There but for The_ A Novel - Ali Smith [71]
You know my friend, Jennifer says in one of the short silences between May’s foot lifting off the pedal and pressing down on it.
What friend? May says.
He said this thing, Jennifer says.
May sighs.
He said when he was small, Jennifer says, and his grandfather was still alive, his grandfather would have him to the tunes off the soundtrack record he had at his house of the Mary Poppins film.
May presses the pedal down. The machine whirs. She takes her foot off again.
You mean, May says in the loud absence after the whirring noise, that his grandfather would have him over to listen to the tunes off the soundtrack record he had at his house of the Mary Poppins film.
She presses the pedal. The machine whirs.
When she takes her foot off again Jennifer speaks behind her.
Yeah, but that’s not what he said, Jennifer says.
There is a silence for a moment.
He said it always started when the tune about I Love To Laugh came on, Jennifer says.
May presses the pedal. The little reel of thread on top of the machine spins like a mad thing. Jennifer slides off the counter and leaves the kitchen, swings out through the door with her hands in her pockets, whistling a tune. The kitchen door shuts behind her by itself.
May sits at the machine with her foot off the pedal and her head has something like a storm wind roaring through it.
When she next looks at the clock several minutes have passed.
She gets up from the machine and goes to the sink. She turns the hot tap on and she puts her hands under it. She leaves them under it until the water is too hot to keep doing it. She pats her reddened hands dry on a clean tea towel.
She goes to the back door and calls her husband out of the garage. Philip stands at the back door in the light summer dark. He sees her face and a look of alarm crosses his own. What? he says.
When Jennifer gets back in later that night from God and all the angels only know where, she is whistling the same tune she went out whistling earlier.
They see her through the window coming up the garden path, her hands in the pockets of the awful jacket, and they hear her come through the front door and make to go straight up the stairs.
Her father gets up and switches the television off. He calls her, asks her to come into the front room for a bit. She stops halfway up the stairs, then she turns and comes back down and does as they ask. Her father asks her to sit on the sofa. She does.
Why is the TV off? she says.
Is this about me whistling? she says.
Come on, what? she says.
They forbid her from seeing the boy again. Her mouth falls open. Then she says they can’t forbid her because she and the boy are in all the same classes at school.
They forbid her from seeing him in the out of school hours. She shakes her head.
They forbid her from speaking to him on the phone. She says they can’t do that, it isn’t fair. They explain to her about troublemaking, attention-getting and lying. She crosses her arms and looks them both in the face and says they are being unfair. They tell her they are saying it for her own good, that people who tell manipulative troublemaking lies to cause a drama are not decent. She goes to say something but she decides against it. She stops herself. She stands up. She leaves the room, closing the door behind her.
May and Philip exchange glances. Philip gets up and switches the television back on.
May and Philip watch TV. Then they go to bed, when it’s time to.
What happens next is that there is no talking to Jennifer for days. In fact, what happens is, Jennifer stops speaking. Jennifer won’t speak. Morning, dinnertime, night, if she’s in their company at all she sits insolent and silent.
Mealtimes are particularly difficult.
Then thankfully it all settles down a bit. Eventually