G03 - Resolution (23 page)

It was a good area, full of architectural finds, large cars and delicatessens. The houses had burglar alarms outside, flashing red or blue high on the walls. As she turned the corner and approached the house, she knew that Una was inside because her pride and joy, her green Rover, was parked in the street under the shade of an old tree. It was a company car, a symbol of her success, and the leather seats and walnut dash reassured her that she was making it.

Una’s house was the bottom floor in a squat three-story tenement. The large three-bedroom flat had two reception rooms and a big kitchen that led into a sliver of private garden, most of it concreted over. The reception rooms were at the front and, as she approached, Maureen saw that the lights were on in the living room.

In the street in front of the flat was a small fenced-in island garden. It was thirty feet across and a hundred yards long, with signs on the gates reserving use of the garden for key holders and residents. A driver had crashed into the fence and the replacement chicken wire hadn’t been soldered yet. Maureen pulled out the overlap, climbed through, and sat on a bench directly opposite Una’s front room. She watched and waited.

In the course of an hour and a half no one came into the room but as the light began to fade she noticed movement through the open door in the hallway. She waited until she could be sure of what she was seeing, worked out the geography of the house, and slipped out of the garden, following the lane round to the back of the flat.

Una would have done up the garden for the baby coming; she was too organized and controlling to let a major consideration like that slip by, but when Maureen got there and peered through the thin hedge, she discovered that nothing had changed. The concrete was still there; three white plastic garden chairs were still sitting out, uncleaned after the grimy winter. Maureen was so self-involved she’d forgotten about Una’s troubles, hadn’t really considered how hard Alistair’s affair with the upstairs neighbor must have hit her sister.

Crouching down, keeping her head below the hedge, she looked into the brightly lit kitchen. The windows were barred with Venetian blinds and she had to concentrate hard to see, screwing up her eyes and disciplining herself to stare at one slit of light despite movement in others.

Una had changed her hair. It was a relationship-breakup hairdo, a radical change, chosen in a state of upset. She’d cut it short, above her ears, and had streaked it different hues of blond. She was sitting at the table with her back to the window, her hands busy in front of her. Alistair came and went from the room, bringing things, taking a nappy bag away. He kept his eyes down, only looking at Una’s chest, smiling when she wasn’t talking to him. Una must be holding the baby, feeding it. The television news flickered blue and gray on the worktop. Una was usually meticulous about the house but dirty plates and baby bottles were stacked on the counter, and the table was strewn with wipes and a blanket.

Una tugged at her jumper and lifted a bleary-eyed baby to her shoulder. Maureen couldn’t see its face — the blind was in the way—just a tiny red mouth and chubby jowls. The mouth opened and a slick of white sick dripped down Una’s shoulder. It took her a moment to feel the wetness of it. She looked at the baby, as if demanding an explanation, and sat it in a plastic carry-chair, folding the handle back. Then she turned and spoke to what Maureen had assumed was the top of a gray soft toy before leaving the room.

The man stood up unsteadily, looking at the baby, and turned to the window, his face red, sweat stains on his collar, and Maureen knew him immediately. It was Michael.

He was eating a slice of toast when he opened the door and looked out at her. He didn’t speak. He took in the vomit splatters on her T-shirt, her dirty, cut knees and the hedge leaves in her hair. She tried to look up at him but only got as far as his chin when she started to cry and raised a hand to hide her face. Liam dropped his toast on the floor and reached out, took her by the wrist like a lost child and pulled her into the house. It took over an hour to suture the tears.

“Calmer?” asked Liam.

She wiped her face, feeling like an idiot.

“Come on.” He took her into the kitchen, sat her on a chair at the table and poured some milk into a pan. As he took the Ovaltine out of the doorless cupboard he caught her eye and smiled at her. She breathed in, shuddering at the unaccustomed depth. “Are you making that for me because I’m a pathetic fucking idiot?” she said.

“Yeah.”

He set two cups on the worktop, spooning sugar and malty powder into them. Liam had been forced to stop refurbishing the kitchen because of his resit exam, but he’d already ripped the doors off all the cupboards and pulled up the filthy lino. It was quiet in the house and there was comfort in watching Liam, sure and steady, performing a chore. Maureen prayed that he wouldn’t be mentioned in the court case. She wiped her nose on her hand. “It’s nice in here.”

