All the Lonely People

by Mike Gayle

  By the time their grandmother summoned them for dinner, as they ran around the backyard trying to catch lizards soaking up the last of the early evening sun, they were so grubby and disheveled that they reminded Hubert of him and Vivian when they were young. Joyce, however, was horrified at the state of them and spent a fruitless ten minutes trying to smarten them up for the dinner table in a house that had no running water or electrical wiring. Still, Hubert could tell just from looking at them as they all squeezed around the table, the children sitting on upturned fruit boxes, that everything they were experiencing, whether good or bad, was making an impression on them, etching itself permanently into their memories. Gus had visited home the year before last, and other friends had all been back too over the past five years, but whether single or married, they had all, for reasons of economy, made the journey alone.

  Hubert, however, was now glad that he had waited, because thanks to Joyce and his children, he was seeing his country of birth through their eyes and not his own, seeing all the wonderful delights of rural Jamaica as if for the first time. Fresh fruit growing on trees that belonged to no one dotted along the roadside, flowers so bright and vibrant that they almost hurt your eyes to look at growing on scrubby untended pieces of land, and wildlife so fascinating and diverse, from the hummingbirds feeding on nectar to spiders as big as your fist, all without the bars or strengthened glass of a zoo.

  After the meal and using what little light remained of the day, Hubert, Joyce, and the children walked the five minutes to where his father, Theodore, was buried. It was on a quiet, elevated spot on the southernmost edge of their land, overlooking a stream and the valley below. Hubert hadn’t been a frequent visitor to this place even when he lived here, but for reasons he couldn’t vocalize he felt the need to show the children the last resting place of their grandfather. Rose and Joyce very sweetly picked a posy of brightly colored wildflowers, full of yellows, oranges, reds, and purples, and gently laid them on the marble tablet in front of the headstone.

  David stared up at Hubert, his eyes questioning.

  “What was he like? Was he fun?”

  Hubert nodded, even though it wasn’t quite as simple as that, given the troubles his father had lived through.

  “He… he did his best. And you can’t ask for more than that, can you?”

  Thinking about what Hubert had said, Rose traced her fingers across the lettering of the headstone.

  “When I grow up and have children of my own, if I have a boy I think I’ll call him Theodore. It’s a nice name.”

  “That’s lovely,” said Joyce. “Theodore is a nice name.”

  They stood in silence for a moment until David heard something in the bushes behind them. Desperate to see his first ever mongoose, he raced off, closely followed by Rose, leaving Joyce and Hubert alone.

  “It’s so lovely seeing them so free and happy here, don’t you think?” said Joyce as she and Hubert walked along hand in hand.

  Hubert didn’t respond. He was too busy thinking about the past, his own childhood, and trying to make sense of it.

  Joyce nudged him gently.

  “Penny for your thoughts?”

  Hubert blinked several times, as though waking from a dream.

  “Sorry, love, were you saying something?”

  “Not really. What was it you were thinking about?”

  Hubert didn’t know what to say. He tried not to think about the past if he could help it, but coming back here with his family after so long away had brought a lot of long-buried memories to the surface.

  As though reading his mind, Joyce said, “You never really talk about your father. How old were you when he passed away?”

  He thought for a moment about that day, the day when his mother told him that his father, a man he barely knew, had taken his own life.

  “Fifteen,” said Hubert.

  Joyce squeezed his hand tightly.

  “Oh, Hubert, I’m sorry.”

  “Me too,” replied Hubert. “Me too.”

  23

  NOW

  The next morning, following a restless night, Hubert woke early and after breakfast and feeding Puss, got dressed and left the house. On the way to the train station he called into the Tesco Metro and bought a small bunch of pink carnations that he tucked under his arm and a pack of barley sugars for the journey. At the station he boarded a train to central London, and twenty-three minutes later was gathering his things together and joining the throng making its way to the underground. Hubert made the short journey to Westminster on the District line and as he took the escalator up to street level he tried to read the advertising posters on the wall next to him, but it was as if they were written in a foreign language. Who or what was a Zoopla? What exactly was an O2 or indeed a “vitamin concept”? Hubert suddenly felt like he was really getting old, like he was a relic from the past, like the world was racing ahead and leaving him behind.

  Emerging into a busy midmorning in central London, Hubert took a moment to get his bearings. To his left a man selling fruit and vegetables from a stall was busy crushing empty boxes, straight ahead of him snaked three long lines of traffic, and to his right sat a homeless man begging, legs covered with a filthy sleeping bag. Hubert took a five-pound note from his wallet and placed it in the cap at the man’s feet, then, crossing the road, made his way toward Westminster Bridge.

  Gaggles of tourists were taking photographs of themselves on the bridge using the Houses of Parliament as a backdrop while hurried office workers strode past them purposefully. No one paid Hubert the slightest bit of attention as he slowly made his way to the middle of the bridge and gazed over the parapet, taking in the view.

