Saving Missy

by Beth Morrey

  We skipped his bath, as that felt a bit beyond me, but I supervised his teeth-brushing, helped him get into his Minions pyjamas, then led him to Arthur’s room where we snuggled up to read a new book from the library about a dragon who was desperate for a job. His eyelids grew heavy as I read, and afterwards I kissed his forehead and sat in a chair in the corner until he’d gone to sleep. He slept like he’d fallen out of an aeroplane, on his front, star-shaped, dark eyelashes fanning his cheeks, thumb in his mouth.

  I quietly let myself out of the room and found Bobby on the landing, sitting bolt upright, staring at me. It was her, Bruce and me as far as she was concerned, and the change to the status quo made her wary. So I took her downstairs, gave her a bit of sausage Otis had left, and settled her on her bed. I ate in the living room, flicking through an interiors magazine Sylvie had left on her last visit. Then I fed Bobby and cleared up, listening to the sound of her new tag clattering on the bowl as she ate. Denzil told me that you shouldn’t put the name of the dog on the tag, because that just helped dog-nappers, so you put the name of the owner instead. As Angela had reminded me, I wasn’t her true owner, but all the same I’d gone to the cobbler’s and got them to engrave ‘Carmichael’ on one side, and my phone number on the other. I liked the sight of it glinting on her Christmas collar.

  After her dinner, Bobby felt frisky, and brought me Bruce for a game of tug. I sat on the sofa and pulled at the frayed and damp rabbit as she mock-growled and pounced. We were still engaged in this game when my mobile rang. Dropping the rabbit, I picked up the phone abstractedly, watching her as she darted forward to snatch her toy, shaking it until she was sufficiently convinced she’d ‘killed’ him. Then she tenderly placed him on the floor and licked him thoroughly.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘It’s me. I’m outside. I didn’t want Bobby to bark. Can you let me in?’

  I went to the door and opened it, grabbing Bobby’s snout to smother the outraged woof. As I straightened up to look at Angela’s tear-stained face, I thought of her odd request, and the not smoking, and not drinking, and suddenly it all became clear and I cursed myself for being so stupid, so infuriatingly blind. I, of all people, should have seen the signs, should have prepared better for this moment. Opening my arms, she fell into them, sobbing.

  ‘I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry,’ she mumbled against my shoulder. ‘I didn’t know where else to go.’

  ‘Hush,’ I said. ‘Hush.’ I led her into the sitting room, and found some tissues, and sat with her while she blew her nose. Then I left her on the sofa with Bobby while I made some cocoa, which she didn’t really drink, just held, letting the heat warm her fingers as she stared into the dying embers of the fire. Later on, I made a hot water bottle and took her up to the spare room, where Alistair and Emily usually slept when they stayed. It was a bit bare and cold, but I retrieved the paisley throw from the living room and wrapped it around her as she shivered in bed. Then I sat and held her hand and thought about all the things I wanted to say but couldn’t. I couldn’t find the right words, wanting to confess but not able to dredge up the right confession, even now.

  ‘I voted Leave.’

  She blinked and looked towards me, blankly. ‘What?’

  ‘I voted Leave. In the referendum. I haven’t been able to tell you, and I feel so bad about it, it was a stupid thing and I was wrong and feel so awful, about Otis not being able to travel, and Hanna’s door, and Mel’s funding and everything else that’s gone wrong. I’m so sorry.’ I trailed off, biting my lip, unable to meet her gaze.

  After a second, she started to laugh, weakly at first, and then properly, wheezing, new tears starting in her eyes, but better ones.

  ‘You fucking idiot,’ she said, finally. ‘What were you thinking?’

  ‘I thought it was what Leo would have wanted. But it wasn’t, Mel said.’

  ‘I should bloody well hope not,’ she huffed.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said again. And she squeezed my hand and lay down with her eyes closed. I didn’t let go, and long after she’d gone to sleep I was still there, still holding her hand, thinking about Bertie and what I did all those years ago.

