took the call on her hands-free.
‘Yes?’ she replied cautiously.
‘Meggy?’
She sighed. ‘Dad?’
‘Hello, my darling. I’m just calling to say that I’m on my way. From the airport. I’ll be there in an hour. Shall I meet you at the house?’
Meg breathed in deeply. ‘Are you alone?’ she said.
‘Yes, yes, of course.’
‘Good,’ said Meg, her mouth set hard. ‘Come to our hotel. I’ll meet you in reception.’
‘Good. Excellent. And darling, how are—?’
But Meg hung up, before her father could finish his question.
He had not been to the airport for months. He had not left his neighbourhood for months. It was strange to be back amongst the hubbub of normal people. Odd to see children and families and teenage groups, people who had not set foot inside a brothel or a girlie bar, people who were not in Thailand to get high or to have sex with anyone. They looked so fresh, these other people, bizarrely, unnaturally so. Rory glanced down at his own self: sweaty polo shirt, baggy shorts, sun-bleached flip-flops, gold link bracelet, skin tanned to the colour of roast beef, more tattoos now – new ones on his shins and his calves, around his wrists and his throat. He ran his fingers through his hair: collar-length, burned blond, not related in any recognisable way to fashion. There was no fashion where Rory lived. He just wore what Owen wore. He’d subconsciously started to dress the same as Owen over
the years: polo shirt with the collar up, gold jewellery, shades on top of his head, beads around his neck, trainers, flip-flops, combat shorts. He could be anyone from anywhere; he could be American, Australian, South African. It was just easier.