The Night Brother

‘Ma. All my life I’ve tried but there’s no pleasing you.’

‘You could never please me,’ she says, and stabs my chest with the point of her finger. Through the reddened skin the bone shows white. ‘Never!’

‘What did I ever do to make you so angry? Was it Papa running off?’

Her eyes stretch so wide open I can see the white around the iris.

‘What?’ she screams, shrill as a mill whistle. She jabs me with two fingers, then three, poking at my chest over and over, bunching her hand into a fist. I hold up my hands to shield myself from the blows. ‘Want to know why we argue about you?’ she cries. ‘You want the truth? Here it is. I hate you. From the day you were born, you’ve blighted my life. I never wanted you.’

‘Ma?’ My voice trembles. ‘You can’t mean that.’

‘Can’t I?’ she sneers. ‘Want to know what’s wrong with this family? You.’

‘No,’ I whisper.

She shakes my shoulder. ‘I. Was. Cursed. With. You.’

‘No, Ma.’

‘Lord only knows I tried to get rid of you. Knitting needles didn’t work. You were stuck fast like a pigeon up a chimney and I’ve had to put up with you ever since.’

‘You’re lying.’

‘Am I? Ask your sainted grandmother.’

‘What?’

‘That’s taken the wind out of your sails, hasn’t it? Go on, if you’re so clever. Run and complain how cruel I am. She only pretends to love you. She hates you too.’

And with that, she lets go of me. I crumple to the floor. She has said many things over the years and I’ve suffered her insults, borne her tirades. This is the first time she’s used the word hate. Like a child who picks at a scab until it bleeds, I’ve provoked Ma into spewing out the truth. It has turned to ashes in my mouth. This is the mystery I sought to plumb: hatred, pure and simple.

By the time I raise my head, the room is empty. I remain curled on the rug. I try to imagine myself a cat: a beast with no worries other than to lick its paws and sleep. My stolid imagination fails me. I am a repulsive girl, unwanted by my mother. Neither use nor ornament.

I lie there a while longer. Some grain of hope remains that Ma may relent and return. The house is silent, as if holding its breath: no shouting, no pounding of her feet up and down the boards. I wonder what she is doing, or rather not doing. I scramble to my feet and press my ear to the wall. I take a glass from the dresser and return to my listening post. I hold the glass to the brick and listen. There is a faint whooshing, like wind through trees.

‘I know you’re listening!’ Ma yells. I stagger backwards, dropping the glass with a crash. ‘I hate you, do you hear? Get away from me!’

Very carefully, I gather up the fragments. I can hardly put them on the shelf: Ma might cut herself. I stow them in my pinafore pocket.

‘I’ve broken a glass, Ma,’ I say timidly. No answer. The hush is unnerving, far more so than the sound of complaints. ‘The big one, with the blue ring around the top.’

I don’t know what to do. I want her to come and tell me off. The glass is a favourite of hers. I can’t remember a time when she did not have it. Gingerly, I shake the splinters on to the tabletop. If I can find some glue, I can mend it. But there don’t seem to be enough pieces to make it whole again. I can’t understand why the edges of each shard are red, until I look at my fingers and find the answer.

As I watch, a dreamlike sensation creeps over me. My fingertips are oozing blood, but seem unconnected to the rest of my body. There is no pain. There is no sensation of any kind. It is not unpleasant. With the same cool detachment, I notice that my pinafore is stained crimson. I will have to use cold water when I scrub it. Hot water sets bloodstains hard.

Time slips through my fingers. I stand there for hours, or a few seconds. I have no idea how to keep track of the minutes, nor indeed the point of such measurements. Questions cluster at the fringes of my consciousness. Why does Ma hate me so much? Why can’t I feel my fingers?

I glance at the half-completed jigsaw of glass, turn and leave the room. Walk down the corridor to the front door. Try to take my shawl from the peg. It snags on the hook, impossible to untangle. I step outdoors without it. I do not expect a stroll to solve any problem. I simply wish to remove myself from anguish.

I know it’s a mistake the moment my foot strikes the kerb. I’ve never known it so cold. Slush the colour of pewter slops underfoot, turning my toes to stone. It is neither night nor day, rather a time balanced between the two. I glance over my shoulder. The windows of The Comet twinkle with a cheery welcome. It is false. I’d rather cut off my own nose than creep back in. I press my face into the shrill edge of the wind and set out, whither I neither know nor care. If I am missed, Ma will think it a cause for celebration rather than sorrow.

