Page 26 of A Slow Fire Burning

It was Boxing Daybefore Irene saw Angela again. Angela came round with a book (a collection of Shirley Jackson stories) and a box of chocolates, apologizing for the missed dinner. “I’m so sorry, Irene,” she said. “I feel awful, just awful, but... the thing is, Daniel and I had a row.”

She didn’t seem to have any recollection of her fall, of what she’d said afterward. Irene was still angry; she’d half a mind to repeat what Angela had said, to tell her how hurt she had been. Angela must have seen something in her face, perhaps had a flash of recollection, because her own face colored suddenly, she looked ashamed, and she said, “It isn’t me, you know. It’s the drink.” She exhaled a short, painful breath. “I know that’s not an excuse.” She waited for a moment for some response and when none came, she stepped forward and kissed Irene lightly on the cheek. Then she turned away from her, toward the door. “When they’re born,” she said, her hand resting on the door handle, “you hold them, and you imagine a glorious, golden future. Not money or success or fame or anything like that, but happiness. Such happiness! You’d see the world burn if only it meant they would be happy.”

FIFTEEN

Carla stood, distracted, in Angela’s kitchen, which was empty save for an ancient kettle on the counter next to the stove top. Her mobile phone was buzzing; it kept buzzing, on and on. She didn’t bother to look at it—either it would be Theo or it would be the police, and she wasn’t in the right frame of mind to talk to either. She’d already had the estate agent on the phone, wanting to set up a time to see the place so they could get it on the market in time for the peak home-buying season of late spring. She’d found the act of engaging in conversation, with the agent, with Irene next door, almost overwhelming.

She opened the cupboards above the sink and then closed them again, she checked down below. The cupboards were empty. She knew they were empty. She’d emptied them. What on earth was she doing? She was looking for something. What was that? Her phone? No, that was in her back pocket. The tote bag! Where did she put the tote bag?

She left the kitchen and went back into the hallway, only to discover that she’d left the front door open. Jesus. She really was losingher mind. She gave the door a good kick, slamming it shut. She turned back and stood, aimless, staring at the point on the wall just next to the kitchen doorway, where the ghost of a picture hung. What was it used to hang there? She couldn’t remember. What did it matter? What was she doing? What had she come in here for?

This forgetfulness was new. It came from sleep deprivation, she supposed; there was a reason they used it as a form of torture—it robbed you of all capacity. She remembered this feeling, vaguely, from just after Ben was born. Only then the distraction was suffused with joy, it was like being stoned. This was like being sedated. Or held underwater. This was more like after he died.

Carla wandered back into the kitchen, stood at the sink, looking out into the lane, leaned forward, her head against the glass. Just about caught a glimpse of the girl, the one she’d met at Irene’s, disappearing from view. Walking with a strange shuffle. There was something about that girl, something off. Weaselly. Pretty, sharp-toothed. Sexually available. She put Carla in mind of that cartwheeling young woman who’d been all over the newspapers a few years back, the one who murdered her friend. Or didn’t murder her friend? Somewhere in France? No, Italy. Perugia, that was it. Jesus,what on earthwas she thinking about now? She knew almost nothing aboutthisgirl—in fact, the only thing she did know was that in her spare time she visited old ladies to help them with their shopping. And here was Carla, casting her as one of the Manson family.

In her pocket, her phone buzzed, an angry insect trapped in a jar, and she ground her teeth. Ignored it. Tea, she thought. I’ll have a cup of tea. Lots of sugar. She went back into the kitchen, flicked on the kettle. She opened the cupboard above the sink. Still empty.Oh, for God’s sake.

Carla turned off the kettle again and walked slowly up the stairs; she felt exhausted, legs leaden. At the top, she paused, turned andsat, gazing down the steps at the front door, at the space on the floor beside the radiator where once had lain a small Qashqai rug. Next to her, on the top step, there was a tear in the carpet. She plucked at its fabric, running her finger along the length of its neat slit, an inch or two. Wear and tear. From the end of her nose, a tear dropped. Worn and torn, Ang, she thought. That about sums us up.

