into the itchy valley between her tits. Her chest smelled of tea and old biscuits.
‘Ahoy,’ a man said, appearing at the end of the hallway.
Nan had married a Polish man, who was twenty years younger than her and wore only England rugby shirts. I was supposed to call him Uncle Sawicka. When I shook his hand, he barely squeezed, like he was scared I’d break.
‘Someone looks hungry,’ Nan said. ‘Has Mummy been eating all your food?’
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Mum,’ Mum said.
‘Nan,’ I said.
Uncle Sawicka bought fish and chips and we ate in front of the TV. Nan discussed the royal family with herself. Mum asked Uncle Sawicka about Poland. Are they pagan? Do they like chocolate? Do they have gays? I chewed my toenails until I fell asleep, balled like a foetus in the armchair. In the morning, Mum woke me up, told me to be good, and went away.
*
Nan’s cottage wasn’t really a cottage, it was only called that because of how it was surrounded by grass and if you pulled the corners of your eyes upwards you could kind of see the sea. There was a caravan park above it and a university across the river. I mostly stayed inside with Nan. Even when the sun visited, grey wind scared away all the warm. We pieced together jigsaws of Scottish cottages and watched Murder, She Wrote and drank tea that tasted different from the tea at home. Nan took me down to the sea on bright days, but she got tired quickly and we spent most of our time recovering on the rocks (‘on the rocks’ also meant when Nan wanted ice in her gin and tonic, which mostly she didn’t. It gave her severe brain freeze).
Uncle Sawicka didn’t spend a lot of time in the house. Sometimes, when we met in the hallway, we’d pause and try to talk.
‘Heavy weather,’ he’d say, looking through the glass in the front door.
‘Yeah,’ I’d say.
‘Rain,’ he’d say.
‘Yeah,’ I’d say.
‘Hungry,’ he’d say, patting my shoulder and going through to the kitchen. It’s hard not to think that people who don’t speak your language are morons, even when you’re eight.
After two weeks, we’d established a quiet routine. Uncle Sawicka and Nan woke up early, ate together, and he left for work. I woke up at ten, came downstairs, and ate whatever Nan had made (scrambled eggs, toast, cornflakes, or hot Weetabix). Nan read and I watched TV until lunchtime, then we visited the shop or the beach, then we napped, then Scrabble, then dinner, then bed.
That day we ate without Uncle Sawicka. He was working all night posting computer parts to people who ordered them on the Internet. It was seven. The grey outside had gone black and light rain was prickling the windows. Me and Nan were watching a repeat of Bargain Hunt on channel 409. The electric fire was on and I was sitting close, even though I wasn’t cold. It was never allowed to get cold in the house. If it wasn’t warm enough, Nan could die.
Blue team won, the programme ended, and Nan pulled herself up using only her arms.
‘Nan’s going to have a bath,’ she said. Standing in the centre of the living room, hands on her hips, she looked more solid than any other human I’d met. ‘Give Nan a kiss.’ I stood up and let her smudge pink lipstick into my eyebrows. ‘Another half an hour and you get to bed. Do your teeth downstairs.’
‘Okay. Night night.’
‘Goodnight.’
She yawned, adjusted a shoulder pad, and went upstairs. I didn’t want to brush my teeth. I wanted to sleep. I waited a few minutes then followed her up and climbed into bed. Sleep wasn’t hard to find. It happened. In a dream, I was being chased by an army of Redwall animals. Stoats, ferrets, foxes and bears, with thin red eyes and oversized weapons. Along the River Moss, through the Mossflower woods. I could see the Abbey but it wasn’t getting closer.
They were.
They were almost here and –
I woke up with wet hair and a room devoid of angry animals. Wind was nudging the window. My mouth was dusty so I knocked back the duvet and climbed out of bed. I itched my eyes. There was still a bit of scared left in me from the dream.
‘Nan?’ I said. She wasn’t awake. Baths make you sleepy, she taught me that. The warm makes your head slow down. ‘Nan?’ My door was open. It was always open. I padded along the hallway, trying to keep my sound small, which was easy with the carpet being teacup-deep. The bathroom door was framed with light. Nan might have fallen asleep in the bath, I thought. Which is dangerous. You drown. ‘Nan?’
I pushed the door open.
Nan wasn’t asleep in the bath, she was dead in it, balanced by the taps in a crumpled handstand. She was wearing green underwear and a flesh-tone bra. Her body looked bigger than usual. All the skin was piled up in one mound, sagging down over her tits and face, her grey legs pointed away from each other like TV antennae. They had the texture of kebabs.
I didn’t run forward and hug her. I didn’t slap her face and ask her to wake up. I didn’t repeatedly say ‘please, no’.
I knew Nan was dead. I’d already seen enough dead bodies on TV. This was exactly how they looked. There’s no fight left under the skin and everything flops, like a kite kept indoors. Everything goes where gravity wants because it’s waiting to melt back into the ground and come back as dogs and gold and flowers. We learned about it at school. Unless you quickly put electricity into the tits, a dead person is dead.
Mum kept her voice calm when I called. She could hear the scared in mine. Talking was hard. My cheeks were thick with snot.
‘Darling,’ she said. ‘Listen to me. I need you to stay calm. Go and sit downstairs. Wait for Uncle Sawicka. Please, try not to panic. Have a biscuit. I’ll be there as soon as I can.’
‘What if. Mum. A murderer.’
‘Did you see someone?’
‘I don’t know. No. What if he’s hiding? Or invisible?’
‘Etgar, no one’s there. Now, please, go and wait for Uncle Sawicka.’
‘Okay.’
‘Promise me?’
‘Okay.’
‘I love you.’
‘Okay.’
I hung up. I went into the kitchen and took two knives from the block. I turned on every light. I sat outside, to the right of the front door, down in the tall grass and the thistles, seeing bear shapes in the black.
4
I push open the door and the smell of shit climbs into my nostrils. Everything’s black. I turn on the lights. Amundsen has done two shits on the living-room carpet. I didn’t leave the conservatory door open. I kick him. He whines. Stupid. I open the drinks cabinet and take down Dad’s bottle of Famous Grouse. He only drinks whisky during sports finals, election nights and Christmastime, and he won’t notice, and if he does it doesn’t matter. I pour some into my mouth and it hurts. I turn on the TV. It’s a quiz programme. A man in a blue suit is looking into the camera and rubbing his hands together like he’s trying to light a tiny fire.
In which film is it said, ‘Some dreams come true. Some don’t. Keep on dreaming’?
a) Autumn in New York
b) Pretty Woman
c) Basic Instinct
d) Runaway Bride
I shout b at the screen. The man says he doesn’t know. I call him a fucking dick idiot. I shout b. I imagine Julia Roberts aggressively hugging me until my sides go numb. Julia Roberts shampooing my hair in the bath. Julia Roberts massaging