Tessa Hadley - The Past

— Though it’s a shame you never got to see the cottage, he said. — I mean, the way I’ve sorted it all out. I did it specially for you. You’d have liked it.

— That is a shame, she agreed, heartfelt, hesitating. — Well, I could stay.

— I could show you tonight.

— All right then.

— If you stayed.

— I will. I’ll go and tell them now.

At last they were gone. Up until the moment of their departure, their leaving had seemed dreadful — they were tearing an irreparable gap, which must be the beginning of the end. The old house must be finished with now, the others felt, and they might as well leave too. Farewells were shallow and perfunctory, as if they suddenly couldn’t wait not to see one another any longer. Pilar smiled and squeezed Alice’s hand, but her eyes were truthful and her insincerity was even somehow righteous. With a hand on the roof of the Jaguar she hesitated, about to fold herself sinuously into the passenger seat, and Alice wondered whether it had occurred to her to leave some message for absent Harriet — if it did, then the next moment she thought better of it. Roland held out his cheek for his sisters to kiss as if he were elsewhere already. He sent his love to Harriet — so Pilar hadn’t told him about their quarrel yet, whatever it was, or at least hadn’t insisted that he take sides. He was pained because Molly had chosen to stay — her aunts had promised to keep an eye on her, but he didn’t trust them. Embracing his daughter, he was punctiliously affectionate, but Alice saw how he withheld his approval, and in Molly’s face saw the shadow of her fear of disappointing him.

And yet Molly had nonetheless stayed! Keeping Molly made the stayers-on triumphant. And as the Jaguar slid between the old gateposts always gaping their welcome promiscuously, those left behind — Fran and Alice and the children, Kas and Molly: Harriet hadn’t yet returned from her walk — were suddenly jubilant, relieved, saved, shutting the front door behind the departed ones, putting on the kettle. After all, the present moment closed around them, and they needn’t think of the future yet: they needn’t think of leaving, or any endings. The four young ones went to play more Scrabble; Fran made tea, while Alice built a fire in the sitting room. Outside the French windows the afternoon changed and glowed with a mild light, the rain eased, a blackbird singing in a birch tree made it shiver and shed silver drops. Fran carried four tea mugs upstairs, all milked and sugared in different proportions, then brought Alice her pretty cup. — This is cosy, she said wholeheartedly, pulling her feet up under her in an armchair opposite Alice’s armchair. — Now at last we can say what we think.

Kneeling at the hearth, Alice coaxed her fire with expertise, nudging a log into place with a stick of kindling, putting her hair behind her ears with the back of a smutty hand. — D’you mean, about Pilar?

— And everything.

— She isn’t our type. But then perhaps our type is awful. Or at least, isn’t good for Roland.

— We are awful.

— Relentless. Always pouncing on things, analysing them to bits.

— Do you remember how we tortured him when he was studying for his A levels? Leaving bits of our underwear in his sock drawers, writing him fake love letters. No wonder he’s confused when it comes to women.

— Our type is no good to him. He needs someone who just thinks a remark is a remark, and a fact is a fact, a feeling is a feeling.

— But I mean, come on, Alice. She stamped on every step on her way upstairs!

— I was watching his face, and I think the only thing he minded was that I heard it. I don’t think he cares much about scenes. It isn’t scenes he hates: it’s complications, and grey areas. He likes clear-cut situations.

— But whatever was going on between her and Harriet?

— I don’t know, Alice said doubtfully.

Upstairs, the children were getting Molly ready (after she’d won at Scrabble as usual). They wouldn’t let Kasim into her bedroom, they told him he wasn’t allowed to see her yet, he could see her at supper time. After supper, Kasim was taking her to the cottage: what was she going to wear? She said she would just wear her shorts as usual, but Ivy picked up a dress from where it was thrown over the back of a chair — Harriet had given it to Molly, saying she’d bought it and never worn it, Molly could give it to a charity shop if she didn’t like it. Molly hadn’t even bothered to try it on, she never wore dresses. Now Ivy fingered the filmy flowered chiffon wistfully, exclaiming that it was beautiful and she must wear it for her wedding. — It’s not my wedding, Molly said.

— It is, it is, the children insisted, drunk with all the excitement in the house. — It’s a pretend wedding.

So Molly stripped off her shorts and tee shirt and pulled the dress over her head: it was baggy across her bust, sleeveless, with a scoop-neck and fitted waist; the chiffon skirt with its blue cotton underskirt was cut in a full circle and hung limply to just above her knees. She wore it with her trainers and no socks, and looked as poignant as an orphan dressed in an old lady’s cast-offs. Then she sat on the edge of her bed while Ivy knelt beside her with an intent face, doing Molly’s hair in tiny plaits all over her head, weaving in beads and bits of ribbon and lace. Molly only ever wore one silver bangle but had bags full of accessories she never used: diamante chokers and sequined brooches and hairgrips stuck with pink butterflies, all grubby from being jumbled in with tubes and pots of the make-up that she didn’t use much either. They heaped her with jewellery — her own and then everything else they could find. — We’re dressing Molly up, they said to Alice. — Can we borrow some of your necklaces?

Alice was enthusiastic and also lent them a lace scarf and clip-on white earrings, round and matte like mint imperials, which she told them had belonged to their great-grandmother, Sophy. — Oh, that dress, she said when she saw Molly. — I knew that Molly would look lovely in it.

Ivy pinned the lace scarf in Molly’s hair like a veil, then they painted her face; Arthur was allowed to put green on her eyelids with a brush, concentrating furiously, the tip of his tongue protruding between his lips. Ivy pencilled her eyebrows strongly in black, then put blusher on her cheeks and did her lipstick. — Go like this, she said, bringing her a square of toilet paper from the bathroom, pressing her own lips together to show Molly how to blot them.

Molly laughed when she saw herself in the mirror.

— Goodness, Fran said. — What have you done to the poor girl?

— She likes it, Ivy insisted.

Arthur started to tell his mother that it was for Molly’s wedding, but Ivy kicked him and frowned at him, shaking her head. Kasim said she looked like a nightmare and would have to take it all off, but Molly who thought it was funny was suddenly stubborn and said she wouldn’t. Remembering their argument at lunchtime, he decided after all that it didn’t matter, though he regretted the white bird she had been. So she ate supper with them in all her finery, her painted face unreal as a mask, not saying much or eating much. The others chattered around her almost as if the real Molly was absent; but they were also disconcerted and touched by the presence of this eerie, hieratic figure amongst them. She was like a doll or a gaudy image of a saint, brought down out of her niche for her feast day, conferring her importance on their meal.

Still Harriet hadn’t returned. After supper Alice stood with a tea towel in her hand at the front door, looking out for her, then walked up with the tea towel through the churchyard, expecting to meet her taking the short cut home. Fran was washing up and Alice ought to be helping; Harriet would only be cross with her for worrying. If they did meet, she would give Alice her shrivelling look: why did she have to make such a fuss out of everything? But Alice was susceptible to this panic of waiting for nothing in particular; expectation beat against the evening’s serenity. The sky overhead was glassy now, as if it had been washed clean; in the west a mass of cloud on the horizon, navy blue and edged in rosy light, was like a whole city in the distance whose existence they’d somehow overlooked, or forgotten. Nothing in this bland external world resounded with Alice’s anxiety; while she stood watching at the church front gate, Kas and Molly passed, walking hand in hand on the road. Molly had pulled a jumper over her dress because the temperature was dropping; her hair was still in plaits, though she seemed to have scrubbed her face clean and looked more like herself. They said they were going for a stroll; distractedly, Alice told them not to stay out too long, it would be getting dark soon.