So, to hell with it. Maybe Michael will have to cancel at the last minute. But so what? Getting ditched for a three-line whip would hardly be worse than what I’ve been through in the last year or so.
Plan for a bit of spontaneity, I thought. (I’m good at contradictions in terms).
Chapter 19
PLANNING FOR THE PARTHENON?
After our usual Wednesday morning team meeting I met with Andrea and Shirley. We had an extremely dull chat about health and safety in preparation for the launch of the cafe and shop. Opening your premises and serving hot drinks and snacks always requires another mound of paperwork to be carried out and half a dozen action plans to be written. Not my forte, that’s for sure.
And then I went back to my office to make the phone call. My in-laws, Julia and Malcolm, had remained close to Adam despite their move to Reading just before our wedding. Adam had been their only child. The physical distance between us meant that they had kept most of their grief and horror at arm’s length from me – perhaps deliberately. Perhaps they thought I had enough to deal with. But I suspected that Adam’s side of the family were even more dysfunctional than mine when it came to any revelations about vulnerability, when it came to the whole talking about feelings thing.
I knew, though, from the odd confidential chat I had had over the phone with Malcolm, that Julia had been battling hard with depression since Adam’s death. Several months ago Malcolm had told me, “I’ll never come to terms with losing our Adam. Never.” But even he was struggling to understand the depth of Julia’s despair. He would urge me to “send the kids to come and stay with us – it’s the only time I see her as her old self!” But with Lydia being at school full time, and Matthew being a child version of Jack the Ripper, I had been reluctant to. Or perhaps I hadn’t felt there was a viable enough reason to do it. Until now.
Malcolm answered the phone in his best circa 1956 telephone exchange manner.
“Russells!”
A booming voice. Like Adam’s. Or, Adam’s – like his.
Sending me off on one. Scrabbling sorrow at the pit of my stomach. Most days I managed to cruise along, to blank it all out, but it still never ceased to amaze me how the grief-addled brain could suddenly experience that feeling. Of being slammed around the head with a sledgehammer. Just hearing those echoes of Adam’s sent my subconscious catapulting into the past.
Adam, shortly after our honeymoon:
“Don’t think so, Rach. It won’t ever be me running off with a younger model. If anyone’s going to be doing the ‘leaving’ in our relationship, it’ll be you. You’re the flighty one. You’re the one needing the high emotional maintenance.”
You were wrong about that one, Adam. And it was even worse for your parents than it was for me.
Because being widowed while your children are still very young is horrendous. It’s shocking. It’s a vortex of asking ‘What If?’ and ‘Why Me?’ Of waking up in the middle of the night from the most terrible nightmare you ever had and finding out it was true.
But. At the end of the day you can always find another love. Someone else. You have that choice, after all. And if you lose a parent you might well get lucky, be blessed to gain a brilliant step-parent. To find a parent-substitute. Or possess a set of incredible grandparents, or something.
But if you lose a child, there is nothing remotely like a form of replacement. You’re left with a child shaped chunk missing from your life. Whether you’re grieving over a tiny baby or a grown man.
I clenched my jaw, shaking my head. Hard. This was just another sideways swipe of sorrow. It still happened every week or so. Whether it was a photograph, a letter addressed to him, the way that Lydia blew her nose … It used to feel like every hour – on the hour. So maybe things were progressing for me. Maybe life was moving on. Perhaps too fast, though, come to think of it. And not at a speed – or in a direction – that Julia or Malcolm would approve of. So there would be no mention of any men on the scene during this little conversation. That’s for sure.
So I outlined my thoughts on ‘a little tourist trip’ to London for Lydia and I. And asked him whether he thought they could cope with Matthew for a whole weekend. Malcolm sounded enthusiastic.
“Sounds great. But let’s check with the boss, eh?”
He passed the phone to Julia, who gushed, “Oh, we’ve never had Matthew to ourselves – that would be lovely!”
“You sure that you can handle him? He’s a bit …”
Julia brushed my fretting aside.
