Mo said she was quirky (22 page)

She had to empty the machine, once she had she could spin-dry the handwash. Thank goodness for microwaves. Or the pizza.

How long had she even been sitting? She opened the washing machine door.

Lost in her own wee world. Where was her head! Doolally, the old Glasgow one, Mrs Doolally, that was her, so absent-minded, in her mind and on her mind. All the time.

She hung the machine wash on the two clothes-horses by the radiator. It was still dry outside. Her mother would have
hung out the clothes. Helen didnt. The shifts she worked made it more trouble than it was worth. Then if it looked like rain you had to bring them all in again. The truth is she preferred the clothes-horses.

Sophie was over by the little chair Mo found someplace. It was a proper child’s chair like you saw on antique programmes. Of course Sophie didnt sit on it. But she did play with it. She had her dolls lined on the floor next to it, and ponies, she liked ponies, and she was talking in character, pushing them and the dolls about. She spoke in a wee shrill voice, but with a snobby English tone to it like on television, and addressed herself: Oh naow Sopheee you ovah theyah, Ell shell gao heah. And then answering in her own voice yet with a nasal American edge to it. Oh nohh Lindy, I dont waaant to. Oh boat yoh hev toh Sophee. Oh but I dont waaant to.

Helen stooped to lift a damp sock from the floor, it must have fallen when she removed the clothes from the washing machine.

The girl was used to being on her own. Perhaps she would become an actress. She
was
good at voices. As long as nobody watched. Then she stopped. It was best not to notice. She was just so
natural
. It was such a positive thing about her. She had a strength too. Even she could be tough. Like her Mum! Helen
had
been tough. She had. Tougher than Brian. She just
became
weak. She wasnt always. Far from it. Far from it indeed. Oh God.

But it was true. She didnt used to be weak. A tough little madam more like. Oh well, damn phone, it had been out of action the past eight days. What was he talking about fixing it? it didnt need fixing, it couldnt be fixed. She needed a new one. She would when she could, and get it herself. He knew somebody who got deals. He knew somebody who knew somebody who knew somebody. It was a running joke, him and his mates.
People always like
knew
somebody. The same in Glasgow. Her ex too, he was as bad. Helen wasnt keen on illegal stuff, if it went against the law like with DVDs and other rip-off things. Then if they didnt work properly, you couldnt even see the film. She hated that. Why bother? Then if you got caught, my God. Even if you didnt. If it was a rip-off thing and somebody had stolen it and you were to buy it cheap so then it was in your house, it was just there, and what if somebody came to the door? it was complete agony. Helen hated it, she just really – it was difficult to cope with, she found it so anyway; other people were different, and that was good, it was just how you were brought up. In her family everything was above board; that was Dad, the law was the law and if you had to put up with something you just did it and got on with your life.

But she needed her phone. All women did. The same at the casino, you saw it for the smokers. It was policy that staff had to use the lane round the rear of the building and not be seen by the entrance. It was understandable because this part of the city in the wee small hours, what did people think? If it was a female standing smoking with the clothes she wore. A phone was vital. People went in twos and threes.

But she needed it now and not the end of the month. A ‘deal’ was the last thing. She was hopeless at ‘deals’. Her face gave it away, like if she was guilty, everybody knew, everybody, she was just so God silly, hopeless, in these situations. Proper name-brands is what she preferred. Okay you paid more but you knew what you were getting. Mo said they werent stolen. But if they werent, what were they? If they were so cheap, they had to be
something
. According to him they were made in the same country, even like the same factory, by the same people, only they stuck on different labels.

There was a hypocrisy there too that Helen didnt like. She
didnt understand it either. If it was south Asia and women workers, children too. Mo and other people gave money every week like charity, alms for people, it was good, it really was but then the next thing if it was rip-off deals, what about that? And if it was like young children involved as workers my God their wee fingers holding the needles, how did they manage it? these slave-owners, fourteen hours a day. It was heartbreaking and horrible and just slavery. Britain was so selfish, so so selfish, people didnt even care.

