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Title Page
MAYA FOWLER
The Elephant in the Room
KWELA BOOKS
Motto
The mother of excess is not joy, but joylessness.
– FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
There is fiction in the space between you and me.
– TRACY CHAPMAN
Prologue
When I was born, my mother thought she could get away with attaching the label Lilith Fields to me. She thought I’d go through life that way, and didn’t envisage me becoming a Lily. That’s her story, anyway, but people will do what they like with your name, and if you end up being Lily Fields, so be it.
Finding someone a label is a sensitive process, with lots of potential for screwing up. This my mother did – twice. As if being named after a pasture weren’t bad enough, it had to be Lilith, too. She never even looked it up. I did, eventually. Dust and a family of silverfish sprang from the pages of my grandmother’s faded blue dictionary as I scurried my way to the entry. It said: “Lilith: in Jewish folklore, a female demon who eats children.” So right from the beginning, I was doomed.
People call me reticent. They whisper about me; complain I don’t talk much; I carry secrets. This is true.
Things could have been very different. My mother had really liked Judith, a strong name: the woman in the Bible who’d severed the head of Holofernes. But a friend of my mother’s had already taken the name for her own baby. I was stuck with the L-word.
I must say, everyone thinks I’m a Lily. Down to my plain white face and ghostly eyebrows, I look like a lily. But I’m a Lilith.
My sister Beth arrived, with a new wave of inspiration on the “-th” theme; Ruth was a contender, but in the end my grandmother strong-armed it into Elizabeth – her own name. Then there’s Gracie, who, besides getting a label that really suited her, ended up being named after a famous singer. By mistake.
My mother chose the name just after my dad left. I was five years old, and she had only just fallen pregnant with Gracie. I don’t remember much about Frank, but I recall feeling glad that the shouting had stopped.
Three months after Gracie arrived, he got hit by a milk van in Main Road, Plumstead. Eyewitnesses later told my mother he’d been laughing so hard at one of his own jokes that he didn’t even look before he stepped off the pavement. His young companion had been pulled into the road along with him. Our whole street was scandalised when the details came to light. The two of them had been tied together at the neck by her hot-pink feather boa. Apparently the woman died with her legs sprawled wide, one knee up, the heel broken off her right sandal, hotpants stained. They said my father snuffed it with a smile on his face, which seemed even more pronounced because of his moustache. Nobody said it out loud, but the general feeling was that this was a lucky accident; just about the best thing that could have happened.
Chapter 1
1986
Chapter 1
Masses of leaves stand upright in a grey-green sea, which parts for us as we wade through. Beth and I are looking for the manna Mom told us we’d find up here if we just searched hard enough. Manna is a very special kind of doughnut, I think, made with extra love, and love is what we’re looking for, now that Mom’s pouring it all into our new baby sister.
The rain has left the earth slick. So we need to tread carefully, else we could slide right down to the kitchen door, and then we’ll be done for because Mom can’t be washing muddy corduroys every friggin’ day of the week. The leaves we’re exploring belong to the nasturtiums that grow in a clump up on the hill behind our house. I could easily believe that something special might be hidden under these leaves which Beth and I use as wands in our games where ants are transformed into steeds, and stones into princes.
Nasturtiums are themselves kings and queens. They stand up tall in any weather, and after the rain you will find them crowned with crystals. These glisten, and can grow into massive gems if you gently tilt a leaf so that the drops all melt into one. But you have to be ever so careful, because nothing is as slippery as a raindrop gem on a leaf.
None of our searching delivers anything other than five million insects. Songololos unroll and scuttle from under rocks, an earwig launches himself forward, looking like a hovercraft (which makes me scream), and tiny bugs that we call armadillos curl up into defensive little balls.
Beth sighs and sits down on a tree stump next to the fence. She blows out her cheeks as she rests her elbows on her knees and her jaw on her hands. I’ve had enough too. The air tastes especially salty tonight, and the clouds are hanging thickly overhead. In the background the sea keeps whispering.
The sound of the sea is as much a part of living here as the frequent thundering of trains. It’s like a heartbeat, and at night, when the windows are closed or rain washes away the sound of the waves, I put my hands over my ears and listen to what Grampa has told me is the rush of blood. Blood or not, it comforts me because it’s my sea. My sea inside.
The yellow light pouring from the house gets brighter as the sky turns to charcoal.
“Come on, Beth,” I call, even though she’s on her way already. She inches down the terrace with a nasturtium posy in one hand, and a leaf, crowned in gems, in the other. It’s getting too dark now for me to notice where I tread; I crush leaves as I go. Stalks snap, and the peppery, sour fragrance that is clean and dirty at the same time tickles my nostrils.
Just as she reaches the threshold, Beth’s rain gems plop to the ground.
Chapter 2
2000
Chapter 2
I arrive home after work to find Gracie sitting on the sofa painting our mother’s nails. Gracie and my mother, Amelia, are surrounded by a heap of dresses and blouses. Gracie is chewing gum with her mouth closed; they are both silent. The ashtray, a dead volcano perched on the coffee table, is close to overflowing. The eruption is over, though the last ashes still sully the air. Two empty glasses flank a two-litre Diet Coke, and the room smells not only of smoke but also old cheese.
Beth is upstairs, studying. She has recently taken up psychology, which means abandoning my mother (mother’s own words), curtailing her social life and cocooning for hours with textbooks and heaven knows what. This has been a gradual modification of behaviour, but suddenly all her alone-time has legitimacy. Gracie, a straight-B thirteen-year-old with a fascination with butterflies and a surgically implanted Discman, has made time to coif and manicure our mother. The cuckoo clock strikes six as Gracie applies the last stroke of Yardley Cherry Pop.
My clothes for the evening are waiting in my room. I have to look good for my grandmother, so God forbid I’m left to conjure up my own outfit. I find it on a coat hanger. Jeez. A white blouse and black pants. It’s just like Beth to ensure I do my penguin body justice by stuffing it into a penguin suit, while creating a marvellous opportunity for me to be mistaken for a waitress all evening. The shirt fits fine, but true to form, I’m a bit short for the pants. These dachshund