  The Thames, he thought as he removed the carnations from underneath his arm, wasn’t a pretty river, certainly nowhere near as attractive as any of the big rivers back home in Jamaica. It was, however, a grand river, he decided. One that was impossible to ignore. This was a river that kings and queens had sailed down, that famous artists had painted, and that rich men paid millions to live next to. But more important than all of these things was the fact that this river, this bridge on which he was standing, had borne witness to his first date with Joyce all those years ago. And it was here, rather than her grave in Bromley cemetery, where he came when he wanted to feel close to her or, like now, needed an answer to a question weighing on his mind.

  Removing the cellophane from the flowers, Hubert lifted a single bloom to his nose and inhaled deeply. He’d hoped to catch a scent of heady sweetness but disappointingly it didn’t smell of very much at all. Possibly it was Hubert’s failing—old age seemed to be diminishing each one of his five senses every day—but it could just as easily have been the flowers themselves, grown in a test tube or something. Next time, he thought, he would search out a little florist’s like the one he used to buy Joyce flowers from in Bromley, to see if they had better stock. Regardless of their smell or lack thereof, Hubert decided it was the thought that counted and so, pressing the flowers briefly to his lips, he said quietly: “For you, my love.” Then, holding the bouquet out over the water, he released his grip and as it fell through the air then finally into the river below, Hubert thought about Joyce, their life together, and how, even now, nearly thirteen years on, he still missed her with every fiber of his being.

  He stayed on the bridge long after the flowers had been swept away by the current. He thought about the questions he had come to ask, and he thought about the answers Joyce might have offered had she been there with him, and by the time he was ready to leave he knew, if not exactly what he should do, then at least the direction he needed to be going in.

  On his return home, Hubert felt lighter and more focused than he had in a long while. So when Ashleigh came round later that afternoon and said she’d had some thoughts about what they’d been talking about the day before, Hubert had wanted to tell her that he had been doing some thinking of his own. He could see that she was excited, however, and so let her speak first.

/>   Reaching into her bag, she proudly produced a bright yellow A5 sheet of paper. Slipping on his glasses, he read it aloud:

  Do you think loneliness is a bad thing? Do you wish you knew more of your neighbors? Did you know that loneliness is a bigger killer than cancer?

  If you’ve answered yes to any of the above, then here’s your chance to stop being part of the problem and start being part of the solution! Come and join the Campaign to End Loneliness in Bromley!

  First meeting, Friday 1 June @ Bromley Library Community Room @ 7:30 p.m.

  “The Campaign to End Loneliness in Bromley,” read Hubert again. “Me never heard of them.”

  “That’s because they don’t exist yet,” said Ashleigh cryptically.

  “How you mean?”

  Ashleigh took the flyer from Hubert’s hand and held it aloft gleefully.

  “Because I made it up last night on my laptop and printed it out at work this morning! The idea came to me in a flash. I was thinking about your friend and everything we talked about, and then I got to thinking about my situation and how different it would be if I didn’t have you to talk to. That’s when it hit me… you remember I said that somebody ought to do something about this loneliness problem? Well, I got to thinking, what if that somebody was us? Me and you, Hubert? Because that’s what’s wrong with the world, isn’t it? Everyone’s always passing the buck or shifting the blame onto someone else. But what if we stopped thinking about problems like loneliness as someone else’s thing to sort out and started taking responsibility for it ourselves? It’s like my nan always used to say, ‘Ash, if you want a job doing, roll up your sleeves and get stuck in!’”

  “So let me get this right… You… you… want us to set up a… campaign group?”

  “Well, I think they’re called pressure groups these days. But yeah, we’d be like CND or Greenpeace or Surfers Against Sewage… but, you know… for lonely people in Bromley.”

  “But this sounds like an awful lot to take on,” said Hubert, thinking not just about Ashleigh but about Rose. He now only had two months left in which to make some more new friends. No time at all, really, if he was to have any hope of sorting out his life so that his daughter wouldn’t have to worry about him. Yes, he’d made some headway with Jan, but that was about it. With Gus being the way he was and everyone else having vanished off the face of the earth, he’d have to get his skates on.

  “Haven’t you got enough on your plate as it is? Just a few days ago you were telling me that you hadn’t got time to do all your housework. Where are you going to find the time to…” He glanced at the flyer again. “End loneliness in Bromley?”

  Ashleigh seemed a touch affronted.

  “Firstly, I only said that about the housework because when you came in for a cup of tea that day the flat was a tip and I didn’t want you thinking we lived in a pigsty. Secondly, I won’t be ending loneliness in Bromley on my own because you’ll be helping me…”

  “To end loneliness in Bromley?”

  Ashleigh nodded confidently, which made Hubert feel uncomfortable. He didn’t like the sound of this at all.

  “Don’t you think we should start with something… me don’t know… smaller?”

