The Shock of the Fall (Special edition) (9 page)

In the right light, you can still make out the shadows of Pokémon characters beneath the paint.

Simon’s bedroom became a guest room.

It happened over one weekend. ‘We should have done this a long time ago,’ Dad said.

He was on the stepladder pushing the paint roller. I was working in the corners with a small brush, and Mum was on the landing sorting out piles for Charity Shop and Throw Away. Dad placed the roller down. ‘What I mean is—’

‘I know what you mean, Dad.’

He was right too. If we’d done it straight away it would have absorbed into the bigger sadness, part of the goodbye. But to hesitate – to wait – it’s impossible to know how long to wait. Is a year enough? That becomes two, then three – until half a decade has slipped away, and the elephant in the room is the room itself.

As it happens, I was the one who made the suggestion. This was the Saturday before my granddad was due his second knee operation. With knees they tend to do them one at a time. He’d had the first six months earlier and it had gone okay, but it was hard on Nanny Noo. He was in a wheelchair, then on crutches, and she had to do a lot of lifting and moving him about. Mum and Dad were talking about this over breakfast, about how stubborn she can be, and how much persuading it had taken for her to agree he could stay with us next time. They started laughing about how relieved Granddad had looked when she finally relented. Then I suddenly came out with it, ‘Do you think we should redecorate the bedroom for him?’

We shoved heaped spoonfuls of cornflakes into our mouths, and nobody said anything for a bit. We just chewed it over. Mum was the first to swallow. She said, ‘Let’s do it today.’

In my memory milk squirts out of Dad’s nose. But probably it didn’t. Memory plays tricks over time. He was shocked though. ‘Really, love? I’m sure your dad won’t mind if—’

‘Let’s make it nice for him, okay?’

It’s like pulling off a plaster.

No.

It’s not like that. It’s a far bigger deal. It’s only like pulling off a plaster in that once we decided to do it, we did it quickly. I’m not giving lessons in how to grieve. I’m only saying what we did. Dad took measurements of the room with his tape measure, and by early afternoon we were traipsing around B&Q, Allied Carpets, and IKEA.

‘Can you bring through more newspaper?’ Dad called from the top of the ladder. Mum didn’t answer.

‘Are you okay, Mum?’ She didn’t answer me either.

She’d been doing well. In B&Q she’d outright flirted with an assistant for a discount on the rollers, even though they were clearly separate from the Big Sale bucket.

‘I’ll go,’ Dad mouthed to me. He wiped his hands on a paper towel and climbed down the ladder. I stayed in the bedroom, listening.

‘Can we change the colour, Richard?’

‘You liked it.’

‘I know. And I do. Can we?’

I could hear them hugging, a kiss planted on a cheek. ‘If we leave now, we’ll get there before it closes.’

As they pulled out of the driveway Dad wound down his window, waving and holding his thumb in the air. I took a deep breath, smelling the wet paint. Then I smeared a section with my fingertips and let it dry against my skin. I’m hopeless at naming colours, but it was something like terracotta. It was rich and warm, and all at once I understood they would come back with white or magnolia or one of those colours you see in waiting rooms and offices, but don’t really notice.

When we decorate a room, we’re wiping away its old personality and giving it a new one. Mum could lose the Pokémon wallpaper and curtains, the aeroplanes on strings. But she didn’t want a room people commented on; she didn’t want paint with personality. That’s what I think, anyway. And it might sound mad, but my mum is mad. We have more in common than we care to admit.

We got rid of my brother’s belongings. Even the N64 went to a charity shop, along with three black bin liners full of his clothes. This was Sunday and the shop was closed, so we did what the sign said, and left them in the doorway. That felt strange but we didn’t need a ceremony – it was what it was; stuff no longer needed.

Of course his keepsake box stayed. That goes without saying. When everything else was finished, Dad placed it carefully inside the new IKEA wardrobe, and we were done.

I suppose it should have been obvious that after a knee operation my granddad would need a bed downstairs.

Perhaps it was obvious. He stayed with us until he was out of the wheelchair, and all the while he slept on a fold-out in the lounge. As far as I know he never once made it upstairs. He didn’t even see the new guest bedroom. Or its magnolia walls.

