This Perfect World (8 page)

There were three bags of sweets, quarter-pounds of something
or other, wrapped up in paper and lined up on the arm
of his chair.

‘Can we have them now? Can we have our sweets, Dad?’
Ian asked, his low, slow voice quickening only slightly, though
he rocked from side to side, eyeing those sweets.

‘We waited for you, Laura,’ Mrs Partridge said. ‘Ian’s had
his eye on those sweets all morning, but no, wait till Laura’s
here, I said to Mr Partridge. Didn’t I, Uncle Vic?’ She blustered
up behind me, rounding us up like rabbits.

Uncle Vic.

He smiled and it made his skin look yellower. It was a
horrible smile, spreading his lips across his teeth and making
the fear in his eyes stand out, starker.

‘Go on,’ Mrs Partridge urged, giving me a little push. ‘Ask
Uncle Vic for some sweets.’

‘Can I have some sweets, please, Uncle Vic?’ I asked, automatically,
trying not to look at his cavernous, grim-reaper
eyes.

Heddy and Ian crowded up beside me. Mr Partridge lifted
his hand above the sweets on the arm of his chair and, swallowing
and swallowing, he croaked out the words, ‘Help
yourselves, children. Have fun. Enjoy yourselves!’

Have fun? Was he mad as well as dying? Heddy and Ian
pounced on their sweets, stuffing them into their fat, wet
mouths. Tentatively I picked up the last paper bag and held
it, and listened to Mr Partridge’s lungs collapse and gasp,
collapse and gasp, as if there was some pedal-pump inside
him, pumping him up like a lilo.

We played cards. Gin rummy and things that I thought
were just for grown-ups. I wanted my dad, and my mum,
badly. I wanted the loo badly too, but I was far too scared
to venture up into the dark upstairs of the Partridges’ house.
We were sitting on the floor – not Mr Partridge of course,
but the rest of us. I sat on the heel of one foot, finding it
hard to keep still, until in the end I was fidgeting so much
that Mrs Partridge said to me, ‘Need the lavvie, Laura?
Heddy’ll show you where it is.’

Heddy showed me up the dark, narrow stairs where the
air was much, much colder and smelled of old mattresses
and damp. The bathroom was down the end of the landing,
past the two bedrooms. Heddy flicked on the landing light,
a dusty, solitary bulb hanging yellow and shadeless from the
ceiling, illuminating the shadows and spooky corners. ‘It’s
there,’ she said, pointing at the bathroom door. ‘Do you want
me to wait for you?’

And I said
No
, in the way that we always said no to
Heddy, as if everything she suggested was stupid, or weird,
or both.

The light in the bathroom was one of those old-fashioned
strips, worked by a cord. I yanked it on, and closed the door
behind me. Bathrooms are intimate places. I remember laughing,
recently, over someone’s tale about a bathroom cabinet
stuffed with marbles, so that when a nosy guest went prying
the marbles came tumbling out, crashing all over the place,
for everyone else to hear.

They had a really old-fashioned loo with a big, black cistern
up above it, which looked as if it might crash down upon
your head while you were sitting there; and a proper chain
to pull, to flush it; and square sheets of toilet paper in a box,
not on a roll like we had at home. The soap was on a little
shell-shaped dish, and going soft underneath. I washed my
hands and dried them on the big towel hanging over the
bath. I wondered whose towel it was, and how they ever
managed to have a bath when it was so filled with the
washing basket, a cactus plant in a tub and Mrs Partridge’s
sewing machine.

Mrs Partridge had got the cake out when I came back
down. She’d put it on the table and was sticking the candles
into little holders balanced precariously on top. Heddy and
Ian were standing by the table, watching her, both of them
puffing their cheeks in and out as if practising their blowing-out
skills. I looked over at Mr Partridge, still sitting in his
chair. He’d fallen asleep, with his head tilted backwards and
his mouth wide open.

I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead and no one
else had noticed.

‘There,’ Mrs Partridge said, as she stuck the last candle
in. She patted the pockets of her pinny, found matches and
pulled them out. ‘Now, what else do we need?’ She glanced
around the room, vaguely, her eyes passing over Mr Partridge.
She didn’t seem to notice that he was dead. ‘Heddy,’ she said,
‘go and fetch some plates, and a knife.’

