Two Women

by Martina Cole

  His lips were on hers now. She could taste his mouth and pushed him away in disgust, turning her head from him. Trying to make him leave her alone without disturbing her mother.

  She knew that her mum would go mad if she learned of this.

  But she was up in bed, her face swollen and bruised, her three youngest children still in Doreen’s. Her mother could sleep in peace knowing they were all looked after, that Barry couldn’t harm them.

  Why had Wendy decided to come home? Why hadn’t she stayed at Auntie Doreen’s? She felt as if it was all her fault, that she was to blame for it all. Her records had started the fight, and her lying on the settee half dressed had caused all this.

  ‘Please, Dad, stop it! Dad, please. Stop it!’

  His beery breath was heavier now as he tried to force her legs apart. She could hear the animal grunts coming from him and taste the salt of her own silent tears. Finally she used all her strength and shoved him as hard as she could. In his drunken state Barry fell sideways and she ran from the room like the wind.

  She fell halfway up the stairs and made a noise. She picked herself up and as she reached the top of the stairs heard her mother calling softly. Going into the room she allayed her mother’s fears, told her that her dad had come in drunk and fallen over.

  Barry came up the stairs, and when he was in her mother’s room Wendy went to her own and pulled the chest of drawers against the door. Then she got into bed and for the first time in years wished her brother and sisters were there.

  Barry fell into bed with his wife and went straight to sleep, his snoring loud and broken only by his mumblings.

  Wendy lay in bed, terrified of the man she had always hated.

  She could still feel his hands on her body, feel his foul breath and tongue trying to slip into her mouth. She heaved, feeling her whole belly rise up in protest at the thought of what he’d wanted to do to her.

  His own daughter.

  Chapter Twenty

  Wendy brought her mother a cup of tea and some toast. Her father had gone out earlier and she had waited until he’d left the house before getting dressed and moving the furniture back into its usual place.

  She had hardly slept all night. Every noise or movement woke her as she dozed. It was as if her whole body was on red alert. Waiting for something to happen.

  As she looked into her mother’s face Wendy sighed. If she confided in her there would be trouble, and looking at her bruised face and body she felt her mum had quite enough on her plate already.

  ‘You all right, babe?’ Susan’s voice was concerned.

  Wendy replied sadly, her big blue eyes brimming with pain.

  ‘Mum, I’m fine. It’s you we should all be asking about, for crying out loud! Look what he’s done again. Can’t we just make him go away?’

  Susan looked at her beautiful daughter and felt the futility of her own life. She could cook for her kids, clean for them, protect them from the outside world. But where Barry was concerned she could do nothing.

  She grasped her daughter’s slim hand, its childish heart-shaped gold ring pointing up the woman emerging before her eyes.

  ‘Listen to me, little heart, that man loves you all in his own way. I wish things were different, you know that, but I can’t make him do anything he don’t want to do. If wishes were kisses I’d drown you all in my love, darlin’, you know that. All I can do is hope for the best. It’s all any of us can do. He’ll feel really bad later and everything will be all right for a while, you’ll see.’

  Susan knew her words were pointless, just words. But she so desperately wanted her daughter to feel better.

  Every breath she took was a trial, her ribs were screaming with pain. But she had to pretend that nothing was too bad. That she was just a bit under the weather. That being beaten like this was nothing really, just another merry day in the life of Susan Dalston.

  ‘Throw him out, Mum. Get rid of him, please.’

  Wendy’s voice was low, full of meaning and broken from her yearning to cry.

  Susan grasped her hand tighter.

  ‘I can’t, darlin’. You know the score, love. Old Bill ain’t interested, no one’s interested in the likes of us. That’s why I want you to educate yourself, get out of all this. Get a proper life for yourself where people are civilised and talk to one another and the use of their fists isn’t the only option.’

  Wendy felt such a rush of love for her mother then she threw herself into her embrace. Squeezed her mother to her as if she would never let go. Susan felt the love, and also the excruciating pain in her ribs from her daughter’s embrace.

