Page 33 of Little Wing
‘Why’s she at our table? Why’s she looking like that?’
‘Nell? Nellybelly?’
Somehow Danny’s voice managed to find a way through the din that was ricocheting around Nell’s head.
‘I told you – he’s not worth it. Got to listen to your Danny. You know so.’
Nell looked at Danny. He didn’t like her eyes like that. She looked like she was a crazy lady. He’d go and get Debbie.
‘I think there was a third sister. I think her name was Florence. All this time my mum’s been insisting that she has no child and I thought it was just her being –her. But now I think – I think I might be Florence’s daughter.’
For a few precious minutes afterwards, Debbie and Nell just sat in silence in the storeroom, Nell’s hands in Debbie’s, Debbie’s eyes on Nell, Nell’s eyes trying to scan through a million incidents and memories.
‘Everything makes sense and none of it makes sense.’
‘What’ll you do?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Speak to your mum, maybe?’
‘I’ve been speaking at my mum for the last five years not knowing what she hears, what she understands. Not knowing what she’s talking about when she does respond, not knowing what’s true or what’s imagined, what might have happened or what’s been reinvented.’
‘Your – dad?’
‘Come on! He left when I was three! I haven’t seen him for over thirty years!’
‘Your aunt, then?’
Nell thought about Marjorie. ‘You see, she went really quiet when I said about Mum calling me Florence,’ she said. ‘I just thought she was tired, that I’d outstayed my welcome.’
‘There’s probably a really simple answer to everything,’ said Debbie. ‘And honestly – it might not be what you think it is.’
Nell nodded. She could hear Debbie. It all sounded logical. But there was a small and terrible inkling growing with every thought she had.
‘But what if I’m not who I think I am?’ said Nell.
‘You are Nell.’
‘But whose Nell am I?’
With a stagger and a lurch, Nell spun from one notion or theory to another. Her head hurt. Debbie had told her to go early. She couldn’t remember driving home and, as she climbed the stairs, Nell stamped down on thoughts, turning them into little more than the stains already there. Down the corridor, past the cheery doormats of others, the sounds of their lives muffled but there. Her doormat was plain, no words, no images; she’d bought it because it was called a DirtEater which seemed better value for money than one saying Welcome. She closed the door and slid down it, sitting there looking in on her life. There wasn’t much to see, an empty love seat and the mug from this morning’s tea. She closed her eyes and tried to trace her steps around her childhood home instead. So different from her flat. She could remember her dad’s coat, so long and dark on the hook against her small red one with the furry hood and her mother’s flamboyant jackets. She could see her dad’s shoes, slip-ons, by the front door and if she walked her mind along the hallway and turned left into the sitting room – might she see him there?
No.
When she thought of her dad it was just the man in the photograph. Summer and an ice cream and a lopsided hat; her father with shirtsleeves rolled up, wearing staggeringly wide flares, a cigarette in his hand, two-year-old Nell on his hip, a smile for the camera. But she couldn’t see him in her memory walk, just her mother in a rainbow dress dazzling and happy in a kitchen that was in utter chaos. She could see her childhood bedroom, all organized and neat with toys in a line and books undulating like the pipes of an organ. She could see her mother’s bedroom, strewn with clothes and cluttered with stuff. A bottle by the bed and one in the wastepaper basket. One shoe here and another over there. A Babycham glass on the windowsill and a forgotten cigarette in an ashtray, just one long perfect snake of ash.
Nell rested her head on her knees and wrapped her arms around her legs. Why hadn’t she asked more questions? Why had she always just accepted any information given? What was her mother capable of answering? What was her aunt willing to reveal?
Three stupid lovely Coronation china sets. One each.
There were three of them, who was the third?
And whenhadher mother started calling her Florence? About four years ago – when she let her hair go back to its natural colour and she grew out her crop? She couldn’t really remember.
Nell went to the bathroom and turned the dimmer switch to full. She stared at herself in the uncompromising brightness. Who did she look like? Did she not look like her mum? Whose nose is this? And these lips? And this eye colour? Her mother’s eyes were brown; Nell’s a greenish grey, edged darkly.
She phoned Philippa in America, saying no – you can’t phone me back in half an hour something has happened and I need you to listen. Her oldest friend with such a different life now, thousands of miles away in another time zone. Kids and a husband and a high-powered job. Their friendship had spanned the years, but how much longer could it maintain its closeness over the distance, across the gulf between their lifestyles? She’d never doubted it but, just then, Nell doubted everything. Philippa said fuck! fuck! She said Jesus Nell, as mad as it sounds, maybe there’s something?
