If You Were Here

by Alice Peterson

  ‘Our lives, our futures, are in the hands of the gods and no amount of chanting and carrot juice is going to change that, young man.’

  You should have seen his face. I doubt anyone had ever spoken to Theo like that before.

  But in reality, Theo hadn’t meant to be insensitive; he just wasn’t aware of Tim’s HD or Beth inheriting the gene. In the grand scheme of things, what he’d said was hardly a crime.

  Theo is older and responsible; he clearly cares for Flo. Yet I can’t help but feel something is lacking.

  ‘Is he kind?’ I ask, again registering Flo’s surprise. But I have to ask, not only for myself, but for Beth too.

  She nods. ‘He’d do anything for me. I know you don’t know him that well yet, but that will change. You don’t need to worry, Granny.’

  My face softens. I realize I’ve pushed her enough. I raise my glass to touch Flo’s. ‘To your future – just don’t come home with an American accent.’

  And at long last we laugh, before Flo lays the table. We spend the rest of the evening eating supper and discussing her engagement, Flo sketching a picture of the dress she would like to wear and trying to persuade me it’s time to go shopping. ‘Hats are back in fashion, Granny.’

  6

  Flo

  ‘Granny said she was happy, but I could tell something was worrying her. It was strange,’ I say to James in the kitchen later that night.

  James hands me a mug of tea. ‘In what way?’

  ‘That’s the thing, I don’t know.’

  There’s no reason for Granny and Theo not to get along. Though I can’t help but recall the run-in they had when Theo said he believed so much of any illness is preventable – and I agreed with him – which appeared to rattle Granny.

  ‘That generation really don’t understand the power of the mind,’ he’d said later to me on the way back to his flat. ‘They simply take the pills their doc prescribes, but there’s endless research now about exercising the brain to beat dementia.’ I remember him turning to me with a smile, adding, ‘But boy, she knocks back the vodkas, too, doesn’t she? She could drink me under the table.’

  ‘Listen, it’s her job to make sure Theo’s good enough,’ James says. ‘My mum always grills my girlfriends.’

  ‘She was happy,’ I insist, realizing I’m making little sense, ‘but—’

  ‘You’re overthinking. You’re jet-lagged.’

  I nod, but I don’t agree. I’m certain that, for a split second, in her eyes, I saw fear.

  7

  Peggy

  The following morning I wake up even more exhausted than when I went to bed, and now my head is pounding. After Flo left, I decided to polish off the rest of the champagne under the guise it was medicinal. I’m not too proud to say drink is my crutch. It allows me to park my problems, anaesthetize them for a few hours. The only hitch is that they soon come back once the anaesthetic has worn off, leaving me worse than before.

  Another memory comes creeping back, like unwanted ivy.

  Oh, Peggy. You didn’t, did you?

  My hazy recollection of marching into the garden with my torch, leaning over the wall and shouting comes flooding back to me.

  ‘Keep the noise down! I am trying to sleep!’

  What must the new neighbours think of me?

  Oh, I don’t give a flying monkey what they think.

  I swing my tired old legs out of bed and stretch my neck and shoulders hearing an unpleasant crunch, before I head downstairs to the kitchen to make myself a cup of tea and let Elvis out.

  ‘What should I do, old boy?’

  I ruffle his ears and give him one of his sausage roll treats. Sometimes I wish I were a dog, my only concern being my next meal or which position to take by the Aga for my afternoon nap.

  The kitchen sink is heaped with unwashed plates and glasses. Flo did offer to clear up last night, but I thought she looked exhausted after her flight. I wanted her to go home and get a good night’s sleep.

  Besides, I needed to be alone, to think things through.

  I rinse one of the plates before loading it into the dishwasher, cursing myself yet again for not having had the courage to talk to Beth. My own mother had practically been a stranger, abandoning my father and me on the verge of the Second World War when I was six months old to move to America with her new man. Apparently, she felt trapped in a boring marriage to a stuffy army man, so when she met a much older, wealthier American chap – a banker – who asked her to return to New York with him, off she bolted.

  My father joined his regiment, the Black Watch, and I was packed off to live with my spinster aunt, Celia, Mum’s older sister, who lived in a small village in Wiltshire.

