When God Was a Rabbit

The townhouse was nestled in the heart of the Village in a tree-lined street that was quiet and strangely remote, considering it was only a street away from Bleecker and two from Washington Square. We could see the realtor up ahead talking on the phone, standing next to a large ailanthus tree that offered little shade against the draining afternoon sun.

We ran the last fifty yards to meet him, a sudden race, a ready-set-go, which I won, because I reached and touched the black iron handrail first. The realtor seemed bemused; we looked hot and sweaty and, most of all, poor; as if we couldn’t even raise the price of a hot dog between us, let alone prime New York real estate.

The odour from the ailanthus became strong as we climbed up the steps to the front door, and as we entered it mingled with the smell of damp, a smell the realtor immediately assured was only a slight problem, rather than the structural signifier we both imagined. It was dark as we entered, thankfully unfurnished, and the rooms were concealed behind wooden shutters, which stalled midway as they were pulled back, refusing to offer light beyond the realms of dusk. The house was rather poky inside, with a cumbersome layout that mimicked a chicken run. Walls were plastered with striped paper, an orange and brown and black theme throughout, with dark oak balustrades clumsily painted and now hidden behind the heavy gloss of mocha stain. I traversed the hallway and followed its narrow ascent to the upper two floors, the highest one nursing a hole and a bird’s nest, and then precariously down to the kitchen and the small uninspiring garden beyond, which was landscaped with weeds and knee-high ailanthus trees, the seeds having been blown in from the front. There was so much wrong with this house, so much to do; but as I stood there, my brother secretly pointing to his watch, I immediately understood the layout, the how-it-should-have-been all those years ago, and the how-it-could-be now. And when my brother asked, ‘Well?’ with no enthusiasm in his voice, I said, ‘I love it.’ And I really did.

We got back just before six. I showered quickly and dressed; hid my nerves behind an article I needed to finish for the following day. It was a pitch, actually, a pitch for a regular column in a weekend newspaper which I’d hastily (and unimaginatively) entitled ‘Lost and Found’ – a name that would eventually and surprisingly stick. It was to be the story of Jenny Penny and her return to my life; stories cemented together by our correspondence and the memories of our past. And when I’d nervously written to her suggesting such an idea, asking for her opinion and maybe later her permission, I received a resounding Yes! by return of post, together with the new fictitious name I’d asked her to choose, to protect her fragile yet willing identity.

The buzzer rang; I wasn’t finished. The buzzer rang and my brother shouted from his bedroom. I opened the front door and stood a few feet back. I suddenly remembered the towel around my head and pulled it off, throwing it over the back of a chair, letting my hair fall damp, unruly, free. I felt anxious. Wondered how he would enter. Would he run in shouting, happy to see me? Or simply knock? I heard his footsteps, heard him pause. And then he did neither; simply pushed the door gently and stuck his head round and smiled, and said, ‘Hello, Ell, how’re you doing?’

The dark features were the same, the smile the same, but his voice had lost the flat Essex tones I could still remember. And he’d brought champagne. We were going out but he’d brought champagne because it was a moment for champagne, and he stood there with his hands on his hips and said, ‘You haven’t changed,’ and I said, ‘You neither,’ and we embraced, and he was still holding the champagne bottle as we embraced, and I felt it cold and hard against my back.

My brother came out to the sound of the cork popping. He came out still wet from the shower, wearing his choir T-shirt, a pink T-shirt that had ‘The Six Judys’ written on the front above a line drawing of that famous dame. And then underneath in smaller type: ‘We’ll Sing for your Supper’. It was something they did every time, had a new T-shirt printed for each new charity they supported. One year, they’d supported an elderly group and the T-shirt had said: ‘You’re Never Too Old to Sing’. This time, though, it was food for the homeless, and the provision of a new catering van.

I handed around the glasses of champagne. I’d filled them to the top, not something I usually did, but it had been distracting and I’d needed that because when my brother raised his glass and said, ‘To us. Finally together,’ I had to turn away as I felt the first of my tears, before I’d even had my first mouthful, before I could even join them to say, ‘To us.’

I thought he was in the study with Joe helping with a finance problem, but as I began to close down the computer, I suddenly felt his hand on my arm and I startled and he said, ‘Wait,’ and began to read the opening paragraph.

