Why did I have to go to the stupid school in this stupid village? I wanted to go back to London and my friends and my school and my old house and my dad.
And I would find a way, I thought, as I picked up the school top I’d thrown on the floor the day before. I would.
Chapter Three
ELSIE
She hadn’t been able to manage it today – was that part of her life over? The thought made a hand fly to her chest, a heavy weight in her heart. Would she have to give it up? The realisation forced her to finish earlier than she always did. She’d never stopped that early, never, but she’d needed to get away from there and the worries that crowded in on her. Was she too old now? Her hand shook as she placed the kettle on the hob, water sploshing out of the spout and making her curse into the small space.
‘I do mean it!’ she replied to the voice that wasn’t there. ‘I do bloody mean it!’
Tears pricked at her eyes as she rubbed at her hip. She wouldn’t return to the GP with her sympathetic tilt of the head and her irritating soft voice, her office plastered with photos of smiling grown-up children.
The shriek of the kettle reflected the noise she wanted to make sometimes: a loud, long, jarring wail.
She didn’t want to do anything else; everything was ruined. And yet the thought of abandoning her daily rituals overwhelmed her and she found herself swilling out the polka-dot teapot, nibbling half-heartedly at a cheese and cucumber sandwich and locating her purse for the second walk of the day into the village. The boy would need something for tea tomorrow – she had promised his mother. She felt a churning nervousness at the thought but a promise was a promise.
The high street was a little busier this time, a cornflower-blue sky dotted with wispy white clouds overhead, the wind still containing a surprising chill. She pulled her coat tighter and muttered as she passed a dog on a lead relieving himself against a lamppost, his bald owner chatting obliviously on a mobile phone. Everyone always yabbering on a phone.
The small café bustled with life, two women sat at one of the tables outside, one of them familiar but Elsie wasn’t sure how, nodded as she passed them. The bakery on the corner had a small queue to get inside, the chemist next door was practically empty. Elsie pushed open the door of the butchers and headed straight to the bell on the counter. A man in a three-quarter length white coat and a peaked white hat caught her eye just as she pressed down on the bell. He was young, a smooth chin and a glimpse of blond hair under his hat.
‘How can I help you today?’
‘Six sausages, please.’ She jabbed a finger at the pork and leek sausages piled up on a tray behind the glass and waited as he snipped the ends, weighed them and rolled them up into paper, sealing them with the price label.
She had her purse out by the time he asked, ‘Is that everything?’
Nodding briskly, she held out a hand for the sausages. ‘Everything.’
‘There you are.’ His smile wavered as she accepted them and held out the correct money. ‘Oh, let me get these gloves off.’ The young butcher fumbled as an older man peered round the doorway behind him.
‘Elsie!’ he said, moving inside to stand next to the younger man. ‘I thought I heard your voice. How can we help you today? Oh, I see Darren here has sorted you out,’ he added, his voice booming as ever as he looked at the sausages she had now placed in her basket.
‘Mr Porter,’ Elsie greeted him formally.
‘I’ve told you a hundred times: it’s Stanley. You must have bought three hundred Scotch eggs from me now and that certainly earns you the right. To your mother I was Stan, remember?’
Elsie pressed her lips together, the reply lost somewhere inside her.
Mr Porter didn’t appear to notice. ‘Excellent woman, Rosa. Excellent,’ he said, always a soft spot for her mother. He had told Elsie once before that every year her mother had made them jam for Christmas. ‘Everyone, Elsie, even the boys in the back, she’d think of everyone.’ Other times she would bring him cough medicine if he’d had a tickly throat the day before. ‘Always thinking of others in her gentle way.’
For a second Elsie wanted to halt everything and ask him to tell her another story, another longed-for memory of her mother. But grief made her slower in her response and the moment passed. ‘Well, lookie now, Elsie, Darren here just got engaged, did he tell you? Asked her to marry him on a hill in Wales!’ He laughed, Darren’s smooth skin turning pink as he slapped him on the back.
