Judith Wants To Be Your Friend

by Annie Weir

  Mary Morris and Lucy the personnel manager are waiting for me at the top of the stairs.

  ‘Good morning, Judith,’ says Mary Morris, ‘please come straight through to my office.’

  Bloody hell! When did it become a disciplinary matter getting pissed the night before work?

  ‘I expect you saw the police car outside,’ she goes on.

  Bloody hell! When did it become a crime to get pissed the night before work? I remember the car crash, but still can’t make the connection.

  ‘No, I didn’t actually,’ I reply, although I don’t really think anyone is expecting me to.

  We go into her office and there is PC Plod who took our fingerprints.

  ‘You remember PC Stone?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘He took your fingerprints.’

  ‘Yes, I remember.’ I wish she would offer me a seat. I think I am going to faint with this hangover. I start to sway and grab the back of a chair to steady myself.

  ‘You have obviously realised what we are going to say, Judith,’ says Mary Morris.

  Where does she get that idea from? ‘No,’ I say, ‘I don’t. It’s just that I have a very bad headache and think I am going to faint.’ At last someone pushes a chair behind me and I fall back into it.

  ‘I am sorry that you have a headache, Judith,’ Mary Morris goes on as Lucy hands me a plastic cup of cold water, ‘but this won’t wait. I’ll come straight to the point. Your fingerprints were found on the Sellotape sticking the notes under Maureen’s desk.’

  I sip the water gratefully, and after a few seconds I realise what she has just said.

  ‘What?’ I whisper, ‘This is impossible.’

  ‘Not impossible, I’m afraid Ms. Dillon. They were there as clear as anything. There is no mistake; no mistake at all.’

  Mary Morris gives Plod a look that says that she wishes to deal with this herself and he lowers his eyes. ‘Maureen made an allegation that you, in her words, were setting her up for some reason. I didn’t believe it at first but now,’ she hesitates choosing her words carefully, ‘now, I wonder whether you can convince me otherwise?’

  She has obviously instructed everyone to keep quiet and that is exactly what they do. The four of us sit there in silence as the clock on the wall becomes first audible, then loud, then like a torture technique. I can see no way out at all. Somewhere through the ticking and pounding and swaying nausea I decide that my best chance is to get Maureen right off the hook, not through any conscience attack but because those that own up get lesser prison sentences, at least on television programmes they do.

  ‘When I say impossible,’ I say, ‘I mean that it seems impossible that I should make such a basic error.’

  ‘So you admit it?’

  ‘When I did it, no one had mentioned refurbishment. I had intended for the notes to fall down in time then everyone would see that there was not, in fact, any money missing at all. It seems impossible that I didn’t realise what would happen that night and simply move the notes to the safe to be found by someone else.’

  They don’t know what to make of this, of course. They weren’t expecting me to say that.

  ‘Why did you do it at all?’ asks Mary Morris.

  ‘Because she was getting on my nerves, because she was always so perfect, because she was my supervisor, because I am cleverer than she is, because she wanted me to hang on every word she said, because I was expected to be in her loyal gang, because, because, because. I don’t know. I wish I hadn’t started it.’ I look up at PC Plod. ‘Are you going to arrest me now?’

  ‘That is up to Mrs. Morris.’

  ‘I would prefer to accept your immediate resignation,’ she said, ‘on the understanding that nobody here will give you a reference when you apply for other jobs. I think it unlikely that you will be offered a job in Carlisle when news of this gets out.’

  Here we go again. No charges pressed, although they could be this time. No chance of another job. No friends left who will speak to me. It would be out of the question for Ken to have anything to do with me even if he wanted to after this, and after last night. I sit in Mary Morris’s office staring out of the window to the piece of grey sky above the bare tree, contemplating nothing at all. Void. Blank. No plans. Nowhere to go. No one to see. Nothing to do. No cash to speak of. It would probably be easier to get arrested and go to prison but knowing my luck, I wouldn’t get locked up. I’d just get a fine and a police record and still be in the same situation. The clock starts to get loud again. They continue to sit in silence.

