air; hints of ashes catching in my throat. I saw Lucy, her face buried in Louis’s coat collar, her body slim and straight and dark against the grey of his coat. Dad’s face was bleached. Mark was standing silent nearby, his blue eyes the only colour I remember in that day. He stretched out a hand for me to grab, to pull me to him like a tired swimmer through resisting water. Then I was walking into the crematorium beside him, our hands clasped dry and cold together, the bulge of my belly making me feel grotesque and embarrassed. I was wearing Mum’s coat, unable to catch the scent of her, unable to feel anything at all. Her coffin lay at the top of the aisle, the lid screwed into place. We sat in the pew, and I felt pinned down by gravity, as if I might never get to my feet again. Dad got up to speak, his voice thin; Lucy choked on the poem she had chosen, and I just sat there, swollen and heavy, and didn’t say a word. They’d said that it was fine; no one minded if I didn’t want to speak. People understood. Later, when the coffin rolled off into the darkness and the flames, I remember feeling an uneasy kind of relief. That we were not burning my mother’s body, but burning the sickness out of her.
Later, Dad had us share out Mum’s jewellery, me and Lucy. She lifted off the rosewood lid, and turn by turn we picked out the pieces from their cushions of pink baize. We laid them out on the counterpane: the charm bracelet that had fascinated us when we were little; the locket with a picture of her father in uniform; an embroidered bronze swimming badge that neither of us could remember winning; earrings and brooches; pendants and beads, dating from her grandmother to last Christmas. I looked up at Lucy, at her clear skin, her greyish eyes pink with tears. I can’t do this, I said, and she shook her head; me neither. We put everything back, neater than she left it. We sat on the counterpane and talked about Dad, and how Dad would cope, what we between us could do for Dad. And then Lucy went back to Paris, and Dad went back to work, and then Cate arrived, and I just got on with it.
All the time I’d been scrubbing baby bottles clean, sterilizing them, washing my hands again and again till the skin cracked; all the time I’d been boiling kettles, letting them cool, filling the bottles, counting scoops of formula, one for every fluid ounce of water, and losing count, and staring down at the powdery surface of the liquid, and pouring the formula into the sink in a rage at my own incompetence, and scrubbing the unused bottles, putting them back into the sterilizer, and starting again; all the time I’d been wearing sunglasses on cloudy days, pushing the pram around the park, the scar pressing itself against my jeans; all the time, this house had stood, gathering desiccated flies, the air drying in the sunshine, the spider plant dying in the bathroom. The soap splitting into cracks. The lampshade gathering dust on its bones. The static growing. Waiting.
There was movement outside. The shock was almost physical. An elderly woman came out of the front door of the cottage across the street. Until that moment I hadn’t seen a soul. I wiped my cheeks with my fingers and turned to watch her.
She had a bucket in her hand. She had that old-lady stooped carefulness. She set the bucket to one side of the step, then knelt down, took a scrubbing brush from the bucket and knocked it against the side. The curve of her back to the street, she rocked back and forth as if in prayer, the flesh-coloured soles of her slippers vulnerable and tender. She dipped her brush into the bucket, tapped it, and started scrubbing again, this time with tiny circular movements, as if cleaning a large tooth, the action making her jiggle on her haunches as she worked. Then she got up stiffly, and emptied the bucket into a road drain, and the suds spilled back on to the tarmac like spat toothpaste. She was wearing a navy cardigan, a knee-length skirt.
Later, Dad had us share out Mum’s jewellery, me and Lucy. She lifted off the rosewood lid, and turn by turn we picked out the pieces from their cushions of pink baize. We laid them out on the counterpane: the charm bracelet that had fascinated us when we were little; the locket with a picture of her father in uniform; an embroidered bronze swimming badge that neither of us could remember winning; earrings and brooches; pendants and beads, dating from her grandmother to last Christmas. I looked up at Lucy, at her clear skin, her greyish eyes pink with tears. I can’t do this, I said, and she shook her head; me neither. We put everything back, neater than she left it. We sat on the counterpane and talked about Dad, and how Dad would cope, what we between us could do for Dad. And then Lucy went back to Paris, and Dad went back to work, and then Cate arrived, and I just got on with it.
All the time I’d been scrubbing baby bottles clean, sterilizing them, washing my hands again and again till the skin cracked; all the time I’d been boiling kettles, letting them cool, filling the bottles, counting scoops of formula, one for every fluid ounce of water, and losing count, and staring down at the powdery surface of the liquid, and pouring the formula into the sink in a rage at my own incompetence, and scrubbing the unused bottles, putting them back into the sterilizer, and starting again; all the time I’d been wearing sunglasses on cloudy days, pushing the pram around the park, the scar pressing itself against my jeans; all the time, this house had stood, gathering desiccated flies, the air drying in the sunshine, the spider plant dying in the bathroom. The soap splitting into cracks. The lampshade gathering dust on its bones. The static growing. Waiting.
There was movement outside. The shock was almost physical. An elderly woman came out of the front door of the cottage across the street. Until that moment I hadn’t seen a soul. I wiped my cheeks with my fingers and turned to watch her.
She had a bucket in her hand. She had that old-lady stooped carefulness. She set the bucket to one side of the step, then knelt down, took a scrubbing brush from the bucket and knocked it against the side. The curve of her back to the street, she rocked back and forth as if in prayer, the flesh-coloured soles of her slippers vulnerable and tender. She dipped her brush into the bucket, tapped it, and started scrubbing again, this time with tiny circular movements, as if cleaning a large tooth, the action making her jiggle on her haunches as she worked. Then she got up stiffly, and emptied the bucket into a road drain, and the suds spilled back on to the tarmac like spat toothpaste. She was wearing a navy cardigan, a knee-length skirt.
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