‘How nice,’ Elsie said, knowing engagements were a cause for celebration, knowing why she couldn’t feel the same joy. She glanced at her watch in an effort to show she needed to get on. She wouldn’t normally bother with that courtesy but Mr Porter was a little different.
‘The ring doesn’t fit though, Elsie. She’s had to wear it on the wrong finger, hasn’t she, Darren?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Oh, oh well,’ Elsie said, her hand squeezing the handle of her basket.
‘I told him, Elsie, I said, you should have checked her other rings, made sure. But did he listen? Did he, Elsie? No, of course he didn’t. The young never do – am I right? It’s up to us to see them right, isn’t it?’ He smiled, displaying the gap between his two front teeth as he waited for her to respond.
‘Well, I must get on.’
‘Always somewhere to be, haven’t you? Well, I like busy women, ask a busy person – am I right, Elsie?’
A busy person. Yes, yes, she was busy. She always had things to do.
She had moved across to the door by the time he had finished the sentence. ‘Well, goodbye then,’ she said over her shoulder.
‘You take care, Elsie, you come and see us again soon,’ Mr Porter called as she left, a new customer waiting outside the door to come in.
She could hear Mr Porter say something to Darren, his big laugh following her as she pushed back out onto the high street.
Walking home she was reminded to pop into the chemist and before she had checked through the glass, she had opened the door, a bell tinkling her arrival. Her shoulders drooped as she saw who was stood behind the counter, dressed in a plum tunic that clashed with the shade of her cropped hair, a name badge tilted above her left breast: ‘JUNE’.
It was too late for Elsie to back out now – she had seen her. Elsie felt her insides squeeze as she moved down the first aisle searching for what she needed, the empty shop smelling of antiseptic, her footsteps loud as she felt the other woman watching.
She approached the counter, the small pack clutched in one hand.
‘You haven’t been in in a while. Lozenges last time, wasn’t it?’ June said, leaning over the counter to glance directly into Elsie’s basket. ‘Been to the butcher,’ she carried on, seeing the sausages wrapped in paper. She lowered her voice, ‘How is Stan? Did he look well?’
‘Fine,’ Elsie replied.
June took a step back, mouth puckering, ‘No stomach problem?’ She gave a quick glance to the back, where her younger male colleague was scanning shelves of different coloured pills. ‘Obviously, we are always confidential about our customers, but I can’t help caring. It’s a real weakness, my friends say to me. ‘June, they say,’ she placed a hand on her chest, brushing the name badge, ‘You’re just all heart.’
Elsie gave her a thin smile and handed over the packet of plasters – her fingers often needed plasters, and the thought reminded her of earlier that day. She felt the gloom descend once more.
June took the rectangular packet, her mouth pressed together, eyes smaller as she swiped it through the till and handed them back. Plasters are not really juicy enough to gossip about perhaps, Elsie thought, or was it because she didn’t agree that June was all heart? Elsie still lamented the time, years ago but still fresh in her mind, when she had asked the other chemist for some cream for something delicate and the next time Elsie had appeared, June had pointed out the ring cushions. The cheek!
Elsie paid, placing the pack in her basket next to the sausages. June to
ok the change out of the till and then held the coins hostage in her palm as she looked at Elsie.
‘I’m off on a girls’ weekend,’ she said, one side of her mouth lifting. ‘Celebrating my birthday. Not a special one, mind,’ she added, clearly not wanting Elsie to escape just yet, the shop empty. ‘Funny, isn’t it,’ she mused, ‘to think we’re the same age?’ She patted her short, cropped hair, tinged with a deep red dye. ‘I remember we both had our bowel cancer screening at the same time.’
Elsie felt her cheeks grow hot as she stood there, unable to respond. Was June really talking about bowels? Was she suggesting they couldn’t possibly be close in age? She bit her lip, just wanting her change and wondering whether she could simply turn around and leave. Was this exchange worth sixty pence?
