The Woman Who Kept Everything

by Jane Gilley

  Your ever-loving grandmother

  Barbara xxxxx

  ‘Of course, I forgive you, dear grandmother,’ Gloria had whispered to the letter, as tears had flowed, unheeded, down her face. ‘It was war. It wasn’t ordinary circumstances. And at least I know my family history now.’

  Her adopted mum, Alice, had always been a loving, encouraging person, so Gloria knew she hadn’t missed out by not having the chance to be brought up by her own parents. And she’d been thrilled with the life-changing gift of a house, which’d come at a time when Arthur had lost his job through a back injury and they had been struggling with their finances.

  * * *

  Gloria couldn’t actually remember when she’d started collecting things.

  She’d always loved going to car boots for bargains. But after her beloved adopted mum died, Arthur had cleared out her council house – putting most of Alice’s things in their large shed out back. Gloria hadn’t wanted to get rid of Alice’s stuff. It made her feel like she still had her mother with her but it seemed to kick-start her collecting with a vengeance and she’d started bringing more and more stuff back from everywhere. Mainly from car boot sales but sometimes she found paraphernalia on roads outside people’s houses. They were a scruffy lot, she said, leaving three-legged chairs, old duvets or broken toys and other stuff just lying around, littering the streets.

  But Arthur had gone wild about it.

  ‘Here, Glor, what’re you doing with all that stuff and all them house magazines? You don’t even like Changing Rooms.’

  When Gloria had ignored his questioning, he’d tried a more gentle approach.

  ‘Yes but how much of this stuff do you really need and what do you need it for, my love?’

  And when that hadn’t worked, he’d found himself close to tipping point.

  ‘Gloria, this’s got to stop! It’s in every room and I don’t want anything else in the lounge. Can’t see the telly! This place isn’t big enough for all this ruddy clobber.’

  However Gloria had the ‘bug’ now and it was a very hard habit to break.

  ‘Never know when we might need some of it, though, Arth!’

  Yet when Arthur got ill and his heart gave out to obesity, the hoarding just went on and on, increasing in intensity; increasing in the never-ending storing of items Gloria knew she had no intention of using or mending. But insisted she needed.

  Due to the resistance she’d encountered because of the way she’d lived these past twenty years, Gloria knew folk didn’t understand why she needed to have lots of things around her. They didn’t know of her heartache when her adoptive mum died, nor how distraught she’d been when Arthur died. Distraught, especially when Arthur died because Clegg seemed to pull away from her after that. Perhaps it was the male influence he missed now Arthur was no longer here.

  But it was as though, suddenly, there was no one around her who loved her and no one around her who she could love. No one was there with a friendly word or even those delicious little hugs from the grandchildren, when they’d been allowed to visit. And Arthur wasn’t there with that cup of tea he brought her, at the end of the day, and his: ‘Sleep tight, love, don’t let the bed bugs bite.’

  So Gloria realised that having things around her made her feel safe when there was no one else around her to make her feel that way. It was almost as though she’d created walls to protect herself, she thought. Yet these walls were made from magazines or old boxes. Yes, that’s how she’d describe it. But even though Tilsbury had tried to make her see how alienated everyone else felt about what she was doing, she simply couldn’t bring herself to stop doing it.

  The only room relatively free from junk was the bathroom now. It was always quite an arduous trip to get into the bathroom and even when she was there, the bath was stacked high with newspapers so she couldn’t use that any more. But at least she could wash in the sink, if she wanted, and use the loo. Or at least she could use them, after she’d stumbled over knick-knacks cluttering the stairs. And climbing over unruly piles of old clothing, including all Clegg’s baby clothes, which she’d kept in case she’d had more babies (unfortunately, it hadn’t happened) and heaps of towels and surplus carpet rolls, which she’d kept in case the carpet wore out.

  Tilsbury said he didn’t mind the state of the place, though. Said it made the place warmer, cosier somehow.

  ‘Saves on washing and cleaning and all that crazy shite.’

  But the following day there was a loud bang when Gloria turned one of the hob rings on and tried to heat the remaining potato soup from yesterday. The small kitchen was quickly filled with the nasty smell of something burning.

