The Glass House Read online

  *

  Half an hour later, Annie comes down the cottage stairs with her bag slung over one shoulder and my old childhood mobile, the little wooden trees on strings, bouncing off one finger. ‘Can I have this? For my baby.’

  My baby. The overwhelming sense is of loss, and powerlessness. I have to remind myself of how, when Annie was growing up, each stage seemed set and unsolvable. I’d felt like I’d always be leashed to a pram I couldn’t figure out how to fold, nap times and feed times, worries about meningitis, vaccines, choking on raisins, never sleeping properly again. But then a new Annie would emerge: toddler, pre-schooler, tween … I’d loved each one with such passion, mourned and marvelled when she morphed again, never quite finished off, never quite ready. This, too, is a stage, I tell myself. A point of transformation. I just need to hold my nerve. ‘Of course, Annie. You have it.’

  She grins. ‘It’ll go nicely with the terrarium, I reckon.’ The mobile starts to turn and twist. ‘Babies love to stare at things like that, don’t they?’

  The little forest under glass left at the hospital for Mum. In the whirlwind of the last two days, I’d forgotten all about it. ‘Oh, yes, they do,’ I say absently, distracted, niggled by a half-formed thought.

  ‘Mum …’ She fiddles with the car key in her hand. ‘I never told Elliot about Granny working for the Harringtons.’

  ‘You didn’t?’ I can’t hide my surprise. The way Annie talks about Elliot – and the look in her eyes as she does so – suggests the union was a meeting of minds as well as bodies.

  ‘Or me first seeing him on their company website.’

  ‘But I thought you’d got close.’

  ‘We did. I mean, it was perfect. That was the problem. I … I didn’t want to ruin things. And it sounded, I don’t know, stalkery. Complicated. It still does.’ She winces. ‘Please don’t say anything either. Not to him or Helen or anyone. Promise? Please.’

  I hesitate, thinking of the photo of the Harrington family standing outside the lovely stucco house. That there’s a link, however gossamer delicate, between them and Annie’s situation is like a stitch in the brain. ‘Not if you don’t want me to, of course not, Annie. But –’

  ‘He doesn’t want me to have this baby,’ she interrupts, jiggling the mobile from her finger. ‘His mother thinks I’m a gold-digger. Why make things worse?’

  ‘He did drive all the way down from London yesterday,’ I point out. ‘I bet he’s phoned.’

  She presses her lips together, which means he has. And she’s probably not taken his call.

  ‘He seemed genuinely concerned about you.’

  ‘No. His monster mother dispatched him from London to make me change my mind, that’s all.’ She blows the mobile, one puff, two, harder, and it starts to spin. ‘I’m doing this on my own,’ she adds vehemently.

  A shadow forest flickers against the pale wall. As the tiny trees slow to a stop, I feel something still in me too, a dawning realization. Annie’s body is not mine: I can no more alter its inner workings than change the course of a satellite circling the moon. And if it weren’t for my inability to confront my own past, she’d never have felt the need to start probing into it … So this is my mess. My responsibility.

  I bend down and blow the mobile, so it dances on her fingers once more. ‘You’re not on your own, Annie. We’ve got this, okay? You and me.’

  26

  Rita

  Rita stares down at the puzzle of strings, wire, and half a dozen or so wooden trees, each the size of her palm, yet thin and flat as a fingernail, just as smooth. They’re attached by a large brass hook, which she instinctively picks up, so that the strings hang down from a circular central rim, like one of those jellyfish that would wash up on the beach near home. The sweet scruffy collie, sitting beside Robbie, glances from one of them to the other, as if following a silent conversation. Her heart rears in her chest. Has Marge gossiped already? Leaked the mad plan to keep a baby hidden at Foxcote until the end of August? Fear mixes with the smell of fresh pencil shavings.

  ‘I made it last night.’ His eyes smile right inside her. She pictures him cutting and sanding, oblong thighs spread, leaning over a workshop table, an alchemist, pulling something exquisite and delicate from a lump of wood, where it’s been hiding. ‘For the baby.’

  ‘The baby?’ she stutters.

  ‘The baby I can hear over the garden wall.’ He nods at her collar. ‘The baby that’s left a patch of milk on your blouse.’

