by Andrea Darby
I’m startled by the phone. I’m in a light, busy-headed sleep. What’s happened? Dad? Mum? Eleanor? I come to my senses – the soft mattress and strong smell of laundry liquid reminding me I’m at Mum’s, all my loved ones are here; safe.
Fragmented memories of meeting Ashley float back as I grab my mobile from the bedside table. Yes, it had happened. I flick on the porcelain lamp, screwing my eyes shut at the shock of the bulb.
‘Hi.’ It comes out as a whisper. I haven’t noticed the number.
‘Ask me what I’m doing.’ It takes several seconds to realise it’s Imogen.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m bloody packing.’
‘Are you going on holiday? It’s a bit late.’ I’m still dazed, mouth dry.
‘No, I’m leaving Ben, taking the girls with me, that’s what I’m doing.’ Her voice has so many inflections, in odd places. Had she been drinking? Crying?
‘Hang on. Why? What’s happened?’ I pull myself upright, tilting the plump Oxford pillow behind me and noticing the dark shadows at the edges of things in the room.
‘Because I can’t give him sex so he’s looked elsewhere.’
‘What. He’s had an affair?’
‘Well, who knows … no … bloody porn sites. Disgusting stuff.’
‘That’s not so bad is it, Imogen? I think all men do it.’ I’m relieved it’s not something worse.
‘Totally disgusting,’ she slurs.
‘Have you been drinking?’
‘Yes, lots. Totally rat-arsed.’ This was the flip side to Imogen. No one could be as bubbly and upbeat as her without downers. Even the best bakers occasionally pulled a flat cake out the oven. Her lows were rare, but could be quite dramatic if fuelled by alcohol.
‘Where’s Ben. And the girls?’
‘The girls are asleep. He’s in Caen, staying overnight. With work – or so he says. Probably banging a prostitute, or one of his glam colleagues.’ I gasp inwardly, shocked to hear her talk like this. ‘Caught him on the laptop.’
‘Oh … well—’
‘I said, “Show me what else you’ve been looking at, you dirty bastard”.’ Imogen’s voice is hard and spiteful. ‘He wouldn’t. So I looked anyway – though I wish I hadn’t. It wasn’t normal stuff. It was horrible, kinky, sordid things. Just horrid—’
‘But that’s the trouble with the internet, Imogen. Some sites just pop up …’ I wince at my choice of words, ‘… and take you to others. Perhaps he didn’t intend … but I think lots of people look at that stuff.’
‘You didn’t see it. Disgusting bugger.’ I feel so sorry for her. Ben’s timing is lousy. I glance at the alarm clock.
‘It’s so late. Why not go to bed? Think about things tomorrow when you’re calmer. Talk to Ben when he comes home. You can’t do anything now anyway.’
She sighs. ‘Oh God, lovely. I don’t know what to do. It’s all such a mess. My fault. Fucking France.’
I try to be firm, think what she’d say to me. ‘Look, get some sleep. I’ll ring tomorrow and we can have a big chat.’
‘OK. Sorry to wake you with this. You’re such a great friend. Anyone else would be so pissed off with me.’
‘Don’t worry. I wasn’t really asleep. Too much thinking. I’m at Mum’s.’
‘Shit, yes … oh sorry … I haven’t even asked about Ashley. How was it?’
‘It was tough, but—’
‘So, did he explain? What did he say?’
‘Yes, he did, but it’s all very complicated. Tragic. His ex-girlfriend was pregnant. Sadly, the baby died.’
‘Oh my God. So—’
‘I’ll tell you more in the morning.’
‘How awful. So what—’
‘I’ll ring in the morning.’ I’m unusually assertive. ‘Bye.’
‘Bye – and thanks, lovely.’
CHAPTER 10
Spring brings some early sunshine and thoughts turn to fancy dress. Mark hosts another charity event in the grounds of a friend’s Victorian mansion and we all turn up as superheroes. Tash is Wonderwoman, Mark Batman, I’m Mrs Incredible (incredibly, I managed to squeeze into a small-sized costume I’d ordered by mistake) and Pete’s Mr Invisible – failing to appear. We all suspect he knows his superhero days are done. ‘Imagine Pete grappling his trussed up gonads all night in a tight jumpsuit,’ Mark says, to a chorus of ‘ewwws’.