  Tilsbury was hopping around in mild terror.

  ‘Ooo, my love! You gotta get the electricity people out now. Could be a fire! You insured?’

  ‘Wouldn’t know, Tils. Never really pay for anything any more, do I, ducks. S’all set up out of me bank account or summat. Cleggy sorted it all out for me after Arthur went, as you know. But I can smell summat singeing! Get hold of me son for me, will ya, ducks? Cleggy’ll sort it all out. Bit worried about being burned alive in my bed. You hear of it happening.’

  Chapter 3

  A few days after the people from the electricity board came to check on the situation, three people from social services turned up; one with a clipboard. They looked official, to Gloria, with their curt smiles and long dark coats. She would’ve said they were calm and sympathetic, if someone’d asked. But they didn’t look that way after their first encounter with 75 Briar Way.

  They came into her house, sniffing the air and gagging for some reason. One of them, a man, ran out muttering something. Gloria found it amusing. Tilsbury went round shrugging.

  ‘Must’ve eaten summat off before they came here.’

  The plump, friendlier woman who finally arrived later that first day, Diane, was the most understanding, but even she had a strongly scented handkerchief she kept wafting across her face. Gloria screwed her nose up at the smell and stood a little distance away from her. She wasn’t keen on heavy perfumes.

  Oh, but there was nowhere to sit per se. That was the tricky thing about having more than one person over at any one time. And in order to be courteous, Tilsbury had to clamber over a lot of stuff, upstairs, to get the stool off the top of Gloria’s bedside dressing table, so Diane could sit down in the tiny bit of space between the hall and kitchen door. Gloria leant against the architrave and rested her burnt hand on a stack of crumpled magazines.

  Now that Diane had finished looking around – her mouth gaping in awe, her handkerchief not far from her nose – she said that her mother had been just like Gloria when Diane’s grandparents died. Couldn’t quite accept it; still didn’t; in a nursing home now.

  ‘Much better for her. All her woes dealt with and she’s properly cared for.’

  Gloria didn’t really know what the woman was talking about. She wasn’t interested to know something about someone she didn’t know and would never know and, anyway, her hand ached. She grimaced as she tried to reposition it.

  ‘Oh my, that hand looks sore, love. Should’ve wrapped it in cling film or something clean if you had it. But, anyway, don’t you worry about all that, now. We’ve got to get you away from here and do some sorting out,’ Diane informed her, with a bright smile.

  Gloria shook her head solemnly. ‘Don’t want to go anywhere else. Been here so many years, ducks, and I certainly don’t want to go anywhere now.’

  ‘I know that, Gloria! But we’ve, um, we’ve got to sift through all this – er – this stuff to try and find where the electrics blew. Your house’s become a bit of a fire hazard now, so we’re taking you somewhere safe while we sort things out. And that hand of yours needs looking at.’

  Clegg appeared at that precise moment, his large frame filling the already clogged front doorway. He was sweating and also trying not to gag. He squeezed past them to try and look at the kitchen, pushing boxes and piles of magazines aside in his attempt to
get through, but then he stopped, deciding against it.

  ‘Oh stuff this! Right, Mum. Bleeerr. God! What a stench! And what on earth is all that crap and rubbish doing over there by the kitchen sink? Wasn’t there last time I came. Good grief, there’s bits of food in it as well, Mother! What on earth’ve you been doing?’

  ‘I think some hooligans nicked me wheelie-bin, Cleggy. So I leave me household rubbish near the back door. Can’t put it outside. Foxes might get it!’

  Clegg gagged and put his hand over his mouth, shaking his head.

  ‘Un-fucking-believable! Right, well, I got rid of that bloody scoundrel, Tilsbury. Seems to me he’s using your ruddy good nature to wheedle his way into favour, rent-free, and how’s that helpin’ matters? It ain’t, Mother. So you’re coming with me. And I don’t want any more ruddy arguments. Plus it’s not safe for you in here with all this crap everywhere and dodgy electrics.’

  He turned his back on his mother and nodded to Diane.

