The Other Son (16 page)

Nowadays, she has told the story so many times that she’s not entirely sure it’s untrue – it almost feels real. Sometimes it’s the years in the orphanage, it’s the mafia guys and their offer of “work” in London, it’s the years in that horrific club that feel like a nightmare.

But Alice, she fears, sees through it all. It’s a woman thing, and Alice, she senses, has always been able to tell that Natalya is not quite who she says she is.

She wonders, now, how long you have to be someone new before you’re allowed to forget the past. She wonders how long you have to live a different life before it defines you, before it washes away the stains – and the sins – of who you were before.

Alice slides back in her seat, but then shuffles forwards again. Tim and Natalya’s made-to-measure sofa certainly wasn’t made to measure for her. It’s so deep that she can’t quite work out how she’s meant to sit, especially seeing as she’s wearing a skirt. If she moves back far enough to use the backrest, her little legs jut out horizontally. If she sits on the edge, on the other hand, it compresses and tilts, seemingly trying to tip her onto the floor. In the end she links her arms around her knees and manages, just, to find a stable position. But she feels silly, somehow, perched on the edge of this lorry-length sofa. She feels silly in this room, too. It’s all too big, too self-conscious, too demonstratively wealthy. It’s impersonal and cold, and, Alice can’t help but think, all a bit nouveau-riche-Russian-bride.

Tim has given them a tour of the house, and it’s all more of the same. Alice has done her best to enthuse, but it’s difficult because in truth she simply doesn’t get the point. For who could possibly need five bedrooms? Who could need three bathrooms or a stove that heats the pan magically without getting hot itself? Who would even think of buying a kitchen tap with a pull out shower head (good for washing vegetables, apparently!) or a sofa with an iPad in the armrest, or a hi-fi you can control from your telephone? Who needs any of it?

“Name a song, Mum, any song,” Tim is saying now. He wants to show off his new gadget, a Sonos music box that he claims can play any song ever recorded.

“I don’t know,” Alice says. She’s aware that the challenge is fraught with danger, though she hasn’t yet identified quite why. “How about Old Man River?”

“Old Man River?!” Tim spits, and Alice isn’t sure why it’s a bad choice any more than she understands from whence the song popped into her head.

“Come on, Mum,” Tim says. “You can do better than that.”

“I’m not sure what you want from me,” Alice tells him.

“Something rare,” Tim tells her. “Something only you’d want to hear.”

Alice licks her lips and looks up at the ceiling and tries, as the boys run repeatedly past her, to rise to the challenge. “Oh, I know,” she says, “Something by Perez Prado.”

“Perez Prado?”

“Yes,” Alice says. “The song was, um, ‘Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White’. That’s it.”

“Now we’re talking,” Tim says, tapping away at his iPhone screen.

Alice blushes at the memory of the song, at the realisation of where this one popped up from. Incredible, the way these things can lodge in the recesses of your mind. Most days, she can’t even remember to take her shopping list to the shop, but there it is: Joe’s favourite song from fifty years ago.

She glances at Ken, but he looks back at her blankly. Actually, he’s not even looking at her. He’s looking
through
her. He doesn’t know the song’s significance. All is well.

When she looks back at Tim, she sees that his face has a pained expression. “It hasn’t got it,” he says, miserably. “Maybe you got the name wrong?”

“I don’t think so,” Alice says. “But never mind. Play
any
song by him.”

“Is that P.E.R.E.Z. then P.R.A.D.O?” Tim asks.

“Yes, that’s the one!” Alice enthuses, thinking that Tim has found it.

“Sorry, but it’s never even heard of him,” Tim says.

“Maybe it’s too old,” Alice offers. “It is
very
old.”

“How about Madonna?” Ken asks. It’s his own clumsy attempt at easing the mounting tension in the room.

“Don’t be daft,” Tim says. “Of course it’s got Madonna.”

Ken sniffs and with a circumspect expression, looks down at his shoes which he taps together. He thought that was what they were trying for: something that the bloody machine
does
have.

Alice tries desperately to think of a song that might seem rare enough that it reassures Tim whilst not being
so
rare that it trips him up again. The atmosphere in the room feels like her life depends on finding that perfect song, but it’s precisely that atmosphere which is making her mind go blank.

