Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit (12 page)

There is an order and a balance to be found in stories.

History is St George.

And when I look at a history book and think of the imaginative effort it has taken to squeeze this oozing world between two boards and typeset, I am astonished. Perhaps the event has an unassailable truth. God saw it. God knows. But I am not God. And so when someone tells me what they heard or saw, I believe them, and I believe their friend who also saw, but not in the same way, and I can put these accounts together and I will not have a seamless wonder but a sandwich laced with mustard of my own.

The salt beef of civilisation rumbling round in the gut. Constipation was a great problem after the Second World War. Not enough roughage in the diet, too much refined food. If you always eat out you can never be sure what’s going in, and received information is nobody’s exercise.

Rotten and rotting.

Here is some advice. If you want to keep your own teeth, make your own sandwiches …

J
OSHUA

‘T
HERE, ‘ DECLARED MY
mother, laying down the vacuum cleaner. ‘You could keep a coffin in here without feeling guilty, not a speck of dust anywhere.’

Mrs White came out of the lobby waving a dishcloth. ‘I’ve done all them skirting boards, but me back’s not what it was.’

‘No,’ my mother answered, shaking her head, ‘these things are sent to try us.’

‘Well at least we know they’re holy,’ said Mrs White.

The parlour was certainly very clean. I poked my head round the door and noticed that all the seat covers had been changed to our very best, my mother’s wedding best, a present from her friends in France. The brasses gleamed, and Pastor Spratt’s crocodile nutcracker took pride of place on the mantelpiece.

‘What’s all the fuss about,’ I wondered. I went to check the calendar, but as far as I could see we weren’t down for a house meeting, and there was no visiting preacher due on Sunday. I went into the kitchen where Mrs White was making a sad cake, a round flat pastry filled with currants and spread with butter.

For a moment she didn’t notice me.

‘Hello,’ I said. ‘What’s going on?’

Mrs White turned round and gave a little screech. ‘You’re supposed to be at violin practice.’

‘It’s cancelled. Anybody else here?’

‘Your mother’s gone out.’ She sounded a bit nervous, but then she often did.

‘Well I’ll take the dog out then,’ I decided.

‘I’m just going to the toilet,’ said Mrs White, disappearing out of the back door.

‘There’s no paper …‘I began, but it Was too late.

We set off up the hill, climbing and climbing until the town was beaten flat. The dog ran off down a trench and I tried to spot various landmarks, like the dentist and the Rechabite Hall. I thought I might go and see Melanie that night. I had told my mother as much as I could, but not everything. I had a feeling she wouldn’t really understand. Besides, I wasn’t quite certain what was happening myself, it was the second time in my life that I had experienced uncertainty.

Uncertainty to me was like Aardvark to other people. A curious thing I had no notion of, but recognized through second-hand illustration. The feeling I now had in my head and stomach was the same as on that Awful Occasion, and that time, as I stood by the tea urn in the vestry, I had heard Miss Jewsbury say, ‘Of course, she must feel very uncertain.’ I was very upset. Uncertainty was what the Heathen felt, and I was chosen by God.

That Awful Occasion was the time my natural mother had come to claim me back. I’d had an idea that there was something curious about the circumstance of my birth, and once found my adoption papers hidden under a stack of flannels in the holiday drawer. ‘Formalities,’ my mother had said, waving me away. ‘You were always mine, I had you from the Lord.’ I didn’t think about it again until there was a knock on the door one Saturday. My mother got there before me because she was praying in the parlour. I followed her down the lobby.

‘Who is it Mum?’

She didn’t answer.

‘Who is it?’

‘Go inside until I tell you.’

I slunk off, thinking it was either Jehovah’s Witnesses or the man from the Labour party. Before long I could hear voices, angry voices; my mother seemed to have let the person
in, which was strange. She didn’t like having the Heathen in the house. ‘Leaves a bad atmosphere,’ she always said.

I remembered something I’d seen Mrs White do on the fornication occasion. Reaching far back into the War Cupboard, behind the dried egg, I found a wine glass and put it against the wall. It worked. I could hear every word. After five minutes I put the glass away, picked up our dog, and cried and cried and cried.

Eventually my mother came in.

‘She’s gone.’

‘I know who she was, why didn’t you tell me?’

