There but for The_ A Novel - Ali Smith [61]
(Jennifer comes into the kitchen. She is eight years old and very angry. She is holding a book she’s found in the pile of books on the table in the upstairs toilet. On the front it has a picture of a man on fire, his arms and legs stretched out inside what looks like a wheel of flames.
It is the most unfair thing I have ever heard of in not just the whole world, but the whole world and all the surrounding planets, Jennifer says.
She has been reading about people who burst into flames. The whole book is about people who suddenly burn to death there and then in their living rooms or wherever for no reason. Sometimes their legs and arms survive them and someone comes home and finds them in a pile on the carpet, nothing left of the main parts of their bodies but little heaps of ash.
Jennifer is near tears.
What if Rick was just playing football and kicking the ball and just as he was about to kick in a goal, just, out of nowhere—? Or Nor was doing modern dance like normal at the class on a Wednesday and then right in front of the big mirror, she—? What if Dad was fishing and he just, you know,—?
Well, then, the river would be the best place for him, May says. And it’s not often you’ll catch me saying that.
She puts down the iron and lifts Jennifer, who is clammy with anger, on to her knee on one of the kitchen stools.
But what if one day I came home from school, Jennifer is saying, and I went to make you a cup of tea, and then when I got through with the cup of tea, there was just a, a pile of ash on the chair, and there on the floor were your legs, and there on the arms of the chair were your arms?
Right. If this actually ever happens, May says, are you listening? These are my instructions. You are to just put the mug of tea in one of my hands there on the side of that chair regardless, have you got that? Because I’ll be wanting that tea.
Jennifer nearly laughs. She is almost persuaded. Then she goes limp again on May’s lap.
The water inside the iron on the ironing board makes a small impatient noise.
Jennifer, there is no way in a million you’re going to burst into flames, May says.
It’s not me I’m worried about, Jennifer says.
You’ve not to think about such things, May says. If you thought about such things you’d go mad. And the worst thing about worries is, they’re contagious.
How are they contagious? Jennifer says.
What I mean is, if you worry, May says, then I have to worry too.
Jennifer looks desolate. She climbs off May’s knee and goes and stands by the sink.
In the future, she says, I will keep my worries in the confines of my own head.
God and all the angels only know where she got that from. She is quite a child for the saying of things strangely. It’s my life too, you know, is what she said in the middle of an argument they were having about breakfast cereal, and that was when she was barely four years old. May had had to turn round, turn away, so her child wouldn’t see her laughing. And another time, last year, she’d just turned seven. What if, when we’re praying like to St. Anthony about things being lost, what if the being who hears us and sees us and helps us isn’t St. Anthony at all but is Rascal the dog? Recently too she’s started refusing to take her mother’s hand if they’re crossing a road.
May pats her knee. Jennifer gives in, comes back and climbs back up. But her head is hot under May’s chin, too heavy against her chest. The weight of her is sullen, maybe settling in for the afternoon if May’s not careful.
The iron sighs on the ironing board again.
Could be quite good, mind you. If you burst into flames, May says.
Good?—if—? Jennifer says lifting her head.
Especially if you were on horseback, May says. You on that Shetland pony, what’s its name, going over the jumps. You’ll be all lit up like a bonfire on horseback at the Summer Fête at the Park.
Ha! Jennifer says.
Instead of the Hoop of Fire,