Hulme is the nearest thing to quiet I’ve ever heard. Snowflakes tumble from a leaden sky; spears of ice dangle from the gutters. Clouds roll overhead, slow and black as coal barges. I think of us beneath: twisting our light-blind eyes upwards, necks bent beneath iron rain, and the wind sharp enough to pierce you right through.

I pass a smattering of folk swathed in thick coats, scarves drawn tight under the chin, their breath steaming behind them in a foaming wake. No one gasps at my bloodstained apron, or remarks that I should get to the infirmary sharpish, that I’ll catch my death. As I go, the sensation of cold lessens rather than intensifies. It is most curious. I wonder if I am truly walking down the street or if I’m dreaming the whole thing. Perhaps I am still at home, this very moment.

Home. I laugh out loud, to a flurry of turned heads. I no longer have a home; that has been made clear. I walk on through frigid sludge, numbness rising from my ankles to my knees. Gradually, the snowfall peters out and I find myself at the gate of Whitworth Park. I peer through the bars. The paths are streaked with ruts where mothers pushed perambulators earlier that afternoon. Snow cloaks the lawns and piles in heaps upon the bushes, transforming it into a strange, smothered landscape.

How I scale the locked gate I have no notion, but in the blink of an eye it is behind me. The clouds peel away, leaving the sky clear. I make my way into the park, ploughing through the drifts. I find myself lying down. I must have slipped and fallen. My shoulder and elbow shriek. It appears that I can feel pain, after all.

I struggle to my feet and continue walking, trailing my fingertips along the hedges. Without any warning, I am on my knees. I must have fallen again. I don’t remember. My memory is as full of holes as a tea strainer. I examine my arms, sleeves rolled to the elbow from when I peeled the potatoes. The flesh is bluish. There is no longer any sign of bleeding.

The snow is as thick as a mattress and as inviting. Without thinking overmuch about what I am doing, I lie down and sink into feather softness. I cannot recall ever feeling so content. I wonder if this is happiness. If so, it is very agreeable. I will stay here. There is no shouting. No loneliness. No confusion. No pain. No hate.

I close my eyes. A distant part of myself knows I ought to feel cold. If anything it is the opposite. Something that is not precisely warmth, but very much like it, steals through my limbs. It is unbearably sweet. Tears spring, forming icicles. My head draws away from my body, my limbs also. I lose sight of them. I do not care. I am at peace. It has all stopped. All of it. So simple.

My heart beats. The thumping grows in intensity until my body is shuddering. I am a door and someone is knocking so furiously I am being shifted off my hinges. I smile at the peculiar idea. In the thunder I hear a voice.

You! You! Get up!

‘Leave me alone,’ I mutter and stick my fingers into my ears. If I can’t hear him, he’ll have to go away. I’ll be able to hide. I will, I will.

You can’t do this! he yells. Edie!

All I want is to fall asleep. But this creature won’t let me.

‘Let me stay here,’ I say.

Not a chance.

‘I’m happy.’

You’re not.

‘Am so,’ I whine. ‘Just a little longer.’

Bloody get up! he screams. We need each other. There is a pause. I need you, Edie.

A longer silence follows, so profound I can sense each snowflake in the quilt beneath which I lie.

It’s not fair. You can’t do this to me.

‘You’re not real,’ I mumble.

I’m Gnome, you idiot. Have you forgotten?

A chill cuts to my core, far icier than the burrow in which I’m buried. I shake my head.

‘No. You are all in my mind. Gnome is a bad memory. Ma says …’

My brain is being dragged awake. I try to ignore its spark and fizz, try to slip back into the delicious lassitude, but it nags and niggles and will not let me lie. I hardly know if I pull myself or am pulled out of the snowdrift, but emerge I do.

Now, I feel the bitterness of the weather and wish I didn’t. I look over my shoulder at the soft bed I have just left, but the voice lays on the whip and drives me forward. Each step is like walking barefoot on broken glass. I stagger to the gate of the park and this time, climbing over is torture.

I lurch along the street, shivering. People throw sideways glances, wrinkling their lips at this guttersnipe straight from the pages of a cautionary tale told to warn girls of what they’ll be reduced to if they stray.

There is nowhere for me to go but The Comet. It is not home, not in the way the world takes the word, but it is all I have. By the time I turn on to Renshaw Street it is past closing time and the windows are dark. My fingers are so stiff I can barely open the door. I cower in front of the kitchen range and listen to my teeth chatter, oddly loud in the quiet house.

