Beside the Sea (2 page)

It wasn’t the stairs I was looking for, it was the lift, but, well, we were nearly there, that’s what mattered. Come on, boys, I said, one last effort,
and Stan took Kevin’s bag, the littl’un took my hand and he said Is this the hotel? again. You’re going to have a lovely bed with brand-new sheets, I said, but it didn’t cheer him up, I haven’t got my noonoo, you forgot my noonoo! His voice was full of resentment, I’m sure he hadn’t pictured our little trip like this. Wait till tomorrow when he sees the sea! I thought. I couldn’t see how that − the sea − could disappoint us, it’s the same everywhere for everyone and I was perfectly capable of taking my kids to see it, thank you very much, I could travel at night, it’s not true that I’m paralyzed by my anxieties, like they say at the health centre.

I mulled all this over as we climbed up the stairs, but I didn’t really believe it, it was just to get my nerve up. Deep down I couldn’t wait to get it over with. But I also knew that the boys had to see the sea, and the thought of all this time to ourselves made my head spin, I hung on to the banister and it felt like it was pulling me, pulling me by my arm. Stan was having trouble with the sports bags, he wanted to stop on the fourth floor. Oh, no! I said, if we stop we’ll never start again! I let go of Kevin’s hand to help Stan carry one of the bags, hard to say who was helping who, who was hanging on to what, one thing was sure: we were pretty depressed about having to climb so many floors, the staircase was steep and there was no light, perhaps if there’d been a light we’d have felt more like it. Without
light it was like going into a tunnel, an underpass, we couldn’t picture what the room was going to be like, everything was too brown, too dark, no room for the imagination.

Kevin was jealous because he was tagging along behind, because I was helping his brother, I’m sure of that, and he started to cry, saying he was tired and even saying he wanted to go home! Well, that knocked the stuffing out of me! What? I said, Mum pays for you to go to the seaside and you want to go home? There’s school tomorrow, what are we going to tell Marie-Hélène? We’ll take her back a seashell, I replied, and I thought perhaps we should do that, choose a seashell and give it to the teacher, my son’s first love, yep, give her his first seashell. Now that made Kevin smile, and I was proud of myself, I know how to handle my kids, I thought, I just need to be left to get on with it, would a social worker have thought of that? Getting a five-year-old to climb six floors by talking about seashells? Of course she wouldn’t have thought of it, it wasn’t even in her questionnaires. “Do you talk to your children about seashells: every day, once a year, never.” Well, I’ll bet there are plenty who’d say Never, and yet they’d be the ones who call themselves good mothers, just because instead of getting to school at six o’clock they pitch up with their chocolate biscuits at twenty-five past four and grab their children, moaning You were the
last one out. Huh! What matters more when it all comes down to it? Seashells, of course, and I was determined to find a really big one, one of those ones that rumble when you put them up to your ear, and look pretty on a sideboard.

It worked a treat, with the whole seashell thing we got to the sixth floor like a dream, me, the kids and the bags. We didn’t have any mud left on our shoes, we were sweating, exhausted and boiling hot, ready to go to bed, and I felt a moment of happiness. I just wanted the kids to go straight to bed so that, easy as you please, we’d suddenly find it was the next morning, like other people do, the ones who go to bed at night because they’re tired, because they’ve managed to fill every hour of their day, and they get up in the morning because it’s normal, it has to be done and they do it − not like me who gets day and night all confused, who sits up while everyone else is crashed out and collapses when they’re all prancing around, and whenever I go out I wonder where everyone’s going, charging in every direction, tramping up and down the streets, some of them even make phone calls while they walk, how can anyone be that busy?

I put the big key into the lock of the third door on the left, that’s what the nightwatchman had said, and I hadn’t got it wrong, third on the left, the door opened… well, not all the way because it knocked into the bed which took up the whole room. We
slipped inside and all three of us sat down on it, there wasn’t anything else to do, there was no table, no chair, no wardrobe, nope, just the bed, and the room was hardly bigger than that bed.

