Inheritance

‘I suppose I should collect my books and get on back to school…’

The snatch of song drifting down from the top-floor flat breaks my reverie and the soft single bed creaks as I adjust my position. My back is aching: goodness knows how long I have been sitting here in my old room, daydreaming, staring sightlessly at the pink flowers on the faded wallpaper. I shift the laptop onto my knees and try to concentrate on the email that I’ve been struggling to write for the past hour.

“Dear Friends, I am writing to tell you…” I pull a sharp face and delete the last three words with a quick click of the mouse.

“I am writing to let you know that my mum passed away…” another click and delete - that particular lazy phrase makes me shudder.

“…died last night aged fifty-three, following a long and brave battle with cancer.”

I re-read it and wonder why the language of death is so laden with double-speak. My mum wasn’t brave in the last few days when the cancer had left her an emaciated ruin. She wasn’t brave just before the end when she’d held her translucent, mummified hands in mine and begged me to help her die.

I blink away the prickle in my eyes and write something about the date of the funeral and wake – a week on Thursday – and donations to the local hospice instead of flowers; I sign it simply “Emma”. I feel a tiny weight lift from my shoulders as I send it and I slump back on the unmade bed and let the tears come.

***

‘My name is Bob an’ I’m an alcoholic.’

Bob is shaking but there is determination in his voice, in the set of his face. He thinks that speaking in front of half a dozen people can’t be harder than three months without a drink.

‘Hi Bob,’ the room replies: Ascetic schoolteacher Gary, toothless Polly with her carrier bags and red wellington boots, and a tiny nod from shy sometime-barman Nelson.

Bob shuffles his feet twice, quickly, as if he is about to change his mind and run. Instead he stares hard at a damp spot on the pale green wall beyond the semi-circle of chairs.

‘My name is Bob…an’ today I’ve been sober for one hundred days.’

The room breaks out in tatty and heartfelt applause. Grubby Polly cheers and claps like a seal. Nelson remains motionless, his pinched expression making him look like a man forever walking into the rain.

‘I want to tell you a story, cos now I’ve been sober for three months, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking an’ I realise what a complete bastard I used to be, an’ all I want to do is to find my wife an’ apologise. No wonder she left me…’

Bob’s voice begins to crack like a schoolboy’s. He coughs, takes a deep breath, continues.

‘Because I still love her, even if she left me twenty-five years ago. I still think about her every day, about what I did.’

‘And what did you do, Bob?’ asks Gary in his quiet Sunday-school voice.

‘I hit her…I mean we’d had loads of fights before but this one time she’d been complaining there was no housekeeping money to get food an’ things cos I’d spent it all up the pub – I was drunk an’ I hit her an’ she fell down the kitchen steps. She was expecting - eight months gone.’

‘She packed up an’ left the next day when I was at work an’ then next thing I know her mum rings up an’ tells me Jenny’s in the hospital with broken ribs. An’ that’s when the drinking went properly mad; a bottle of scotch every day in the end, more if I’d got the money. It was like someone had turned a light off once she’d gone, I ain’t got no reason to get up in the morning or go to work, no reason to do anything but drink all day. I ain’t blaming her for leaving but she never spoke to me again, only through the solicitors when she divorced me, and I’ve never seen my kid. So now I’m sober, I want to find her an’ tell I’m sorry for what I did.’

Bob sits down sharply in the cheap plastic chair and looks as though he might be sick. The rest of the group murmur encouraging, positive things but Bob does nothing to acknowledge them. For the rest of the meeting - the notices, the collection for coffee, the closing prayer - he sits likes a stunned beast.

Afterwards they all troop out of the church hall and walk into a South London afternoon the colour of wet cement.

‘I want to do the ninth step,’ Bob says to Gary, the determination back in his voice.

***

I’d not long woken up – curled up like an overgrown Goldilocks in that tiny single bed - and had started to make a cup of tea when my phone rings. I’m still half asleep and it makes me jump.

‘Hi Em, how are you? I were just thinking about you when I got your email.’

I lean wearily against the kitchen counter. Thank God for Karwinder, I think: solid, dependable Auntie Karwinder. I rub my puffy eyes.

‘Hi Ka. Yeah, bearing up….no, actually, I’m feeling like crap. Was the email OK?’

‘It were lovely, pet, absolutely lovely, you did your mum proud. Now, I were thinking - you shouldn’t be on your own, not at a time like this. Shall I pop round later - about six, like?’

I exhale slowly, torn between spending the evening alone in the desolate flat full of memories and having the strength to entertain my mother’s best friend.

‘Thanks for offering, but I’m exhausted - there’s so much to do. I don’t know where to start…’ I say, thinking about mum’s little New Age jewellery shop in the North Laine. I wilt at the thought of another set of jobs to add to the list.