  ‘Just get rid of the bloody LOT! Don’t care how you do it but just DO it. Give me any paperwork you find in drawers and the like but otherwise there’s nowt of any value. I’ll pay for what needs payin’ for but just get rid of it. And, er, thanks for getting her a place at Green’s Nursin’ Home for a couple of weeks. They’ll clean her up and sort her out a treat, I’m told,’ he said through clenched teeth.

  ‘They certainly will, Mr Frensham. They’re one of the best homes in the district. And you say you’re happy to take her afterwards? Is that for full-time care or will you need some additional help?’ mumbled Diane, behind her handkerchief.

  Clegg shook his head vehemently. ‘No. We’ll be okay with that, thanks. My Val’s sorting all that side out. She’s a nurse as you know. We’ve got a small en suite extension for my mother. So we’ll all be fine at home together. God! That smell is unbearable! Dunno how she’s put up with it all these years. Nowt so queer as folk, as they say.’

  Chapter 4

  From the moment Gloria stepped foot inside Green’s Nursing Home she decided she didn’t like it.

  Well, it wasn’t 75 Briar Way, for one thing! And where were her belongings? Where was her winceyette nightie? Where was her splayed blue toothbrush for cleaning her dentures with? And where was her little alarm clock with no battery that Arthur bought her, back in the day, which she kept under her pillow when she slept? She liked those things around her. They brought her comfort.

  Clegg had driven her to the nursing home. His wife Val was not with him and nor were the children. Gloria felt as though she was being shuttled away somewhere, out of everyone’s hair.

  ‘Right, Mother. I’ve got to go. Already had more time off work than is good for me. You go in through those doors, there, to reception and ask for Mrs Lal. She’ll be looking after you,’ he’d said, revving his engine. Once Gloria had clambered out, he’d driven off without so much as a wave. Gloria shook her head. Clegg’s behaviour was not what it used to be.

  The lady who’d met Gloria in reception, Mrs Lal, was the chief carer. She’d asked if Gloria would like a brief tour first but all Gloria wanted to do was squirrel herself away and have a jolly good think about things. Plus she wasn’t good at speaking to new people because she hadn’t had to do that for a long time.

  So Mrs Lal had taken Gloria upstairs via a lift and showed her into a very small room with a single bed, one chair and a wardrobe and nothing else at all. No ‘things’ or ‘stuff’. The décor was insipid. Pale peach walls, pale peach bedspread. Pale this, pale that. Not the mish-mash of colours, textures and chaos she was used to. Gloria felt downhearted. Clegg had told her she’d be here for two weeks while he sorted things out with the house. So she knew she had no choice but to stay and accept this place and the people she found within its walls.

  Clothes, not new ones, had been left on the bed for her to change into. They weren’t her own. Mrs Lal had shown her where the shower and toilet were and asked her to have a good shower and hair wash with the gels provided.

  ‘You okay with that, Mrs Frensham, or do you need someone to help you get cleaned up?’ Mrs Lal had said with a kindly smile.

  The very thought had appalled Gloria, that someone might have to clean her one day. It would not be today, however. She had shaken her head so hard that she thought it might fall off.

  ‘No, ducks. I don’t want touchin’ by no one, ta very much.’

  Mrs Lal had said she understood and then told Gloria she was to come downstairs after her shower and she’d be shown where she would have dinner and eat all her meals.

  Gloria was a little damp when she finally found her way back to the reception area. In fact, she’d been in the shower so long, just enjoying the sensation of hot water cascading over her, for the first time in twenty years, that dinner had finished and the only food the cook could prepare was a cold chicken salad with two slices of white buttered bread.

  But Gloria tucked in hungrily, thinking it was probably the best meal she’d ever tasted. It certainly beat potato soup! And then, feeling completely shattered, she asked if she could go to bed.

  Mrs Lal took her back upstairs to her room afterwards and Gloria lay on top of the soft bed, fully clothed, staring at the ceiling. There was a light switch by the bed so she could switch the light off whenever she wanted. But Gloria spent a good couple of hours just staring at the Artexed ceiling, wondering where they were going to put all her things whilst they searched for the electricity fault. And how would they know where to put her things back afterwards? And would the house she’d lived in for thirty-some-odd years ever be the same again, when everyone had finished poking around in it? She felt a tear prickling the corner of her eye and wiped it away. Clegg would sort it all out for her, she was sure. But his behaviour, she’d noted of late, was becoming alarmingly discourteous.

