Page 32 of Pyg

SKULKING IN SHADOWS OF THE PAST

A sense of melancholy weighed heavy on me as I stood in the front garden of the only home I’d known as a child. Despite the warm spring day, a strong smell of damp earth and decomposing leaves filled the air. The vibrant flowerbeds our mother had once tended were now choked with weeds, and the hedges surrounding the property formed a twisted, impenetrable mass which cast long, dark shadows.

I glanced at my watch; Bernard was over twenty minutes late. I hadn’t wanted to be here alone, that’s why I’d asked him to come all the way from London. But I should’ve guessed at Bernard’s tardiness and planned accordingly. I paced the broken concrete path that led to the front door and kicked a chunk of moss.

“Shit!” I said when it left a muddy mark on my new leather brogues. I bent and brushed the dirt away. They’d cost me a decent chunk of my first pay packet, but a respectable teacher should have a nice pair of shoes. And that’s just what I was now, a respectable teacher. Pride swelled in my chest at the thought.

Finally, I was earning an income and no longer reliant on handouts from the church or money from my grandmother — not that that would be happening any longer.

“Georgie-boy!” Bernard’s bellow pulled me out of my head and instantly dispelled my low mood. He rounded the hedge looking like a rock star, with aviator sunglasses and a pencil moustache, which he smoothed with his finger and thumb. He wore a pair of purple flares and a colourful shirt with a ridiculous floppy collar.

“Bernie, didn’t you leave the circus years ago?” I laughed.

“Ha-fucking-ha! It’s called fashion, dear. Perhaps you should try it sometime?”

“You look like a peacock!”

“Better than a dull grey pigeon.” He pushed his aviators back into his long hair.

We went in for a back-slapping hug and I clutched him to me like it had been much longer than three months since I’d last seen him.

“Right. Shall we get this over with?”

I swallowed. “Yeah, I would’ve made a start, but I didn’t want to go in without you.”

Bernard draped an arm around my shoulder and steered me towards the house.

“Cheer up, Georgie. Ding-Dong, the witch is gone. We can sell this old wreck now and put it all behind us, can’t we?”

“Do you think she’d mind?”

“Who, Grandmother?”

“No, I meant Mum. Do you think she’d mind us getting rid of it?”

“I think she’ll be fucking delighted. This place was nothing but a prison for her. And if she ever shows up again, we’ll take care of her, won’t we?”

I looked into my brother’s bright blue eyes and nodded.

Even now, Bernard held onto a hope that I’d long since let go of. And the solicitor’s letter that landed on my doormat last month diminished any glimmer that had remained.

Dear Mr George Shaw,

I am writing to you in my capacity as a solicitor handling the estate of your late grandmother, Mrs Sylvia Shaw, who passed away on 13 th November 1977. Please accept our heartfelt condolences for your loss. Regrettably, our records indicate that Mrs Shaw did not leave a valid Last Will and Testament. As a result, the estate will be administered under the rules of intestacy. You have been identified as one of two surviving relatives entitled to inherit from the estate…

And it continued, but my eyes kept drawing back to the same words: one of two surviving relatives. I contacted the solicitor to ask if they had any more information, but if they did, they didn’t tell me. Thus far, I hadn’t had the heart to tell Bernard, and fortunately he hadn’t received a letter of his own, probably owing to his inconsistent living arrangements. How had he put it?

“Why be tied down when I can flit from one wealthy fucker to the next? Saves me paying rent and I get to have a bit of fun whilst I’m at it.”

I didn’t entirely agree with Bernard’s lifestyle — not on moral grounds, more safety concerns. Bernard had been hurt on more than one occasion, physically and emotionally. And whilst he always laughed it off, I couldn’t help but worry for him.

But here we both were, ready to recover any valuables before we had our childhood home cleared and put on the market. Living there hadn’t ever been a consideration for either of us.

I twisted my key in the lock and pushed, but the door had swollen with damp. I took a step back and barged it with my shoulder, it inched inwards a little but didn’t budge.

“Shit,” I said rubbing my arm.

“Here, let me.” Bernard smoothed his moustache and sniffed.

I grinned. “Don’t ruin that nice shirt, Bernie.”

“Oh, fuck off,” said Bernard with laughter in his voice. He clenched his fists and his technicolour sleeves tightened around his biceps. Clearly, my little brother was not so little any more. With a run-up and a grunt, he crashed through the front door.

I stepped inside and coughed as the dust swirled around. The place smelt musty and damp. Cobwebs draped from the ceiling like spooky bunting. No one had been in the house since the church had moved Ruth on. When she left, she must have pulled all the curtains shut, and now they kept the light of the spring day from penetrating the thick gloom.

Bernard flipped the light switch up and down, but nothing happened.

“They must have shut off the electricity,” I said.

“Better get finished before it gets dark then, hadn’t we?”

“Yeah, can’t imagine it’ll take long. There probably isn’t much worth keeping.”

