by Eve Smith
‘Lily knows you’re here,’ says the carer. ‘She’s on her way now.’ My stomach tightens. ‘I’ll take you through shortly. Can I get you anything to drink?’
‘I’d love a cup of tea. What about you, Sasha?’
‘Just a glass of water, please.’
The carer leaves us and I start to pace. A camera swivels round above us.
‘They’ve more security in this place than school,’ says Sasha, eyeballing the camera.
‘Hardly surprising,’ I say. ‘These are the shores of the River Styx.’
She looks at me blankly. I don’t know why I just said that: it’s a sure sign I’m stressed. I start another lap of the room.
‘Mum!’ Sasha catches my arm. ‘Can you stop that? You’re like a demented parrot in a cage.’ I burst out laughing. It’s a welcome release.
The door opens and the laugh freezes on my lips.
‘Mrs Connelly, Lily’s ready for you. Would you and your daughter like to come through?’
CHAPTER 38
LILY
The little red light on the camera blinks at me like a reptile’s eye. I have a sudden urge to go to the toilet, even though I’ve just been. My head feels too heavy. As if there’s a weight on the back of my neck, pressing it down.
She’s here. She really is here.
I’ve barely slept these past few nights. When I do, my dreams consume me. I think I hear her, crying for a feed. Even after I wake.
I remember her warmth as she suckled. The little snuffles and whimpers she made. Each detail was a new miracle. The pink filigree of veins on her eyelids, so fine they were almost transparent. The way her mouth made a perfect ‘O’ when she slept. The nail on her little finger: no bigger than a buttercup’s petal.
I hear voices, and the pounding in my chest intensifies. I cover my hands with my sleeves and fold them in my lap.
The door opens. A handsome woman with light-brown hair walks in and stops. Her pale-blue eyes shimmer like crystals.
‘Kate?’
The word emerges from somewhere so buried that I barely recognise it. My baby. My beautiful baby. All grown up.
She doesn’t answer, doesn’t budge from the doorway, just gazes at me, completely still. A blonde-haired girl behind her whispers something, and the spell is lifted. Kate steps forward, and I scrabble with the arms of my chair. I latch onto her with my ugly claws as my eyes dissolve in tears.
I hear a gravelly voice saying the same thing over and over:
‘Sorry. I’m so sorry. Sorry.’
It’s mine.
KATE
The door presses like a dead weight against my hand. I am frozen, unable to move. It’s worse than when I went down the aisle. Because I don’t know who’s in there waiting for me. This mother that disappeared. Who I can’t even call by her real name.
I take one step.
A frail woman with white wisps of hair sits hunched in a chair. She could be one of my patients. I recognise her, just, as the woman in the photo. But the years have taken their toll. She lifts her head. Sallow skin sags beneath pleading eyes.
‘Kate?’
Is this her? My mother?
I feel nothing.
‘Mum,’ whispers Sasha behind me. ‘Mum, you need to go in.’
I command my feet to move. As she strains to get up I notice her hands: gnarled and sculpted by arthritis. She clings to me like an injured bird and says something I can’t make out. She repeats it, over and over, and I wonder if she does have dementia after all.
There’s an almighty crash. I spin round and see the startled face of a carer, hands still outstretched. Teacups roll across the carpet, jettisoning fluid; cake has already toppled off plates. Lily and I are still holding each other, like two dancers who have been interrupted on stage. The woman drops to the floor, muttering apologies, and starts sweeping the china back onto the tray.
‘Oh dear. Shall I get a cloth?’ I bend down to pick up a glass, grateful for an excuse to let Lily go. The carpet squelches under my feet.
‘No, no, please, I’ll deal with it,’ says the carer, blushing. She collects the remaining crockery and scurries out of the room.
‘Well, that’s what you call an entrance,’ says Sasha.
Nobody smiles. Lily collapses into her seat, eyes circling the floor.
The carer reappears a few seconds later with a tea towel and a bowl. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she says, mopping the carpet. ‘So clumsy of me. This won’t take a minute.’
