Daisy darker, p.2
Daisy Darker, page 2
She smiles. ‘Come on inside, before it starts to rain.’
I’m about to correct her about the weather – I remember feeling the sun on my face only a moment ago – but when I look up, I see that the picture-perfect blue sky above Seaglass has now darkened to a palette of muddy grey. I shiver and realize that it’s much colder than I’d noticed before too. It does seem as though a storm is on the way. Nana has a habit of knowing what is coming before everybody else. So I do as she says – like always – and follow her and Poppins inside.
‘Why don’t you just relax for a while, before the rest of the family joins us?’ Nana says, disappearing into the kitchen, leaving me – and the dog – in the hallway. Something smells delicious. ‘Are you hungry?’ she calls. ‘Do you want a snack while we wait?’ I can hear the clattering of ancient pots and pans, but I know Nana hates people bothering her when she’s cooking.
‘I’m fine, thanks,’ I reply. Poppins gives me a disapproving look – she is never one to turn down food – and trots out to the kitchen, no doubt hoping to find a snack of her own.
I confess that a hug might have been nice, but Nana and I are both a little out of practice when it comes to affection. I expect she is feeling just as anxious as I am about this family reunion, and we all deal with anxiety in different ways. You can see fear on the surface of some people, while others learn to hide their worries inside themselves, out of sight but not out of mind.
The first thing I notice – as always – are the clocks. It’s impossible not to. The hallway is full of eighty of them, all different colours, shapes and sizes, and all ticking. A wall full of time. There is one for every year of Nana’s life, and each one was carefully chosen by her, as a reminder to herself and the world that her time is her own. The clocks scared me as a child. I could hear them from my bedroom – tick tock, tick tock, tick tock – as though relentlessly whispering that my own time was running out.
The bad feeling I have about this weekend returns, but I don’t know why.
I follow my unanswered questions further into Seaglass, hoping to find answers inside, and I’m instantly filled with a curious collection of memories and regrets. Transported back in time by the familiar sights and smells of the place, a delicious mix of nostalgia and salty air. The diffused scent of the ocean loiters in every corner of the old house, as though each brick and beam has been saturated by the sea.
Nothing has changed in the years I have known this place. The whitewashed walls and wooden floors look just as they did when my sisters and I were children – a little worn out maybe by the left-over love and loss they have housed. As I breathe it all in, I can still picture us as the people we used to be, before life changed us into the people we are now, just like the sea effortlessly reshapes the sand. I can understand why Nana never wanted to live anywhere else. If this place were mine, I’d never leave it behind either.
I wonder again why she has really invited the whole family here for her birthday, when I know she doesn’t love or even like them all. Tying up loose ends perhaps? Sometimes love and hate get tangled, and there is no way to unpick the knot of feelings we feel. Asking questions of others often makes me ask questions of myself. If I had the chance to iron out the creases in my life before it ended, which ones would I choose to smooth over? Which points and pleats would I most want to unfold, so they could no longer dent the picture of the person I wished to be remembered as? Personally, I think that some wrinkles and stains on the fabric of our lives are there for a reason. A blank canvas might sound appealing, but it isn’t very interesting to look at.
I head up the creaky stairs, leaving the ticking clocks behind me. Each room I pass contains the ghosts of memories from all the days and weeks and years I have walked along this hallway. Voices from my past trespass in my present, whispering through the cracks in the windows and floorboards, disguised as the sound of the sea. I can picture us running through here as children, giddy on ocean air, playing, hiding, hurting one another. That’s what my sisters and I were best at. We learned young. Childhood is a race to find out who you really are, before you become the person you are going to be. Not everybody wins.