  My father survived the war. I recall vividly the moment his train pulled into the station.

  ‘Go and kiss your father,’ Aunt Celia encouraged me, but I had no idea who he was until she pointed out a handsome man striding towards us in his kilt.

  I lived with Dad after that, but it was a quiet, solitary life. He hated noise and was allergic to drama. He was kind and never hurt me, but in many ways I was rather intimidated by his silence. I was seven years old when I first met my mother properly. I don’t recall it being a happy visit. I didn’t know how to act or behave around this glamorous woman wearing a fur coat and high heels. Over the years she would occasionally sweep in and out of my life with little care of how deeply it affected me. Often I was ill with flu or caught some mysterious bug only days before she arrived.

  I met Tim through a friend when I was twenty-four and we were engaged and married within a year. Perhaps the cruellest thing my mother ever said to me was that I’d better accept his proposal as no one else was going to ask me. I hadn’t expected her to come to the wedding, but I suppose I always kept that flicker of hope inside me that one day my mother might apologize for leaving Dad and me behind.

  I load another glass into the machine.

  It’s simple. I have two choices: I either tell Flo about the letter, or I don’t. I just need to decide which option causes the least damage.

  Last night, I was certain I should say something soon, but now I’m not so sure. After all, there is nothing she can do to help herself; no preventative measures. We are all going to die; we just don’t know when or how.

  Maureen, my bridge friend, told me that her aunt died of a mystery virus. One morning she was eating breakfast, happy as Larry, and the next her head was buried in her bowl of cornflakes.

  If we all knew our fate, would we ever get out of bed in the morning? I’m not sure I would.

  Tim always reflected that he was glad he hadn’t known to begin with. He may have lived his life in fear.

  I look up to the ceiling. I could always pretend I’d only just found the letter.

  For a moment that thought brings comfort. Until I realize Flo would still accuse me of not telling her the truth about her grandfather.

  The argument for telling Flo is simple: she deserves to know the truth, not only about her grandfather, but about her mother, too. She needs to know the facts before she makes any life-changing decisions.

  If Theo is the right man, he’ll stick by her.

  She’s still Flo. Nothing needs to change. She can still get married and move to New York. Her world doesn’t need to stop. Surely once I have explained my reasons for not saying a word she’ll understand the impossible position I’ve been in? Oh, who am I kidding? The truth is, I’ve made a real pig’s ear of this. Her faith in me will be shattered. She might never trust me again.

  I feel faint.

  I need to sit down, I—

  I gasp. What have I done?

  I look down at my leg. Blood is dripping on to the floor.

  Elvis follows me upstairs to the bathroom, my right leg bleeding severely. I tug at the loo roll and place a wodge of sheets against the gash.

  How could I have been so careless?

  I find my first aid kit under the sink and open the rusty old tin, but I can’t find a pla
ster or gauze big enough.

  I sigh. It’s no use. I know what I have to do.

  *

  ‘Morning!’ he says, locking his front door at the same time as me. It’s my new neighbour with the dreadlocks. ‘I’m Patrick.’ He shakes my hand. ‘I’m sorry about the noise last night; it was Shelley’s fortieth.’

  ‘Not to worry.’ I wave a hand away, not wanting to encourage further conversation when I urgently need to get to my GP’s surgery. ‘Bye now.’

  I march towards the main road, heading for the bus stop. I refuse to pay for a cab, even in an emergency.

  ‘Wait!’ Patrick catches me up. He’s staring at my bloodstained trousers. ‘What have you done?’

  ‘Just a little knock. It’s perfectly all right.’

  ‘You need to get it seen to immediately.’

  ‘Well, I’m off to the doctor’s now.’ I quicken my pace, feeling more blood ooze down my leg.

  ‘Wait,’ he calls. ‘I’m a nurse. Why don’t I take a look at it? You can’t walk with it like that. It’s bleeding badly.’

  I stop. I’m tempted. But I really don’t know this man, towering over me, claiming he’s a nurse. I think back to him knocking on my door at all hours of the night, scaring poor Elvis.

  ‘Let me at least clean it up for you.’ He bends down, making himself closer to my height. ‘Don’t be scared of me.’

  ‘I’m not scared,’ I reply, knowing he’s recalling the same moment I am.

