The Private Parts of Women (10 page)

It was a terror-filled love. I used to wake at night, suddenly sit up sweating and gasping my way out of dreams of fire or flood or falling where I could not reach my baby, could not save him. I used to stop frozen at the top of the stairs, with him in my arms, afraid that I would fall or drop him. I could not drive for weeks after Robin was born, I couldn't trust myself or other drivers. War in the Gulf broke out soon after his birth and sometimes, as I fed him, I watched the war on the television and tears would stand in my eyes. It petrified me to realise how little control I had, that I could not make the world safe for him.

I took ridiculous numbers of photographs as if in that way I could keep moments. At least that moment was safe, at least that moment was happy, I would think, hoarding the past as if it is of some use when it is the future that is the danger. There are albums and albums of pictures of Robin, the walls at home are covered, every expression, every movement he made practically in the first few months. Richard thought I was obsessed. He wanted us to have another, get on with it, ‘get the babies had' was his curious expression, ‘and then get on with our lives'.

I kept putting it off. I didn't want to have another. I didn't want anyone else. I didn't even want Richard half the time, but he insisted that I made time for him. Sometimes he arranged a baby-sitter and took me out to dinner or to a concert or film. Sometimes I quite enjoyed it, sometimes I relaxed, but I could never wait to get home. I was always relieved that it was over so that I could stand in Robin's room and watch him sleep. Secretly I used to lick his sleeping cheek, just for the soapy taste.

Not until Robin was two did I want sex again, and hardly then. I let Richard do it to me once a week or so but I breast-fed Robin until he was nearly two and my body felt like
his
. I did not want any hot and hairy man on it or in it. It wasn't Richard's fault; no matter how kind he was, no matter how much he touched or kissed me, I felt nothing. He was so patient, so insistent that I enjoy myself that I used to pretend, to gasp and shudder and sigh, with my eyes on the clock calculating hours of sleep. Only when he believed that I was satisfied would he come. I wanted to tell him not to bother – but how could I? He was so wonderful, as always, such a diligent lover. I should have been grateful.

When Robin was two and a bit, Richard arranged a surprise for me. It was the middle of August, a Saturday, my birthday. Hot sunlight glowed through the red curtains on to our bed. Richard brought me coffee and the room was filled with its scent and that of a sheaf of red carnations. Robin gave me a card with a picture of a tractor on it that he'd drawn himself and a box of chocolates. Richard gave me a long, expensive-looking box. Inside was the most fantastic watch: a silver bracelet, each section set with a fleck of glittering stone, two glittering claws holding the oval face, as tiny as my little fingernail.

‘I love you,' Richard said. ‘Old woman, thirty-two eh?' he kissed me. Robin bounced on the edge of the bed, his pyjamas wet, his nappy all skew-whiff. Two faces pressed against mine, one stiff and scratchy, the other cool and soft.

‘Granny coming,' Robin announced.

‘Is that the surprise?' I asked, for a surprise had been promised. I had been told to keep the weekend free.

‘An essential part of it,' Richard said. He was sitting on the bed beside me, wearing only a crumpled pair of pale blue boxer-shorts.' I looked at the line of hair on his belly like the tail of a butterfly, its wings of hair on his chest. He had a smile on his face as if a secret was pressing against his lips and I was afraid. I was afraid that I would not want the surprise, and I did not want to hurt him. I pulled Robin on to my lap. ‘Happy birfday to you,' he sang. He smelled of small boy and sleep and pee.

‘Robin needs a bath,' I said.

‘Put it on,' Robin said, picking up the watch.

‘Yes,' said Richard, ‘put it on and I'll tell you.'

I fiddled with the clasp and he had to do it up for me. It was a beautiful watch and I hated it. The claws that held the watch-face were sinister, pointed, greedy. Little hairs on the back of my wrist caught between the silver segments. I held it up to my ear to hear its tick, a tiny tutting tongue.

‘I thought it would be nice for evenings,' Richard said.

‘It's lovely.'

‘Thirty-two,' Richard said again, looking at me with his head on one side. ‘You look … eighteen, twenty-one at most.' He touched my cheek. I was glad Robin was there, I could see the stirring in Richard's shorts, knew the look he was giving me.

‘Let me drink my coffee,' I said.

Robin climbed off the bed and began to fiddle with my earrings which were hooked through a long scarf hanging on the wall. He liked to unhook them and put them back.

