Will You Remember Me?

by Amanda Prowse

  ‘Nothing?’ Poppy shook her head. ‘How dare you say it was nothing? He is my husband, we have a life, a history and you have damaged it. That day was a symbol of what we had achieved, how far we had come.’ Poppy stopped, briefly pictured their dingy Walthamstow flats from years ago, the pub on their wedding day. ‘But I can’t think about Peg in her special frock or Maxy dancing on the spot with his little waistcoat on, not even the bloody buffet, none of it. It’s like it’s all disappeared and all that is left is that image of you and him.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Her voice was a whisper.

  Poppy shook her head; she didn’t want to hear sorry. ‘And the worst thing, the very worst thing is that I am dying. I am dying, Jo, and you know that.’ Poppy beat her flattened palm down onto the tabletop. Two women on the adjacent table looked over in the direction of the noise.

  Jo’s tears came now, falling over mottled cheeks and into her twitching mouth.

  Poppy wasn’t done. ‘All my kids will have is the memory of me, the idea of me. And that party was supposed to make special memories. Instead, they saw me crying and had to leave before they got any cake.’ Poppy gritted her teeth as she remembered her beautiful cake. ‘They heard me screaming at their dad and that made them cry. You took that wonderful memory away from them and you took that day away from me.’

  ‘I’m so sorry…’

  Poppy looked out of the window and mentally reloaded, aware of Jo’s snivelling into a paper napkin.

  ‘Are you having an affair with my husband?’

  ‘No!’ Jo looked Poppy in the eye, emphatic.

  Poppy sighed, gathering her thoughts as she stared at the woman sitting opposite her, the woman who knew everything about her; everything. The woman she had sat and counselled over Danny. Poppy rubbed her brow. ‘I have felt sorry for you, worried about you! You’ve eaten at my table, sat my kids on your lap and given them baths.’ Poppy shook her head as these thoughts formed images in her head. ‘I never, ever in a million years would have thought that you’d have done that to me, to us. Especially not now.’

  ‘I love you, Poppy. You know that. And the kids.’ Jo let her head fall on her chest and gulped air that seemed to fuel her distress. ‘You know how I feel about them. They… they were the closest I ever got to being a mum.’ Jo continued to address the table. ‘I miss them.’

  Poppy remembered their conversation only weeks ago, how she’d asked Jo to be part of Peg and Max’s futures: ‘You will stay in their lives, won’t you, Jo? Look after them, be there if they need someone to talk to?’ Poppy watched now how Jo’s face crumpled as she cried without restraint. She felt the tiniest fissure appear in her armour. It was true, Jo did love the kids. ‘I will love them for you, Poppy, always,’ she’d said, and Poppy believed her, even now.

  Poppy felt her heart rate slow. She was calmer now. Peg and Max would need all the friends they could get. Would it be so hard to forgive Jo for their sakes? She drew breath to speak, but as she did so, the image of Jo’s hair came into her head, falling sideways in a curtain, her head twisted to the side to avoid his nose, the two of them meeting at opposite angles. It was as if she had seen it only a second ago: Jo stooping slightly in her heels, her hand on Martin’s back. It was enough to fuel her anger once again. Gathering her bag, she stood abruptly and yanked her coat from the back of the chair. ‘Well they don’t miss you. The only thing they will remember about you is that you upset their mum.’

  Jo looked up with eyes red and swollen, her breathing erratic, fingers fidgeting with the napkin that had rolled itself into little worms beneath her fingers. ‘Poppy, I—’

  ‘No, save it, Jo. There is nothing you can say that can make up for what you have done. And trust me, if I ever see you within five feet of my family, any of my family, ever again, you’ll regret it. And remember, I have absolutely nothing to lose.’

  Poppy saw Jo’s eyes widen as she turned on her heel and swept from the café.

  She walked along Butcher Row, her vision blurred by the rain and the tears that misted her eyes. Her hands shook as she punched her fingers into the screen of her phone.

  ‘I’m ready for pick-up,’ she mumbled, when Claudia, who was parked round the corner, answered the call.

  Without warning, the ground rushed up towards her as a man’s voice echoed in her ear. ‘Are you okay? Oh God, I think she’s fainted…’

  She felt the cold pavement graze her cheek and welcomed the blackness that removed her from the world.

