Wallpaper

When I think of my mother, I think of her laugh.

And then I think of how uncomfortable it always made me feel. Even as a child, it grated — it was just wrong, out of place.

I suspect The Laugh became a kind of security blanket. She would laugh first, before anyone could laugh at her. Or perhaps she thought that if she followed everything she said with a laugh, people wouldn’t notice the real her.

The real her, as far as I can tell, was easily used and discarded. Easy to break, easy to ignore.

Some of that was done to her — by my father, and even more so by her second husband. But much of it she did to herself.

Like begets like, so there are many pieces of my mother that are simply pieces of her mother, rearranged. Both were child brides; neither ever really grew up. And I don’t say this as an indictment. It would be unfair to expect growth from someone who had barely spent any time in the real world before becoming a mother herself.

There were differences between them, of course.

My mother was the quiet, downtrodden dormouse to my grandmother’s grandiose ringmaster. I still have vivid memories of the forced etiquette lessons — the fine china, the silver cutlery, my grandmother presiding like a pageant judge. The fact was, we were poor. Far too poor for restaurants with real fish knives or salad forks.

But there was my mother, every time, perched beside her.

“This is amazing, Mum — you must have worked so hard.”
“Oh, it was nothing. But I was up extra early,” Nan would chortle.
Unsure what to say, Mum would turn to me. “Pass the salt, love — hahaha.”

My grandfather had no time for it. Sometimes he’d throw in a dry quip. And then, there it would be again, sawing through my on edge teeth.

I grew to hate The Laugh.

It followed her everywhere and covered her discomfort like a cough. It filled the air when silence might have forced her to name something real. It grew even more insidious when she brought the violent drunk into our lives — the one who taught all of us how to shrink and anticipate, just to feel safe.

We learned to hold our breath when his key turned in the door. Which version of him would walk through it?

“Where’d you get that bruise, Mum?”
“Oh, I was so silly — the table with the broken leg fell on me again, hahaha.”

But the bruises never matched the table.

Years later, I confronted her about what he’d done to the dog.

“Oh yes, it was a bit tender for a while, but it’s all okay now — hahaha!”
“Abuse isn’t funny, Mum.”
“I know, I just—”

Her voice trailed off. This time The Laugh couldn’t carry her away from the truth.

And so, ever the dutiful daughter, I’d step in. I’d carry the weight she refused to. Or couldn’t, or didn’t know how to.

It’s not that she was powerless. It’s that she stopped looking for power. And in doing so, she handed the rest of us over to his rage. But I no longer believe the trauma is excuse enough. Not for the violence she allowed. Not for what she let the family live through, just because she didn’t have it in her to push for change.

This was a devil she knew. He paid the bills. He kept his alcoholism in check just enough to pass under the radar. And every time, there was my mother: blaming his work, blaming herself.

Always ready with the excuses. Always ready with The Laugh.

There were so many weekends where we were going to leave after he’d strewn her clothes across the lawn again. Her face unreadable, closed, as she stooped to gather them. Her back rigid, her arms quick — fighting with him not over the abuse, but over what the neighbours might think.

I don’t know how many times I packed. I don’t know how many times I heard the same speech after it was patched up.

“Oh, you know me, I just overreacted. It was silly really — hahaha.”

Sometimes, when she felt really awkward, The Laugh would go on far too long. It made her sound like a banshee who’d forgotten she should be wailing.

There were tender moments.

But every one of them involved care, and care only arrived when I was sick. She could be relentlessly uninterested in me until then. Suddenly there would be marmite soldiers with the crust cut off. A bell next to my bed. Everything arranged within reach. Her voice gone soft and warm. I grew to distrust even that. The care was another performance.

I’ve come to realise: The Laugh was wallpaper.

Each one a fresh sheet, pasted over the last — covering and compounding her disappointment, her despair, her unspent rage. She used it to smooth over everything that should have been faced. And it didn’t just swallow her pain. It swallowed mine too.

Sometimes I pity her. Other times I judge her, because I don’t think she ever realised how easy The Laugh made it for people to not take her seriously.

And then I remember — that was always its purpose.