‘So,' Richard said, sliding his hand under the quilt and up my thigh, ‘don't you want to know?' He settled his hand between my legs but kept it still. It felt nice, felt friendly though it was proprietorial of course. He was saying with his hand that I was his and later on he'd have me. But that was all right because it was safely later on.

‘Go on then,' I said. ‘I'm all ears.'

‘And a face and a tummy,' Robin corrected.

‘And a bottom,' Richard added giving me a squeeze.

Robin giggled. ‘Bottom!' I sipped my coffee. ‘Two parrots,' Robin said to the earrings, ‘two paceshits.'

‘Not spaceships, silly,' I said, but when Robin held up the two long silver earrings, I saw that he was right, they
were
spaceships.

‘Mum should arrive around twelve,' Richard said. ‘We'll have a bit of lunch with her – I've got chicken and salad-stuff. And then, darling, I'm spiriting you away for the night. To pastures new.'

‘Oh,' I said. ‘Where?'

‘Derbyshire, the Peaks. I've booked a night in a great hotel, recommended by Lucy. She and Dick keep going back.'

The sun was very hot in the bedroom. We'd bought thick red curtains to keep it out but still it got in, thick and oily and choking.

‘That's a nice thought,' I said, ‘thanks Richard … so Pauline's coming all this way … just for lunch? She's not coming with us?'

‘No, dope, she's staying here.'

‘But why …?' I began. But I knew why. Robin wasn't included. Richard had been threatening to ‘get me away from it all' as he said, as if all I wanted wasn't here at home. ‘Just the two of us,' he was always saying, ‘an affirmation. Romantic.'

So Robin would be staying with Pauline, with his very nice granny who'd been plotting a way to get him to herself ever since she'd first clapped eyes on him. ‘The image of Richard,' she'd said and I'd seen the greedy look in her eyes. Sometimes when she'd visited, she'd called him Richard by mistake as if she was the mother and he her son, and me? I was nobody. She got out photographs of Richard as a baby to show how uncanny the likeness was and yes … to some extent … both dark-haired, round-faced with wide dark eyes. But there was me in him too, no one could see it but me, there is a lot of me in him, but I have no parents left to point it out. Pauline is the only grandparent Robin's got.

Whenever I went quiet when Pauline was there, or whenever I criticised her, Richard sprang to her defence. Of course she loves Robin,' he'd say. ‘He's her only grandchild. It's quite normal, you should be glad, relax. Don't begrudge her this pleasure. She's lonely.'

But he couldn't see what I could see, the criticism in her eyes when she watched me fumble with him. I only fumbled when she watched. And traitorous Robin lapped up her adoration, he took his first solo steps when she was there, toddling towards her with open arms and a big dribble-bright grin on his face.

‘I don't want to leave Robin with Pauline.'

Richard sighed. He removed his hand. ‘I know,' he said, ‘I knew you'd say that, but you'll be fine. Soon as we're off …'

‘Can you open the curtains?' I said.

He got up and did so and the bright sunshine stung my eyes.

‘I don't want to leave Robin,' I said.

‘Not much of a romantic weekend then,' Richard said.

‘Two moons, two wiggly worms,' said Robin, oblivious.

‘I'm sorry,' Richard said. He has this way of lowering his voice when he's angry instead of raising it. ‘But it's all arranged. Mum's on her way. The hotel's booked. Robin's looking forward to Granny minding him, aren't you Robbie?'

‘Granny coming!' Robin said and the scarf fell down scattering earrings on the floorboards and the rug. ‘Oops,' he said, looking at me with a flinch in his eyes as if he thought I'd slap him which I never ever would.

‘It's all right,' I said, ‘never mind.'

‘Let's pick them up again,' Richard said, kneeling down. ‘The hotel is booked,' he repeated to me.

‘A hotel can be unbooked,' I muttered.

‘I'll see to lunch,' he said in rather a martyred voice. ‘I'll tidy up. I'll see to Robin. All you have to do is pack a nice dress for tonight.'

I watched the two of them picking up the earrings, two dark curly napes bent at the same angle. I did not see how he could do this to me in the name of kindness, separate me from my son. Although, at Richard's insistence. I had recently stopped breast-feeding Robin, my breasts smarted.

Richard stood up and pinned the scarf back to the wall.

‘Dere,' said Robin, rubbing his hands together.