I was worried Kevin would ask Is this the hotel? again, so I quickly told him Kevin, wee-wee then bed! Where? he asked. Where what? Wee-wee. I put out my hand to open the door and sidled out into the corridor, Kevin followed me, looking very unsure. The light was flickering like the bulb was about to blow, but it didn’t. I went along the corridor, it was full of numbered doors and at the end there were two grey doors which said “WC” and “Shower”. Phew! I’d been worried we might have to go back down to the first floor and I wouldn’t have had the heart to do it, no, I’d rather have had my kid pee out the window. That was when I realized the hotel was deserted, we hadn’t met anyone and, apart from the bulb on the blink, we couldn’t hear anything.

I opened the door to the toilet and pointed at it to Kevin, it stank in there, it really did, it smelt of sewers and rust, and the flush was dripping onto the toilet seat. Kevin didn’t want to sit down, he refused to do a wee so I said You’re going to learn to pee like a big boy, and it made me laugh the way he stood on tiptoe holding his tiny little willy in his hands, it’s funny how proud little boys are when they start peeing standing up.

When we went back into the bedroom Stan was already asleep with his clothes on in the double bed, and I suddenly thought He’s only nine… so I ran my hand over his damp hair and I felt like kissing him, but I didn’t, I didn’t want to wake him, it’s so unbelievable watching someone sinking into sleep, where does everybody go when they sleep, do they meet in their sleep, is there a kingdom of dreams, a real place, is it possible to land in someone else’s dream, no, no, I mustn’t start thinking like that, the psychiatrist at the health centre said, there are some ideas that take you straight to the bottom of the pit, he said, and I know he’s right. Stan was just a little boy sleeping, that’s what I should have thought, like the other mothers do before they switch the light off and go back down to finish the washing-up in the kitchen.

Are all three of us going to sleep in the same bed? asked Kevin, eyes wide with amazement, and I hadn’t thought about that. Go to bed, I said, and before he asked for it I explained I’m going to give you a T-shirt, you can suck it like it was your noonoo, even if it doesn’t smell the same, you’re a big boy now, you do your wees standing up. But are we all sleeping in the same bed? he asked again, and I could tell he was really worried about it. No, of course not, I replied and I wondered once again what I was going to do. Go to bed, I said quietly, the bed’s for Kevin and Stan. You’re
not going to leave us? he asked in a shrill panicky little voice like a girl’s − like the first time I left him at school, I remember, Are you leaving? he asked, sort of horrified, and one of the mothers laughed when she heard him, her kid probably didn’t love her anything like as much as mine loved me. I thought very fast and said I would sleep at the foot of the bed, I wouldn’t even feel their feet because they always slept curled up, I knew that, I often watched them sleeping at night, they were almost bent double, like they were cold.

Kevin wanted his pyjamas, his “hotel pyjamas”, the ones with Mickey Mouse on them, and it’s funny how it reassured him putting them on, They smell like home, he said. Well, it’s really worth the trouble taking them away! I thought, but the smell cheered me up, too, it smelt of my washing powder and of damp, the smell of my little boy, I put my head against his neck, necks are the softest bit on a child.

Kevin got into bed. The sheets aren’t new, he said, all reproachful, and he was right! they weren’t new at all, they were so worn they had holes, and some hadn’t even been mended. They’re clean, I said, but Kevin wasn’t listening, he was wondering how he was going to cope with this strange noonoo, he sucked one corner of it, spat it out, sucked another, tasted it… Stop! I said, you’ll make yourself thirsty, and where was I going to
find a drink in that hotel? Given the state of the toilets, the plumbing must be a mess, and I didn’t want my kids drinking rusty water.

When they were both asleep it was hard for me. The talking started all on its own in my head, I hate that, thinking is a nasty piece of work. Sometimes I’d rather be a dog, you can bet dogs never wonder what their place in life is or who they should follow, they just sniff the air and it’s all recorded, in there for ever. And they stick to it. Humans don’t have a sense of smell, that’s what’s dangerous. I’d like to be able to sniff around me and for everything to be clear, with just one meaning and no messing around. To stop the thinking I started humming a song, Brave sailor back from the war, Hushaby, my dad used to sing it when I was little, it used to make me cry, but it did me good now, singing an old song’s like finding a long-lost friend. Brave sailor back from the war, Hushaby, Your boots all worn, your clothes all torn, Brave sailor where have you been, Hushaby! It’s been the same sailor for thirty years, what I mean is the way I see him’s still the same, he’s still got his torn clothes and holes in his boots because it’s the bit about “boots all worn” that really matters, it’s terrible having sore feet, and shoes are the ruination of many a mother. I love saying that: many a mother! then heaving a sigh, overwhelmed, like the ones who wait at
twenty-five
past four, that’s when you feel like you’ve got
so much in common and might understand each other. For many a mother! mind you, you always have to sigh afterwards, never laugh, once with the social worker I got a fit of the giggles and when she took it badly I just couldn’t stop, she looked like she was busy silently loathing me, I could tell I wasn’t her favourite, I’m sure she’d rather lend her hanky than watch one of us have a good laugh.

