The Housewife in the Pantry with the Cocoa Powder

I hardly slept after the incident in the early hours of the morning. I lay with my covers up to my chin, rigid with a cold fear that had me hopping in my bed every time I heard the slightest noise. I was pretty sure that the woman in the bungalow was the person who’d followed me to the graveyard the week before last, and as the morning moved on and the sun shed light on the shadows, I became less frightened of her. Perhaps she wasn’t dangerous, perhaps just a little odd. By the look of her hair and clothing at the studio, she wasn’t somebody that saw people regularly. Besides, she’d given me a gift of the small tear‑shaped glass. She was obviously reaching out.

But the burned diary gave me a sense of impending doom.

When I did sleep I dreamed of fire: of castles on fire, and books on fire. I dreamed of glass being made, blobs of molten hot glass being shaped and dripping. After waking up to a dark room, with my heart beating wildly in my chest, I tried hard to stay awake. I watched the pages of the diary for the rest of the morning, waiting for the burned pages to uncurl themselves, for the writing to magically appear in its neat loops and crosses. But they remained the same.

I was up early the next morning determined to catch Rosaleen do whatever she was doing. Catching the Housewife in the Pantry with the Cocoa Powder wasn’t exactly the most exciting thing in the world, but I had realised that the diary was leading me somewhere, was trying to show me something, pointing to the way out just as I had been trying to show the bluebottle. I would be a fool to ignore the miracle of what was occurring. Every word was a clue, every sentence an arrow, a signpost for me to get out of here.

The radio was blaring in the kitchen, Arthur was having a shower and Rosaleen thought she had the morning entirely to herself. She turned and headed to the pantry, and I ducked out of sight behind the hall door just in time. I could see her in the pantry through the crack in the door.

She had Mum’s breakfast tray on the counter and she reached into a box, hidden behind another box and took out a container of pills. My heart hammered. I had to block my mouth to make sure I didn’t scream. I watched her tip two capsules into the palm of her hand, open them and sprinkle the powder into the porridge and mix it around. I fought with whether to jump out then and confront her. I had her. I’d known she was up to something but now I had to stop myself. They could merely be headache pills and my pouncing on her would backfire, again, or else they were something more serious, which were making Mum sicker. I leaned in closer to the crack in the door but as I did so, the floorboard under my foot creaked. Rosaleen immediately dropped the container into her apron, picked up the tray and swivelled around as though nothing had happened. I quickly stepped out from behind the door.

‘Oh, good morning,’ she said, a bright smile. ‘How is the birthday girl today?’ I might have been paranoid but I was convinced her eyes were searching my face to see if I’d witnessed her actions.

‘Old.’ I returned the smile, doing my best to regain my composure.

‘Oh you’re not old, child,’ she laughed. ‘I remember when I was your age.’ She threw her eyes to heaven. ‘It’s all ahead of you yet. Now I’ll bring this up to your mother and I’ll be back down to give you a special birthday breakfast.’

‘Thanks, Rosaleen,’ I said sweetly, and watched her race up the stairs.

As she disappeared into Mum’s bedroom and the door closed behind her, the mail landed on the mat by the front door. I stalled, waiting for Rosaleen to come flying down on her broomstick to snatch it, but she didn’t. She didn’t hear it. I reached for the post‑only two white envelopes, probably bills‑and rushed into the kitchen with them. I didn’t know what to do. I looked around quickly for somewhere to hide them. I wouldn’t have time to read them now. I heard Rosaleen’s feet on the stairs again and my heart slammed in my chest. Last minute, I decided to tuck the envelopes into the back of my tracksuit bottoms and covered them over with my baggy boyfriend cardigan. I stood in the centre of the kitchen with my hands behind my back looking as guilty as sin.

She slowed when she saw me. The muscles in her neck protruded.

‘What are you doing?’ she asked.

‘Nothing.’

‘You’re not doing nothing. What’s in your hands, Tamara?’ she said forcefully.

‘Fucking thongs,’ I said, pulling at the back of my trousers.

‘Show me your hands.’ She raised her voice.

I took my hands out from behind my back; waved them at her cockily.

‘Turn around.’ Her voice quivered.

‘No,’ I said defiantly.

The doorbell rang. Rosaleen didn’t move. Neither did I.

‘Turn around,’ she repeated.

‘No,’ I repeated, stronger, firmer.

The doorbell rang again.

‘Rose!’ Arthur shouted down the stairs. Rosaleen didn’t answer and we heard boots on the stairs as he made his way down. ‘I’ll get it so,’ he said, glancing at us with frustration. He opened the door.

‘Weseley.’

‘I couldn’t back the van up any more, is that okay? Is it in far enough? Oh, hi, Tamara,’ he said, looking in past Arthur.

Rosaleen’s eyes narrowed even more.

I smiled. Yes I had a friend that she didn’t know about.

I looked at Weseley with wide eyes, willing him to pick up that something was wrong. I didn’t want him and Arthur to leave.

‘We’ll see you later so,’ Arthur said.

The door closed behind them and we were left facing one another in the kitchen.

‘Tamara,’ Rosaleen said gently. ‘Whatever you are hiding, and I think I know what it is, just give it back.’

‘I’m not hiding anything, Rosaleen. Are you?’

