by Ann Kelley
In the booklet they gave me at the hospital it says that heart and lung transplant patients are likely to have more than three years of life, possibly ten.
They don’t really know, they’ve only been doing them for a few years. Let’s be positive and assume I have ten more years. That means I’ll live until I’m twenty-two. That’s old. I ought to have a plan of action for things I must do. Perhaps one for each year. I must act wisely. It’s a good reason not to put off dreams.
1. See New York.
2. Go to Australia and New Zealand, especially
Wellington, the birthplace of one of my favourite writers, Katherine Mansfield.
3. Meet Nelson Mandela and go back to Africa.
4. Walk the West Cornwall coastal path or some of it.
5. Make sure Mum and Daddy are, if not together, then at least good friends and make sure he meets his Cornish family.
6. Read as many of the best books in the world as is possible. Start now!
7. Go on a course to learn about writing poetry (I suppose that should go before no. 4).
8. Be kissed by Brett.
9. Get married and have at least one child who
will be healthy and whole and have a useful happy life. Maybe she’ll be a world famous – an artist or writer, or maybe she’ll be an ordinary, extraordinary person. (Maybe I shouldn’t have any children as the world is already too full. I might adopt children with health problems.)
10. Visit the Galapagos Islands. I better do that before I have children as it’s an expensive trip to make. Now I can’t stop thinking about favourite things.
Things I love or have loved to do:
1. Sitting with my back to the wall on Porthmeor Beach watching the sun slipping into the sea.
2. Birding with Brett on Tresco.
3. Reading a favourite book. Better still, having a book read to me.
4. Playing Scrabble with Mum.
5. Watching old movies with Daddy.
6. Having Charlie on my lap.
7. Hanging out with Precious.
8. Laughing.
9. Watching the seagulls on the roof.
10. Playing with my kitten.
Favourite smells:
1. Cockle shells and mud at Old Leigh, Essex.
2. The air when you get out of the train at St Erth after being in London.
3. Second-hand book shops.
4. Charlie’s fur.
5. Hot chocolate.
6. Daddy’s aftershave (don’t know what it’s called – Suave or something).
7. Moules marinière and chips.
8. Sunburnt skin.
9. Horses’ breath.
10. Primroses.
11. Leather car seats.
That’s enough.
Favourite things to touch:
1. Cat’s fur.
2. Daddy’s hand in mine.
3. Grandpop’s tattoos.
4. Mum’s silk velvet dress.
5. Pebbles warming in my hand.
6. Books.
7. The wooden banister in our house at St Ives.
8. Mud under my toes.
9. Cold stainless steel.
10. A cool cotton pillow on my cheek.
Favourite tastes:
1. Moules marinière and chips.
2. Roast chicken and roast potatotoes with gravy and peas.
3. Coconut ice-cream.
4. Crumpets and strawberry jam.
5. Ginger biscuits dipped in tea.
6. Raspberries and cream.
7. Cornish clotted cream with meringue and strawberries.
8. Apple crumble and vanilla ice-cream.
9. Elderflower cordial.
10. Steamed samphire with melted butter and black pepper.
At least the last one makes me sound sophisticated.
Favourite sights:
1. A bluebell wood.
2. Starlings dancing together at dusk before going to roost.
3. Seagulls flying over the sea.
4. The first sight of St Ives through the gap in the wall by the coastguard cottages.
5. The sun setting into the sea at St Ives.
6. A field of daisies and buttercups.
Favourite sounds:
1. Charlie’s ‘hello’ miaow.
2. Seagulls talking, crying, and all their sounds.
3. Starlings praying to the Sky God.
4. A robin’s evening song.
5. The sea – whooshing and whispering, roaring and hissing, and when it sounds like an orchestra in the middle of the night.
6. Rain on the roof when I’m inside in the warm on a sofa wrapped in a woollen blanket.
I fall asleep and dream of Precious. We are running together along a warm sand beach. I wake with the shock of realisation that he is gone.