It was the way our shadows were cast. The sun was low in the sky behind us, and as I pedalled, my mum kept pace, running three or four steps behind me, shouting encouragement: You’re doing it, sweetheart. You’re doing it. Looking at the ground, I watched her shadow, watched it slowly recede so that my front wheel was criss-crossing her knees, then torso, then head, and I was pulling away. I really was on my own.

‘I’m ready, I can do it.’

‘Pardon? I can’t hear you.’ Mum was calling through my bedroom door. ‘Now please. You need to get ready.’

I pushed my face against my mattress, nudging at a spring with my jaw. ‘What time is it?’

‘It’s nearly midday. We need to get going or you’ll miss it.’

I took a deep breath. My sheets smelled sweaty and stale. ‘I’m not going,’ I said.

‘Of course you’re going.’

‘They’ll post them.’

‘I can’t hear you. Can I come in?’

‘I said, they’ll post them.’

As she opened my door, she gave it a little tap. Then came the sigh, and the smallest shake of her head.

‘What? Say it.’

‘You’re not even up,’ she said.

‘I’m tired.’

‘I thought—’

‘I never said I was going.’

In a single movement she picked up clothes from my floor, dropping them into my laundry bin. She stood for a while, looking around the room, noticing the small pipe and bag of that Bloody Stuff on my bedside table, pretending not to notice, and then quickly turning to open my curtains.

‘Matthew. What on earth?’

My curtains were no good because the light would creep under the folds, so I’d flattened out empty cereal boxes and taped them over the glass. ‘Oh for— what next?’

‘Leave it! I need it there. It’s too bright.’

‘It’s meant to be bright, it’s called daytime. It’s like a cave in here.’

‘I mean it. Leave it.’

She stared at the cardboard, her hand still raised to take it down. Then she closed the curtains again. Turning to face me, planting her hands on her hips, ‘If you’re out of your deodorant, you know you can just put it on the list don’t you? I can’t keep track of what everyone needs all the time. It’s what the list is for.’

‘What are you talking about? Who said anything about—’

‘It’s just a bit stuffy in here. And I don’t mind getting you Lynx or whichever it is you want, but you need to put it on the list because—’

‘Jesus. I didn’t ask you to come in.’

‘No. But what if a friend came around?’

‘Like who?’

‘Like, like anyone. Like Jacob. It’s not the point. Now please, for me. Please Matt. Even if you don’t care how you’ve done, I still do.’

In life there are milestones. Events that mark out certain days as being special from the other days.

They begin before we’re old enough to know about them, like the day we uttered our first proper word, and the day we took our first steps. We made it through the night without a nappy. We learnt other people have feelings, and the stabilizers came off our bikes.

If we’re lucky – and I am, I do know that – we get help along the way. Nobody swam my first width of the pool for me, but Dad drove me back and forth to swimming classes, even though he’d never learnt to swim himself, and when I got awarded my Tony the Tiger Five Metres badge, it was Mum who carefully sewed it onto my swimming trunks. So I reckon a lot of my early milestones were their milestones too.

Mum’s hands slipped from her hips, then she folded her arms across her chest, then back to her hips.

She was nervous – that was it.

‘Even if you don’t care how you’ve done, I still do.’

She’d woken up first thing with my dad and driven him to work. In the car they’d listened to the radio. I can’t know this. I’m guessing. It’s what you might call an educated guess. On the local news a roaming reporter had based himself at one of the high schools. They didn’t catch which one, but maybe mine. The reporter talked about how average GCSE grades were up for the millionth year in a row; he talked about how boys were closing the gap on girls; he talked about a slight increase in home education, and Mum felt her tummy do a somersault. Then he took his regional accent to meet a group of squealing girls – prising one away for the obligatory interview. Um, four A stars, 3 As and two Bs, the girl says, breathless with excitement. Oh, and a C in Maths, she giggles. I hate Maths.

Getting out of the car, Dad paused. ‘He’s a smart lad. He’ll have done okay.’

Mum answered quietly. ‘Yes. I know.’

I’m guessing. It’s an educated guess.

Sitting in slow traffic, in slight drizzle – enough to use the windscreen wipers, but not enough to stop them squeaking – Mum would have allowed herself the small luxury of imagining the perfect morning.