  Twenty-Three

  Poppy had insisted on getting a taxi to the airport. The cost was the last thing on her mind; she would have given her last penny not to have to spend hours in the car next to Martin. She could hardly bear to look at him, let alone sit in such close proximity. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t dilute the bitter taste of anger that filled her mouth.

  She had packed as though he had never been invited. His newly acquired trunks, sandals and pile of T-shirts were still in their carrier bags, abandoned on the bedroom floor. He hovered guiltily in the corners of the room, too afraid to interact and trying to make himself small, invisible. This suited Poppy just fine. She had deliberated long and hard over the email she’d sent to Simon and Kate and after four deleted attempts, in which she’d tried to sound upbeat and perky, had decided to be as honest as she was able. Martin and I are having difficulties and I will be travelling alone. I hope you understand.

  Their reply indicated that they did indeed understand, but couldn’t she put the ticket to some use?

  Poppy looked up from her seat in the departure lounge, her hand luggage by her side, to see Peg standing in front of two tall male pilots. They were dressed in their full regalia, complete with shiny shoes, and peaked caps sitting squarely on their heads. Poppy strained to hear the conversation.

  ‘So, yes, I’m going to be a pilot too.’ Peg nodded.

  ‘That’s good to hear. Are you going to join the RAF like I did?’ one of them asked. ‘That can be a good route to becoming a pilot.’

  ‘No, I don’t think so. My dad’s a soldier and he says the army is the best and the RAF is for softies and lightweights. But I might – does it pay you a lot of money?’ Peg’s head was tilted back on her shoulders so she could converse face to face.

  Poppy cringed and sank low in her seat.

  The men laughed. ‘The money’s not bad,’ the other pilot piped up, ‘but not as good as British Airways.’

  ‘British Airways? Right, I’ll remember that.’ Peg nodded again.

  ‘We’ve got to dash, but safe flying, Peg.’

  ‘You too!’

  The men saluted Peg, who returned the honour. She came over and plonked herself down in the spare seat next to her mum and pulled out her magazine.

  ‘Who were you talking to?’ Poppy asked.

  ‘Oh, just some other pilots,’ Peg answered dismissively, without lifting her nose from the article on ten ways to wear long hair this summer.

  Poppy smiled at her confident daughter, who had insisted on wearing her summer sandals, floppy hat and heart-shaped sunglasses to the airport.

  She declined to answer the calls from Martin as she waited for the gate to be called and it was surprisingly easy to delete his text messages without reading them. She was in no mood to hear the same wailing apology issued in any number of variants. Every time she heard his words of remorse she saw the image of him and Jo locked together in the cloakroom. His eyes were closed, her hand on the small of his back and despite his previous words of explanation, he looked far from coerced. The memory of it made her feel physically sick; she suspected it always would.

  Poppy was aware of the hum of noise around her. She watched excited families chasing each other, hauling bags on wheels behind them and popping into Boots for last-minute bits and pieces. She felt detached, unable to engage in the here and now, unable to focus on anything but the finality of her illness. It clouded everything. She couldn’t even think about her marriage, or about anything practical.
It’s like I’m sitting next to a giant ticking clock, she thought. And I just want to scream loudly to make it stop. Everything had become meaningless, spoiled because of what lay ahead.

  Peg’s shouts drew her into the present. ‘Can we, Mum? Can we? Can we?’ She bounced on her seat and pointed at the buggy that had stopped by their side.

  Peg loved the kudos of sitting in a buggy and being driven to the gate, waving and smiling at everyone they overtook. Poppy, however, hated the attention and tried to hide her face. She insisted on managing the stairs alone and didn’t look back as she laboriously climbed the steps of the jumbo jet. Clipping her seatbelt into place, she kicked off her shoes and turned to look at her travelling companion.

  ‘Are you going to watch a movie, Peg?’ Poppy flicked through the in-flight magazine. ‘Look, they’ve got Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2!’

  Peg sat with her back ramrod straight, her eyes fixed on the screen in the back of the seat in front. ‘I’m not going to watch a movie, Mum. I’m going to watch this for the whole journey.’ She pointed at the moving map that held her attention, running her finger over the aeroplane graphic. ‘I’m going to make out I’m flying it all the way.’ She traced the path it would follow. ‘I’ll take it over the sea and I’ll land it here in St Lucia.’ Peg tapped the screen and looked at her mum and grinned.

