First, my father

Maybe they were all dead now. Maybe she should not even try to find them. Maybe they had been swept away by the disaster (they would have said: 'The Disaster'), and maybe it was better for her to remember them in all their glory, she did not want to be haunted with their sad, expressionless, dead faces.

A single step – a single move – would have been enough. But the first ordeal was too fresh in her mind. Fresh or not fresh, it would never leave her anyway.

She had spent thirty years avoiding the enemy, and now he was there, comfortably settled or floating maybe in her soul, in her heart, he was there to stay, for ever and ever. Maybe she would get used to him. Maybe she would even tame him – who knows? Or maybe the enemy (no, The Enemy, they would have said: 'The Enemy') would just pretend to be tamed, only to extend his claws later. Yes, that was it. He was so suave, he was such a two-faced bastard. He would let her think she had the upper hand, he would listen to her talking flippantly about him, and then he would jump to her throat and draw blood: I Am Not Mocked.

Well, for the moment he did not need to pretend, he was really making himself comfortable in her soul, he was invading her, possessing her, eating her up, gorging himself, smug with satiety, contemplating his new home with the satisfaction of the rightful owner. Later, maybe, he would decide to occupy only part of the premises: out of a cheap kind of generosity, really, as he would always know he could reclaim the totality at a moment's notice and be obeyed.

So she should never, ever ignore him, let alone trust him. A few days ago she had had to tell a vague acquaintance of hers: My dad is dead. My dad, possessive pronoun, for ever and ever, because they would never be able to take that away from her. Lower case, short, simple words, I don't do euphemisms, look, how bravely I'm taking it, I can even say it, don't give me that conventional, contemptible, idiotic, embarrassed, meaningless pitying look, let me shrug it off with a disdainful, dignified smile, I am nothing to you, you did not even know my father, you did not even know enough about him to feel sorry that you never met him, poor wretch, I prefer my sorrow to your ignorance.

Then the enemy had jolted into action again: what do you mean, 'my dad is dead'? My Father Has Passed Away! None of your off-hand, flippant ways with me. I will be treated with respect. For the time being I am only a polite occupying force, but if provoked I'll only be too pleased to become your torturer and you'll regret the day you were born.

Then tears and rage had overwhelmed her, and the fact that they were silent made them all the more piercing, and she had laid down her arms, defeated, humbled, at the feet of The Enemy. They were right when they said 'The Enemy'.

So how could she, so early in the day, run the risk of facing that second disaster? How could she take the risk of knowing for sure that they were all dead, they who she knew were the only ones capable of silencing her pain, if only for a few hours?

So at the beginning, she did not even attempt to trace them, preferring to steel herself against this second desertion by feigning to think that it was certain and irremediable. Of course she missed them. Their smiles, the colour of their clothes, the smells of their houses. In a way, missing them was a welcome derivative, it helped her bear the unbearable grieving for her dead father. The memory of their vanished laughter was helping her not to think about her father's vanished smile, his voice, his eyes, the lesser grief helped her forget, if only for a moment, the supreme one.

Then, sometimes, she realised she was fooling herself, ha, a welcome derivative indeed, and in those moments, savagely, she decided to throw down the gauntlet at the Enemy, mourning her father, mourning – them, yes, bring it on why don't you, anyway the pain was so violent that she almost fed on it, didn't need or want to flee it, it was so vivid that her adrenalin levels reached unsuspected heights, it was so deep that she couldn't tell it from exhilaration, as a burn, in the first few seconds, can be caused by either ice or fire, when you don't know and you just don't care.

Then after a few weeks the pain, the enemy, the grief had settled, and their quiet was more devastating than their early effervescence. Their quiet was saying: we are less frantic now, because we can't keep up this rhythm forever. That was the key: forever. They were there forever.

And she had thought about them again, of course they were dead, almost as a consequence of all this. Well, they were probably dead. Perhaps they were dead. Perhaps. Right. And what if they were still alive? What if they were waiting for her, saddened by her lack of faith, but forgiving, ready to reach out, as they had always done? This refusal of hers to face certainty – whatever that certainty turned out to be – was it not simply, well – cowardice?

So one day she took the decision, just like this, abruptly. She only had a few steps to take, a flick of the hand – all it would take was finding the place where she had left them, the last time they had been together. Before. Before The Disaster.

So she breathed deeply, closed her eyes and opened them again, as calmly as she could, took the few steps, how heavy each step was, made the necessary, forgotten movements, how rusty her hands felt, and she ran her eye over the place where she had last taken her leave of them.

And there they were. Nicholas, Kate, Mrs Nickleby, Smike, even Crummles and his Infant Phenomenon, and Cheeryble was there too, looking on with that wonderful, hardly human, glowing benevolence of his. They were talking, with their usual emphasis and vehemence; and she could hear them – she could hear them. The sweet-smelling spring wafted gently through the open windows, the light was soft and golden, she could hear the horses' hooves proudly hitting the warm cobblestones. They were all there. They had survived.

They could not see her, of course; they had never seen her and never would. But her trust had made them come to life again. And they had raised her from the dead.

She spent three hours with them, wholeheartedly surrendering her mind and soul and senses to them. As they deserved. If they had not abandoned her after That, they never would.

Then, reassured, at peace with herself and the world, she contemplated Dickens' name on the tatty cover and, ludicrously, tenderly, whispered 'Thank you'.

* * * * *

A Papa. 26 janvier 1999.