In this morning, this perfect morning, she’d get home and I’d be out of bed already – waiting for her in the kitchen. I’ve made myself some toast but hardly taken a bite. I’m too nervous. ‘Do you mind driving me Mum? It’s just— I want you to be there.’

‘Of course,’ she smiles. She sits beside me at the table, stealing a cheeky bite of toast. ‘Now listen,’ she says.

Now listen.

Listen.

Listen.

Sitting in traffic, she rehearsed.

Her voice would be perfect. A soothing voice – tender and reassuring. Not her scratchy, knotted voice. Not the exasperated I’ll-count-to-ten-and-start-again voice, the voice I’d started mimicking to send her over the edge.

‘Now listen. You have nothing to be nervous about. You worked so hard. You tried your best. And really, Matt. That’s all that matters.’

Then the doubts appeared. Or they were there all along, but now she noticed them. Like specks of rain on the windscreen. The way you can look right through them at first, focus into the distance, as if they’re not even there, but as soon as you see them, you can’t stop seeing them. For this perfect morning, there would have needed to be other perfect mornings: a string of days before this, where I actually had worked hard, when I had tried my best.

And by now – I’m guessing, I’m only guessing – the car in front had long since pulled away, and the driver behind beeped his horn. Mum panicked and stalled the engine.

By the time she got home, she had already worked herself into a state – was already weighing up the decision to wake me and drive me in, or take a yellow pill and head back to bed herself.

‘I’m not going,’ I said again. The bed spring twanged against my jaw. ‘You don’t have to collect them. It says in the letter. If you don’t show up they post them.’

‘But— It doesn’t make sense. Please. I’ll drive you.’

‘No. I’m not going.’

Mum had her own theories. They filled the dark space at the foot of my bed.

‘Do you want to hurt me?’ she asked.

I rolled over, end of the conversation.

I didn’t hear her leave.

I lifted from my saddle, pushing harder on the pedals. Pulling at the handlebars. It was there in the distance. Far in the distance, but getting closer with each turn of the wheels.

It erupted from the ground and reached high into the sky – glass and bricks and concrete.

I watched my front wheel, watched it criss-cross her knees, her torso, her head. I was pulling away.

I’m doing it. I’m really doing it.

You know what dreams are like.

Only fifteen minutes today, then puncture time. I have a few compliance problems with tablets, the answer – a long, sharp needle.

Every other week, alternate sides.

I’d rather not think about it now. It’s best not to think until the injection is actually going in.

Fuck this.

I’m going home.

I didn’t tell you where I live yet.

It probably doesn’t matter, but I’ll tell you now, because then you can have some pictures in your mind as you read. Reading is a bit like hallucinating.

Hallucinate this:

An ash grey sky over a block of council flats, painted jaundice yellow. I’ll buzz you up. It’s the sixth floor, No. 607. Come in. The narrow, dim-lit hall is cluttered with pairs of old trainers, empty Coke and Dr Pepper bottles, takeaway menus, and free newspapers.

To your left is the kitchen, sorry about the mess. The kettle’s billowing steam onto the peeling lime green wallpaper. There is an ashtray by the window, and if you open those blinds you can spy on half of Bristol.

It can spy on you too.

The toilet’s just across the hall but the bolt doesn’t slide properly, so you’ll need to prop it closed with a doorstop. On the ceiling is the carcass of a spider, tangled in its own web. My razor blade is getting blunt, and I’m out of toothpaste.

I have a small bedroom with a single mattress on the floor, and a Hungarian Goose Down Pillow bought from John Lewis for nearly fifty pounds. The room smells of broken sleep and marijuana, and well into the night you can hear my neighbours bickering above your head.

In the main room a couple of rugs cover a worn-through carpet. I spend most of my time in here and do try to keep it tidy, but it’s small so feels cluttered whatever. I do not have a television or a radio. On the small wooden table beside the window is a book called Living with Voices, and a few loose stacks of my writing and sketches.

In the far corner, and stretching across the back wall behind the armchair and curtains, is the tangled mass of sprawling plastic tubing and dirt-encrusted bottles and jars, that make up what has survived of my Special Project.