“Rachael – I’ve told you so many times what a crabby little boy Adam was …” she trailed off for a few seconds. Lost in sadness. But managed to collect herself and added, brightly, “And these days we have more TV and DVDs. And those soft-play places to go if we start to have any problems. So don’t you worry!”
I wanted to tell her that gadget and experience overload was a sure-fire way to get Matthew to kick off big time, but whenever I offered any such advice to either my parents or Adam’s, I was always met with the same response: “We have had children ourselves, you know!”
So I didn’t bother.
Next, I called my little sister. Vicky was rather different from me. She was all-aesthetics and a science-obsessive, as opposed to her clothes-clueless and bleeding-heart liberal elder sibling. But we were close and she had always been a huge fan of Adam. She had moved to south London five years ago for her career, and had no intention of settling down and “feeling smug about the fact that I managed to carry out a bit of basic biology”, as she liked to refer to the act of having a family. Even at the age of fifteen she had been determined never to have any children.
Still, she sounded chipper at the prospect of having Lydia to herself for the weekend. But suspicious about my reasons for wanting to be in the capital of Blighty.
“You hate London!” she said. Followed closely by, “It all sounds a bit odd … you dumping Liddy on me and not staying here …” And then: “Hey … this better not be some weirdy Shaun sordid liaison thing rearing its head again. Because if it is … I’m finally going to tell Mum and Dad all about …”
“Bloody hell, Vicky!” I burst out laughing. “Just listen to you! ‘Go and tell Mum and Dad’? I thought you were the director of some highbrow international electronics techie multinational. Not my kid sister threatening to grass me up for nicking her Easter eggs!”
“Well, I don’t care …”
She carried on with her petulant response, so I interrupted her before she could engage any more deeply into her usual character assassination of Shaun. I gabbled my excuses.
“Got to go – things are mental around here. Bye for now.”
After talking to my in-laws and to Vicky, I’d been on a bit of a high. I called Michael to tell him that it was looking like a trip to London was on the cards. I was hoping that he would be as pleased as I was about it all, but he answered his mobile with a rather clipped, “Sorry … bit too busy to speak right now.” He called over to someone else in the room with him: “Yes, we’ll be there in a minute, Marv.”
I put the phone down and ruminated on this for a bit. Perhaps all the publicity folk – the spin doctors like Marvin and Alex the Twat – were playing a longer game with Michael. Working on him slowly so he would ultimately run like the wind from me, my cursed personal life and my limpid social concerns.
(Probably letting your imagination run away with itself, Rachael.)
I rapped myself on the head, with my knuckles. Hard. Yes, here I was, forgetting that only a couple of hours ago I had decided to steam ahead with life from now on. Plan for me and for my small family and not focus on needing anyone else in our lives apart from each other. And if life decided to chuck the odd chance at us to have a bit of fun, presented a light moment or two along the way … or a significant new person in our lives – then all the better.
But a new distraction now presented itself. One of our receptionists, bearing a huge bouquet of flowers, entered my room. She had a tight
little smile on her face. She might have seen me rapping myself on the head, but it was just as likely that she was pleased for me. Wondering whether the poor wee widow was back in the game.
After she left I tore open the envelope, expecting them to be from Michael after our jokey chat about me being the type of woman to demand flowers and chocolates.
But no. The card had just one word.
‘Stan.’
I stared across my desk. In shock. I focussed on the vision outside the office windows. The pathetic park and the faded playground. In all of our not-time together, Shaun had only ever given me two things: a pair of socks (which he once left at my bedsit in Trafford by mistake) and an old copy of Housing Studies and Research Methodology .
This was strange. Everyone and his dog knew that Shaun didn’t do gifts. Didn’t do gestures.
My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a baby’s squawk, and I looked up to see Dawn at my office door. Clad in a clingy purple and green striped mini-dress and with the latest celeb-style sunglasses. They helped to hide the bruises, at least. New nails and new hair extensions, by the look of it. Chewing a wad of gum and looking souped-up; cooking on gas.
“Awright, missus?” she chirruped as she sashayed into the room. “Ooh, nice. Someone’s popular,” she added, as she noticed the flowers. I flicked my hand towards a seat and she plonked herself down, letting Poppy-Rose freewheel herself around the office.
