The Tin-Kin (10 page)

‘Was I born here?’

‘Aye, yous were aw born in the hoose, bairn,’ Granny says. She makes it sound like that’s a pity, a terrible shaness to be a tinker born indoors.

I bite my lip and turn the picture over. There’s a message on the back, written in lovely handwriting. My daddy can’t write so it must’ve been the tourist that put it there for him. I stroke a fingertip over the twirly ink.

‘Can ye read, bairnie?’ my granny asks. Granny never learnt to read or write. I can, though.

‘It says, to my . . . darling Martha from . . . your . . . ever-loving Duncan.’

My darling. Ever-loving. Those words keep going round and round in my head. Even after I’m back upstairs and I find my sisters asleep and Mammy at the table with a face like she’s looking out to sea, but it’s just the empty pot on the hook over the fire that she’s staring at. I still can’t forget the words, the look of them written down like that; inky letters that curled like my mammy’s hair, and like her by-name! No one ever calls her Martha in real life.

To my darling Martha from your ever-loving Duncan.

Dawn

A small black album lay open in the cupboard and the photograph of the two girls had fallen from inside it. There were other pictures, all the same size and held in with sticky corners that had come loose. The corners drifted to the carpet, a trail of confetti as Dawn walked to the kitchen. She was thinking about the picture, how an empty matchbox is never really empty, how a pendant is always a locket if you look close. Maybe Shirley had been telling the truth. Perhaps there were secrets in the cupboard.

Dawn poured some vodka into a china cup and took a gulp. She turned on the grill and got fish fingers from the freezer to feed Maeve. She kept turning to the photo as if she risked missing an explanation from it if she looked away. Whoever had been behind the camera when the picture was taken had said something cheeky and put the wee girls just on the edge of laughter as the shutter clicked. They were pretty, but their clothes didn’t fit quite right. The elder one was squeezed into a kilt and cardigan, the sleeves and hem a wee bit short, and a dress, probably a hand-me-down, hung baggy on the other.

In the next picture there was a much older girl, long blonde hair, make-up, painted lips, a smile. She was only half covered, dressing or undressing in the dunes like a fifties beachwear beauty, shoulders bare except for two spaghetti straps. Tall grasses tickled the image. The photographer had taken her by surprise. Maybe he (because it would be a he) had been hiding in the long grass, waiting to capture the exact moment she spotted him.

Dawn turned the picture over for a clue but the back was blank. The strange energy she’d felt before had gone and the tapping of the rain on the windows had stopped as suddenly as
it had started, leaving only a strange silence. Maeve was playing quietly.

Elgin had once had a pipe band. It had marched every weekend, deep-filling the town with warmth; rich and heart-stopping as gulps of Christmas pudding. But when the music stopped no one in earshot could get their day back in sync. The silence had pounded deeper than the great drum. Dawn felt like that now. The clocks in Shirley’s house were ticking too loudly. It was an odd, uncomfortable feeling, one she usually only had late at night when Maeve had gone to bed and she was alone.

Where are you? she called.

Maeve mumbled something back. She was playing at swimming pool in the bathroom sink. She made a splashing noise, as if to prove she wasn’t fibbing.

You’ll have to stop when food’s ready, Dawn said.

There were a couple more pictures she only glanced at. The blonde girl with her back turned, barefoot on wet sand, waves splashing up her legs. And then a close-up, a long scarf hung loosely round her neck, tassels blowing in the wind and a pattern like snowflakes falling down it. It must have been freezing, but the girl didn’t seem to care. Her delight was as clear as written down.

There was a knock. Dawn’s chest laced up tight. She hated it when someone unexpected came by. Couldn’t control the nerves. Once she’d opened the door to a man selling shoes, a harmless wee fellow with salt and pepper hair and a red necktie, like something out of a fairy tale. He was holding a black women’s shoe in his hand, a sample of his wares, and maybe it was the way he held it or the way the patent leather caught the light, or maybe she’d just been watching too much telly (her favourites were the thrillers and the spy flicks), but whatever the reason was, she believed he was about to shoot her. A stiletto heel aimed point-blank at her stomach. She tried to scream but her throat felt robbed, emptied with fear. It was several seconds
before she managed to make any sound at all. And then she had nightmares for weeks, cause if she ever opened the door and there was a man with a
real
gun, by the time she made a single sound the trigger would have been pulled.

