Happiness

A Novel

Aminatta Forna

• Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9780802165572
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literature General
• Index: Literature

The prize-winning author of The Memory of Love investigates London's hidden nature and marginalized communities in this fascinating novel.

London, 2014. A fox makes its way across Waterloo Bridge. The distraction causes two pedestrians to collide—Jean, an American studying the habits of urban foxes, and Attila, a Ghanaian psychiatrist. Attila has arrived in London with two tasks: to deliver a keynote speech on trauma, and to contact a friend's daughter Ama, his "niece" who hasn't called home in a while. Ama has been swept up in an immigration crackdown, and now her young son Tano is missing.

Jean offers to help Attila by mobilizing her network volunteer fox spotters. Soon, rubbish men, security guards, hotel doormen, traffic wardens—mainly West African immigrants who work the myriad streets of London—come together to help. As the search for Tano continues, a deepening friendship between Attila and Jean unfolds.

Attila's time in London causes him to question his own ideas about trauma, the values of the society he finds himself in, and a personal grief of his own. In this delicate tale of love and loss, of thoughtless cruelty and unexpected community, Aminatta Forna asks us to consider our co-existence with one another and all living creatures, and the true nature of happiness.

Chapter 1

LONDON. SUNDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2014. EVENING

At that time of day Waterloo Bridge is busy with shoppers and weekend workers who make their way on foot across the bridge to Waterloo Station. At that time of year too, dusk comes early, by four in the afternoon. By five it is dark. The fox wended its way through the pedestrians, who for the most part paid it no heed, for they would not so easily be distracted from their fixity of purpose. Through the slanting sleet many people didn’t see the fox, those who did thought it was perhaps a loose dog.

A few people had observed the fox on its journey. Upon the terrace of the National Theatre, a pair of smokers had spotted the fox watching them from behind the corner of a raised concrete flower bed that was filled with dead lavender. The smokers and the fox looked at each other in stillness for several seconds. Then three things happened which caused the fox to bolt. A passing cruiser on the river gave a blast of its horn, which in turn caused one of the smokers to utter a high-pitched ‘Ooh!’ of surprise. This startled the fox which backed off and might have done little more than run down the stairs to the next level had not, third, a plastic bag, dislodged from a tree branch by a sudden gust of wind, borne suddenly down upon the terrace. Moments before all this happened another smoker had emerged from the theatre lobby and now stood with the heavy door propped open upon one shoulder for use as a wind shield while she lit a cigarette. The fox, escaping the threat of the carrier bag, dashed through the open door and into the lobby where it joined the lava flow of departing theatregoers. Down the stairs and through the crowd went the fox, and as it went it brushed against calves and knees, causing people to hop, exclaim and search the floor through the thicket of legs for the cause.

Down on the ground level the fox skittered across the hard floor. A young man selling programmes for the evening show pointed and cried, ‘There!’ in a kind of outrage to a pair of security guards, who, with a jangle of keys, lumbered into life. The fox headed for the glass doors leading to the outside. Onlookers stopped to watch, talk stalled to silence. Between the bank of glass doors and the concrete walls of the building the fox had nowhere to go.

On the other side of the glass a man painted top to toe in silver, carrying a silver cane and wearing a silver bowler hat, and who had spent eight hours standing motionless upon a box in the freezing temperatures of the day, approached the building with no idea of the commotion unfolding beyond. Just as the fox reached the last in the row of doors, the silver man pulled it open. The fox ran out. The security guards skidded to a stop, one nearly fell over, the other uttered an exclamation in Yoruba. Both laughed and adjusted their peaked caps, one clapped his companion upon the shoulder. Some people broke into a scattering of applause and the silver man took a bow.

Outside the smell in the air was of river water and traffic fumes. The fox ran up the stone steps to the bridge where it overtook a man carrying a bicycle. On the bridge the people walked unswervingly, armed with bags, defended by earphones, looking neither right nor left and acknowledging nothing and nobody. Those who did not walk with purpose meandered in pairs, rocks around which the faster walkers flowed. Past a cameraman taking a time-lapse image of the river, the fox, moving at a metronomic trot, wove a line through them all.

A man so tall he appeared to be wading through the crowd was crossing the bridge in the opposite direction to the fox. The man’s name, the name his mother had given him as though she knew to what size her only son would one day grow, was Attila. In his pocket Attila carried a theatre ticket. In addition he held a reservation for one at a restaurant in the Aldwych. He had chosen the restaurant after reading the menu displayed outside the entrance and now his reverie was of boiled beef Tafelspitz and chopped-chicken salad. Attila was newly arrived in the country by no more than a few hours and he relished, for the moment, the feel of wind and sleet on his face. He relished, too, the idea that soon he would sit alone in a dark place, surrounded by strangers, where nobody could find him. He moved slowly in the crowd, letting people pass. In the middle of the bridge, just beyond the cameraman standing with his camera on a tripod, Attila came to a stop and turned to admire the view of the Houses of Parliament.

