Chapter Thirty-Nine -
Pictures of Cindy
I'm sitting on the window
seat in the dining room next door. Cindy is explaining how
everything is going to be alright."...and it's bound
to help. I'm sure he'll feel differently when she's born."Terry of course
didn't really want a child. There were so many reasons why
it was not a good idea. Cindy was unbalanced. She would make
a bad mother, and that would lead to more problems. He
wasn't making enough money. Having a child meant having an
extension built onto the house to provide another bedroom, a
playroom, and .....well, was one child the end of the line?
Two extra bedrooms. Then there's the problem of schooling.
That had to be boarding school, of course, with the
attendant fees. Cindy would have to give up her job to stay
home and look after the child, so there would be less money.
Terry was not happy."And it'll take my
mind off all these things. I wont have to worry so much
about how I feel, or how Terry feels about me, because I
shall have to think about the baby. And it will be good for
me to have someone else to look after. I really do need to
have someone dependent upon me. The trouble has always been
that Terry does everything. He doesn't ask my opinion even
about the simplest things. I am totally dependent upon him.
He doesn't need me for a thing, not even sex since Ann came
on the scene. And anyway the sex is a dead loss. I feel he
doesn't want to touch me. I don't know, maybe it's just me.
I get so het-up about it.""Then why don't you
force yourself to take the initiative?""What do you mean?""Go to bed tonight
and actually attack him and make him feel you want him.
Touch him and get excited, and...." I waved my arms about in
the hope that she would get the drift without me going into
too much detail."I could do I
suppose. I always wait for him to make the move. You see
I've got so used to him making all the decisions."There was a short
silence. I suppose I should have said something, but I had
no idea what to say."Don't you think
having a baby is a good idea?"I wasn't expecting
her to suddenly ask me that. "I don't know," I said, hoping
that didn't commit me to too much."I think it's a good
idea. It does after all help to cement relationships. I was
reading something about it in a magazine the other day.""Ah well, they say
all sorts of daft things in magazines," I said, which, on
second thoughts, committed me to rather a lot. It was no
doubt a silly thing to say."Do you think it's
daft?" She suddenly looked eager, and slightly worried.I was in it now, up
to my neck. I shrugged. "Yes, I do.""Why?"I didn't want to
answer that question, but what the hell! I took a deep
breath. "If a relationship isn't going too well then isn't
it rather silly to build on it? I mean, if you look at the
foundations you've just laid, and they are a bit askew,
building more bricks on top of them wont straighten them
out, will it?""Ah yes, but we
aren't building a house, are we?" she said brightly.I started chewing
the inside of my mouth and stared across the room. "No...."
I thought perhaps I shouldn't say any more."So you don't think
we stand much of a chance of making this work? She was
staring sullenly at the floor now.I suppose I
shouldn't have said that. But that was what I felt. Why say
'yes, have the kid and things will be better' when that
isn't what I thought? On the other hand, she wanted support.
I should be giving her support."But I need someone
to want me. I need to be useful. I think I'll be better if I
have the child to look after, and then Terry wont have to
worry about me so much, and perhaps we'll get on better."I shrugged my shoulders again. "Well, maybe that's how it will be. How can I tell? I dont have a crystal ball. I cant tell you whether it's a good thing or not. Maybe you're right. Maybe you'll feel so much better, the tension in the marriage will lessen and things will start to go well." I didn't believe it but I wasn't going to throw away the out she'd presented.
