Short Story / cets part one (of many!) (Analysis)
Cold Enough To Snow
(1)
You’re born in Brockmoor, and you’re born alone.
You grow up lonely in the hopes that one day you’ll find another isolated soul, so you can grow absent together while furthering the species – push the button, empty the shredders, ring up the tills and chase that promotion. To pay for the privilege of living in a town that orbits its own sun, full of lives that move in swampish circles, if at all.
It came to me when I was twenty-three, in one of those precious moments when there is time to follow a train of thought right through to its simplest form: people come to Brockmoor to die.
The falling rain was the full stop punctuating my suspicions, reiterating the uneasiness, once more with gusto. And straighten that tie. When you’re young, it’s natural to feel different to the rest of the world, special even – to believe that no matter what happens, you can make the change. I’ve never been the one hunting some submissive creature to become alone and embittered with, and sometimes a stranger will come along who thinks in hyphens and raves about life outside the tomb of our hometown. When they do, I let them in.
Welcome to the night we first met, my hyphen and I.
“Alex, turn the heater up – I’m dying!” I’ve never liked Laura Prince, adamant that she’s Nadine’s best friend, not mine. I couldn’t even show restraint on my sister’s behalf, and after a million talks – having slammed so many doors in my face with howls of adoption and resentment – Nadine seemed to have grasped the point. How Laura and her ballistic nasal whining had gotten within a hundred yards of my car is still unclear, but as usual I’d been belittled into escorting them, this time to a sleepover in Penny Bridge on the other side of town.
“Alex!!! Turn the – “
“I heard you the first time, it won’t go any higher.”
Her blue eyes audibly rolled in the back seat. “Nadine says you should be nicer to me.”
“She also says those jeans make your butt look like a planet.” I wasn’t lying, and neither was my sister. It gave her the look of a lollipop with a gargantuan rectal tumour, much to my unrepentant joy. “What I should be is back home.”
“You weren’t doing anything great.”
“I was warm!”
My fifteen year old sister had been in the store compartment of the service station for twenty minutes, now. It was Nick, from the sub-zero temperature to the delightful conversation, I was only ever in these predicaments when our elder sibling visited, taking his way with words and beating me with it. Nick could talk me into anything.
“I wish Nick had driven us.”
Oh, to reach out and squeeze that pencil throat…I’d had no say in any of this, and the temptation to tell her exactly why my Adonis of a brother couldn’t grace us with his presence was growing. I suppose I’m the archetypal middle child. “Well, he couldn’t. Live with it, I have to.”
There was a lot I had to tolerate of late, and I was barely sleeping. Most days I’d get home around midnight, grab a couple of hours, and wake up with a start around three o’clock. I never remembered my nightmares, only the sensation of fear itself, and my inexplicable dread at the thought of returning to sleep. So I’d sit up at my desk until the sun rose, reading to keep myself occupied while I waited for Nadine or our mother to get out of bed. The early hours of the morning can be the loneliest time, but I was adjusting fairly well – it had been the same basic pattern of insomnia and night terrors since Jesse died.
I yawned, contemplating time behind weary eyes. Tomorrow would be the two month anniversary of the accident. I should explain: see, Jesse was the only person in our family born at around the same time as me, and the only cousin I had any real time for. We went to the same school, we hung out, I taught her how to ride her first bike, that sort of thing. She was like the sister I’d never found – Nadine didn’t come along for another nine years, and aside from the generational differences, she’s completely ruined by our mother. But Jesse and I were a team, best buds, amigos.
We went everywhere together, and when I got my own place she was decorator in chief – on her last morning, we were talking quite seriously about her home situation, and I pleaded with her to move in with me. Jesse had been seeing the same person since the third year of secondary school, and they shared a flat not too far from my own. Brian Cole, Neanderthal king, an alcohol driven, knuckle dragging, sports worshipping example of the lower class Brockmoor male, the kind of person you pass in the street while moving your wallet to a pocket that’s closer to hand. He was headed for a life of bingo halls, eight or nine children and no damn job, and he was dragging her along with him. I believe she was finally realising that, the night of the accident. She told me she was scared. Brian couldn’t always control himself, on the nights he came home staggering drunk, and obnoxious, to the point where she barely tried to confront him anymore. It just wasn’t worth another broken wrist.
“She’s on her way over, Alex, and I’m gonna tell her you’re being rude to me again.” Laura’s whining cut into my reverie, probably for my own good – I was obsessing. In a quiet moment, I could find a thousand things that reminded me of Jess, and it couldn’t be healthy to dwell for so long on a subject that only caused my bruised heart to break. “I’d love to know what took her twenty minutes.”
For once, I agreed. “Well, that’s Nadine for you. She’d be late for her own…never mind.”
“Funeral? Tell me about it”, Laura said, unhelpfully.
