The First Time I Saw Your Face

by Hazel Osmond

  ‘You and your lovely locks,’ she said, getting a real hiss into that last ‘s’. ‘Let’s see what you look like bald.’

  ‘Sheila, Sheila,’ he screamed, trying to disentangle her fingers from his hair, ‘please stop, just listen.’

  Amazingly she did, but when he straightened up he could see it was not because of him. Sonia was standing a few feet away in a too-short, too-tight dress.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Sheila said, her tone aggressive.

  ‘I’ve come—’ Mack began.

  ‘I’m not talking to you –’ Sheila nodded towards Sonia – ‘I’m talking to her.’

  ‘That’ll be a first.’ Sonia folded her arms, making her dress ride up higher. ‘Been to the dentist, spotted this little creep in the park.’ She pointed at Mack. ‘You owe me money, took off without paying your bills.’

  ‘Sonia, it’s all right: you were on my list of people to visit.’ Mack reached for his wallet.

  ‘Typical, Sonia,’ Sheila said, ignoring him. ‘Typical. Not concerned about Jen, just your bottom line –’ there was a perfect pause – ‘which, in that dress, everyone can see.’

  ‘Well, at least Oxfam hasn’t given me a loyalty card.’ Sonia laughed at Sheila’s rather snug skirt and top. ‘And I do care about Jen.’

  Sheila moved nearer. ‘No you don’t, all you care about is money and men. The younger the better. How’s that husband of yours, weaned yet?’

  Sonia took one large, furious step towards Sheila. ‘How are those boys of yours, still running wild?’

  ‘No,’ Sheila blasted back, ‘they’re sitting around waiting for you to come and seduce them like you did their dad. You can say you’ve got the matching set then, you cow.’

  Now understanding what had caused the rift between Sheila and Sonia, Mack decided it might be fortuitous to take a step to one side. Slowly, as the women continued to square up to each other, he backed away. They didn’t appear to notice he had gone.

  Joe’s mantra stopped his withdrawal. ‘Hey,’ he shouted, ‘you were meant to be having a go at me, not each other. Sonia, here’s some of your money. Sheila, come on, get what you want to say to me off your chest.’

  He wished he hadn’t phrased it like that, not with the size of Sheila’s chest.

  The women barely looked his way. ‘We’ll get to you in a minute,’ Sonia said.

  ‘Yeah, later,’ Sheila agreed before they started shouting at each other again. As he walked round the back of the library, they were nose to nose.

  Jennifer left Lionel contemplating what an animal he was and nipped out of the library to find Sheila and Sonia at what looked like boiling point.

  ‘Hey, hey, hey,’ she said loudly and managed to get both of the women’s attention. ‘Come on, Sonia, come on, Sheila. Fighting in the street, you’re better than that.’

  Sheila suddenly looked as if she had woken up.

  ‘Jen, love, you shouldn’t be out here.’ She caught hold of Jennifer’s arm, ‘Let’s get you inside.’

  Sonia was looking around, confused. ‘Where’s—’

  ‘Shut up, you,’ Sheila screamed, ‘not another word. We’ll finish this later. I’ll ring you.’ Jennifer had no time to find that last bit funny before Sheila was almost lifting her in through the library door.

  ‘What an earth is going on with you two today?’ Jennifer said, smoothing her clothes back down when they were inside the library. ‘Have you been taking testosterone supplements?’

  ‘Might have done.’ Sheila was looking at the desk.

  ‘Possibly,’ Lionel agreed and would not meet her gaze either.’

  *

  Jennifer’s car was parked around the back of the library and Mack patted it warily. After the events of the last half hour he would not have been surprised if it had turned and bitten him. Should he stand by the car or back off a little? Jennifer would know he was here by now, and he didn’t want to look as if he was stalking her.

  Not again.

  He loitered by the wheelie bins.

  ‘Waiting for them to take the rubbish away?’ Doug was walking towards him. ‘See you’ve had a run-in with someone already.’

  ‘Lionel.’

  Doug whistled. ‘Lionel, eh? The crowd of people wanting to kill you must be bigger than I thought.’ He was looking over Mack’s shoulder, ‘And you know what? I think your day is about to get worse.’