"I did think you
might need me a little.""I looked up
sharply. "Me? What do you mean?""Well, with Ann
going to bed with Terry, you and I....." She still stared
down sullenly at the carpet. She looked as if she had gone
flop, as though her depression was literally pressing her
downwards. She seemed to have grown very heavy and be slowly
sinking into the floor. I felt a bit awkward, and didn't
know what to do."But... I mean.... I
thought you and Terry were making up. I mean, the baby and
all that...." I couldn't get her drift at all."I wasn't thinking
of that," she said slowly and dully, still looking at the
floor. "I thought you came up to see me because you cared,
perhaps, just a little." There was a pause. "You didn't, I
assume, just come up to screw me?"I licked my lips and
did a double-take. I now really did have to be careful what
I said.She looked up before
I managed to think of a suitable reply. "You started writing
something about it, didn't you?""Yes.""Why did you do
that?""I... well..." I
stopped to think a moment. Actually I hadn't thought of why
I started to write the poem. It came as an idea, and somehow
at the time it seemed the obvious subject. A poet writes
poems. Why he chooses to write about one topic in particular
isn't always clear at the time. You get an image or two, an
impulse, and you build on the little you've got, and your
interest grows, and so the poem takes shape. Sometimes the
work doesn't get a life of its own, and the poem doesn't get
beyond the first or second draft, but there isn't a clear
reason as to why one originally decides to get going."I mean you must
have had some particular reason. Do you write about all the
girls you go to bed with?""No. I don't
necessarily write about going to bed with people. I mean,
that isn't some special category of action that I write
about, it's..." I stopped. I was going to say 'it's just
another action like anything else', but that seemed to be a
rather disastrous statement to make just at the moment."Or were you just
out to get your own back on Ann?""Get my own back on
Ann? What? Writing about you?""No. Going to bed
with me?"You're joking. Why
should I want to get my own back on Ann? Anyway, what makes
you think going to bed with you would have any effect on her
at all? I mean, she does know, and she doesn't give a toss,
so I don't see....""It evens up the
score.""I beg your pardon.""Terry goes to bed
with Ann. You go to bed with me.""You're being
ridiculous."She stared up at me
with a hard but very sad look. "Am I?""Look Cindy, what
are you trying to do? Are you trying to get me to tell you I
cant stand the sight of you, and wish you'd go jump in the
lake? Are you goading me into saying something nasty?""No. I just want the
truth, that's all.""No, you don't want
the truth. You want a lie. You want me to say what you want
me to say.""I get fed up with
people telling me lies just to make me feel better. I want
you to tell me the truth.""Look Cindy, I don't
need you. If you are rigorously truthful nobody needs you.
If you hadn't existed, then nobody would have lost out. But,
and this is a big but, that is true for everybody else as
well. You're no different from the rest of us. You have to
satisfy your own needs. Terry lives with you. He does so for
some reason. He must need you in some way. Okay, your kid,
when you have the child, will need you. I mean, you create
the situation for the need to exist. I mean..... okay, I
know, everybody likes to feel, needs to feel, useful, to be
of some account in the world, but.... Oh hell."She was sitting on
the floor. I had paced up and down, and found myself facing
a window at the other end of the room. She said nothing. I
didn't know what to say. I felt I'd said it all wrong, but I
made no attempt to change my stance.Terry had mentioned
to Ann that Cindy and I would make a good friendship. He
wanted me to take the strain of his relationship. I resented
that. I didn't want to cope with Cindy's problems. I
couldn't. I was fucked-up enough myself. I was not at all
sure what was going down with Annabel, and that was worry
enough. I couldn't make Cindy happy. I couldn't make her
laugh, and I didn't want to talk depressing existentialist
philosophy with her. And I certainly couldn't solve her
problems. And what on earth was going to happen if I went up
to see her every day to give her lots of hugs? Wasn't that
going to weaken rather than strengthen her relationship with
Terry, and what the heck was it going to do to my own
relationship with Ann?I was beginning to
understand why she liked Leonard Cohen, and wondered if I
could cope with all that darkness of the soul.I felt trapped. I
felt I was being emotionally blackmailed. 'Give me a little
love to make me blossom. It isn't too much to ask, is it?
Just love me a little.' And yet the real demand was always
more than that. It would be more love tomorrow, more need
the next day, and a double album of Leonard Cohen by the end
of the week. I would be sucked dry.I wasn't having it.We were on opposite
sides of the room. I walked over slowly and stood beside
her, stroking her hair. I didn't want to speak. I did want
to stroke her hair. After all, I wasn't her enemy. I wanted
to be her friend, if only she demanded something just a
little less confusing than I felt was being presented.Terry came in. I
looked up and smiled weakly. He looked bright and breezy.