At Plymouth in one of the scruffy back yards next to the railway line there’s a pink camellia bush standing alone. A game of football is played on bright green artificial grass at Devonport with artificial lighting. The teams look like robots or characters in an animated film.
Our train is trundling over the huge Isambard Kingdom Brunel bridge across the River Tamar into Cornwall. Swans are gliding by in front of the pub with the Union Jack painted on the front. Two herons stand sentinel on a gasholder, and Brent geese are heads down waddling through a field. Primroses grow in clumps on the railway banks, quite unreal-looking, like children’s posies on a grassy grave.
I wish I had been able to go to Precious’s funeral. I didn’t get to say Goodbye. It was the same with Grandpop and Grandma. Then I was in hospital. Perhaps one day I’ll be able to write a poem about him. I’ll call it When I Die.
If I become a famous poet I might change my name. I have been known by various names:
Gorgeous Gussie (there was a tennis player with that nickname in the Fifties I think. She work frilly knickers).
Pansy. Don’t ask why, I have no idea.
Honeybun – Daddy.
Gussiebun – Daddy.
Gussie – everyone.
Guss – everyone.
Sweetheart – Mum.
Sweetie-pie – Grandma and Grandpop.
Princess Augusta – Grandpop.
Org – Summer used to call me that and I hated it.
My Flower.
Why was I called Augusta anyway?
‘Mum, why was I given my name?’ She wakes and yawns.
‘What?’
‘Why did you call me Augusta?’
‘Because you were born in August, and because it means sacred and majestic.’
‘That’s no reason.’
‘It’s a lovely name.’
‘Hmm.’
‘Unusual and memorable.’
‘Hmm.’
The journey between Plymouth and St Erth is agonisingly slow. We stop at every station.
The rain hasn’t stopped since Liskeard; drops run horizontally across the window and outside the world is grey and foggy.
I am so tired. Mum is too. I kick her when she snores.
The people with the bald baby must have got off when I was asleep. We are the only people left in the carriage. Bubba is quiet. She must be so bored, stuck in the box, but I daren’t let her roam.
Mum said she lost a kitten once on a long journey. She searched the train for it and thought it was lost forever. It had crawled over the top of the metal partition under her seat. Hours later it cried and she found it, but it wouldn’t come out and she had to get the train manager to unscrew the partition to rescue it.
I’m too tired to be excited, and sad about so many things – Precious mostly. Mum has Agnes’s address in West London and she’ll write to her, if she’s still there. What will she do? Will she wait for her daughters to arrive or will she go back to Zimbabwe to be with her husband?
I’m sad that I didn’t achieve my aim to get Mum and Daddy together again.
And I’m ashamed I was horrid to Alistair. He can’t help it if he isn’t my father. I’ll ha
ve to make it up to him. Perhaps I could get him tickets for a really important cricket match, except that that would be rather expensive. I know: I’ll cook him and Mum a romantic dinner for two. No paper napkins, of course.
The sky is lightening as we reach Truro. Only half an hour before we reach St Erth. I go for a wee. The buffet is closed and the staff are relaxing, reading discarded newspapers. It must be strange to spend your working life on a train journey. I wonder if they suffer from land sickness when they get off?
‘How’s the little cat, then, my flower?’ the manager asks.
‘She’s asleep.’
He must be Cornish, calling me ‘my flower’.
I wake Mum and she goes to ‘freshen up’. She looks better than she did when she first came out of hospital. I wonder if people will recognise me? I’ve put on a bit of weight, though I haven’t grown upwards. And I’m pink – a real, normal pink.
We’ve gathered our bags on wheels and the kitten’s box, which is very light, and when we get to Hayle we stand at the door, looking through the gap between the sand dunes at the estuary mouth. The town is like a white floating island against a grey-green, tumbling sea.
Mum opens the window.
The sun has come out into a broken patch of pale blue and the sweet smell of salt air takes my breath away. We draw slowly into St Erth station.
‘Alistair!’
I jump into his arms and find myself crying on his tweedy shoulder as he hugs me.
