The Reading List(52)
After a moment, Leilah said, ‘Keep reading?’
Aleisha continued, until the sunlight vanished from the room, and Leilah mentioned dinner, vaguely, noncommittally, before deciding instead that it was too late, it was time to go to bed. Aleisha should have fed Leilah. Aidan would be upset that she hadn’t. But for the first time since Leilah’s dark days, weeks and months had begun, she had let her daughter in, even if just for a moment. All thanks to a boy, a tiger, an orang-utan, a zebra and a hyena stuck on a boat.
Leilah kissed Aleisha gently on her face and wandered upstairs without looking back. The book was still open in Aleisha’s hands, but she couldn’t read the words any longer. The plastic cover was hot and soft under her fingertips. She wanted to remember this moment, the warmth of it, and how a terrifyingly unpredictable tiger and a boy could create this magic beyond the pages. She didn’t want to think about whether this moment, this feeling, her own and Leilah’s, would last until the morning. She knew she might never recreate this moment again, but she hoped she could. She believed the book … and the list … they might bring her mother back to her.
She collected the glass of water; Leilah hadn’t even taken a sip.
THE READING LIST
GIGI
2018
GIGI SPOTTED SAMUEL RUNNING up ahead. Her son loved supermarkets. He just ran, and ran, and ran. That’s why she always took him to the Tesco Express now, because there wasn’t so much space, it was harder to lose him.
As Samuel charged into the shop, he ran past a man perusing his shopping list, and an unfortunate gust of wind from the automatic doors, combined with Samuel running at the speed of light, sent the piece of paper flying out of his hands. Samuel, spotting this opportunity to play a new game, followed the piece of paper, dodging through people’s feet, ducking and diving around mini-trolleys and baskets.
Eventually, Gigi caught up with him in the fruit aisle, where she spotted his little fingers reaching for the grapes – his new favourite. A week ago, she’d have had to smash grapes up with a banana or something before he’d touch them.
She knew he’d lost interest in the shopping list, wherever it was. He loved rummaging in the fruit at the moment. He’d pick something up and show her, then name it, confidently. Mostly he was right, ‘nana’ and ‘gwape’, but often he was wrong with the trickier fruit – mango was often ‘apple’, pineapple was ‘bababa’ which was his made-up word for ‘I have not a fricking clue’, and orange was ‘ball’. But she so loved watching him change, watching him turn into a little person.
She tried to get to him before his sticky fingers made contact. As she approached, she noticed his hand wasn’t going for the ‘gwape’ but for a piece of paper tucked under them. The man’s shopping list. He pulled it out and started waving it, triumphant, looking around for applause from his fellow shoppers.
She grabbed it gently so he wouldn’t start wailing about having been ‘fiefted’. ‘Samuel,’ she said calmly. ‘We should return this to the man it belongs to.’
She looked down at the list and frowned. It wasn’t a shopping list after all. It was a book list, a film list, or something like that.
She held Samuel’s hand in one of hers, and wandered towards the front entrance, hoping to find the man again. He was nowhere to be seen. She hurried around the shop once, with no clue what he really looked like.
After a minute or so, Samuel grew restless. ‘Mummy, slow down, slow down!’ Gigi gave in. The best place for this list would be on the community board, which was right next to the spot where the man had been standing, in case he came back to find it. She placed it gently on one of the sticky pads, face up. Maybe he wouldn’t mind that it was gone – she imagined he’d got the list on his phone or something anyway – everyone did these days. She looked at it one last time, trying to work out why someone had been perusing this kind of list in a supermarket.
To Kill a Mockingbird – that was one of those black-and-white films, wasn’t it? Based on a classic book.
The Kite Runner. This was another film that she’d seen with her ex, at the point they’d been close to breaking up. It was really way too much of an emotional film to see with someone you weren’t totally comfortable around any more. She’d tried to hide her ugly crying but had ended up giving herself hiccups – twice as embarrassing.
Pride and Prejudice – also a classic book-turned-film; she’d watched it with her mum because her mum loved Keira Knightley. She called her ‘the English Rose’. She missed her mum, she hadn’t spoken to her in ages – both busy with their lives, living far away. Now, whenever she called, they ran out of things to talk about beyond the usual life updates. Once upon a time, they’d spoken for hours – about everything and anything.
Life of Pi – the one with the special-effects tiger. She’d seen it in the cinema, in 3D. A date, again. A better one, the guy was her guy now. But she couldn’t wait until Samuel was old enough to watch it with her – he loved tigers. He would love that film. And the little boy, Pi, she imagined Samuel might look a bit like him when he grew up.
She didn’t know all the other titles, but she brushed her hand down the list, securing it in place, as Samuel pulled at her free hand. These titles, they pulled her away from the person she was right now, back to a previous Gigi. Those films she’d seen on dates – that was her go-to date night. She hadn’t seen a film in the cinema for ages now. Samuel didn’t have the attention span for it, not just yet.