We all watch her in silence, as if we’re the audience at a play.
I try to remember what I was going to say to my mother.
But the moment has gone.
LILY
Her disappointment rolls across the room, stifling me. She can’t even look at me: the wizened remains of the mother she never knew. I want to gather her to me, breathe her in, but there’s a wall of years between us. What did I expect? She’s a mother, with a daughter of her own. I think of all the photos in Margaret Benn’s room, and my chest aches. Those moments in Kate’s life: I’ve missed them all.
‘Hello, Lily. I’m Sasha.’
It’s the girl. She bends down and touches my arm, like the visiting vicar does sometimes.
‘I’m Kate’s daughter.’
She has hair the colour of burnished gold. I look up into electric blue eyes.
A keening sound escapes my lips. The eyes, the hair, everything.
Sweet Jesus, it’s him.
She pulls away, and I think that’s it. But she kneels down in front of my chair and wraps her pale, thin arms around me.
I see Kate watching us from the other side of the room, her mouth contorted, as if in pain.
She brings her palms up to her face and starts to shake.
KATE
I don’t know how long we’ve been here. The three of us, in this room. It feels as if time is shifting: speeding up and then slowing down. My body has rebelled; I can’t trust it. I have no idea what it might say or do next.
‘She’s the image of him, you know,’ says Lily, nodding.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Your father. He was an exceptionally good-looking man.’
Sasha raises her eyebrows. I ignore her. I’m stunned Lily’s brought that up.
‘You’ve probably guessed by now that he was married.’ She tugs at the sleeves of her cardigan. ‘I loved him. Really loved him.’ She turns her watery gaze to me. ‘But he had his own family. It wasn’t to be.’
I see the hurt in her eyes, even now. I wonder if he knew about me. Strange to think that I may have a half-brother or half-sister somewhere who have no idea I exist.
I take a breath. My mind is racing with so many questions that I’m at a loss where to start. ‘What happened to him?’
Her gaze shifts to the carpet. ‘He died, many years ago. In the Crisis.’ She clenches her fingers. ‘I’m sorry you never knew him. But perhaps it was for the best.’
The question sticks in my throat, fighting to get out. ‘I … I imagine it must be difficult, having to dig all this up again.’ I swallow. ‘Please, don’t worry about the fact that I … that you weren’t married. That doesn’t bother me at all.’
She turns to me and her face crumples. ‘I know what you’re thinking. There were lots of single mothers my age; why not me?’ She shakes her head. ‘I wanted you, Kate. I wanted us to be a family, but that just wasn’t possible.’ Her lips tremble. ‘I was so afraid that … that, after everything that happened … I wouldn’t be enough.’
Her honesty sinks me and I have to look away. Lily reaches for my hand. I let her take it.
‘I’ve thought about you so often, Kate. There have been countless times I regretted my decision. But later, when the Crisis came, I knew I was right.’ She cradles my palm in her veined, crooked hand. ‘You were loved and brought up by good people. You’re a successful woman with your own family now.’ She smiles, but it’s a painfully sad echo of her Mona Lisa smile. ‘I’m glad you never had to end
ure the blemish of my mistakes.’
I stare at this old lady in her chair. This lady who is my mother.
I don’t understand. And I don’t necessarily agree.
But I realise that none of that matters, as the distance between us peels away.
CHAPTER 39
Crisis
Shocking Rise in Infant Mortality after Hospital Outbreaks of MRSA
‘We are staring down the barrel of an amputation glut,’ warns Director of National Infection Service.
A leaked report claims that the TB pandemic has been compounded by an explosion of infections in overcrowded hospitals caused by multidrug-resistant bacteria, including MRSA and E. coli. The number of untreatable infections has rocketed, with a sharp increase in bloodstream, urinary-tract and respiratory-tract infections.