The broken glass has been cleared away, the plates and cups on the shelf rearranged. There’s no sign it was ever there. The only proof I left The Comet is my sodden pinafore. Did I really lie down in the snow? Was I really waiting for – wanting to – My mind gutters like a cheap candle.

I can’t stay here for Ma to trip over me come morning. I tiptoe through the public bar. Papa observes me from behind his glass.

‘Did you leave because of me?’ I whisper. ‘Who are you, really? Who am I?’ He lifts a hairy eyebrow. I’ve always taken his expression to be sympathetic, but after this evening, nothing is certain. ‘Why am I talking to you?’ I sigh. ‘You’re a photograph.’

I climb the stairs. Nana calls out a sleepy greeting. I peel off my filthy clothes, promising whatever guardian angel is listening that I’ll wash them tomorrow. I crawl into bed. Arguments rumble through the wall. The sound is almost comforting.

‘Why me?’ Ma whines. ‘What did I ever do to deserve this?’

‘You’re a hard woman, Cissy. The child is going out of her mind.’

‘So she should be.’

‘A secret is one thing. Hatred is another.’

My door opens. I hear the smoky wheeze of Nana’s breath. The mattress shifts as she lowers herself on to the end of the bed.

‘You shouldn’t rile your mother, child,’ she sighs. ‘She takes care of us all.’

She speaks carefully, and I know it is because Ma is eavesdropping.

‘Yes, Nana,’ I reply. I lower my voice. ‘Why does Ma hate me?’ I whisper.

‘What sort of foolish notion is that?’ she replies, but will not look me in the eye.

‘Am I so horrible?’ I say, words thick with misery.

‘Lass. There is nothing horrible about you,’ she replies with great tenderness.

‘Then why …’ I sob.

‘Your mother has a difficult time of it,’ she continues. ‘She’s not strong, not like you or me.’

I’m strong? It is a strange idea. Nana stretches out her arms, draws me into the safe harbour of her lap and begins to sing.

‘See how she runs, she tumbles and falls,

She catches the sunbeams that come through the door.

Nobody knows how I adore

Nana’s little girl.’

For the space of a song, I taste safety and it is delicious.

‘Will I grow up like Ma?’ I ask with a guilty blush I hope is obscured by the darkness of the room.

‘I pray to all the saints in heaven that you don’t,’ she sighs. ‘Enough. You might not need to sleep but I do. Goodnight.’

She presses dry lips to my brow. Her chin scratches. I think nothing of it, not till much later. I lie quietly, the warmth of my body soaking into the bed, and fall asleep.

The next morning, I wake up with not so much as a speck of dirt under my fingernails, nor one tangle in my hair. I regard myself in the mirror. Ugly as always, but miracles are not for the likes of me.

However, there has been a small miracle of sorts. The previous evening, I came close to extinguishing my life, and stayed my hand. I stumbled, but didn’t fall – not all the way. My mother poured her whole store of bile upon me, all fourteen unlucky years of it. It should have destroyed me. It did not. I have not been vanquished.

If I can survive that, I say to myself, I can survive anything. Perhaps Nana is right, and I am stronger than I imagine. I may have nowhere to go, nor any hope of escape. Yet I sense a core of steel of which I was not previously aware. Even if Nana cannot – will not – stand up to Ma, affection is affection and I’m not such a fool as to spurn it. Things may not be different in my life, but they are in my heart. I pledge myself to the improvement of both.

I am to be tested far sooner than expected.

The Wednesday after, all is as usual in The Comet: the bar full to bursting and a scuffle to stand closest to the fireplace. Ma and I circle each other like warring cats. She plays the cheery landlady, acting as if no cruel words were ever spoken. I move through the crowd, offering pipes from the rack to those who desire them, when one of the customers yells across the din.

‘Hey! What’s the weather like up there with you, lass?’

Every eye swivels in my direction. It is an old joke and one I am well used to. I stretch my lips into a tolerable impersonation of a smile.

‘How about a song, Lady Goliath?’ he shouts, clearly not done with me.

‘Her? She can’t carry a tune in a bucket,’ quips another toper.

‘Shush now, you’ll upset the wee creature. She can’t help having cloth ears.’

‘Wee? You blind all of a sudden?’

There ensues a general bout of mirth at my expense. I pick up a dirty glass.

