White Goods (9 page)

‘Looks like
it came from a shop, Mum,’ I reassured her and Mum had given me her
look that meant
oh-very-funny.

The tree had silver tips
so it sparkled even before we had decorated it. And once we had
decorated it – smothering it with streams of red and blue tinsel
and five boxes of ancient baubles that Mum appeared to have had
since she was a kid – it could have been any colour. We draped
three different types of lights around it – multi-coloured lanterns
that were the size of a small fist; plain white ones, which Mum
thought were tasteful and we thought boring; and illuminated Father
Christmas heads, which were my favourites.

‘Lovely,’ Mum had said,
but not in the way she usually said it. ‘Lovely.’ Bit like the way
she said ‘right’ or ‘now.’ Like we hadn’t quite finished, like
there was something left to do.

By Christmas
Day, the floor space that Dad had cleared of
his
livelihood
was covered again, as presents from various friends and
relatives had begun to arrive. By then, you could see the white of
the Christmas tree again, as there were fewer decorations on
it;
the Christmas Fairy
, Mum insisted, had been to borrow some of our tinsel and
share it with poorer families.

‘She’s taken our lights
as well,’ I’d added, noting that only the tasteful/boring ones
remained in place.

‘Oh dear, I’ll have to
have a word,’ Mum had said, trying to hide a smile.

Dinner was
planned for two in the afternoon. By then, Dad had been to the pub
and back, grudgingly taking
Uncle
Ashley with him.
(
‘What’ll I say?’
he had moaned to Mum.
‘Shush. Just talk about football, or something.’)
Nan Buckley had drunk enough sherries to put her
to sleep, and was snoring and perping, which made us all laugh,
including Mum, as Nan Buckley was a proper lady when she was
awake.

‘A duchess,’ Dad used to
say, making Mum’s eyes roll.

‘Who are you, Ronnie
Kray?’ she’d say and laugh, and you could see Dad get narked. Nan
Buckley was no laughing matter.

But she was quite posh
and proper. Even Mum agreed. ‘Your nan thinks she’s better than
us,’ she once said, confirming it for me.

This
particular Christmas followed the pattern of previous years: up
early, Santa presents at the end of our beds in old pillowcases, TV
in the morning, rumours about the Queen of Sheba, followed by Nan
Buckley’s grand arrival instead, kids helping Mum, whilst the men
and Auntie Stella went to the pub.
You
sure I can’t help, Theresa?
The men and
Auntie Stella coming back tipsy, Mum’s last minute panic in the
kitchen, and then the perfect dinner was served. After that, it
was
Top of the Pops,
The Queen’s Speech
and
Jim’ll Fix It Christmas
Special
, followed by an afternoon snooze,
tree presents before tea and then more food – hot mash, cold meats
and pickles.

The only difference to
our routine that year happened on the doorstep: part of a history
of small dramas that settled themselves on our
threshold.

We were in the middle of
dinner when the bell went.

Ian had answered, then
called back for Dad’s assistance.

‘Oh, Anthony, who is it?’
Nan Buckley had asked, sitting up taller, preparing herself for
company.

Dad hadn’t replied. He
looked briefly at my Mum, and excused himself from the
table.

‘
Coming,
son.’

You couldn’t hear what
went on - Dad had closed the door to the porch, and kept his voice
low. But, from where I was sat, I could see the glass of the porch
door and a movement of colour through it. A blue shirt or coat, if
I recall. And, when the conversation was over, and the door opened
for a second, a glimpse of a face: the pale skin, the blue sunken
eyes.

‘They not coming in
then?’ Nan Buckley inquired, disappointed when Dad and Ian returned
without any additional company.

‘It wasn’t who I thought
it was,’ Dad answered, looking around the table at our faces,
taking longer as his eyes stopped at Mum.

But I knew who it was. I
knew who wasn’t welcome. I knew who left that look on their faces,
especially on Ian’s.