  Chapter 36

  I called him Bertie from the moment I realized I was pregnant, that summer of 1956, when Leo had gone and I was back in Lancaster Villas for the holidays, supposedly preparing for my third year at Newnham. It took me a while to comprehend it, maybe because I didn’t want to, but eventually the nausea, which wasn’t limited to the mornings, made things very clear. I spent a few weeks being sick in secret, sneaking off to the bathroom to grip the basin and cough up the bile from the back of my throat before collapsing, clammy and shaking, onto the tiled floor. Even when the sickness passed, I gagged with the misery and dread of it, contemplating the abyss of confusion and hope and horror I’d fallen into.

  Downstairs, my mother and her cronies were busy organizing their latest crusade, distributing leaflets, making placards, going on marches. She’d thrown herself into the campaign for the abolition of the death penalty, devastated and outraged by the execution of Ruth Ellis the year before. So she was often out parading in front of HMP Wandsworth, or Holloway, and didn’t notice her wraith of a daughter quietly retching round the house, waiting to be found out. In the end I had to tell her, as I had no idea what else to do. She stood in our drawing room, still holding a placard that read ‘Thou shalt not kill’, while I whispered my confession, unable to look her in the face. The silence of that moment after, as I cringed and wept, and then the blessed relief as she put down the sign, and I felt her arms around my shoulders. ‘Hush,’ she said. ‘Hush.’

  I never doubted my mother’s warrior-like qualities, and in the following days she channelled that fiery energy for me. Money was found, discreet enquiries made, appointments booked. But, alongside the single-minded ferocity with which she dealt with it all, was a tenderness and absolute acceptance that humbled me, made me feel more guilty than ever, because I didn’t deserve it. Part of me wanted her to rail and condemn, just as another part of me wanted her to tell me I should keep the baby. It was Leo’s child, after all. Bertie, even though I would never find out if he was a boy. Bertie, even though he would never be born.

  I saw two psychiatrists, and my mother said it was necessary for me to appear mentally unhinged. This I had no trouble with, as by that point I was delirious with sickness and lack of sleep, going into rooms and forgetting why I was there, twirling my hair round my fingers and pulling it out in great clumps.

  I saw them on separate days on the same street in central London. They both asked me a few questions, making notes so they didn’t have to look at me. The first time, I couldn’t breathe properly, and had to put my head between my knees to quell the dizziness. The second time I fell into a kind of abstraction and stared into space, barely aware of the voice prodding my eardrum, an echo in my head. I wasn’t sure if any of it was real, or simply the bravura performance that was essential to get me out of this mess. Leaving the second office, I caught a glimpse of the doctor’s notes: ‘history of mental illness in the family.’ Like Sibby wringing the necks of her beloved chickens, my mother was prepared to make sacrifices.

  We got a cab to the clinic out in Ealing, where I remembered very little except white sheets and the smell of disinfectant. When my mother asked and I told her she said, ‘Thank God’. I had pain and bleeding for a day or two, much less than I deserved, and spent that time lying flat on my back in bed, staring at the ceiling, feeling euphoric and wretched, hopeful and despairing, cramped and unravelling. My mother brought me tea and toast with the crusts cut off, which I didn’t eat, but let dry out on the bedside table, thinking of the stale carrot sandwiches in the cellars. Then, after three days, she told me to get up and start studying: ‘There’s a reason we did this.’

  I got a First in Classics, which no one at Newnham expected, least of all my bewildered tutors. But that was my gift to my mother, my refuge in adversity; it was the one thing I could do, havin
g put her and myself through all that. I slogged away, staying late in the library, attending every lecture, devouring every book, conjugating every last verb. No longer the skimming stone, but the boulder, shouldered and pushed up the hill, even if it all meant nothing without Bertie.

  I left Cambridge with my splendid degree and empty womb, my mother’s arms around my shoulders, proud and validated. But when Leo came back and we got engaged, she was horrified. How could I marry this man, given our history? She pulled me aside at the wedding – ‘darling, are you sure?’ – and I nodded because he was my Odysseus, my destiny. From the first time I saw him, I knew that we belonged to each other. You couldn’t insulate yourself against misfortune – an arrow would always find its way in somewhere – but with the right person, when life knocked you down, you would be able to get up again. Onwards and upwards, as Leo used to say. When I married him, I felt like I was finally making amends – picking myself up – and when I next conceived, Bertie would rise again.