‘Now, let’s have some respect.’

I throw a grateful glance at whoever has spoken in my defence and find myself eyeball to eyeball with the bane of my existence, copper eyebrows and all. I wasn’t expecting him till tomorrow. He smoothes his hands up and down the front of his waistcoat and tugs at his cuffs. His shirtsleeves are uncrumpled, uncommonly fresh for this late in the day. I wonder how he keeps himself so clean. I’d bite off my own tongue rather than remark upon it.

‘Give us a smile,’ he leers, pinching my cheek. ‘Anyone would think you weren’t pleased to see your Uncle Bob.’

‘You’re not my uncle,’ I reply as rudely as I can, which is not very.

‘I declare. You’ve got a sight more zest these days. Then again, I like a lass with a bit of spunk in her.’ He doffs his cap and rolls his eyes at Ma. ‘What say you, Mrs Latchford?’ he enquires, the soul of civility. ‘A song from the lips of your charming daughter?’

Ma rams a cloth into the throat of a pint pot and sniffs. ‘As you like it.’

‘Positively Shakespearian,’ he titters.

Ma shrugs and concentrates on pouring a precise measure of porter into the clean glass. The head is thick with cream. He returns his attention to me.

‘I wager that you are a nightingale!’ he trills. ‘Furnish us with a song!’

I shake my head. ‘I don’t know any songs,’ I mutter, worrying my apron into knots at the prospect of his slippery attentions twice a week rather than once.

‘I bet you do,’ says my tormentor cheerfully. ‘Do not disappoint your impatient audience!’

The room takes up the cry, banging beer pots on the tables and stamping their feet. I am trapped. I wonder what it is about me that makes this scoundrel feel he has the right to pin me to the spot. It’s clear that peace will not be restored until I’ve placated the crowd with a song.

‘“Father, O Father, come home to us now,”’ I whisper.

‘Speak up, love!’ someone cries.

‘Can’t hear you!’

‘Put some vim into it.’

I throw a pleading glance at Ma. She is looking in the opposite direction.

‘Go on,’ growls the gingery man. ‘Sing.’

I place one hand flat against my stomach and hold up the other, pointing a finger at the ceiling. I clear my throat, gabble the verse and scuttle back to the safety of the bar.

‘If you will parade yourself you deserve everything coming to you,’ says Ma sourly enough to take the polish off a chapel pew.

‘I did nothing!’

‘Oh, hush your moaning and take this,’ she snaps, shoving a platter of fried bread into my hands.

‘But, Ma …’ I whimper. I want to give that man a wide berth for the remainder of the evening. Indeed, for the rest of my life if I can help it.

‘Move, girl, or I’ll make you regret it.’

I squeeze between the tables. I’ve gone less than half a dozen paces when the pest grasps my arm and pulls me between his knees. He eyes the plate and smacks his lips.

‘Bringing me a treat, are you?’ he asks.

‘It’s for everyone.’

‘Such ingratitude!’ he chortles. ‘Is this how you treat your knight in shining armour? I saved you from the rude and churlish ways of this rabble. How about a thank you?’

‘I have to take the bread round.’ I take a step backwards, but he hangs on to my arm.

‘Go on. Give Uncle Bob first nibble,’ he says, poking me in the stomach.

I hold the bowl out of reach, but Ma barks my name and I have little choice but to proffer it, however unwillingly. He takes a piece with a dainty gesture and places it between his lips.

‘That’s tasty,’ he says, gaze swarming across my breasts.

I try to wriggle free. He presses his knees together like the jaws of a man-trap.

‘Let me go. Everyone else wants a bit.’

‘I’ll bet they do.’ He selects another piece of bread and slithers his tongue over it until it glistens with spittle. ‘I’ll bet you’ve got a queue of beaux lining up for what you’ve got.’

‘I don’t!’ I try to sound outraged at such an indelicate suggestion, but it comes out as petulance.

‘No?’ He swallows the damp morsel with a gulp. ‘Unplucked. How delectable.’ He sucks grease off his fingers and wipes them on his spotless waistcoat. ‘I must check such an assertion.’

As innocently as a man retrieving a dropped sixpence, he bends to the floor. Hidden by my petticoats, I feel his hand circle my ankle. I start away but am caught in the vice of his thighs. In a leisurely fashion, he draws himself upright and, as he does so, his fingers slide up my calf. I can’t move, can’t speak. He squeezes my knee.

