Highly Unsuitable Girl

by Carolyn McCrae

  “You look dreadful.”

  “Thanks brother of mine.”

  “Well you do.”

  “You’ve been crying darling.” Kathleen tried to sound consoling.

  “So?”

  “Did you have an argument with Tim?”

  “Why would I have had an argument with him? We’re engaged. We’re going to get married.”

  “You could look happier about it.” Geoff’s voice was without humour.

  Kathleen hoped that Tim had done the business and tied her to him, she had never understood her daughter’s desire to be a virgin on her wedding day. Surely he had done the decent thing and taken her gently, his urges reduced by his earlier adventure. Kathleen hoped that Margaret’s quietness this morning was due to a feeling of guilt rather than of disappointment in her fiancé’s performance.

  “Where’s that girl?” Margaret couldn’t bring herself to use Anya’s name.

  “She’s gone.”

  “She’s waiting for me at the station. I’m meeting her there in a few minutes. I didn’t want her to have to face you this morning. She’s tired…”

  “And we all know why!” Margaret sounded childish and petulant.

  “And she knows that you don’t like her.” Geoff carried on through his sister’s interruption “She wanted to leave. I don’t see why she should put up with your hostility. And before you say how bad her manners are she asked me to say ‘thank you for having her’.

  “Surely that should be addressed to Tim.”

  Geoff ignored Margaret’s rare attempt at wit. “We’ll both be back for the wedding. Just let me know when Mum and Esme finally set the date.”

  Chapter 6: Disillusionment

  Liverpool, Summer 1971

  In the three days Anya had been away she had seen a different side of Geoff, one she did not like and, as she followed him up the stairs to their new flat, she regretted moving in with him.

  Geoff had made no comment on the changes to the flat made in the week he had left Anya there alone. He said nothing to indicate he had noticed the bright posters, cushions and rugs that made the place more like a home. Instead he turned the television on and sat down and asked what was for supper. Anya made excuses for him, it had been a tiring weekend and a long drive.

  “How should I know? Beans on toast?”

  “I don’t think so.” He half turned away from her and she felt she had somehow let herself down by not having prepared something before she had left for the south.

  “Well what do you want?”

  “If we haven’t got any food in then I’ve no idea.”

  Anya tried to work out why Geoff was being so pompous and decided it must be because he had been with his mother for ten days. She wondered if this was how he acted there, or maybe there was always a hot meal at night, complete with meat and two veg.

  She bit back caustic remarks about not being his mother. “Do you fancy a chinky?”

  “What, when it’s at home, is a chinky?” He sounded unimpressed.

  “You mean you’ve been in Liverpool for three years and haven’t learned about chinkies?” She was incredulous.

  “I thought you were the dangerously left leaning liberal who tried to ignore people’s class or race or sex?”

  She tried to keep her voice level and spoke very precisely. “Haven’t you realised that most chippies, sorry ‘chip shops’, in Liverpool are run by people of Chinese heritage and therefore known to all and sundry, except obviously stuck up pricks from Kent, as a Chinky.”

  “The finer details of the ownership of Liverpudlian chip shops have obviously passed me by.”

  Perhaps they were both tired, and what chip shops were called was hardly a good reason to argue but Anya felt herself slipping inexorably into another quarrel.

  “Since you seem to expect me to wait on you hand and foot I’d better go and fetch something.”

  “Fine, here’s a fiver.”

  “I don’t need your fucking money.”

  If Geoff was surprised he didn’t show it.

  When she returned, after having had to queue for more than ten minutes to be served, Anya was ready to become more irritated by Geoff’s attitude. He said nothing as she laid the table, heated the plates and put the containers out.

  “Your dinner is served, sir.” She hoped he would catch her eye, smile, apologise for being an idiot and eat the meal with a smile. But he ate in silence and as soon as he had finished he returned to his chair and his television programme leaving the plates on the table. Silently she cleared the table, washed up and tidied the kitchen wondering how she had got herself into this situation.

  That morning she had been getting dressed, looking forward to continuing her verbal sparring with Geoff’s mother and sister when he had said it would be better if she left quietly and waited for him in the station café. He said he’d be half an hour behind her and then they would have all day to drive back. She had been on her third coffee and had finished reading all she wanted to read in the Sunday Times before she saw his car turn into the station forecourt. She wondered how saying goodbye to his mother and sister could have taken more than two hours.

  Once they had settled in the car she sat back to watch the miles pass, putting distance between her and a world she hadn’t enjoyed and never wanted to be part of. Geoff had been quiet but she put that down to having to concentrate on his driving so she was surprised at the edge in his voice when he finally spoke.

  “Was he worth it?”

  “Who?” Anya’s mind had been miles away and she had no idea what he was talking about.

  “Tim.”

  “Was he worth what?”

  “It really upset Margaret you know, you screwing Tim.”

  “What?” Anya couldn’t believe Geoff was taking Margaret’s side, if indeed there were sides to take.

  “She was really upset this morning. You ruined the day for her.”

  “I can’t believe you’re saying this! You don’t even like your sister.”

