And so he returns.
Again. But I am changed. Part of my heart has turned to ice. I back away from him. Literally and metaphorically. We are wonderful beings. Self preservation is powerful. He progresses from the hotel To a small flat. Geographically, Not far from where we live. Close to Wife No. 2. He is in the flat for 3 months. 3 months. I am detached. He dupes us again in that period. I can’t write about it. But we are nearly finished. And then. And then. There is a final broken promise To Grandson No. 1. A trip to Manchester. An assurance Son will come. Grandson No. 1 looks forward to it. On the morning we wait. We wait. We wait. Grandson No 1 keeps looking at his phone. Nothing. And suddenly. He’s gone. Puff. Like smoke. Into silence. He disappears from our lives. He is with his wife, He is close by. But he’s gone. And she’s gone. No calls. No texts. We hold our breath. Each day. Silence. Each day. We relax a little more. Each day. We are surprised by normal life. Christmas comes. Silence. No greetings to us or his children. Grandson No. 1 doesn’t understand. His tentative “Have you heard from Dad?” Like a knife in the heart. We have our regular January holiday. This is normally punctuated By texts threatening suicide And asking for money. Wife No 2 is also silent. Unbeknown to us Daughter has communicated with her. Instructing (as only Daughter can) That we have some peace. During the calm of the holiday, We have dinner with one of our neighbours. A retired, ancient catholic priest. We sit in the evening sun. We drink red wine. We eat pasta. We gaze at the indifferent sea. We tell him everything. Beginning to end. The dreadful years. The dawning of a kind of acceptance. He listens intently. He doesn’t speak. He lets us talk and talk. His gaze is wise and weary. When we have finished, He looks at us: “He’s a grown man. He has chosen his path. He must conquer it himself. You have done all you can. You must let him go.” Remember. “A good act does not wash out the bad, Nor a bad act the good.” He must fight for redemption every day. And now. We are at home. I have my strong Husband. My beautiful Daughter. My funny, handsome Grandson No 1. My odd little Grandson No 2. I have my life. I have a Son-shaped hole. I have some contentment. When I think of those days. Those terrible, terrible days. I wonder how we have all survived. But you do. As Churchill says, You just keep buggering on. I revel in the peace. For the moment. But. The past remains part of the present. You don’t forget, You just remember less...
0 Comments
I wake to silence,
A grey light seeps into the room. The stars are gone, Replaced by a cold indifferent dawn. The house slumbers on. I creep downstairs, Make tea, Hug the peace. I dread doors opening And the day beginning. I dread Son looming. But. I know him well, He will hide in his room till forced out. I feel like a pencil drawing of myself. Not quite there. Husband has followed me downstairs. “I’ve texted Wife No. 2, She’s coming round in a couple of hours.” My chest tightens. “I’d better rouse him then.” Horror. Horror. I knock on his door, All is quiet. I open the door. Tentatively. There’s a fog of fear in the room. “Wife is coming. Shower’s free.” He is glassy eyed and hostile. I knock at Grandson’s door. Peep in, whisper: “There’s to be a meeting soon, it won’t be a laugh. Keep out of the way. I’ll let you know when all is quiet.” He grunts. I hate that he’s witness to this hideous stuff. But it is what it is. Unfortunately. And so we gather. In the front room. Again. Wife No.2, Son, Husband and myself. The fire is on, The rain rains on and on, Clattering at the windows They are misting with warm breaths And terrible words being spoken. He sits on the sofa. Isolated. Again. We all have different views on the situation. We are all right, We are all wrong. The awful thing. He can’t stay here. Wife doesn’t want him at her house. So, where does he go? He has walked out of rehab. Truly it’s his problem. But, as usual, he’s made it ours. We have to turn him out. “Teach us to care and not to care, Teach us to sit still.” T.S. Eliot. Who wins? The one who shouts the loudest? The one who proposes the easiest interim solution? The hardest decision is to ask him to leave. No ifs or buts, Just leave. That’s my awful answer. Once said, can’t be unsaid. Wife says no, no. But has no further suggestions. Husband suggests paying for a week in a cheap hotel While we consider the options. What options? What options? We need to agree. The outsider is the bad guy. Wife and Husband remove it from me. Start to look at hotels. It’s sticking plaster. I want to shout, My answer is too radical. Too cruel. I know this. I stare at a book on the table. The cover is vivid orange. There is a silhouette of a kestrel simply drawn. There are coffee cups. There are slices of toast, curling at the edges. Meanwhile we ask him what he intended to do when he walked out. He is silent as usual. I’m having a panic attack. It’s like a huge bird flapping in my chest. I want it all wiped out. I want it as we were. We will never be as we were. None of us want him. He has done terrible things. We love him but he can’t stay. He can’t stay. It’s gut wrenching And he won’t go. I have said the words. Me. Me. Husband is already ringing hotels. I understand. I feel relief, of course. I look at Son. He has placed us all here. I want to kill him. I want forgiveness. He is cold, calm and hopeless. A room is found, It is booked for a week. Son brightens, Problem solved. Wife drives him to the hotel. We have a week’s grace. And what then? I close the bedroom door.