‘I know, pet, you must be worn out, you’ve not had a good night’s rest in weeks. I’ll be round in a couple of hours, no arguments.’

I laugh out loud for the first time in forever as I understand that Karwinder needs the company, the support, just as much as I do.

‘Right you are. I’ll have the kettle on.’

***

‘I really don’t think that’s a good idea, Bob,’ says Gary. He looks over his rimless glasses and blows the steam from his espresso.

‘Why not? I need to apologise to her an’ I’m no good with writing, I can’t get everything out properly. I’ve got to see her.’

Gary nods sympathetically and scratches his goatee. ‘I can help you write the letter, if you like. Help you get your feelings on paper.’

‘What good is a letter? She’ll never read it.’

‘Sometimes just writing these things down can be a great help…’

Bob swallows a mouthful of tepid, milky coffee and grimaces. ‘But it ain’t about me! It’s the ninth step, making amends to all those people that I let down when I was drinking. Jenny’s the most important one an’ I want to start with her.’

Gary sighs. ‘Put yourself in her position, Bob. You’ve admitted that you were violent towards your wife on a number of occasions whilst she was pregnant, finally leading her to leave you for her own safety. She stopped you from having any contact with your child since he or she was born: you have to consider that Jenny could well be very upset and threatened by you turning up. I’m sure you remember that the ninth step tells us to make amends only when it won’t cause harm to other people. As your sponsor I have a certain responsibility...’

‘But it’s different now! I’ll explain everything, about being ill, about AA...’

Gary shakes his head slowly. ‘Write her a letter, Bob. It’s the only way.’

Bob swears and stands up suddenly, his anger written in hard lines around his eyes. The chair scrapes sharply on the tiled floor of the coffee shop as he scrunches up a paper napkin, throws it on the table and walks out. Gary watches him leave, and calmly savours the last of the espresso. He does not follow.

Bob is suddenly filled with a hot and unformed idea that the library will be able to help him find what he is looking for. He stomps along Peckham High Street through the crowd of shoppers, barging past a young woman in a headscarf herding a gaggle of toddlers. The library – a block of multicoloured glass like a giant-child’s discarded toy – looms above the tawdry shops and flats.

Inside, a faded blonde with lipstick the colour of corpses catches his eye. Bob mutters something about needing the phone book, and finds himself steered towards a computer. He explains that he is looking for an old friend; the blonde mentions something called Facebook, but she sees the incomprehension on Bob’s face and turns back to the online phone directory.

Bob types slowly, one-fingered, Jenny’s double-barrelled name taking three or four clumsy attempts to complete. He feels proud that he still remembers it, remembers that she changed it back. The blonde apologises, leans over him and taps a key, understanding the narrow boundaries of Bob’s computer literacy.

A single line of black text appears on the screen and Bob feels the world rock on its pivot as he sees the name Jenny Maslen-Ward for the first time in over two decades. He scrabbles for a pencil and a scrap of paper and his hands are shaking so much he can barely write down the name and address of the shop in Brighton.

***

The day before the funeral Karwinder and I are tidying up the shop, trying our best to stem the tide of dust, junk mail and red bills that has built up over the past few weeks. It is shattering, gruelling work trying to decide what we need to keep, what to throw away, who else to notify of mum’s death. Together we have written a note to explain what’s happened. As we write I try not to think about what comes next: whitewashed windows, the landlord’s For Sale sign, and then another tacky pound shop here by Christmas. I stick the note in the window and briefly entertain a pointless thought about leaving my tedious housemates and dull office job in Northampton and running this place instead.

I let it go: I’m exhausted. I can’t face opening another envelope or dusting the displays or any of the thousand other things that must be done. They can wait.

I absent-mindedly pick up a photo of mum and I on holiday in Spain and look at it for a few moments before carefully replacing it between the till and a jar of pens.

‘Do you fancy a drink?’ I say.

Karwinder’s dark eyes light up, like a child who’s been told Christmas has come early. She pulls off the pink rubber gloves and drags a stray wisp of black hair back behind her ear.

‘That’s the best idea I’ve heard all week,’ she beams.

We adjourn wearily to the pub opposite. I take a seat by the window; the warmth of the open fire makes me drowsy and I drift for a few minutes whilst Karwinder buys the drinks. The bar is called something trendy and modern now, quite different to the old days when I was allowed to sit in the garden with lemonade and crisps and listen to mum gossip with the other traders of an evening: who’d been seen up West Street on Saturday night making a fool of themselves, who’s husband had run off with that tart from the bookies, who couldn’t afford the rent this month…

Karwinder returns with a gin and tonic and a glass of white wine for me.

‘Cheers.’

