None. I lap at it, as if it were a bowl of thick hot chocolate, letting myself take advantage of the moment, while he sleeps peacefully, his breath warm and regular above my head.
The silence is broken by the ridiculous high-pitched ring of the phone downstairs. I feel things slide, go a bit out of focus. See myself as if from above, squatting here over this boy’s
body, my hair trailing over his hip bones. Shocked by this image, I leave Jez alone, still tied to the bed.
The stairway is dark after the subdued light from the moon in his room. I creep down, holding onto the bannister, shivering a little. I stand in the living room and listen. The phone continues
to ring. I’m not going to answer it. I’m afraid I’ll betray myself, in my heightened state. The machine clicks on to voicemail. After the beep comes the disembodied voice of a
grown woman. The girl I brought into the world sounds like someone I barely know.
‘Mum, it’s me. You didn’t answer my text! Are you OK? I’m coming back in a few days. There’s a reading week. I spoke to Dad and he said he’d be back on
Thursday night too. He wants to talk about moving. Yessss! At last. Oh, and I’m bringing Harry ’cos he’s knackered. I promised him a weekend on the riverbank! Give us a ring
sometime. Byeeee!’
I stand by the phone for a few minutes after she hangs up, and shiver again.
It’s always cold in the living room. I’ve not been able to settle in it since we came back here. For that reason I let Kit and her friends have the run of it. I
encouraged Kit to bring friends to the River House. I wanted her to be like other children in a way I’d never been. My parents didn’t let me bring friends home, or to go to their
houses. Having Kit made me see how islolated my childhood was. I wanted hers to be different.
So I let Kit have the DVD player in here, a widescreen TV, a laptop and CD player. We dragged beanbags and cushions down from her room and I let her stick her posters on the walls and even stock
the old sideboard with cocktail paraphernalia. Kit and her friends bought retro posters and beer mats from the shop up on Creek Road. They had endless parties and get-togethers in here and I was
actively kept out. It suited me. Now that Kit’s gone, the room is not only too cold, but too still. Greg, when he’s here, sits on the sofa in the evenings with the paper, or the TV,
before going up to bed, but he agrees it’s always chilly even with the fire lit and the heating on.
This house has a life of its own. It breathes and fidgets. And it has its particular sounds. The
whooof
as the heating goes on, the
ping ping ping
of the pipes when you run a bath, the creak of
the roof slates on a windy night. But the living room is silent. I spend most of my time in the kitchen. You could say I live there, but the living room, in spite of its name, is dead space.
It’s not that it’s an ugly room. Far from it. Visitors are always quick to comment on its beauty, with the river view at one end, the fireplace, the polished wood floors and large
Persian rugs that have been in here for as long as I can remember. I dislike the sideboard but otherwise the furniture is unobtrusive, tasteful. No, it’s not the aesthetics that make me
unable to relax in here, it’s something else, a shadow in the corner of my eye that slides aside each time I try to focus on it.
I look down at the phone, wondering if I should call Kit back now, or if I can leave it until tomorrow. I decide on the latter. I need to think it through before I can say as I would once have
done, yes, it’s fine to come, bring Harry, darling. Bring whoever you want.
I push open the door to my room and go to lie down again. For a few minutes I contemplate climbing up to the music room to take the scarves off so Jez need never know, will not take fright. But
each time I decide to move, another wave of exhaustion presses down upon me.
The next thing I know, dawn is breaking all over
The silence is broken by the ridiculous high-pitched ring of the phone downstairs. I feel things slide, go a bit out of focus. See myself as if from above, squatting here over this boy’s
body, my hair trailing over his hip bones. Shocked by this image, I leave Jez alone, still tied to the bed.
The stairway is dark after the subdued light from the moon in his room. I creep down, holding onto the bannister, shivering a little. I stand in the living room and listen. The phone continues
to ring. I’m not going to answer it. I’m afraid I’ll betray myself, in my heightened state. The machine clicks on to voicemail. After the beep comes the disembodied voice of a
grown woman. The girl I brought into the world sounds like someone I barely know.
‘Mum, it’s me. You didn’t answer my text! Are you OK? I’m coming back in a few days. There’s a reading week. I spoke to Dad and he said he’d be back on
Thursday night too. He wants to talk about moving. Yessss! At last. Oh, and I’m bringing Harry ’cos he’s knackered. I promised him a weekend on the riverbank! Give us a ring
sometime. Byeeee!’
I stand by the phone for a few minutes after she hangs up, and shiver again.
It’s always cold in the living room. I’ve not been able to settle in it since we came back here. For that reason I let Kit and her friends have the run of it. I
encouraged Kit to bring friends to the River House. I wanted her to be like other children in a way I’d never been. My parents didn’t let me bring friends home, or to go to their
houses. Having Kit made me see how islolated my childhood was. I wanted hers to be different.
So I let Kit have the DVD player in here, a widescreen TV, a laptop and CD player. We dragged beanbags and cushions down from her room and I let her stick her posters on the walls and even stock
the old sideboard with cocktail paraphernalia. Kit and her friends bought retro posters and beer mats from the shop up on Creek Road. They had endless parties and get-togethers in here and I was
actively kept out. It suited me. Now that Kit’s gone, the room is not only too cold, but too still. Greg, when he’s here, sits on the sofa in the evenings with the paper, or the TV,
before going up to bed, but he agrees it’s always chilly even with the fire lit and the heating on.
This house has a life of its own. It breathes and fidgets. And it has its particular sounds. The
whooof
as the heating goes on, the
ping ping ping
of the pipes when you run a bath, the creak of
the roof slates on a windy night. But the living room is silent. I spend most of my time in the kitchen. You could say I live there, but the living room, in spite of its name, is dead space.
It’s not that it’s an ugly room. Far from it. Visitors are always quick to comment on its beauty, with the river view at one end, the fireplace, the polished wood floors and large
Persian rugs that have been in here for as long as I can remember. I dislike the sideboard but otherwise the furniture is unobtrusive, tasteful. No, it’s not the aesthetics that make me
unable to relax in here, it’s something else, a shadow in the corner of my eye that slides aside each time I try to focus on it.
I look down at the phone, wondering if I should call Kit back now, or if I can leave it until tomorrow. I decide on the latter. I need to think it through before I can say as I would once have
done, yes, it’s fine to come, bring Harry, darling. Bring whoever you want.
I push open the door to my room and go to lie down again. For a few minutes I contemplate climbing up to the music room to take the scarves off so Jez need never know, will not take fright. But
each time I decide to move, another wave of exhaustion presses down upon me.
The next thing I know, dawn is breaking all over
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