Still, shoes
are
expensive. Tomorrow we’d be walking barefoot in the sand, we’d dip our feet in the water and laugh, so why couldn’t I get to sleep, didn’t even feel like singing any more. It’s like that sometimes: everything brings me down, I don’t know what to do with myself, what direction to point my dreams in, there must be paths I should follow, ones that aren’t dangerous, well edged, that’s right, with barriers everywhere, that’s important.

I heard a noise in the room next door, voices, banging against the wall, how could I have thought the hotel was deserted? That’s me all over, that is, when I’m on my own I think everyone’s disappeared. It took me ages to recognize my neighbours! Years, I reckon. Now I’ve clocked them, they don’t look unkind, but I still prefer going out when I can’t hear anything in the corridor, when I’m sure I won’t meet anyone. Of course there are some people I have to see. At the health centre, and school. I don’t like it when Marie-Hélène asks to see me, Kevin may well be her pet, I know that, but she
never gives praise, she’s always asking questions, Why hasn’t he got his plimsolls for gym? What time does he go to bed because he’s falling asleep in lessons? Oh, that Marie-Hélène! Sometimes, when I want to frighten Kevin, I threaten him with her, I say I’ll tell Marie-Hélène you didn’t finish your mashed potato and you wet the bed again. Of course I won’t, I won’t tell Marie-Hélène, but when you’re trying to bring up two nippers on your own you need a bit of authority.

My boys were asleep. Curled up. Like kittens. Kevin’s make-do noonoo was slipping out of his mouth, he always slept with his mouth open, because of his adenoids, I always used to think that when I had the money I’d get him the operation but now… now…

I looked out the window, couldn’t see a thing. I’m used to looking out at the buildings opposite and I like it, seeing people moving about behind their curtains and all the little lights coming on in the evening, it’s pretty and we’re all in the same boat, tucked away in our boxes, that’s the way it should be, I like it. Here I couldn’t see a thing, not even car headlights or a street lamp, nothing. What was it going to be like in broad daylight? What was there outside my window? The sea? No, I couldn’t hear anything and anyway a hotel by the sea would have been too expensive, I’d have steered clear of that. So? What was facing me out there that I
couldn’t see? The bus station? A building site with cranes and lorries and all that racket, something being built or demolished? I hate that, houses torn in half, I can’t stand seeing the colour of the wallpaper in houses half torn down, I can’t think of anything sadder. Shouldn’t have started trying to imagine it, everything was possible beyond that window, I had to be ready for anything, I should just forget it, forget it straight away before it gave me nightmares.

I got undressed, my clothes were soaked, rain, sweat, all smelly and stuck to my skin, but I didn’t have the strength to go and wash at the far end of the corridor. I put on my nightdress and lay down at the foot of the bed, pulling the bedspread over me, it was cramped, we must have been quite a sight, the three of us huddled there! The three of us… That was nice to say, too. The children didn’t move, I could hear them breathing, it was the first time I’d slept next to them and, hearing them breathing like that, I knew I was the one who’d given them that breath. Me. What a job life is… what a funny old job…

I thought about that and then went to sleep. I hadn’t taken my medicine but no one sat on me that night. I was like everyone else that night. Tired by the journey and the emotion, and probably because I really couldn’t think about what was coming next. I slept like I do during the day. Without dreams.
Without pictures. Without feeling good or bad, perhaps without living, yes, I slept like the dead in that strange town, but still I knew that the next day my kids would have their first glimpse of the sea.