  ‘How does it feel, Peg, to think you might fly a plane like this one day?’

  Peg drew a sharp intake of breath. ‘Oh, Mum. It feels… brilliant!’

  Poppy stared at her little girl and for a fraction of a second she saw her daughter older. Her hair was pulled into a tight bun. She was wearing a white short-sleeved shirt with epaulettes on the shoulders and despite her age she still had the same open grin and clear eyes, and a smattering of freckles remained across her nose.

  ‘I’m so proud of everything that you will do, Peg.’ Poppy turned to the screen in front of her, unable to face her daughter, not wanting to douse this happy moment with more tears.

  ‘Is this your first time on a plane too, Mummy?’

  How to answer? Poppy felt a wave of sadness as she pictured the last outbound flight she had taken, thinking of the man she had headed out to save and trying to reconcile the way she felt about him right now.

  ‘No. Actually I’ve flown four times before; two planes out and two back.’

  ‘Was that when you went to bring Daddy home?’ Peg whispered.

  ‘Yep.’ She nodded. ‘As Daddy says, a long, long time ago.’

  Poppy closed her eyes and gripped the arms of her seat. She remembered the smell of nervous sweat lingering inside the plane, being packed in like lambs in transit and the naked fear of being launched into the unknown.

  ‘And Daddy didn’t know you were going to see him at his work, did he?’ Peg leant towards her mum, animated.

  Poppy shook her head. ‘No that’s right, he didn’t.’

  ‘Daddy said you went to bring him home because no one loved him as much as you and no one wanted him to come home as much as you did.’

  Poppy could only nod.

  Peg kicked her legs back and forth and chewed her bottom lip. ‘Did you love him more than anyone else, Mum?’

  ‘Yes.’ Her voice was softened with emotion. She knew what came next.

  Peg gave a small cough. ‘But you don’t love him more than anyone right now, do you, Mum?’ Her eyes were wide as she waited, hoping for her Mum’s denial of this fact.

  ‘I don’t know, Peg. It’s complicated.’

  Peg sighed; it wasn’t quite what she hoped for. ‘If Daddy needed you to go and get him back right now, you would go and get him, wouldn’t you, Mum?’

  Poppy watched her daughter’s chest heave.

  ‘You don’t have to worry about things like that, my love. He’s not going anywhere.’ Poppy patted her daughter’s arm. Neither commented on the evasive nature of her reply.

  Poppy sat in silence, replaying the journey to Camp Bastion over and over in her head. Knowing that her overriding thoughts had been of her husband, mentally reaching out to him, assuring him that she was on her way. Peg’s questions had made her think, what would she do now, given the same set of circumstances?

  Poppy remembered the mix of emotions she’d felt when she arrived in that hot, dusty place, driven on by the single desire to find Martin and bring him home. She opened her eyes and sat forward, shocked at the situation in which they now found themselves, still unsure of the level of his betrayal. She never would have thought it, not her Mart, not in a million years.

  When they touched down at Hewanorra Airport, Poppy held Peg’s hand tightly and they breathed in the hot Caribbean air. The second thing she noticed was the bright, bright blue of the St Lucian sky, a colour she had never seen before. It made everything beautiful.

  ‘Look, Peg!’ Poppy pointed into the distance. ‘Palm trees.’

  They stood in the slow, winding queue, fanning their faces with their passports as they snaked their way out past customs. After retrieving their one shared suitcase, which Peg pulled along on its wheels, they ventured out into the bustle of the airport. It was busy. Taxi drivers jostled for position whilst shouting greetings or insults, depending on the recipient. Holiday company reps stood in bright suits, holding up colour-coordinated clipboards. Bored kids, waiting in the heat for relatives, ran and fought among the feet of the travellers.

  ‘It’s so bright, Mum. It’s making me really squinty!’ Peg threw her head back and practically closed her eyes.

  A tall, wide-shouldered black man with braided hair that fell to his shoulders and wearing khaki board shorts and a white polo shirt stepped forward. He stretched out his large hands and pulled Poppy towards him.

  ‘Hello, Poppy. It’s lovely to meet you in real life.’ His voice was a rich, deep baritone. ‘And you must be Peg.’

