Fiction: The Portrait

Copyright (c) 2008

This is not autobiographical, it does not feature any member of my family. I just wanted to explore the idea that people are complicated and what you see is not ever what's really there. I especially liked the idea that heroes, or heroines, can be just like you and I: argumentative, cross and awkward.

Her name was Ethel and she was a formidable lady. She had a sharp mind and an even sharper tongue. Very little got past her, at least, not without being helped on its way by a scathing comment or a chilly put-down. I don't know how Dad put up with her all that time, but then I suppose that opposites, as they say, attract and opposites they certainly were. Dad was the quiet, unhurried type, while Mother (I never called her 'mum') was much more direct.
Dad told me once that Mother was a volunteer nurse in Camden during the blitz of 1940. She wore a tin hat and drove an ambulance. I remember gawping at him in amazement. “Mother?” I said. “In a tin hat?”

Dad, as always, stayed very calm. “Well, you had to wear the hat. Never knew when a bit of rubble might fall on you.”

“Yes but.. Mother? Don't tell me she actually got her hands dirty?”
Dad gave me one of his slow stares. There was that hint of reproach there which always succeeded in making me feel horribly guilty. “Your mother,” he said heavily, “had to drive that ambulance through the streets, in the dark, while Jerry dropped bombs all over the shop. And when she wasn't doing that she was pulling bodies out of the rubble. I don't think she was that bothered about getting her hands dirty, do you?”

I think I was about 12 at the time. I do remember that my opinion of her changed dramatically, for a while anyway, until it became apparent that the woman who drove the ambulance all those years ago was now a distant stranger to the woman who would sit at the breakfast table, peering at the Daily Mail through her bifocals and complaining about how Harold Wilson and his 'cronies' were driving the country onto the rocks. She always did have strong opinions and she never held back from speaking her mind. When I announced at dinner one evening that I wanted to go to University to study art, she predictably spoke her mind at some length on the subject. It was a long speech, during which Dad had plenty of time to quietly sink another 2 glasses of vin de table and retire to the kitchen to make custard for the crumble. By the time he returned, Mother was winding down, having made her point that art was all very well as a hobby but only a fool would try and make a living from it and why didn't I follow the example of James Wattersley and secure a position in a bank? Steady income, reliable prospects..

I was 16. I was impulsive and reckless. I made the mistake of calling James Wattersley a 'spotty twat' who was 'boring' with 'no friends'. An argument developed as often happened and I retired to my room to sulk, while Dad and Mother discussed me, probably in despairing tones, downstairs.

I went off to university anyway. They couldn't really stop me, short of chaining me to the bedpost. Dad tolerated my departure with resigned weariness, while Mother refused to talk to me at all, at least for the first few months. After a while she gradually unbent and condescended to communicate by phone. Her phone calls were mostly full of warnings about drinking too much, wearing damp clothes in the winter and not eating properly. I always put the phone down feeling that I had somehow shrunk to the size of a 10 year old and could barely reach to replace the handset.

After leaving university I took a procession of dull jobs to get some money coming in and got myself a flat in the grubby end of Chelsea at a time when such things were still available for sensible money. It was small but it was on the top floor of a block which had been built in the 1920's so it benefited from large windows and plenty of natural light. Perfect for painting. I moved in on a February morning. A few days later, with a chilly wind rattling the iron-framed windows and a light drizzle falling from a bleak, deathly-grey sky, without any warning, Mother turned up on the doorstep.

“I was just passing,” she said, before I could recover from the shock of seeing her. “Simon. You're looking well.” She pecked me on the cheek.
“What are you doing here?” I managed to say.
“I just told you. Are you going to invite me in?”
“Er, yes, of course. Come in.” I stood aside and she swept past and into the lounge, where she stopped in the middle of the floor and looked around. “Very nice dear,” she said. “It'll be so much nicer when it's tidied up though. You know, it doesn't take long to pick things up and put them away.” She went to the window.
“I haven't finished moving in,” I defended myself.
“Oh, no, of course not, I can see that. These things take time. What a lovely view, dear.”
She could change the subject like a hummingbird could change direction.
“Uh, yes, it's a nice view of the park. If you look-”
“Oh yes, I see it, just behind the gasworks. How lovely.” She removed her coat and held it out. I grudgingly took it.
“Why don't you sit down?” I asked her. “You must be worn out after climbing those stairs.”
“I used the lift dear. A very nice gentleman in the lobby pointed it out to me.”
I cringed inside. Of course there was a lift. Idiot!

