Maggie Gee - The White Family

Alfred bit his lip. How could you ever know? You just had to get on with it, there wasn’t a textbook, you did the things you thought fathers had to do. And May never criticized, May backed me up, if I was so wrong, you’d think she would have said — ‘Mum and I only wanted the best for you.’

‘My life is a mess. I hate my life.’

‘You’re upset, Darren. You’ll feel better in the morning. Go and get some air. Have a word with —’ What’s her name? How can I remember, if he keeps on marrying? ‘— your wife. She seemed a sensible girl.’

‘It’s nothing to do with my fucking wife .’

Darren stared at Alfred, furious, his jaw stuck forwards, his fists half-raised, but pulling his coat-sleeves over his hands, a peculiar gesture, trying to hide.

Alfred thought, I suppose he’s embarrassed himself. But his son was still angry. Would go away angry. Alfred couldn’t help feeling he was at fault. He wants something from me, but I don’t know what .

‘It isn’t any good my saying sorry.’ Alfred knew it wasn’t. He wasn’t one for sorrys. Best not to do things, if you’re going to feel sorry.

But Darren’s response was not what he expected. ‘Well you could say sorry. It would be something.’

There was a long pause. Alfred was annoyed. Had Darren thought about his illness, one bit? Making a scene. Demanding things. Wanting him to crawl, with so many people listening.

But then he remembered Darren’s tearful face, so like his face as a teenage boy. Those years had been awful, if Alfred was truthful. For me as well. It was miserable. I never enjoyed it, being the dictator …

How Alfred had longed to get out of the house, away from Darren’s cheek, his sulks, his anger. He’d almost started to hate the kids. You couldn’t say a word without somebody rowing. There was never any time alone with May … And in the end, it was her who mattered.

I escaped to the Park whenever I could. And later I forgot. We got over it, didn’t we?

It seemed they hadn’t, after all.

‘I’m sorry, then … I am, Darren.’ Alfred didn’t find it easy. It caught in his throat. But he did mean it. Of course he was sorry. If he had faults, they should be pointed out. (But it wasn’t fair to talk about fascist .)

‘You’ve left it rather late to say it.’

They were Darren’s parting words, shot over his shoulder. He didn’t said goodbye, not properly, and his soles made an angry sound on the floor so he couldn’t hear Alfred trying to speak, he was old and hoarse, his voice didn’t carry — ‘But what can I do, lad? To make things right?’

So Alfred just lay there. All shook up. The doctors had told him he ought to keep calm.

He’d never get to sleep, if he thought about Darren …

Or Dirk and his friends. His queer new friends. With their leather jackets, and crewcuts, and chains.

Fascist –

Nonsense. Put it out of your mind.

He had taken his pills, which were nothing, really, just tiny little things, but if they offered them, well … If May didn’t know, she wouldn’t worry.

And he was desperate for sleep, after Darren. He couldn’t bear to lie awake, thinking about what the lad had said, wondering if his brain would kick or jiggle or fit or whatever it was they called it. Wondering if he would have an event .

(It was a funny word. He had known great events, he had stood in the street on VE day after the news came over the wireless, his heart bursting with happiness, and watched all the people flooding out, they didn’t clock off, they just got their hats and ran into the streets to be together, out of the factories, out of the shops, all flushed, excited, with sparkly eyes … They looked so alike, to his recollection. Like one big family. It was glorious. The way his own family had never quite managed. Why did things never work out as planned?)

VE day, now, that was really an event. We were all together. All part of it.

But these new events were something quite different, something he couldn’t understand, something that happened behind his back, as if life went on, but he was left out.

Darren’s voice stabbed him as he tried to doze. You wrecked my life . Alfred winced and fretted. You terrorized us . The boy was upset.

Put it out of your mind.

But he couldn’t, just yet.

Chatting to Thomas had been very pleasant. A nice young man, a decent sort. Bit of a perpetual student, maybe, bit of a dreamer, but a good heart. Pity the wife had run out on him. That was women, though. They liked men to be men. If you were too soft, they would trample on you. (Not May, of course. His lovely wife. May was a very feminine woman. He was still in love with her, forty-odd years on.)

I hope we make it to our golden wedding.

It had been agreeable, talking to Thomas. For an hour or so, he had forgotten it, the thing the doctors had told him today, the thing that was waiting at the bottom of the bed, the thing that was lurking inside his head … I was feeling pretty chipper, talking to Thomas.

Then Darren barged in and lost his rag.

Please let me sleep.

I need to sleep.

I took the bloody pills, I deserve to sleep.

They clanked so much, the bloomin’ trolleys. And the swing-doors swinging and whooshing closed. And the low thunder of the air-conditioning, he’d never held with air-conditioning, or was it the heating, it was always too hot — It was never quiet, on the ward. And the voices of the nurses. Sweet and low . There had been a song once, Sweet and low , sweet and low when he was young … They were sometimes quite loud, to tell the truth, but he admired the nurses. Always patient. Always smiling. Even the coloured ones. Lots of them were coloured. That gave him a surprise, to see so many brown faces. But he had to be fair. They were as good as the white. Not that he’d tell the white girls that, he wouldn’t dream of hurting their feelings … They were all good girls. A decent lot.

It was just that at night, he didn’t want strangers.

His own bed, his own dear wife.

His eyes wandered restlessly across his blankets. That statue thing that Shirley had given him. A great disappointment, once unwrapped, which he’d finally done when they all went away. It looked marvellous in its packing. Shining, gleaming. A bottle of really special spirits, he’d guessed. Very nice at Christmas, or on his birthday. Cherry brandy, maybe, to which May was partial. It would glow like wealth on the front-room sideboard. But when he got the paper off, he saw the little figure.

Ugly little bugger, to his eyes, at least. What did she want to buy a thing like that for? A nonsense, really. Expensive rubbish. There never was a John Bull, that he knew of.

And I know my history. Most of it.

‘Land of Hope and Glory.’ Stuff and nonsense. We had it once. Hope, and glory. Now the British Empire doesn’t exist. I never thought that day would come. In my own lifetime, the end of the empire.

He reached out fretfully to push the thing away, but his arm was tired, his hand was heavy. He closed his eyes so he wouldn’t see it. Just go to sleep and leave it be …

Then he jerked awake, and it was looking at him. False little smile, like a wicked little demon, a devil that had got inside his bed. Or inside his head. He had to get it out. He gathered his strength and lunged out towards it, to turn it round so he couldn’t see its face, but without his glasses in the dim light he caught it clumsily, it spun on its side, tottered, nearly fell, and he tried to steady it but only succeeded in pulling it towards him — it fell against the metal bedstead and then on the floor, with a sickening crash.

He thought of the woman next door’s bare feet. Wandering around in the middle of the night.