He walked smoothly to the far end as if on roller skates – it was almost a moonwalk, actually – and reached up to grab a fluorescent-pink gatefold album. ‘Record, CD or cassette?’ he asked, flashing the cover at me.
I hesitated. The album cover, featuring Billy in leather jeans, was glorious, but we didn’t have a record player. Rob’s tastes, technology wise, were decidedly modern.Did I want to look at a big picture of Billy, or listen to him?
‘CD,’ I replied abruptly, telling myself off for being so silly.
The lad slid the record back into the rack and grabbed a CD from the shelf above. ‘Chart stuff’s £12.99,’ he said. ‘But if you like that, then you really should have a listen to this.’ He briefly lifted REM’sAutomatic for the Peoplefrom further along the same shelf, and then slid it back in.
‘I will,’ I told him, ‘but not today. Just the Argonauts, please.’
As I fumbled in my bag for my purse, Lou, writhing with surprising force, managed to punch me in the chin.
By the time I got back home I was almost in tears myself. Lou hadn’t paused for breath and once Lucy’s sweets were gone she started to moan and throw things out of the pushchair too.Why had I had another child?I wondered. I could remember, now, what a nightmare baby Lucy had been. How had I let myself forget?
Having a newborn is a bit like being in an abusive relationship. You’re stuck with someone who constantly mistreats you but you’re not allowed to fight back, get angry or walk away. Not ever. Not even for a break.
I was feeling overwhelmed by it all and as nothing I tried – not feeding, not jiggling, not swaying, and definitely not shouting at him to shut up – would calm Lou down, I put him in the nursery, which was still at the top of the house. I needed half an hour of peace and quiet to relax. And Ineededto listen to my new album. It seemed like if I could just steal a moment to do that, I might actually feel like myself again.
In the lounge, still wired but also a bit breathless with excitement, I slid the CD in and pressed play. Lucy looked expectant, then, once the music started, distraught.
‘Lucy songs!’ she said, and I could tell from her wrinkled brow she was about to get feisty. The sugar from the sweets was hitting her veins now, and was about to reach her little brain.
‘No, we’re going to play Mummy songs first,’ I told her, listening to the first few bars of the title track before skipping to track two, which was the single I’d heard on MTV.
‘Mummy!’ Lucy shouted angrily. ‘Lucy songs!’ She’d picked up the box that held her nursery rhymes – a CD she’d become addicted to the moment Rob had played it for her the first time – and was whacking my knee with it, hard.
‘Later,’ I told her. ‘Now, shush!’
Second time round, the song was even better. The jingly-jangly guitars reminded me of the Smiths with maybe a touch of the Cure thrown in for good measure. Billy’s multi-layered voice slithered over me like chocolate. It was like having five Billys sing to me at once.
I’d been right – this was what I needed! Just a moment to listen to the wonder of Billy’s voice. It took me straight back to the sensations of that summer, to being young and free and in love. I’d actually been this guy’s girlfriend! In a room filled with the music Billy had created, the memory felt like a shock.
God, it was good to close my eyes and just listen though, wasn’t it? I’d forgotten how wonderful that simple pleasure felt. To be able tochoose; to be able to enjoy something, just for the fun of it, just for me. Half an hour listening to some music – it wasn’t a lot to ask.
A sense of relief washed over me. I was still that person after all. I still had the capacity to be happy. I’d actually been starting to doubt that.
The music stopped and I opened my eyes – to see that Lucy, incredibly, had managed to eject the CD from the drawer and was trying to insert her nursery rhyme box instead.
‘Stop it!’ I said, snatching the box from her and putting it on a shelf out of reach. ‘You’ll break it! That CD player cost Rob a fortune!’
Lucy started to wail full-on. There would be no slow build-up today. She’d gone straight to maximum meltdown.
‘Lucy,’ I begged. ‘Please stop.Please?’Then, ‘LUCY! Ineedyou to stop.’
I was breaking out in a sweat again. Tears were welling up afresh.
‘Look, Lucy, you’re making Mummy cry!’ I told her, pointing at my eyes. ‘Please, please, just give me a bloody break here?’
My daughter glared at me, unmoved, and pinched her little mouth at me. I swear that in that moment she looked possessed. ‘Good!’ she said, trying to climb up my arm for the CD box. ‘Bad Mummy!BadMummy! Hate Mummy!’
I cracked. Some dam within me gave way. I think I’d just run right out of reserves.
So I did a terrible thing.
It was only once, I promise, and it only lasted for just over an hour – long enough to listen to the album twice – but I carried her shouting and kicking upstairs, and locked her in the nursery with Lou. I left them to scream themselves silly.
Down in the lounge with the door firmly shut, I turned Rob’s top-end Marantz up until the sound made the windows rattle.
As I listened, with no one there to see me, I ran my fingers over that tiny photo, all the while imagining that Billy was singing to me.