  Mack turned to see Alex rushing towards him and then he was down on his knees again, but this time it was on concrete and he had not been pushed, but punched. He just had time to feel the pain bloom across his back before he was hauled to his feet.

  ‘You bastard.’ Mack could feel Alex’s spittle landing on his face. ‘What you did to her was unforgivable and you’ve come back for more?’ Mack was being shaken vigorously. ‘No one wants you up here – especially Jennifer.’

  His promise, to take whatever was thrown at him and not fight back, shattered when faced with Alex. Mack pushed him away and was pleased to see him stumble on the kerb.

  ‘Well Jen doesn’t bloody want you either,’ he shouted and then ducked as Alex threw another punch at him. ‘You were history before I came along.’

  This time Alex’s fist did connect with his face and Mack stumbled back against the wall.

  ‘Shut up, you little prick,’ Alex said, grabbing him by his jacket and twisting him round so that his face was flattened against the stone. Mack felt his arm being pushed up his back and Alex’s mouth was right by his ear.

  ‘The people who love her are looking after her, putting right the damage you’ve done. I won’t have you upsetting her again. Take this as a warning and go.’

  ‘So you can move in on her. Smother her? Get her up on that farm of yours and bury her?’

  ‘I’m protecting her,’ Alex snarled and Mack felt his hair being tugged. His head was pulled backwards before it was smacked forward into the stone. He was so stunned he didn’t feel the pain until he started to slide down the wall.

  ‘Hey, now,’ he heard Doug say, ‘not his head, not on the wall, that’s too much.’

  ‘Oh, you think so,’ Alex replied and Mack felt a sharp pain as he was kicked in the thigh.

  ‘Hey,’ Doug shouted, ‘enough. He’s on the ground. He’s bleeding. Leave it.’

  Mack was being lifted to his feet again, but this time it was by Doug.

  ‘Careful, Doug,’ he muttered, ‘I’m dripping on you.’

  Mack saw Alex’s hand was on Doug’s shoulder. ‘Move aside, Doug. Don’t you dare get in my way or I’ll—’

  ‘Or you’ll what?’ Doug asked sharply, ‘Have me horsewhipped, run me off your land? I’m not your serf, and I say this stops.’

  There was some other shouting which Mack didn’t catch as Doug had let him go and he was too busy crumpling on to the pavement and trying to stop the blood from dripping into his mouth. He was aware of Alex stalking away still shouting before Doug returned to lift him back to his feet.

  ‘Make it easy on yourself,’ he said peering at the cut on Mack’s head, ‘gan and get yourself patched up and then leave.’

  Mack tried to shake his head, but it hurt too much. ‘Can’t, Doug. I have to tell Jen how much I love her, make her believe all those good things I told her and forgive me for all the bad things.’

  ‘It’ll never work. They won’t let you near her. And what you did really was unforgivable.’

  ‘Got to try.’ Doug’s head appeared to be lengthening and then shortening. ‘Stand still, Doug. I want to know: Postwoman Pat, you asked her out?’

  ‘You’re gibbering, you soft git, I’m not moving at all. And it’s none of your business if I’ve asked her oot.’

  ‘That means “no”, doesn’t it? Ooh that’s bad, Doug, very bad, and I’d tell you why if you stopped swaying about. It’s not good Doug, it’s making me feel sick and dizzy. I’ve already bled on your jeans. I think I might vomit now.’

  ‘Oh, bugger,’ Doug said, ‘why do I get landed with t
his? Howay. Let’s get you to A&E. Can you walk?’

  ‘Learned when I was a toddler.’ He felt himself start to disconnect with everything around him except Doug manhandling him along the road.

  ‘Not a good start to your campaign, is it?’ Doug was saying. ‘You might want to consider some kind of private health insurance if you’re serious about staying up here.’

  Jennifer had only just got herself back up into the office when her mother and father appeared in the doorway, with Sheila behind them. Her immediate thought was that something had happened to Danny or Bryony, or even Louise.

  ‘It’s all right, love,’ her father said quickly, ‘it’s not bad news. Well …’

  She saw him look towards her mother.

  ‘Jen, love,’ her mother said, ‘Doug rang to say he’d had a visit from … from that … that Mack. Earlier. And since then he’s been spotted in Tyneforth. He’s back.’