That’s the trouble with Tim these days, she thinks. His ego is so fragile, you have to look at every word you say before you let it out of your mouth just in case you say something wrong. And Alice knows that’s one particular game she’s never been very good at. She wonders how he got to be so up-tight. It must be something to do with his relationship with Natalya, because he certainly wasn’t like that when he was little.

“How about that woman who won the TV program?” Ken asks, suddenly back-in-the-room. “That
mong
woman.’”

Tim turns to face his father with an expression of such hatred that both Alice and Natalya fear that an actual fight is going to kick off.

“The term ‘
mong
,’ Dad,” Tim says, deliberately, “hasn’t been acceptable since about nineteen twenty two. And anyway, I have no idea who you mean.”

“I don’t think it was acceptable even back then,” Alice says, her own expression pained, then, to Ken, “I can’t believe you just said that.”

“Oh come on,” Ken blusters on, unruffled and seemingly unaware. “It’s what everyone thinks. You know. The one who sang
I Dreamed A–
”

“Dad!” Tim shouts. “Just shut the fuck up.”

Ken raises his hands in submission. “Jesus,” he says. “I was only trying to help.”

“There’s no need to swear, Timothy,” Alice mutters.

“Just play something nice,” Natalya suggests. “Play the Wild Beast.”

“The Wild Beast?” Alice repeats, leaping at this escape route that Natalya has so generously offered from Tim’s Music Challenge Nightmare. “What’s The Wild Beast?”

“It’s
The Wild Beasts,
” Tim says, emphasising the S. “They’re a group Matt put me on to. And you’ll probably like it. It’s very mellow. OK. Here goes.”

The music starts to play. It is, indeed, smooth and agreeable if a little echoey in the cavernous lounge.

Ken starts to tap his hand against his knee, a visible attempt at expressing his approval even though they all know that the only music he likes is James-Last-style easy listening.

Alice opens her mouth to ask if Tim has had any news from Matt recently, but then closes it again. She’s under the impression that she is supposed to listen carefully to the music for a least a minute before she can reasonably speak again. It reminds her a little of when she was at school. Mr Withers used to put a scratched record of Tchaikovsky on the gramophone player and they had to write down what the music inspired in them. The music rarely had much effect on Alice – she’s never been a fan of classical music. But she had always enjoyed the exercise. It was a great excuse to write about anything you wanted, to say whatever was on your mind.

Alice’s shoulders are aching a little from hugging her knees so she stands and crosses to the big picture window. As she looks out at the empty pool, Boris runs to her side. “Are we going outside?” he asks.

“No,” Tim says immediately. Which is a shame, because Alice would have quite liked a short walk around the garden with Boris. “You’ve been out all morning. We’re staying in for a bit now,” he tells the boy.

Alice reaches to smooth Boris’ hair, but he flinches from her touch and returns to where Alex is lying on the rug.

She starts to ask why the pool is empty, but thinks better of it. It probably has some kind of problem. Best not to mention it.

“They must be enjoying having all this space to run around in,” she says instead, and the atmosphere in the room seems to lighten under the relief of her compliment. But then, before she has even realised what she’s saying, she has added, “They’re so hyperactive, those two. They
need
a lot of room!” And the atmosphere has noticeably darkened again.

Alice pulls a handkerchief from her sleeve and starts to rub at a smear on the window. “These must be a bugger to clean,” she says.

“Yes, we need a proper window cleaning company to do them,” Tim says. “Poor old Vladlena can’t even reach as high as you.”

“I try, too,” Natalya says. “But is hard. You think you have done it, and then the sun is moving, and it’s not so good.”

“Yes, I hate that,” Alice agrees. “Newspaper and vinegar, that’s what you want. Newspaper and vinegar.”

“Newspaper and vinegar,” Natalya repeats. “This one I must remember.”

“If you’ve got some, I’ll show you,” Alice offers.

“Mum,” Tim whines.

“What?”

“Just sit down. Just relax a bit, won’t you?”

“I just wanted to...”

“You’re not going to start cleaning the windows now, OK?”

Alice shrugs and returns to the uncomfortable sofa just as Boris and Alex start to wrestle on the rug in front of her.

“Boys, calm down,” Tim says.

Boris looks up and his little brother makes the most of the distraction by whacking him across the back of the head. The boys resume their fight.