  How did I keep that knowledge to myself for all those years? What kind of marriage was it? An uneven one, as I’d always known it would be, weighed down by my love and my secrets, while he was unencumbered. But we bobbed away, he and I, the anchor and the buoy, and our whispered song was never entirely drowned out. I still heard it then, though it was very faint, as I sat in our spare room, holding Angela’s hand, mourning her lost child and mine, as my dog listened patiently to my confession.

  Chapter 37

  The following morning I let Angela lie in, and got up with Otis at an unholy hour, feeding him cereal and letting him watch far too much television, keeping the door to the living room closed so as not to wake her. I didn’t tell Otis she was there, instead embarking on the tricky process of getting him ready for school, retrieving socks, hunting down his school bag and wrestling him into his clothes while he tried to play trains, draw a picture of a monster, and wrap Bobby in his scarf. When we finally got out of the house, I was sweaty and breathless with the effort, and it was only after I’d dropped him at school and he’d scampered off, bag flapping against the backs of his knees, that I realized Bobby was still wearing the scarf. I took it off her and stuffed it in my pocket, taking the opportunity to scratch her neck.

  When we got back from our walk, Angela was down in the kitchen drinking tea and listening to the radio. She was still pale, though less pinched than the night before. She leaned down to fondle Bobby’s ears and looked up at me slightly shyly.

  ‘Did you sleep well?’

  She nodded, sipping her drink. ‘Not bad, considering. Thanks for taking Otis to school, how was he?’

  ‘Fine. He gets to set the table at lunch today, apparently that’s a huge privilege.’

  She smiled. ‘Funny how they manage to turn chores into treats. I can never manage that myself.’

  I poured myself some tea and ate some cereal, because I hadn’t had time while I’d been chivvying Otis, all the while surreptitiously watching Angela to gauge her mood. The spell of the night before had been broken, and her shields were up again. When I finished my breakfast, I got to my feet and deposited the bowl in the sink.

  ‘Hanna says her boss has made the café dog-friendly. I thought I’d take Bobby for a coffee – would you like to join me, or would you prefer to rest?’

  That fired her up, as I hoped it would. ‘I’ll come with you,’ she said, going to fetch her coat.

  It was a beautiful clear day, with a light cold breeze, and we walked slowly towards the café, Bobby pulling ahead, dragging me this way and that as she was compelled to sample the aroma of every lamppost, bin, weed and twig in the vicinity. Angela walked with her hands in her pockets, head down, staring at her clinking boots.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell Sylvie?’

  She looked up, eyes narrowing at the question. ‘What?’

  ‘She said you called her to talk about something, but then decided against it.’

  She hesitated. ‘Because she’s too nice. And she’s never wanted children.’

  ‘Wouldn’t that have been helpful?’

  She shook her head, and we walked on in silence for a while. Then, as we approached the café: ‘I so wanted Otis to have a brother or a sister. I’m an only child and I never wanted that for him. But when it came to it, I couldn’t do it all again on my own. I just couldn’t.’

  I thought of that day when Ali was sick on the rug, both children screaming and crying, the burning in my ankle, suffused with rage and frustration, the tightly-wound impotence of the moment when everything became too much. When it came to children, two was more than two; with just one parent, I could see why it was an infinite and unthinkable number.

  ‘Did you tell … the father?’

  ‘Jack? No. He’s in New York, it was never on the cards. It should never have happened, it was a stupid, stupid mistake.’ She took a deep breath and re-tied her ponytail. ‘Shall we get that coffee?’

  We went into the café, as warm and welcoming as ever, and sat at our usual table. Bobby, excited to be in a new place, immediately started sniffing, her nose on a puppet string around the cake shelf. I pulled her back, tucking her under my seat where she lay down with a disapproving sigh, eyebrows twitching.