  ‘I was locked out of my house,’ Patrick explains. ‘I was going to ask if I could jump over the wall from your garden and climb through the back window. Hurdles were my favourite sport at school. Not surprising with these legs.’

  ‘I wasn’t frightened.’ I brush a loose thread of cotton off my shirt to avoid eye contact. ‘I just wasn’t in, that’s all.’

  He tries not to smile.

  ‘You say you’re a doctor?’ I ask him.

  ‘A nurse, and I’ve seen this kind of thing many times before. Let me guess, the dishwasher?’

  Still I hesitate.

  ‘Please don’t be scared of me,’ he reinforces. ‘The only person I’ve ever scared is myself.’

  *

  ‘You need to roll up your trousers or take them off,’ Patrick says, standing in my bathroom. Clocking my uncertainty he suggests, ‘I’ll leave you to it. Call me when you’re ready.’

  Alone, I fling my trousers into the laundry basket. When he returns I feel vulnerable with only a towel wrapped round my waist, presenting to him my mottled leg, skin as thin as tracing paper. My sock is soaked with blood. He asks me if I’d be more comfortable perching on the loo seat.

  When Patrick kneels down in front of me, he’s more my height again, which certainly does make me feel less intimidated by his sheer physical presence. He assembles his first-aid box, much more impressively stocked than mine.

  Wanting to fill the silence, ‘My modelling days are probably now over,’ I say, laughing nervously. I then ask him the first question that pops into my head. ‘How old is your baby?’ I don’t even know if it’s a boy or a girl.

  ‘Mia, she’s five months. I have a son, too, Leo. He’s ten.’

  I recoil when I see a flap of loose skin.

  ‘Sorry, this might sting,’ he warns, cleaning the wound with a small tube of sterilized water and a pad of gauze. ‘You really gave your dishwasher a good old thump, didn’t you?’

  I jut out my chin. ‘I like to do things with style.’

  ‘How many kids do you have, Mrs . . . sorry, I don’t know your name?’

  ‘Mrs Andrews. Just one.’

  He waits.

  ‘A daughter.’

  ‘Ah, so the woman I often see coming over, she’s your—’

  ‘My granddaughter, Florence.’

  ‘What does she do?’

  I tell Patrick she works in a travel agency. ‘She’s just got engaged.’

  ‘How exciting.’

  ‘Yes. Yes, very exciting.’

  He looks up at me. ‘You don’t seem too happy about it, if you don’t mind me saying.’

  ‘He’s ten years older.’

  He returns his attention back to my wound. ‘Age is just a number.’

  ‘Yes, but why isn’t he married already?’

  ‘I have a girlfriend, but we’re not married.’

  I cross my arms. ‘He’s thirty-seven.’

  ‘I’m forty-one.’

  ‘Pah! Why haven’t you tied the knot then?’

  ‘Not everyone wants to, Mrs Andrews. I’ve got loads of single friends. As for me, I love Shelley, but I’ve never believed in a piece of paper, that’s all.’

  ‘I haven’t seen Leo before,’ I say, watching him carefully applying an iodine patch to the wound. It stings, but I breathe through the pain.

  ‘He lives with his mum in Chelmsford. I see him every other weekend. It’s not enough though; I miss him.’ He covers the iodine patch with a square of gauze. ‘You should still get this checked out, but at least you look respectable now.’ He wraps my leg in a crepe bandage. ‘I don’t want to apply too much tape, Mrs Andrews, as it might tear your skin.’ He gets up and peels off his gloves. ‘Right, better be off before I’m sacked.’

  I stop dead, remembering this was something Tim used to say to me when we were first married. I can see him now in his suit, picking up his briefcase before saying ‘Just one more kiss, Peg,’ which usually turned into two or three. ‘Right, better be off before I’m sacked,’ Tim would finish. To my surprise I find I don’t want Patrick to go.

  ‘Do you love your job, Patrick?’

  ‘I do. It’s a privilege, looking after people.’

  ‘Theo’s very successful. You should have seen the rock he gave Flo. Must have cost an arm and a leg.’

  ‘Well, it’s not all about the money, is it?’