  The next day Mrs Lal came to fetch her and took her to breakfast. She was put on a table with two other white-haired ladies: Yvonne and Annie. They didn’t say much. In fact, Gloria wondered if there was something wrong with them. They just seemed to stare ahead without any knowledge of what was going on around them. A carer had to place toast in front of them and encourage them to eat. One man on another table suddenly shrieked, which made Gloria jump.

  Gloria got up and went to find Mrs Lal and told her what had been going on.

  ‘Summat’s not right with Dotty and Lotty, love. And there’s a poor man in anguish over t’other side. Think summat needs to be done about them.’

  Gloria could see Mrs Lal was trying to stifle a chuckle.

  ‘Oh, Gloria. I’d forgot you’re not used to the daily comings and goings in a nursing home, are you. Well there are some people here who need a lot of care, you see. And there’s others like yourself who are just, um, visiting for a short while. Yvonne and Annie are sisters and they’ve both had strokes so they need a certain amount of help and care. We sat you next to them because they’re very quiet. They’re not like Henry who does have a tendency to shout a bit. And some of the others can’t get used to new people straight away. So that’s why we put you there. If you’d prefer to be on your own, of course, we can set a separate table up for you for the duration of your stay.’

  Gloria shook her head. ‘No, that’s all right. They don’t make no fuss. And you’ve explained things to me now. So I understands, I do.’

  After breakfast Mrs Lal led Gloria into a beautiful light and airy pale green room with trailing plants, an aquarium and bamboo seating and introduced her to Kate, a social worker, who said she was going to have some regular general chats with Gloria, whilst she was here, to find out what she’d been doing since her husband’s demise.

  By the second day Gloria was looking forward to her next conversational session with Kate. It had been a long time since she’d had meaningful chats with anyone. In fact she usually only saw the postman, Tilsbury, Clegg occasionally, and a persistent window cleaner who reckoned her windows needed more than a simple hose-down – cheeky git. Plus she was starting to get used
to her tiny characterless bedroom, now, and she’d even gotten a chuckle or two out of Yvonne and Annie.

  Chapter 5

  ‘Cup of tea, Gloria! I’ll put it on the table. No, don’t worry about your hand. That shaking comes and goes, I know. Least your sores have been treated. And I like your hair now they’ve cut it. It’s much better shaped like that, instead of long and straggly, don’t you think?’ said Val. ‘You must be feeling much better in yourself now everything’s been sorted out? That nursing home did wonders for you!’

  Gloria didn’t look at Val. Her mouth was full of Victoria sponge, anyway. But she had nothing to say to the daughter-in-law she hadn’t seen in ten years.

  ‘I’ll leave you to look out the window then. The garden’s nice this time of year isn’t it? Nice to look at.’

  Val left the conservatory, closing the door behind her quietly, shaking her head slowly. She looked tired. There were grey bags under her eyes, belying her forty-eight years, flecks of grey, also, in her short dark hair; her fringe was clipped back with a hairgrip. Clegg beckoned her into the kitchen.

  ‘She never acknowledges anything I say to her, Cleggy. Just stares ahead. I get the feeling she either wants to hit me or spit.’

  Clegg pulled Val into a tight hug and kissed her cheek. ‘It’s just her way, love. Look – hey! Are you regrettin’ this now? We spoke about this at length, din’t we? She’d’ve never left that place unless summat serious happened and thank God it did, in a way.’

  Val pulled away from him, leant back against the sink and crossed her arms.

  ‘But I don’t think I can stand any more of this silent treatment. It’s only been a couple of weeks. And we can’t keep the kids away forever. Adam says he can’t concentrate on his studying whilst he’s over at Zac’s. He says they’re partying all the time, instead of studying – don’t laugh, Cleggy! He’s just not into partying like his mates, is he? At least he’ll get a decent job at the end of the day. Plus, I’ve heard Zac’s probably taking stuff. So I want them back home. And your mum should be in a home or summat – she really should!’