And they could change things if they wanted. Although could they? What if it was hospitals? What could be changed there? We dont know people’s lives and assume everybody is okay, but what if they arent? People can be ill. If it was like Brian, what if he was ill? If that was why he was on the street. He was so wild-looking my God. What if he
was
ill? like disturbed, in the head – if he didnt know where he was, if he thought he was home and he wasnt. If he thought he was in Glasgow and he wasnt, if he just woke up and there he was in London, and didnt know how he got here.

People suffer memory loss. If he didnt know who he was. His own actual name. It was possible. So he was just wandering around. He didnt know where he was, or who he was, he was just like who am I? He didnt know. Until the guy with the limp helped him. People do help. It isnt all doom and gloom. Even ones who are down-and-out and living rough on the street, they help ones less fortunate than themselves. People have so so little and yet they share, even with strangers, if they are down-and-out and homeless. It is only rich ones who are selfish, poor people share. It is true, everybody knows it. Some say different but everybody knows the truth.

Helen didnt want to go to work. She didnt want Mo to go either. Mo had gone and so would she. She was in he was out he was out she was in. What a life but they coped, they coped,
Sophie too, Sophie most of all; thank God thank God, children survived and she was no different.

Azizah came at seven fifteen and had to be on time. Helen needed that hour and a half to get into the city; by train and tube, if the connection worked it was fine but if it didnt it wasnt. Taxis were out of the question except when three or four shared. Mo couldnt believe how much went on taxis but what choice was there? He never took a taxi anywhere. Either he walked or jumped a bus. So would she if she could, if she could she would, of course she would, only she couldnt.

The last childminder quit without proper notice. Helen found such behaviour difficult, even like bizarre it was so irresponsible. It wasnt so much being forced to miss a shift but the idea that your little girl had been left in the care of somebody like that. ‘Care’ was the wrong word. They were lucky with Azizah. She did the five nights and didnt mind if there was a sixth, and usually there was. She brought a backpack full of textbooks. She was going to be a lawyer. Mo knew her father from Mosque. She had a sister but no brother. Sophie liked her. Only she didnt look forward to her coming because it meant Helen was going to work. Somebody came and somebody went. Sophie came home from school and Mo left for the restaurant. Azizah arrived, and Mummy went to work. Mummy came home from work and Sophie went to school.

Once Sophie was in bed Azizah got on with her studies. That was the theory, but when did Sophie get to bed? Nine o’clock should have been the cut-off point but was it? Helen was never quite convinced. Sophie was devious. All children were. They enjoyed tricking adults, especially parents. They could be tough, they knew how to wound, they could be spiteful, hypocrites too my God, they said one thing and did another. And told lies to save their own skin. If they were a species of aliens, nobody would want to know them. That was the truth.
Even like treacherous, children could be treacherous. Helen too, when she was a girl

oh God, she could only sigh. Sighing was allowed. Yes she had been hypocritical. She had been, and a liar, and a cheat and treacherous, yes. These were not endearing qualities. Children
were
guilty. Helen was a child, so she too, yes, guilty! They did mischievous things, not very nice things. Although if these were ‘traits’. Some had them and some didnt. Traits were traits and qualities were qualities. ‘Qualities’ belonged to everybody, ‘traits’ to some. Helen had traits. But that was childhood. Children do things, they dont mean it. Sell their parents for a packet of potato crisps. Sophie was as bad. When her father was there she acted up to him. It didnt matter about Mum then, Mum was forgotten! Mum was the mundane everyday and he was the wild exciting once in a blue moon, it was so unfair, really, and wounding, Sophie could
wound
. That was children, and unthinking, she didnt know she was doing it, apart from the need to hurt, and her own mother. Perhaps it was her father she meant to hurt but couldnt, so she hurt Mum. The easy option. They hurt the woman because the man, the man is the man. Helen was the same, she had been, as a child. But that was childhood and childhood was over, childhood was all finished.

There were times when Helen too felt strong, she did, almost
tough
.