  Pushing her away gently, she kissed her on the forehead tenderly.

  ‘He will fuck off one day, I promise you that. We’ll bore the arse off him soon enough. We always do. But until he deigns to leave, we’re in lumber, mate.’

  Wendy knew her mother’s words were true but with the youthful exuberance of all girls believed that somehow there had to be a way of getting rid of him once and for all. There was always an answer to a problem, you just had to find it.

  ‘Stay in bed and rest, Mum. I’ll watch the kids, have a day off school. I need to revise anyway.’

  Susan nodded, feeling better now that they had had a little talk. As Wendy stood up Susan saw the emerging body, the high breasts so like her own at that age, the beautiful face she couldn’t believe belonged to a child of hers.

  Wendy had a brain, a good one, and she would use it to better herself.

  Susan was determined on that.

  Roselle heard the banging and crashing on her door and sighed. She knew who it was and walking wearily out into the hallway, called, ‘Go away, Barry, before I call Ivan and get you removed once and for all.’

  ‘Let me in, Roselle, we have to talk.’

  Leaning on the cool white-painted wall of the hallway, she felt an urge to cry. Barry was a piece of shit really, a wife-battering, violent thug, but not with her. Never with her. With her he had been the man he should have been all along if circumstances had been different.

  Yet once out of her orbit he reverted to Mr Macho Man. It was laughable.

  Picking up the phone she dialled quickly, knowing in her heart she had to make the final break.

  Five minutes later two men arrived from Ivan’s gambling den in Dean Street. She watched from the window as Barry was threatened with baseball bats and beaten severely on a busy London street in the early afternoon.

  No one interfered, no one called the police, no one cared. Except her, and maybe Susan. Because she would take the flak. She would take the kickback of his anger and his rage. Roselle knew this and the thought disturbed her, but she had to get Barry Dalston out of her life.

  He was her folly, her one crack at taking what she wanted whatever the consequences. How could a man’s looks make you so unconcerned about everything else? She knew that if she looked into his eyes again she would be sorely tempted to forgive him. Something she knew she must never, ever do.

  Unlike Susan she had back up, had people to ‘sort it all out’ for her in the only way people like Barry Dalston respected. With violence. With hard punches, with baseball bats, and if necessary maybe even a gun.

  She phoned the ambulance, though, after he had lain on the ground for ten minutes. After all, she wasn’t without her finer feelings.

  June came in the house and without a word put on the kettle and looked through Susan’s cupboards.

  ‘You seem to be well stocked, love.’

  Susan nodded. She was sitting at the kitchen table. Her face was still bruised but she was at least mobile five days after the latest hiding. Baby Rose was walking unsteadily around the room, opening cupboards and playing with the saucepan lids.

  June smiled as she looked down at her.

  ‘She’s a little princess, ain’t she? Look at them eyes! Who’s nanny’s little darlin’, eh?’

  Rose smiled, a big gummy smile that melted everyone’s hearts.

  ‘Me. Me.’ Her lit
tle voice was like a corncrake when she got going and the words became a hoarse shout that made them both laugh out loud.

  ‘Well, Susan, how’s everything?’

  June poured out the tea, her tight black skirt and high heels making her look much younger than she actually was.

  ‘All right. The usual. He’s been missing for nearly a week again so we’ve all had a bit of peace and quiet. Why?’

  She knew her mother well enough to realise that June playing the caring grandmother could only mean one thing. She was on the ponce.

  ‘If it’s money you’re after I am boracic lint, Mother. I ain’t even got the money for an ice cream.’

  June turned to her then.

  ‘Why are you always such a fucking miserable mare, eh? I was going to offer you a few quid as it happens. Your father had a tickle at the weekend. He turned over the bookie’s at Green Lanes in Ilford.’

  She laughed then at Susan’s shocked expression. ‘He had a big winner. Anyway, I thought I’d spread it about a bit as Christmas is just around the corner like.’

  She placed fifty pounds on the kitchen table.

  ‘You can pay me back in the New Year, I’ll be needing it by then.’

