But he hadn’t died, and he’d continued being nice and talking in his custard-voice, and, once, he had even held her hand. She’d been bawling her head off – about her mother, probably, but he didn’t ask his usual questions, just reached out for her hand and clasped it very firm and tight, like he was her anchor.
Hope and Anchor – it had never even struck her before, but that was exactly how things were then: Mary her hope; Christopher her anchor.
Her real mum had been against it from the start, though. ‘I’d no more trot off to a trick-cyclist than swallow a mouthful of wasps. I don’t believe in poking things with a stick. And I’ve had far more crap to deal with in my time than you’ve ever had, my girl! Your life’s a bed of roses, however much you bellyache. When I was your age, my dad thought nothing of giving me a damned good wallop, just because it was Tuesday, or some other damn-fool reason.’
It was always worse for her, of course. So why hadn’t she simply topped herself, instead of having seven kids and making their lives hell?
She’d soon learned to avoid all mention of Mary or Christopher. Her mum would only jump down her throat, and even her friends thought it weird being sent for counselling, like she was completely off her head. And, if they ever found out about Christopher’s wig, they’d all take the piss and die laughing.
She still missed the sessions horribly – you were allowed only ten on the NHS, and you’d need to win the Lottery if you wanted to go private. But at least Christopher and Mary were real, unlike Granby and the fairy cakes. And, in fact, it wasn’t totally impossible for them to come and find her here. Her mum might even have rung them; begun to worry big-time when she saw how late it was. No, that was crap – her mother didn’t worry even small-time. But Christopher and Mary might have had a deep gut-feeling that she was in some sort of trouble and needed sorting out. After all, they knew each other well, so it wasn’t out of the question they could join forces, just for once. In any case, peculiar things did happen – things no one could explain, like ghosts and UFOs and miracles.
It was a sort of miracle to have them sitting with her now – and have them both together, which never happened at the clinic. And they’d brought all the things she needed: blankets and an oil-stove; a powerful torch; a Thermos of hot chocolate; butter for the bread and strawberry jam; even cheese and pickle. They weren’t flustered in the least. That was the point of counsellors: they were trained to be calm, whatever clients did or said. You could swear, or shout, or go berserk – all of which she’d done – but they still had to keep their cool. Sometimes, she’d been a total pain on purpose, to see how much they’d take. But they’d never shouted back, or told her to get lost, or stalked off in a huff.
And, this time, she wouldn’t need to lose them after just ten measly sessions, or want to kill their other clients, so she could have them back, and have them to herself. She was no longer even a client now, but living with them permanently – their child, their only child. Mary was spreading the blankets over her and slipping a pillow under her head, while Christopher lit the oil-stove and started buttering the bread. He made tiny, dainty sandwiches, with all the crusts cut off, and fed her like a baby. Then he gave her the hot chocolate, tipping up the Thermos and trickling the warm, foamy liquid gently into her mouth. And, when she was full up, Mary tucked her in and began reading her a bedtime story. ‘Once upon a time….’
While the two of them kept guard, she was safe from everything. The police would never find her, and no drunks or freaks would dare come near, because Christopher and Mary had a special knack of changing stuff, like your screw-ups or your past, and of making bad things good. And, for the first time since she’d walked out, she was beginning to feel almost human. In fact, her eyes were actually closing and she was not that far off sleep, as Mary’s voice continued with the story: a story with a happy ending. Yes, her father had come back: brave, bald, kindly Christopher – there, beside her bed; promising to stay; to watch over her, for ever. And her mother, Mary, was just kissing her goodnight, a real, adoring kiss….