  “Well was he?”

  “Was he what?”

  “Worth all the agro. If you’d needed a fuck that badly I would have been available. It didn’t have to be Tim.”

  “I did not ‘need a fuck’ and you’re jealous!”

  “I am not jealous. I’d hardly be with you if I was the jealous type would I? You’d screw the dustman if you felt like it.”

  She didn’t pursue the jealousy angle as another thought occurred to her. “You’re worried in case he was better at it than you.”

  His answer, an indignant “I am not” served only to tell Anya she had been right.

  “You men are all so petty. Tim wanted to know if he was better than you.”

  “Well? Was he?”

  “Oh shut up and drive.” She would never give an answer to that particular question.

  The brakes slammed on and the car came to a rapid halt, horns hooted around their car and she felt a moment’s relief that nothing hit them.

  “I will not shut up. Are you going to give me an answer?”

  “OK.” She had leant over and squeezed his leg, “you are the best.”

  “Really?”

  “You are an insecure little shit aren’t you?” She spoke gently.

  He smiled. “Probably.” The argument seemed forgotten but it was lurking, waiting to be revived when the first thing had gone wrong, when there had been nothing to eat in the flat.

  Anya stood in the kitchen door, waiting for Geoff to ask whether there was anything she wanted to watch or whether she was tired and wanted an early night, waiting for him to acknowledge in some way that he knew she was there. When he made no move at all she went to the room that was her study and unlocked the silver trunk that contained all her diaries.

  As she carefully wrote ‘Anya Cave 1971’ on the outer cover of a pale green third year Latin exercise book, one of several she had taken in her last raid of the stationery cupboard, she wondered where she would be and who she would be wit
h when she looked back at this book as her history.

  Sunday 1st August 1971: The Flat, Liverpool

  Summary of what happened since last proper diary.

  August 1968 to August 1971:

  She sat writing for a long time, there was so much to say even though the minutiae of detail was missing. After a couple of hours she was aware Geoff was standing in the doorway looking at her. She wondered how long he had been there.

  “Hi. You OK?” She asked, wondering whether he was still in his mood.

  “I’m just going to bed. Sorry about earlier, I suppose I’m just tired. I hate it when I’m supposed to be Dad, I suppose something of him rubs off on me.” She knew that as far as Geoff was concerned that counted as an apology.

  “OK, I’ll carry on here for a while, you go to bed.”

  She turned back to her writing.

  Yesterday

  Engagement party. Preparation all day but no amount of work would make Margaret anything but a frump. Obvious from first moment G different person when at home almost boring he didn’t want me to sleep in his bed at first but I persuaded him. Lucky there was Tim or there would have been no fun. At the time I thought G was fine about it, in fact he was so fine about it I thought he’d probably arranged it. He could easily have told me to get a certain train and he could have met me at the station. But it was his idea for me to meet Tim at Charing Cross and I bet he knew exactly what that would lead to. But on the drive up he was so jealous and competitive about it all. I thought he’d think it a big laugh but he didn’t. I wanted to talk about us. I have no idea where this relationship is heading. We’ve got a year (if we last that long) then what? I can’t see him worrying about me having a career. He’ll want to go back south in a year but after last weekend I know I don’t want to do that. I know what I don’t want to do but I’m no nearer knowing what I do want to do than I was three years ago.

  She absent-mindedly fiddled with the locket she had worn around her neck since it had been put there by Dr Hill just ten days earlier. There was no photo inside it yet. She wondered about asking Geoff for a photo but decided against it. The person she put in the locket was to be the one man in her life. And she wasn’t sure that that man was going to be Geoff.

  The next morning she phoned Dot. She was surprised to hear her on the phone so soon after her last visit.

  “How did it go?” She asked, “The visitation to your young man’s mother?”

  “As well as either of us expected I suppose.”

  “That good?”

  “Worse.” She then gave a highly edited version of the events of the past weekend. “Before I go, do you know what happened to Marion? You know, the girl…”

  “… in the tower block. That was five years ago. What made you think of her now?”

  “It was the blocks of flats along the railway line into London.”

  “It’s so very sad. She had the little boy when you saw her didn’t she?”

  “And she was having another.”

  “She had another boy and then a little girl.”

  “So no exams then?” Anya didn’t mean to sound as judgmental as she did.

  “Three months ago there was an accident. She was waiting at a bus stop with the baby in the pushchair and the two toddlers standing next to her when they were hit by a car.”

  “Oh my God! Were they badly hurt?”

  “The boys were killed outright and the baby died in hospital the next day.”

  “Oh my God! How awful? What about Marion?”

  “She was not badly hurt in the accident but gassed herself the day after the little ones’ funeral.”

  Anya could think of nothing appropriate to say. “Why didn’t you tell me last week?”

  “We didn’t know if you’d remember her and if you did we didn’t want to upset you on such a happy day.”

  “I owe Marion so much. It was that visit that turned my life into something approaching sensible.”

  “I know dear.”

  “It’s so sad. She had such a tough time.”