"Well, how's it going?"I didn't feel bright
or breezy. "I don't know. We came close for a little while
and then we seemed to move away again. I don't know." I
looked down at the wreck that was Cindy sitting on the
carpet.And then I looked
back up at Terry. There was something in his face. It was
obvious. In fact it was screaming at me. He was pleased I
was standing there by his wife. He was pleased I had my hand
stroking her hair. He was pleased that I was taking the
strain in his marriage.At that moment I
thought of picking up Cindy and carrying her upstairs,
ripping off her clothes and shagging her to kingdom come and
back.I then had a picture
of what would be happening downstairs. Terry would be
smiling. He'd check in the kitchen to see what Cindy had
made for dinner. He would be pleased that I was upstairs
with his wife so he didn't have to deal with her. I could
see me starting a parallel life with Cindy, doing what Terry
should be doing, and poor Annabel would be even more pissed
offI bent down and
kissed her, stroked her hair, and said goodnight, leaving
her in the hands of her husband, who ought to have been more
capable of looking after her. At least he ought to have been
more committed to the problem.* * * * *
I had my supper. It
was another quiet evening. Cindy had left me feeling drained
and depressed. Ann was depressed over Terry. She felt she
had now been let down twice in quick succession, and that
was after being let down by me.We went to bed
early. It was about two in the morning when the telephone
rang. Terry was on the line. He was hysterical. "The
ambulance has just come to take Cindy to hospital. She's
taken an overdose, and they've got to pump her out." He
shouted the news at me in an accusing manner, and slammed
the phone down.I stood there, naked
in the cold winter night, my hand still on the phone,
staring at the dark curtains. I suppose she had to do it. It
was part of where she was. I could have prevented it. I kept
muttering over to myself that I could have prevented this
happening.I stood there
thinking back to the way Terry came in that night. He was
really pleased to see me standing over his wife, stroking
her hair. He thought he was in for an easy evening as I'd
been sitting with her and comforting her.I had all these
thoughts come flooding through my brain. I should have
answered his question. How's it going, indeed? I should have
answered him back. I should have picked up his sad and lost,
totally uncomforted wife, and taken her upstairs, and made
love to her for the rest of the evening. I should have
called over my shoulder that his dinner was in the oven, and
that I was going to do what he should be doing.He would probably
have put his books on the settle under the window, gone to
look in the oven, and been pleased I was trying to revive
his wife. Yes, he would have been relieved I was upstairs,
naked in bed with his wife.What a ridiculous
situation! But how could I be the emotional support for his
marriage? The whole idea was preposterous. I would have tied
a millstone round my neck. I would have had to get it off at
some time, and then everything would have been even worse.
But..... Yes, it was a big but. Yes, I could have prevented
it.I liked Cindy. I
could have loved her. It would not have lasted, but....
Another but. All these buts.The situation was
like a threat, an ultimatum. If only these things could be
allowed to grow. Love is like a butterfly reaching out from
its chrysalis. The back of the cone splits, the butterfly
arches out with sticky wings, and sits in the sun. Slowly
the wings open to dry and stiffen. When it is ready, the
fledgling flaps the wings slowly at first, and then lifts
off to flutter into the new bright world.If you blow on the
wings and force them to open and dry too quickly, the
butterfly lifts off but crashes to the ground because its
wings are not really ready.Anyone can fly.....
when they are ready.Everyone needs their
time in the sun, for their wings to strengthen before they
can fly.Why is it that at every turn there is something in the way; something that threatens, something that forces, something that ought not to be there, something that springs up to prevent what should happen?
Everything would
have been all right Cindy. Things weren't as bad as you
thought. But you didn't know that. I was still there willing
to support you. I should have known it was up to me to throw
an arm around a fragile girl and lie as much as the
situation needed.All I can do is
write words and make excuses. What use is that?I was cold. I stared
out of the window at nothing at all. Then turned and slowly
walked back up to bed."What was all that
about?""Terry phoning to
say that Cindy has taken an overdose, and she's been carted
off to the hospital.""She's not dead
then?""Oh no, they're
going to pump her out.""Bitch! Just getting
more sympathy." And she turned over and pulled the
bedclothes tightly round her. * * * * *
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