The next day was really bad luck, it was raining again. Apart from the dim morning light it was hard not getting day and night confused in that town. There wasn’t much room for the light, no one had arranged for it, you could tell that right away. I don’t know what the time was when I woke, but the kids were already up, they were by the window having a raindrop race: they each chose one at the top of a pane and the first to reach the bottom was the winner.

I wondered what they could see through the window, what the rain was hiding.

Mum! Kevin cried when he saw I was awake, and that’s a wonderful thing! The way a littl’un says hello to you in the morning, as if you were the surprise of the day, the piece of good news he’d given up on. In the morning it was always like Kevin had missed me, I wonder where he goes at night to make him feel he’s coming back from so
far away. When it’s a school day Stan won’t let him into my room, I know that, but often on Sundays, when they’ve finished watching their cartoons, he doesn’t hold back then, oh no, he jumps onto my bed and asks me to give him a farty kiss, that’s a big kiss on his tummy which makes a lot of noise and it makes him laugh so much you wouldn’t believe it, it’s like he’s laughing to hear himself laugh, that he’s making the most of that laughter, having fun with it, and I know that a laugh like that runs away the minute you grow up.

I’m hungry! he said, and if there’s one thing Kevin never forgets it’s being hungry, sometimes I feel like a larder. We’ll go to a café, I said, but neither of them looked convinced by that and I added We’ll order and we’ll be served! They looked at me suspiciously like I was telling a fib, so I got up and then I couldn’t help smiling – never mind my gappy gums, I was too proud of myself, I rummaged through the blue sports bag, took out my tea tin and tipped it out onto the bed, regretting it didn’t make more noise: I spilled out all my money! All of it! Everything I’d put by to have fun some day, all my little savings scrimped from the change at the baker and sometimes at the supermarket.

The kids didn’t touch the money, they just looked at it, cautiously, like they were meeting
someone
new. Can we have an ice cream? Kevin asked to
make sure, and I was convinced he was no longer missing school. Plonker! Stan said quietly, in a café you drink coffee! And, anyway, there’s practically only twenty-centime coins left! Really? I said. Only twenty-centime coins? And I looked a bit closer. The boys sat down next to me on the bed, peering at my treasure like some strange creature. It’s true there weren’t many ten-franc coins, but hey! It was my scrimpings not an investment, a bit extra, okay! I didn’t want them to see my disappointment, but at the same time I resented them for showing so little enthusiasm. Stan started counting the coins with such a serious expression you’d have thought he was picking up something I’d broken, sorting out some stupid accident, that’s what they teach them at school: to be distrustful. Me, I’ve always had trouble managing my budget, I’ve got to admit there’s not a lot to manage and also, as soon as I get my allowance, I celebrate, I mean I spend it. Not on me, no. On the kids. Always on the kids. Once one of the social workers asked me if I drank. Who? Me? Never touched a drop of alcohol, I mean, who the hell does she take me for, really! I rang the health centre like a shot and complained: Who did you send me? I asked, a social worker who thinks I drink! They apologized. That’s how it works. Everyone’s always waiting for you to put a foot wrong, for you to fall, it’s like walking on soap, yes, our lives are full of soap, that’s what I think.

There’s fifty-two francs and thirty-five centimes, Stan announced. I’ve been had. Money isn’t worth anything any more. Stan was right not to trust appearances, all those coins added together meant nothing. Kevin’s convictions and happiness started wavering, Is that a lot? he asked, pulling a face… Yeah, I said nastily, specially with the thirty-five centimes, and it wasn’t the littl’un I was annoyed with but the bloody money. Kevin gave a half-smile and said Great! and heaved a big sigh of relief. It’s hard living up to a child’s hopes. Right! I said, we’re going to buy some biscuits and a bottle of water, and we’re going to have a picnic down by the sea! It’s raining, Stan said like it was my fault, and that was when I’d had enough. Nothing was working. Nothing was taking off. I asked them to play with the raindrops and went back to bed, but in the middle of it this time, not at the foot like an animal. The sheets were still all warm from the boys, I hugged the pillow to me and pulled the blankets over my head so I couldn’t see anything, couldn’t hear anything. Except I could still hear. Kevin was snivelling and stamping his feet, But I’m hungry! he kept saying and, however hard Stan tried to stop him, he kept at it.