Somebody ran into him.

The collision left Attila unhurt, a testament to his scale and size. By contrast, the woman who had run into him was thrown to the ground and Attila promptly bent to help her up. He apologised, in sympathy, for obviously this could not be his fault. The woman accepted his hand, stood up and brushed her backside. She wore jeans and a sweater and jacket, all in black. Attila retrieved a black day pack from the ground and held it out to her, but she left him holding on to it for some moments while she retied her hair into its ponytail. As he waited, Attila noticed two things about the woman, first that her hair was a rather remarkable pale silver and hung to the middle of her back, or would have done were she not already in the act of pushing it up inside a woollen hat, secondly that she was tall for a woman, she nearly reached his chin. The woman put her hand out so Attila might pass her bag, swung it onto her shoulder and said: ‘I’m so sorry about that. Do excuse me,’ in a way that suggested no particular sorrow at all. Attila nodded. A moment later he watched her walk away, her long strides. He could still feel the force of their collision, the imprint of her body on his.

Later in the theatre Attila drank a gin and tonic and forgot about the woman on the bridge. The show was a comedy and he laughed explosively at all the jokes until he had to wipe away the tears that rolled down his face. At the interval he bought himself a vanilla ice cream. He came to London infrequently but regularly enough to have formed certain habits. Late morning Attila had checked into his preferred hotel, the early part of the evening he had spent walking and buying theatre tickets. Now from the terrace he searched the skyline for changes and identified two new skyscrapers to the right of St Paul’s Cathedral, one with a single sloped side, the other a concave structure – they had been built since the time of his last visit to the city two years ago. In the middle of Waterloo Bridge stood an engraved plaque of the skyline and Attila made a mental note to check it for the names of the new buildings. As he finished his ice cream the bell sounded and he turned with fresh anticipation to take his seat in the auditorium.

On his way back across the bridge Attila was driven by hunger and failed to check the plaque. A few minutes later he was being shown to his seat by the maître d’ of his chosen restaurant. As he followed, Attila glanced covertly at the plates of the other diners. He liked and at times even asked to be seated near the kitchen door, a request so unusual it could always be accommodated. This way he had sight of the plates of food held aloft by the waiters as they emerged through the double doors. In places where he was known the waiters would sometimes pass by his table, dipping each dish to waft it in front of his nose. ‘Tagliolini ai funghi porcini freschi, signor.’ ‘Steamed whole tilapia, Dr Asare.’ ‘Today’s prime aged porterhouse steak, sir.’

Despite the late hour the restaurant was full. Booths lined the walls and in the centre, like water lilies, an array of small and large round tables covered in white tablecloths. Attila was shown to a corner booth, the maître d’ pulled the table out a good way to allow him to slide onto the banquette. He said good evening to the people at the next table and picked up the menu to remind himself of the good things on offer. He ordered calves’ liver and bacon because both of these were hard to come by where he lived, and the potted brown shrimps because these too were a rare treat. A carafe of Rioja completed his choices, and as he waited for his meal to arrive he sipped wine and looked around at the other clientele. With the exception of a couple seated at one of the water lilies, everyone in the restaurant was white. Attila watched the single black couple for a while: they were young and close in conversation. The woman wore a fuchsia dress, the man was in a suit. An anniversary, thought Attila, and looked away. Some minutes later, as Attila was eating brown shrimp, the man walked past Attila’s table and a few minutes later, on his way back from the Gents, he passed by again. This time Attila happened to look up and catch his eye. The man nodded, a single dip of the chin. Attila nodded back and returned to his shrimp. The nod was something that was exchanged only in certain places. Moscow, for example. Perth. Prague. São Paulo, no. Havana, no. Mumbai, yes. Rome, less and less often. All of Poland. Much of England beyond the M25. Belfast, yes. In London more rarely, although a nod might be exchanged in certain kinds of establishment. In this restaurant Attila drew no stares, but it was still a place the nod might occur.

Caramel and chocolate pudding, the chocolate sponge dusted with icing sugar. Attila struck the sponge casing with the back of his spoon and hot caramel poured from within.

