In Search of Adam. Caroline Smailes
neighbours weren’t always there after school. Eleven months and one day since my mother’s death and I was known to be a reet strange bairn. They said it was alright for me to be alone. They liked me to be on my own. They found me odd. She’s strange, that Jude. It was a Tuesday evening and I didn’t go to Mr Johnson’s (Number 19). I used my key instead.
Rita came to my mother’s house before my father got home from work. She cooked his tea and ironed his shirts. She wanted to marry him. She wanted to live in my mother’s house. She always came at the same time. Number 28 bus from Wallsend to Marsden. Arrived at 4.45pm or 5.15pm depending on which one she caught. I had sixty minutes. She had a key.
I went into my father’s garage. It was attached to the house, through a wooden door from the kitchen. The stone floor was cold. I felt the cold through my white ankle socks. I looked around. The walls of the garage were my father’s. Shelves of goodies and racks of tools. Half empty cans of paint. Brushes. Turpentine. Buckets. Jars of screws. Tins of nuts and bolts. Rakes. Brooms. Hammers. Screwdrivers. Saws. Spades. Never just one of a sort. I saw a tin. A pretty tin. A navy blue cylinder. It had a gold trim and EIIR in gold lettering. It was dusty. It was neglected. It was too special to be on a shelf. In my father’s cold garage. My father liked his garage. His special things were kept there.
The bricks of the garage were damp. It stank of the oil which had leaked from the bottom of my father’s yellow Mini. A pool of oil was in the centre of the stone floor. A rusting lawn mower slumped against the wall waiting to be cleaned. I was looking for something to help me. I was standing in the doorway, scanning the room for something. Something to help me.
A paintbrush. Too soft.
A spade. Too heavy.
A hammer. Just right.
I took down a hammer from my father’s tool rack. It looked very old. A thick dull metal head, with a wooden handle covered in scratches and dents. It spoke of experience. It was heavy and cold. I went back into the kitchen.
The kitchen. A rectangle that was divided into two separate areas. One where you ate. One where you cooked. When the house was empty I sat in that area where we used to eat. Special occasions. Christmas Day. Ripped-open Selection boxes. Chocolate for breakfast. A Curly Wurly poking out, waiting to be sneaked before lunch. Turkey dinner. Snapping crackers. Paper hats and funny jokes. Toon Moor night. Fish and Chips from the chippie on the seafront. Eaten straight from the newspaper parcel. Placed onto a plate. A bag of candy floss saved from the fair. Fluffy, pink and promising to be delicious. Easter Sunday. A leg of lamb, roast potatoes and lashings of mint sauce. Easter eggs lined up on the kitchen worktop. In sight and waiting.
Timber panels were nailed to two of the three walls giving a Scandinavian woodland feel while we ate. It was a simple setting. A matching stained wooden picnic table, resting against the panelled wall. A themed location. Hardly used anymore.
I sat at the table clutching the hammer. Hovering its cold head over my wrist. Plucking the courage. Finding the courage. Deep within me. Somewhere. Just a little tap at first.
Tap
tap
tap.
It felt nice. It wriggled and jiggled and tickled. I liked it. I tapped a little harder.
Tap
tap
tap.
Pain. Physical pain. Actual pain. Throbbing, pounding, thumping pain. I could breathe again.
I hit a little harder.
Hit hit hit.
Pain. Again. Again. Again. The pain released me. The pain cleaned inside my head.
My wrist was red. The white bone was shining through the stretched skin. I saw my bone. It shone. Tears gushed from my eyes. My legs were shaking. Shock. Cold feet. Pain. Again. Again.
Enough. The hammer was too heavy to continue.
My wrist was swelling. I stood. Shaking. Colour jumped from my cheeks and plummeted to my toes. I wobbled. I went back into the garage, clutching the heavy hammer. The stone floor was cold. I wiped the handle of the hammer. I don’t know why. I replaced the hammer, back on my father’s tool rack. It swayed. I went back into the house. Slowly slowly.
A plan. A simple plan.
Fourteen minutes later. Rita came. I was sitting at the bottom of the stairs. I was crying and clutching my wrist. I could cry. My red swollen wrist made it alright to cry. I told her that I had fallen down the stairs. Fallen onto my wrist. It was a simple plan. She was worried. My father would be in trouble. No one was looking after me. She told me she would buy me sweets. She told me that I was not to tell anyone that I had been left alone in the house. It’s our little secret, bairn. Whirling. Swirling. Round and round. Hush hush.
She would say that she saw me fall. I didn’t have to lie. She would help me. She phoned my father at work. He came home and he hugged me. He hadn’t hugged me before. He smelled of cigarettes and his breath puffed out stale beer. I didn’t want him to let go of me. I wanted to stay. At the bottom of the stairs. Standing on the red carpet with my father’s arms wrapped around me. He said that it would be alright. My father promised to make everything alright. Rita would look after me too.
We all went to hospital. They told my story. I had an X-ray. My scaphoid bone was cracked. A clear crack in the small boat-shaped bone in Jude’s right wrist. This type of crack is consistent with a fall downstairs. The doctor didn’t know about my father’s hammer. He didn’t know about my tap tap tapping. I would have to have a plaster cast on for up to six weeks.
A nurse was waiting for me. She had blonde spiralling ringlets, coiling to just above her shoulders. Her silver eyes twinkled and sparkled. They had been speckled with enchanted fairy dust. She wrapped the soft white cotton wool around and around and around. My wrist felt safe. Snug. Warm. Then the bandages wrapped around and around and around the cotton wool. Securing. Cuddling. Then. Water was dripped onto the bandages. Magic. A white plaster oozed between the nurse’s fingers. I watched the enchanted nurse manipulate the white lumpy mess into a perfectly smooth shell. She created a faultless capsule. It shrouded my tiny wrist. I admired how she could manipulate the gluey substance between her slender fingers. I watched as the plaster began to dry and white patches decorated her bitten finger nails. I thought she was magical. So magical. When she finished, she gave me a real smile and then offered me a shiny sticker. It was a brown teddy bear with a golden star on his round tummy. I had won a prize.
As we left the hospital Rita and my father promised to look after me. I cried through the pain. I cried out my pain. It was fine to cry.
Crying made the pain real. I rested my heavy arm within a powder-smelling sling. I liked the pain.
I could have some time off school. I could eat sweets and watch the television. A ten-pence mix up. Pink Shrimps. Gum rings. Foam teeth. Black Jack. Fruit Salad. Candy watch. Strawberry lace. Flying Saucers. All neatly placed in a crisp white paper bag. Aunty Maggie brought me a magazine. The Beano. Edition 2015, February 28 1981. Sellotaped to the front was a shiny fifty-pence piece. I liked the pain. The pain made them notice me.
I was here again. I was visible.
The pain was lovely. The cold hammer was miraculous. The smell of the damp plaster made me happy. My father tucked me in bed. I was a clever girl for not telling the doctor. Some secrets were good. Hush hush. Pain was nice. My father was proud of me. I was not alone. That night I slept and wanted to wake up.
Exhibit number two—sticker from nice nurse.
My plaster cast had magical powers. Really really