  ‘Was Leo a good father?’ Angela bit into a sugar cube, cupping her palm underneath to catch the falling grains.

  I paused, stirring my coffee. ‘No, I suppose in many ways, he wasn’t.’ A tingle of shock and relief at the admission. ‘He was great fun, knew how to play with them, which I was never very good at. But there was a limit to his patience. He didn’t want to get involved in the details and if it ever got boring, or messy, then he would just retreat to his study, or go off to a conference. And I would be left to clear up and carry on. But then, I’m not sure I was a very good mother either. The most I can say is that I was always there.’

  Angela’s eyes glistened with unshed tears. ‘Trust me, sticking around is as good as it gets.’

  ‘You’re still young, you could easily have more children. Otis doesn’t have to be an only child, and if he is, well, there are worse things.’

  ‘I’m thirty-seven. Sean and I were together, on and off, for thirteen years. I don’t think I can be bothered to get to know someone all over again. Do that thing of pretending I’m not insane, or that I don’t eat like a fucking pig.’

  I thought of how carefully I’d played Leo, declining invitations, all that holding back and furtive application of make-up. I felt quite glad that I was far too old to go through all that again.

  ‘Maybe next time you could, oh, I don’t know, just be yourself?’ I suggested.

  She stared at me for a second and then we both giggled.

  ‘The very idea!’ she gasped. ‘Hell’s bells!’

  When I stopped laughing I felt washed out, as if I’d had a good cry. ‘It’ll be OK,’ I said. ‘You’ll be OK.’

  We finished our coffee and then Angela felt tired, so we paid the bill and left, Hanna’s effusive boss, Ahmed, taking the opportunity to pump our hands, give Bobby a pat and assure us that dogs were welcome in his establishment.

  ‘So you know,’ said Angela grimly, as we wandered towards home. ‘We’re going to have to talk about Brexit sooner or later.’ She raised her eyebrows and dug her hands deeper into her jacket as she stared me down.

  I stalled on the pavement, Bobby tugging impatiently at her lead. ‘I wish I’d never told you,’ I sighed, eventually. ‘I know how you feel about it. But, on the day of the referendum, I just wanted things to change. It had nothing to do with the vote, not really. It was more like … firing a shot in the air, to startle the pigeons.’

  Angela huffed. ‘More like shooting yourself in the foot. I thought you were better than that. You’re an educated woman. You lived through the war, for Chrissake.’

  ‘I know. I feel terrible about it. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t say sorry to me; say sorry to the country.’ At that point I sensed a tirade coming and realized Angela must be feeling a littl
e better. ‘This poor country, which is going to go to the dogs. Sorry, Bobby,’ she patted her head. ‘I’m all right, I’ve got an Irish passport, but the rest of you are doomed, I tell you. Doomed to sit on the sidelines as some second-rate, two-bit lost empire. Sovereignty, my arse. It makes my blood boil—’

  Then Angela’s step suddenly faltered and her breath caught in her throat. Following the direction of her gaze, I saw a tall, solidly-built man standing with one hand on her front gate, looking at us.

  ‘It’s Adrian,’ she breathed. ‘Fix’s husband.’

  We approached warily, Bobby lagging behind to sniff. When we reached him, Angela nodded stiffly.

  One hand rested lightly on the wrought iron railing, but there was a kind of suppressed tension in his body, like a cat before it pounced. Adrian’s eyes passed across me, barely registering my presence, before resting on Angela with an inscrutable expression. Even in the strong winter sunlight, I couldn’t see the colour of them, they seemed to be all pupil, all black. Hunter eyes. He didn’t say anything, just kept looking at her.

  ‘Adrian. I didn’t expect to see you.’ Her hands were shaking slightly, so she thrust them in her pockets and stood very straight.

  He breathed in, slowly, nostrils flaring. ‘I came to see Felicity.’

  ‘She’s not here. What made you think she was?’

  ‘I’ve been everywhere else.’ The hand holding the railing tightened slightly.

  ‘I don’t know where she is,’ said Angela. ‘But I’m sure she’ll be in touch if she wants you to know.’