No – hold on; slow down. Bedtime stories came later, when she was a kid of five or six. Better to start at the beginning, inside Mary’s womb. Her real mother’s womb had been cold and hard and grudging, and so cramped she couldn’t move an inch, let alone turn round. Most people couldn’t remember being in the womb, but her own vile nine months still bugged her to this day: that gruesome feeling of being caged up in a woman who didn’t want a baby in the first place and kept her starved of food. All she’d had to eat was pills and cigarette-smoke and, each time she tried to rest, the bang-bang-bang of her mother’s manic heartbeat jolted her awake. Mary’s womb would be different altogether: soft and safe and welcoming, with room to stretch her limbs, and a quietly throbbing heartbeat lulling her to sleep. And there’d be constant streams of healthy food to help her grow, cell by cell by cell, and constant streams of love, right from the time she was a blob. In fact, Mary would probably care enough to read bedtime stories even to a blob. A blob might not understand the words, but it would know that having stories read meant it was special from the start.
She curled into a blobby ball and listened to the dreamy voice whispering through her snug cocoon: ‘Once upon a time …’ Another story with a happy ending – her father in the delivery-room, instead of in the pub, waiting for her birth, in a state of high excitement. Yes, at this very moment, he was reaching out his arms to take her from the midwife, so proud it was like his team had won the Cup. And now he was announcing to the whole wide world that his little girl was the most amazing, gorgeous creature any dad had ever—
‘Hey, miss, wake up! What are you doing here at this time of night?’
The loud, stern voice cut right across the story. She squinted through her lids, but the murky gloom had vanished and a glaring torch-beam shone right into her eyes. Peering up, she saw four black legs looming over her; two unfriendly faces, each topped by a black helmet, stooping down towards her. Bloody hell – the cops!
‘Is anything wrong?’ the taller one asked, although she could hardly hear for the crackling of the radios, which were spitting out traffic news and emergency reports.
‘Are you all right?’ the second bloke repeated.
She didn’t answer. Their fluorescent jackets were a shiny, blinding yellow. She hated violent colours. Christopher’s jacket was a soft, peaceful shade of brown; Mary wore quiet blues and greys.
‘You look very young. How old are you?’
A new-born baby, she couldn’t say – babies didn’t speak. Someone small and weak, she mouthed, who had to be fed and kissed goodnight; tucked up; watched over; protected from all harm.
‘Why aren’t you answering our questions? You’re obviously trying to hide something. We’ve asked you, twice, is anything wrong?’
‘No,’ she muttered. ‘Everything was perfect, until you ruined it.’
The radios drowned her voice; both of them at once – a sort of snorting shorthand, all accidents and horrors.
‘Pile-up at the junction of …’ ‘Serious assault …’ ‘Urgent assistance required …’ ‘A stabbing in the High Street. Two young men with blades….’
The taller cop squatted down beside her. She could see his muscly hands; the dark hairs on the thumbs.
‘This is not the sort of place a young girl like you should hide in, let alone so late. We’d better take you along with us and find out more about you.’
She wouldn’t go; not anywhere. New-born babies had to stay safe with their mothers.
‘Yeah,’ the other guy chipped in. ‘Come down to the station and we’ll sort this out, OK?’
No, it wasn’t OK – not at all. She needed help, and desperately. ‘Mum …’ she whimpered. ‘Dad….’
But nobody was there – no one except the two big, burly men. They pulled her up to her feet; stood one on either side of her, each holding on to her arm, so she couldn’t make a run for it. She tried to struggle free, but it was like a floppy rabb
it had dared pit its strength against two fierce old foxes. Already, they were marching her along the path; their grip so hurting-tight, it felt like handcuffs.
She glanced up at the pub, rearing, dark, above her. Even its name was a lie. There wasn’t any anchor; wasn’t any hope. And the only happy ending was a night in a police-cell.
BOUQUET OF LIES
‘I’m here to visit my sister – Marion McCall. Can you tell me where I can find her, please.’
‘Hang on a sec.’ The nurse spoke with a distracted air.
Eileen glanced at the crumpled uniform; the strands of greasy hair escaping from the ponytail. Did the girl have no professional pride? ‘Hang on a sec’ was hardly an appropriate response, especially as she’d been waiting at the nurses’ station a good five minutes already, with no choice but to eavesdrop on a whispered conversation. The nurse was confiding in her colleague about some disastrous romance; none of the steamy details spared.