So she never opened the front door without checking who it was. Just in case. She couldn’t forget to be wary. Sometimes in the city whole afternoons had gone past without her thinking of Warren – but not here.

Another knock.

Dawn ignored it. Maybe it was Ally from downstairs. But so what? She turned quickly to the next picture. It was the blonde girl again, further away this time, with someone stood by her side.

There was a third knock, louder than before, and this time Maeve stopped splashing in the bathroom sink and came into the kitchen, a drenched Barbie suspended in an upside-down dive in her hand. Dawn told her to wait in the bathroom.

Who is it?

Me, Dawn. It’s Dad.

It had started spitting again. Dad had backed away and stood several steps below her, slowly getting wet. He peered behind her at Maeve, who’d toddled through when she heard his voice. Hello, lovie, he said, and she waved back with the wet doll. Dawn opened the door wider and Dad followed into the kitchen, looking round Shirley’s flat as though he hadn’t been there in a long while. I’ve just got Maeve’s tea on. Drink? She started laying the table.

Dad didn’t answer. He’d sat down where the album was lying open and was trying not to pry, brushing it away. His hands were older than Dawn remembered; thick, stiff fingers, Marmite-stain speckles that wouldn’t wash. They still looked strong, though – good hands to hold. She still remembered him throwing her into the air and catching her.

Hmm? he said. Oh, aye. Tea.

I found those pictures in a cupboard in the good room, Dawn said, nodding at the album. Dad wasn’t listening. He’d taken a wee box wrapped in bright paper from his jacket pocket and was beckoning to Maeve, who stood in the doorway sucking on the Barbie’s wet hair. When she saw the box she looked first to Dawn

Go on, then. Grandpa’s got you something.

He lifted her onto his knee and helped untie the shiny parcel ribbon. Inside was a gold chain with a heart and a tiny ruby swinging on the end. Dad’s big fingers stumbled over its delicate thread.

You shouldn’t have, Dad. She’s only four.

Nae too young fer jewels, eh, princess? he said, lifting Maeve’s hair and fastening the necklace beneath it. This was yer great-granny’s once and now it’s yours. Let’s see! There. Is that nae bonnie?

What do you say, Maeve?

Thank you, Grappa.

Maeve was so pleased she let her tea go cold. She sat all the time with her chin pressed to her chest, admiring the wee gold heart with a red stone at its core.

Is it blood? she said.

No, pet, he told her. Not real blood. It’s a ruby.

Dawn sat between Dad and Maeve in awkward silence. He tapped his fingernails on the side of his chair and watched Maeve. Dawn noticed the small photograph album had been closed and pushed out of sight. She poured herself another small measure of vodka and reached for it. It held only one picture to a page and she leafed to the last two photos, ignored Dad clearing his throat, a hacking, raking sound. It had bothered him for years. ‘Dad’s haughing’ was what Mother called it.

The first photo she turned to meant nothing: a bleary shot of a strong-looking old woman in a cleaner’s apron. Her mouth was parted and her eyes were closed, the lids crinkled: two
dates. She’d have looked like an old-fashioned widow if it weren’t for the sprigs of flowers printed on her apron and the way she’d placed her hands. She rested them either side of her belly, elbows jutting out as she laughed.

The last picture was another one taken at a beach. It showed a couple, and behind them a row of huge wooden posts that crossed diagonally from the sand into the sea. Dawn searched the horizon for a lighthouse, sure this was the beach she’d played on as a child.

Dad was half-heartedly whistling now and she had to try hard not to let it irritate.

The couple in the photo was the blondie from the other photos and a young lad who held her lightly round the waist. The boy was the same height as the girl, but while she was slight, he had broad shoulders, a casual stance. It looked easy for them to stand like this, side by side, each with an arm round the other. A strand of the girl’s light hair was blowing loose over the bridge of the boy’s nose and up towards his black cow’s lick. It didn’t seem to bother the boy cause he hadn’t lifted a hand to sweep it away.

There was no name on the back and no date. Whoever’s sweetheart this was, time had forgotten him. He wasn’t in the other photos.

Do you know who these pictures are of, Dad?