‘It’s nothing to do with you.’

‘She’s my mother.’

No sooner had I said that than I felt a blow that wrapped round my head like a bandage. I lay on the lino looking up into the face.

‘I’m your mother,’ she said very quietly. ‘She was a carrying case.’

‘I wanted to see her.’

‘She’s gone and she’ll never come back.’ My mother turned away and locked herself in the kitchen. I couldn’t think and I couldn’t breathe so I started to run. I ran up the long stretchy street with the town at the bottom and the hill at the top. It was Easter time and the cross on the hill loomed big and black. ‘Why didn’t you tell me,’ I screamed at the painted wood, and I beat the wood with my hands until my hands dropped away by themselves. When I looked out over the town, nothing had changed. Tiny figures moved up and down and the mill chimneys puffed out their usual serene smoke signals. On Ellison’s Tenement they had started to run the fair. How could it be? I had rather gaze on a new ice age than these familiar things.

When I finally went home that day, my mother was watching television. She never spoke of what had happened and neither did I.

Knowing Melanie was a much happier thing, so why was I beginning to feel so uncomfortable? And why did I not
always tell my mother where I stayed at night? It was usual for our church to spend time, days and nights, in each other’s homes. Until Elsie got sick I stayed with her a lot, and I think she knew where I was, on the nights I didn’t arrive. Melanie and I stayed there together sometimes, long sleepless nights till the light filled the window and Elsie fetched us coffee.

‘Whatever do you talk about?’ she scolded, as we yawned and fumbled our way through breakfast. ‘Still, I was the same.’

Now that Elsie was in hospital we had to be more careful. She stayed at my house once, and my mother very carefully made up the camp bed in my room.

‘We don’t need it,’ I told her.

‘Yes you do,’ she told me.

Early in the morning, about two a.m., when the World Service closed down, we heard her come slowly up the stairs to bed. I had learned to move quickly. She stood by my door for a few moments, then suddenly pushed it open. I could just see the braid at the bottom of her dressing gown. Nobody moved and then she was gone. She kept her light on all night. Soon afterwards I decided to tell her how I felt. I explained how much I wanted to be with Melanie, that I could talk to her, that I needed that kind of friend. And…. And…. But I never managed to talk about and…. My mother had been very quiet, nodding her head from time to time, so that I thought she understood some of it. When I finished I gave her a little kiss, which I think surprised her a bit; we never usually touched except in anger. ‘Go to bed now,’ she said, picking up her Bible.

Since that time we had hardly spoken. She seemed caught up in something, and I had my own worries. Today, for the first time, she was her old self, busy, and obviously wanting company, if Mrs White was around. I wanted to know what had happened to cheer her up, so I set off down the hill again with our dog circling behind.

‘Hello,’ I shouted, wiping my feet on the mat. The house was quite still. She had been there recently because the coffee
table in the parlour now had her Bible and Promise Box on it. She’d taken a promise out too. I looked at the rolled-up bit of paper. ‘The Lord is your strength and shield.’ Mrs White’s coat had gone, but she’d left her dishcloth on the chair. I took it into the kitchen. There was a note on the cupboard. ‘Gone to stay at Mrs White’s. Come to church in the morning.’

Now my mother never stayed in other people’s houses except when she went to Wigan on her business. It suited me though; I could go and stay with Melanie. So I fed our dog, had a wash and set off. As usual, when I had no money for the bus, I walked the couple of miles through the cemetery and round the back of the power station.

Melanie was doing the gardening.

‘What’s your mum planning tonight?’ I asked her.

‘She’s going to the club, then staying with Auntie Irene.’

‘What do you want to do?’ I went on, pulling up a few weeds.

She smiled at me with those lovely cat-grey eyes and tugged at her rubber gloves.

‘I’ll put the kettle on for a hot water bottle.’

We talked a lot that night about our plans. Melanie really did want to be a missionary, even though it was my destiny.

‘Why don’t you like the idea?’ she wanted to know.

‘I don’t like hot places, that’s all, I got sunstroke in Paignton last year.’

We were quiet, and I traced the outline of her marvellous bones and the triangle of muscle in her stomach. What is it about intimacy that makes it so very disturbing?