I sip the cold wine and wish I could stay here forever.

***

Bob climbs off the train at Brighton. Despite feeling strangely calm on the journey he is now plagued with locust-swarms of doubts and can hear Gary’s voice telling him that he’s making a terrible mistake. For the fourth time since leaving Peckham he checks the address on the scrap of paper from the library, and then searches for Sydney Street on the grubby tourist map at the station entrance. He pulls a face, surprised to find that the shop is only a couple of streets away: he’d hoped for more time to get his head together before confronting Jenny: perhaps a cup of coffee somewhere, or a walk along the front to clear his head.

There is a bilious, queasy feeling in his stomach and he thinks he should have gone to a meeting this morning before his trip to the coast - gone to a meeting, or at least called Gary to apologise for the argument yesterday. He can feel the beginning of a craving start up, like a scabby itch in the back of his mind, and he wonders if he can find an AA meeting here.

He shakes his head to try and make the craving go away and walks out of the station. He tells himself that he’ll call Gary when this is over, when he’s found her and made his apologies. He is tired of Gary patronising him as if he were a naughty child.

The sky is the texture and colour of mackerel, and a chilly wind gusts up from the sea, blowing newspapers and tickets in a rattling swirl around the bus stop. A seagull the size of a tomcat pecks aggressively at the discarded remains of a Chinese takeaway: they eye one another warily.

Following the directions from the map, he walks under the station into a dim tunnel. A thin young man in a dark suit is playing the accordion, and the tunnel’s acoustics lend an eerie, haunting quality to the music.

There is a tall Victorian pub on the corner with tables and chairs outside and a handful of hardy smokers are gathered in the cold; red-faced and lager-loud. Bob grits his teeth and side-steps the pub at a safe distance, realising at a cellular, visceral level that this journey going to be harder than he’d thought. He scuttles down a side street lined with narrow, brightly painted houses but at the end of the road there is another pub: his hands flutter and he feels as if the Greater Power is torturing him for going against Gary’s advice. The craving is almost unbearable now, an all-consuming hunger. To distract himself he tries to rehearse the speech he’d run over and over in his head in the small hours of this morning, but he’s stuck at ‘Hi Jenny, it’s me. It’s Bob…’

He walks past a narrow lane, a fish shop, a vintage clothes store - and then he sees it. Jenny’s Crystals, a tiny white-painted boutique between a record shop and a dentist. He trots across the road without looking, his heart pounding in his throat.

The shop is firmly shut and the blinds are pulled down. Bob is puzzled and wonders briefly if they still have half-day closing in Brighton, until he sees the notice in the window signed by Emma and Karwinder. He slumps forward and lets out a howl that comes from somewhere very dark and a very long way away.

Nobody on the street pays him the slightest attention.

***

‘Thanks Eddie.’

The barman puts another large glass of Pinot Grigio on the bar. He waves away my money and insists this one, like the others, is on the house; I’m feeling a bit drunk and try to remember if this is my third or fourth glass. It is very hot in the pub despite the time of year and the tiny bar is jammed with people: Karwinder tells me later that the entire Trader’s Association turned out to pay their respects.

It’s weird: I don’t know who half these people are but they keep coming up to me to tell me how much Jenny will be missed and how lovely the service was. Four times complete strangers comment on the family resemblance. Karwinder is at my side all afternoon, hovering like a hippy fairy godmother in her best Doc Martens and a red velvet kaftan (mum had insisted no-one wear black), saying all the right things to all the right people whenever I clam up from nerves or embarrassment. She’s my rock; I don’t know how I’d cope without her.

‘Who’s that?’ I ask, pointing with my wineglass at a skinny redhead in blue PVC trousers.

‘That’s Kylie from t‘tattooist, her boyfriend is here somewhere. Enormous bloke wi’ a ruddy great big ring through t’end of his nose. Like a bull.’
I conjure up a mental picture of a sad-eyed Minotaur in leather jeans and a nose ring and start to giggle uncontrollably. Christ, I must be drunk. I carefully put the wineglass down on the bar and make a mental note to eat something from the buffet.

‘And what about him?’ I nod over to a little ratty grey man in his sixties who has wandered into the pub. He looks lost and uncomfortable, as if he’d accidently walked into the Ladies.

‘No idea, pet. I don’t think ‘e’s one of ours.’ She tosses her long hair decisively and strides off to speak to him, to explain that the pub is closed all afternoon for a private function. Instead I see Karwinder deep in rapid, urgent conversation and after a minute or two she ushers the ratty grey man over to where I’m standing. She looks confused, which confuses me: Karwinder is always so relaxed and in control. I feel a little bubble of anxiety rise up, despite all the wine.

