Every Seven Years (4 page)

I feel so sad remembering it all. I feel
like a house without a fire in it. I glance at
Tam driving down the small road. He
looks as if he's had a good old fire burning
for the past seven years in him. His cheeks
are pink, his eyes are shining. He's upright,
sitting proud of the seat back. He's wired
with bitterness and ready. I'm a sloucher.

It seems so odd, us being in a car together,
driving. Neither of us could drive
back then. Tam takes a minor cut-off
road and we follow the line of the hill, out
towards the furious sea. At the headland,
along the coast, the waves are forty feet
high, smashing higher than the bare black
cliffs. The sea is trying to claw its way onto
the land and failing. Each time it retreats
to catch its breath it fails. But it keeps trying.

Suddenly we see Paki Harris's house, a
stark silhouette against the coming storm.
It's one of those Victorian oddities that
seem inevitable because they've been there
for a hundred and fifty years. It is big,
squat, and solid. The roofline is castellated;
the windows are big and plentiful. The
wind coming straight off the water is perpetual
and incessant on this headland. The
house is an act of defiance, an elegant onefingered
salute to the wind and the ocean.

Very much like Paki himself, from what
I've heard.

Before I knew he might be my father,
before the note, I listened to stories about
Paki without prejudice. I knew they hated
my mum and loved Paki but I didn't see
him as anything to do with me. Paki was
a wild boy. Paki had bar fights and rode
ponies into the town on the Sabbath. Paki
pushed a minister into a bush. Paki
burned a barn down. I heard a lot of stories
about him. He was ugly but wild, and
wild is good here.

As we draw up to the house the big
heavy car is buffeted by the wind. Tam
finds a wind-shaded spot by the side. He
drives straight into it and pulls on the
hand break. He wants to talk to me before
we go in. He gets the hip flask out again. I
don't want anymore but he makes me take
it. And he tells me quietly what will happen:
he will knock on the front door. I will
go around behind the house to see if the
back door is open. If it is open, I will come
in and find the kitchen, first door on the
right. There is a knife block with carving
knives on it. Karen will come to the front
door and let Tam in. Tam will bring Karen
into the kitchen where I am hiding behind
the door with my knife. I will go for the
neck.

He looks at me for confirmation and I
nod. I shouldn't be scared, he tells me. He
will be right there. He smiles and makes
me drink more. He doesn't drink anymore
because he is driving. He's a cop. He can't
afford to lose his license.

We get out of opposite doors and I slip
around to the back of the house. Suddenly,
the wind pushes and shoves and
pulls at me and I have to crouch low and
run for the steps up to the door. It is open.
I'm in. I find myself breathless from the
pummeling wind and the short sharp run
up the worn stone steps.

In the dark stone hallway the house is
silent. I don't think Karen is in. This is an
eventuality that didn't occur to either of
us, so deep were we into our consensus. I
flatten myself against the wall and listen
to the creaking windows and the hiss of
the wind outside. At the far end of the hall
I can see the cold white light from the
front door spilling into the hallway.

Three knocks. Bam. Bam. Bam. Tam's
shadow is on the carpet. Karen isn't even
in.

I draw a deep breath.

A creak above. Not wind. A creak of
weight on floor above. Karen is standing
up somewhere. She takes a step, I feel her
wondering if she did hear someone
knocking. Then Tam knocks again. Bam.
Bam. Bam. She is sure now and comes out
to the upstairs hall. At the top of the stairs
she pauses, she must be able to see the
door from up there. She gives a little “oh”
and hurries down to Tam standing outside.
She seems a little annoyed by him as
she flings the door open.

Why are you knocking? she asks.

Tam keeps his eyes on the hall and slips
in, shutting the door behind him, taking
her by the elbow and pulling her into a
room.

Thomas? She's calling him his formal
name, his grown-up name. Why did you
wait out in that wind? Did the lawyer call
you? She's jabbering like a housewife talking
over a garden fence but Tam's saying
nothing back.

