by Elaine Chong
There’s something else here though that feels unfamiliar. It’s a smell. It isn’t exactly unpleasant – an old-fashioned, floral perfume, perhaps – but there’s a staleness about it, a hint of decay, and I find myself wrinkling my nose in distaste.
Maggie has some explaining to do.
When I return to the kitchen, once again the only audible sound is the tick-tock of the hallway clock, but the experience of finding Julia’s room in such a state of neglect has rattled me. I can think of no logical reason why Maggie would leave it like this, but as she’s already suggested I check with my mother before the room is made ready for Julia’s stay, I can only hope that she is well enough to offer up an explanation.
I manage to get another couple of hours work under my belt then decide to call it a day. The project I’m managing is an architectural albatross. It’s going to be a boutique hotel, but for now it’s a building site because our client is a lady (I use the word loosely) with too much money and too much time on her hands so the brief we’ve been given changes, like the weather.
I remember that my stomach has been reminding me for nearly an hour that breakfast was just a slice of toast, and I still need to drive back to the hospital to question the doctors over the prognosis for my mother. It’s hard to make plans for her when I have no timeframe to work with and minimal understanding of either the immediate or short-term requirements. (I don’t want to think about the long-term requirements.)
I soon discover that Maggie has cleared most of the food out of the fridge, so I decide to take the short walk to the high street and buy lunch. When the girl behind the counter in the cafe asks if I want to eat it there or take it with me, I realise I’m in no particular hurry to return to the house.
When I left my childhood home for the last time with my father’s angry, hateful words ringing in my ears, it was with a mixture of heartbreak and relief. Those oddly conflicting emotions have followed me down the years. Hillcrest House was my home and I did have a happy childhood there, but it also represented everything I disliked about my father: stiff-necked convention, lack of imagination and bourgeois pretension. Even after his death I’ve continued to feel like an undesirable guest in spite of my mother’s warm and heartfelt welcome and I can’t throw it off, so it’s an easy decision to sit in the window of the café and watch the world go by.
Just as I’m about to finish my lunch and leave, a man wearing a worn, brown suede jacket suddenly stops and peers at me through the glass. The face is familiar, but I can’t remember the name. He smiles and points to the empty chair next to me. I still can’t remember his name, but I feel obliged to be hospitable, so I motion to him to join me.
“Richard. How are you?” he asks solicitously as he takes a seat then carefully places his hand over mine. “How’s your mother? I feel awful about the whole thing, you know. It’s a good job Maggie turned up when she did because I didn’t have a key to get back in.” He sees my look of blank incomprehension but rattles on regardless. “The door slammed shut behind me. Of course, I’d gone and left my bag with my phone in it on the floor of the porch. It was terrible, absolutely awful ... I could see her lying there at the foot of the stairs.”
“I’m sorry, I’m not sure...” I begin.
He colours up and withdraws his hand. “How stupid of me. It’s just that I’ve known your mother for many years, and she talks about you and your sister all the time. I feel like I know you, but of course you don’t really know me.” He proffers his hand in a more formal gesture of friendship. “Reverend Edward Feering at your service. Sometimes known as Father Ted?” He leans in and gives me a conspiratorial wink. “Wrong denomination, but it’s the thought that counts.”
Now I remember. I grasp his hand firmly in mine and tell him that I should have recognised him. He brushes this aside. “I had no idea you were there when it happened,” I say.
He makes a guilty face and lifts his shoulders in an apologetic shrug. “Well, I wasn’t. That was the problem. I’d offered to give your mother a lift to the church hall. I only popped into the house to use the facilities, if you know what I mean. She said she was going upstairs to change her jacket, so I went straight back out. Two seconds later the front door literally slammed shut behind me.”
“So, you didn’t see her fall?”
“No. I waited for her in the car for about twenty minutes.”
“Twenty minutes?”
The note of incredulity in my voice registers with him and once again his face colours up. “I know. I feel dreadful. But I’ve been doing this job for a long time, Richard, and I’ve learned that ladies of a certain age expect to be treated with respect and – dare I say it – deference. You don’t rush them.” When he realises that I’m not going to bawl him out for his ineptitude he quickly goes on. “Thank God – yes really, I do thank Him from the bottom of my heart – Maggie turned up with a key.”
“Well, I’m just glad someone was there to help her,” I say.
“Always a pleasure, Richard.” He clears his throat – I feel a little awkwardly. “Will she be in hospital for long? I usually visit, but it’s quite a long way to drive, so if she’s coming home soon then I’ll wait till she’s back. Much nicer to be in your own in bed, I always think.”
“I really have no idea,” I say. I don’t know why I suddenly feel compelled to confide in him – he’s virtually a stranger after all – but I find myself telling him about the problem with the house, although I refrain from mentioning my half-sister. He listens very attentively and doesn’t interrupt. “I don’t know what we’re going to do if she can’t manage by herself anymore.”
He nods his head sagely. “It’s a big problem for lots of families, but your mother could move into the bungalow, couldn’t she? In fact, I’d be inclined to recommend that she do it in any case. No stairs then, eh?”
“What bungalow?”