‘Em, this is Bob.’ Karwinder sounds serious.
I hold out my hand, ready to shake his, but Bob looks at me as if I’m a ghost. Not a rat, I think. A startled rabbit. I stand there like a fool with my hand held out and nothing happens.

‘You’re Jenny’s daughter?’ he asks in a cracked, querulous voice.

‘Yes, I am.’

I take my unshaken hand away. Bob keeps staring at me: I feel uncomfortable and wish he’d blink or look away.

Karwinder interrupts. ‘Bob were looking for yer mum, he’s come here specially to tell her summat.’ She ushers us to a table and goes to rescue our drinks from the bar. Her use of the present tense confuses me – if Bob is here how can he not know that mum is dead?

‘Who are you?’ I ask.

‘I’m an old friend,’ says Bob. ‘From London. Me an’ Jenny fell out an’ I came to say sorry…’ he drifts off and there are tears starting in his pale old man’s eyes.

I explain to him what happened, how mum thought she’d beaten the cancer until it came back last summer and finally killed her one slow cruel day at a time. The wine is taking over as I tell him that I’m twenty-five and Brighton born and bred, or as good as, and that as far as I knew mum didn’t know any blokes who lived in London; not that she ever told me about, anyway.

Bob tells me I’m the spitting image of Jenny when she was younger. I bitterly laugh off the compliment and tell him that I’ve heard that all afternoon. Then I ask him how he knows mum, what happened that was so bad that they fell out about it. I cringe a little bit and apologise for being rude and tell him it’s the wine talking: the best part of a bottle on an empty stomach.

He shakes his head and perceptibly flinches as I pick up my glass and take another large swig. I need the courage: it’s been a long day and I feel as if I’ve been flayed.

Karwinder offers to buy Bob a drink: he licks his lips and asks for coffee.

‘I’m your father,’ he says to me once Karwinder’s gone to the bar: half a statement and half a question.

‘No you’re not!’ I shout. ‘I haven’t got a dad!’

I unravel and explode in great snotty drunk tears.
Bob looks cornered, his eyes darting from side to side. Karwinder magically re-appears, and several heads are discreetly turned around for a better view.

‘Wha’s going on?’ she demands to us both.
I find my voice first. ‘He…he’s saying he’s my dad! But I haven’t got a dad, have I, Ka, it was always just me and mum, always, since I was little…’

Karwinder leans over me and I bury my face in her soft velvet bosom. I’m six years old again; she hugs me and holds me tight against her side.
‘Is tha’ right?’ she says.

I look up from the safety of Karwinder’s embrace. Bob nods and clears his throat.

‘Yeah, it’s right…not that you’ll remember me, Em. I ain’t never seen you before, Jenny left me when she was expecting. I drank, an’ I did some really bad things, horrible things…that’s why Jenny went an’ so I drank even more an’ then eventually I got ill an’ went to AA to quit the booze, an’ one of the steps you have to do is to make a list of people who you need to make amends to an’ then go an’ say sorry to them…’ Bob stops, breathless.

‘Which is why you came to see Jenny,’ says Karwinder blankly.

‘I came to say sorry for all the things I did, I messed up her life, I know I did, she said it all in the divorce papers…’

‘You were married?’ I blink owlishly at this little grey man, my mother’s ex-husband, my so-called father. ‘My mum was married to you?’

‘Yeah.’

A malign hush descends like a blanket of poison gas: even the barmaid has stopped obsessively polishing the glass in her hand and is staring at our little group. People begin to whisper.

I leap up and run down the road towards the sea with no idea of where I’m going: my handbag and keys are still in the pub but I need to get away. I stumble to a stop two streets down, gasping and dizzy. I lean against a cool brick wall to catch my breath and wait for the world to stop spinning.

A few minutes later I hear Karwinder calling my name. I wave weakly and she jogs gently over to where I’m standing.

‘It’s alright, pet,’ she says. ‘‘e’s gone.’

‘Gone? Where…?’

‘Em, love, I’ve been mates wi’ your mum fer more than twenty year, and she never mentioned to me about having any husband. Bob – if that’s really what ‘e were called – well, I bet ‘e fancied her years ago and got the brush off and ‘e’s gone a bit…well…’ She gestures the universal sign for crazy.

‘He said himself ‘e’s a drunk, and you can tell ‘e’s a bit barmy just from the look of him – I mean, those eyes - so I sent him away wi’ a flea in his ear. Turning up at a time like this, I don’t know…’ She dusts her hands as if to say 'job done'.

I give Karwinder a hug in the middle of the street and I feel a dark cloud lift in my head. She takes my arm and we proudly march back into the pub, our heads held high. She insists on buying everyone a drink.

***

A week later I find the marriage certificate in a shoebox under mum’s bed.