“No, you’re not wrong. The old witch was such a tight-arse you could’ve used her shit for shoelaces.”

“Bernard!” Grimacing, I glanced around.

Bernard snickered. “It’s not like she can hear us.”

A scuttling scratched above us. Bernard squealed and leapt behind me. “What the fuck was that?”

“And you’re supposed to be the brave one.” I laughed. “Probably just mice.”

I threw the curtains open wide in the drawing room and sunlight filtered through the dirty windows. I tried to open one, but the wooden frames were as swollen as the front door.

“Do you reckon this place is even worth anything?” I asked.

“I wouldn’t buy it. Someone might if they fancy a project.”

All the drawing room contained was a filthy hearthrug and an eclectic array of sagging old furniture.

Bernard shrugged. “Nothing worth keeping in here.”

In the kitchen, he opened the back door and stepped outside to smoke a thin roll-up he pulled out of a tin. “You want one, Georgie?”

“No, thanks. It makes me lightheaded.” I rinsed and filled the kettle. After clicking the ignitor a few times, the hob flamed to life. “Bingo! Fancy a cuppa before we venture upstairs?” I looked over my shoulder. Bernard was no longer leaning by the back door. “Bernard?”

I peered through the grimy window and watched as he strode up the overgrown garden path, kicking at the weeds as they pulled at his ankles. He stood at the blackened entrance of the studio, and with a hand pressed on either side of the doorway, he poked his head inside.

I couldn’t bear it. Ever since the day we thought we’d lost Pyg, I’d kept away. Nothing good could come of venturing in there to see the charred remains of our childhood skulking in shadows of the past.

Bernard was back at the door. He pulled the last drag from his roll-up and crushed the butt under his shoe. “I still can’t believe the old witch burned down the studio. If it wasn’t worth something, I’d take great pleasure in burning this fucking house down.”

“Do you want tea?”

“Yeah, go on. Is there any sugar?”

I scoffed. “What do you think? I thought to get milk and biscuits, though.”

Bernard opened and banged shut the cupboard doors. “Nothing in here but mouse shit. Ooh, what about this?” He held up a dusty decorative glass vase.

I shrugged. “I don’t want it.”

“I’ll have it then. And these too,” he said, opening a box of tarnished fish knives.

I raised an eyebrow.

“Dinner parties, darling,” he said.

We took our mugs of tea upstairs. Mum’s room was devoid of everything but a stripped bed, dressing table and wardrobe with empty hangers swinging on the rail. For the longest time, it had been Ruth’s room, anyway. The only trace of its former occupant was a cardboard box, unceremoniously shoved at the back of the wardrobe. It contained the few items Mum had left behind. I pulled it out and rifled through the contents: a cracked handheld mirror, an old pair of stockings, and some tatty paperbacks, including a dog-earned copy of Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw. Nothing of any value, sentimental or monetary, but I shoved the play in my satchel anyway.

“Oi, oi! What’s this?” Bernard pulled a chain-link belt from a drawer.

I grimaced. “I’d put that down if I were you.”

Bernard whipped the belt around in the air. “Why? What is it?”

“I dunno, but I saw Ruth putting it on once.”

“Oh, did you now?”

“Not like that. Jesus! She’d left the door open, and I was passing. She had it around her thigh. I think it’s some sort of Catholic thing, you know, like as a punishment or something?”

Bernard turned his nose up and flung the spiky belt onto the bed. “Sounds fucking kinky to me. And they call my lot perverts!”

“Ruth wasn’t so bad in the end, was she? As long as we kept our heads down.”

“Yeah, bit like living with a big mouse, I suppose. Maybe it was her shitting in the kitchen cupboards?”

I laughed. “Yeah,” I said, although she always reminded me more of a bird than a mouse.

As we exited Mum’s room, I put out an arm to halt Bernard and raised a finger to my lips.

“Shh!”

Bernard’s brows crumpled in confusion until he caught my drift. We hopped along the landing towards our room, retracing our childhood steps. Bernard stumbled and landed on a squeaky floorboard. We looked at each other with wide eyes and burst out laughing.

“Ah, do you remember how Pyg used to do it, too?”

“Such a clever girl. I miss her, Georgie.”

“Me too.”

“Oh my God, it stinks in here.” Bernard covered his face.

I managed to crack open the window and fresh air spilled into the room. “Eau-de-teenage-boy-and-stinky-dog.”

“It’s disgusting.” The springs loudly protested as Bernard flopped back onto his bed and stared at the ceiling.

I knelt and pulled a shoebox from under my bed. After blowing off the dust, I opened the lid. Inside were a few treasured possessions, including the Christmas book. I smiled and held it up.

“Remember this?”

Bernard bounced onto his side and grinned.

“I wrote in it after you left.” I opened the cover, looked down at the long list of markings on the page and read the final one aloud. “Three miserable Christmases without you, Bernie. And one without Pyg.”

“I couldn’t come back here. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be, I get it. This place sucked the joy out of everything. You’re right, we should bloody torch it.”