“The one that used to belong to your mother’s friend, Agnes. Agnes Bagshot?”
“You mean Aggie?”
“Yes, of course.”
“What bungalow?” I say again.
“I thought you knew...” There’s a moment of pained embarrassment, and then he hurriedly gets to his feet. “It’s probably best if you speak to your mother about it.” He claps me on the shoulder. “It was great meeting you again, Richard. And tell your mother I’ll pop round to see her as soon as she’s home.” Before I have a chance to question him further, he raises his hand in a farewell gesture to the girl behind the counter then dashes off.
My mind is full of questions as I walk back to the house. I feel complete and utter mystification at my mother choosing to not inform me that she inherited Aggie’s bungalow. I try to recall when Aggie died, but I can’t remember if it was ten months or two years ago. This changes everything, and these thoughts continue to preoccupy me while I close up the house and retrace my journey to the hospital.
When I get to the ward, my mother is sitting up in bed. She still looks frail and the painkilling medication has dulled her eyes, but she smiles as soon as she recognises me.
“They said you came this morning,” she says. I lean over the bed, place a kiss on her cheek. She reaches up and touches my face. “I thought I was dreaming when I saw you standing in the doorway but you’re real.” She sighs and clutches at my hand. “It’s the drugs they give you, it makes you see things.”
“It’s really me.”
“Yes, I know. But sometimes I can’t be sure.”
“How are you feeling if that isn’t a stupid question?”
She shrugs. “Tired. A bit sore, I suppose. They give me painkillers if it gets too uncomfortable.”
“They told me this morning they’re going to move you to another bed.”
She nods. “I have to start the rehabilitation programme with the physiotherapist. She was here earlier. A lovely little girl, lovely warm smile, but she hasn’t a clue.” She points at the chair I’m sitting in. “She wanted me to get out of bed and sit there. Do I look l
ike I want to get out of bed and sit in a chair?”
“Well, they have to get you moving, Mum. They said they won’t keep you in here longer than necessary so as soon as you’re able, they’ll be showing you to how to use a frame to get about.”
She responds with an irritated sigh. “I’ve fallen down the stairs and fractured my hip; I haven’t just stubbed my toe on the end of the bed, you know.”
“Yes, I do know, but it isn’t fractured any more, is it? Now you have a nice, new hip,” I reply brightly in an effort to jolly her along.
“You sound like your sister,” she retorts. “She was always a fountain of sympathy in a moment of crisis.”
“Ah, sarcasm. Now I know you’re feeling better,” I tease her. She manages a wan smile in response.
I pick up on the fact that she knows she fell down the stairs, but when I ask her how it happened, she looks away; says she doesn’t remember. I know I’m going to have to question her about the bungalow, but something tells me that now isn’t the right moment so instead I just describe how I met Father Ted in the cafe.
She rolls her eyes. “He’s a right twerp. Father Ted – I ask you.”
“It was lucky he was there when you fell down the stairs – lucky that Maggie was there as well.”
She says stiffly, “Well, as I said, I don’t remember much about it, but I do know if he hadn’t called and insisted on giving me a lift then I wouldn’t have gone upstairs to change my jacket.”
I can’t begin to understand the logic of this argument and change the subject. I tell her instead about Silvio’s nephew’s new baby. She lies back against the mound of pillows and listens with obvious enjoyment to my story, but she soon tires so I kiss her goodbye and tell her I’ll speak with the doctor in the morning. “They won’t keep you in here long, Mum. But I need to have some kind of timeframe so I can organise things for you. And for Julia as well.”
She startles at the mention of my sister’s name. “What are you talking about?”
“I’ve asked Julia to come back for a couple of weeks to help out.”
“That won’t be necessary. I can manage on my own.”
“That will be necessary,” I insist. “I can’t do it while I’m in the middle of this hotel project, and you’re going to need someone to stay with you until you’re able to do things without any help.”
The broader question of whether she can continue to live completely independently at Hillcrest shall remain unspoken, as shall the mystery surrounding Julia’s bedroom and Aggie’s bungalow, because I see that my visit has exhausted her. She yawns and closes her eyes. I hear her murmur, “Julia won’t come home, not for me.”
“Yes, she will,” I say firmly, and for my mother’s benefit I sound confident even though I’m not. But I think to myself, now that Julia knows her inheritance has been passed to somebody else, it could be the incentive she needs to come back. We have some difficult decisions to make and I won’t do it without her.
Lenora
“Are you alright there, Lenora? Do you need some pain relief?
I want to answer her, this nice nurse, who gently holds my hand, but my tongue has turned to cardboard inside my mouth while I was sleeping and it won’t move, won’t let me form words. It sits rigidly behind my teeth, papery dry, so I squeeze her fingers in reply.
“Do you want a drink of water? Will that help?”
I nod my head, communication now limited to parts of the body less conveniently associated with conversation. Moments later, a cotton wool lollipop saturated with water is pushed between my dry lips. I draw the cool liquid into my mouth, and my tongue is loosened from the roof of my mouth.
“Is that better?”
“Much better.”
“You were calling out there, Lenora. Are you in pain, my love, because I can give you something for that?”
