Swallowing Grandma (34 page)

No bloody wonder, I nearly said.

‘So I got fed up with it and took matters into my own hands. I posted on a Web site that tries to match up people who’ve lost each other, adoptees mainly. Not that Friends Reunited, this one’s called Lookup. The day after my posting appeared, three people emailed and told me there was only one person called Pollyanna Millar registered in England; two of the emails included your address and phone number.’

‘Why? Why would complete strangers send you that sort of information? I don’t believe you.’

He shrugged. ‘Try it for yourself. They’re Internet fiends with nothing better to do, maybe. One of them said she was a private detective, and for a small fee she’d gather information on you, or facilitate a meeting. I didn’t reply to any of them. But what would you have done, this phone number sitting in front of you, begging you to ring it? I came and had a look at the house before I met you, you know.’

‘Freak.’

‘I wanted to take my time. Get it right. Ironically.’

We’d drawn level with the Methodists’ when a voice called out: ‘Ooh, hello again.’ It was old Janey Marshall, carrying bunches of flowers into the Methodist church. ‘You two still doing your, what is it, research?’ She gave a huge, ugly wink.

‘We’ve finished all that,’ said Callum. ‘Thanks for asking. Now we’re just going off for a shag. See you around.’

Janey’s face froze.

‘Let’s hope the old cow has a stroke or something,’ he said loudly, quickening his pace. ‘Can’t you walk a hundred yards in this God-forsaken place without someone poking their nose into your business?’

I was stunned. ‘What the hell was that in aid of? Jesus, Callum. I have to live here, you know.’

‘I thought you were going to Oxford. Or didn’t you get in?’

‘Yes I bloody did, actually. I’m going on Sunday. Poll says it’s fine and she’ll look after herself.’

‘Well, then. Bye bye, Bank Top.’

‘It’s still my home. God, the terms only last eight weeks. I’ll be back in no time.’

‘Eight weeks and the Methodists’ll have forgotten all about it,’ said Callum, thrusting his hands into his pockets. ‘It’ll all get lost in the excitement of knitting toilet-roll covers for the Christmas Fair. Stop getting so agitated. There’s more to life than Bank bloody Top, Kat.’

I was so furious I had to stop myself speaking for a minute, in case I said something I regretted. I wanted to ask him so much stuff, get it straight in my mind, before I told him to disappear forever. I didn’t want to start the row too early.

We made it to the wrought-iron gates before I really turned on him.

‘Go on, then, explain; why the story about being my cousin? Why didn’t you tell the truth from the start?’

‘Because you’d have hated me. If I’d burst in on the scene and announced your dad had kept a mistress that you knew nothing about, you’d have been livid.’

‘I’d have been shocked. But I’d have come round. I had a right to know.’

Callum shook his head and carried on up the gravel path. ‘Well, you know now. I’m
sorry
, OK? It was my chance to find out something about my dad. If you’d flown into a rage and said you’d never wanted to see me again because of who I was, I’d have learned nothing. I’d have blown my one opportunity. I had a right as well.’

‘You should have asked your mother.’

‘I did, last week. We’ve been talking about it. I told her about coming here and meeting you, and she was pretty gutted. She threw a cup at me. But when she’d calmed down, she told me a load of stuff. It’s been great, we’ve got really close.’

‘Bully for you.’

‘Yeah, all right, all right. Anyway, back then, all she’d tell me was that Dad had died in a car accident and that he was already with someone. And there was a baby.’

‘So when you found me, back in July, did you already know about my mum running off?’

He stopped under a yew tree, screwing up his eyes against the sun. ‘Yeah. It was in a letter I found, how she went when you were less than a year old. Of course, I didn’t know whether she might have come back in the meantime. But I thought, if you did suddenly whip a mother out of the hat, I’d say I’d got confused and that it was Miller I was searching for. Something like that. I’ve usually got an idea up my sleeve.’

‘You shit,’ I said. ‘I don’t even know whether you’re telling me the truth now.’

‘I am.’

‘And what was this letter? Was it your mum’s? Who was it from?’

‘Your paternal granddad. Vince.’

‘Fuck.’ I walked away from him a few yards, then came back. ‘And
why
was he writing to your mum?’

Callum kicked at the gravel with his shoe. ‘Because he was giving us money. He gave some to your mum too. I think he felt responsible; Mum says he was one of those people who likes to go round trying to put things right. After he left your grandma, he traced Mum through the university, and came all the way over to Sheffield to look after her. She let him stay for a while, because she’d been so ill. Then, after about six months, he left us. God knows where he went after that. But he always sent money, every month. We wouldn’t have managed otherwise.’