  She laughed again and Susan nodded wearily.

  ‘I’ll see what Barry has to say before I spend it. To be honest he’s out of work again. But I’m hoping he’ll find something soon. I’m still claiming benefit. I have to, Mum, you know what he’s like. I never know where we’ll be from one day to the next.’

  June nodded in understanding.

  ‘Like your old man. I know what you’re saying. Still, at least you’ve got him back now. That must be a touch.’

  Susan rolled her eyes to the ceiling.

  ‘Oh, it’s wonderful, I was missing the hidings, the rows, the violent clashes of temperament. The kids were gutted when he left, couldn’t get used to the peace and quiet. I was going to send them to the fucking Falklands so they could live with constant warfare.’

  June grinned.

  ‘You’re a sarcastic mare, Susan.’

  ‘Well, to be truthful, Mum, I wish him and me dad would drop down dead.’

  June sipped her tea and took a puff on her Rothman’s.

  ‘Fucking tell me about it. I wish your father was brown bread meself. Old ponce!’ She laughed then. ‘I remember once, when you was a baby, he punched me lights out in Romford market. Said I was looking at a bloke. Which of course I was, me being me like.’ She took a deep drag on her cigarette before she continued. ‘He was handsome, though. Too fucking handsome really.’

  Susan’s voice was incredulous.

  ‘Who, me dad?’

  June laughed out loud then. ‘No, the other geezer. He was a Turk or something, dark handsome fucker with great big eyes.’ She looked off into the distance, to another time, another place. ‘I had him, though. Your father never knew, but I went back and I had him. He was fucking blinding he was. All muscles and chocolate skin. I always liked the spades, me. Funny that, ain’t it? They do something for me like, make me blood boil. Do you know what I mean, girl?’ June was serious now and Susan felt the uneasy pity she always ended up feeling for her mother and her endless quest for men.

  ‘They treat a woman how she should be treated, they’re grateful like that you want them.’

  ‘Maybe then, Mum, when it was all new to them, but not now. They treat you like all men do, I suppose. Not like Barry and me dad, but like regular people treat their wives.’

  June nodded.

  ‘I suppose so, but I did love it in them days. I loved the chase, you know? Loved the feeling of being someone, going somewhere, feeling like I had a life to lead. That I was important to someone.’

  ‘You was important to me and Debbie, Mum.’

  June shook her head and waved her cigarette in denial.

  ‘Nah. You ain’t wanted unless a man wants you, girl, remember that. It’s hard you know, getting older. Men stop looking at you, just ignore you. See you as too old to bother with. It’s hard when you was an attractive woman once. A head turner.’

  Susan smiled softly.

  ‘Well, Mum, you look better than I do, girl, always did and I’m still a young woman really. But I never turned heads. Never.’

  June shrugged. ‘You was always an ugly kid, love. Luck of the fucking draw really. If Debs had had your brains she could have gone places. She had the looks - no real body to speak of, but enough to get her what she wanted. Now look at her, stuck out there in Rainham with no kids, nothing. A right fucking miserable mare she turned out to be. Have you heard from her at all?’

  Susan shook her head.

  ‘Jamesie is at it, I heard through the grapevine. His bird had a baby as you know. Must have hurt Debs. In fairness, Mum, to be barren must be terrible.’

  ‘Especially when you’ve lumbered yourself with a ponce like him! I never liked the Irish. Look what they’ve caused, them bleeding Catholics out there. Bombings and that . . . I don’t know what the world is coming to.’

  Susan felt an urge to laugh at her mother’s ignorance but she didn’t. June was June and that was all there was to it.

  ‘Are you coming up the pub tonight?’

  Susan shook her head. ‘I doubt it, Mum. I can’t afford it really and the kids need me here.’

  ‘Leave them with Doreen’s boy or get that fucking Wendy to have them. Do her good to give you a hand now and again.’

  June had a downer on Wendy that made Susan angry.

  ‘She’s turning into a beauty, Mum. You want to see the body on it!’