Wiping her face, she got to her feet and walked directly into Daniel’s old room at the back of the house, empty save for the old single bed and the wardrobe with its door hanging off. She placed the notebook she was carrying on top of the pile of papers at the bottom of the wardrobe and closed the door as best she could. Then she took the dog’s lead from her pocket, shuffling her coat off her shoulders as she did so. She closed the bedroom door and looped the leather end of the lead over the coat hook, giving it a good tug. She left it hanging there, opened the door once more, and wandered slowly, taking her time, along the hall to Angela’s room, dragging her fingertips over the plasterwork as she went.

After Angela sent Daniel away to boarding school, Carla went round to visit less and less, until one day, she stopped going altogether. There wasn’t a reason, or rather, there wasn’t just one reason; she just found that she couldn’t face it any longer. Fake yoga was over.

Years passed. Then one night, a good six or seven years after Ben’s death, Carla was woken by a phone call, sometime after midnight, the allotted hour of dreaded telephone calls. She took a while to answer, to shake off the fug of chemically assisted sleep.

“Can I speak to Carla Myerson, please?” a woman said.

Carla’s heart seized—Theo was in Italy, holed up in some remoteUmbrian farmhouse, trying to write, and people drove so badly there.Theodrove so badly there; he seemed to feel the need to join in.

“Mrs. Myerson, could you possibly come down to Holborn Police Station? No, no, everything’s all right, but we have a... Miss Angela Sutherland here, your sister? Yes, she’s all right, she’s okay, she’s just... she’s had a bit to drink and got herself into a bit of trouble. She needs someone to pick her up. Could you do that, do you think?”

Carla called a taxi and threw on some clothes. She stumbled out into freezing London rain, unsure as to how to feel, terrified or furious. The police station was quiet and brightly lit. In the waiting area a woman sat alone, crying softly to herself, saying, “I just want to see him. I just want to know he’s all right.”

The woman on reception, quite possibly the one she’d spoken to on the phone, nodded at Carla. “Domestic,” she said, indicating the crying woman. “He lumps her one, she calls us then decides that, actually, she doesn’t want to press charges after all.” She rolled her eyes. “What can I do for you, love?”

“I’m here to pick up Angela Sutherland. She’s my sister. I was told... I was told she was here.”

The woman checked her computer screen and nodded, called out to someone in a room somewhere behind her desk. “Could you bring Mrs. Sutherland out for me, John? Yeah, her sister’s here.” She turned back to Carla. “She’d had too much to drink and caused a scene at the taxi rank.”

“A scene?”

The woman nodded again. “She was being abusive to another man in line, a man who by all accounts had it coming, but in any case your sister was extremely vocal, and when one of the cabbies tried to intervene, he got it in the neck too. He called for assistanceand when a couple of our officers turned up, they were called a bunch of effing c-words for their troubles.”

“Jesus.” Carla was appalled. “I’m so sorry, I’m... God, I’m so sorry. She’s... I’ve never known her to behave like that, she’s not that sort of person at all, she’s... quite civilized, usually.”

The woman smiled. “Ah, well, the drink does funny things, doesn’t it? If it’s any consolation, I think she’s feeling pretty ashamed of herself. And no charges have been brought, so there’s no harm done, really.” The woman leaned forward, lowering her voice. “I think she’s given herself a bit of a fright, if I’m honest.”

Carla’s overwhelming memory of that night was of shame too. The shame of being called in the middle of the night to pick up her drunk and disorderly little sister was completely dwarfed by the shame of seeing what her sister had become in Carla’s absence. Emaciated, hollow-eyed, her smooth cheeks spidered with veins, her shoulders hunched.

“Angela!”

“I’m so sorry, Cee,” she said, her eyes lowered, her voice a whisper. “I’m so sorry, I don’t even remember doing it. They said I was shouting at people, shouting and swearing and... I don’t remember doing it.”

They sat side by side in the back of a black cab on the way back to Angela’s house. Neither said a word, but Carla wrapped an arm around her sister’s bony shoulders and held her close. The sensation shamed her again: it was like holding a child, like holding her sister when she’d been a little girl—tiny and fierce and funny. Infuriating. Lifetimes ago. It felt like lifetimes since she had loved her, since they had been each other’s best friend. Carla started to weep.

She was still weeping when they reached the lane. She wept as she handed the money to the taxi driver, as she followed her sister to thefront door, as she took in the mess of the house, its dank smell of damp and ashes.

“Please stop,” Angela said. “Please, for Christ’s sake, stop.”

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