‘Where did he get all this money from?’ I thought of how Poll had struggled for cash all these years.

‘Dunno. It’s stopped now, though. We haven’t had anything from him since I was about nine, ten, Mum says. He just disappeared. He might even be dead, I suppose.’

I found myself scanning the sky, but all there was in the air was my cold breath. ‘You are such a huge fucking liar.’

‘I’m telling you the truth now.’

‘So that makes it all right?’

I stalked off round the back of the chapel to the war memorial and sat on the icy stone steps. Who could you trust, really? If I’d had a gun, I swear I’d have shot him as he came, now, round the corner; blasted a big hole in that stupid greatcoat of his. I’d have stood over him as he died, and laughed.

‘How many more times can I say it?’ he called. ‘I’m sorry.’

Don’t you dare sit next to me, I thought. He must have picked up the vibes, because he leant against the chapel wall a few feet away and stared at his boots.

‘Did she ever get married, your mum, like you said?’

‘No. I think our dad spoilt her for another man.’

Your mother and mine. ‘You don’t especially look like him, you know.’

‘Neither do you.’

‘It was a mean trick to play with the photo, letting me think it was Elizabeth. That was really low.’

Callum spread his hands. ‘You said it was the only picture you had. I couldn’t take that away from you. I couldn’t destroy your illusion like that.’

‘God.’ I struck the stone column with my fist. ‘You’ve an answer for everything. Why does everyone think I need protecting all the bloody time?’

He said nothing, and the white skin on my hand flushed and welled into tiny beads of blood. Below us, Harrop stretched away into moorland and sky. I can leave all this behind, I was thinking. Two days.

‘Listen,’ he said, coming closer, his voice gentler, ‘there’s another reason I came back to see you. As well as to tell you the truth.’

‘What?’

‘You know, in the club, right, when we, when I—’

‘Oh no, don’t start that again. You’re either a liar or a pervert, one of the two. I don’t want anything to do with it.’

‘I wasn’t lying about the kiss. You need to know. You’re lovely, you’re like Blanche Ingram.’

‘
Blanche Ingram
?’ I almost sniggered. ‘She was a scheming cow, wasn’t she?’

‘No, not that way.’ There was a sort of smile on his lips that made me angry and warm at the same time. ‘Looks-wise. Tall, curvy, strong. You glow.’

‘Fuck off.’

‘You do. All right, never mind that. I’m not about to leap on you, I’ve got a new girlfriend, actually. So you’re not in any danger. But I hate the way you think you’re ugly when you’re not. If I wasn’t your brother—’

‘Which you are.’

‘I know. Didn’t you feel like you were in tune with me, though? That there was a sort of pull between us?’

‘No.’ I stood up. ‘Have you any more revelations for today, or have we finished?’

‘Kat.’ He took my fingers in his. ‘Jesus, you’re like ice. Look, I wanted to say, nothing funny, but you’re my sister, I don’t want to walk away from that. Now I’ve found you.’

‘People walk away from their families every day,’ I said, withdrawing my hands and putting them behind my back.

‘Yeah, but it doesn’t make them not exist. They’re still there. You might as well close your eyes and expect to go invisible.’

‘I don’t know. I need time to think.’

‘Kat.’ He went to put his arms round me.

‘Get off. I told you, I need time. I need to stop hating you.’

He looked miserable at that. Good, I thought. I bet you assumed you could talk me round with a bit of charm and flattery. Well, you were wrong.

‘I’ve got your number,’ I said. ‘I’ll be busy for the next eight or nine weeks, but I’ll give you a call before Christmas.’

‘That long?’

‘That long. But I will call. Promise.’

He walked me to the gate and tried again to hug me, but I ducked away.

‘I turn right here,’ I said. ‘You’re going left, for the station.’

‘OK,’ he said. ‘Fair enough. One last thing, though. If you hate me anyway, I might as well say. My mum reckons your mum was mentally ill. I mean, really bonkers. Sectioned at one point. So, if you ever do find her, if she ever does come out of the woodwork, watch yourself. Go steady. Be careful you don’t end up looking after her instead of after your grandma.’

I watched his tall grey figure walk away till it was out of sight.

*

This time I was going to get it right.