“Alex!” Natalya shouts. “Sorry, Alice. They’re very exciting since moving houses.” She stands and pulls the two boys apart, then sits them either side of Alice on the sofa.

“Excit
ed,
” Alice corrects. “They are excit-
ed.”

“Yes. Sorry,” Natalya apologises.

Alice has always been drawn more to little Alex. Boris is something of a bruiser, a future rugby player no doubt, but with his blue eyes and David McCallum mop of hair, Alex looks like a sort of cartoon child, like one of those Japanese manga children. She tries now to put one arm around Alex, but he pushes her away and runs off.

Natalya, who sees this happen, and who notes Alice’s pain, knows that it’s because Alice always tries to kiss them on the lips – which they hate – and because they both claim that she “smells funny” which can only be because of that horrible perfume she always insists on wearing. It doesn’t suit her at all. In fact, Natalya’s not entirely sure that
Beauty Parisienne
suits anyone.

She has tried, on many occasions, to nudge Alice in a different direction perfume-wise. She has boxed and wrapped tens of bottles containing different expensive fragrances. But Alice, who is as stubborn as a mule, always goes back to
Beauty Parisienne
. Natalya suspects that she dumps her perfume gifts directly in the dustbin. She once gave her a jumbo bottle of Chanel Number Five. She hopes she didn’t bin that one, at least.

Alice, now desperate for a cuddle with
one
of the children, makes a lurch for Boris but he’s too fast for her. He, too, takes flight.

It happens, she thinks, because the boys don’t know her well enough. Natalya and Tim virtually never come and visit them these days, and invitations to visit them are even rarer occurrences. “So how long have you been here now?” Alice asks, that thought leading to this one.

“Six weeks,” Tim says. “That’s right, isn’t it, Nat?”

“Yes, nearly six.”

Mentally, Alice rests her case. She bets there aren’t many parents out there who don’t get to see their children for six weeks in a row.

Boris and Alex now reappear from the kitchen: Boris is chasing Alex with a broom making train noises.

“Boris, put that down,” Tim says.

“If he falls over with that...” Alice warns. She’s imagining him running the broom head into some piece of furniture – imagining the broom handle knocking his teeth out.

“Boris! Stop!” Natalya orders, but the boys carry on regardless. Ken raises one eyebrow and catches Alice’s eye. And Alice knows what he means, and agrees.

Tim makes to stand up, so to save him the effort and perhaps the shame of having to physically intervene, Alice grabs Boris’ arm as he runs by. When he kicks out at her shins in an attempt to break free, she instinctively slaps at his legs.

Everything stops. Even the Wild Beasts stop singing – by coincidence it’s the end of the track. Boris, looking angry, looking devilish even, turns to check out his parents’ reaction. And seeing them looking surprised, concerned, angry even, he starts to howl. He rolls to the ground and clasps his leg.

“Ha!” Ken laughs. “He’ll make a good footballer, that one. Oh, me leg, me leg!”

“Boris,” Alice says, reaching half-heartedly towards him. “I didn’t hurt you. You know I didn’t.”

“I’d sign him up for Man’ United right away if I was you,” Ken says.

Tim glances at Natalya then turns to face Alice. “You didn’t hurt him, Mum,” he admits, “But please don’t hit the children. You know we don’t do that here.”

“I didn’t
hit
him,” Alice protests. “It was just a little slap.”

“No, well, please don’t. We don’t physically abuse our children in this household. We’ve been through this before.”

Ken snorts.
“Physically abuse?”
he repeats, derisively.

“It was just a slap,” Alice says, turning to Natalya for support. “Not even a slap. A tap. That’s all it was.”

But Natalya looks as upset as Tim about it.

“Kids need a slap, sometimes,” Ken offers.

The temperature in the room seemingly drops ten degrees.

“I’m sorry?” Tim asks, sitting up straight and gripping the arms of the chair like he’s on a roller coaster about to loop the loop. “Would you like to repeat that?”

“Oh don’t start making a fuss,” Ken says. “I’m just saying what everybody thinks. That sometimes kids need a bit of discipline. Sometimes a slap is the only thing they can understand.”

Tim chews his bottom lip. “I can’t believe
you’re
saying that to
me
, though,” he says.