I wanted to get back to the night before, that night without dreams or insomnia, the one that detached me from myself, I wanted to get back to that place with no threats that I’d fallen into,
but I’d lost it for good. Did I have the same night as other people that time? Is this what they got every evening, a reward for getting through their day so well? I’m never rewarded and my sleep’s like a knife hacking through the threads I cling to during the day. I’m abandoned. Dumped. And it started again. Instead of getting back to the night before, I went far and deep into my chilling black thoughts. I know them well. I didn’t want to stay there, swimming in them and drowning. I could still hear the boys, I hung on to their voices, I had to get back up to where they were, to answer them. I sat up with a start, I didn’t really know where I was, but I knew I had to stay. Here. In this room. I saw the kids, talking very quietly, looking out of the window, arguing without making a sound.

My Kevin! I cried, let’s go and eat! And it became urgent, the only thing to do, and straight away: eat! eat! eat! That’s what the rest of the world was doing, that’s what you had to do to feel alive: eat! eat! eat! Let’s get dressed and then we’re off! I said. They didn’t move, I got back into my clothes from the day before, they were cold and smelt horrible, I stayed under the covers to put them on… what if someone brought us breakfast up on a tray? It would be a miracle! Afterwards we’d go back to sleep, how wonderful! And why shouldn’t the sea come to us too, yes, why shouldn’t it come and settle at the foot of our bed, why shouldn’t we be
allowed that for once in our lives? If I could make a wish it would be this: for the sea to come to the foot of my bed. When I was little my father didn’t only sing Brave Sailor Back from the War, he also sang a love song which said that in the middle of the bed the river runs deep and a hey and a ho, and that bed was a real princess’s bed, a four-poster with hangings, not like in this brown hotel, oh no, you wouldn’t get a river running through here, so the sea… forget it!

I like songs. They say things I can’t seem to say. If I didn’t have these rotten teeth I’d sing a lot more, a lot more often, I’d sing my boys to sleep in the evenings, tales of sailors and magical beds, but there you are, we can’t be good at everything, we can’t know how to do everything, all of it, that’s what I tell the social worker till I’m blue in the face.

I got up. The lino was freezing, and sticky too. I wanted to see what was outside the window, but that wasn’t possible because there was a wall on the other side of the window, a huge wall, and I wanted to know what was beyond the wall. Was it the back of a building, the back of a prison, the back of a changing room, and the far side there was a sun-filled meadow with kids playing ball games, hmm? What was it? Another hotel for this town nobody lives in, a place everyone comes and sniffs around for a few days before leaving again on
the bus? Ha! No point thinking about it, it was just a bloody great sun-block, a life-block, a fucking concrete wall, I didn’t want to look at it any more, or try to find out its secrets.

You look like a couple of old rags, I told the boys, I bet you haven’t washed. I showed Stan how I can pee standing up, said Kevin. Oh, yes, I said, well, the bathroom’s right next door, why didn’t you nip in there, hmm? Stan says there’s
creepy-crawlies
, muttered Kevin, wrinkling his nose. Creepy-crawlies don’t eat great big things like you, Stan, didn’t you tell him that? And now you look like a couple of pigs. Stan stared at the end of his trainers and said he didn’t want me to wake up all alone. Well I never! How does he know, my Stan, how does he know I often feel lost when I wake up? He must spy on me, unbelievable but yes, like when I sit for hours in the kitchen and he waits behind the door. Does my little boy watch me sleeping? And who’s going to watch me sleeping tomorrow?

You’ve got to wash your faces at least, I ordered, and they seemed to like that. I’ve noticed how kids love doing what they’re told, what everyone else is doing. Sometimes Stan even lays it on a bit, saying things like We have to brush our teeth after every meal. Oh yeah? And where did you see that? On the telly? No, my teacher said it. God, you wouldn’t believe the power they have, those teachers, they could make them eat anything, they could tell them
to walk on their hands and for sure there’d be no more spending a fortune on shoes!

We slipped quietly along the corridor but the bathroom was occupied. Right, this hotel wasn’t deserted at all, there were even people where we wanted to be, soon we’d be queuing to have a pee. What time was it? Were people getting ready to go to work? Were they smartening up to go to work? Why? Funny, it annoyed me not knowing who was shaving in there, or who was slapping it all over her face, make-up everywhere she could possibly put it, eyes cheeks mouth, the whole lot, and us stuck in the corridor waiting our turn!