Their voices move from the hall to
nowhere to suddenly coming from the
first door on the right. They are in the
kitchen. They have gone through a different
door into the kitchen and I am supposed
to be in there right now with a knife
from the knife block.

For the first time in my life, I have
missed my cue.

I throw myself at the door and fall into
the room. Look up. There is Tam, standing
behind Karen, holding her by the elbow,
sort of, pushing her forward, toward me.

There, right in front of me, is a worktop
with a large knife block on it. A lot of
knives, maybe fifteen knives, all sizes, and
the wooden handles are pointing straight
towards the front of my hand. I can reach
out and be holding one in a second.

Karen's mouth is hanging open. Tam's
face is a glowering cloud of bitterness behind
her shoulder.

I say, Hello, Karen.

No one knows what to do for a moment.
We all stand still.

Hello, Else, says Karen.

If I was at home, in London, and a person
I had been at school with seven years
ago fell through my kitchen door I might
have a lot questions for them. Karen just
looks around the floor in front of her and
says, Cuppa?

It takes a moment to compute. Cuppa?
Cup of tea? Hot cup of tea for you?

Actually, I say, looking at Tam who is
getting more and more red in the face, A
cuppa would be lovely, Karen, thanks.

Expertly, as if she is used to doing it,
Karen twists her elbow to snake it out of
Tam's grasp and steps away. She picks the
kettle up off the range. She turns to look
at both of us, thinking about something
or other, and then she says, Well, I might
as well make a pot of tea.

No one answers. It's the action of the
elbow that makes me realize my gut was
right. Tam has held her by that elbow before.
And Karen has freed herself from
that grip many times. He knew she wasn't
in school today. I remember his look at me
last night, the laughing-eyed assessment
of me as he sat at the table.

She has her back to us as she fills it from
the tap. Tam nods me towards the knife
block. There it is, his face says, over there.

And my face says, What? What are you
saying? Oh! There? The knives! Oh, yes! I
forgot about a knife! Okay then! But inside
I'm saying something quite different.
It's not his fault. It's understandable because
I'm in a lot of crap on telly. Tam
doesn't know I'm a good actor.

Karen gets some mugs down and a
packet of biscuits. She's talking. To me.

Else, she says, I heard that your mum
died. And I know that she died before you
came to the school yesterday.

We look at each other and I see that she
is welling up. I'm so sorry, she says and I
wonder if she means about the book. But
she doesn't. About the talk, she says. You
must have felt that you couldn't cancel. Or
you were too shocked, I don't know, but
I'm sorry.

And then she puts her hand on my
forearm. I can see in her eyes that she is
really sorry, for my loss, for my mum, and
for the sorrows of all daughters and mothers
and I start to cry.

Karen's arms are around me, warm and
safe, and I hear her tut into my ear and say
Oh no, oh no, oh dear. She whispers to
me, I hope you like the book. I'm sobbing
too hard to pull away and she adds, Tam
remembered you liked it back then.

I don't think Tam can hear her. He
thinks we are whispering lady things. We
stand in this grief clinch for quite a long
time, until the whistle of the kettle calls an
end to the round.

She sits me down at the table and I
gather myself, wipe my face, and look at
Tam. Tam is staring hard at the table,
frowning furiously. He has given up making eye contact with me or nodding at
knives or anything. He hasn't heard it but
he has realized that I'm not going to stab
her and never was. He doesn't know what
to do now. Karen puts a plate of sugary
biscuits in front of me and gives me a cup
of tea.

And I've put sugar in that for you. I
know you don't take sugar probably, but
there's sugar in that because you've probably
had a bad shock.

Karen sits down, her knees towards me.
She picks up her mug and flicks a finger
out at him without looking.

Did he tell you?

I sniff, What?

She smiles,
Us
, she says, a wry curl
twitching at the side of her mouth.

I shake my head, baffled.

She glances at him. He is staring hard
at her but she says it anyway:
Married
.