  June shrugged. ‘No good to her if she don’t use it, girl.’

  Susan looked into her mother’s eyes.

  ‘Like you did, you mean, Mum? Or should that be, let her body be used? There’s two ways to look at you and your life, you know.’

  June shrugged.

  ‘Have it your own way, but she’ll end up looking down her nose at you lot, you mark my words.’

  Susan laughed then, a loud vindictive sound.

  ‘I fucking well hope she does. I want much better for her and the rest of them than anything we had.’

  June suddenly looked crushed.

  ‘I did the best I could for you and Debs.’

  Susan laughed again.

  ‘That’s what I mean, Mum, that’s exactly what I mean.’

  It was Doreen who finally talked Susan into going down the pub that night. They were having a big party with a live band. Susan plastered her face with make up and dressed in her one good outfit, a dress and jacket from Marks and Spencer’s. She and Doreen left Wendy in charge.

  Susan’s ribs were still giving her gyp, but she wanted to get out, see people, have a good time. And Doreen convinced her the best way to do that was go to the pub with all her family and friends.

  Susan was glad she’d gone. Even Debbie had turned up. Overweight and sad, she had a miserable-looking Jamesie in tow and the remains of a black eye was clearly visible in her pudgy face. The two sisters sat together and Susan listened as Debbie systematically pulled everyone to pieces. Especially the ones she knew Jamesie had been after over the years.

  The pub was alive with people of all ages, the music was good, loud and danceable. The drink fast-flowing.

  All in all, a typical East End night out.

  The women sat together, the men stood at the bar. Younger children sat outside on the wall and drank Coke and ate crisps, played kiss chase and had fights.

  It hadn’t changed much since Susan was a little girl.

  It was where she felt safe.

  After a few Bacardi and Cokes she felt herself relax. Felt the tension leave her body and the worry gradually lift from her mind. Doreen was acting the goat as usual and everyone was laughing. Even Debs relaxed and started to enjoy herself. As the band struck up yet another old Beatles number, Susan wished she was well enough to join in the dancing. But she clapped and sang along and made do with that. Then June and her father started to dance the twis
t and everyone watched them, geeing them up and egging them on.

  Laughing like she had no care in the world, Susan joined in the clapping and the calling out. October the tenth, 1983 was a night she would remember for more reasons than one. For the first time since Barry’s return home, she felt light-hearted, girlish almost.

  Then she spied Peter White and waved at him across the bar. He waved back, and she watched him make his way through the throng to talk to her.

  ‘He fancies you, Sue.’

  She flapped her hand at her sister. ‘Don’t be silly. We go back years, to when we was all kids. He’s just being polite.’

  Debs laughed, a low dirty sound.

  ‘He wants to be a bit more than polite, girl, you mark my words. He always asks about you.’

  Sue raised her eyes to the ceiling.

  ‘He’s just being friendly, that’s all, Debs. Now for fuck’s sake give it a rest.’

  Peter smiled at them both and nodded to the other women at the table. Susan loved the attention. Everyone was watching her talking to this very presentable, unmarried sailor who looked nice, was well dressed and seemed to have eyes only for her.

  ‘Long time no see, Susan, how’s life treating you then?’ Peter’s green eyes were twinkling and she laughed girlishly. ‘The same as usual, mate, and you? Found yourself a nice girl yet?’

  Peter, a few drinks under his belt, felt reckless enough to say to Barry Dalston’s wife, ‘All the best ones are taken, yourself included, girl.’

  She blushed then. Her face went a bright shade of pink and her mother shouted across the pub, ‘Oi, look, my Susan’s doing a cherry! What’s he asked you, girl, your bra size!’

  Everyone started laughing, Peter included.

  Susan shook her head and cried over the din, ‘Take no notice, Peter, she’s an animal.’

  But the noise was too much now and they couldn’t hear one another. Miming that he was going for a drink he walked away from her. Flushed and happy, Susan looked at her sister and grinned.

  ‘My God, I think you’re right. He does fancy me!’