The Curious Heart of Ailsa Rae

by Stephanie Butland

  Actually, I was doing a clever thing. BraveHeart/BlueHeart.

  From: Ailsa

  To: Seb

  Aha! Maybe Mel Gibson *is* my real father, then.

  But just in case he isn’t, I’m googling ‘David Twelvetrees’ for what is probably going to be the shortest search for a parent in history.

  From: Seb

  To: Ailsa

  You don’t have to get in touch with him if you don’t want to, you know. If you do, do. If you don’t, don’t. Your blog’s amazing, but you’re better.

  From: Ailsa

  To: Seb

  I do.

  From: Seb

  To: Ailsa

  Not my business. Understood.

  So, rehearsals start on 2 July. I hope we can see a bit of each other.

  From: Ailsa

  To: Seb

  Won’t Meredith need your attention? And the others? I mean – isn’t it all intense and – actorish?

  From: Seb

  To: Ailsa

  I think it will be/can be intense, yes, and it has to be, because you have to trust each other. Like a massively complicated tango. On ice.

  But the rehearsals are going to be bitty, because Roz (Bulgaria) has to accommodate everyone trying to fit in day jobs, and even though Romeo is, obviously, the most important character in the play, she won’t need me all the time. She’s offered to put me up.

  Meredith can look after herself. Roz offered her accommodation as well but I think she’s staying in a hotel.

  From: Ailsa

  To: Seb

  It would be nice to spend some time with you.

  I might not be great company. I’ve never really fallen out with my mother before. Not seriously. But it’s like things have frozen over between us.

  And I didn’t even ask about your eye.

  From: Seb

  To: Ailsa

  It will be more than nice, BlueHeart, if last time is anything to go by.

  I could stay over sometimes, if you wanted.

  My eye is OK. More stitches out next week. I think the light’s getting a bit easier. When things change little by little it’s hard to tell.

  7 July, 2017

  This Time Last Year

  ‘I’ve got good news,’ Hayley says with a grin, and then adds, quickly, ‘not a heart.’

  Ailsa has been dozing. She dozes a lot, at the moment, pretending to herself that it’s the heat but knowing it’s the creeping failure of her body that’s turning her into someone who can barely face getting out of bed. She sits up, and Hayley is there straight away to adjust her pillows.

  ‘What, then?’ Ailsa cannot imagine any other good news.

  ‘I’ve got you a weekend pass. We can take a trip.’

  Ailsa’s torn between wanting to go – the sky, seen from the hospital garden, isn’t big or broad or uncluttered enough to satisfy her dying heart – and the sheer effort involved in standing upright, unhooking from drips and monitors, leaving the room. But her mother’s face tells her she needs to pretend. During his last week, Lennox had said, ‘It’s not about me anymore.’ Ailsa knows what he means, now.

  ‘Fantastic! Where do you fancy?’

  ‘It’s up to you, hen.’

  Ailsa finds a laugh. ‘Disney? I could meet Mickey Mouse.’ She stops herself, just in time, from making a joke about that being what all the dying kids want to do. Lennox would have got it.

  ‘I dinnae think we could afford the insurance.’

  ‘OK,’ Ailsa says, ‘how about —’ And then her breathing starts to speed up with panic, because she realises that what she’s being asked to do, in all probability, is decide where she’ll go on the last trip of her life. The more ill she gets, the more the likelihood of a heart arriving in time diminishes.

  Hayley takes her hand. ‘It’s OK, Ailsa. Slow it down.’

  ‘Where do you want to go, Mum?’ But Hayley looks away, and Ailsa can see that she has the same weight of decision-making on her. Where is the last place you would choose to go with your daughter?

  ‘We should ask your blog.’

  Ailsa laughs. ‘You don’t approve of the blog, remember.’

  ‘Aye, well,’ light tone, but a pain in Hayley’s eyes that Ailsa can’t bear to look at, ‘I dinnae have the head space to decide either. This time next year, you won’t be needing a blog to make your decisions.’