He might have been tired but he was not. There was no question of jet lag for there was no time difference between Accra and London, but he had flown overnight. On the plane he had used the time to review the papers for the conference and details of his keynote speech, which though he had delivered it often in the past few years, nevertheless required updating. Attila worked while the other passengers slept or watched movies, the same one it seemed, for on multiple small screens Attila could see the same handsome actor grapple with the same armed men, race desperately through the same crowds and streets, to defuse the same terrorists’ bomb. Tirelessly, over and over. Attila possessed the gift of being able to choose when and whether to sleep, one that had served him well on various tours of duty when sleep was impossible, when the environment was too hostile or the victims too many. Out in the field he would forfeit sleep to work long days, interviewing, assessing, collecting data, and then sleep for a fourteen-hour stretch back at the hotel. He never waited to return to base to draft his report but began it then and there, as soon as he woke and while the thoughts were fresh.

Following dinner, when it was by then after midnight, Attila walked briskly back in the direction of the bridge. Exercise and a little air were the things he needed now. Taxis passed him without slowing. The brutal concrete theatre buildings and galleries on the opposite bank were lit blue and red. The plaque was mounted on the balustrade at the apex of the bridge and faced east towards the river estuary, the engraving was worn, the lettering faded and it had been defaced by a scrawl of graffiti. But the moon was good that night and Attila bent and traced the skyline with his forefinger, the two new buildings though had not yet been added. He turned to walk back the way he had come. Tonight he would sleep well, in his mind he was already planning the breakfast he would order in the hotel dining room.

When he was away, in the places where he worked, places lost in the moral darkness, London seemed unreal and distant. Even street lighting struck him as an improbable luxury, lights left burning so the population of a city could walk home without fear of injury or crime. When he was in London, going to see plays and eating in fine restaurants, the city itself began to feel like a stage set, whose denizens enacted their lives against its magnificent backdrop. A theatre of delights, where nothing surely could go wrong, and if it did, all would be put right by the end of the third act. He stepped up his pace and clapped his hands as if in anticipation of what lay ahead, but in reality against the cold.

On the empty bridge an animal was trotting towards him, a shifting shape that slid in and out of the light and dark on the bridge. At first Attila thought it was a cat and then a dog, until finally the moving shape resolved into the form of a fox. The fox passed Attila by, carving a shallow arc around him, as if merely observing the rules of personal space. Attila walked on and then stopped and turned round. At the same time the fox, too, stopped and glanced back over its shoulder and seemed to regard him. Attila pushed his hands into the pockets of his coat. The fox held his gaze, unblinking, for a long moment, then turned and trotted on.

Morning. Attila faced the window of his hotel room, which offered a view of an office building, windows veiled in pale grey voile through which he glimpsed the occasional ghostly figure. In his hand he held the telephone receiver. Old friends had heard nothing from their daughter whose habit it was to call every Sunday upon their return from church. Attila, who had known the girl from babyhood and thought of her as a niece, had taken it upon himself to look her up. Now his attention was caught by a movement high above him. A falling feather swung slowly through the air, drifting past the floors of the office block and his hotel window. A bright green feather. Attila watched it, lost sight of it and found it again, followed it as it became caught up in the traffic below, buoyed upwards on the rush of air of a passing taxi to recommence its rocking descent until it was tossed again. Up, up, down, down. He became aware of the receiver in his hand ringing distantly and he replaced it on the cradle. When he looked back to see what had become of the green feather, he could no longer find it.

Twenty minutes later Attila stepped out of the hotel into the freezing day. The doorman, who knew him from previous trips, offered to call him a taxi. Attila asked where he might buy some gloves. The doorman gave him directions and Attila moved away, shoving his hands deep into his pockets. Already the tips of his ears sang. He was twenty yards away when the doorman called out his name and hastened after him, pulling off his gloves. He thrust them at Attila, who would have refused.

‘They won’t fit me,’ he said.

‘They will fit you,’ said the doorman.

And they did. Just. Attila looked at the doorman and saw that most of his clothes seemed outsize: his greatcoat drifted past the back of his knees, his shoes were huge, his feet could not possibly have filled them. He looked like a child whose mother had been persuaded by an outfitter to buy his school uniform ‘with room to grow’.

‘What will you do?’ asked Attila.

‘I will stand inside,’ replied the man, as if this were obvious.

Attila thanked the doorman but the man shook his head. ‘After all,’ he said. ‘What is a pair of gloves between countrymen?’

Somewhere close to the Elephant and Castle, a stone’s throw from the intersection known as the Bricklayers’ Arms, at ten o’clock that same Monday morning, a young man pushed a very old man in a wheelchair across a rectangle of uneven tarmac. The chair rocked on the rutted surface; once a wheel caught where the tarmac was torn and briefly juddered to a halt. When they reached the far side of the space the young man performed a neat three-point turn with the chair and backed it up against the wall. Leaving the old man parked thus, he strode away. A few minutes later and the young man returned handling another wheelchair containing another elderly person, a woman, tiny, crabbed and swaddled in wool: cardigans, scarves, blankets. He performed the same sequence of manoeuvres with the chair and again walked away leaving the two old persons now parked side by side. Neither spoke, the old man lifted his face to the sun.