And Heddy went out to the kitchen, walking past Mr
Partridge, and she didn’t notice that he was dead, either.
Soon she came back again, carrying plates with a big kitchen
knife balanced on top. She watched what she was doing,
so as not to drop anything. Still she didn’t notice what had
happened to Mr Partridge.

I didn’t know what to do.

Ian was starting to jump about a bit now, excited at the
prospect of cake. He’d see, I thought. He’d see that his dad
was dead. But Ian didn’t take his eyes off the cake, and now
Mrs Partridge was striking up a match and lighting those
candles.

‘Come on, come on, gather round,’ she said to me, but I
stood rooted to the spot. ‘
Happy birthday to you
. . .’ she
started up, and Ian joined in, and I tried to, but I couldn’t
stop glancing sideways at Mr Partridge. I wondered when
they’d realize he was dead, and what would happen then.

Then, when they’d stopped with the ‘Happy birthday’ and
Heddy was just about to blow out the candles, Mrs Partridge
said, ‘Hang on a minute now, don’t want Mr Partridge missing
everything.’ And she moved over to his chair, put her bony
hand on his knee and gave him a little shake. At once he
gurgled and spluttered and coughed into life, and opened his
eyes.

I cannot tell you how much I wished I was at home. I
couldn’t eat any of that horrible cake. And when my dad
eventually picked me up to take me home, I got down their
pathway and out through their gate and burst into tears.

‘Why did you make me go there?’ I cried. ‘Why?’

But my dad just got angry with me and said, ‘For God’s
sake, Laura, why can you not think about anyone but yourself?’

And worse, much worse than all of that, was that my
parents went and invited Heddy to my birthday party, in
March. No matter how much I cried and begged them not
to, they said we had to return the invitation, we had to be
polite. And again – why couldn’t I just make an effort and
be nice to poor Heddy Partridge?

*

I do not want to see Heddy Partridge again, ever. Heddy
Partridge is gone,
gone
, like all the other mistakes made in
childhood. What point is there in going back and revisiting
nightmares? What could I ever say to her now?
Oh, I’m sorry
I made your life sheer hell, and I’m sorry for any part I may
have had in your current terminal gloom, but hey, let me have
a little chat to your doctors and see if I can’t put things right.

I do not want to go back. And I don’t want to even think
about trying to put things right.

I moved on a long, long time ago.

She turned up at my party wearing that same purple dress,
slightly shorter now, and tighter.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ I said, opening the door and taking the
present out of her hand, and then I ignored her.

We all ignored her. We made quite a game of it.

I opened my presents and said my thank-yous. Everyone
crowded around to see what I’d got, except for Heddy, who
stood glum-faced on her own. I opened her present last – it
was a book, I think – and let it fall discarded to the floor
with all the torn-up wrapping paper.

My parents gave me one of those make-up stations that
opened out, all pink plastic and lit up inside, crammed with
glittery make-up pots and hair things, and a dummy’s head
with long nylon hair to practise on. I let everyone have a go,
except Heddy. And at teatime we wouldn’t let her sit down.
Whenever she went for a chair we’d all shuffle along, blocking
her way. All the way round the table she went, red-faced and
flustered, and round the table we went too, bumping along
from chair to chair, until my mum came into the dining room
and snapped, ‘Laura!’ in a shocked, angry voice. ‘What do
you think you are doing?’

And she made Heddy sit next to me, ruining my party
entirely.

Later, when everyone had gone, my mum told me how
disappointed she was with me. And when my dad came home
early to see me, she told him how disappointed she was, and
he got angry. Really angry. No
Happy birthday, Laura,
no
Have you had a nice day?
– oh no, nothing like that. Just
straight in there, slamming his fist down onto the kitchen
counter and raging at me.

‘I do not want to hear this!’ he shouted, his face gone all
tight and grey. ‘I do not want to come home from work to
find that Heddy Partridge has been a guest in
my
house and
that you – yes,
you
, Laura – have humiliated her!’

We had this huge row. Made all the worse because I was
full of cake and sweets and lemonade and was riding too
high on the innate belief that on your birthday
you
matter,
you’re
the special girl, for the day.

He told me I was selfish and spoiled. He told me how
ashamed he was of me.