  Lennox’s voice, in Ailsa’s head: That’s true, either way.

  From: David

  Sent: 7 July, 2018

  To: Ailsa

  Subject: Good to hear from you

  Dear Ailsa,

  What a surprise to hear from you. A good surprise, that is. Before I replied I looked you up. I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you looking so alive and well. I’ve read your blog from beginning to end. What a time you’ve had.

  I don’t know what your mother has told you but I won’t start with the past. I’ll start with the now. That seems best.

  I’m 54 and I live in Leatherhead in Surrey. I work for a bank and I’m married to Gemma. We met when I moved to Guildford, around the time you were born – we worked in the same branch. We have two boys, George and Thomas, who are 17 and 15. George is very keen on his music and we are trying to persuade him to go to university, but all he really wants to do is play in his band. We have no idea where his talent comes from. Gemma and I are music fans but have no skill. Thomas is severely dyslexic and loves animals and consequently we have a real menagerie at home – mostly animals that he rescues, although he does have a Labrador of his own. He volunteers at an animal shelter at the weekends. Gemma has three older sisters and we have such a big extended family that we hire a church hall on Boxing Day so that we can all get together!

  I’ve spoken to Gemma and she agrees that it is important that I come to see you. In case you are wondering, you have never been a secret from her.

  Guildford to Edinburgh is something of a journey (six hours by train, with two changes!) but I am happy to do it. Our diaries are quite complicated, with the boys’ activities and Gemma being in an am-dram group. I play golf too, though Gemma says it’s just me making an excuse to get some peace! If you can let me know when is a good time for you I will try to get myself organised. It’s probably best if you send me two or three options.

  With my very best wishes,

  David (Twelvetrees)

  www.myblueblueheart.blogspot.co.uk

  10 July, 2018

  What Now?

  Tomorrow, I’m going to tango. And I love tango, for so many reasons. I love the music, which has more of a pulse than a beat, because in tango music there is no drum. I love that all I have to do is put one foot in front of the other and listen to see what my partner is telling me with the way he or she moves their body. I love the concentration of it: there’s no room for anything else to crowd my brain. So it’s a sort of rest. And I love that Apple and I started learning at the same time. It feels as though we’re equal. I feel like one person when I’m dancing.

  And I don’t often feel like one person.

  This is what my head is (mostly like) – it’s like there’s a conversation going on in there, every damn minute, between IA (Inspirational Ailsa) and EA (Everyday Ailsa).

  IA: Hey! Let’s do a thing! Let’s do a cool thing!

  EA: I’m tired. I want some chocolate.

  IA: You’re not tired! You don’t want chocolate! Let’s make today worth something!

  EA: OK, what shall we do?

  IA: I don’t know! But just think of all the medical research and effort that went into keeping you alive! All the people who helped!

  EA: That makes me feel as if nothing I could do today is good enough.

  IA: You have a dead person’s heart!

  EA: That doesn’t help, either.

  Apple: Yeah. That was really tactless, actually.

  I have no idea whether this is normal. I think it probably is. I know I ought to go and talk to someone about it, but, well, I haven’t, because I
also know what the answer is. Because, somewhere in the mix is SA (Sensible Ailsa) and she says: Keep going. It’s early days. It’s going to take a while for everything to shake down. You were some sort of ill for most of twenty-eight years. Plus, your personal life has got a bit complicated. Give yourself a chance to get used to some sort of well. Be as gentle with yourself as you were when you only had three quarters of a heart. You’re making progress, but you just can’t see it.

  So, right now, Ailsa and The Other Ailsas are going dancing. They need to get some practice in, because they’re going to be taking part in a show. Oh yes they are.

  Poll for today: what’s the best way to spend time with someone – someone who might be important in your life – when you’re meeting them for the first time, and you’re not sure how you’ll get on?