I am in pain. It radiates down my leg from the new hip.
“We need to reposition you,” she tells me, when I explain where it hurts. “I think you’ve tried to turn onto your side while you were asleep. What we’re aiming for Lenora is ‘neutral alignment’ – that’s hospital jargon. It means sleeping on your back and sitting up straight.” She checks my notes. “How much pain are you in – on a scale of one to ten?”
I think about it. “Six-point-five.”
“Six-point-five. That’s very precise. I think we’ll be needing something with a bit more kick than a couple of paracetamol, so give me a minute and I’ll get you something to make it go away.” She scuttles off.
The pain is really quite bad so when the nurse returns, breathless and smiling, and offers me some tablets, I’m suitably grateful for her haste. She stands over me and watches, while I swallow them down with a cup of water. Then she says, “I’ve checked your notes, Lenora. Apparently, you refused to get out of bed this morning for our lovely physiotherapist, Lucy. What was that all about?”
I feel myself bristle. I’m not fond of the way that elderly people are infantilized when they’re in hospital, but I like this woman: she’s innately kind and caring, so I keep my irritation in check. “I’m not ready to walk yet. I’ve only just had this operation, you know.”
“I do know that, Lenora, because I’ve just read your notes,” she replies. “But if you want to leave this hospital sooner rather than later then you need to get moving. I’m warning you in the nicest way possible that if you stay in that bed, it will only slow your recovery. Don’t you want to go home?”
I want to answer her with a reassuring ‘Yes, of course, I do’, but it’s a question with which I’ve been wrestling from the moment that I woke from the anaesthetic and remembered starting the descent of the stairs; remembered the sudden pressure in the small of my back; remembered how I tumbled and fell, striking my head painfully against the sturdy, wooden pedestal at the foot of the stairs. Do I want to go home? No, I’m not sure that I really do.
Julia
It’s six o’clock in the evening. I’m tired and feeling more than a little irritable. In fact, my nerves are as taut as a proverbial piano wire.
Aysha has just arrived and Connie is itching to leave, but this might be the last opportunity I have, before I fly to London, to impress upon them both the importance of good timekeeping, security and attentive customer service. “I need to know I can trust you,” I tell them.
Connie keeps glancing down at her phone. She thinks I can’t see it (and I can’t) but I know that it’s wedged between her knees. Any moment now I’m going to hand her a very large box then make her stand up, just to hear the satisfying sound of the phone fall and hopefully break into a thousand pieces on the hard, concreted floor of my office.
Aysha is also pretending to listen, but she’s already explained to me that her mind is on her young son, who’s being looked after by her mother-in-law this evening. Aysha hates her mother-in-law with a burning passion, but her own mother is unwell today and can’t babysit. The boy is four years old and ‘very naughty’ – Aysha’s own words. Aysha’s mother-in-law uses an ancient but tried and tested method when dealing with naughty children – it’s called the hard slap. I’m definitely with the mother-in-law on this one, but Aysha is sitting and fretting and not listening because she doesn’t believe in ‘that terrible corporeal punishment’.
I want to shoot myself in the head, but only after I’ve shot Jian first.
In those first minutes after Nancy exploded the bombshell that was the news that Jian’s wife is pregnant, I seriously wanted my life to end, because Tan Wenjian is my life. I looked into her sorrowful, dark brown eyes and saw that it was true. I jumped to my feet, ran into the gallery and collapsed onto the floor. I wanted to rip my clothes from my body; tear every single highlighted hair from my head; drown myself in the million, gut-wrenching tears I cried into the carpet in front of the gallery window where everyone could see me and know that I’d been wronged.
As soon as Nancy realised that I was in the throes of a nuclear-scale meltdown, she pulled down the shu
tters and closed up the shop. When Connie came back from her lunch break, she stopped her in the doorway and told her to go home. Connie didn’t argue, but then she could hear me wailing like a banshee, so I suppose she was relieved not to have to share my pain. Without asking, Nancy gathered me into her arms and held me close.
“He isn’t worth it, Julia.”
“Yes, he is! You don’t understand, he’s all I have,” I sobbed.
“But he isn’t really yours. He’s a married man from a prominent and very wealthy Singapore family and he isn’t going to leave his Chinese wife for you.”
“You don’t know him! He promised me we can be together.”
“How can that ever happen? Seriously Julia, the Tan family are old Singapore. You know what they’re like. They even arranged his marriage – brought him back a bride from China, for crying out loud.”
Of course, I knew all this already, but I was still clinging desperately to the illusion of a happy ever after with the man I adored, so I said, “He doesn’t love her, he loves me. You don’t know what it’s like for him, having to lead a double life.”
At that point she pushed me away, stood up and, with a shake of her head, left me sprawled on the floor of the gallery. I knew she was frustrated with me, but I thought she was going to come back with a cup of tea and her sympathy for my horrible predicament restored. I waited and waited, but she didn’t come back, so I hauled myself to my feet and went to look for her. She was sitting at my desk and had made tea, but it didn’t look like she was going to offer me any kind words judging by the expression on her face.
“Are you all cried out?” she asked