  “Yes, so very sad. Just remember, my dear, life can be shorter than you think. Don’t waste a moment of it. Treat every day as the precious gift it is.”

  Anya grabbed the gold locket, given to a young woman, now middle aged, by a young man, long dead. She began to think she should take life a little more seriously but decided she wasn’t quite ready.

  Thursday 9th September 1971

  Took G to tea at Dot and Dr Hill They seemed to like him, he adored them. Asked me why I’d kept them so quiet. Went to see 16 Tennyson. They’ve knocked it down. They’re even knocking down the laundry building a supermarket or something. All my old life disappearing. Is Anya Cave disappearing too?

  When, in late December, Dr Hill rang her Anya knew something was seriously wrong.

  “Dot’s in Clatterbridge. Can you visit her? She wants to see you.”

  “Dot’s in hospital?”

  “I’m afraid so. She’s not been well for a while.”

  “But she seemed fine when we saw her in September.” Anya was more upset than she had ever been at the thought of losing Dot.

  “She won’t leave hospital again and she wants to see you.”

  “Of course.”

  “Please wear her locket.”

  “I never take it off.”

  Geoff stayed outside as Anya went into the ward and found Dot’s bed. As she had walked up the steps and along the echoing corridor Anya remembered that Dot had been born in 1921. She was only 50 years old. Perhaps that was what she had meant when she had said that life was too short.

  Dot held out her hand and Anya took it. Was this the first time they had ever touched? She couldn’t remember.

  “Thank you for coming.” Dot’s voice was surprisingly strong.

  “I had to.”

  “I wanted to say thank you.”

  “But that was what I wanted to say.”

  “Thank you Anya for not letting me down. You haven’t so far and you won’t in the future will you?”

  “I’ll try not to.”

  “But you must have fun. Take life seriously, my dear, but never lose sight of the fun. Life isn’t just about work and a career and life isn’t only about having children. Remember that. There are other important things to do, but always balance work with pleasure. I never did that.”

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  Dot nodded.

  “Why do you have such faith in me?”

  “You remind me so much of me when I was young. You were at the start of everything but you were throwing it all away. I couldn’t let you do that, I had to do what I could to make you see that not having children is not the end of the world it can sometimes seem.” She lay back, tired out by her thoughts and her words.

  “You’ve made such a difference to my life. I won’t let you down. I promise.”

  “Don’t forget.” The voice was different, the eyes were shut and a nurse came and hustled Anya away.

  Tuesday 11th January 1972

  We went to Dot’s funeral today. The crematorium was packed. I recognised a few people, teachers (it’s only three and a bit years since I left) and pupils, but loads of people I didn’t. No one said anything to me. It was a strange service, no religion at all. It hadn’t occurred to me that she didn’t believe in God after all those school assemblies she’d taken. We didn’t go back to the wake. I wanted to help Dr Hill, he looked 10 years older, but I couldn’t think of anything to say. I should have done Psychology and a treatise on the nature of relationships between brothers and sisters. The devoted, Dr Hill and Dot, and the literally unspeakable… I came home and cried. She was only my headmistress but it seems like there’s only Dr Hill left of my old life. Everything and everyone else is gone. All I have is Geoff and I’m not sure that he’s enough anymore.

  “We need to talk.”

  Anya had been planning the conversation for weeks. Perhaps it was the funeral, perhaps it was Dot’s voice in her head
telling her not to forget how precious life was that gave her the courage.

  “I’m not sure I like the way my life is going.”

  “What?” Geoff looked up from his book, taking a while to focus his mind back into the real world.

  “I’m getting a bit fed up with things.”

  “Fed up?” Geoff wasn’t particularly worried, Anya had been moodier than normal the past few days but nothing seemed to have changed between them, she still tantalised and satisfied him when it mattered.

  “Haven’t you noticed how since we’ve been in this flat things haven’t been the same?”

  “How do you mean?” Geoff genuinely did not understand.

  “We’ve both working hard aren’t we?”

  “Yes, of course we are.”

  “We’ve both got projects we’re working on that take up a lot of time and mental and physical energy?”

  “Yes, of course we have. What are you getting at?”

  “Then why is it me that does all the shopping and the cooking and the clearing up and take the washing down to the laundrette and the ironing and tidying up?”

  “That’s what women do isn’t it?”

  “That is the wrong answer!”

  It hadn’t occurred to him that she wouldn’t do all those things. Perhaps it was having had a doting mother and an elder sister but he had never done anything around the house.

  “Did your mother do everything for you?”

  “No we had Eileen…”

  “What did you do in hall?”

  “There wasn’t much to do.”

  “No. Food was cooked, there was no washing up other than the odd mug and, if I remember rightly, you didn’t bother to do that very often.”

  It had never occurred to him that those were jobs he should allow time for.

  “I went to the laundrette.” Geoff wasn’t sure why he felt he had to justify his actions.

  “How many times?”

  “A couple.”

  “What have you done since we moved in here? It’s nearly six months and I can’t think of anything you’ve done unless it’s a special occasion.”