Mother was examining the sofa, which was ragged at the edges and slightly mottled in colour, especially around the arms where guests tended to balance their glasses. “I think I'll stand, thank you,” she said.
I dropped her coat in the spare room and when I got back to the lounge, Mother was peering at the landscape over the fireplace.
“I'd like to say that's mine, but I'm afraid I can't,” I joked, trying to lighten the mood.
“No dear, it's a Turner.” She straightened and looked at me, then looked around again.
I sagged. “Cup of tea?”
“No thank you dear. Actually I wanted to ask you something.” She paused to compose herself. “I wondered if you might paint my portrait?”
I think possibly my mouth fell open. “Pardon? You want me to paint your portrait? Why? I mean, well, yes, of course I will if you want me to but why? You don't even like my paintings!”
“I know I don't, but it's your father's birthday soon and frankly I'm at a loss as to what to get him. I simply can't bear the thought of any more golfing memorabilia. I thought it might be nice to get him something original and personal.”
“Like a portrait?”
“Exactly. In any case he has no taste whatsoever so he won't mind if it doesn't look like me. Well, at first i thought you might as well have a free hand, dear. Cubist, impressionist, whatever you like.” She shot me a stern glance. “I draw the line at nudity.”
“Oh god no,” I blurted, then coughed and did my best to recover. “Er, well, of course I'll do it, I'd be more than happy to do it.”
“Thank you dear, that's very kind of you.” She opened her bag and took something out. “Anyway, i finally decided. I'd like you to copy a photograph for me, if you don't mind.”
“A photo? Don't you want to sit for a portrait?”
“No thank you, that would be extremely boring for me and I'm sure we would soon get on each other's nerves. It will me much simpler if you just copy this.” She looked at the object in her hand which I could now see was a silver picture frame. A curious, thoughtful look was on her face. Almost wistful. She handed me the picture without saying anything.

It was an old photo in black and white, so old it was tinged with yellow at the edges. The young girl in the uniform was sitting very upright, hair pulled back and tucked under her cap. A very formal pose, but her face was alive, with a soft smile and laughing eyes. “Is that you?” I asked quietly.
“Hard to believe, I suppose.” Mother sighed.
“Was that when you were in the, the nurses group?”
“The WVR, the volunteer reserve. That's where I met your father. He was home on leave at the time.” She looked out of the window then as if she might find something out there to help clear her head. As if she had too many memories, both good and bad.
“Why do you want this picture?”
“I don't want to look at me, hanging on the wall. I don't want to see me and I don't want anyone else seeing me either. I want to see her.” She pointed at the picture I was holding.
“Is this really for Dad? Or for you?”
“Simon, does it really matter?”
“It obviously does to you.”
“Don't be facetious.” A little of the old Mother I knew came flashing back and I almost smiled. Then she softened again. “I would like a picture of me as I was then. There, I said it. If you really don't want to do it then fine, we can forget the whole thing.”
“No, no, of course not. I'm sorry, I'll be happy to do it.”
“Well. Only if you're sure,” she added quickly.
“I'm sure. But... why do you suddenly want it now? You could have turned this into a portrait long before now.“
“Not really. I.. didn't think of it until now. I'd forgotten I even had this picture.”

In that moment, for the first time, I saw her as a person and not just 'mother'. I realised that for her, now, the past was the only thing she understood any more. I could barely imagine what that must feel like.

I painted the picture as best I could and it hung in their house for years, until the day the house was shut up and the pictures were taken away. Except for the portrait which I kept, and I still have it today. Whenever I look at it I don't see Mother at all, I only see a young woman with laughing eyes. And that makes me smile, because that was, after all, what she wanted.