  Oh, no. She rubs frantically at the bobbly scurf of milk, where Baby Forest nuzzles. She wonders if it’s Robbie she’s sensed in the grounds this last day or two, if that would explain why she can’t shake the feeling she’s being watched. Sometimes, walking in the woods, she’ll hear something, glance around and no one’s there, and she’s left rattled. The other night, burping the baby in the drawing room, pacing and jiggling, she could have sworn she saw something at the window. But when she ran over and looked out, she could see no one. Just a slick of moonlight. She began to feel a bit silly then, thick-headed from broken sleep.

  ‘One sec.’ She collapses the mobile back into the paper and closes the front door so they’re standing alone in the porch, awkwardly, the site of the fumbled kiss, a few days ago yet light years away. ‘A friend of Jeannie’s got into trouble. We’re helping out. It’s all very hush-hush.’

  He nods. It’s only the slight sharpening in his soft brown eyes that makes her wonder if he believes her.

  ‘You mustn’t say anything. It’d be a right old scandal. There’s so much at stake.’ This is true, at least. Heaven knows what Walter will do.

  He phoned yesterday, his questions forensic: ‘Has Jeannie been eating properly and managed to put on any weight? How much?’

  ‘Do her eyes look swollen from crying in the morning?’

  And the worst one, ‘Has my wife mentioned me?’

  She reported back, yes, Jeannie’s mentioned him a lot – honking lie – and her spirits were much improved. Not a lie. When he’d asked if there’d been any ‘distracting’ visitors – she could tell from the timbre of his voice he meant Don Armstrong – and she’d said no, she could feel his relief down the phone. ‘I told you Foxcote would restore her, didn’t I, Rita?’ Walter had said, obviously heartened. ‘A break from …’ And then a pause and Rita felt Don slip into it. ‘… her normal routine. I can’t wait to see you all.’

  His sister Edie also phoned. That didn’t go as well. Rita didn’t cup the receiver with her cardigan in time: the baby started to mewl in the background. ‘Have you got animals in the house or something?’ Edie said, with a small laugh followed by a pause. ‘Shit, Rita, you’ve not got yourself into trouble, have you?’ Cars beeped manically in the background. The sounds filled Rita with an agitated longing, and worry that she might never get back to the city. It felt as if an unbridgeable gap had yawned open between that world and Foxcote’s. ‘Rita? Are you still on the line? Do you need my help, darling?’ So she’d had to lie to Edie too. She hated that. She’d always liked Edie, her particular kind of worldly brisk kindness. After Edie had hung up, Rita had just stood there, listening to the pips, feeling utterly alone.

  ‘I won’t say anything to anyone, Rita.’

  She believes him. She can’t imagine Robbie gossiping. A silence thickens. ‘I wouldn’t judge if …’ He stops. ‘I mean, if I can do anything to help, Rita.’

  ‘The baby’s not mine!’ She stifles a gasp with her hand. ‘Is that what you’re thinking? It is! I can tell from the look on your face.’

  ‘I didn’t know what to think. Sorry.’

  She starts to giggle at the awful irony. The idea that Baby Forest is hers. But she’s also touched by his sweetness. And the package in her hand. All so confusing. She’d hated him for lunging at her after the dance, and thought him a brute, grabbing her like that, his hands like carpenter’s clamps on her hips. But he isn’t a brute. In fact, people never seem to be who she thinks they are. She wonders if she’s the exc
eption. Or if she’ll surprise herself too. ‘Thank you for this,’ she says, feeling oddly humbled. ‘It’s beautiful.’

  He looks away shyly, but can’t stop his spreading smile.

  ‘Big Rita, Baby Forest wants you,’ shouts Hera, from inside the house. Then the front door flings back and there is Hera, the baby whining in her arms. ‘Oh!’

  ‘Hera, it’s all right. Robbie knows we’re looking after Jeannie’s friend’s baby,’ Rita says, with slow deliberation. Hera nods, cottoning on.

  ‘Look. He’s made her a mobile. Will you take it upstairs and show your mother?’ She reaches for the baby. ‘I’ll take her.’ The baby grabs a handful of her hair. ‘Ouch.’ She smiles, unwinding the little fingers.