I step inside the bedroom that was always mine – the smallest in the house. It is still decorated the way it was when I was a girl, with white bedroom furniture – more shabby than chic – and old, peeling wallpaper, covered in a fading pattern of daisies. Nana is a woman who only says and does things once, and she never replaces something unless it is broken. She always used to put flowers in our bedrooms when we came to stay as children, but I notice that the vase in my room is empty. There is a silver dish filled with potpourri instead, a pretty mix of pine cones, dried petals and tiny seashells. I spot a copy of Daisy Darker’s Little Secret on the bookshelf. Seeing it reminds me of my own secret. The one I never wanted to share. I lock it away again for now, back inside the box in my head where I have been keeping it.
The ocean continues to serenade my unsettled thoughts, as though trying to silence them with the relentless shh of the sea. I find the sound soothing. I can hear the waves crashing on the rocks below, and my bedroom window is stained with the resulting spray, droplets running down the glass like tears, as if the house itself were crying. I peer out and the sea stares back: cold, infinite and unforgiving. Darker than before.
Part of me still worries that I was wrong to come, but it didn’t feel right to stay away.
The rest of my family will be here soon. I’ll be able to watch them walk across the sandy causeway one by one as they arrive. It’s been such a long time since we’ve all been together. I wonder whether all families have as many secrets as we do? When the tide comes in, we’ll be cut off from the rest of the world for eight hours. When the tide goes back out, I doubt we’ll ever all be together again.
Three
30 October 2004 – 5 p.m.
My father is the first to arrive.
Being punctual is his only way of saying, I love you. For as long as I can remember he has expressed emotions through timekeeping, unable to demonstrate affection in the ways most other fathers do. But when I think about him growing up here as an only child, in a house full of clocks, on a tiny tidal island, I suppose time was always going to be on his mind. As a boy, I suspect he was often counting down the minutes until he could leave. I watch him from my bedroom window as he trudges across the damp sand. The sun is still setting, melting the sky into a palette of pinks and purples that do not look real. Dad glances up in my direction, but if he sees me, he doesn’t smile or wave.
Frank Darker is a frustrated composer who mostly conducts. He still travels the world with his orchestra, but while that might sound glamorous, it isn’t. He works harder than anyone I know, but doesn’t earn as much as you might think. Once he has paid the salaries, hotel bills and expenses of an entire ensemble, he doesn’t have a lot of spare change. But he loves his job and the people he works with. Perhaps a little too much: his orchestra is more like family to him than we ever were.
My father looks in pretty good shape for his fifty-something years. He still has a full head of black hair, and carries his suitcase with ease, despite it looking rather large for an overnight stay. I notice he chose not to use the wheelbarrow left on the other side of the causeway to help with luggage. I suspect it’s a different kind of handout he’s after from Nana. Dad’s back is a bit hunched from years of sitting at a piano, and his suit seems to be hanging off him a little, as though life has made him shrink. I notice that he’s dressed as if he were attending a funeral, not a family birthday, and I watch as he stops before reaching the front door, trying to compose himself like a piece of music that doesn’t wish to be written.
He knows – just as we all do – that Nana intends to leave this house to a female relative. She inherited it from her mother, whose dying wish was that Seaglass would always belong to women in the Darker family. The decision to skip a generation caused my father great upset from the moment he knew about it. Dad never wanted Seaglass, he just needed money to keep his orchestra together. He would have sold this place years ago were it up to him. Nana has been bankrolling my father’s ambitions since he was a child, but no matter how much she gives him, it is never enough. I head downstairs to see him, even though I know he’d rather not see me. I never leave me alone with myself for too long; I can’t be trusted.
Poppins is already at the door, and Nana opens it before my dad has the opportunity to knock. Nana’s face lights up when she sees who it is, a genuine smile revealing neat white teeth, still sharp enough to bite.
‘Hello, Frank.’
‘Mother,’ he says, with an odd little nod. ‘It’s good to see you.’
‘Is it? Perhaps you should try visiting more often?’ There is a twinkle in her eye but we all know that she means it. Being alone never used to make Nana feel lonely, but the things and people we miss can change with age.
