Perfectly Preventable Deaths

32 Foxglove

We are staging an intervention for Catlin. In the library. Because Brian apparently learned his parenting skills from reality television, and Mam is going along with it for some reason. I sit on a pinstriped cream-and-white chair. It’s gilded at the edges. Catlin is on the chaise longue, having a meltdown.

‘I can’t believe this,’ she shouts. ‘I can’t believe you. And you. And you.’

She points at me, deciding I’m the one she hates the most.

‘Be that as it may, Catlin …’ says Brian in a neutral voice, holding his hands open in front of him, like a hip teacher who tries to get you to talk about your feelings because this is a safe space and, like, no judgement. ‘… we love you and we need you to trust the three of us on this. He is not a good person. You need to stop seeing him.’

‘He IS a good person. He’s the best person I’ve ever met.’ The pitch of Catlin’s voice is beginning to rise. I look up at the stacks and stacks of books that line the shelves. If they could talk, I think they’d probably say, Shut up, Catlin.

‘I know it feels that way now, love –’ Mam starts, and Catlin whips around to stare her down.

‘You don’t know HOW it feels,’ she screeches like a righteous romance-harpy. ‘Because if you DID know how it felt, if you even had an INKLING how it felt, how much I LOVE that boy, you would be THRILLED for me.’

‘Catlin –’

‘COULD YOU SHUT UP? I haven’t finished speaking.’

Why are they trying to interrupt her? It’s like saying excuse me to the sea.

‘What I was GOING to say –’ she continues, waving her extended pointer finger over us as though it were a sort of magic wand – ‘before you rudely interrupted my train of thought, is that Lon and I are in LOVE. Proper LOVE. The kind you obviously know nothing about, seeing as you’re not supporting me. And that makes you all PRICKS.’

She glares around the room, like twelve Mamós on speed. Her face is flushed and sweaty, like her anger is also a workout.

‘Catlin,’ says Mam, ‘your BOYFRIEND, who you claim to LOVE, was a suspect in a murder. He hurt that girl while they were together, Brian says. That is not OK. Would you like Madeline to be with someone who is physically abusive?’

‘Catlin, he tells you how to dress,’ I say. I feel like Judas Iscariot.

‘They’re only rumours, Mam. They aren’t true.’ She turns to me. I know that I’m a prick. She doesn’t have to say it. But she does.

‘And, as for YOU, Madeline, YOU are SUPPOSED to be my SISTER. Not some gossipy sneak, going behind my BACK because you’re jealous that I found love and you’re a LONELY DRIED-UP LITTLE BITCH.’

I gasp. ‘That isn’t fair.’

‘What isn’t fair is that you’re betraying me. That’s what isn’t fair. I am the fairest person in this room.’

‘Love …’ Brian’s voice is calm.

‘Don’t call me that. You cannot use that word around me now. Love is something people like you destroy.’

Mam grasps his hand. They look at Catlin together. Drawing strength. We’re used to her hissy fits, but this is something else. Her eyes are wide, her hair is ratted wild, she can’t sit still. She’s like a crazy person. She picks up a blue-and-white vase. It looks as if she will throw it.

‘Put that down,’ Mam says.

‘Fine,’ says Catlin, and swings it at the wall. It thunks against the paper, and plonks down on the soft maroon carpet. Not even chipped. She goes to pick it up and try again. I see the muscles in Brian’s face twitch a little. He brings his index fingers to his temples. Rotates them back and forth. Twice. His voice is quiet and definite.

‘Enough.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘I said, Catlin Hayes, that that is enough. Your sister and your mother and I have had enough abuse. You are forbidden from seeing this boy. He is dangerous, and can’t be trusted. No matter how much you think you love him. You are not to see him. You are not to text him. You are not to email him, or message him in any way. And if you do, we will find out about it. And we will stop you.’

I utterly believe him in that moment. And so does Catlin. She sits down, still hugging the vase to her stomach.

‘So I can still go to school?’ she asks through gritted teeth.

‘Yes. But we will drop you there and pick you up. And you need to apologise to your sister. She cares about you. Which is why she came to me.’

Brian does the hand thing again. Did he attend a course on conflict resolution? I wonder. Did they teach him magic hands of trust?

Catlin’s face looks paler now, and sharp. Her mouth is set. Brian’s voice drones on about ‘respecting boundaries’ and ‘understanding that adults sometimes know things children don’t’. She doesn’t roll her eyes, but I feel the effort.

‘Are you hearing what we’re saying?’ he concludes.

She meets his gaze. ‘Yes, Brian. Yes, Brian. I am.’ Her voice is deceptively meek. She’s going to explode.

I close my eyes.

‘And what you have to remember, Brian, is that while you are married to my mam, you are in no way my real dad. You’re just Mam’s husband. You do not get to tell me what to do. So you can thoroughly, utterly and completely fuck right off. I’ll see Laurent if I want to. You do not get to tell me who to love.’

Brian opens his mouth and closes it again.

‘And furthermore …’ says Catlin, rising to her feet, ‘I will only apologise to Maddy when she apologises to me for being a weaselly little bitch.’

‘Catlin Hayes!’ Mam’s voice could cut through steel. ‘SIT!’ she barks, as though Catlin were a dog. ‘And let me tell you the way that things will be. There are two rules. One: you will respect your family. And Brian is that now. You need to choose what you are going to say next, Catlin. I’d think about that, and I’d shut my mouth. If I were you.’

Catlin opens her mouth.

‘Sit down. Shut Up.’

Catlin sits down.

‘Two: you will not see that boy again. Give me your phone.’

‘I am NOT giving you my PHONE. That is an invasion of privacy.’

Mam holds out her hand. ‘I don’t care. Give it here.’

Catlin gets up, flounces to the door. She tries it and the door won’t open.

‘I hate you all,’ she yells. ‘I hate you all so much. It isn’t fair.’

‘Catlin.’ I try to keep my voice calm and gentle. ‘The Helen thing … it’s scary. We don’t want that for you.’

Her voice is high and sharp: ‘What about what I want?’ She looks me in the eye, then swings to face Brian and Mam. The one beside the other. Like a unit. ‘And anyway it’s LIES.’

‘It isn’t lies,’ says Brian. ‘And, unsavoury rumours aside, your sister’s right. He isn’t right for you. He’s too controlling.’

Oh no, Brian. No, don’t bring me into this, I think, and crinkle my eyelids together as tightly as they’ll go.

‘Controlling?’ Catlin asks, addressing the imaginary jury. ‘That, like you, is RICH. And not in a good way.’

Brian holds up his hand. The gesture is both tired and strangely sassy.

‘I’m not doing this,’ he sighs, possibly realising that he has been trying to parent too hard too soon. ‘Give Sheila your phone. Then we’ll let you out.’

Catlin rolls her eyes and hands it over.

‘I don’t care. He’ll find me, with or without a phone. Our love is bigger than a phone, and you can’t stop it. And, Brian – your comb-over isn’t fooling anyone. You’re bald. And, Mam – you are a BITCH. Thanks for ruining my life.’ She pulls the door aggressively. It wasn’t locked at all; she just didn’t use the handle right. She swears at us again, and stamps out. I hear her muttering down the stairs. We sit until the tramp of feet fades into silence. Looking at each other.

‘Well, that went well …’ says Brian.

Mam starts to cry and he gives her a hug.

I slink away, dried-up-weasel-Judas that I am.

I hear my sister sobbing all night long. Her door is locked. She will not answer me.