We sweat in our costumes, munching canapés in the marquee and drinking ‘super’ strength cocktails on the perfectly-striped lawn, while a string ensemble plays action movie tunes. Before long, everyone’s ‘Pow’, ‘Fwap’, ‘Clank’ and ‘Boofing’ each other and behaving like kids at a Smartie party. Mark trips over his cape after too many bat-juices and Tash takes out a plate of smoked salmon blinis with her right arm doing her best Wonderwoman twirl.
I’m driving to Sunny’s, silently chuckling as I recall the events of that night – a happy distraction. Eleanor’s in the back seat, sealed in by her headphones and teenage introspections.
The car radio cranks out a nineties indie rock track and it strikes me how much my thoughts have been on Ashley, as if the lid of the box containing past events, labelled ‘done and dusted’, has worked its way loose. My thoughts are mostly tinged with frustration and ‘what ifs’, tainted with regret.
Ashley has ‘kaboomed’ me over cyberspace, sending an email suggesting we could meet up again as two coffees weren’t enough to catch up on twenty years. Feeling unsure, I sent an ambiguous reply, a sort of vague acceptance.
I’m always a bit tense going to Sunny’s house, and carrying some extra guilt in my conscience clutchbag – because of Ashley – makes it worse.
Sunny called several days ago to tell me Mick’s health was deteriorating. I decided I should visit, offering her a lift to the care home, expecting a ‘no, the weather was sublime, the crocuses and wild primroses were in bloom, she’d prefer to walk’. But she said ‘yes, that would be lovely’ as she was pushed for time and her Micra was off the road – something wrong with the clutch. ‘Of course, Dan sorted all my car issues,’ she’d added. ‘I can only wonder what it’s going to cost to repair.’ And I’d thought we might just have managed a Danless conversation.
As usual, there’s no space outside Sunny’s house. Hers is number 166 of around two hundred assorted red-bricked houses sitting behind cramped front gardens and shoehorned into a road that climbs and curls up a steep hill.
I park near the bottom, and while I try to relish the spring flavour of the surprisingly still warm day, the bursts of sun waking up a sleepy street and creating bright stripes on the pavement, Eleanor moans with each step. She isn’t wearing the right shoes for uphill walking apparently, though the expensive pumps she’d begged me to buy look perfectly fit for purpose.
Sunny apologises for not being ready. Her friend, a fellow traveller she’d met in Spain, has only just left. Eleanor and I sit on the sofa, taking in strong drifts of citronella, while Sunny, curls still damp, flutters around the living room in bare feet straddled by aubergine flares, rearranging furniture.
‘We went to a folk music festival yesterday,’ Sunny says, re-emerging from her treatment room with a cane chair. ‘My friend plays the flute, so we took our instruments. It was wonderful to lose myself in music again. So uplifting. I was quite giddy when I got home.’ She flashes her Madonna gap in a broad smile.
Eleanor hops up, heads to the bookcase. ‘This is well awesome, is it new?’ She’s holding a large piece of rock with rings in vibrant blues.
‘No, it used to be in my bedroom but I found I didn’t fully appreciate it in there,’ Sunny says, gently shaping her curls. ‘The light’s not as complementary.’ Being settled in one place wasn’t natural to Sunny, so she liked to keep changing her surroundings, said it made her feel more alive.
‘It’s agate,’ Sunny adds, walking over. I’m desperate to say I thought it was a rock, not a gate, but I fear the puerile police would be on my tail and I’d face a long sentence. Mi
ss Giggles would have laughed at that one though.
Sunny’s tilting the rock, showing how the colours change as the light catches them. Eleanor’s as tall as her auntie now, around five foot three, with a similar petite frame. Yet, with their heads almost touching, the contrast between them is striking – Eleanor with her perfectly straightened, chocolately hair and heavy make-up and Sunny’s naturally tumbling curls and lightly-powdered face. I’d always thought the same seeing Sunny and Dan side by side. You’d never have guessed they were siblings. Dan essentially ticked all three of the tall, dark and handsome boxes (he scraped six foot stood ramrod straight in his Oxfords), and was pretty solid and robust, even before the muscles expanded. Sunny was more delicate, like their mum, one of those people who appeared to have extra bones, little knobbly ones that protruded and stretched her skin.
‘Could you go and see if Blossom’s still on my bed, sweetness?’ Sunny asks Eleanor, returning the rock to the shelf. ‘If she is, I won't need to shut Daisy in the treatment room. I don’t like leaving the cats together when I’m out. Daisy likes to torment Blossom.’
‘Sure.’ Eleanor heads up the twisted pine staircase.