Over breakfast the next morning she told me she intended to go to university to read theology. I didn’t think it was a good thing on account of modern heresies. She thought she should understand how other people saw the world.

‘But you know they’re wrong,’ I insisted.

‘Yes, but it might be interesting, come on, we’ll be late for church. You’re not preaching are you?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘I was supposed to, but they changed it.’

We bustled through the kitchen and I stood on the stairs to kiss her.

‘I love you almost as much as I love the Lord,’ I laughed.

She looked at me, and her eyes clouded for a moment. ‘I don’t know,’ she said.

By the time we got to church, the first hymn was under way. My mother glared at me, and I tried to look sorry. We had slid in next to Miss Jewsbury who told me to keep calm.

‘What do you mean?’ I whispered.

‘Come and talk to me afterwards,’ she hissed, ‘but not till we’re out of sight.’

I decided she had gone mad. The church was very full as usual, and every time I caught someone’s eye they smiled or nodded. It made me happy. There was nowhere I’d rather be. When the hymn was over I squeezed a bit closer to Melanie and tried to concentrate on the Lord. ‘Still,’ I thought, ‘Melanie is a gift from the Lord, and it would be ungrateful not to appreciate her.’ I was still deep in these contemplations when I realized that something disturbing was happening. The church had gone very quiet and the pastor was standing on his lower platform, with my mother next to him. She was weeping. I felt a searing pain against my knuckles; it was Melanie’s ring. Then Miss Jewsbury was urging me to my feet saying, ‘Keep calm, keep calm,’ and I walking out to the front with Melanie. I shot a glance at her. She was pale.

‘These children of God,’ began the pastor, ‘have fallen under Satan’s spell.’

His hand was hot and heavy on my neck. Everyone in the congregation looked like a waxwork.

‘These children of God have fallen foul of their lusts.’

‘Just a minute … ,’ I began, but he took no notice.

‘These children are full of demons.’

A cry of horror ran through the church.

‘I’m not,’ I shouted, ‘and neither is she.’

‘Listen to Satan’s voice,’ said the pastor to the church, pointing at me. ‘How are the best become the worst.’

‘What are you talking about?’ I asked, desperate.

‘Do you deny you love this woman with a love reserved for man and wife?’

‘No, yes, I mean of course I love her.’

‘I will read you the words of St Paul,’ announced the pastor, and he did, and many more words besides about unnatural passions and the mark of the demon.

‘To the pure all things are pure,’ I yelled at him. ‘It’s you not us.’

He turned to Melanie.

‘Do you promise to give up this sin and beg the Lord to forgive you?’

‘Yes.’ She was trembling uncontrollably. I hardly heard what she said.

‘Then go into the vestry with Mrs White and the elders will come and pray for you. It’s not too late for those who truly repent.’

He turned to me.

‘I love her.’

‘Then you do not love the Lord.’

‘Yes, I love both of them.’

‘You cannot.’

‘I do, I do, let me go.’ But he caught my arm and held me fast.

‘The church will not see you suffer, go home and wait for us to help you.’

I ran out on to the street, wild with distress. Miss Jewsbury was waiting for me.

‘Come on,’ she said briskly, ‘let’s go and get some coffee and decide what you’re going to do.’ I went along with her, not thinking of anything but Melanie and her loveliness.

When we reached Miss Jewsbury’s house, she banged the kettle on to the gas ring, and pushed me by the fire. My teeth were chattering and I couldn’t talk.

‘I’ve known you for years and you were always headstrong, why haven’t you been a bit more careful?’

I just stared into the fire.

‘No one need ever have found out if you hadn’t tried to explain to that mother of yours.’

‘She’s all right,’ I murmured mechanically.

‘She’s mad,’ replied Miss Jewsbury very certainly.

‘I didn’t tell her everything.’

‘She’s a woman of the world, even though she’d never admit it to me. She knows about feelings, especially women’s feelings.’

This wasn’t something I wanted to go into.

‘Who told you what was going on?’ I asked abruptly.

‘Elsie,’ she said.

‘Elsie?’ This was too much.

‘She tried to protect you, and when she got ill that last time, she told me.’

‘Why?’

‘Because it’s my problem too.’

At that moment I thought the demon would come and carry me off. I felt dizzy.