Richard is frightened, endorphins spent way back, cold at the base of his spine, in his pelvis, under his ribs. His teeth are still chattering. Alex says something but Richard is not sure what. He has an abscess, he needs to tell someone this before they put him under. Come away, fellow sailors, your anchors be weighing. His father stands in the doorway, arms crossed, that surly expression, letting the tension mount. Richard wonders if he is going be picked up and slapped across the legs. The smell of cigarette smoke and Old Spice. God, this hot water stung.
The ping of the microwave and the clicky slam of the plastic door and Louisa reappeared with what looked like a mug of warm milk. Made Alex think of waking up in the night when he was a child. He can smell honey, Louisa doing her folded napkins and hospital corners even now. She kneels and offers it to Richard. He takes it in his hands, which is a good sign, though he clearly can’t move his fingers independently. Christ, what a strange picture. Richard in his clothes in a bath of oxtail soup, Louisa leaning over in a flowery shirt, muddy footprints over the white fluffy mat, like some grubby dogskin carpet. He sees the bloody graze on Richard’s hand and looks down at his own scabbing knuckles. Louisa takes the mug and puts it down on the corner of the bath and starts to remove Richard’s running vest. The bath almost full now. It feels uncomfortably intimate, watching her do this, the hair on Richard’s chest, pudgy man breasts, the sheer bulk of him, pathetic and threatening at the same time. Alex feels he should leave but he can’t. He imagines Louisa on top of Richard, naked. Is it stupid not to ring an ambulance? He turns and sees Mum and Dad in the doorway. Louisa is oblivious but Angela says, quietly, How is he? Alex simply shrugs to punish them for being so fucking useless.
Can we do anything?
Food, says Alex. He remembers an episode of Born Survivor. Have we got any chocolate? Something soft and sugary. Though his intention mostly is to get them out of the bathroom, because he has earned his place here in the centre of the drama and they haven’t.
I’m on it, says Dominic.
♦
It never occurred to Melissa that Richard might be in any kind of danger, he being the person who sorted out other people in danger, but when she came downstairs to make herself a mug of coffee she found Dominic heating a tin of soup and Angela said, He’s in the bath, and Melissa wondered who the hell she was talking about.
Alex brought him back, said Dominic.
He’s going to all right, said Angela.
We hope.
And then it dawned on her, but Alex had appeared in the doorway, sopping wet, still wearing his trainers. We’re out of the woods, I think. He went to the bread bin and cut himself a two-inch doorstep. I need a shower. Melissa, can you go and grab some warm clothes for Richard?
She bridled but now was clearly not the time. Sure. Sweetness and light. She turned and headed back into the dining room.
Alex took a large bite of bread. Give me a shout if you need help, yeh?
Then he, too, was gone and Dominic felt proud of his son. The young taking over the world; maybe it wasn’t so bad after all.
♦
Daisy stepped on to the landing and saw Melissa disappearing like a hotel chambermaid bearing a folded pile of clothes. Then Alex appeared in his towel, with a chunk of bread in his mouth. Bit of an adventure downstairs.
Yeh?
Twisted his ankle. Touch of hypothermia. He’s in a hot bath. He gently moved her aside. Now I need a shower or I’m going to go the same way.
Suddenly she couldn’t bear the idea of being alone any longer. Can I come into the bathroom with you?
He raised his eyebrows. If you really want, I guess. Because, after all, it was the kind of day when the normal rules had been temporarily suspended, so they went in, she shut the door behind her and sat on the toilet. Vosene, Miracle Moist, Louisa’s chequered pink washbag. He turned the shower on, took another bite of bread, placed the remaining crust on the rim of the sink then dropped the towel and stepped behind the big plastic panel, turning away from her to protect his modesty. Dints in the side of his bottom, the muscles in his back, unexpectedly at home without his clothes. She remembered how she felt about her body when she was swimming, not caring what it looked like, just enjoying the way it worked. They felt like the children, again.
So you’re a bit of a hero, then?
I wouldn’t go that far. But she could hear the pride in his voice. God, this feels good. His pleasure in the hot water oddly more intimate than the sight of his body.
She liked being in here together, hiding almost, comforting and secret. But he’s all right now? His silhouette blurred and fogged behind the steamy plastic.
I think so. He bent down to clean the mud off his ankles. He was pretty far gone when I got him back to the house. Squirting shampoo onto his hair. What a pillock.
I saw he’d bought loads of new running kit.
Not looking very new now.
She sat quietly for a while. He turned the shower off and stepped out, turning away from her to pick up his towel and dry himself. Like a model, but like a little boy, too. He put the last piece of bread in his mouth and said, Right. I need to pee at this point in time, which feels kind of weird so you might want to, like, stand over there and look the other way.
I think I might be gay. As if someone else had spoken on her behalf, as if someone had pushed her off that top board. Time stuck, rippled banners of light on the water’s surface way below, the ring of cold and the blue silence.
You think? He really had knitted his brows, as if he were struggling with a crossword puzzle.