‘Women of our age,’ June began, ‘we need to live a little. You haven’t really left the village, have you?’ She didn’t pause, within the same breath adding, ‘Later this year, I’m going on a cruise. The ship has a nude sunbathing section.’
‘I—’ Elsie wanted a hole to appear in the pharmacy floor.
‘I’m thinking I might try it, but then you never know who goes on these things, bu—’
‘Could I have my change, please?’ Elsie interrupted.
June’s mouth pressed together again. ‘Someone’s got no time to chat,’ she said sniffily.
Elsie didn’t bother to reply, simply dropping the coins into her wallet and placing it back in her basket, turning and leaving as quickly as she could. She set off for home, wishing she had bought the plasters on her supermarket shop.
Normally the conversation might have been enough for her to brood on for the rest of the day but today was Wednesday and that was always a little bit different.
It was the first thought that cheered her since all the upset.
When she got home she didn’t wait to boil the kettle; the clock told her she was a little behind her usual schedule already and her mind itched with all the things she wanted to say. Placing the sausages in the fridge and her basket on the dresser, she hurried through to the living room.
The room looked as it always did, the figurines all wiped down yesterday – a job that took a while, not because there were so many but because Elsie often paused to recall the memories of her mother that they conjured. ‘He is quite, quite ugly!’ Elsie had said, cleaning a goose clutching a daisy that her mother had been given by her father after he’d won it in a raffle. ‘But I’m keeping him clean for you.’
The room smelt of the furniture polish she had used on the bookshelves and she felt satisfied everything was ready as she moved across the room to the desk. It hadn’t been touched at all since last Wednesday. She never did. She pulled out the chair now, the fabric of the seat so faded it was hard to tell the original pattern, but she would never have it upholstered. Elsie sat down gingerly, her body sighing with relief. Everything ached these days.
The whole useless day melted away as she focused on the task in hand, the one ritual that she enjoyed.
The purple fountain pen rested on top of the smooth cream pile of paper to her right and she moved it, licking one finger and peeling the top sheet of paper away. Sitting up straight, she looked at the small framed picture in front of her, where her mother’s and her own head poked out of the holes in a seaside peep board. The picture always made her smile. What would she write today? Which memory would she choose?
Bending her head over the page, she removed the lid from the pen and wrote the date at the top of the crisp sheet of paper. Then, rolling her shoulders, she began in earnest:
We…
Writing plunged her into another world, a world of memories. How she loved to relive some of those days, watching the purple ink spell out those happy times. Her writing was naturally tidy but at times her mind raced ahead, the letters spilling from the pen before she would straighten up and slow it down.
Today was no exception. Everything else faded around her as she formed the words, feeling her heart fill with love. The sounds of the carriage clock on the mantelpiece, the occasional car passing outside, the far-off bang or clatter through her walls from next door: it all disappeared. For an hour on a Wednesday it was simply her and her purple fountain pen, a clear cream sheet of thick paper and her cherished memories.
The last few sentences were crammed together towards the bottom today, the neat, large ‘x’ squeezed into the corner as she signed off. Then she sat back, the letter finished, staring at the two full pages, a small, sad smile on her face.
She would seal the envelope, get up, put her coat back on and make the third visit out of her house that day, this time to the postbox in the lane around the corner. Buried into the wall, the red façade almost obscured by ivy, she would push the letter through that gaping hole, imagining it already in the hands of the special person named on the envelope.
You always made me feel I could do anything. Hands clamped either side of my face: ‘You’re so special, Elsie.’ Your hands were warm, your grip assured, transferring that strength to me.
The expression as you looked into my eyes: serious, believing. And although I had always felt so ordinary, I realised I was extraordinary to someone else.