I lift my sugary tea, for the shock, and
drink it though it is too hot. When I put
the mug down again, empty, I tell her that
my mum never said anything about that.

She hums. It was a secret. They married
on the mainland, didn't they, Tam. Tam?
Didn't they? In secret. Tam gives her nothing
back and that makes her sort of
snicker. Because of their families, you
know. Because she had a lot of money and
houses coming to her and he had nothing.
Her family didn't trust him. But, you
know, it didn't work out and no kids so,
no harm done. They're getting divorced
now. Aren't we Tam? Tam? Tam, are you
not going to speak at all?

Tam is so uncomfortable that he cannot
speak. He is eating biscuit after biscuit to
keep his face busy. He is doing a strange
thing with this head, not nodding or shaking
it but sort of jerking it sideways in a
noncommittal gesture.

Karen frowns at him. She doesn't understand.
She gives up trying and turns
her attention to me. So, what is going to
happen with your mum's funeral?

I tell her: I'm flying her out of there.
I'm taking her to London and I'm going
to have her cremated there. Karen says,
Wouldn't it be easier to have her cremated
nearby and then take her to London?

Tam came here to kill you, I say.

Karen says do I want another biscuit?

I actually wonder if I said that out loud
because she hasn't reacted at all. But then
I look at Tam's face and I know I did say it
out loud. Karen lifts the plate and offers
me another one, her face a perfect question:
biscuit? That's how they do things on
the island.

Tam stands up then, knocking his chair
over behind him. The sharp clatter on the
stone floor ricochets around the kitchen.
He turns to the door and walks out,
through the hall and out of the front door,
slamming it behind him. A skirl of wind
curls around our ankles.

Apropos of nothing, Karen says to me,
This was Paki Harris's house.

I eat a biscuit and when I've finished I
say, I know.

Karen nods. I don't know if you ever
discussed him with your mum?

No.

She puts a hand on my hand and
cringes, tearful again. Do you know who
your father is, Else?

We never discussed my father.

Hm. Karen doesn't know what she can
and can't say.

It just falls out of my London mouth:
You think Paki raped my mum and that's
why she ran him over?

Karen sighs. I don't know, she says, I
don't know what happened. Not for me to
know. But, Else, I think this house might
be yours.

I don't want it.

It's worth a bit of money—

I don't want it.

Karen looks at me and I can see she's
glad. She likes the house. She belongs here.
These are not sometimes houses.

I was so mean to you when we were
young. I'm sorry.

And I say, Oh! Forget it! because I'm
flustered.

But she can't. She's been thinking about
it, a lot, she says. But she is really sorry. She
was jealous, because I was an incomer. It
seems so free to me back then, she says, to
not be part of all of this—

Aren't you worried, Karen? I blurt, Tam
invited me here to stab you in the neck!
Doesn't that concern you? You've just let
him leave. Where's he going?

She looks fondly towards the front
door. Gone to get drunk, I think. It's a
rough week. Our divorce is final tomorrow.

And I understand finally. He wanted
her killed today so he could inherit this
house. And if I committed the murder I
couldn't inherit from a woman I killed. It
would be his outright.

I think he still has a thing about you.

Really?

Yeah.

I don't think so.

Well, you're wrong.

I look at her and realize that she's nice,
Karen. She's not bitter. She is tied to this
place and always will be. She accepts what
it is to be from here and of here. There's
no escape for Karen, not from my rapist
father's house or from Tam who wanted
to kill her. She accepts where she is and
who she is and what had happened. She's
like my mum. Karen is winning her race.

Let me drive you back to town, Else, as
an apology. And as a thank you, for soldiering
on yesterday. She pats my hand.
Soldiering on is important.

She goes out to the hallway and pulls on
a coat and I see past her to the vicious sea.
The wind is screeching a ferocious caw.
The waves are streaming over the cliffs.
The grass on the headland is flattened and
salted and Karen looks back at me. She
smiles her soft island smile that could
mean anything.

I am getting out of here. I am getting
away, and this time I'm taking my mum
with me.