Towers of Silence

Chapter Seventeen

At school Maddie and Tom each had a batch of letters reminding us about the school play, the school Christmas Fair and the holidays timetable. Tom also had a painting of a Christmas Tree, the powder paint layered on in thick green lumps. It must have taken days to dry. I could feel the weight of the paint as I took it from him.

“That’s lovely, Tom.”

“It looks like snot,” Maddie observed.

“Hey,” I shot her a warning glance. She was never at her best after six hours in the classroom.

“We’ll put it up in the playroom,” I promised Tom.

“When can we have our real tree?” Maddie said, her voice dripping with impatience.

“I told you, next weekend.”

A blast of wind whipped the papers back and forth in my hand.

“Zip up,” I said, “it’s cold.”

No reaction.

Fine. The kids had internal temperature control systems that didn’t seem to bear any relation to external conditions. If they felt cold they’d do their coats up. Tom practically never felt the cold while Maddie veered from one extreme to the other. Boiling or freezing, usually at odds with other people’s responses. She’d once worn a thick Arran sweater all summer, even on the exciting three-day heat wave, insisting she was cold.

“Come on, then.”

There was an oyster sky, the setting sun licking clouds salmon and silver and grey. The street lights were coming on as we reached home. The dark and the wind setting off the warm glow of windows and the pretty twinkle of fairy lights. One particularly brash display that we passed had ribbons of lights in several colours including some very bright white ones which flashed around the windows like strobes spelling out NOEL and a neon centrepiece of a sleigh and Father Xmas.

“Wow!” Tom breathed.

“Sick,” Maddie said. It was the latest slang for approval. No longer bad or wicked or cool, this year everything was sick. And really ‘sick’ things were psychosomatic. I ask you.

As we reached home I could hear the board on the roof clattering again and once I was inside I scribbled a reminder on a post-it note, to tell Ray.

The house was warm and I didn’t feel much like setting out again but Rusholme wasn’t far and I’d be driving against the early rush hour traffic.

Ray was in the cellar. The place smelt delicious, the tang of wood and sawdust. He’d taken on three Christmas orders; two chests of drawers and a set of dining chairs. He was planing the drawers and a pile of curly shavings covered his feet. There was a fine wood dust over everything including Ray. It made him look older.

“How’s it going?”

“Oh, don’t ask.”

“Ah.”

“It’ll be a bloody miracle if I get any of this finished by Christmas.”

I made a noise to show sympathy but I knew he’d do the jobs. It might mean he was down here till the early hours every night but he’d get it done. He only ever completed things under pressure of a deadline and this panic was par for the course. If things didn’t have a deadline he’d work on them for months, constantly refining. Once I’d cottoned onto this I always made a point of telling my friends to give him a completion date. That way they got their stuff.

“I’m off now. Be about half-five when I’m back. Maybe sooner. Don’t wait though. Feed them before.”

“Save you some?”

“What is it?”

“Haven’t a clue, yet.”

“No, don’t bother.” It might be something that didn’t reheat well. I’d rather look forward to something I could rely on and make it myself. Or seeing I’d be in Rusholme, to visit the Johnstones, I could maybe treat myself to a vegetable bhuna or a prawn biriyani. I brightened at the thought and made sure I’d got a bit of money on me.