  ‘Precisely. My husband, Tim, used to say to me, “If the house were on fire, Peg, what would you save first?” ’

  Amused, Patrick asks, ‘What did you say?’

  ‘The dog.’

  Patrick roars with laughter. ‘You crack me up, Mrs Andrews.’

  ‘I fear Theo is the type of man to save his BlackBerry before Flo. Or one who’d fling his granny in the Thames to make a quick buck.’ I can feel my cheeks flush. ‘Oh, I don’t mean that. I don’t know what’s come over me.’ I pause. ‘He works in New York. Flo’s moving out there.’

  ‘Lucky thing. It’s a place I’ve always longed to go. But you’ll miss her, right?’

  I nod. ‘It’s hard letting go, isn’t it? I just wonder whether he’d run for the hills if something bad were to happen to Flo.’

  Patrick tries not to smile again.

  ‘I understand you’re protective,’ he says, ‘but maybe you’re worrying too much?’

  I look away. He doesn’t understand.

  ‘Mrs Andrews?’

  ‘Ignore me,’ I say, at last. ‘You’re right. I’m being silly. Now you must get to work.’

  *

  Downstairs, Patrick puts on his jacket and picks up his rucksack, which he’d left by the fireplace. I catch him looking at a photograph on my mantelpiece of Beth on her graduation day at Camberwell. ‘Your daughter?’

  I hold back the tears. ‘Beth.’

  ‘She’s stunning.’

  ‘That’s one of her paintings,’ I say, gesturing to a pretty coastal scene in Devon, close to Burgh Island.

  ‘And look at you.’ He picks up the photograph of Tim and me running across the very same beach hand in hand, on our honeymoon. ‘Sorry, I’m being a nosy parker.’ He puts the frame down and I lead him to the front door.

  Just before he leaves, he says, ‘What does Beth think of Flo getting engaged and going to New York?’

  ‘She died five years ago.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘And my husband died many years before that.’

  Patrick doesn’t have to say he’s sorry again. His look says it all.

  ‘You se
e, I’m all Flo has,’ I continue. ‘She’s all I have.’

  When Patrick touches my arm I find it comforting. ‘If Flo leaves, you won’t lose her, Mrs Andrews. She’s only a plane journey away.’

  I nod.

  ‘Well, goodbye.’ He shakes my hand.

  ‘Goodbye, Patrick.’

  ‘Call me Ricky. The only time I’m called Patrick is when I’m in trouble with my mum or missus.’

  When I reach for his hand and clutch it in my own, I’m not sure who is more shocked. ‘Thank you for coming to my rescue, and please call me Peggy.’

  ‘Anytime you want to talk, Mrs— I mean, Peggy, you know where I am.’

  After we say goodbye, I close the door and walk into the sitting room. I picture Tim in his recliner, watching the television, and I miss him so much it hurts. When I look again, he isn’t here, and it’s painfully quiet, except for the sound of the ticking clock, the patter of Elvis’s paws, his four feet never far away, and me blowing my nose, moved to tears by a stranger’s kindness. A man I dared to judge.

  I can’t help but think that my dishwasher did me an enormous favour today.

  8

  Flo

  It’s my last weekend at home before moving to New York. I can hardly believe how quickly things have changed. It’s just over three weeks ago since Theo proposed, and now I have only one more week left at work before I leave my old life behind.

  Maddie’s just arrived. She caught a train from Maiden Newton in Dorset, and James should be here any minute. I wanted to cook a special supper for the three of us tonight.

  James had suggested taking us out, but I know money’s tight for him this month, especially since, while someone didn’t steal Vile Vera last week, they did decide to slash her tyres instead. Bastards. And Maddie rarely has any money.

  ‘Don’t be an artist if you want to be a millionaire,’ she says. She’s a freelance costume designer and has to earn extra cash working shifts at Costa.

  As I make the chocolate sauce to go with our pudding, Maddie and I reminisce about the past. We met at school when we were eight and have remained inseparable ever since. Her family had moved from the depths of Wales to West London as her dad was setting up a veterinary practice in Barnes. I remember how funny she looked in her bottle green and gold uniform, her jumper tucked into her skirt – so mean of her mother to insist – tie lopsided, laces undone, and she had this frizzy mop of auburn hair that framed a heart-shaped freckled face.