My sister surprised me by getting into the passenger seat. If I was my father through and through, as many said, then Nadine was every inch our mother, from the deep set blue eyes to the cowlick at the front of her long auburn hair. She pouted at me, and jabbed a finger into my arm. “What are you gawking at? There’s no point having a sleepover if we don’t arrive till tomorrow.”
Sometimes I wondered who had really taken on the role of adult in our relationship. “Twenty minutes, Nad.”
“I bought some munchies for our big night. And?”
“Did you order them out of a catalogue or something? It’s freezing in here.” Even bundled up in jeans, two tee shirts, a shirt, my warmest hooded sweater and a pair of red knitted gloves, the cold was sharper than a comic’s tongue – the kind of chill that causes headaches. “And will you please tell your friend to back off? I’m trying to be nice but I swear, she is testing me.”
Nadine grinned as I pulled out of the petrol station. “You know it’s only because she has such a huge crush on you.”
This was why I didn’t enjoy chauffeuring them around. My brain is not equipped to cope with or relate to that of a teenage girl, I break out in a psychological rash. “Whatever. I’m ignoring both of you.”
Laura had become a noiseless shadow behind us. Unfortunately, this did not apply to my sister. “Aw, you’re shy!”
“Please, I’m not in the mood, just let it go.” For years, I’d longed for Nadine to accept me, and yet I found myself rejecting the effort when it was made. I hated living at home again, after experiencing the freedom that came with having a place of my own, but everyone agreed that I was in “no fit state” to live on my own. Everyone, that is, except me, though an argument with the women in our family is one I would be doomed to lose. “It’s nothing personal.”
She squeezed my knee. “I’m only ever in the next room, if you need someone to talk to. We’re all thinking about you, Alex.”
The sheer horror of it was enough to choke me. Only in the wake of such exhausting grief could we bring ourselves to communicate with some semblance of human decency, friendship even. “I appreciate that”, I said simply, trying to avoid being drawn into a conversation. Nadine amused herself by flicking through the radio stations as we made our way through the town centre, the Friday night roads bursting with traffic like clogged veins. I spent the final few minutes of our journey mentally comatose, functioning on autopilot, clearing my mind. By the time we arrived, I barely felt alive. Laura leapt out of the car the second it stopped. Nad hung on a little longer.
“I know you think I’m just a kid, but I hear you creeping around the house at all kinds of hours, and I hear you screaming in your sleep, too. You’re scaring me.” Screams? Her furrowed brow left no room for argument. “Mum’s worried but she’ll never admit it, she holds it in the same as you. I want you to talk to me.”
I gaped, having no idea what she wanted me to say. “Don’t make it your problem. I can cope, alright?” The support of others hindered my progress, and every attempt they made to comfort me was only a reminder that something was wrong. “Besides, you ARE a kid. Even if you understood my frame of mind right now, you’re not equipped to take on other people’s emotional baggage. You don’t have the experience.”
She shoved the car door open, wind slapping me in the face – as did her expression as she clambered out. “At least I’m trying. I’ll see you at home”, she spat, and slammed it behind her. I sat and watched them approach the house, shuddering, and wondered if the heartburn in my throat could be guilt. In her scarf and bobble hat, she looked all of eleven years old, yet when she spoke to me, Nadine could easily pass for my senior. We were learning about each other every day, and I’d certainly underestimated her.
Once they were safe inside I set off home, one eye on the dashboard clock as though I had somewhere to be. The old habits were gone, the routine was over, and my days grew longer than ever with no Jesse to alleviate the boredom and no job to regulate my schedule. I’d been working part-time for Laura’s father, taking calls at his veterinary clinic on the outskirts of town, right up until the day of Jesse’s funeral, when he took me into his office and very gently let me go. People tend to do that when their employees start taking flasks of vodka to work, so there are no hard feelings.
The journey home took no more than ten minutes. Mum’s car was gone, and so was Nick’s – it was a relief to be alone. There’s a presence in our house even when empty, one I’ve never been able to explain, and when I let myself in I called out both names before retiring to my room. A note was taped to the door:
Babysitting for your brother, honey.
Tidy the kitchen!!!
Love you, Mum
x x x x x x x x x
Twenty-three years old and living with my mother. Again. Was she as embarrassed as I was? I crumpled it, and walked in. My room was a safe haven, a place of solace. The walls were red and warm, devoid of posters (most perished in the transition) save for a painting above my desk. A Jesse Fentham original, given to me as a twentieth birthday present. It depicted the lake above Upmere Forest, and she had a gift, there was no doubt about it.
Screaming. Nadine’s words were lodged in my brain, frustrating in their implication. I took a seat, reached into the top drawer, and pulled out my flask, eyes glued to the painting – and the instant I resumed drinking, Brockmoor had won.
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