The young man departed and returned, departed and returned. Six times more.

By 10.30, eight old folk were parked against the brickwork. They sat with their backs to the sun-warmed wall, eyes closed as if with the reverence of prayer, faces turned to the sun, they might have been believers awaiting the appearance of their god. The young man stood to one side leaning with his palms against the wall. He felt the sun on his face, but he didn’t close his eyes, instead he gazed at the red-and-yellow-brick building, the triple-glazed windows filmed with muck from the flyover less than two hundred feet away. A plane flew overhead and the sound of its engines carried through the air. Once the plane had passed other sounds rose up: cars on the flyover, the brief blast of a stereo, the pock pock pock of an unseen person bouncing a ball as they walked by, the claws of a squirrel struggling to maintain its grip on the trunk of a tree, the flap of a pigeon overhead. A dog barked thrice. The young man looked at the old folk who were oblivious to everything but the steel-sharp air and the rays of the sun.

A shriek, high-pitched and throaty, some combination of outrage and urgency. A green bird had come to sit on a branch just above the squirrel who climbed onwards and upwards. The bird tilted its head and called again, and with each cry the young man felt a tightening in his chest, as though he had just heard the sound of a familiar and much-loved voice speaking to him after a very long time. He watched the bird as it began to clean the underside of one iridescent wing with a bright red beak. The old people watched the bird too, with unblinking eyes, as though they had somehow been expecting this. The next moment the bird flew away. A few of those in the car park of the Three Valleys Rest Home watched it go, others closed their eyes and others still turned their faces back to the sun.

Half a mile south-east of the Bricklayers’ Arms Jean, an American and resident of the city for a year, sat on the roof of her apartment and raised her binoculars to watch a fox as it danced along the boundary wall of the property where she lived. Light bright, she thought, how she would have described its coat, a true russet. The fox was small, a vixen of less than three years. This was the sixth, maybe seventh time Jean had seen her. Jean put down the binoculars and picked a camera up from the table and took a series of shots. The vixen stopped, raised her head and sniffed, as though she discerned some shift in the molecules of the air; the next moment she slipped sideways from the wall into the overgrown buddleia and was lost from view. At the edge of the viewfinder Jean’s eye caught a movement. A green parakeet had come to rest on the branch of a dead tree and began to investigate the toes of one foot. Jean put the camera down, sipped her coffee and recorded the sighting of the fox in a spiral-bound notebook. She turned back the pages and totalled the number of sightings of the light bright vixen. Seven since Christmas. The first time Jean had seen the fox from the kitchen window had been one cold November morning. A skinny scrap of life, all legs with a coat that didn’t look nearly thick enough to carry her through the winter.

Jean pulled her shawl around her shoulders, picked up a tin plate from the table and rose. The roof garden was the first thing Jean had set her mind to when she moved into this apartment. The apartment had seemed an improbable choice and the landlord, who owned the van rental business with offices on the ground floor, did not disguise his surprise at her interest. As soon as Jean realised the ladder and skylight led to a large flat roof, she’d made up her mind. The roof looked out onto the rows of white vans in the parking lot and, only a short distance away, the massive triple towers of a disused gasworks.

The garden had cost her three weeks’ hard labour, long hours to get the plants bedded down in time for spring. She’d measured and partitioned off part of the roof with trellises, slotted together wooden planks to make raised beds into which she laid the pipes for a simple irrigation system before hoisting bags of top soil and compost one by one through the skylight and up onto the roof with a rope and pulley. In the place where the sun reached farthest into the day, she planted raspberry canes, blackcurrants and greengages. She trained vines along the trellises and runner beans up them. She hung bags of soil and seed potatoes from the walls. In the corners she placed pots for tomatoes. In the remainder of the raised beds she planted kale, onions, strawberries, carrots, broccoli, not in architectural rows, but intercropped without apparent pattern, in a way that could be mistaken for haphazard.

Beyond...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Praise for Happiness
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Dedication
• The Last Wolf
• Chapter 1
• Chapter 2
• Chapter 3
• Chapter 4
• Chapter 5
• Chapter 6
• Chapter 7
• Chapter 8
• Chapter 9
• Chapter 10
• Chapter 11
• Chapter 12
• Chapter 13
• Chapter 14
• Chapter 15
• Chapter 16
• Chapter 17
• Chapter 18
• Chapter 19
• Chapter 20
• Chapter 21
• Chapter 22
• Chapter 23
• Chapter 24
• Acknowledgements
• A Note on the Author
• About this Guide
• Questions for Discussion
• Suggestions for Further Reading
• Back Cover