  Jennifer heard the words but there was no meaning underneath them, it was too incredible, too unlikely. But then she thought of all the things that had happened this afternoon. That one scrap of comfort she had dressed herself in over the last four weeks, that it couldn’t get any worse, was suddenly whisked away. She was naked and raw again. He was back? For what? To laugh at her, rub her face in it? Her scarred face? She felt her father’s arm around her shoulders.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ Sheila said, ‘your mum couldn’t get you on your mobile, so she rang me and, what with Lionel and then Sonia, I—’

  ‘Where is he now?’ she asked, feeling the panic start to swirl in her.

  ‘I don’t know, not outside.’ Her dad had his hand under her elbow. ‘Come on, love, we’ll get you home. Stay there for a bit. Lionel said take as long as you want.’

  Jennifer let herself be led out to the car, jumping at every noise and every man who had even a hint of soft brown hair, and on the way out of Tyneforth she could not bear to look out of the car window.

  Why was he back?

  CHAPTER 42

  Mack woke up to hammering in his head and after lying on his back for a while, not daring to move, realised the hammering wasn’t just in his head. He was at Doug’s.

  Getting dressed took a long time and he stared at the dried blood on his T-shirt and the front of his jeans, not certain of exactly how it had got there. Standing up straight for any length of time made him feel dizzy, so he leaned and crouched and sidled his way downstairs to find the kitchen door open and the sun already warming the large flagstones in the kitchen. It was all a bit too bright really, and those pigeons, they had to keep on with that noise, did they? He screwed up his eyes as he tottered over to the forge, the noise getting louder and louder and braced himself for the moment when he actually had to stick his head around the doors. Doug was holding a piece of metal under the power hammer, gently manoeuvring it into a new position each time the hammer lifted. His two assistants were, bizarrely, building a curved wall with bricks and cement.

  ‘Didn’t die in your sleep then?’ Doug said, turning off the hammer and coming to the doors.

  Mack couldn’t shake his head. ‘Why the wall?’ he asked, screwing his eyes up against the heat.

  ‘Building a replica of the one them little buggers will be fixed to in the Diving Centre.’ Doug held up what looked like a splodge of flat metal. ‘They’ll be shells and seahorses when I’ve finished with them and I need to get the curve on them exactly right.’ He went over to speak to the lads and Mack meandered back to the house.

  Finding Doug waiting outside A&E when he’d emerged yesterday had been a huge surprise. Being offered a bed for the night had been an even bigger one. As he’d driven him home Doug had said he didn’t want Mack’s death on his conscience.

  ‘Breakfast,’ Doug said behind him and set about making toast and coffee while Mack carefully felt his head and slowly tested which parts of him hurt and which did not.

  ‘Was it just coincidence you turned up at the library?’ he asked when Doug sat down.

  ‘Nah, I came to warn Jen. I’d rung the farm too. Divvn’t know how Alex knew you were back, Danny, I guess. Now shut up and eat your breakfast.’

  Mack did as he was told, wondering what his next move should be. Another trip to the library, or should he bite the bullet and go to the farm now they knew he was back? First of all, he supposed, he needed to get back into Tyneforth and find a bed and breakfast.

  Doug chewed his toast and said nothing, and Mack didn’t feel like talking either. The enormity of the task that faced him had been brought home to him yesterday. Forgiveness seemed like a sheer cliff-face, dotted with people waiting to swipe him off. Even if he got past them and reached Jen, that was when it really got hard.

  He was close to her here, though, and there was comfort in that. The most comfort he’d felt in the last month. He had been thinking about her in bed last night as he’d drifted off. Thinking of how her skin had felt against his, the beautiful yielding sounds she’d made underneath him.

  Lovely, funny, graceful Jen.

  ‘If you’re set on staying, you might as well bunk up here,’ Doug said, putting his knife down abruptly.

  Perhaps Mack’s hearing had been impaired when he’d been hit. ‘Here? Doug, that’s … but I can’t. It would make you really unpopular, with the Rosebys, with Alex, with every—’

  ‘Divvn’t care. What you said yesterday about Alex burying Jen away … touched a nerve.’ Doug scraped the crumbs on the table into his hand and went to the door and chucked them out. ‘He’s been paying visits to the farm again; he’ll be looking to get his feet back under the table.’