Liam looked at her skeptically as he poured the warm milk into the powder.

“I mean it’s nicer. Cleaner. It’s clean.”

Liam put the cup down in front of her. “Drink that,” he said. “It’ll calm ye down.”

“How?” She sniffed. “Is it drugged?”

Liam grinned as he sat down. “Yeah,” he said, and made a joke of forgetting which mug had the drugs in it and reaching anxiously for her cup. When she wrapped her hands around the warm mug the gentle heat seeped into her chilled fingertips. She sipped it and the creamy drink slid down her throat, warming her tired, tight belly. “Have ye watched that video yet?” she asked.

“Oh, God, no, not yet,” said Liam. “I’m building up to it. Are ye going to tell me what happened to you tonight, or will I guess?” Guess.

“Una?”

Maureen nodded.

“Michael?”

She nodded again, seeing Michael’s face again in her mind’s eye. Her stomach tightened and she had to rub her eyes hard to make the image go away.

“Mauri, he’s not going to abuse a newborn baby. The baby isn’t you, remember? Alistair’s there, Una’s there, and they’ve got a nanny coming in during the day. Una won’t leave the baby with Michael. I don’t even know if he’s going to be there that much.”

She looked up at him, appreciating the kind lies, knowing he meant well.

“I went over there,” she said quietly. “I saw Michael through the window. Una left the baby alone with him.”

Liam sighed. “Mauri, why did you go there?”

“I just wanted to know. I want to know where he is. I want to know what he’s doing and what he looks like …”

“You’re just upsetting yourself.”

“I want to know, I need to know things …”

“Honestly, spying on him through a window. Ye couldn’t know everything that goes on, you’ll just worry yourself.”

Maureen sat back and looked out of the window at the dark garden. “I’d like to know everything,” she said wistfully. “Everything I’ve ever wondered about. D’ye ever think that?” She tried to smile at him but Liam looked worried. “I’d like to know everything about everyone. No mysteries left. No secrets.”

Liam sipped his drink and looked at her, licking the frothy mustache from his top lip. “He’s not a well man, Mauri. By the time the wean’s up a bit he’ll probably be dead.”

“How can she see him?” said Maureen, getting angry. “How can she have him in her house? He’s nothing to us. He was never even there.”

Liam pulled a cigarette out of his packet and lit up. “I think Una and Marie remember him differently than we do. All he ever was to us was trouble. I think they remember him before he got really bad. You know? Happier times.”

“Well, I don’t remember any of them.”

“But I think that’s what they’re chasing, those happier times. He’s very sick.”

“What’s wrong with him?” asked Maureen, hoping for a virulent cancer.

Liam watched her drink her Ovaltine. “Winnie thinks it’s a brain tumor,” he said solemnly.

Winnie never suspected anyone of having a slight cold or being overtired. For Winnie every symptom spoke a massive, dramatic, terminal malfunction. Maureen spluttered the milky drink over the table and they started laughing, looking around the room, enjoying the release. Suddenly she remembered Michael alone with the baby. Her face became hot and she began to cry again. She caught her breath. “Just the mild headaches, then?” she said, wiping Ovaltine off her chin.

Liam snorted and leaned over in his chair, balancing on two legs as he picked up the kitchen roll from the worktop. He pulled three sheets off the roll and mopped up the milky mess in front of Maureen. “I think,” he said, “it’s a bit more than that. He shakes a lot and his legs are a bit unsteady. He can’t really be left alone.”

“What do the doctors say?”

“He won’t go. They’ll tell him to stop drinking and smoking. Keeps insisting there’s nothing wrong with him. I think he’ll be dead by Christmas.”

“They said that about the war.”

Chan, Liam’s Chinese student lodger, tiptoed down the passageway into the dark kitchen. He nodded politely to them, bending from the waist and smiling. “Hello,” he said, pretending not to notice Maureen’s swollen eyes and red nose.

“Hi, Chan,” said Maureen.

“Yeah,” said Liam, gruffly.

Sensing the extent of his intrusion, Chan grabbed a family-size packet of crisps from his open food cupboard and left as quickly as he had come in.

“He’s paying rent here, Liam, ye shouldn’t be so rude to him.”

