The Bricks That Built the Houses (22 page)

The cold air feels hot and too thick to be air, it feels like he’s breathing porridge. He can’t take a proper breath, it’s like a hand has its thumb over the top of his windpipe. He used to care about things. He wanted to improve things. Challenge things. Understand things. Now it’s too much to hold anything in his head beyond the immediate. He can’t think of why he’s got no money, got no work. All he knows is that he’s got no money, got no work. Got no hope for a fulfilling life. He can’t see anything but Becky in his brain. He struggles, panics that he isn’t taking enough oxygen, he can feel his throat constricting. He walks fast, tries to forget the panic. Tells himself that he’s breathing already. He doesn’t have to think about it. He’s doing it. He’s breathing.

The slamming door brings Harry and Becky out of the kitchen, and Miriam and David out of the dining room. They stand in the hallway looking at each other.

‘What happened?’ Harry asks Miriam.

‘Has he gone?’ Miriam asks Harry. Neither acknowledges the other’s question.

‘Pete?’ Becky calls up the stairs but nothing comes down them.

‘Was that Pete that just went out the door?’ Harry asks no one.

‘Oh David.’ Miriam turns away from him.

‘I’m so sorry, love.’ David turns with her, talking to her back.

‘What happened?’ Becky asks them both.

‘We were talking, and I called him “son”. You know, a turn of phrase. And I think it upset him.’

‘It obviously upset him! Poor Pete.’ Miriam has one hand on her hip, the other holding her forehead.

‘Maybe he just went for a bit of air,’ Becky says. ‘He’ll probably be back in a second.’

They nod. Miriam looks heartbroken. Harry stands listlessly, feeling awkward without her brother there, the buffer between her and her mum.

‘Shall I put the kettle on, Mum?’ Harry asks her. ‘Cup of tea?’

‘Yes.’ Miriam agrees on tea, but doesn’t smile at her daughter. She turns to Becky, ‘I made afters. If anyone still wants?’

‘I, for one, would love a spot of crumble!’ says David, trying to cheer things up between them.

‘Doesn’t feel right though,’ Miriam says, heading to the kitchen to heat up the custard. ‘Him upset, and us eating crumble. Sweet boy.’ David walks after her, head hanging. Becky says nothing, just opens the front door and looks out at the empty cul-de-sac.

Harry wanders slowly into the kitchen behind David. ‘Have you made any plans for his birthday?’ she asks.

‘Oh yes, I’ve got a couple of ideas for gifts, but I’m not sure what he’s doing. Have you spoken to him?’

‘I’ve been thinking it might be nice to throw him a party.’ Harry leans against the worktop, waits for the kettle to boil. Miriam is by the fridge getting the custard. If they don’t look at each other, they can keep a conversation going much longer. ‘But, you know, he hates his birthday.’

‘Course he doesn’t, no one hates their birthday. People just worry no one will make a fuss. That’s all,’ Miriam explains patiently.

‘So you think it’s a nice idea?’ Harry throws a tea bag in the air and catches it. Throws it up again.

‘Yes of course. It’s about time he had a party.’ Miriam glances over her shoulder. ‘Don’t handle the tea bag like that.’

Harry puts the tea bag in a cup. ‘It’s alright, I’ll have that one.’

‘What kind of thing are you thinking?’

‘Well, knowing him.’ Harry pours the water, David makes a big show of fetching her the milk, bringing it over, even unscrewing the cap before passing it. Harry shouts towards the hallway, ‘WANT A TEA, BECKY?’ Waits for a reply but doesn’t hear one. She carries on. ‘It would have to be a surprise thing.’

‘Lovely idea.’

‘Yes.’ David lifts himself over the worktop and sits with his back against the wall, his feet swinging. ‘I LOVE surprise parties. SO much fun! Is it a big one this year?’

‘No, not particularly,’ Miriam tells him. ‘Twenty-seven,’ she says. Harry hands her a cup of tea, Miriam looks at it. ‘It’s a little strong for me actually.’ She turns to David. ‘Can I have a drop more milk, please, David?’

David jumps off the worktop and hurries over to the milk, which is still beside Harry, lifts it up and splashes a little more in Miriam’s cup. They smile at each other.

Harry feels a wave of anger. She breathes into it until it passes. She hands David his tea.

‘Perfect,’ David says. Harry nods her thanks.

Outside the front door Becky looks up and down the street but can’t see him. She calls him again. He doesn’t answer. She tries him one last time but it goes to voicemail. She walks back into the house and leans against the hallway wall. She can hear Miriam clucking about crumble.

Harry comes out of the kitchen. Nods at the phone in Becky’s hand. ‘Did he answer?’

