as high as she could stretch. The right leg. Or maybe the left. She put her foot halfway up the cupboard where the plates were kept, rested it on the long white handle and hauled herself up, the way she always climbed up the frame in the park, wriggling until she was sitting on the worktop, with her bottom next to the kettle and her legs dangling over the edge. It was like being on the side of the swimming pool and looking down into the water. Mummy had taken her once but she didn’t like it. The noise, the cold, the not wanting Mummy to let go. The kitchen floor seemed a long way down, and it was wet, just like at the pool, when their bare feet had gone slip-slap on the floor and Mummy had laughed and said they sounded like fish.
But she could get to the top cupboard now, if she just stood up next to the kettle and reached above her head. The floor looked even further away as she pulled herself up. She wobbled as she leaned backwards just enough to pull on the handle of the door where the biscuits lived. She felt the cut in her thumb sting and open up again as she squeezed her fingers tightly around the handle, and then the cupboard swung open towards her, too smoothly, too quickly, and almost knocked her flying, but she had it now, between her hands. The big tin, with the picture of a monkey on it. Cheeky monkey, Mummy always said when Lily asked for another chocolate finger.
Lily bent down and lowered the tin very carefully onto the worktop next to her feet, before starting to shuffle herself back down to a sitting position beside it. Her hip banged against the kettle and she stumbled, one foot tangling itself into the lead, tipping the whole thing over as she bumped herself down. A little stream of cold water poured out and sent her slipping, grabbing for something to hold on to, and knocking the tin, with a very loud crash, to the floor.
By the time Lily had clambered down, the lid was off and the contents were scattered all over the lino. But there were no chocolate fingers today. Just one broken rich tea, which she stuffed hungrily into her mouth in two big bites. And then there were just crumbs. Nothing left but crumbs, a trickle of water, and a trail of sticky red fingerprints all over the cupboard doors.
*
William couldn’t settle. The afternoon was slipping by, like so many others. What he needed was a job, a purpose, a life. A woman? No, probably not. He looked around at the mess that had once been their tidy, well-ordered house. His and Susan’s. How had he let this happen? The unwashed clothes, the takeaway boxes, the unopened mail …
He should do something about it, but it was Sunday. Wasn’t Sunday meant to be a day of rest? So, he’d do something about it tomorrow. He’d start cleaning up, start trying to sort himself out. Tomorrow.
There was no Susan any more. Well, there was, obviously. Somewhere. But not here. And that was a good thing. Despite the mess and the loneliness, he knew it was a good thing. And now it was time to be just William again. Just William! He remembered the book with that name that his mother used to read to him, about the naughty schoolboy. Wasn’t he a pretty hopeless character too? Covered in mud, with his socks hanging down? Full of half-hearted, dimwit schemes that were usually doomed to fail? The likeness wasn’t lost on him.
He went into the kitchen looking for food. When had he last gone shopping for food? Proper shopping, with a trolley and a list? There was a tin of beans at the back of the cupboard, and the final two slices of last week’s loaf sat curling in their plastic wrapper on the bread board. They’d have to do for now. Just a little bit of green around the crust, but that didn’t matter, did it? He sliced the mouldy edges away with a knife, the blade slipping, slicing a thin slit into the tip of his little finger. It was surprisingly deep, and painful. A spot of bright red blood ran out and dripped onto the bread. He grabbed for a piece of kitchen paper to wrap around it, but the cardboard roll stood empty on its holder. He needed to buy some more. And he needed a plaster. Did he have any? Where were they kept? He had no idea.
He sat down at the table and stuck his finger in his mouth, sucking hard at it, like a baby seeking comfort, until the bleeding eased. He was sick of being on his own, with nobody to talk to, nobody to notice, let alone care, if he were to sit here and slowly bleed to death. Tomorrow he would definitely go and see his mother, if the car battery was charged and working by then. Something told him that fixing the car would probably be a lot easier than the fixing he needed to do on himself.
*
Lily was playing with her bricks in the bedroom, building a house with a chimney like the one where Granny lived, when the poo came out. She didn’t get any warning. It just happened, ever so quickly. She’d forgotten she wasn’t wearing any knickers, and it slithered out onto the carpet, all runny.
It was too late to get the potty. She’d done it now. But maybe she should try to clean it up, so Mummy wouldn’t shout at her when she came back and saw it there. There was a special lock on the cupboard under the sink. Mummy said the lock was to stop her touching the cleaning things because they were dangerous and she mustn’t swallow them. So she couldn’t get to the big bottle of stuff that Mummy used that smelled like lemons.
Lily stood up. The last bit of runny poo streaked down her leg and onto one of the plastic bricks she was using to make the chimney. She picked the brick up – a red one –.before it made any more of the bricks dirty. The ones for making the walls, and the windows. She didn’t want to build a dirty house. Granny’s house was clean. She remembered the nice smell of flowers, and that you had to take your shoes off when you went inside before you were allowed to stand on the carpet. Mummy always laughed about that. She said lots of posh ladies did that, but they didn’t.
Maybe she could get some paper from the roll hanging in the bathroom to clean herself up with. And a flannel, or a towel, to wash the blob off the carpet. Then she could put it in the washing basket with the pyjamas. Be a good girl.
The smell that followed her was worse than it was before. Not like lemons or flowers. Her bottom felt all squidgy and messy, and a bit sore. Lily tried to reach round and rub it clean with the paper, forgetting she had the brick in her hand, but it just made her hand all nasty, and the brick even nastier. And the kiddie step wasn’t here to reach the bathroom sink and wash it off. The step was still in the kitchen, but it was too dark in there and she couldn’t reach the light.
But at least her tummy ache had gone now. That was good. She didn’t need the Cowpol any more, from the bottle that wouldn’t open. Maybe that had a special lock on it too. But it wouldn’t be to stop her swallowing it, because she knew she was allowed to swallow Cowpol. It tasted nice and made everything feel better.
Lily wished everything would feel better now, but it didn’t. She had never been on her own before, and she didn’t like it. It was getting dark outside again, and the tree outside was blowing around, and the wind was rattling the window. She was hungry again, and she wanted something nice to eat, but whatever was left was in the kitchen, and she wanted a plaster for her hand that kept hurting all the time but the plasters were in the cupboard she couldn’t open, in the box with a red cross on it under the sink. She wanted to get into her bed with Archie and have Mummy tuck her in, but it was all wet and nasty. And she wanted to cry but when she did it didn’t make any difference because nobody came. And she wanted to see Daddy, and Granny, who she hadn’t seen for such a long time …
But most of all she wanted Mummy. She just wanted Mummy.
*
Dinner was a fraught affair. Patsy had offered to help but had been turned away from the kitchen with a look that could have curdled milk. Now they all sat together around the table in the dining room, very formally, eating some sort of indeterminate pie with waxy potatoes and thin tasteless gravy, and trying to make polite conversation.
It was only half past six. Much too early to be eating, but it wasn’t Patsy’s house and therefore, according to Michael who was doing his best to keep the peace, not her decision. The meat was chewy, the pastry as hard and tasteless as cardboard, and the gravy was lukewarm, but Michael didn’t seem to notice or, if he did, he’d chosen to ignore it.
‘Lovely, Mum. Thank you,’ he said, clattering his cutlery down and wiping his mouth on a paper serviette with Christmas robins around the edge.
Patsy