‘Infected cuts, surgical wounds or catheters can be fatal, even to healthy adults,’ said one doctor we interviewed. ‘Children and the elderly are particularly at risk. If infections are allowed to progress, to save lives, we are forced to amputate. The safest thing is to stay at home and avoid infection. Without an effective drug arsenal, doctors are powerless to help.’
MARY
I slump back in my seat, eyelids hovering. With my eyes almost shut and mask on, I look as good as dead. Unconscious, at the very least. It’s a whole lot safer if they think you’re not breathing. Joel has taught me that. I watch the grey strip of track in my wing mirror, the sliver of trees in front. I start to count. If someone’s coming for you, they’ll make their move before twenty, in case you hit the pedal and go. Joel has taught me that, too.
Six. Seven…
Something erupts from the branches. My eyes snap open. Only a wood pigeon. Lucky: one that got away. It flaps its stubby wings and settles on a distant telegraph pole. As it bobs its head I think of those grey feathers sashaying into a little pile on the kitchen floor. Moons of onion tucked under its pale, nude wings. My stomach claws at me. God, I hope he turns up.
All these decades of overmedicating our livestock have finally caught up with us. As if the food shortages weren’t bad enough, we’ve managed to transmit our human TB strain to our farm animals, who, in turn, are passing it back to us, incubating more and more virulent strains. The vast majority of cattle have been massacred; they say the pigs and sheep are next. Even those farms that managed to avoid infection aren’t exempt from the culls, not unless the animals are antibiotic-free. The last thing we need is to keep on transferring resistance. Given that under three percent of animals have been reared organically and all meat imports have stopped, meat, fish and poultry are pretty well off the menu. The Crisis has turned this country vegetarian.
There’s a sudden flash in the tree tops, like sun reflecting off glass. I check my mirrors. Nothing.
Sixteen, seventeen…
A gunshot ricochets in the branches. I shunt back my seat and hit the floor. Blood thumps in my ears as I cram my body under the steering wheel. I should never have risked it. Diesel and cars are big bounty. Looters are everywhere.
Twenty-one, twenty-two…
There’s a light crunch of feet. Getting closer. My hand creeps into my bag and curls round the pepper spray. Sweat pricks under my arms.
My door rips open. The smell hits me first: blood and earth, and something else: a musky, feral scent. Two wild eyes glare at me, red filigrees of veins straggling out from the pupils. This face is so beaten by the elements that it looks as if it’s been roasted.
‘Dropped something?’ Joel’s whiskered mouth twists into a smile, exposing jagged peaks of teeth. Grotesque as they are, I can’t help but stare. I don’t see many mouths these days. Joel is not one to bother with masks. As he explained to me once, with a tap of his rifle: ‘If I don’t like the look of someone, they won’t get close enough to breathe their germs over me.’
The floppy neck of a bird swings towards me like a pendulum; electric-blue and emerald feathers shimmer above one scarlet-masked eye.
I scramble up onto my seat. ‘I … I heard a shot.’
He sucks in his lips. ‘Pigeons. One of God’s stupidest creatures.’ A waft of sour breath blows in my face. I resist the urge to tighten my mask. ‘Don’t even have the sense to hide.’
I follow Joel’s gaze to the still body lying underneath the telegraph pole and feel a twist of remorse. I’m not a fan of killing wildlife. Or breaking the law. But I’m not a fan of starvation, either.
I pop the boot, anxious to move things along. ‘Only enough diesel for two cans, I’m afraid. I’ll try to bring more next time.’
He gives a disgruntled snort. ‘Might not be a next time.’ He scratches his nose leaving a smear of dirt like some tribal marking. ‘Woods round here are cleared out. If you’re sticking to game, I’m going to have to look further afield.’
There must be hundreds of Joels all over the country, making a fortune from the misfortune of beasts. Paid to cull livestock and game that they’re supposed to incinerate, instead they sell the meat on, for commodities or cash. I refuse to take any farm stock, though, no matter what they say. I’m prepared to take my chances with game: they haven’t been stuffed with antibiotics; the wildlife culls are mainly a precaution.