  ‘Hello, baby.’ Robbie grins, cocking his head on one side. He cups his not-quite-clean-enough hand around the fluff ball of her head. The dog brushes up against his legs, competing for attention.

  Rita remembers how Fred claimed to love babies. ‘I can’t wait for our nippers, Rita,’ he’d say, patting her belly, as if it was his Ford Cortina’s bonnet. But he’d always gravitate to the Anchor rather than spend time with his infant nephews, ‘ankle-biters’, he’d call them. ‘Uncle Fred will be back when you’re old enough to help me butcher a lamb, boy.’

  ‘She’s a beauty, Rita.’

  Rita feels herself puff with pride, as if Baby Forest was hers, then catches herself. She’s promised herself not to get sentimental, or too close to this child, since she’ll soon be going away. She must be professional. It’s proving difficult. No wonder Jeannie’s got so attached.

  ‘What’s her name?’

  ‘We call her Baby Forest.’ She’s gently discouraged Jeannie from giving the baby a proper name, the sense of possession that comes with it. She clears her throat. ‘Discretion’s sake, you know.’

  He says nothing, processing this odd detail. He strokes the baby’s head with a tenderness that makes Rita look away, confused. ‘She’s hungry,’ he says.

  ‘Always hungry.’

  He laughs and a tension she wasn’t aware of dissolves. She allows herself a glance at his compelling mouth. How could it have been such a clumsy collision of a kiss? Such a total disaster?

  ‘Rita, I’m sorry. For that night.’ He rushes into the apology, like a man trying to get through a crowd with his head down. ‘I’m not … I’m not like that.’

  She focuses on the constellation of milk spots on the baby’s forehead.

  ‘I don’t know what came over me. Well, I do … I mean – Ach. Someone shut me up.’

  She bites back a smile and longs to say, No, don’t stop now, tell me exactly what you felt, in your heart, in your trousers. What made you pull me towards you like that? She wants him to prove she was the focus of his desire, not just a lumpy female body that happened to be there, a few beers into a warm summer’s night.

  ‘I’d better go,’ he says, instead.

  She looks up. Their eyes lock, and something crackles between them, like a radio broadcasting in a foreign language she doesn’t understand. ‘Bye then.’ She watches him step into his truck, yearning to call him back to ask for help. The baby, agitated by the quickening two-step thump of Rita’s heartbeat, starts to cry.

  27

  Hera

  The tree stump has a funny draw. I keep returning to the squat column of wood, with its bulging root toes, reliving the moment I found Baby Forest, lying there sweetly, like a pudding on a plate. It’s a good place to sit alone, unbothered by the others, far enough away from the house not to be seen, with a good view into the dappled shade of the woods. If you sit very still, like I am now, you can see deer, the trusting fawns, the nervous mothers. Movement! A flash of something reddish. A deer? I visor my hand over my eyes. But the trees chop up every view, so you see in sections, and can only fill in the missing bits by moving from side to side, and revealing your presence. Whatever was there vanishes.

  I wait a bit – it doesn’t come back – then start to swing my legs, brushing the bare soles on the bristly bracken. I like my feet today. They don’t look like fat girl’s trotters any more. They’re tanned, or a bit grubby – it’s quite difficult to distinguish between the two. My soles are hardening, padding out, adjusting to not wearing shoes. They make me feel free. Soon my zigzag fringe will tuck behind my ears, and I won’t think of Mother screaming, ‘Oh my God, what have you done to your hair?’ every time I look in the mirror. The sun is out, streaming through the branches. And the light is really nice, amber and soft. Like looking at the world through a bar of Pears soap.

  I smile. It feels like the baby’s changed everything. She brightens Foxcote’s shadowy corners too, filling the house with her funny sounds and smells and bits and bobs: bottles and rubber teats on the draining board; the silver rattle on the sofa; baby clothes draped over the fireguard, like happy little ghosts. She’s had a magical effect on Mother, who is so different from a week ago, no longer sleepy and switched off, like a cold dark room in a basement. She hasn’t worn her sunglasses once. I feel proud: I found the baby, after all. I’m sure the baby knows this. She smiled at me last night: Rita said it was wind, but it wasn’t.