“Nah, she’d be more pissed off at the thought of us enjoying her money.”

I laughed and closed the book back in the box of keepsakes.

Bernard swung his legs around and stretched up. “I’m going out for a fag. I’ll make us another cuppa.”

* * *

I clasped the doorknob of Grandmother’s room, my imagination feeding my mind with images: sunken eyes latching onto me through the darkness, a puckered mouth twisting into a sneer, sagging flesh hanging from skeletal arms, and claw-like fingers reaching out from the bed. I took a steadying breath and pushed into the room. A cool draught gushed out, and with it, I could’ve sworn I heard the hiss of “little bastards”.

After Grandmother’s stroke, much of her speech had been lost, as was the use of her right-hand side. Her lips could no longer pucker in disgust, but the phrase “little bastards” somehow still came out of them loud and clear.

Thankfully, Ruth had stayed on as Grandmother’s primary carer after she’d been discharged from hospital, over a year after she’d burned the studio and injured her hand in the process. She lived the rest of her days in this room, wallowing and alone, apart from Ruth. She even refused visits from the priest.

I stepped to the window, tugged the curtains open and daylight bathed the room. Only then did I allow my gaze to drift to the bed and dispel the workings of my imagination. No withered corpse passing judgement from between the four posts, just worn, dusty old bedlinens.

The wardrobe was stuffed full of clothes that hadn’t been worn for years, most of them so moth-eaten they’d likely end up in landfill. I pulled out the seat at the dressing table and sat in front of the mirror, its surface cloudy and de-silvered with age. The dressing table drawer rattled but didn’t budge — locked.

I opened Grandmother’s jewellery box and started as a ballerina sprang up and creaked out a full turn to a few eerie notes before stopping. The treasure she’d been guarding amounted to no more than a few tarnished rings and a pearlescent brooch in the shape of a feather — oh, and a key. I turned it in the lock of the drawer, and it clicked open. At the front was a velvet box containing a gold pocket watch inscribed with the name of the grandfather I’d never met. Another box contained a set of military medals.

Tucked away at the back of the drawer were two stacks of letters, each tied with red ribbon. I untied the first stack. The coarse yellowed envelopes were addressed to Sylvia and Eleanor in a hand I recognised from the Christmas book — Papa . I retied the stack and picked up the other, noting an untidy handwriting I’d never seen before. I squinted at the envelope, postmarked October 1968 with a foreign stamp, and addressed to George & Bernard Shaw.

My fingers fumbled with the ribbon. In haste, I pulled the top letter out of the envelope and narrowed my eyes at the scrawl on the page.

Dearest George and Bernard,

It’s with the heaviest heart I’m writing this letter to you. I’m truly stricken, and I don’t know where to even begin. I’ve tried to reach you on the telephone, but as yet, I’ve been unsuccessful. I’ll keep trying and do whatever I can to get this news to you as you have a right to know.

Your mother and I were involved in a terrible car accident in Ethiopia. Two days later, she died in hospital from her injuries. I was with her, holding her hand. The last words she said were your names.

This won’t bring your mother back, but I wish it had been me. I wish I could take her place and she were home with you now. But God took her as my punishment.

I’m so sorry. I should’ve been a better man. But that’s just it, I’m weak-willed and flawed. We were going to send for you. We had so many plans.

Please know that I loved her with all my heart, and I love you both too, my sons.

Your father,

Henry Higgins.

Blood rushed in my ears as I scrunched my eyes and glanced at the words again. The inked characters scrawled across the page confirmed what I thought I’d known all along. Higgins was our father. That was obvious.

But our mother had died in Africa, and Grandmother had known. All these years, she’d known and kept it from us. The fucking church knew, too —

“Whoa, Georgie-boy! You’re brave. You ventured into the dragon’s den without me?” Bernard’s voice on the landing snatched me from my thoughts. With shaking hands, I shuffled and shoved the letters back into the drawer.

“Found anything interesting?”

“Oh, just these.” I gestured to the pocket watch and medals. “And there’s some jewellery in here. You think it’s worth anything?”

“Oh nice!” Bernard eyed off the feather brooch and slid one of Grandmother’s rings onto his pinkie finger, holding it up to inspect it in the light. “Do you a deal? You can keep the watch and medals if I can have these bits and pieces?”

“If you’re sure that’s what you want.” I laughed as Bernard pinned the brooch onto his shirt and pouted at his reflection in the mirror.

“I, er, found some old letters too. Do you mind if I take them and have a read?”

Bernard waved his hand in the air. “Sure, you know I can’t be bothered with all that. Right, what delights did the old witch have hidden away in this wardrobe?”

Gulping down my guilt, I retrieved the letters from the drawer and tucked them into my satchel.

“Holy shit! I think this is real fur.” Bernard held a hideous brown coat against his body and twirled around, summoning memories of Mum and the studio and dancing to From Me to You as it blared from the radio.

I will tell him. When the time’s right, I’ll tell him.