‘What do you think?’ I said.

My brother ran in and said, ‘The taxi’s here. Are you ready?’ before disappearing into his room for a pile of promotional CDs and photos.

‘I want to be in this,’ said Charlie quietly. ‘Write about me.’

‘In this?’

He nodded. ‘You lost me and now you’ve found me. I should be in it too, don’t you think?’

‘You’ll need to change your name,’ I said.

‘Ellis.’

‘What?’

‘That’s the name I’d like. Ellis.’

‘OK,’ I said.

‘What’s Jenny Penny’s?’ he asked.

‘Liberty,’ I said. ‘Liberty Belle.’

We sat at a small unoccupied table at the back of the suite, away from guests we didn’t know, ignoring the ones we did, close to the ice-sculpted vodka bar and a never-ending supply of mini hamburgers and fat breaded scampi.

‘I thought you might be married,’ he said.

‘No,’ I said, finishing my drink.

Silence.

‘That’s it? No elaboration? No one special?’

‘No.’

‘Never?’

‘In hindsight, no.’

‘In hindsight. God, you’re so like him,’ he said, waving to my brother who had just peeped out from behind the makeshift red velvet curtain. ‘Your own little club.’

‘It’s not like that. It’s complicated.’

‘We’re all complicated, Ell. Do you remember the last time you saw me?’

‘Yeah.’

‘You were nine, ten, right? And really pissed off at me.’

‘He never got over you.’

He laughed. ‘Yeah, yeah.’

‘Yeah, actually,’ and I reached swiftly for a glass of wine as it passed by on a tray.

‘We were what, fifteen? Fuck. Where did all the time go, Ell? Look at us.’

‘It’s as if it was yesterday,’ I said, downing half my glass. ‘So, are you fucking?’

‘God, you are all grown up.’

‘Yeah, happened overnight. Well?’

‘No,’ and he tried to swipe a glass of champagne from the tray, this time spilling it down his arm. ‘He won’t with me.’

‘Why not?’

‘He doesn’t go back,’ he said.

Bobby, the hairiest of The Judys, came out and introduced the rest of the group. He talked about the charities being represented that evening, talked about the artists exhibiting around the room. He talked about money and asked for lots of it.

‘By the way,’ I said turning back to Charlie, ‘the last time I saw you wasn’t then. It was when you were on television being bundled into a car.’

‘Ah,’ he said, ‘that.’

‘Well?’ I said, but he pretended not to hear me as the opening bars to ‘Dancing Queen’ quickly filled the room.

I couldn’t sleep. Buoyed by the latent effects of jet lag and coffee, I found myself wide awake at three in the morning. I got up, crept to the kitchen and poured out a large glass of water. I turned my computer on. The sound of breathing was loud and close. My brother never shut his bedroom door. It was a security thing: he needed to hear the sounds of his home, needed to hear if a different sound entered. I gently closed his door. Tonight he was safe; safe with me, and safe with Charlie asleep in the adjacent room.

It was then, in the three o’clock darkness, that I wrote about the moment Ellis re-entered our lives that evening in August, as shoppers gathered at corner bars, swapping tales of sales and divorces pending, of who loves who and holidays to come. I wrote about how he entered with a wallet crammed with fifties, and memberships to MOMA and the Met, and loyalty cards for Starbucks and Diedrich’s too. I wrote about how he entered with a slight scar above his lip from an accident skiing, and how he entered with a wounded heart from a man called Jens; a man he didn’t really love, but he was someone there, a late-night-talk-to; we’ve all had one of them. I wrote about how he entered with a letter in his pocket, which his mother had written a couple of days before, a letter more emotional than usual, wondering how he was, wishing they spoke more, stuff like that. I wrote about how he entered with a terrifying ordeal that he wouldn’t talk about for years, with an empty space where once was an ear. And I wrote about how he entered with the knowledge that he was changing jobs, leaving the snow fields of Breckenridge and the Rocky trails behind, and swapping them for land in the Upstate quiet, where neighbours were unseen, and where the Shawangunk Mountains would watch over him like the eagles they unleashed; swapping it all to be with an unlikely someone from his distant past.

That’s how he entered; how I remembered he entered.