So in the end, my policy of cowardice and inaction paid off. Oxford has turned out to be brilliant, because everyone here’s a bit weird so I don’t stand out. They all call me Kat, at any rate.

This is where I’m up to now: six weeks into term and I’m technically in college but spending most of my time round at the flat Mum rents in Summertown. She moved in two weeks ago, after she’d worked out her notice at the library. When she finds a job, she’ll put her Bolton house on the market and buy a place here. Then I can move in. That’s what we’ve said, anyway.

She’s easy enough to live with. We have our own kitchen cupboards, and I’ve accepted the fact she doesn’t eat just like she’s accepted the fact that sometimes, after a meal, I lock the bathroom door and play the radio loudly. But even that’s not happening as often as it used to. Food’s not the same in her house, somehow.

One day I saw her standing in silhouette by the window and she was so slim it took my breath away. ‘Why don’t I look more like you?’ I couldn’t help saying. She laughed. ‘That’s a fallacy, children always looking like their parents. Children aren’t clones, they look like themselves because they’re new individuals. You wouldn’t want to be me, I promise you.’

I’m still finding out about her. Once, as she was unpacking, she showed me a ring box containing a dried-up old conker, like a little brown brain. ‘Your dad gave me that,’ she said. Last of the big spenders, I thought, but I didn’t say so. It obviously meant a lot.

Another time I was looking through her box of Everyman novels and I found a folder full of hole-punched sheets and dividers to mark off the years. I flicked through the pages and they were just lists of books. I wondered why she’d kept them, then I began to recognize some of the titles. Turning to the most recent, I could see they were the ones I’d taken out from Bank Top Library. She’d catalogued every single book I’d ever borrowed.

Other surprises we keep hidden. She’s never mentioned Callum, except once to say she was sorry I’d fallen out with my boyfriend. I didn’t reply and the conversation went no further. One thing about my mum, she certainly gives you your space.

Although I don’t call her Mum. I call her Ann. If anyone asks, I say she’s my friend. I don’t encourage a lot of questions because I’m frightened of tying myself in knots. I certainly haven’t told anyone she’s my mother, because I’m not sure she really is. Oh, I don’t doubt she gave birth to me, but it’s not the same thing.

So far I’ve had postcards from Becks (
I went to a club last night!!!
), from Donna (
Saw this and thought of you
– picture of Clever Cat from Letterland –
keep rolling the tubes
), and from Maggie (
We are all free from colds here but dickie has put a nail through his foot hope you are wearing your winter coat
). Nothing from Poll, but she does have difficulty writing. I’m not too worried, I’ll see her at Christmas and we’ll make up. I’ve not heard anything from Callum either. Perhaps I’ll ring him when I get back, perhaps I won’t. Perhaps I’ll invite him on a Trisha show, ‘I Temporarily Fell for my Lying Love-rat Brother’. Christmas is also when we’re planning to tell Miss Dragon; Dinah, I’m going to have to start calling her.

Maybe we could all get round the table and pull crackers together.

There are parts of my dad’s story, and therefore mine, that only I know; parts that only Poll knows, parts that only Vince would know, parts that only Ann and Jude know. Only all of us together would stand a chance of seeing the whole picture, and maybe not even then. I know that every time I leave the flat, Ann turns my photograph of Dad to the wall, but there’s no way I’m going to take it down for her.

One thing I’ve learned in my short life is that no bugger’s who you think they are. That’s OK, though; you just have to keep on your toes.

CHRISTMAS POSTSCRIPT

I had vaguely meant to go and see Poll back before the end of term, but there hadn’t been time. They work you really hard at Oxford. I like that.

Ann had a job interview so I travelled on my own. I managed the changes and everything, and no one stole my luggage or pulled the communication cord or showed me their penis. I got off at Bank Top and hauled my bags up the Brow to Poll’s.

Oddly, there was no one in and, by the looks of the post on the doormat, there’d been no one for a day or two, at least. And yet I’d written to say when I was coming home. Where was everyone? I used my key and went through to the living room. There were two free papers and a slip from the window cleaner on the table, but everywhere else looked unnaturally tidy. Most of the ornaments and pictures were gone. The kitchen had been cleared out, though not cleaned, and when I went upstairs to use the toilet, all the soaps and bottle had disappeared off the windowsill. My room was more or less as I’d left it, but Poll’s bed was stripped and her quilted dressing gown absent from behind the door. The place
smelt
empty.