  The baby sits in the middle of my thoughts and swats at them if they go in the wrong direction. For one, I keep forgetting to steal food. My knicker elastic no longer pinches or leaves a red mark. This morning my stomach actually rumbled. It suddenly feels possible that we’re not actually stuck being ourselves either. Or trapped in the families into which we were born, like the plants in Big Rita’s terrarium, pressed against the glass. Families can form without blood ties. Good things can happen. You can walk into the woods, and stumble across a beautiful baby, for example.

  ‘Big Rita wants you!’ Teddy bursts out of the trees. He’s only in his pants, and he looks hot and excitable and biscuit-brown. ‘In the house. Come on!’

  I jump down from the stump and run back into the garden to find Big Rita changing the baby on the lawn, making cooing sounds under her breath and pulling silly goofy faces. Seeing us, she stops, looking caught out, like she’d forgotten herself for a moment. She says Mother’s upstairs having a much-needed rest and we should all get out of her hair. How about a picnic?

  Big Rita’s the one who needs to rest. She’s got purple rings under her eyes and never seems to stop scrubbing down worktops and scouring with the Brillo pad: ‘Babies need things to be squeaky clean.’ But it feels like she’s trying to rub away something the rest of us can’t see.

  After she’s ordered me and Teddy to put on our shoes, we set off. She carries the baby in her arms. ‘Like a big bag of spuds,’ she says, but she won’t let anyone else do it. My job is to hold the wicker picnic basket and shepherd Teddy, who keeps darting off, trying to climb trees. As we walk through the woods, the buttery light thickens.

  Teddy stops to pick up sticks because Robbie’s going to teach him how to whittle them – really just a ploy to visit Big Rita. Mother was delighted by this. ‘What a good idea. You don’t want to end up like your father, Teddy, a man who struggles to carve the roast!’

  Her comment brought it all back, those disastrous family Sunday lunches, Daddy hunched over the grey leg of lamb, teeth gritted, sawing fiercely at the meat, like it was Don Armstrong, not lamb at all.

  We pick our spot by the bank of the stream, where the blackbirds and skylarks shelter from the afternoon heat, and sing on the highest branches. Big Rita throws down a holey old blanket. I arrange the cake on a plate, licking its jam filling off my finger. Teddy strips and jumps into the stream naked, making us laugh. Tanned to the shape of his pants, his bottom is bright blue-white. The water comes up to his thighs, but it’s crystal clear, roping around him, the tiny fish scattering, weaving between his knees.

  I change into my swimming costume under a towel, like I do in the school changing rooms, so no one can see my mouse-nose nipples and jiggly belly. I leap in, gasping at the blazing cold, and hide under the water.

  Big Rita hitches up her cotton skirt an
d wades into the stream too. Very slowly, she dips the baby’s foot in then out again. We hold our breath, waiting for her to cry. But she doesn’t. Her pretty monkey face grows intent and serious, as if considering this strange stuff, water. Again and again we dip her foot in and she starts to gurgle with pleasure. We laugh. The sun beats down on our backs, baking us. Teddy dunks himself and emerges like a mad thing, his wet curls flat against his head. I forget about what I look like in my costume and just enjoy the tug of the water on my body. And it feels like it’ll go on for ever, the sunshine, the yellow lilies lining the bank, the blue dragonflies, the hunk of sponge cake waiting in the wicker picnic basket. Or that I’m already remembering it from a distance.

  After the picnic, Big Rita pats dry the baby with a tea towel, changes her nappy and dusts her body with Johnson’s baby powder. She announces it’s time to go. ‘Too many midges. This place gets itchier the later it gets,’ she says, fastening the poppers of the Babygro. Me and Teddy protest: it’s the most fun we’ve had in ages. But Big Rita isn’t listening to us, only the baby, who is gazing at her with enormous eyes and making soft ‘ooh’ sounds, like she’s trying to speak. So we seize the moment of distraction and leap off the bank into the stream again, shrieking, the water spraying into our faces.

  ‘For goodness’ sake.’ Big Rita groans, fighting a laugh. She lays the baby on the blanket, next to the picnic basket. The baby reaches out and scratches the wicker with her tiny razor fingernails.