She twitched.

On that note we heard a bang from upstairs, a crash of plates and then feet on the floorboards. We both snapped out of our staring match and immediately looked up.

‘Where is he?’ I heard my mother screech.

I looked at Rosaleen and ran past her.

‘No, child.’ She pulled me back.

‘Rosaleen, let go, she’s my mother.’

‘She’s not well,’ she said nervously.

‘Yes, and I wonder why that is!’ I yelled in her face, and ran upstairs.

I didn’t make it that far. Mum had flung the door open and with wide eyes, terrified eyes, was searching the corridor.

‘Where is she?’ she said, unable to focus on me.

‘Who? Rosaleen?’ I started, but she pushed by me when she saw her at the bottom of the stairs.

‘Where is he?’ she demanded, standing at the top of the stairs in her dressing gown.

Rosaleen, wide‑eyed, was wringing her hands in her apron. I could still see the outline of the container of pills in the pocket. I looked from one to the other, not understanding what was going on.

‘Mum, he’s not here,’ I said, trying to hold her hand. She shook it away.

‘He is. I know it. I can feel him.’

‘Mum, he’s not here.’ I felt tears welling. ‘He’s gone.’

Her head twisted round to me immediately then and her voice lowered to a whisper. ‘He’s not gone, Tamara. They only said he was but he’s not. I can feel him.’

I was crying now. ‘Mum, stop, please. That’s just…that’s just…his spirit that you feel around you. He’s always going to be with you. But he’s gone…he’s really gone. Please…’

‘I want to see him,’ she demanded of Rosaleen.

‘Jennifer,’ she said, her hands reaching out even though she was too far away to touch her, ‘Jennifer, just relax, go back and lie down.’

‘No!’ Mum shouted, her voice trembling now. ‘I want to see him! I know he’s here. You’re hiding him!’

‘Mum,’ I cried, ‘she’s not. Dad’s dead, he’s really dead.’

Mum looked at me then, and for a moment she seemed so sad. Then she was angry and ran down the stairs. Rosaleen ran for the door.

‘Arthur!’ she yelled outside.

Arthur, who was only in the driveway with Weseley, loading equipment into the Land Rover, jumped to attention.

Mum ran out to the garden, shouting, ‘Where is he?’ over and over.

‘Jen, stop it now. Relax, it’s okay,’ Arthur called to her calmly over and over.

‘Arthur,’ Mum cried, running for him and throwing her arms around him. ‘Where is he? He’s here, isn’t he?’

In shock, Arthur looked to Rosaleen.

‘Mum!’ I cried. ‘Arthur help her. Do something to help her, please. She thinks Dad is still alive.’

Arthur looked at her with what seemed to me to be a broken heart. He took her in his arms and as Mum’s skinny body shook with tears and she asked over and over again, where he was and why, he rubbed her back soothingly.

‘I know, Jen, I know, Jen, it’s okay. It’s okay…’

‘Please help her,’ I cried, standing in the middle of the garden, looking from Rosaleen to Arthur, who was keeping Mum up. ‘Send her somewhere. Get somebody to help.’

‘My dad’s at home now,’ Weseley offered quietly. ‘I can call him and tell him to come round.’

Something twisted inside me. A cold fear. An instinct of some sort. I thought of the burned diary, of the fire in my dreams. I had to get Mum out of the house.

‘Take her to him,’ I said to Arthur.

Arthur looked at me in confusion.

‘To Dr Gedad,’ I said so that Mum couldn’t hear.

In Arthur’s arms, Mum twisted and slid downwards, grief overtaking her.

Arthur nodded at me then, solemnly. Then he looked at Rosaleen.

‘I’ll be back soon.’

‘But you‑’

‘I’m going,’ he said firmly.

‘I’m coming too,’ she said hurriedly, swiftly taking off her apron and rushing into the house. ‘I’ll get her coat.’

‘Weseley, stay with Tamara,’ Arthur instructed.

Weseley nodded and took a few steps closer to me.

Moments later they were all in the Land Rover, Mum in the back crying and looking so lost.

Weseley put his arm round my shoulders protectively.

‘It’s going to be all right,’ he said gently.

When we arrived here I felt like me and Mum were all washed up, two people who’d landed on the beach coughing and spluttering after our boat had gone down. We were a mess, we had nothing, belonged to nothing, felt aimless, as though we were trapped in a waiting room with no doors.

I’ve realised that when things are washed up, they haven’t just been torn apart‑they’re the survivors. I didn’t think it until I was forced to watch some nature documentary such as Arthur loves. It was about the South Pacific islands, how they’re so far apart it was difficult to explain how life spread from one to another at all, apart from the birds. Then these coconuts came bobbing along. All washed up, the narrator said. Two lost things that had survived the seas and arrived on a coastline. What did they do? They implanted themselves in the sand and grew into trees and lined the beaches. Sometimes a lot can come of being all washed up. You can really grow.

Even though Mum had a hissy fit, thought that Dad was still alive, and appeared to be falling apart, I felt like it was the start of something new, something better. And as we watched them drive away, Rosaleen looking back at us with concern, not wanting to leave us but not wanting to leave Arthur and Mum alone, I really couldn’t help it. But I smiled and I waved.

Date: 2015-02-03; view: 584