‘Sorry. Who did you say?’ she asked, at last, presumably remembering she was paid to work.
‘Marion McCall. I’m her sister.’
The nurse consulted the whiteboard on the wall beside the desk, ‘Yeah, this is the right ward. Last bed in the last bay on the right.’ With a casual wave, to indicate the general direction, she returned to her discussion of Mr Hopelessly Wrong.
Eileen made her way into the ward. There was no sign of her sister from this first bay, all of whose occupants appeared to be in the final stage of life – or perhaps non-life would be more apt a phrase. Most were hooked up to a daunting array of drips and tubes and oxygen-masks; three lay completely comatose, and one poor wrinkled crone seemed to be coughing up her lungs. How come Marion, at fifty-six, had landed up amongst these geriatric no-hopers? Her sister’s garbled phone-call had been distinctly short on facts, but it was clear she was in no danger. A hysterectomy, however painful or upsetting, was hardly terminal.
She was aware of eyes following her as she traversed the second bay; her mere presence attracting notice because no one else had visitors. Her natural inclination was to pause by every hapless patient’s bed and give each one some portion of her time. For all she knew, they might be mostly family-less and friendless, and just mouldering here until released by merciful death. But having realized, on reflection, that the approach of a total stranger might be less a source of solace than of disquiet or even alarm, she made herself walk on. Fortunately, there were more signs of life in the last bay: one patient actually mobile and another even packing to go home, although a third was sobbing piteously, with no one on hand to help. Those nurses at the desk were obviously too busy discussing the vagaries of their love-life to provide comfort, Kleenex or even a listening ear.
She stopped in shock at the sight of her sister, who lay asleep and ashen-pale; her head askew on the pillow and one arm stretched across the counterpane, as if in supplication. Her once-dark, bouncy hair was now sparse and greying; her face haggard, deeply lined. How in God’s name could she have aged so much in the five years since they’d last met?
With as little noise as possible, she eased herself into the chair beside the bed. The exotic lilies and hothouse roses she had purchased at the hospital shop seemed to cringe at their surroundings – pampered aristocrats forced to slum it in this shabby NHS ward. Positioning the bouquet across her lap, she gave silent thanks for her own robust health. Her only operation in her entire sixty-two years – a minor hernia repair – had been carried out at St Winifred’s, a private cottage-hospital, where she’d had her own luxurious room, fully air-conditioned and with a view of landscaped gardens. Here, the air was stuffy, if not smelly, and the vista from the window was of dismal concrete wasteland. But then Marion had only herself to blame. All her life, she had refused to take a regular job or establish a settled home, and thus had not the slightest chance of affording medical insurance – or even other kinds of insurance. Many times, she, as elder sister, had offered financial assistance, only to see the money squandered on some damn-fool project, such as the ill-fated trip to Mexico, or the attempt to found a commune with a group of equally feckless folk.
She closed her eyes, exhausted by her early start and the long drive from Harrogate. When she’d set out this morning, the temperature had been minus five – the coldest day of January, so far – and the icy roads and flurries of snow had only added to the strain. However, it was impossible to doze in this milieu, with all the noise and disturbance. The sobbing hadn’t abated; the patient who’d been packing was now clattering things around, and another had started wailing and complaining. Two nurses had, in fact, appeared, but seemed only to be contributing to the hubbub; one bawling at the weeping woman, who was clearly very deaf, and the other manoeuvring a patient into a wheelchair; managing, in the process, to knock a glass off the bedside-table and spill water all over the floor. If she had her way, she would send these staff straight back to nursing school, to learn manners and appropriate patient-care, not to mention a little TLC.
Although she had to admit that she, too, was somewhat lacking in the TLC department when it came to displays of distress. She herself would never dream of giving way to such public exhibitions, and thus found them hard to tolerate in others. Even at the funeral, she had remained resolutely dry-eyed, despite the appalling shock of her busy, lively mother, with her many friends and interests, and her firm intention of not dying until she passed the hundred mark, suddenly keeling over in a heart-attack. There had been no warning; no prior illness. On Thursday, she’d been an energetic, healthy octogenarian; on Friday, a waxen corpse.