Joel lumbers round the back and thuds a bag into the boot. ‘Haunch of venison and a brace of pheasants.’
Such culinary delights used to possess a rustic charm. ‘That’s great, Joel. Thanks.’
The whole car shakes when he slams it shut. ‘Make it three next time.’
I hit the accelerator. In my rear-view mirror I see Joel staggering towards the telegraph pole, a jerry can clenched in each hand. He stoops over, pockets the pigeon and disappears back into the trees.
If it wasn’t for my Pharmaplanta fuel allowance, my protein levels would be seriously deficient. If I’m careful, and sleep at the lab some nights, I can save enough fuel to trade. The extra e-coupons, though, are as good as useless; there’s barely enough food for people to spend the rations they have. The travel permit’s handy, though; it gets me through the checkpoints. They even kitted out my car with a purifier. It’s in their interests to keep me alive.
I bump along the track, scanning the hedges partitioning each field. Clouds loom overhead, cloaking every leaf and branch in a film of grey. A tractor stands abandoned in a half-ploughed field, waiting for a driver who never returns. In the distance rise the all-too-familiar plumes. The acrid stench of charring flesh permeates the car, too pungent even for the purifier. And I remember what Piet said all those years ago: ‘The stench. It never leaves you.’
My mind starts playing tricks on me, imagining bodies folded into hedgerows, looters lurking under trees. The noise of the engine seems unfeasibly loud. I switch the radio on, low volume, more for distraction than news. The road’s not far now. Just got to get past the farm.
‘…stay in your homes. Only drivers with authorised travel permits will be admitted through checkpoints. Ration packs will continue to be delivered every two weeks; update your order online through the Government Gateway…’
Despite the woeful list of instructions, just hearing that official, sane voice calms me.
‘…the latest health advice and to order medication…’
The presenter falters. ‘I’m sorry, I…’ There’s a rustle of paper. ‘We’ve just received some breaking news.’ I lunge for the volume button. ‘A report released by the security services claims that the UK, the US and several other European countries may have been the victims of bioterrorist attacks.’ My heart slams in my chest. ‘It’s alleged carriers infected with the resistant TB strain were used to spread the disease. A statement by the home secretary is expected shortly…’
It’s true, then, what Piet told me. Someone harnessed that disease. We are the architects of our own disaster.
The car thuds over a rock, sending it spinning out to the side. I lift my foot off the accelerator and remember to breathe. Up ahead a pair of rusting metal gates are propped against a green barn with a corrugate
d iron roof. Ivy straggles over the walls of empty pens. I glance up at the farmhouse; damp cobwebs cling to lichen-coated stones. No face appears at any window.
I skirt round the building onto the cobbled drive that leads down to the road, the news still buzzing in my head. That’s when I see him: a small boy, hanging over the gate in front of the cattle grid. He kicks the gatepost with one listless foot, as if it’s just another day.
I kill the radio and skid to a stop. I keep the engine running. There’s never been anyone at the farm before. The boy looks up. He has hollow cheeks, sunken eyes. No mask. He hesitantly lifts a hand. It’s more of a question than a wave. This is no coincidence. He’s been waiting for me.
I swallow, trying to get some moisture into my mouth. That gate is the only thing that separates me from home. My instincts tell me to flee, that this is some kind of trap. I imagine a sweat-sodden man barrelling out of the farmhouse, clambering into the car, his phlegmy breath coughing into my face.
The boy’s jaw pumps as if it’s gearing itself up for something. I keep my foot on the pedal. The gate is flanked by a stone wall on one side and a barbed wire fence on the other. Both look pretty robust. I scan the fields behind. The ground’s too soggy; if I try to go round, I could get stuck.
I lower my window an inch. ‘Sorry, can I help you?’
His lip trembles. ‘My mum…’ My heart sinks. I know what’s coming. ‘Please, can you take her? To the hospital?’
My eyes squeeze shut. ‘Listen to me. A hospital is the worst possible place to be right now.’
His eyebrows knit together. ‘She’s got the sickness. They can help her.’