  ‘Please can I have another glass of water, and a piece of paper and I’ll write out my resignation now.’

  Lucy the personnel manager jumps up to get me a drink. I take two more aspirin before picking up a pen and starting to write.

  ‘Give Lucy your locker key and she will pack up anything you have to take with you,’ orders Mary Morris and I do as I am told. By the time I have completed the short note of resignation she returns with a carrier bag with my comfortable shoes and the book I still haven’t finished reading.

  Saturday 6th March 2010

  I wake up at six-thirty as usual and instantly remember that I have nowhere to go. I stay in bed and try to go back to sleep but within an hour the traffic has started to build up, the sun shines through my flimsy curtains and the heating switches itself off. I get up and make a cup of coffee then my phone rings. It won’t be Ken or Joanna or Gaynor so I am at a loss to know who else it can be. It’s Mill View. I don’t answer it so Tina leaves a voice message in her caring but urgent voice telling me that my mother has taken a turn for the worst in the night and suggesting I come to visit as soon as possible. I know she means now. Bus or train? That is the most challenging decision I will have to make today. I consult the bus timetable and the train timetable and decide on the train. It’s still only eight o’clock so I slowly get showered and dressed and make my way down to the station. At least I don’t feel sick and headachy today.

  At Hexham Station I expect to feel something horrible or nostalgic as I walk along the platform, but I feel absolutely nothing. Nothing except cold and miserable, that is. I can’t afford a taxi to Mill View as I have no idea where my next pay cheque is going to come from. I catch the bus that will take me to within about half a mile of it and look out at the roads I used to call home. Maybe I should have contacted Fiona. She might have picked me up. She might not have, as well. Better to stay independent.

  Tina comes to let me in to the fortress. She ushers me through to her office and shuts the door. She dispenses with formalities.

  ‘Judith, thanks for coming over so quickly. Your mother is really very unwell. She had a stroke during the night so there was a delay in getting medical help.’

  ‘Can I see her?’

  ‘Yes, of course, but I wanted to prepare you first. She has lost all feeling down one side and can’t talk.’

  ‘She hasn’t been making any sense for ages. It’s OK. I’ll just sit with her.’

  ‘Fiona has been here but she’s gone to pick up Rosie. They’ll be back soon.’

  ‘Are you preparing me for that as well?’

  ‘No, of course not. That’s not my place, to comment on your family relationships.’

  ‘No, I suppose not.’ I sit quietly for a few moments. ‘Is there anything to do? To be done, I mean? What is the prognosis?’

  ‘It’s not good. There’s nothing we can do to cure her. We’re simply making her as comfortable as possible.’

  ‘How long?’ I bet everyone asks that. She’ll probably say she has no way of telling.

  ‘She’s unlikely to live beyond the weekend.’

  ‘The weekend! I thought you were going to say… well, never mind, it doesn’t matter. Can I go and see her now.’

  My mother is in the room that I a
rranged for her, and let’s be honest, forced her to take. She looks pale and thin and very fragile. I sit down next to her and hold her hand. She sort of acknowledges it with a flicker of her eyes so I squeeze it gently.

  ‘Hello Mum,’ I say, then put my head down to it and to my surprise the tears start to flow. She seems to make a huge effort to squeeze my hand back and when I look up I see tears making shiny lines down her face too and her mouth is slightly contorted. ‘Oh, Mum.’ I try to hold back the sobs. If she knows what’s going on this won’t be helping her. If she knows who I am it will probably upset her and if she doesn’t it will confuse her even more.

  She makes a sound that sounds like ‘Jj jj’. She’s trying to say my name.

  ‘Mum,’ I wail. And this is when Fiona and Rosie arrive. I didn’t see or hear them come in but when I finally put my head up and rummage for a tissue in my bag, Rosie puts her arms around me.

