Five(53)

But Liam won’t let her do it this time, won’t let her say two sentences and think she’s solved the whole problem and had the last word. He thinks of the chimneys and the gutters and the dirt and the rubble in the heat and the rain while they were sat here, reading books. He pushes away his plate, pushes away from the table, forgets his strength and his size in the tiny kitchen, the chair tips over, the table shakes.

“How long, Mum? How long is my penance? How many roofs will I have to tar, and shit bosses will I have to listen to, and holes will I have to dig before I’ve repaid God for how I was born? I know things aren’t easy for ’im, but they’re not easy for me either, you think they are but they’re not, and I’m paying for it every day,” Liam says.

Doreen says nothing.

“Do you hear me, Mum?” Liam says.

Doreen surveys her son from her position at the kitchen sink, dish towel in one hand, rubber gloves in the other. She notices his height, his width, his strength, the spitting image of her own father, thank God, thank God he has not grown to be the man who fathered him instead, and then she says, “Yes, I hear you, lad. Now, put the mouse back in the house, Liam, and clear the table,” which means “Your fly is undone, you big oaf, and stop feeling sorry for yourself.”

They look at each other for a moment. He laughs and so does she, and he zips up his jeans and brings the dishes to the sink.

“Mum, I…” he says, and doesn’t finish, and she knows he means “I’m sorry.”

She pats his cheek. “It will be all right, lad,” she says, and even though she believes this, he does not.

But Danny, who hears everything from the living room sofa where they thought he was taking a nap, does not laugh. He cries. And he makes up his mind.



* * *





“Let—me—help,” Danny says to Liam one Sunday morning, leaning on his crutch. Liam looks at him. Danny sees resentment dulling the shine of his brother’s eyes. It is a look Danny remembers, an ancient memory of a father they once had.

“How?” Liam says, his sentences growing shorter, like their mother’s. Danny knows what’s contained in the how: How could you help, how could you earn some money so I don’t have to do it alone, how can this be all there is?

Danny has the answer. It is on the sign he saw outside the local pub on his way to the library: Quiz Night, Cash Jackpot.

Liam is skeptical and uncomfortable. “You know I have trouble with those sorts of things, Danny.” But Danny says, “Try—once.” And once is all it takes.

“What British city was formerly known as Duroliponte?” the quizmaster calls out as heads bow to sip their pints and confer around the tables of the Rose and Crown. The punters this evening don’t know yet that they have no chance at winning with the twins in the room.

Liam leans over to Danny, who covers his mouth with one hand and says as quietly as he can, “Cam—bridge,” in his halting way.

“What is the symbol for tin on the periodic table?” comes the next question.

“S—n,” says Danny, with a long pause between the letters.

“Who was the only prime minister to ever be assassinated?”

“Spen—cer—Per—ce—val,” says Danny, focusing hard on getting out all the syllables and getting his breath so he could be understood above the din of the pub, because he knows that Liam’s never heard of Spencer Perceval and it’s a hard one for Danny to articulate.

Danny knows all the answers but can’t write them down fast enough, and Liam can write them down but recognizes few and can’t spell any. But no matter, together they sweep the jackpots at all the pub quizzes in East London.

They win ?25 at the first quiz, ?35 at the next, and they keep going and keep winning. They return home victorious, and Liam puts their winnings in a jar that he keeps on the high shelf of the wardrobe in the room he and Danny still share. Then puts on a dash more Brut, brushes his teeth, smooths his hair, and says, “Are you sure you don’t want to come, mate?”

“Tired—now—see—you—la—ter,” Danny drawls as he watches Liam leave to meet the lads for one more pint before the pubs close.

“Ah, you’re a legend, I’ll be back soon,” Liam says as he leaves, clapping his brother’s bony shoulder with his strong hand.

Part of Danny wants to go with Liam, will always want to go, but after an evening of questions and disbelieving stares and curious glances and unkind murmurs from the drinkers and quiz goers that they beat out, he’s had enough of being on show.

Tonight, after Liam leaves, Danny enters the kitchen on his crutches and sees Doreen at the table, staring at the bottle of Dubonnet the boys bought for her after their victory, not daring to open it. They won a lot, ?72, the most they’d ever won. It was a rolling jackpot that kept growing because no team could crack the questions until Liam and Danny arrived and took it all. Liam also got talking to an electrician at the bar who needed an apprentice, got the number and a sliver of hope that there was more waiting for him, like his mother said there would be.

When Doreen dies not long after this evening, there will be ?1,004 in the jar. By then Liam will have learned that all this time everyone thought he was thick, he really just had a mechanical brain, and he learns from the electrician to read machines and wires and circuits the way he never could read words.