Deadland by William Shaw

Author:William Shaw [Shaw, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Quercus
Published: 2019-05-01T16:00:00+00:00

THIRTY-TWO

Cupidi sat watching the late news, got up, peered through the window, sat down again, tried to listen to a discussion about gross domestic product, gave up, and went upstairs to knock on her daughter’s door.

Her daughter was in bed, playing on her phone. Cupidi sat down on the bed and ran her hand through her daughter’s short hair as she focused on the game. Eventually Zoë gave up, put the device down.

‘What did you do today?’

Zoë shrugged. ‘Not much.’

‘It’s spring. Isn’t this when you get all excited about the new birds coming over?’

‘Kind of.’

Cupidi looked at her daughter, puzzled. There was so much she didn’t understand about the girl. ‘Wasn’t it this time last year you were all giddy about the poopoo?’

‘Hoopoe,’ huffed Zoë, pulling her mother’s hand off her head.

‘I knew that.’

‘I don’t feel like it, that’s all.’

Every time she thought she had begun to understand her own daughter, Zoë seemed to elude her. Birds had been the one thing in her life that seemed to make her daughter genuinely happy.

Cupidi shuffled closer to her daughter; as she leaned against her arm, Zoë flinched.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing.’

Cupidi reached out to touch her. Her daughter pulled back.

‘Have you hurt your arm?’

‘No.’

She put her hand on the sleeve of her daughter’s shirt. Zoë pulled away. ‘Let me see.’

‘You’ll go mad,’ Zoë said.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing’s wrong, Mum. Nothing at all.’ Angrily she pulled her shirt over her head. ‘That’s all.’

Cupidi stared at the fresh tattoo on her daughter’s arm, red skin raised around dark blue ink.

‘You’re seventeen. That’s not legal.’

‘I was wondering how you’d react,’ said Zoë. ‘Typically, you’re seeing this as a law-and-order issue first of all.’

That’s why she had been wearing a jacket indoors last night. ‘Who did this?’

Zoë pulled her shirt back down. ‘Why would I tell you? You’d only go and arrest him.’

‘I would. You’re right. There are perfectly rational reasons why you’re not allowed to tattoo seventeen-year-olds. Is it infected?’

‘No. It’s fine. Just a bit sore.’

She had never imagined it, her daughter wanting a tattoo. ‘Oh, Zoë. I wish . . . I wish . . . you’d talked to me about it.’

‘You’d have only tried to stop me.’

‘Of course I would.’ How much other stuff was Zoë doing these days that she didn’t want to talk to her mother about because she knew her mother wouldn’t approve? ‘What if . . . when you’re older . . .’

‘What if I change my mind?’

Stupid question, Cupidi chided herself, feeling an unexpected kind of grief. Her daughter’s perfect body, that she had given birth to, raised, fed, kept warm, tucked in at night, was no longer hers at all. Her daughter had claimed ownership of it.

‘What is it, anyway?’

A circle with arrows through the middle.

‘Just a tattoo, that’s all. You can’t do anything about it.’

‘I know I can’t.’ Cupidi paused, closed her eyes, opened them again. ‘I was just wondering if I should get one too.’

Zoë laughed. ‘That’s ridiculous.’

‘Is it?’ She pulled up the sleeve of her T-shirt. ‘I think it could look pretty good.

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