  I’m giving you a week.

  GO FOR A WALK: It will disguise any awkward silences and you don’t have to look at each other.

  HAVE A MEAL: At least you’ll know for sure if you never want to see them again.

  BRING A FRIEND: It will diffuse things and you can see each other in a setting where it’s easier to be relaxed.

  ASK THEM OVER: You’ll feel more confident on your own territory and you can ask them to leave if it doesn’t go well.

  7 shares

  39 comments

  Results:

  WALK

  60%

  MEAL

  22%

  FRIEND

  18%

  HOME

  0%

  11 July 2018

  The actors form a clutch of leaning-in attention on Roz in one corner of the room. Her bright blonde hair is shining under one of the spotlights in the ceiling, her hands working, making circles in the air, then pointing up, making an encircling gesture. Finally, she raises her voice to say something not quite audible to Ailsa, the actors all laugh, and the group breaks apart, standing and stretching, hoisting bags onto their shoulders, checking phones.

  Today has been the first day of the acting company working with Edie and Eliza. Ailsa tries to see how it’s gone, but she can’t tell: the Tango Sisters are always smiling, and she can’t imagine they’d ever slump, round their shoulders, no matter how many two-left-footed actors they had to train.

  ‘Edie says they’re invited to stay,’ Venetia says, ‘and about half of them said that they will.’

  Ailsa nods. She knew this – the first bit, anyway, via a text from Seb earlier – but she doesn’t say so. ‘We need to start getting used to each other,’ she says.

  ‘We haven’t got a lot of time to train them up, for sure,’ Venetia says, with a wink, and Ailsa laughs at the thought that she might know more than – well, anyone – about tango. She recalls Seb’s suggestion that the two of them dance at the end of the read-through: it seems as ludicrous now as it did a month ago, even if she has had four more classes and been to two milongas in the meantime.

  Seb puts his arm around the shoulder of a stocky older man (Capulet? The Friar? Though some of them are doubling, so he could well be both) and says something that provokes a rumbling chortle. The older man slaps his palm against Seb’s chest before disengaging and walking towards the exit; Ailsa finds herself wincing at the slap, her shoulders coming forward, and feels as though Apple moves backwards, towards her spine. A chest is a fragile place, still.

  Seb speaks to Roz and then to Meredith, who is almost as tall as him, and has a sort of gangliness that doesn’t come across in photographs, or maybe is converted to ‘willowy’ by camera angle and clothes that aren’t leggings and a T-shirt. Her face is serious, concentrated, and so is Seb’s as he speaks to her. Then the two of them are walking towards the top of the stairs down to the bar, and Ailsa ducks her head as they pass, because she’s not sure what to do.

  Jesus, Ailsa. Get a grip. She stands up just after they pass. ‘Seb,’ she says, ‘welcome back.’

  He turns, and Meredith with him; he smiles, kiss-kiss, a tiny rub of stubble. ‘Hello you.’

  ‘Hello.’ He does what he always does in person – he is so himself that there’s nothing to do but to trust him, and to be herself in return.

  He holds her by the shoulders for a heartbeat/blink, and then, ‘Meredith, this is Ailsa. She’s my favourite blue-hearted bus fan.’

  ‘Hello,’ Meredith says with a smile, as though this is a normal way to introduce someone, or as though she wasn’t listening. Ailsa, at work, is starting to perfect the art of communication that slides over her instead of going in – conversations about the rain, the tourists, sport – so she doesn’t mind.

  ‘Hi,’ she says, ‘it’s good to meet you.’

  Meredith nods, and turns back to Seb. ‘I need to go.’

  ‘I’ll walk you out,’ Seb says. And then, to Ailsa, ‘Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be back to take a good hard look at your ochos.’

  myblueblueheart.blogspot.co.uk

  12 July, 2018

  A Question of Country

  Hello, hello, my friends.