‘No.’ Becky chews the inside of her lip. Looks at her phone.

Harry gets her coat from where it’s hanging over the banister. ‘Well,’ she says, ‘I’m heading home if you wanna go station?’ Harry is standing in her usual awkward stance, her shoulders like two pegs the rest of her hangs from.

‘I’ll just say goodbye to Miriam and David.’ Becky walks past her, touches her arm at the elbow.

In the kitchen Miriam and David are debating custard or ice cream. Miriam has put her apron on and is holding a dish of apple crumble.

‘Thanks for dinner,’ Becky says from the doorway. ‘I’m not gonna stay, actually, for pudding.’

‘Are you getting off then, love?’ Miriam puts the crumble down.

‘If Pete comes back here, tell him to call me, would you?’

‘Course I will. Likewise if you hear from him first.’ They smile at each other. ‘Such a pleasure to meet you.’ Miriam walks towards her, arms out, and takes her into a hug. Becky notices the apron she’s wearing matches the serviettes and hugs Miriam a little tighter. David, leaning against the fridge holding a tub of ice cream, pushes his glasses up his nose, smiling.

Harry walks beside Becky. They keep in step and watch the paving stones. Neither of them feels the need to speak. Becky pushes her hair out of her face, gathers her collar up round her neck. Everything about the day feels close. They hear every passing car and gurgling bird. Harry swings her arms at
her sides, walks on lazy legs. Becky’s hands are in her jacket pockets. They turn left at the end of the road. Harry points.

‘That’s the station, just down there.’ They keep walking, cross the road and through the doors, they look at the train times.

‘Where do you live?’ Becky asks.

‘Off Lewisham Way. Tanner’s Hill. You know it?’

‘Yeah, I live round the corner. In the block behind the high street,’ Becky says, smiling in surprise.

‘Deptford?’ Harry’s voice jumps up in excitement.

‘Yeah.’ Becky nods.

‘I would have thought I’d seen you ’round?’

‘Well, maybe you will now you know that I’m there.’ Becky studies the screen. Her hair ruffles in a passing wind that drills through the station; it touches her neck and she shivers. ‘There’s one in nine minutes.’

‘Come then.’

They walk down the steps, and up the other side. Becky blows on her hands and leans against the station wall. They watch the clock ticking over; one of the panels is broken and the 3 shows up like an 8.

‘They’re so nice, your family.’ Becky’s voice is soft, hushed on the empty platform.

Harry looks down at her feet, embarrassed. ‘We have our moments.’

‘It’s lovely. You all get on so well.’ Harry lets out a little laugh. ‘Why’s that funny?’

‘We never used to.’ She glances up into Becky’s eyes. Falls in, flounders. Clambers out.

‘What d’you mean?’ Becky feels the wind picking up around them, watches Harry’s outline.

‘Long story.’

‘Well’ – Becky looks up at the clock – ‘we got seven minutes.’ She closes her jacket around herself, her face is calm and cool.

Harry hunches inwards without realising, then slowly straightens. Her posture has never been good. She begins to speak, one word at a time, like feet treading a narrow path. ‘I didn’t speak to my mum for, like, ten years.’ Becky’s eyebrows climb. Harry shrugs. ‘She couldn’t deal with my . . .’ She breaks off into a quietness. She looks for the words but can’t find them. ‘The way I am.’

‘The way you are what?’ Becky leans against the wall and watches her new friend closely. Her fingers scrape the mortar between the bricks behind her, rubbing the red crumbs and pushing them down into the groove.

‘Me.’ Harry leans back too and places the flat of her shoe against the wall, bouncing a little against it.

‘You can’t bring yourself to say it?’ Becky leans in towards her, eyes wide and round as a greyhound’s. Harry flinches in the face, a little pinch across the cheeks. A subtle tic she can’t control that betrays the force of her feelings.

‘No, what? It’s not that. I’m fine with it. It’s cool.’ Becky watches Harry’s profile; her cheekbones catch the winter sun.
She’s blushing. She looks away, down the empty tracks, searches her pocket for her tobacco. Absorbs herself in rolling a cigarette. Speaks to the distance. ‘I went to live with my uncle when I was fifteen.’ Harry’s voice crackles at the base of her vowels. She speaks quietly, rich as music, a rattling sonata. The sloping toughness of the south London accent. ‘He was good to me. But he wasn’t well, though. He was an addict, he got sick. He passed away a few years ago. It was at his funeral that I reconnected with my mum. We speak now, yeah. We’re on OK terms.’