Jackie.

At
midnight,
Uncle
Gary
insisted we finally went to
bed. We were so tired that we didn’t disagree. Despite that, none
of us fell asleep for long and I woke up just a couple of hours
later, when I heard Della leaving her room.

‘
They’re
back,’ she whispered, on hearing me get out of my bed.

She was two steps down the
stairs when I caught up with her. We crept the rest of the way
together, quietly, taking slow steps so we wouldn’t be heard,
unlikely allies in a silent, secret mission – to find out what had
gone on.

The final drama of the day
was about to unfold.

They were in the
bathroom.

Auntie Stella and
Dad.

Uncle
Gary had gone.

Downstairs most of the
lights were out –the kitchen ones were on and a light and noise was
coming from the bathroom. The door was pushed to, but not closed.
As we got closer, crisps - from the knees-up earlier - crunched
under our feet and we slowed down, treading more carefully, but we
still weren’t detected. We stayed just inside the back room, with
the length of kitchen separating us from Dad and Auntie
Stella.

Dad was making a moaning
sound.

‘
For goodness
sake, Tony. Keep the noise down.’ Auntie Stella.

I pulled a face at Della,
but she was concentrating; I could see that clearly, even in the
half-light.

‘
Jesus!
Careful with your hands!’

‘
Tony, keep it
down. We don’t want to wake the kids. You could do without
explaining this one away.’

‘
Della-.’ I
went to ask, but she shut me up with an abrupt: ‘Shush. Just
listen.’

So I did,
confused, wondering. Thinking of all those carry-on comments over
the years. Auntie Stella’s Mini jokes and Dad’s brushing against
her. Thinking, thinking. Hoping. Hoping I was wrong and that this
wasn’t the
funny business
Mum had accused him of over the years. Hoping
there was an explanation. Hoping there were no more dramas to
overshadow this big day.

‘
Della, do you
think-.’

She raised a hand,
signalling me to remain quiet.

‘
Just listen,
Scotty. OK?’

So, I did – we both did -
and the drama unfolded differently.

‘
Those are
nasty cuts, Tony. Jesus. What you gonna tell the kids?’

‘
Dunno.’

‘
You’ve got to
tell them something.’

‘
I’ll tell
them it was the police, ok? Jesus!’ Another moan came from Dad,
followed by a series of winces. I knew that sound and I could smell
something too – a smell I knew from cuts, sores and sheer terror –
TCP.

‘
Nearly done.
Ok, that’ll stop it going bad.’ A few sounds filled an otherwise
silent lapse of time – a cap screwed onto a bottle top, bathroom
cabinet doors being closed, a tap running water over hands. ‘There.
OK. I’m gonna head off.’ A kiss – we heard a kiss, but it was
clearly on a cheek.
No
funny business
. ‘So, you’ll tell the
kids it was the police. Ok, I’ll go along with that, if that’s what
you want.’

‘
I can’t tell
them the truth.’

‘
No, you can’t
have them knowing that. Can’t tell them the whole
truth.’

‘
It’s gonna be
hard enough as it is.’

We went to slip away, but
Auntie Stella momentarily revived their conversation.

‘
Can’t believe
she’s back, Tony. Can’t believe she’s back.’

We listened, waiting for
Dad to respond, to say more, but he kept it simple.

‘
Yeah,’ he
said, sighing a deep long sigh, before he added: ‘She’s better off
dead, though.’ A silence fell between them, like there was nothing
else for them to say. I could hear his hand rubbing his
end-of-day-stubble, making that scratching sound. ‘Right,’ he
added, abruptly breaking the lull. ‘As agreed. Police did it.
Ok?’

‘
Ok?’

And with that, we had
slipped away, silently, back to our beds before they came out and
found us.

In bed, I lay there,
thinking about it all.