The patient’s sobs were setting off unwelcome memories, of other people crying at the funeral; her mother’s best friend, in particular, becoming near-hysterical with grief. What a relentless day that had been; grinding on much longer than any normal day. Yet, despite her private heartache, she had never faltered in her role as hostess: greeting mourners; joining in the prayers and hymns, then presiding at the reception. But, notwithstanding the condolences she had received on every side, there was no consolation. And, now, all she had left of her mother was a jar of ashes on the mantelpiece.
Moving the bouquet to the floor, she opened her handbag and withdrew the crisp white envelope containing Marion’s small portion of those ashes; laying them on the bedside locker, to remind her to hand them over. Whether her sister would actually want them or not was a different matter altogether.
Marion’s locker was pitifully bare: no get-well cards; no bowl of fruit or bottle of Lucozade. After her own operation, her hospital room had resembled a cross between a flower-shop and a branch of Clinton Cards – and she’d been in a mere two days! Did Marion have no friends; no one to visit except a sister who was now an almost-stranger? But that, too, was Marion’s fault. Her knack of alienating people was legendary, including her own family, of course.
She tried to block her ears, as sounds of moaning and retching arose from the far corner of the bay and a raucous nurse kept urging, ‘Spit, dear. Spit some more!’ Repulsive spitting noises followed in their turn and, only when they’d subsided, did Eileen shut her eyes again, longing to sink into oblivion. She had barely slept at all this last raw and aching fortnight, yet determinedly, she switched her thoughts from the funeral; from hearses, wreaths and ashes, and that horrendous, final moment when the blue-velvet curtains closed around the coffin. Instead, she pictured her mother in her prime: the resourceful and courageous widow, bringing up two girls alone; never indulging in self-pity, or even in recrimination, despite endless provocation from the rebellious younger child. Exasperation with the black sheep of the family had drawn them close from a very early stage, and, as the years went by and Marion’s defiance increased in scale and volume, the bond had deepened further. Frankly, it had been a relief for them both when the black sheep moved down South, although the transgressions had, of course, continued; necessitating frequent trips to bail her out yet again.
‘Eileen!’
At the sound of her name, she hastily o
pened her eyes. It seemed wrong to be caught napping when Marion was in this vulnerable state. But her sister was now wide awake and staring at her in obvious surprise.
‘I thought you’d decided not to come.’
‘Why on earth should you think that? I told them loud and clear this morning that I was on my way and would they please inform you.’
‘Well, no one said a dicky-bird. And it’s a good week since I rang you.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, defensively. ‘I couldn’t just drop everything and head straight for the door. I mean, there’s Harold to consider and I had to make arrangements for …’ Her voice tailed off. She could hardly admit that she hadn’t been exactly keen to make yet another mercy-trip. It was a good five-hour drive to this unappealing part of London, the weather was atrocious and the only hotel she’d managed to find in the hospital’s vicinity was distinctly second-rate. ‘Besides,’ she added, feeling she had to make a stronger case for her own apparent negligence. ‘I had to take the car in for a service. It was almost due, in fact, and I didn’t want to risk a breakdown.’
‘Sorry to put you to so much trouble.’
She bristled at her sister’s sarcastic tone. ‘It wasn’t any trouble,’ she snapped. ‘These things take time, that’s all. Anyway, I blame the hospital. What sort of hopeless place is it, if they can’t be bothered to pass on important messages from relatives?’
Marion shrugged. ‘Calm down. No harm done. You’re here; I’m here. What’s the problem?’
Her sister’s unexpected smile only added to her guilt. She was uncomfortably aware that, after a five-year absence, she should have been more affectionate; not sounded off about the hospital’s deficiencies. Hastily, she laid the bouquet on the bed, in an attempt to make amends. ‘These are for you,’ she said, returning Marion’s smile.
‘You shouldn’t have bothered. You know I hate flowers.’
The smile froze on her face. How perverse was that? No one hated flowers.
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