a hard-on. I am ridiculous without you.
At least this time it is finite. Mab promises it won’t be long, my darling, and I’ll be back with you. That is the one promise Mab must keep. I’m sure she can even talk Aubrey round to our way of thinking. She’ll make sure he’ll take me back again. She owes me.
Forgive me and don’t forget to miss me.
Your Daniel xx
25th January
The Studio
Dear Mab –
Things continue to be frosty – in all senses of the word. The routine has slipped back into place with terrifying ease and I have taken my role in it: dog-walker; bed-changer; arse-washer; waiter; chef; collector of piss and shit and blood and any other fluid that dog or man wishes to throw at me.
Maggie has progressed the silent treatment into a series of barked orders, which she tosses my way at the most unexpected moments; last time was through the toilet door, just as I’d settled down with the paper. I am expected to carry out these orders immediately and without complaint. This is the only way to win back her approval and assistance. This I learnt by dawdling on the toilet – sheleft the bag of dirty washing behind and only made Dad a cup of tea before she left.
Talk to her for me, could you?
Daniel
28th January
The Studio
Dear Aubrey –
I may not be speaking to you after you kicked me unceremoniously into the gutter, but that doesn’t mean I can’t write to you about a conversation I had with someone else.
I was pottering around the living room, searching for the emergency tobacco. Dad was watching TV and Maggie was in the kitchen redoing the washing-up I’d finished before she arrived.
‘Maggie? Are these yours?’
‘You’ll have to come through. I can’t clean and see through walls.’
I carried the bottles of nail varnish to the kitchen. ‘I found them on the bookshelves. You been dolling yourself up?’
‘Hardly my colour, are they? That one there looks no better than this dishwater.’ Maggie snapped a tea-towel from the rail and wiped the suds from her forearms. She nodded at the bottles in my hand. ‘They’ll be Sarah’s. Give them here, lad. I’ll get them back to her.’
‘When was Sarah here?’
‘What did you expect? Someone had to look after Michael while you were off gallivanting. What did youthink, that I was doing it all on my lonesome? That girl was a godsend. She’d give up anything for Michael. Do anything to keep him happy.’ She swiped the inside of a coffee cup with the tea-towel. ‘Did no one ever teach you how to wash dishes? You use too much liquid and not enough elbow grease. This lot were a right state.’
‘Is she coming back?’
‘That’s what we were wondering about you. Disappearing in the middle of the night and then phoning me up whimpering like a child. Leaving your father high and dry in that god-awful place. Who did you think it was that fetched the doctor and got your dad to the hospital when he was raving? Half out of his mind, he was, poor man. And where were you when you were needed?’
‘I know, I know. But Maggie, what about Sarah?’
‘What about her?’ Maggie laid a final saucer into the stack and twisted her hip to settle against the draining board. ‘Don’t start all that business again, Danny. It’s not right and you know it. Forcing a poor girl out of the only home she’d ever known. Now hand over that nail polish.’
I didn’t. I pocketed them. I took the chair next to the bookshelf and sat there imagining her painting her nails Nose Bleed, Corpse Pallor and Yellow Snow. I wondered what the colours said about her mood. She must have stayed here. Maybe she slept in my bed again.
I used to paint her nails for her, back when she first arrived and we were making friends. I was quite the accomplished manicurist: one stroke to the centre; one stroke either side. Apparently it helps to lengthen the nail. Don’t colour over the lines, Danny . She never wore makeup in the time I knew her and she bit those nails of
At least this time it is finite. Mab promises it won’t be long, my darling, and I’ll be back with you. That is the one promise Mab must keep. I’m sure she can even talk Aubrey round to our way of thinking. She’ll make sure he’ll take me back again. She owes me.
Forgive me and don’t forget to miss me.
Your Daniel xx
25th January
The Studio
Dear Mab –
Things continue to be frosty – in all senses of the word. The routine has slipped back into place with terrifying ease and I have taken my role in it: dog-walker; bed-changer; arse-washer; waiter; chef; collector of piss and shit and blood and any other fluid that dog or man wishes to throw at me.
Maggie has progressed the silent treatment into a series of barked orders, which she tosses my way at the most unexpected moments; last time was through the toilet door, just as I’d settled down with the paper. I am expected to carry out these orders immediately and without complaint. This is the only way to win back her approval and assistance. This I learnt by dawdling on the toilet – sheleft the bag of dirty washing behind and only made Dad a cup of tea before she left.
Talk to her for me, could you?
Daniel
28th January
The Studio
Dear Aubrey –
I may not be speaking to you after you kicked me unceremoniously into the gutter, but that doesn’t mean I can’t write to you about a conversation I had with someone else.
I was pottering around the living room, searching for the emergency tobacco. Dad was watching TV and Maggie was in the kitchen redoing the washing-up I’d finished before she arrived.
‘Maggie? Are these yours?’
‘You’ll have to come through. I can’t clean and see through walls.’
I carried the bottles of nail varnish to the kitchen. ‘I found them on the bookshelves. You been dolling yourself up?’
‘Hardly my colour, are they? That one there looks no better than this dishwater.’ Maggie snapped a tea-towel from the rail and wiped the suds from her forearms. She nodded at the bottles in my hand. ‘They’ll be Sarah’s. Give them here, lad. I’ll get them back to her.’
‘When was Sarah here?’
‘What did you expect? Someone had to look after Michael while you were off gallivanting. What did youthink, that I was doing it all on my lonesome? That girl was a godsend. She’d give up anything for Michael. Do anything to keep him happy.’ She swiped the inside of a coffee cup with the tea-towel. ‘Did no one ever teach you how to wash dishes? You use too much liquid and not enough elbow grease. This lot were a right state.’
‘Is she coming back?’
‘That’s what we were wondering about you. Disappearing in the middle of the night and then phoning me up whimpering like a child. Leaving your father high and dry in that god-awful place. Who did you think it was that fetched the doctor and got your dad to the hospital when he was raving? Half out of his mind, he was, poor man. And where were you when you were needed?’
‘I know, I know. But Maggie, what about Sarah?’
‘What about her?’ Maggie laid a final saucer into the stack and twisted her hip to settle against the draining board. ‘Don’t start all that business again, Danny. It’s not right and you know it. Forcing a poor girl out of the only home she’d ever known. Now hand over that nail polish.’
I didn’t. I pocketed them. I took the chair next to the bookshelf and sat there imagining her painting her nails Nose Bleed, Corpse Pallor and Yellow Snow. I wondered what the colours said about her mood. She must have stayed here. Maybe she slept in my bed again.
I used to paint her nails for her, back when she first arrived and we were making friends. I was quite the accomplished manicurist: one stroke to the centre; one stroke either side. Apparently it helps to lengthen the nail. Don’t colour over the lines, Danny . She never wore makeup in the time I knew her and she bit those nails of
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