  ‘I am Peg!’ She sounded surprised.

  Poppy stood back and studied the man, her uncle. It was a moment of clarity, bizarre and comforting. In the flesh he was more handsome than the grainy image on Martin’s laptop had suggested; he was smiley and he had Dot’s eyes.

  ‘That’s so weird!’ she gasped.

  ‘What is?’ Simon asked

  ‘You do look like her – my nan, Dorothea.’

  ‘Do I?’ Simon clung to the words, as sweet as nectar.

  Poppy nodded. ‘Yes! Despite being black and a man, you do, you look a bit like my nan.’

  Simon laughed and scooped up their suitcase as though it were featherweight. ‘Come on, let’s get you home. There’s a cold drink waiting for you.’

  ‘That sounds lovely.’ Poppy smiled, feeling quite at home within two minutes of meeting this man. Her deep fatigue was eclipsed by the excitement of having arrived in a new country; it gave her spirits and body a lift.

  ‘How was your journey? Are you feeling okay?’ Simon paused and studied Poppy’s face.

  ‘My mum’s got a horrible bug; she throws up in the night. But I haven’t got it,’ Peg trilled as she looked overhead at the palm trees.

  ‘Oh, I see.’ Simon was unsure how to respond.

  Poppy shrugged. ‘That about sums it up!’

  Peg piled into the back of Simon’s jeep, while Poppy slowly climbed up into the front seat, every move requiring superhuman effort.

  ‘You okay?’ he asked again.

  ‘Yes, and please don’t worry about me; I look worse than I am. I just need a drink and a spot of rest and I’ll be right as rain.’

  ‘Is that your way of telling me to stop asking if you are okay?’ Simon smiled.

  ‘In a word, yes.’ She smiled back at her uncle.

  The two newcomers gazed with fascination at the landscape that whizzed by to either side of the steep, meandering road that led eventually to their destination, Rodney Bay. Locals by the roadside nearly all raised a hand in recognition of Simon, who smiled and waved back. Poppy stared at the rickety verandas where families congregated to chat and eat in the sunshine. The thick tangle of
jungle vegetation was glossy with raindrops, and crabs the size of frisbees scurried off the road and into the undergrowth at the sound of the engine. More than once Simon had to slow right down in order to veer round a resolute goat, tethered to a tree and standing defiantly in the path of the car.

  Peg sat forward and ran her hands over Simon’s braids, letting them fall through her fingers. ‘Your hair is a bit like girls’ hair, isn’t it?’

  ‘Is it?’ Simon laughed.

  ‘Uh-huh.’ She was quiet for a second. ‘My friend Jade McKeever has been to Majorca and she said it was very hot. Is St Lucia like Majorca?’

  ‘Hmmm, I don’t know, Peg, I’ve never been to Majorca. But it’s hot here, so I expect that is the same.’

  ‘She bought these really cool friendship bracelets back and I’d like to buy some from my holiday.’

  ‘Ah, well I’m sure my wife can help you out there. She’s a bit of an expert at shopping!’

  ‘I can see bananas growing on a tree!’ Peg screamed.

  ‘That’s where all bananas come from, Peg.’ Simon chortled.

  Poppy liked his low, patient tone.

  ‘Not in our house, they don’t. Ours come from the supermarket,’ Peg informed him.

  Simon let out his deep, throaty laugh.

  ‘Do you still like your wife?’ Peg was on a roll.

  ‘Yes.’ Simon chuckled. ‘I like her very much.’

  ‘My mum and dad don’t like each other very much at the moment, that’s why I’m here and not my dad. They used to, but they had a big fight and my mum told him to piss right off and he did.’

  ‘Ah well, these things have a funny way of working out, Peg,’ Simon said.

  ‘I know, but it’s complicated.’ Peg sighed.

  Poppy looked at her lap, speechless. Peg had not only told Simon all their business, but she’d said ‘piss’ to a vicar.

  Peg wasn’t done though. ‘Jade McKeever says it’s because one of them has done sex with someone else, but I’m not sure.’

  Poppy felt her face go scarlet. She turned to the back seat. ‘Well, you can tell Jade McKeever that’s not always the case, Peg. And just to clarify, neither your dad nor I have done sex with someone else.’ She looked at Simon and smiled. ‘Not quite the opening conversation you were expecting, I bet.’