  Doug wandered out of the door and Mack got up and slowly, clutching his coffee cup for support, followed him. They ended up sitting by the pond in the sun, Mack lowering himself, over several minutes, into a sitting position.

  ‘Still think you’re a first-class shit,’ Doug said when Mack’s backside had finally made contact with the grass, ‘but Alex’s a bigger one … on the sly. Never liked the wanker.’

  ‘Any particular reason? I mean, you don’t need one …’

  ‘Was up at their place, the Lambtons’, few years ago. Making a gate for them. Yeah, a big “Sod off, plebs” gate. They were having a drainage trench dug at the same time and suddenly up came this piece of stone; carved it was, a young boy, holding a cup. Obviously Roman. I went over to have a look and, it was lovely. Such workmanship. I wondered whether it had been carved here or brought over from Rome. Couldn’t get over that the last eyes that had seen it before ours, well, who knows who they belonged to?’ Doug broke off a piece of grass and started to tie it in a knot. ‘Old Lambton was there, and Alex, and it was obvious there was a load more stuff uncovered down in the trench.’ He shook his head. ‘Know what they did? Smashed it up into tiny shards and chucked it back in the trench and then covered it all up again. They put the drainage pipe further over.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Didn’t want the authorities there digging up their land, you see, documenting it, perhaps ordering more digging. I couldn’t stop them and I knew if I told anyone that would be me buggered on the work front. People like the Lambtons can do what they like. Or they think they can.’ Doug chucked the knotted grass into the pond. ‘Felt bad about it ever since. So … I’m not saying I believe your reasons for doing what you did, but coming back, having the shit beaten out of you, well, you didn’t have to do that. I’d say the jury’s oot in this house.’

  Mack fought the urge to wrap his arms round Doug, afraid that might be pushing the truce a little too far. ‘I’m really, really grateful’, he settled for instead.

  ‘Aye, you should be. And remember, if I think you’re taking the piss, we’ll be gannin’ up the coast and one of us won’t be coming back.’

  ‘Understood.’

  ‘That’s sorted then,’ Doug said in a kind of drawing-a-line-under-it voice. ‘Do what you can to really piss Alex off, and in return I’ll protect you when everyone you’ve upset marches up this drive
with pitchforks and blazing torches.’

  The sound of a car turning up the lane stopped any more discussion. It was Ray and Danny, and Mack felt clotted shame settle on him at the thought of facing them again.

  ‘Talking of people who hate you …’ Doug said, walking towards the car.

  CHAPTER 43

  Sitting in the kitchen, Jennifer felt she was part of a Victorian tableau of suffering. Brenda was standing behind her chair, Ray was sitting next to her, holding her hand, and Danny was leaning against the dresser, arms folded, head down. Louise, asleep in her car seat, added an extra little dash of pathos. Only Bryony, standing near the sink, seemed out of place: she looked more like a giant sheepdog, primed to round up anything that moved.

  Danny and Ray had returned from Doug’s with the news that they didn’t know why Mack was here but he had refused to go away again. That didn’t make any sense to Jennifer, and she understood from the looks that were passing between her mother and father that they were hiding something. The gut-clenching panic she had been experiencing ever since her parents had appeared in the library was slowly being tinged by something that might be impatience. She still wanted to run, but now she wanted some answers before she went.

  ‘He agreed not to try to see her in the library, or come to the farm?’ Brenda repeated.

  Ray nodded. ‘Said he wouldn’t actually come into the library, but that’s all he’d promise. Said if he bumped into her that was just fate.’

  ‘Brass neck of the man. Did you tell him about the police?’

  ‘Yes, Mum.’ Danny peeled himself away from the dresser. ‘But until he actually hassles her all they can do is warn him off. We could go through the courts, try for a—’

  ‘I am sitting in the room, you know,’ Jennifer said, standing up and breaking up the little poignant scene. ‘And I have a name.’

  ‘What is Doug playing at?’ Brenda said bitterly.

  ‘Are you sure he didn’t say why he’s here?’ Jennifer tried. ‘He must have said something?’