Sunny disappears through the archway, returning with a violin case and fringed suede boots. ‘Yes, the festival was just the tonic I needed after seeing Mick.’ Her smile wobbles, a hint of discomfort beneath the composure. ‘He’s had a bad few days. I truly hope I’m wrong,’ Sunny says in an undertone, ‘but I sense he’s giving up a little.’
‘Oh dear, really?’
‘Yes. He looks so weary and finds it difficult to shuffle around without help.’ Sunny’s eyes flutter, as if batting away invisible tears. She props the violin against the wall, next to two others. ‘I still find it hard to accept that he can’t speak. He gets so frustrated, poor soul. You know Mick, how he loved to talk.’
Eleanor’s pumps pound down the stairs. ‘Blossom’s on the bed. I’ve been stroking her.’ She heads off to find Daisy.
‘It’s what helped me to accept Mick going into Beeches Green; knowing that he’d have lots of company,’ Sunny continues. ‘Several of the staff have a really positive energy, but I feel the care’s sometimes lacking. And it’s so frenetic.’
‘Really? That’s a shame.’ I’d always thought it had a warm, cheery atmosphere, considering how ancient, ill and cantankerous most of the residents were, but feel I have no right to say so.
‘Anyway, we must keep positive.’ Sunny’s facial switch flicks back to serenity setting. ‘I’ll just fetch some massage oil.’ She heads upstairs, gliding noiselessly.
I feel sorry for Sunny. She’s devoted to Mick, and I know how difficult it is for her. Mick coped well living alone for several years after his wife Mary died, and even after his first stroke doctors predicted a good recovery, that he’d regain his independence. But after Dan died, Mick suffered a second stroke and Sunny’s temporary return from her travels became permanent. She’d made huge sacrifices, suppressing her lifelong wanderlust, and dutifully visited her dad in the home – rarely missing a day.
Dan had very occasional contact with his parents. He tolerated them for Eleanor’s sake. He’d despised his dysfunctional upbringing and Mick and Mary’s hippy lifestyle. He wasn’t surprised his dad had suffered a stroke, with all the drugs and booze he’d consumed. It was almost as if Dan felt he’d got his just deserts. Sunny, on the other hand, embraced her unconventional childhood. ‘I know I was very small when our parents were into the hippy lifestyle, but I have so many happy memories. I loved the freedom, the fields and the fresh air,’ she’d told me during a short stay when Mick had first fallen ill and she’d flown back from Greece. Mick was no angel, but he had a big heart. She wished Dan could have seen the best in him. It was the closest she’d every got to criticising her darling Dan.
‘OK, I think I’m ready now.’ Sunny’s back, bag firmly on her shoulder. ‘I’m doing a treatment later – bit of an emergency.’ She turns towards the door; halts. ‘That reminds me, Carrie. I had a new patient the other day who used to work for Dan. Michael Whitley … or Whitfield? Charming man.’
‘Was it Michael Whitham? Really big fella, very tall?’
‘Yes.’ Sunny stares past me. ‘He was so shocked to hear about Dan, said he didn’t know many people who looked after themselves better.’
‘That’s for certain!’ As soon as I say it, I know it’s come out wrong.
‘Well yes, but … he did it for you. For the family, and because ... ’ Sunny stops, shoots me an uncharacteristically stern look, then turns away.
I hop on my Conflict Dodgem, breathing deeply, silently puzzling over what she’d meant, and what she was about to add before silencing herself. I certainly never pushed Dan to keep himself in peak condition – not like some wives. If anything, I was the one under pressure. I couldn’t let myself turn into a middle-aged munter with such a fit husband. I’ll never forget what Slim Kim said after Dan had picked me up after step class one night. It was summer and he’d been exercising, so he was wearing short shorts and a clingy vest. ‘Your hubby’s such a dish. I wish mine looked after himself like that,’ she’d declared, lips pulled in a ‘phwooaar’ pose. ‘His Nibs is so fat he looks like he’s swallowed our Chow, and he’s got enough back, crack and ear hair to knit an Afghan.’ I’d creased. She was right. Dan was a dish indeed – albeit a very low-fat, sin-free one – and I’d appreciated the fruits of his labours. I’d never stopped fancying him.
‘Shall I shut Daisy in too?’ Eleanor appears through the archway.
‘No, that’s fine,’ Sunny says. ‘She likes to wander if Blossom’s out of her way.’