Dad doesn’t reply. Subjects that sting are best avoided when you’ve already been stung too often. Instead, he glances at the wall of clocks, puts down his case, and hangs his coat on the stand. He’s worn the same thick, black woollen coat for years, not because he can’t afford a new one, but because my father has always been a creature of habit.
‘Don’t forget to punch in,’ Nana says, blocking his path as he attempts to head into the lounge. This house used to be his home, and childhood homes are haunted by all variety of ghosts for people like my dad. The big man soon behaves like a small boy.
The clocks covering the walls in the hall are all different sizes, colours and designs. There are big clocks, small clocks, round clocks, square clocks, digital clocks, cuckoo clocks, musical clocks, pendulum clocks, novelty clocks, and even a vintage wall-mounted hourglass, containing sand from Blacksand Bay. The clock nearest the front door is one of Nana’s favourites. It’s an antique wooden punch clock from an old Cornish factory, originally used by staff to clock on and off. My dad sighs. He is a man who pre-empts most challenges with defeat. He takes a card with his name on from the tiny ancient cubbyhole, slots it into the clock, punches the time on it, then puts it back.
‘Happy now?’ he says.
‘Ecstatic,’ Nana replies with another smile. ‘Family traditions become increasingly important the older you get; they hold us together when we’ve spent too long apart. If you check your card, you’ll see it’s been a while since my only child paid me a visit.’
This is a familiar family dance and we all know the steps.
Nana doesn’t need to nag me to punch in. I love all of her little quirks and traditions, even the unconventional ones. But I’m used to her eccentric behaviour; unlike the rest of the family, I visit Nana all the time. When we’re done with the unusual arrival rituals, we head into the lounge.
If you can imagine a room filled with mismatching retro furniture, a 1950s jukebox, pastel-coloured sofas, comfy armchairs, shelves filled with so many books they have started to bend in the middle from the weight of them all, enormous windows with sea views, a huge open fireplace, and turquoise wallpaper covered in hand-painted birds and elderflower blossoms, then you can picture the lounge at Seaglass. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.
Nana holds up a bottle of Scotch from the brass drinks trolley in the corner. I shake my head – it’s a bit early for me – but Dad nods, then makes a fuss of Poppins while the whisky is being poured. He is the only whisky drinker in our family, everyone else hates the stuff. Nana mixes herself a mojito, plucking some mint leaves, then bashing the ice with an ancient-looking rolling pin before adding a generous glug of rum. I marvel at the Darker family’s version of casual drinks. There is no humble sherry in this house, not even in a trifle.
Thanks to a smidgen of subsidence – barely noticeable unless you know to look, and our family has always been very good at papering over the cracks – drinks placed on tables in this room tend to slide right off. My mother used to say it was why the whole family drank too much – always having to hold their glasses for fear of breaking them – but I don’t think that’s the reason. Some people drink to drown their sorrows; others drink so they can swim in them.
We sit in an awkward but well-practised silence, and I notice they both take a few sips of their drinks before attempting any further conversation. The branches of our family tree all grew in different directions, and it’s best to avoid the stormy subjects that might make them bend or break. I smile politely and try to forget all the years when my dad didn’t speak to me, didn’t visit me in hospital as a child, or behaved as though I was already dead. I pretend not to remember the birthdays he forgot, or the Christmases when he chose to work instead of coming home, the countless times he made my mother cry, or the night I heard him blame their divorce on me and my broken heart. Just for now, while we wait for the others to get here, I pretend that he is a good father and that I am the daughter he wanted me to be.
I don’t have to pretend for long.
My eldest sister is the next to arrive, the clever one, who saved me from drowning when she was ten. Rose is beautiful, intelligent, and damaged. She is five years older and almost a foot taller than I am. We have never been close. It isn’t just her height that makes it difficult to see eye to eye with my sister, and it isn’t the age gap either. Other than the same blood running through our veins, we simply don’t have very much in common.