“I fucking hate having strangers in here. Why can’t they fuck off home for summer?” He stood up and picked up his cup. “Let’s go outside.”

They sat on the cold stairs leading up to the garden. Neighborhood cats yowled at one another, creeping through the undergrowth.

“Una’s very bitter,” said Liam sadly. “I swear she’s spending time with him because it upsets everyone.”

“What the fuck is she bitter about? She wanted a kid, she’s got one, she’s got a good job and a nice house. Marriages split up but she’s not exactly on her uppers, is she?”

“Yeah, well.” Liam sighed and scratched his neck. “Una had hopes, I think.”

“More fool her,” muttered Maureen, watching the moonlight creep about the garden.

“I don’t know if it is foolish,” said Liam. “I think it’s kind of hopeful. Coming out of Winnie and George’s house and dreaming of a good life. It was one of the things I liked most about her. She’s as sour as a leech now.”

“Yeah?”

“Aye. Sees badness everywhere. It’s a shame. Bitterness is a terrible thing. Sucks the good out of everything. What would you hope for? If you could have anything.”

Maureen smiled at the thought of herself having a future but Liam was earnest. “Dunno,” she said, looking out into the dark garden. “Maybe I’d go back to college. I’d be a curator and be surrounded by beautiful things. I’d be content, I suppose. Stop worrying all the time.”

He tutted derisively, as if she’d never known a moment’s grief. “What are you worried about?”

“What’ve ye got?” she said, chewing an imaginary match.

“Just you bide your time, wee hen,” said Liam softly. “Don’t worry about Michael. You’ll see, one day soon, everything’ll come up, Maureen.”

Maureen smiled and nodded, but she knew she would be watching Michael night after night just to know where he was in the city.

The Sheriff Court was a huge building facing the river with modernist columns in gray granite and windows set well back, giving it a solemn, unwelcoming air. Maureen had been fresh and clean when she left the market but during the short walk across the bridge the hot sun made her legs damp and her skirt ride up, the thin inner lining gathering around her waist. She kept expecting McGee’s hand on her shoulder as she came off the bridge and followed the path to the imposing front steps. The doorway was four stories high, a smoked-glass window leading into a vast lobby and the hollow heart of the courts. Inside the door, security staff were gathered around a high-arched metal detector. Two large signs, one on each wall, ordered people to leave their knives, swords and guns outside. Maureen walked through the metal detector without setting it off and approached a reception desk. “I’m looking for the small-claims court,” she said, and noticed that her voice sounded shaky.

The man behind the counter nodded her to a spiral staircase in the center of the lobby. “Court three,” he said. “Up to the top.”

Her knees were trembling as she climbed the stairs but she thought of Ella lying on the cold metal trolley in the makeshift chapel and took hold of the handrail firmly, pulling herself up. The door to the court was locked and the claimants had to wait on soft chairs in the corridor, facing one another, watching for their adversaries to come and sit next to them. An old man across from Maureen, dressed in his best cheap suit, scraped the sweat from his palms with the edge of an underground ticket. A woman next to him was twitching and being comforted by her tarty daughter in a pink plastic skirt and white vest top. Everyone had their papers with them, held in folders or envelopes, some with crumpled letters from the court, folded to fit into a pocket. Maureen sat down and watched the stairs. At exactly two thirty a small man in a blue uniform unlocked the door from the inside, pinning it open into the corridor.

The court was partitioned off into concentric circles by low wooden walls. In the center of the room stood a large, highly polished table with wigged and gowned lawyers sitting around it, speaking quietly to one another and looking through papers. The lawyers’ strange outfits made them look like the perpetrators of a bizarre practical joke. Below the judge’s bench, sitting alone, was a young woman with silver-rimmed glasses and a dark, sleek bob showing beneath her white wig. Surrounding the table was a low wooden partition wall with areas for hemming in the public, the jury and, farthest away and higher than everyone else, the judge’s big fancy chair.

The man in the blue uniform told the public to sit down in the two rows of benches near the door. Maureen tried to get in first in case Si turned up and she had to sit near him, but everyone wanted to sit there. She had to settle for a seat next to the aisle. When they were all sitting down the bobbed woman lawyer explained that she was the clerk of the court. As their cases were called, she said, they were to stand up and come through the little partition gate to the big table and wait to be asked about the details.