I allow him to give Mum a big kiss and then grab his arm again.
‘Alistair, I’m sorry I was rude to you on the phone. I love you, Alistair.’ I reach up and kiss his cheek. He’s smiling and hugs me to him again.
‘Jeepers, you look well, Gussie,’ he says.
‘And who’s this?’
He points at the box and Beelzebub stares out at him with yellow saucer eyes. He carries our bags over the step bridge. I practically skip up the steps. Oh, the clean smell of Cornwall! And there’s a gull – two gulls – chatting above us, flying towards the town.
Mum looks so happy. So does Alistair. She gets in the front seat of his car; I am in the back with Bubba, suddenly wide awake.
There are spring flowers everywhere along the roadside – daffodils and narcissus and primroses, and three hens and a black cockerel peck at the grass verge by the farm at Lelant. We get to my favourite part – the gateway at the old coastguard cottages at Treloyhan, just beyond the big hotel. And there it is, my home, the little town, glowing white and gold, and I imagine I’m running along the sandy beach at Porthmeor, the surf booming as it does when the tide is low, my bare feet sinking into the warm sand, the late afternoon sun on my face and chest. Gulls skim the pink waves, rising and falling with the undulations, and I am running along the beach towards the sinking sun, my shadow tall behind me.
Enjoyed The Burying Beetle?
Continue the journey with Gussie in:
A Snail’s Broken Shell
Here is a taster of the first three chapters.
PROLOGUE
DARK CLOUDS SHROUD the hills of Camborne and Redruth, but the little town of St Ives is bathed in bright light. The white, huddled houses, the orange roofs and the pale harbour beach shine like a beacon showing me the way home.
CHAPTER ONE
MARCH 2000. I breathe in the clean, sweet air, filling my new lungs with the familiar smell of home.
‘Don’t worry, puss, we’re nearly there,’ I whisper to Bubba, as Alistair drives us up Barnoon Hill. She’s been so good on the long journey, and was a great hit on the train, entertaining children and charming the ticket man, who very kindly didn’t charge us for her.
‘Go in, I’ll bring the luggage,’ Alistair tells us.
Mum unlocks the back door and we go in.
Flo and Charlie are on the stairs, looking down between the rails.
‘Charlie! Flo-Flo!’ I put down the pet carrier and go to stroke them. Charlie mews loudly and Flo runs away up the stairs. Rambo’s not to be seen – he’ll be hiding under a bed. Charlie lollops upstairs with Flo, not sure if she should be welcoming or grumpy. I’m sure she’s put on weight.
‘Flo-ee, Flo-ee, Charlie!’ Cats are generally unforgiving when you leave them to cope without you for just a day or so, and we’ve been away for nearly four months.
‘Oh, so many daffodils!’ Mum says. ‘How lovely!’
The sitting room is yellow with flowers, as if the sun is shining from the room. They are on every surface, filling all our jugs and vases.
There’s a knock on the back door.
‘Come in, come in,’ trills Mum. ‘It’s open.’ And in comes Mrs Thomas from next door. She hugs us both, tears in her eyes.
‘Oh, my dear, you look ’ansome, my girl.’
‘I know,’ I say. ‘Look, I’m pink. And thank you so much for looking after our cats.’
‘Back from the Darlings yesterday, they were,’ says Mrs Thomas, dabbing at her eyes with her apron. ‘They brought the flowers.’
‘Lovely,’ says Mum again, inhaling the cold smell of the petals. ‘Oh look, Gussie, so many cards!’
Welcome home dearest Gussie!
Love from Claire, Moss, Fay, Troy, Phaedra,
and last but not least, Gabriel.
Hugs and kisses, The Darlings xxx
There’s a whole pile of cards. I search for Brett’s handwriting, remove an envelope and put it in my pocket.
‘I think the cats knew you were coming. Sat in the window all day, they ’ave.’ Mrs Thomas absent-mindedly rubs at a mark on the table with the hem of her flowery apron.