  ‘Auntie Ju, you’re here. Thank God. How did you know?’

  ‘Tina called,’ I sniff and then blow my nose. I see Fiona reach into her bag but before she can do anything, I take a clean tissue and wipe the tears from our mum’s cheeks. ‘Sorry Mum,’ I say, ‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’

  ‘Jj jj,’ she says again.

  ‘She knows you’re here, Ju,’ says Fiona. ‘She’s really pleased you’re here.’

  How can Fiona be so nice? Are we really born of the same parents?

  ‘Have you just got here? Shall I go and make us all a coffee?’

  I nod and look at her. She blinks away tears and goes off to the kitchen. She knows where everything is. She probably comes here every day. Rosie sits next to me and puts her head on my shoulder and takes her granny’s other hand. She is so still that I don’t know which side she can’t move. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters except that soon it will all be over. How did I let it come to this? Everything I touch turns out wrong. All the wasted time; and now I can’t even have ‘the’ conversation, the one that would mend it all before it’s too late. It’s already too late; I know that. I start thinking of everything I don’t know. I don’t know much about my dad. I know he died, of course, but I was too young to know what drove him as a person. Was he even the driving force behind my parents’ business or was it Mum? Does she care that it got bought out by a bigger company after she sold it, and that they closed it down in Hexham? Did she miss my dad, or was she happier without him all those years. Why don’t I know anything? Why did she always favour Fiona? What did I do that was so bad even as a young child? Does Fiona know any of this? If she does, how come she knows and I don’t?

  She comes back with the coffees and I force myself away from self-pity and pay attention to my mother. One of the staff comes in and presses a button that silently summons Tina. Tina puts a finger to my mother’s neck and holds it there for about ten seconds.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she says to us all, ‘I’m sorry but she’s passed away.’

  I expect Fiona to have hysterics and say it isn’t fair that our mother should die while she is making coffee for me; for me who is never here and never helps with any of it. Instead she says to Rosie and me, ‘I’m glad you two were here holding her hands,’ and to my amazement she comes over and hugs us both as we all cry for someone we will never see again and never speak to again. The staff leave us alone. They take away the coffees and re-boil the kettle for when we are ready then they gently cover her face and lead us to Tina’s office. All in a day’s work for her, I think uncharitably, but allow myself to be consoled and talked to, and to have a part in arrangements for the funeral and the removal of belongings.

  ‘Will you come and stay with us, Ju?’ Fiona asks.

  ‘Yes please,’ I reply.

  Monday 15th March 2010

  I don’t know where the last ten days have gone. We’ve been busy sorting out Mum’s stuff from Mill View and from her house that Fiona and Rosie still call home. Rosie went back to Leeds during the week but came back again on Friday. Fiona and I have got along pretty well without her and Fiona has been surprisingly calm and organised. I expected her to fall apart, still do at some point, but she’s been brilliant; much better than me. We have had a recurring conversation that goes:

  She says, ‘Don’t you need to get back for work?’

  And I say, ‘No.’

  Then she looks at me enquiringly and I carry on with what I am doing. I suppose I’ll have to tell her sometime, but not yet. We’ve driven to the tip and back more times than I can remember and taken bags of clothes to the charity shops in the town. By Friday we had started to make an impression and the house was looking emptier. Fi starts to ask me what I particularly want for myself. There are quite a few things, actually, but I have nowhere to put anything. My rent in Carlisle is paid up to the end of April and I have no idea at all where I will go then. I can’t transport the big pictures I really like, or the oak cabinet that has the glasses in it. I would like at least one of the old bedspreads we had as children. We haven’t sorted out the books yet; there were loads that I’d intended to read as we were growing up but teenage life then business life got in the way. I know we are supposed to be throwing things out but there is suddenly so much I want to keep.