  “Hubert, I know it sounds like a crazy idea and when I was making the flyer, even I thought it seemed a bit bonkers. I mean, trying to ‘end loneliness in Bromley,’ it sounds completely ridiculous, doesn’t it? But then so did sending people to the moon and freeing that Nelson Mandela fella and having a computer in your pocket that you can watch telly on. Everything new sounds ridiculous until someone makes it happen. And like someone posted on Instagram this morning: ‘Even the longest journey starts with a single step.’” She paused briefly, scanning Hubert’s face in an effort to gauge his reaction. “Listen, I know this seems crazy and I know you probably won’t want anything to do with it, but I think this is really important not just for people like me, or like your friend Gus, but for everybody who’s ever felt—”

  Hubert interrupted.

  “Yes.”

  The word was out before he had time to stop it.

  “What do you mean ‘yes’?”

  It was a good question. Admittedly a plan like Ashleigh’s hadn’t been what Hubert had in mind when he said to himself that something needed to be done about the issue of loneliness. At best her idea sounded like the kind of harebrained scheme that would cause more problems than it solved. But in the absence of any other kind, what choice was there? What was it people used to say? “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.” Hubert didn’t want to be part of the problem. Not anymore.

  “Me want to help you end loneliness in Bromley.”

  Ashleigh pulled a face. This clearly hadn’t been what she’d expected to hear from him at all.

  “You mean you don’t think it’s a daft idea?”

  “What? Helping lonely people? There’s nothing daft about that, darling. Nothing daft at all. Count me in.”

  She rested her hand on Hubert’s arm.

  “Wow, Hubert. I thought you were going to say no.”

  “Well, the thing is,” said Hubert, “it’s like me said, me been doing some thinking of my own and it seems me sort of come to the same conclusion as you. You see, Joyce was of the same mind as your grandmother. If someone told her she couldn’t do something, she would find a way to do it anyway. She wouldn’t have just stood by and let things go down the toilet like they are. She would’ve been in the middle of things, trying to make a difference. And me want to do the same.” Hubert drew a deep breath and wondered once again what he was getting himself into. “Granted, until you arrived this morning me didn’t have any idea where to start, but me think you’re right… ending loneliness in Bromley seems as good a place as any.”

  24

  THEN

  August 1975

  The saloon bar of the Old Duke in Brixton on a Tuesday evening wasn’t exactly the most happening place to be. There were a smattering of customers—all men, all the wrong side of forty—most at the bar with a pint, smoking and reading dog-eared newspapers, while a few others played darts or dominoes or simply sat staring into space. It felt like a place where men came to escape their troubles, leaving them stacked neatly at the front entrance ready to pick up again on their way out.

  “Smiler, man,” said Gus, as the two men sat in their usual corner nursing half-drunk pints of Guinness. “You’ve barely said two words the entire evening. Are you going to tell me what is plaguing you or do I have to drag it out of you?”

  Hubert shook his head as if trying to rouse himself from a dream.

  “What you say?”

  “Cha, man! You really is somewhere else tonight.”

  Hubert took several large gulps of his drink as though trying to fortify himself.

  “Me sorry, man, it’s not you. It’s just that me got… well… a lot on me mind.”

  Gus left it a minute, hoping that his friend would elaborate without the need for further prompting, but when Hubert said nothing, Gus was unable to let it go. “Hubert Bird,” he said sternly, “it’s been a long day and my body is dog tired, so either tell me what’s going on right this minute or let me leave so I can go to my bed.”

  Hubert’s whole heart ached with all this sorry business.

  “Enough, Gus, man, me tell you everything.”

  Ever since Marianne had made the invitation over a pot of tea at their usual café the Friday before, Hubert had been trying to work out exactly how he had gotten himself into this mess. It wasn’t as if he had been looking to have an affair; in fact, he’d always thought people who did were weak-willed and feckless. Cheating on your wife wasn’t exactly the hardest thing in the world—especially if you still had your looks. Staying faithful, doing the right thing not just by your wife, but by your children too, that was the tricky thing. That took strength, discipline, and determination—values that Hubert had always held dear.

  Hubert hadn’t felt like himself since the s
udden death of his mother back in February. It had all happened so quickly; one minute he was reading a letter from her in which she spoke of feeling under the weather following a bout of flu, and the next he was receiving a call in the middle of the night from Cora with the terrible news that their mother was gone.

  Joyce told him that he should fly home for the funeral no matter what the cost, but Hubert had reasoned that the money would be of more use sent to Cora to help pay the funeral expenses and ease any financial burdens that had come from caring for their mother during her final days. So instead of grieving for his mother in person, he tried his best to do so from a distance, but it was hard not knowing what he should be feeling, what he should be doing. He’d been fifteen when he’d lost his father but as Theodore had rarely been around, the loss hadn’t had a great deal of effect. Besides, the man had been in such torment that his passing had almost been a blessed release. This was different, he knew that, but he couldn’t bring himself to feel it, to understand what was going on deep within himself.

  Joyce had tried her best to comfort him, knowing only too well what it was like to lose a parent, but whether out of a desire to appear stronger to his family than he actually felt, or his own natural reticence, Hubert found it impossible to open up to her. Instead, every time she asked how he was, he would assure her he was fine, that he was getting on with life, that he didn’t need to talk, that he would be okay if he just kept busy.