Kate Tempest - The Bricks that Built the Houses

Ron had met Linda in the early 1980s. He was a ska boy, and she was a DJ at the clubs he used to go to. The process was not without its dramas, but it all ended well; she got the boy, and he got the girl and he still felt gooey in her arms. He had tattoos on his wrists that Becky knew meant something but she never asked what, and a dark temper that would flare up suddenly when roused and hands big enough to break faces.

Ron and Linda ran a caff together called Giuseppe’s on Lewisham High Street. There was a market there and lots of people and shops and noise. Becky liked going to Giuseppe’s after school and sitting at the counter and drinking the milkshakes that Linda made especially for her.

Paula told Becky that her dad was in jail because the police were scared of him. Her family hid the papers from her in the first few weeks after John’s arrest, and they were careful with the telly.

They never talked about it. Every time she tried, her mum got panicky and tore at her hair and tears came to her eyes, so Becky learned it was best to stop asking and soon the silence around her father’s absence seemed too prevalent and painful to challenge.

In Becky’s earliest memories, her mum was always strong and funny, beautiful and talented, no nonsense. Smoking fags out the window of Ron and Linda’s house. Shouting at the telly when they sat and watched EastEnders . Holding Becky’s hand while Becky learned to roller skate, walking round and round the field eating endless ice creams. Showing Becky photos of all the famous people she had shot; beautiful black-and-white moments from a time when Becky hadn’t happened yet. Going out for tea and cake in town together, looking through the pages of high-end magazines at all the colours and the clothes. She remembered her mum taking her to dance class and staying when the other mothers left, sitting quietly and watching all the steps her daughter learned.

But Becky would hear her crying in the night. And when no one else was in, Paula would stand in the doorway of the room she shared with Becky, drunk, her eyes drooping and her voice shrill, and she’d start the same old monologue Becky had heard hundreds of times. ‘I could have been a legend, you know. Before I met your father I was famous. I was destined for great things. ’

The crying mum and the happy mum were like two different people, never in the same space at the same time, but both lived in Paula, and you never knew which one you’d get. Over time, Becky grew scared of getting home from school in case her mum was still in bed and drunk and crying. When she was like this, nobody was safe, she would surface in a silk dressing gown, make-up smudged and smoking fags and shouting foul abuse at people who weren’t there, and at people who were.

It was a Saturday morning in the middle of December, Becky had just turned thirteen and Paula wanted them to go ice skating, like they used to, but Becky was embarrassed to be seen out with her mum, temperamental as Paula was; drunk, loud, and usually outrageously flirtatious with bewildered men. Becky was sitting in the front room watching the telly. Paula was leaning in the doorway.

Paula had suffered a crushing blow that morning. For the past three months she had been desperately trying to find contact details for her old workmates and commissioning editors, and had at last tracked down the mobile number of Katarina Raphael, once a photojournalist like her, but now the picture editor at British Vogue . Paula had counted Katarina as a friend some fifteen years before, but they hadn’t spoken in over a decade, although Paula had been watching Katarina’s progress from afar. Katarina’s recent well-publicised promotion had fuelled Paula’s latest attempt at stirring the ashes of her career. But Katarina had not remembered Paula. She had not remembered Paula’s name, Paula’s voice or Paula’s photographs. She had told her that she was sorry, but Paula must have dialled the wrong number.

‘I don’t want to go ice skating.’ Becky wouldn’t look up from the TV; she was watching an American high-school sitcom.

‘You used to love it.’ Paula held on to the wall, watched her daughter staring at the screen.

‘I’m happy just sitting here, Mum. I’m tired.’

‘You just want to watch TV all day?’

‘Yeah.’ Becky shrugged. Annoyed at the interruption.

‘We hardly see each other any more, Rebecca.’ Paula walked over and stood in front of the TV. ‘Let’s go out.’ Her words baggy from drink. ‘Let’s go look at the photos in the Portrait Gallery.’

Becky looked up at her mum, spoke firmly, her voice tired. ‘I don’t want to.’

Paula started pacing backwards and forwards in front of the TV. Shaking her head. Breathing heavily. She gritted her teeth behind her pursed lips.

‘Can you let me just watch this, Mum? I like this programme.’ Becky weaved from side to side, trying to see round her mum. Paula saw what Becky was doing and stood firmly in front of the screen, trying to catch her daughter’s eye. Becky looked down at the carpet. ‘It’s only on once a week.’

‘NO!’ Paula shouted. She turned the TV off, and stood victoriously in front of it with her hands on her hips. She stared at Becky, eyes burning, but Becky didn’t look up. Becky sat very still on the sofa and tried to count the individual strands that made up the carpet.

Paula walked towards her and leaned down into her face. ‘Are you not even going to look at me, Becky?’ she asked, her voice calm, but her movements jagged.

‘Mum,’ Becky moaned. ‘Muuuum, please.’ She turned her head away.

Paula raised an extended finger. Spoke at a dramatic volume. ‘I gave my life up for you,’ she began.

Becky rolled her eyes and sat back into the sofa, huffing in exaggerated boredom. ‘Heard it all before,’ she sang, covering her face with a cushion.

‘Your Dad and you. I could have had a life of my own. But I gave everything up, and look where it’s got me. You don’t even talk to me any more. And him ?’ Her dressing gown billowed as she thrust her hands about, her underwear visible, the curtains open.

Becky heard him referred to and tears came to her eyes. She breathed them back without her mother seeing, and shrivelled inside to think of the neighbours. She watched Paula’s face contort and squash and puff.

‘Your precious fucking father.’ Paula’s hair was sticking out madly from her head; it was always wild before she tamed it with products and special brushes and rollers. Her skin was stretched and thin at the edges of her face, blue lines appearing beneath the surface.

Becky looked at her mother and saw a monster. She cowered down into the sofa, hoping she’d never end up looking like that. Paula stood, one hand on her hip, the other holding her head. Her dressing gown was open, her boob was hanging out of her night slip. Becky’s stomach pushed itself out of her belly button and sprinted for the door. Ran down the street with no shoes on.

‘You think he’s better than me ? Because, what? I take a drink now and then, to calm the nerves. Now and then?’

Becky breathed quietly.

‘Can’t you hear me?’

Becky stared at the corner of the cushion that she clutched to her chest. Promised herself she wouldn’t cry. There was no use crying, it just made things worse.

‘You wait here,’ Paula said, raising a finger and pointing it hard at her daughter. ‘Just wait here.’

She backed out of the room. Becky heard her running up to their bedroom and slamming the door and banging around up there. She heard the door being wrenched open, hitting the wall, and footsteps thumping down the stairs, skidding on the steps, and the door being smashed into. Then her mother, breathing ragged breaths, holding her hand against her mouth, eyes like open bottles, walked purposefully into the room. She handed her daughter an old newspaper.