‘And how are your eyes?’ Mum asks her. Mrs Thomas had cataracts removed while we were in London having our operations: Mum’s emergency hysterectomy and my new heart and lungs.
‘Perfect vision, my cheel. No problems at all. Can read the Echo and watch my programmes – it’s marvellous. Now, before I forget, steak and kidney. It’s in the Rayburn. Should be ready at six.’
‘Oh, you shouldn’t have,’ says Mum, smiling. ‘Stay and have some, Marigold.’
‘No, my queen, I want to get back to my programme. I’ll see you tomorrow when you’ve both rested. Cats ’ave ’ad their tea.’
‘Did I hear steak and kidney?’ Alistair has taken the luggage up to our rooms and has come back down, rubbing his hands together.
‘Let me shower and change first,’ says Mum.
‘It’s okay, Lara, I’ll do some potatoes,’ says Alistair. ‘I’ll just park the car.’
‘Potatoes is done,’ says Mrs Thomas. ‘What’ve you got there?’ She points at the pet carrier, from which a squeak sounds.
‘A kitten. Her mother abandoned her.’
‘Another cat? Oh my soul!’ She shakes her grey head solemnly and leaves without seeing the new kitten.
Should I get Beelzebub out and introduce her to the other cats or leave her downstairs and go to make peace with them first? She’s mewing and might need a wee. I lift her out of the cardboard box and cuddle her. Her eyes, blue until a week ago, have changed now to a daffodil yellow. Perhaps I should have called her Daffodil. But my new kitten is coal black, even her whiskers and paw pads, and the name Beelzebub suits her very well. She was a little devil when we were staying at Daddy’s flat in London, ruining his suede sofa and the black mosquito net over his bed. Her claws are needle-sharp.
I show her the water bowl and the leftover cat food. She laps at the water but isn’t interested in biscuits. She’s more interested in exploring her new home. I show her the inside loo – Rambo’s litter tray – and leave her to find her way around the downstairs rooms before I go to my room. Cats are very independent and need to explore new territory completely. So they know where they are.
I can climb all the way up to the attic room without stopping several times to get my breath. I feel like Superman – Superwoman, rather. Before I had my transplant I could hardly get to the first floor without having to sit on a stair for several minutes before carrying on. It
was like mountaineering in thin air. My lungs and heart were so badly diseased that even crossing a room made me breathless and dizzy.
From my room at the top of the house I see right over the town and harbour, Smeaton’s Pier, and to the far lighthouse at Godrevy and beyond. I see the weather coming at us from the horizon, the huge clouds building into orange and brown bouncy castles, squalls of rain like muslin curtains across the bay. A tiny slice of rainbow colours the sky to the west.
The cats are on my windowsill. Flo flies off in a huff, back and tail fluffed up, but Charlie mews and waves her tail and waits for me, looking confused and happy at the same time.
‘Oh, Charlie, I’ve missed you so much.’ I pick her up and she leans her head against mine, quiet at first. I whisper sweet nothings to her, she purrs. But she soon leaps down.
I tear open the envelope to find a card with an illustration of two swans, their heads touching, their necks making a heart shape.
Welcome home Gussie,
See ya soon for some birding.
Brett
I look in the mirror and see what I suspected: my cheeks are rose pink from pleasure. Blue-grey was the usual hue, BT (before transplant). How strange that Brett should have chosen swans!
There are flowers in my room, too: a dense bunch of Paper Whites in a blue jug. They smell of spring and hope.
I unpack Rena Wooflie, smooth down her checked dress, put her on my bed, and sit on the striped cushion to gaze out at the gulls on the roof. Two mature gulls, a large handsome male and a trim female, stand and preen, their feathers quivering in the wind. The town looks just the same, except that there’s scaffolding and polythene shrouding a few buildings on the harbour and on the opposite hillside. Building going on all over town.
I unpack my clothes, putting the dirties in a pile to go downstairs to the linen basket.
I look under my bed and yes, it’s Rambo, curled up pretending to be asleep. I lie on the floor on my right side – the left side is still rather sore – and stroke the shy tabby.