‘Let's do your bum then,' Richard opened the door and Robin trotted out to the bathroom. Richard followed him then came and put his head back round the door. ‘Robin isn't the only one who needs you,' he said.

COBBLER

I wonder how old Inis is? Early thirties? I was settled here before I was her age. I had already fled. And here I've been ever since. Over fifty years, and haven't I seen some changes? Changing faces behind shop counters, changing names, changing façades. What used to be the pork-butcher's is a second-hand book shop now; the wet-fish shop is an insurance agent's; the post-office is an Indian restaurant. Some nights the smell of curry seeps under my door, infecting my own food. I still eat like a Salvationist, simple wholesome food taken in moderation. Better to feel slightly empty than overstuffed. I have never eaten curry. Next-door does – some nights she nips out for a carton of something hot enough to burn her mouth and she drinks it with beer out of a tin. Must play havoc with her digestion. Still, modern times.

She went to Blackpool! Yes, Blackpool, in February. I ask you! She came back glum and frozen and gave me a stick of rock. It's on the mantelpiece in front of the clock. What a shocking pink. What a sticky present. I don't get presents as a rule. I'm quite out of the way of it. Blowski and I manage each other a little token now and again but otherwise … There's a card from ‘Gregory, Gayle and the Gang', as they style themselves – Auntie Ba's grandson and his family – at Christmas. And one from me to them. I bought a box of twenty Nostalgic Christmas Scenes, years ago now and there's still ten left. But no presents. So the silly stick of rock is something a bit special. My eyes kept straying to it all last evening. I won't eat it. I'll keep it as a memento.

The cobbler's is still there, the Blowski's still live over it but it is staffed by strangers. As well as mending shoes, they cut keys and sell bags, purses, key-rings and even slippers at Christmas. The mechanical man in the window is still there, hammering, hammering, the paint on his face all chipped.

That is where I met Stefan Blowski. I didn't go there often, one doesn't have one's shoes mended every day of the week. He had what I would call a nice cheek. I don't chat. I'm not someone who hangs around the shops discussing the weather, making small talk. But Blowski used to tease me. He hardly spoke English at all, at first, but still he managed the cheek, the teasing. He'd been a lawyer in Poland, just qualified when Germany invaded, so he'd never actually practised law. He fought in the Middle East, then came to England at the end of the war. He didn't fancy returning to Poland under Soviet control. ‘I'm political exile, me, not immigrant,' he was always saying. He married Brenda and together they opened a cobbler's shop – his Polish grandfather's trade. He could not practise law in England, did not want to. ‘I had it with books,' he said. ‘Now with my hands I work.'

I came to Sheffield a couple of years before the war, Blowski just after it. I remember his shop opening, on the corner, the opposite end of the terrace to mine. It had been empty, windows boarded-up, since I'd been in Sheffield. HIGH CLASS BOOT AND SHOE REPAIRS, said the sign, with old fashioned, buttoned boots in shiny black painted on either side.
Proprietors. S. & B. Blowski
. In the middle of the window was a mechanical wooden cobbler, who jerked his hammer up above his head then down on the sole of a boot, paused and wobbled and did it again, all day, every day. Children loved to watch him. In those days before they'd seen and done everything like children today, he seemed something miraculous. They'd press their noses flat against the glass to watch him – and every Christmas, Blowski dressed him in red felt and tied tinsel to the head of his hammer.

I met Blowski first, then Brenda. I did not take to her. A perfectly nice woman, I'm sure, bonny, all belly and bosom and unsuitable clothes – see-through places, under-arm dampness, drooping straps, that sort of parcel, lots of doings on her face. Harsh voice unlike Blowski's which is soft.
He
was always slight. He wore a white apron in the shop scuffed at the front by dirty shoes. He had a fine face, dark eyes with long lashes. His teeth were bad though his smile was lovely. He
was
a wicked tease, still is. I suppose he teased all his customers the same.

‘What you been doing?' he'd say, frowning at the heels of my shoes in disbelief, ‘tripping the light fantastic?' And when I smiled he would go on about me dancing all night until the sun came up and call me young lady, and sometimes, a beautiful young lady, even when I was knocking forty. I ask you! I know it was a lark. I know he teased all his female customers like that, but still it gave me a sort of thrill. To be looked at, spoken to, like
that
, flirted with, you might say. Even as a joke. Funny that it didn't offend me. It didn't because Blowski was, and is, good.