I’m hungry, Kevin said again like they were the only words he knew, so I decided that was enough, my kids didn’t look like rags or pigs, I’d said that to be like all the other mothers, the ones who look for creepy-crawlies and want everything to be perfect, deep down I thought my boys were gorgeous and what was a bit of cold water going to do for us? I hadn’t come here to hang around while strangers washed their faces!

We went back to our room and they got dressed, Kevin had always worn Stan’s old clothes, and Stan clothes that were too big so that they lasted, and I’d never noticed that neither of them had things the right size. True, I’m not there when they get ready in the mornings, but now I could see that they didn’t look like the others, two little lads, one
too big and the other too small. Did they know that?

We put on our jackets, I gathered up the coins we’d abandoned on the bed and stuffed them into our pockets. I was really disappointed, mind, I thought I had much more, I’d even pictured myself saying Keep the change! to waiters and shopkeepers. I’d seen that done once, and then the person who’s meant to keep the money looks at you like they wanted to kiss your feet, they were definitely going to keep it, that change! There I was thinking I had a treasure… money should be worth what we want it to be.

I’ve got lots of money! said Kevin, weighing up his pocket, but Stan shrugged his shoulders. Shame, I was prepared to believe it. Once again we left the room one behind the other, slipping through the half-open door, I felt like I’d been doing that all my life – slipping through things, I mean.

The stairs were easier going this way, but just as dark. Kevin had fun going down with both feet together, I could tell he was happy. Stan looked at the numbers on the doors, the arrows, the emergency exits, Stan always tries to read any writing,
everywhere
, ever since Year 1 he’s wanted to make
everything
out, I don’t know what he’s looking for. I was wondering what we would find downstairs, what daylight would do to this town, would we see some pavements at last and some street names?

Each wrapped up in our thoughts, separated by them, we reached the ground floor without even realizing it and not out of breath, like relaxed
travellers
, tourists ready to explore the town. Shame there was no one in the foyer, I’m sure I looked a picture with my two boys.

The town was like the hotel: not deserted at all. Unbelievable how many people there were milling around in the rain, I was stunned. I had no idea what time it was and I didn’t know what was driving these people in every direction. Life, it’s an anthill! People hurry along, they brush past each other, knock into each other, every now and then they swear at someone or kiss hello, How are you? Fine! And then they watch all the others walking by.

No one was looking at us three, standing
stock-still
in the rain, hard to know which way to go to find a café. I decided to do what I did the night before: act like I knew what I was doing. What matters is looking like you know.

The roads were still just as muddy, the ground was sodden but no one paid attention. These people weren’t out for a stroll, oh no, they were trotting along busily, not looking up but not getting lost either. They all looked like they had somewhere to go, they seemed to know the way by heart. I set off at random, in my I-know-what-I’m-doing mode, the kids trusted me and that brought me luck
because guess what we came to? You’d have thought it was expecting us! The sea, yes, the sea! Bang in the middle of town, now that’s something. You’re looking for a café and you find the ocean, that doesn’t happen every day, it was quite a surprise.

I stopped on the sea wall, my two kids holding my hands, I wondered how to do it, how to say hello to the sea. It was making a hellish noise, really angry, and the children cowered. I stayed there, not moving a muscle, watching it… I’d been waiting for it such a long time! Will it come right up to us? Kevin asked. Of course! Stan teased, it’s going to come right up and shake your mit! Really? said the littl’un… My God! Children really are prepared to believe anything, I could have admitted to him that I dreamt of seeing the sea at the foot of my bed.

I’ve got to say Kevin was frightened out of his tiny mind, not at all in the mood for looking for shells or running through the lapping waves – lapping waves were thin on the ground, these were huge great waves stretching out furiously, not something you wanted to get close to. It wasn’t very inviting and the rain didn’t help. It really did look like it was coming towards us, at least it was trying to, gathering itself up, building the waves high to reach us and then falling back down… it was up to us to get closer. We’d better move, I told the kids, we’ll dissolve in all this water, and down we went onto the beach, the littl’un still wary, I
could tell from the way he squeezed my hand, he’d have been happier backing away, that’s for sure, and landing safe and warm in the classroom with Marie-Hélène, him being her favourite.