Sophie’s father was a bully. Not a real bully. Although perhaps he was. Men are bullies. Nice bullies or bad bullies, but one or the other. Mo was a nice bully, her ex wasnt. Mo looked after her; her ex didnt. Not that Helen had wanted him to. Nor did she expect it from Mo. But he did, and she looked after him. It was a partnership.

Life was gambling. You went with a man you didnt know. You even went home with him. You knew nothing about him, but what he told you. Usually it was lies to snare you into their
trap. Mr Adams. But it wasnt lies with him, he just like disappeared. That was strange. She googled his name and there was nothing. She expected to see it someplace; the newspapers or television too because if he was going away, why wouldnt he have said? just disappearing, so if something had happened to him, something bad. She wanted to ask people. But who? The police. Just somebody. She didnt know. But some people would know because he was that kind of man. Ann Marie said not to be daft and to take it as a warning; like how things went on in the world it was best not to snoop and pry; people should leave things alone. But if something bad had happened.

It would not have been snooping. If she was trying to find out, that was all it was. Imagine she had. Sleuths. Of course she enjoyed detective stories, especially ones in the persona of young women and if they were Americans and not posh English so it was good-humoured and a laugh. It was only a story and they did things that were exciting, things that were dangerous and even could make you squirm because it was like everything was imaginable. Not with old women who were so self-contained and could give men ‘knowing’ looks like they knew them. Because they only knew them from the
outside
. Really it was like virginal, these older women. Because it was only
old men
they knew, from the older generations. So if they knew modern young men it was never having slept with them or like in touching contact, never, because if they hadnt slept with them how could it be? not
knowing
, they couldnt be so ‘knowing’. Not with young men. It was like nuns always saying this and that about what girls werent to do and they hadnt seen a man’s body. It was so stupid and just so presumptuous, it really was.

Old women didnt
know
young men. So they enjoyed life. They were always at ease and being witty. And young men were witty back to them, always charming and respectful. But
it was only to them, the old women, because they werent like that with young women. Oh no. Young women were not witty, they were abashed and self-conscious, and like their bodies too because what could be concealed? even as a girl growing up, it couldnt be hidden; clothes didnt allow it so men always were looking, always their eyes looking at you and like seeing through, so it did make you squirm. Men enjoyed making you squirm, and nipples too, guys making comments. That was so outrageous, so unfair too because what could the dealer do? You couldnt do anything except not react, just like pretend not to know, you didnt hear the comment, and of course you did. She didnt tell Mo. Why tell your man about that kind of thing? it only would aggravate him.

It was scandalous he was a waiter. Jobs were ghettos, like how people got trapped.

But if she had told him about Brian.

After dinner Helen had taken out the old photographs again and spread a few on top of the cupboard. She settled Sophie down with a movie and while washing the dishes, crockery and pots she kept the photographs in sight. If Brian’s health wasnt good he should have returned to Glasgow. That was almost like an obvious thing. Because Mum would have been so so pleased, she would have looked after him, and been glad to do it. Mum wasnt old but she was getting old. With Brian there, it would have been mutual, really, looking after each other. His presence alone, it would have been great for Mum. Really. And vice versa. They were close. They always had been. And Mum with the spare room; her flat was spacious, a castle in comparison to the place Helen had. Brian would have been comfortable there
and just nestled in and made it his own. Did he have friends from the old days? Who were they? Helen couldnt remember. Did boys have friends? They did but not like girls, not like in the same way. The first time in London she met William Boyle in a pub along Charlotte Street. It was so weird. She was there with another girl from her work and just like ordering a drink and there was William just standing there at the bar. He had been in her class at Primary School and Secondary School so they knew each other quite well. Helen had been so like pleased to see him. But he had changed so much. He was always a talker and so very very cheery, always just cheery, but now he wasnt, he hardly spoke at all when she met him. Helen had to carry the conversation. And he wouldnt come to their table. Why didnt he? Oh he had to go, and that was him and away he went. Whatever it was he was doing, he didnt say but it made you wonder about him and his life because it was like not being comfortable, even if he was guilty, he didnt want to be seen. But it made you wonder, so he had something to hide.