Our eyes lock. He smiles with tender solicitation, as if it is the most natural thing in the world for a stranger to have his hand up a girl’s skirt. I look at the other customers. They are ogling their glasses and joking with each other as if we are quite invisible. I cast a desperate look at Ma. She is busy washing glasses. I open my mouth to shout for her to come and rescue me.

The cry shrivels.

What can I say? What sort of girl allows a man to do such a thing? The shame of it: I imagine every head in the room turning in my direction and seeing what is happening. I will bring ignominy on to Ma’s head. I will cause The Comet to become known as a den of iniquity where such carryings-on take place. Ma’s years of building up a respectable name dashed into smithereens in a moment.

His hand creeps an inch higher.

‘What a pretty thing you are,’ he says, tilting his head to one side. ‘I believe this is going to become my favourite beerhouse from this moment on, if it has you to tempt me so. Wednesday night, Thursday night. Why, every night, I declare.’

His fingers continue their spider-climb under my skirt until they reach the tops of my stockings. He caresses the naked skin of my thigh. My breath bundles in my throat. With all my being I try to say stop. Such a short word, less than a breath, but it falters on my tongue, silenced by the lifetime of lessons drummed into me that children should be seen and not heard, and that good girls do what they’re told.

I tremble so much that the bread dances in the dish. I dare not slap him away; indeed I cannot, for I’m holding on to the plate and if I let it fall I’ll catch it off Ma. Besides, everyone will look to see what the noise is about and I’ll die of mortification. When I think that I am about to burst, the strangest thing happens. I bend my head until my lips are on a level with his ear. A voice I do not recognise spills out of my mouth, quiet enough for him to hear, but none other.

‘Get your filthy paws off me,’ I growl. A confused look shadows his features. His hand freezes but does not withdraw. ‘Right now.’

A smirk worms its way across his lips.

‘Or what, my little pet?’ he leers.

‘Or what?’ I fill my lungs with cleansing breath, and continue. ‘Pin back your bloody ears and listen. I shall watch you, every moment of every day. I shall bide my time. One night, when you’ve dropped your guard, I’ll take my knife, the one I use for chopping this bread so nice and neat, and I shall slide it between your ribs. And when you fall gasping to the floor I shall unbutton your greasy britches, grab your wizened meat and two veg and saw off the whole damned lot.’

I straighten up in a leisurely fashion. He draws his hand away from my leg and tucks it into his trouser pocket as if it has been there all evening. Around us, men sip beer. We stare at each other, blankly as strangers do. He swallows heavily, staggers to his feet, stutters an apology and hastens away, leaving tracks in the sawdust. I follow him to the door and watch him scurry down the street. He stops, slings a look over his shoulder and disappears around the corner.

‘What’s up with him?’ asks Ma.

‘Who?’

‘You know very well who. You scaring off my customers?’ she says.

I hitch my shoulders lazily. I carry the bread around the room, offering it with a perfect smile. When the plate is empty I return to the bar, where I set it down without so much as a rattle.

That night I stretch on my bed, staring into the shadows where the wall meets the ceiling. I’ve no idea who planted those words in my mouth. I’ve never spoken like that before. Yet tonight, I did. I answered back. I said no. Maybe this is the strength of which Nana.

GNOME

1901

At last. She is standing up for herself. Good thing too. I was beginning to think she was as much use as a dog with one leg. Of course, it took plenty of help from yours truly, but I’m not the boastful sort. Nor have I any desire to squander more brain matter than absolutely necessary upon my sister. There are more important things to worry about.

Top of the list is just how far Reg and his minions have put the wind up me. The last thing I want to admit is that I’m too scared to go to Shudehill, but facts are facts and I may as well swallow them, thorns and all. I stick close to home, prowling the confines of my neighbourhood. I tell myself I am still King of the Night, even if my kingdom has shrunk to the size of a postage stamp. Tell myself this is better than nothing at all, that I am biding my time before I return to the site of my defeat. No, not defeat. I’m simply a wise general who knows when to advance and when to retreat; when to strengthen home defences before venturing abroad on far-flung campaigns. I tell myself this is consolidation.

Weeks slide into months, which stretch into a year, and I wonder if I’m fated to spend my life pacing this grimy cage. No lion ever chafed so against his bars, or roared so disconsolately at the injustice of his imprisonment. I can’t go on like this. A lad’s needs are manifold and I itch to stretch my legs.