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It feels different to me already, when I lay my hands across it I can feel the swelling, like a deep breath in a very tight dress, the stretch of it, and I wonder if anyone else can see.
I wonder if my dad will be able to see.
I ring the doorbell.
Chapter 22
There’s a thudding sound from a door across the street, from behind the door maybe, and he looks up to see what it is, the man with the burnt hands, he lifts the cracked shell of his face and tries to see what the noise is.
It’s coming from number seventeen, a banging noise of wood against wood, the doorhandle is twitching up and down and the door is pressing outwards with each thud, like the heartbeat of a Bugs Bunny in love, boomba boomba. He thinks to himself, the door must be stuck, it happens, in the heat, in these old houses where the landlords let things slip.
The noise stops. He looks at the door, at the shine of the doorhandle, the metal of the doorhandle warming up in the midday sun.
And then the window next to the door is hauled up suddenly, the sashes squeaking, and a gangly young man clambers out through the opening, the net curtain covering his face briefly like a bridal veil before he emerges into the street and strides away towards the shop. He holds his hand up over his eyes, screws his face up against the glare of the sun, pulls at the collar of his crumpled white shirt. One of the twins stops his bowling run-up and shouts splash sploosh, and the young man ignores him.
The man with the ruined hands sits in a chair in his front garden and looks at the net curtain wafting in and out of the open window.
The veil she wore on their wedding day was white, it was like the curtain. It was smooth, silk maybe, and when she breathed it drifted out from her face like a feather. This was many years gone now, their wedding day, but it is like no time at all.
The look in her face when she lifted the veil, the delight, the pride, the beautiful in her soul, could be yesterday.
Her face, was beautiful.
Her hands, was beautiful.
Her skin, was smooth and clear and unbroken, when she touched him lightly it felt like water trickling across his body. She would move her hand across his face to see if she wanted him to shave before the evening meal, and when she was done his skin would feel clean of the dust of the day.
She was tall, and strong, and she kept her hair coiled tightly around the back of her head and she had intricate paintings on the secret parts of her body. She was a wonderful woman, but this was not enough to help her. He loved her deeply, but this was not enough to help her. Please, darling, she called out to him, through the door, the closed door. Please darling can’t you help me she called. He could not reach to her, he was not enough.
The door was stuck, in the heat, it was swollen, the wood of the door in the frame, the frame it was too small, like a wedding ring on a very hot day.
It was so very hot.
She said darling I am very hot I cannot breathe please can’t you reach me.
The paint on the door was coming away, it was bubbles, blistering, each time he touched it he felt knives across his skin and into his bones. The metal of the doorhandle, when he touched it, it melted his hand like butter, it sunk into his skin like an axe into a tree and the hot air and the poisonous paint in his lungs, he thought he would die but he did not. He did not die.
She said my God my God what is happening.
He sits in his garden on a folding wooden chair, this man with the burnt hands, and the sun is shining and his daughter is playing with another girl in the street and he is okay but he is not okay.
He watches the young man with the white shirt and the tie loping back along the street with a bag of shopping. The bag is red and white, thin plastic, inside there is a pint of milk, a carton of orange juice, packets of crisps. He watches as the young man clambers back through the open window, he licks a peel of skin on his palm, flattening it, he watches the young man reappear and fiddle with his front-door handle. The young man pushes at the door with his shoulder, he rattles the handle, he kicks the bottom of the frame. He puts his hand through the letterbox and shakes the door.
The man in the chair brings his hand to his lips and thinks of his wife saying my God the door what is happening.
The young man stands back from the door, he looks around. His face is red and he is sweating. He sees the man in the chair, they see each other, the young man makes a face like well what a laugh and the man in the chair replies with a single slow nod.
She said it is too hot I cannot breathe I cannot please my God can’t you help me darling please.
The young man turns and lifts his foot high and kicks into the door, his arms raised and his fists clenched, his body all pointed down the line of his leg in a rush and a tangle and the door swings open and his momentum carries him through into the shade of his hallway and there is a sound like he is falling to the floor.
The man in the chair looks, he does not move. He remembers her, she said what is happening, the door, please, can’t you reach me, please, the door.
His daughter skips past, her shoes are tapping on the pavement, she is singing and she does not look up at him as she passes.
In the kitchen of number seventeen the young man with the creased and sweaty white shirt puts a kettle on to boil. He lines up a row of almost clean mugs and drops a teabag into each one.
The tall girl with the glitter around her eyes comes in and says what was that noise? and her skirt is twisted round almost sideways and there are creases on her cheek from the pillow. He says that was me kicking the door in, oh she says, what for, I couldn’t open it he says. The kettle boils and he fills up the mugs, sniffing the milk before he adds it to the tea, he says how are you feeling, she says like shit. He says are the others awake? She says I don’t know, she says heal my head and she sits down and takes his hands and pulls them onto her scalp. He rubs his fingers through her hair in circles, squeezing and pressing as if kneading warm dough into life and she says mm that’s nice. The short girl with the painted nails comes in and says is that tea for me what was that noise? The boy says the door was jammed, I had to kick it in he says, she says oh, she says where’s he gone? He says he must have gone out, he’s not in his room, she says oh I hope he’s okay he was being a bit weird last night. The tall girl watches the tissue-thin vapours twirling upwards from the mugs of tea, illuminated by the sunlight, she can see each drop of moisture, lighter than air, spiralling together like a flock of birds turning into the sun, like a tiny waterfall reversed, a playful movement, she feels as though if she put her hand in the way it would tickle she says mm oh I feel better now.