He took the open album and made a show of holding it in an outstretched arm before telling her he couldn’t say. He would need his glasses to see it properly. Eyesight wasn’t what it used to be.

Maeve had finished eating and disappeared back to the bathroom with one hand clasping the doll and the other pressed over the necklace. Dawn looked at her father and took out her cigarettes. She pushed the pack around on the table-top.

You could have come down to the city to see us, she said.

He sniffed, looked at his hands. I nearly did, he said. Mother said ye’d want tae be left. She insisted, pet.

Dawn took out a cigarette.

Have you heard from the bairn’s father? Dad said eventually. Dawn knew he meant Warren. It was there in the lift in Dad’s voice, the nod to the window, to Elgin.

Later, after Maeve was asleep and Dad had left, Dawn did the dishes. She filled the sink with water and washing-up liquid and soap bubbles flew from the bowl up to the evening light. Oily rainbows swirled on their surfaces. She dropped the first of the dishes into the sink and more bubbles drifted free. When she tapped her fingertip against one it seemed astonished, blinked and vanished. A big one escaped her and sailed across the worktop, crash-landing and dying. It left a circle of wetness that said O!

She stood for a second looking at the ring from the burst bubble. The middle was dry, untouched like the eye of a storm or the centre of a bruise. At the centre of her bruises there had been a part that never went blue or black, yellow, red, or any other bruise colour. The middle of her bruises had gone shock white. A blind spot. It was the part of her that had said ‘
I never saw that coming
’
.

Dawn wrung the tea towel, a tug of war. Hot water made the scars on her wrists blush. Every time she did the dishes or took a bath the old burns flared up, a reminder of Warren. Those weren’t the worst moments, though. It was the good memories that could pull her apart, make
her
feel guilty, make her wonder if she had done everything wrong, not just for herself but also for Maeve. She put her inability to heal down to her fair skin.

Dawn pulled her sleeves down and her hands delved into her cardigan pockets to find the usual. Cigarettes. Matches. She checked the chain was on.

First thing next day, a man came to collect two armchairs, a nest of tables, a chest of drawers and a hefty dresser. There was nothing remarkable about the man except his hair, which was wiry and such a bright orange it reminded her of wild grass. It
grew in tufts over his ears and bristled out of his nostrils as if fighting for light. The man was sullen. Dawn sent Maeve into the garden so she’d not get under any feet, and it wasn’t long before she was joined there by Ally’s wee son. The two of them disappeared into the flat downstairs and Dawn wondered if Ally would be home, if she should go down there later.

The man lifted and manoeuvred the old furniture down the steps and round the front to the pavement. Outdoors it looked timid, ashamed of its own cumbersome weight. It was like those documentaries on the clinically obese, folk who’d stayed inside for half their lives being wheeled out on trolleys and paraded across sun-bleached driveways to waiting ambulances. When the furniture was huddled in the back of the van the man slammed it shut. From the window Dawn watched him climb into the driver’s cab and put the van into gear. As he pulled away she blinked at his number plate. Maeve would have liked it.

JW02 ONE

Dawn listened till the van had driven away and then looked around at the new space she’d made. The patterned carpet had been there for ever. There were islands of brighter colour on it where the furniture had sat, and for a while she would continue to walk round those patches, sidestepping ghosts. The room could have blended into any decade in Dawn’s lifetime, and the smell had always been there too: roast tatties, dust, pot-pourri, cardboard. Only the television was different.

What a lucky girl you are, Dawn, everyone said when she’d first moved in. Your Auntie Shirley has a television! Shirley owned a middle-of-the-range set then, one with a black and white picture and a wooden trim. Her aunt had saved her wages for weeks and bought the television especially to make Dawn happy.

She switched the new telly on now. She could watch the breakfast news and try forgetting where she was, the velour settee that bristled if stroked the wrong way (like a cat), the dreary light filtering through a small window, mug mats of idyllic country scenes piled neatly on the table, and the clock always ticking like a headache on the mantelpiece. But the television was full of bad news and that only made her nervous. Planes were taking off. There were familiar replays of jets, dark angles cutting through clouds of sand, bombs sown like seeds over beige cities, fiery red flowers in the grey dust, shouting and whooping in the cockpit, the camera shuddering.