“Just come to let you know that it’s lookin’ like you was wrong!” she sang victoriously.
“Story of my life,” I smiled. “So what was I wrong about this time?”
“Well – actually, I’m exaggeratin’, really. You were right in one way. ’Cause they said I’d have somethin’ like a ten-year wait to get a house in the places I really want – nearer me sister. But ...”
She gave me a second’s pause for dramatic effect and mimicked a fanfare.
“Ta-da!! There’s one just come free in Steppin’ Vale. Which is an all right place, innit?”
I nodded, answering, “Yes, but blimey, Dawn. It doesn’t normally happen that fast. Especially if you’re moving over from Manchester to Medlock.”
“Well,” she said, as she examined her nails, “Brenda Kray gets on right well with the Brindleford housing officer. Who knows me. Well, knows Vinnie dead well. What he’s like. And they called up this bloke they used to work with at Medlock – who’s at New Banks now. Who put ’em through to this Jake Bamber, what they also know. And then – just this mornin’ – this Jake Bamber rang me up and asked me if I knew you. An’ I said yeah – course – and you’d helped me out. And next thing I know, I’ve got a viewin’ lined up for this three-bed house on Friday!”
If I had a fiver for every time I had either heard or thought ‘Housing: it’s so incestuous’…
No one was playing the system here. We were just trusting each other’s judgement. And Dawn’s case – because of the violence and the children – would get priority consideration. She realised this.
“So, yeah. I were a bit gobsmacked myself, actually. But I go straight to the top of the list ’cause of all the grief what that nobhead has caused me an’ the kids.”
She lifted the sunglasses to show me.
“Purple and green. Matches your frock.”
“I know.” She popped her gum at me. “Bloody corker this time, eh? Bastard. Anyway. I just saw Bev goin’ into her relaxation class and she says the house is only a ten-minute walk from hers – an’ from our Debs’. An’ social services can sort the lads out with their new school there. So it’s looking well good. Yay!”
She leant over to the toddler and urged her to join her in arm-waving merriment. Poppy-Rose just stared at her mother, looked befuddled and farted. Dawn roared with laughter.
“Just like yer brothers, you dirty little sod!”
She turned back to me.
“An’ I know I said it already. But I just wanted to say thanks again.”
I shrugged. “It's what they pay me for.”
She disagreed. “Not on a Saturday, they don’t. I’m not daft. I know you didn't have to help me out. An’ there was something else I wanted to say, too.” She looked away suddenly. Slight embarrassment.
“I knew that Vinnie and most other people on Brindleford wouldn’t have twigged it. An’ that fat cow Shelley Murray didn’t, either. Til it were in the papers, I mean. But I did. Straight off.”
“Twigged what?” I asked, caution in my voice now.
“I mean, who he was – the minister bloke. They’re all a bit behind the door in Vinnie’s family. Total thickos. I think they’ve got problems up there, actually.” She tapped her forehead, her initial bashfulness disappearing now that she was into her story. “Like, for example, Shelly’s married to Vinnie’s Uncle Denzel, though he’s banged up again now. An’ his nickname is SFB. Ha!”
“SFB. I don’t get it.”
“SFB – Shit For Brains. Cause he’s as thick as pig shit. They all are. Anyway. It took ’em all till first thing Monday morning to work it out. When they saw the headlines on the news. That story about that gay bloke what worked for him. I mean, yer minister bloke were all over the telly, weren’t he? You couldn’t bloody miss him. So then Shelley and all her lot were all, like, ‘Hey, let’s make some dosh out of all of this with me photo of him on our Vin’s bike!”
I held my hand up.
“Whoa. You’re going too fast for me here, Dawn. I saw Shelly Murray in the papers this morning. She reckoned she’d taken the photo of … of him, Michael. Because she thought he was stealing Vinnie’s bike. So is that true?”
She crossed her legs, giving me a flash of a tattoo at the top of her thigh.