It felt wonderful to have someone in my corner, with such faith in me. In those moments I felt as if I could scale mountains, fight enemies, discover a path to happiness: leave our house, our little village. Even after the start I’d had, it made me feel as if anything was possible.
Chapter Four
BILLY
Mum hadn’t spoken to me the whole way to the school and I scuffed and dragged the toe of my new black leather shoes along the ground – which I knew she hated because it ruined them and we couldn’t afford new ones – but even when I did that, she didn’t say anything. It’s so unfair. I was the one who should be in a sulk, but she was still cross that I lied to her about being ill. When we left the house, she told me if I’d had a fever of 106, I’d be dead. I’d bitten back that I wished I was and after that, she didn’t speak to me the whole way there.
It’s not the teachers or the work or anything and I suppose the school is a bit nicer than my London one – you could fit about eight of my old playgrounds into this one and they have a field too, with football goals and everything, but that’s like the only good thing. It’s the other children. Well, not all of them – it’s Daniel. Daniel and his little group. I pushed my fringe down, wishing it was longer and, well, less crap. Bet Daniel will comment. My chest felt all squeezed as I thought of him and when we got to the school gates, I stopped, feeling the tears in my throat again.
Why didn’t Mum say something at least?
She just buzzed, once, on the box next to the reception and then marched through the glass sliding doors with me behind her.
‘I’m sorry we’re late, Mrs Holmes,’ she said, her voice a bit posher – she did that a bit in this village. Everyone I knew in London talked like us but they spoke differently here, as Daniel liked to constantly tell me. He’d do this stupid impression of my voice, it didn’t sound like me, but when he did it, everyone would laugh. ‘It won’t happen again.’
Mum didn’t tell Mrs Holmes the reason we were late. She hated lying and she wouldn’t want me to get in more trouble, even if she was cross with me.
Mrs Holmes didn’t say much, just waved me through. ‘You know the way, Billy, break time soon,’ she said, her eyes crinkling behind the glasses sitting on her nose. She was like all grandmas in the picture books Mum read me when I was little. She always kept biscuits in a tin on her desk next to the big box of tissues and she knew everyone in the school – apparently, she had worked on reception for, like, a hundred years.
I didn’t wave at Mum or tell her ‘bye’ or that I loved her.
Stopping outside the classroom doors I could see a lot of heads bent over the tables and I knew I couldn’t stay outside the door for ever. Knocking quietly, I stepped inside and Mrs Carter looked up from her desk and gave me a wonky smile, her blond hair i
n a plait.
‘Alright, Billy, I had you down as absent.’
Some of the heads looked up and stared at me and I wished I hadn’t pretended to be ill that morning and had just come in with everyone else. This was so much worse.
‘IthoughtIwasillbutIwasn’t,’ I mumbled, shuffling across to the table in front of her desk. I’d sat there for the first few weeks, probably because I was the only new one in the school and Mrs Carter had wanted to check on me.
I could see Daniel in the second row, smirking at me with his stupid mouth. He would love me being in trouble. I buried my head in my rucksack and put my pencil case on the table. Mrs Carter came and crouched next to my desk, sliding the worksheet across the surface.
‘Here,’ she whispered, ‘we’re working in silence until break. You missed a lot of the explanation but see how you get on, it’s some questions on the poems we’ve been reading.’
I bit my lip and nodded, wanting to just get my head down, feeling eyes burning into the back of my head from every direction.
When the bell went, I stayed hunched over the sheet, digging my pencil into the page as someone nudged the table behind me, scraping sounds on the floor as people pushed back their chairs, low conversations mumbled, the quiet ping of a banned mobile phone. Daniel and his groupies all had them. I wished I did then I could message Liam and maybe Dad, just to check that he does miss us. I bet he’d be nicer if he knew we might leave again. I bet things would be different.
As everyone filed out, some muttering thanks, Mrs Carter called out, telling us to put our names on the top of the worksheet. ‘I don’t always know your handwriting.’
The Garden of Lost Memories Page 2