It dawns on me that Sunny and I are like her two cats. Sunny’s Daisy, the wanderer, all soft and fluffy but not quite what she appears. In the same room, we made each other’s backs arch. But I invariably yielded, like Blossom, so although we stiffened and spat a little, we didn’t reach the full-on fighting stage.
***
‘Mick will be so pleased to see you both,’ Sunny says, giving Eleanor a big squeeze as our feet crunch across the gravel drive that sweeps up to the converted Edwardian house, patches of pale blue paint flaking around its sash windows. ‘You should see how his face lights up when his friend’s granddaughter visits.’
We find Mick sitting in a high-backed green chair in the communal area, with its worn carpet and peeling striped wallpaper. It’s lunchtime and the room’s full of clatter and gusts of cooked cabbage and mildew. The only other face I recognise belongs to a lady with a wispy white fringe and hunched back sat by the window. A friendly old thing, a costume brooch always pinned to her cardigan, she’s convinced it’s a luxury hotel. Last time Eleanor and I visited, she’d boasted about her daughter’s success as a film director, which paid for the accommodation. In fact, her daughter directed sales on Morrisons’ fish counter. Yet she was so convincing; worthy of an Oscar.
Mick looks gaunt and unshaven, his smoky-grey hair thin and lacklustre, though the old twinkle lights up in his mahogany eyes at the sight of Eleanor. A broad, toothy smile stretches the deep dimples that accentuate his resemblance to Dan.
‘Baarr aay,’ Mick says, beckoning his granddaughter for a cuddle.
‘Hi, Granddad.’ Eleanor throws herself at him, settling on a frayed chair by his side. I lean over, kiss his scratchy cheek.
‘You look tired,’ Sunny says, pulling up two chairs to face him. ‘I’m sensing you didn’t have a good night’s sleep, sweetness. It’s not surprising in this place.’ She takes her dad’s hand.
‘Yaaam.’ He drops his head to demonstrate his fatigue, following it with an impish, one-sided smile. It’s a good job his face is so expressive, now his tongue’s been taken.
While Sunny tells him about the folk festival, and Eleanor talks about school and drama club, I watch a tiny lady in a brown woollen hat knitting the longest scarf I’ve ever seen.
A young woman wheels in a trolley, handing Mick a bowl of ice-cream, which he balances precariously betwee
n his frail legs. He refuses Sunny’s offer of help, so we watch nervously as he carefully negotiates each mouthful, at one point dropping the spoon and looking agitated when Eleanor bends to pick it up.
The old lady by the window catches my eye. ‘I’m off to the theatre tonight.’
‘Lovely,’ I say, nodding.
‘You’re not. It’s bingo,’ a skinny woman to her left snaps. Eleanor looks at me and we snigger. Sunny nobly ignores it.
‘I’ve got some lavender oil to massage your feet – see if we can reduce that swelling.’ She taps her dad’s knee. ‘Sadly, I haven’t got time to give the woman who does all the knitting a hand massage today.’ She pulls a bottle from her bag. ‘I wish the carers would help him get outside into the grounds more.’ She looks at her dad. ‘You’ve always loved being outdoors, haven’t you, in your element camping at all those festivals? Saying that, Dan and I did too. Making dens in the woods. Do you remember when I got lost and neighbours had to help search for me?’ Mick waves his fist, feigning anger.
Sunny grabs a stool, gently raising Mick’s legs and removing his socks. The bulging flesh around his ankles is streaked with thick purple veins.
‘Oh dear. No dancing for you this week.’ I give his shin a gentle tap. Mick smiles, wiggling his upper body, dad-at-a-disco fashion.
As Sunny rubs her thumbs up and down her dad’s ankles, telling us how there should be a quiet room as it was ‘impossible to get a sense of calm in here’, a male carer with a dazzling ginger beard and wiry hair comes over to take Mick’s bowl.
‘Three female visitors today, Mick, you lucky thing.’ The carer stands by Sunny, hands on his wide hips, transfixed by her ritual.
‘You’re not usually in on a Sunday,’ Sunny says.
‘The deputy manager’s in Spain.’ He glances at the noticeboard. ‘Vejer de la Frontera.’
‘Oh, I know it well. I spent several weeks there while travelling through Europe,’ Sunny says. ‘A beautiful Moorish hilltop town – full of wonderful, vibrant colours and the smell of pine forests. On a clear day, you can see the coast of Morocco.’ Her eyes widen, as if in a trance. Something has stirred.