Going through
all the dramas, all the actors trying to hog the limelight: Auntie
Stella with her short skirt and Ocean-liner hat; Tina Tankard
coming to the funeral; Justin in my bedroom; Shirley White at the
dump, hiding when Ian arrived. What had Auntie Stella said?
‘I can’t believe she’s back
.’

And the weirdest thing
was, that despite the funeral, despite Dad being picked up by the
police, I felt an odd sense of happiness.

Felt a small a small curve
work at my lips, creating a smile there.

4.

A week after the funeral,
Dad brought home a big square box and placed it on the kitchen
side. He said nothing, but made a big show of what he did, making
sure we all noticed; making sure we all wondered what was in
it.

‘Don’t really
care,’ Della had insisted, shrugging, walking off, but I wasn’t
fooled. No one was. Because when it finally came to opening the
box, she was there with the rest of us, for
the great unveiling,
as Dad had
called it.

He even got Auntie Stella
round for it.

Dad and Auntie Stella
stuck to their story about him being beaten up by the
police.

‘Couple of coppers
whacked me,’ he said, pointing to a scratch just above his left
cheek at breakfast the next day. ‘But it’s worse than it
looks.’

Auntie Stella had stayed
over in the end, and was in the kitchen, frying breakfast, wearing
Mum’s dressing gown. Nothing was said about that.

‘You gonna sue ‘em, Dad?’
Della asked, looking straight at him, catching his eye.

‘It’s worth thinking
about,’ Ian insisted, and for a moment, I wondered if he knew. If,
like us, he had been hiding in the shadows, listening. Only we just
hadn’t seen him.

‘I think your father’s
got enough to deal with at the moment, kids,’ Auntie Stella
interrupted, coming in with two plates of bacon and eggs, and I saw
a small shift in Dad’s face, like a flicker of relief. ‘Right, who
has tea and who has squash?’

‘Tea,’ said
Della, pushing her cup forward, looking at me.
I haven’t forgotten what we heard,
her face told me.
We’re gonna find
out what’s really going on.
I smiled. I
liked our little secret and what it had begun to do: overnight, it
had changed something between us. I couldn’t quite nail it down,
but something was different.

Two days later, she even
invited me into her room - something she hadn’t done since the
caravan incident. Della’s was at the rear of our house, tucked
behind mine and Ian’s.

‘Were you really looking
at me?’ she asked me, calling me in just before my bedtime. ‘At the
caravan, last summer.’

I shook my head. ‘I was
trying to wake you. To tell you something. Thought it would
work.’

She stared at me,
thinking, putting it together, seeing if it made sense.
‘Why?’

‘Can’t tell you
now.’

She gave me
another look: she only half-believed me, it said. Still I couldn’t
tell her all I had seen. I’d sworn to Ian I wouldn’t tell a soul.
And what if she didn’t believe me? What if she just laughed and,
worse, thought I was simply making up sick, twisted stories.
I couldn’t risk it. We would just be back where
we’d started, like the secret we shared about Dad didn’t exist. And
anyway, once I’d told someone else what I’d seen, it would have to
be true, no going back; whilst I kept it to myself, there was still
a chance it was just me - that I’d got it wrong; that it hadn’t
happened. It struck me as a good way of dealing with the things you
didn’t like: pretend they hadn’t happened. At least, that’s how I
saw it then.

‘I can’t tell you.
Sorry.’

‘Okay.’

That was it.
It wasn’t perfect, but it was better. She still didn’t entirely
believe me, but it felt like her
not-believing-me
had lessened a
little – that’s the nearest it got.

Back then, it was more
than enough.

‘Are you ready
then?’

Dad; a week after the
funeral, his bashing forgotten – or so he thought – standing in the
back room, with a pair of scissors in his hands. The big white box
had been moved onto the dining table, which had been dragged out
from the corner of the room; both its wooden leaves up, like it was
a big occasion. The box had strips of white, brittle plastic round
the outside and Dad began to cut through these.