Becky turns her body so that she is facing Harry. The last light of the evening is being drawn out of the sky. Her skin is deepening in the coming darkness. ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘Oh no. It’s OK.’ Harry takes her foot off the wall, turns to face Becky, leaning on her shoulder; the side of her head kisses the bricks. ‘Family, innit, things happen in families.’ Becky nods her agreement, folds her arms and runs a hand over her head, through her hair. ‘Surprised Pete didn’t fill you in,’ Harry says, and Pete’s name opens a well in the ground, a dark sucking wind screams from its depths and pulls the station down towards it.

‘He doesn’t talk about you guys that much.’ Becky doesn’t take her eyes off Harry’s face. Her body is ashes and mud and clay. Everything is shaking with relevance. She is about to reach out a hand and touch Harry’s cheek when the train pulls in. The crack and the rattle smack all the quiet out of the platform. The hiss of electric and steel. Becky watches the
train slowing. Yellow and blue lines stagger into shapes, doors, people’s faces.

‘Wanna wait for the next one?’ Becky asks.

Harry blinks in the wind from the train, looks sideways at Becky, catches her smile. ‘OK,’ she says quietly.

They watch the people get off the train, three young boys dressed in black tracksuits shout slang words. A drunk woman clutches a burger in both hands and brings it tentatively to and from her mouth, dropping shredded lettuce and splodges of ketchup onto the floor. A man in a suit with a fold-away bicycle stops to tie his shoelace. The train leaves, the people roll away and the platform returns to silence. They succumb to it, each in their own for a moment. Harry pushes herself off the wall and stares down the tracks. The wind bashes at her forehead, she closes her eyes and squints into it, shaking her head in joy. Becky laughs.

‘It’s nice,’ Harry tells her. ‘You try.’ So Becky stands beside Harry and faces the wind with her eyes closed, leaning into it, feeling it whipping around her ears, and she smiles. ‘See?’

‘Yeah, it’s nice,’ she agrees, but the wind dies down then.

‘What about your family?’ Harry asks.

‘What about them?’

‘What are they like? You get on well?’ Becky reaches a hand out for Harry’s roll-up, Harry gives it to her. Becky lights it. Watches the tracks curving into the distance.

‘My dad’s in jail. And my mum’s in a convent. She’s Jewish, but she’s born-again now. They’re both nuts. I don’t speak to
either of them.’ She flicks her words like lit matches. They drop delicately, burning.

‘Not even letters?’

‘My mum writes letters, yeah.’ Her hair falls in front of her forehead, longer on one side; it swings across her eyes and down towards her neck. She pushes it away with the back of her hand. It looks so soft to Harry.

‘But you don’t write back?’

‘I haven’t, no. Not yet.’ She passes the cigarette back. Two pigeons land in front of them, peck each other’s feathers. Search the ground for chicken bones. Settle for the dropped lettuce.

‘That must be hard.’

‘Is what it is.’ Becky shrugs.

‘Do you visit him?’

‘No.’ Becky shakes her head. ‘Never been.’

Harry is absorbed. Listening intently. The slats on the clock judder, stuck. ‘Do you want to?’ The wind picks up again, takes dead leaves up in its arms and spins them around. Harry’s heart like an open hand, reaching.

‘Sometimes I want to. But I don’t know where he is.’ Becky’s voice comes from a place very deep down in her stomach.

‘You can find out, you know.’ Harry speaks kindly.

‘Yeah, I know.’ The sky is rolling inwards, dark pink to purple. Sinking to darkness.

‘But you don’t want to?’

‘Don’t think so, no. Not right now.’ Becky smiles at Harry, feeling exposed.

‘Who raised you?’ Harry’s questions are considered. She keeps her eyes on Becky’s face the whole time. Blows her smoke out to the side.

‘Myself. My friends. My auntie.’ Harry turns each word Becky says over in her mind. Divining. Becky reaches for the roll-up again, smokes some, retreating back to lean against the wall.

A can crawls across the platform in a sudden gust. Rings like church bells. They watch the trees rising over the corrugated-iron sheds that line the tracks, the dusk settles over the backs of people’s houses. The rotting fence posts and barbed wire and piles of old tyres.

‘So was it always girls?’

Becky’s face is smooth in the dimly lit night. Her skin sings the dusks and dawns of her grandmother’s country. Harry feels Becky’s beauty in her mouth like thirst.

‘Pretty much.’ Harry mulls it over.

‘No boys?’

‘Couple. But nothing serious, no,’ Harry explains.

‘Who was the first girl you fell for then, Harry?’

Harry lets out the same little laugh as before. Drops her chin. Furrowing her brow. Taken aback. She looks up at Becky, Becky’s eyes are calm and steady.