  ‘There are loads of things,’ I tell her, ‘like the pictures in the hall and some of her crystal glasses. I have nowhere to put anything, though. My place is so small.’

  ‘I’ll keep it all for you until you’re ready.’

  ‘Are you planning to stay here? In this house?’ I try not to sound as though I am making a judgement about this.

  ‘No, of course not. You were right all the time. It’s way too big for me on my own. Rosie’s at uni most of the time, you’ll never come back to Hexham to live and now Mum’s gone.’ She just sort of leaves it there. She really is doing very well. When is she going to break down and break this spell that seems to be enabling us to get through this with the minimum of pain?

  Rosie comes in wearing black trousers and a green jumper. She asks whether we are ready to go.

  ‘I don’t think I’ll ever be ready,’ says Fiona, ‘but the hearse will be here in a minute. Come on, Ju.’

  Rosie keeps watch out of the window while we go to find coats and tissues and put on our shoes, and when she sees the cars coming up the road she links her arms with both of us and leads us from the house where we grew up.

  The funeral at the crematorium is quite short and not overly religious. The bells in the nearby church tower chime twelve as we troop in which adds a nice touch. The vicar came round last week and told us that he knew Mum from Mill View. I nearly said, ‘Well in that case you don’t know her at all,’ but who am I to talk? He told us what he planned to say, and Fiona added a couple of things. I am amazed at how many people there are at the service. I recognise a few of them from Mill View; staff and residents. There are some from the street where she lived for almost the whole of her adult life. There are some from the bridge club; surely she didn’t still play bridge? I realise that all these people knew my mother so much better than I did. They all know Fiona and Rosie and a few ask how I am and what I’ve been doing these last few years. Maybe people round here have short memories after all. The vicar announces that everyone is welcome at the George Hotel for drinks and food and again, quite a few come back. The hotel has seen to all the catering. Most people don’t stay long, and they certainly don’t talk to me for long because I don’t answer any of their questions. I suspect that Fiona has asked people to ask me what I am doing now as I still haven’t told her anything.

  I remember that it is Monday afternoon, and normally I would be looking forward to going to Spanish class. I wonder what everyone is saying about me and how much Joanna would have told them about that night. Everyone I know will know about the money I hid in the cash office by now as well. I expect that Maureen has been reinstated in her rightful place. I shudder at the thought and Rosie
squeezes my arm. I am shocked that I have already stopped thinking about my mother and am back being preoccupied with my own life. Oh well, life goes on, as they say. I suppose I will tell Fiona and Rosie all about it tonight or tomorrow.

  ‘How long are you staying, Rosie?’ I ask.

  ‘I’ll go back later,’ she says, ‘but I’ll be back every weekend for as long as Mum wants me to. How long are you staying?’

  ‘I don’t know. I suppose I’ll have to go soon. I just don’t know.’

  ‘What about work?’

  ‘If you stay tonight, I’ll tell you and your mum together.’

  She hesitates, and then nods. ‘You must promise, though.’

  I’ll have to do it now I’ve said I will. ‘I promise.’

  Rosie seems to have it in her head that this is our last opportunity to talk together as a family, and as soon as we get home she says that she is going to draw up an agenda. She tells Fiona and me to go and put our feet up and that she will prepare dinner while we have a rest. After about an hour in the kitchen by herself she comes through to the lounge.

  ‘I’ve done all the prep,’ she says, ‘so let me know about half an hour before you want to eat and I’ll cook it.’

  I look at my watch. It’s nearly six.

  ‘Any time for me,’ I say, ‘I’m not fussy.’

  ‘Anybody want a drink?’

  I would love a drink but the memories of that night are still haunting me. ‘I’ll wait until we’re eating,’ I say. ‘It’s not good to drink on an empty stomach.’

  ‘Maybe not, but I’m a student and six o’clock is wine o’clock where I live now.’

  ‘You carry on. Don’t mind me.’