Rose is a vet and has always preferred the company of animals to people. Her clothes are as sensible as the woman wearing them: a striped Breton top beneath a tailored jacket teamed with smart (extra-long) jeans. She looks older than her thirty-four years. Her long chestnut hair is tied off her face in a neat ponytail, and her fringe is too long – as though she is trying to hide behind it. We haven’t spoken since before she got married. We both know why.
Families are like snowflakes: each and every one is unique.
Rose is happier to see the dog than she would ever be to see me or Dad, so once again, Poppins gets all the attention. My eldest sister came here alone this weekend; I suppose we all did. Rose’s marriage lasted less than a year, and she threw herself into her work and opening her own veterinary practice after that. Even as a child she was determinedly conscientious; the straight-A student who put the rest of us to shame. Rose has always had a thirst for knowledge that no amount of learning could quench. Dad calls her Dr Doolittle, because he thinks she only talks to animals these days. He might be right. Rose fetches herself a large glass of water from the kitchen, then perches on the edge of the pink sofa, next to my father, still wearing her jacket, as though she hasn’t made up her mind whether to stay.
The sea is already starting to restitch itself across the causeway by the time the others arrive. While my father uses punctuality as kindness, my mother uses lateness to offend. Nancy Darker divorced our dad over twenty years ago, but she kept his name, and kept in close contact with his mother. She has travelled down from London with my fifteen-year-old niece, and Lily – her favourite daughter. They have always been close and still spend a lot of time together. Lily is the only one of us to furnish our parents with an elusive grandchild; I don’t imagine there will be any more.
When my mother looks in my direction, I feel cold. She is a woman who never hides her seasons; she is winter all year round. Nancy looked so much like Audrey Hepburn when we were growing up that I sometimes thought it was her on TV, when she made us watch those black-and-white films over and over. She is still a very beautiful and graceful woman, and looks considerably younger than her fifty-four years. She wears her hair in the same black bob as always, and still looks, walks and talks like an out-of-work film star. The fur coat and costume jewellery aren’t the only things about my mother that are fake.
The fact that she could have been an actress – if she hadn’t accidentally become a parent – is something she frequently reminds us all of, as though her failed ambitions are our fault. But in many ways, I suspect some level of parental resentment is normal, even if rarely spoken about. Doesn’t everyone wonder who they might have been if they weren’t who they were?
The divorce settlement was generous, but dried up once we had all fled the nest. I don’t understand where my mother gets her money from now, and I know better than to ask. She has made a part-time career out of competitions – entering every one she sees on daytime TV. Perhaps because of the sheer number she enters, she sometimes wins, but it can be dangerous to celebrate luck as success. Nancy has always been the puppeteer of our family, pulling all our strings in such a subtle fashion, we didn’t notice when our thoughts were not our own.
When Nana heaves open the old wooden door to greet the late arrivals, the causeway is already slippery with seawater. I can see that their shoes are all soaking wet, forming little puddles around their feet. Lily is too busy blaming everything and everyone but herself for being late – the traffic, the satnav, the car Nana paid for – to notice the way we are all staring at her. It’s as though she thinks the tide should have waited for her to arrive. Complaining is my sister’s not-so-secret superpower. She is a walking frown. The soundtrack of her life is little more than a series of moans stitched together into a symphony of negativity, which I find exhausting to listen to. I feel the chill of the cold shoulder she gives us all, and take a step back.
Lily is a smaller version of Rose, but without the brains or cheekbones. Like my mother, she has never had a full-time job, and yet is still a part-time mum, who got pregnant when she was seventeen. My sister stinks of perfume and entitlement. I get an unpleasant waft of Poison – her favourite eau de toilette – which she’s been drowning herself and our nostrils in since we were teenagers. That’s not the only thing about her that has never changed. Lily still dresses in skimpy clothes from Topshop and I think she must sleep in her make-up, because I can’t remember what her face looks like without it. She twists a strand of highlighted hair around her finger like a child, and I notice that her roots are showing. She is not a natural blonde. We are all dark in my family, including my wonderful niece.