“Yeah. Shelley had been sat in her front garden. Havin’ some beers when yer bloke came past. She knew it were Vinnie’s bike. Says she thought summat weird were goin’ on. She thought someone might be nickin’ it. An’ she’s always up for an excuse to go and get someone’s head kicked in. So she took a photo with her phone. An' she’s always photo-in’ everythin’. Makes quite a bit out of insurance stuff. Car accidents. Spillages in the supermarket aisles and that.”
Sounded about right.
“But anyway. I realised it all after you’d left us in the hostel. Seen him before on the telly, y’see.”
I nodded and chose my words carefully.
“Well, yes. He is in the media a lot.”
“Zactly.” She fished into her large shoulder bag and brought out a bottle of milk for the baby.
“An’ some of us,” she commented more to the baby now than to me, “Unlike Shit For Brains an’ your daddy, like to watch stuff other than boxin’ or the footie. Don’t we? Some of us might not be as stupid as her teachers thought she was when she were at school …”
Her daughter had moved over to my bookshelves, where she had embarked upon yanking out the books one by one. She saw the drink and toddled back to her mother. But Dawn’s mind was now elsewhere. She barely seemed to notice Poppy-Rose’s attempt to grab the milk as she continued to swing the bottle by the teat. Perhaps lost in ancient battles with GCSEs and unimaginative teachers.
“Stupid is the last thing that I’d call you, Dawn. But I don’t understand how you know all this. Haven’t you been living at the hostel since Saturday?”
“Oh, yeah. But didn’t you used to work on Brindleford yerself?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then. You know what it’s like for news spreadin’ like wild-fuckin’-fire. My cousin Katrina is shacked up with one of Vinnie’s brothers. She’s a right mug, she is. Always has been. So the poor cow has had Shelley Murray’s arse stuck to her sofa the last few weeks. Shelley’s a lazy bitch an’ she hangs out anywhere where she can get free tinnies or pizza.”
I knew Shelley. I knew what she was like, of course, but I didn’t tell Dawn this. Dawn finally noticed the child’s attempt to snatch the bottle, and passed it down to her.
“So, yeah. Our Katrina was textin’ me all of this on Mon
day. Sayin’ how they’d all been sat there goin’ on about all the money they were gonna make from them lot talkin’ to News Of The Nation . But the thing is, none of them could figure out why the ’ell your minister bloke was on the estate. Who he was with. Meanin’ you. Vinnie was shitfaced at the time. Wouldn’t have noticed you if you’d been prancing round with yer tits hangin’ out.”
I nodded. Wishing she would stop referring to Michael as ‘your’. I knew it was just a local dialect thing, but it was grating on me. She could read my mind.
“So, Michael Fingy. Whatever his name is …”
I looked at her, pointedly. Michael Fingy was fine by me.
“I knew it were Michael Fingy. I were noseyin’ out of the window at Lancaster House at the time. When the pigs were there. When they were crappin’ themselves for pullin’ ’im over on Vinnie’s bike! Fuckin’ priceless, that was!” She gave out a sudden, very masculine belly laugh. “But, yeah. I asked Brenda on Sunday about you. ‘Cause I wanted to say thanks to you at any rate, so I bobbed down here on Monday to do that. As yer know. An’ then bloody yesterday – the papers were all, like, ‘Who is the mystery blonde?’ stuff. So. I …”
I waited for her to finish. She looked down at her bejewelled sandals. She seemed to be embarrassed again.
“Well. I’ve been thinking about it. Quite a bit. An’ I just wanted to let you know that I’m not saying ‘owt to no one. No one. Not me mates. No journalists, neither. They can all piss off.”
I wanted to hug her. And the grin on my face probably didn’t disguise the fact. Sheer relief. Dawn’s story could have fetched her the kind of money that she desperately needed.
“Oh, Dawn. God. I really ... really appreciate that, thanks. Wow. Thank you …”
She inclined her head. “S’all right.”
“No, no. Look. I’ll be straight with you. You know you could sell your story to the papers for quite a bit. Well, knowing my identity and all that crap, I mean.”
Mind Games and Ministers Page 28