Undress. Sink in that bed. Pull the covers tightly around me. I’m exhausted. Exhausted. And I lie there and sleep won’t come. He’s in the next room. I feel his presence, looming large. Sucking the air from the house. Panic rising. I put the radio on. I switch it off. Pick up The IPad. Play some Scrabble half heartedly. Glance at Twitter. Look at my downloads. Can’t be bothered with any of it. I switch off. The screen dims, goes dark, I leave the digital world behind. I reach for a book. I am re-reading quite a bit lately. Strange how you can read something again and again And still there are secrets in the corners. More than last time, More than the time before. I appreciate the words and cadences. The construction of a plot. The tightness of a sentence. Doors open and close. How do they do that? How do they overwhelm me And place me in a moment? A good writer makes you love the characters, Makes you hate them, Want to sleep with them, Want to be them. You become the story, The place. You live in their world And out of it. Stepping in and out. I am the book, I am the story. I am overwhelmed. I am crying, I am mystified. I have stepped into another place. I can smell the grass, I can smell the sweat, I can smell the petrol fumes, I can smell the fear. There is light and shade, There is pain and pleasure. Favourite books creep through my life like a shadow. I look at my shelves and touch them. There is dust and memories. I love a clever book. I love a Victorian melodrama. Daughter lends me Young Adult fiction. I am dazzled by the inventiveness and wit. These are books I would never have read, I am amazed. Beautiful writing has no category, No subjects are taboo. It lives on. It fills me with awe. It reveals by degrees, It teases, fades, vanishes. It hangs around me like a whisper. It touches like a kiss. And so I pick up Wuthering Heights again. On this bleak night I might as well join Cathy and Heathcliff On those black moors. Again, I am taken by its strangeness, Unable to pin it down. Like trying to catch the air. All the while it’s slipping through my fingers. Like mist. I feel sleep approach. I close the book, Put the ghosts away. Switch the reading lamp off. Darkness. I dread the morning... I ”I’ve quit.” He mutters.
We are standing in the hall in some ghastly tableau. My eyes bulge out of their sockets, My intestines are water. He shouldn’t be here. I don’t want him here. I want him in that grim house. I want him miles away. I want to know he’s alright. But now. I want to step away. I want to turn the clock back 24 hours. I want the chance To run and run and run. Outside the wind moans, The rain lashes. Inside it’s warm and cosy. He’s brought the chill of the outside in. That other world which we thought was gone for the night. He’s a cluster of chaos amidst the calm. Go away, go away, go away. “Come into the front room and get warm.” He is soaked. He has walked 10 miles. He is like some sodden sea creature. He leaves pools behind him. I concentrate on mundanities. “Take those wet things off. I’ll find something of Grandson’s for you to wear.” I go upstairs. Husband is awake, staring at me. He goes downstairs. I find track suit bottoms, TShirt, hoody, thick socks. I gather up his dripping clothes, Give him the dry things. We are grave and silent and efficient. I make tea and toast. I put his wet clothes in the washing machine. The room is quiet, The fire hisses. Outside a storm, rain like pebbles on the window. Inside another, quieter storm. Son, husband, me. I look at him. It’s like time has stopped. I feel pity, Most of all, though, I feel resentful and withdrawn. I look at him. I see the child, the boy, the teenager, the young man, the man, The heroin addict. I wish I was driving through California in the sun Heading for the ocean. Sun glinting. I wish I was anywhere but here. I’m not supposed to think like this. He’s my son. He’s supposed to come when he’s in trouble. But I don’t want it. Father’s questioning him now. He answers in monosyllables. There’s a Greek chorus in the shadows shrouded in grey. There’s no air in the room. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do. What’s going to happen? What’s going to happen? He looks embattled and diminished. I stand up. “Let’s get some sleep. We’ll talk in the morning.” We put him in the spare room With the ironing board and the storage boxes. We all traipse upstairs. Misery hangs in the air. I dread the morning... |
Categories |