I stood among the debris of my party – the wrapping
paper, the crushed crisps, the ripped-up, tangled streamers –
with the unfairness of it all boiling up inside my head, and
yelled, ‘But I didn’t want to invite her! I don’t
like
her!’

And my dad grabbed hold of my arm, tight, and glared
at me right up close, with just this one muscle flickering
under his eye, and said, ‘Laura, I do not care whether you
like her or not.
That
is not the point.’

But if that wasn’t the point, then what was?

This morning’s post is still on the table, unopened. I glance
at it, and push it to one side. It’s bills mostly, and junk mail,
all after money, one way or another. One in particular catches
my eye, although I don’t want it to. It’s a begging letter, a
guilt letter. I shouldn’t call it that, but that’s what it is. There’s
a faint, grey pencil sketch of some poor starved child decorating
the envelope. I’ve seen it now; the picture will be stuck
in my head until I open it up, and pay whatever is needed
to make the image go away. I get a lot of these letters.

I give money here, I give money there, I give it no more
thought.

But the piece of me that Mrs Partridge wants cannot so
easily be dispensed.

I have no intention of going to see Heddy Partridge. I
agreed under duress, as James would say. And what possible
use could I be anyway? What do I know about mental hospitals,
for heaven’s sake? What does Mrs Partridge expect me
to do when I’m there? Have a good look round, say
This
won’t do
, and pack Heddy up and take her home with me?

The thing is, how shall I say no? It’s always much harder,
once you’ve already said yes.

The house is quiet now, and my glass empty. I stand up
and take the wine bottle from the fridge, and pour myself
another glass. And then I take the phone from where it’s
lying beside James’s half-drunk cup of tea, and sit back down.

I’ll tell her I’m too busy. I’ll say,
Look, I’m really sorry,
Mrs Partridge, I’d love to be able to help, but I just don’t
have the time at the moment.

It’ll be easier on the phone than face to face. She’ll get the
message. With any luck she’ll just give up on me, and let me
go. If she does still push me to come and see Heddy, I’ll say
I’m really busy at the moment and can’t fix a date right now,
but I’ll call her, sometime soon. Ultimate fob-off. I’ve done
it a million times before; I can do it again.

It’s the best thing to do. I
don’t
have the time. And at least
on the phone I won’t have to avoid her bird-like stare,
imploring me.

I don’t have Mrs Partridge’s number and our phone directory
doesn’t cover that far out, so I have to phone up
directory enquiries.

‘Partridge,’ I say to the operator. ‘Mrs V. Partridge, One
Fairview Lane, Forbury. In Middlesex.’

But the operator comes back to me and says, ‘Sorry, we
have no listing for that number,’ and hangs up.

I sit there, listening to the dialling tone.

‘Shit!’ I mutter out loud and lay down the phone. Why
on earth would Mrs Partridge be ex-directory?

This means I’ll have go to her house on Tuesday, then, like
I agreed. I don’t have any choice now. But I’m not going with
her to see Heddy. I’ll go to Mrs Partridge’s house and I’ll tell
her, straight away. I won’t even go in, I’ll ring the doorbell,
say
I can’t stop, I just wanted to let you know
. . .

I’ll think of something.

I drum my fingers against my glass in annoyance; wine
sloshes over the rim, and runs red across my hand.

There’s no way on earth I’m going with Mrs Partridge to
St Anne’s Hospital to see Heddy.

On Sunday evening I am sitting on the floor with bits of
grey felt and white fake-fur spread out all around me. I’ve
cut out a big body shape from the felt, like a tabard, that
Thomas can just pop his head through, and now I’m sewing
on the arms. The legs were a problem, a big problem. I was
going to cut out two long pieces of felt and sew them up
sausage-like and then attach them to the main body, like I
am with the arms. But then I realized that getting the outfit
on would be impossible, and if I sewed the legs on while he
was wearing it, he’d never get out of it again, to go to the
loo. So I suggested that I just make the costume to go on
his top half and that he wears his school trousers underneath
– after all, they’re grey. They’ll do, I said.

Thomas went nuts.

‘I can’t wear my school trousers,’ he cried. ‘Baloo doesn’t
wear school trousers. Everyone will laugh at me. Everyone
else will have proper legs.’