  Oh, it’s good to come to a blog post and say, sorry, this is a bit late, but I’ve been busy. Rather than sorry, this is a bit late, but I’ve been too ill to keep my eyes open for more than three seconds at a time.

  I’m taking a very small part in an Edinburgh show this year, and it’s having quite an impact on me. I’ll be honest, for a while I was in two minds about taking part at all, because I thought I might not be good enough, and because I’ve never really put myself Out There on a stage before, and been myself, with people looking at me. (Doctors on ward rounds having a look at your scar doesn’t count.) But – I’m doing it, and I’m not sure when or how I definitely decided, I just got a bit swept into it. Which, I suppose, is a normal life thing. And it’s absolutely fantastic.

  I’ve been practising my dancing. I’ve been going to rehearsals where I learn to shout. (Yes, there is a special way to do it, so you don’t strain your voice.) And I’ve been part of a team for the first time in my life, I think. When I was ill I had a big team of people looking after me, but that’s not the same. I like working towards something, with other people, and being just the tiniest part of a bigger thing. I like having things in common with others that are more than illness and the misery that comes with it. And anyway, being ill is lonely, even if someone else is being ill beside you.

  So: life’s good, and busy, and I think I might be feeling a bit – normal, but in a good way.

  Apart from working, and dancing, I’m thinking seriously about my next career move (another nice, normal activity). And it’s based on two things:

  1. When you are ill, people protect you. They don’t always tell you everything about things, because they don’t want you to worry. They simplify the truth, because they want you to sleep at night. I’ve been finding out what the world is really like, now I am eligible for the full picture. Now that I’m not struggling, I can see the way that others have struggled.

  2. The world’s not fair and I know I’m supposed to grow up and accept that at some point, but I don’t think I ever will. People who know they are dying, and dying painfully, can’t legally commit suicide (unless they can afford a trip to Switzerland). If you consent to transplant and your next of kin doesn’t agree, your wishes aren’t respected. Those are two things that need to be fair. That’s before we get to sick people who don’t have access to the medication they need, parents who don’t take their responsibilities seriously . . .

  Apple has given me the chance to look up and around and see the full picture, and I don’t like what I see. I know that many people are good people, with good natures, but that isn’t always enough. So I’m going to do something about it.

  It turns out you can’t get in to Superhero University if you’re on immunosuppressants (too many radioactive superbugs about) so I’m going to take my as-well-as-can-be-expected body and donate it to the law, instead.

  It’s a long road. I have to do a conversion degree, and that’s only the very beginning.

&n
bsp; I’ll be able to take out some loans, and maybe get some grants. I’ll have to support myself, too. I’m not complaining. But realistically, I need to study somewhere close to home. So I have two choices. I could study in-person and do a conversion that fits me to do (or at least learn to do) anything to do with Scottish law. Or I can do an Open University course that fits me for UK law. The question is which? I feel as though I should be able to do good anywhere. I think Scotland is my home. But that might only be because there’s still an umbilical cord tethering me to the hospital, telling me that if I stray too far, then Apple will just switch herself off, or I won’t remember to take my tablets, or – something will happen. Maybe this feeling will wear off, like the beard did. (Well, it was removed. But it doesn’t grow back anymore.) Or maybe I like it here. I think I like it here.

  Help me.

  I’ll give you a week.

  CLAIM YOUR HERITAGE: Be Scottish. Trust your instincts. Study in real life with real people. You’ll always find opportunities. Even if you move somewhere else you can still practise Scottish law. That’s what the Internet is for.

  BE BOLD: Take fresh new steps. Your horizons can be broader now. And if you study with the OU, then you’ve got more flexibility to work and earn. And it’s not like you never meet people in real life anymore.

  2 shares

  11 comments

  Results:

  EDINBURGH

  27%

  OU

  73%

  21st July, 2018

  ‘God, it’s good to be here,’ Seb says. ‘I’ve missed the old place.’