All the Lonely People

by Mike Gayle

  Returning to the lifts, Hubert made his way back up to the third floor only to find a young man wearing a black-and-gray tracksuit with matching trainers using the phone. He thought about waiting but the young man didn’t seem in a hurry; then he thought about asking him why he wasn’t using one of those damn mobile phones everyone was always glued to these days but decided against it, as the last thing he needed was trouble. Instead he made his way up to the next floor and was relieved to find the pay phone there was available. Digging into the inside pocket of his jacket, Hubert took out his reading glasses and slipped them on, before fishing out the wallet from his back pocket and retrieving Rose’s number.

  Rose hadn’t wanted to tell Hubert about the job offer she had received from the University of Melbourne, but when he’d spotted the letter in the post addressed to her, franked with an Australian postmark, he had asked her about it and the lie she had attempted to tell him had been so flimsy, he had seen straight through it. With prompting, she had gradually revealed the truth of the situation: she had been offered what amounted to her dream job, but only if she was prepared to move to the other side of the world.

  “Of course, I’m not going to take it,” she’d said. “I’m not about to abandon you and Mum when you need me most.”

  “You’re not abandoning anyone,” Hubert had reassured her. “You’ve been here nearly eighteen months now; you’ve helped me and your mother more than we could ever thank you for. This is your time now, Rose. After all that horrible business you went through with Robin, and Mum’s illness, it’s about time you had some good news.”

  The discussions had gone on for a week, with Rose coming up with every excuse under the sun to stay. Finally Hubert put an end to it.

  “Rose, me love you, but if you don’t write and tell them that you want this job this very minute, me do it meself!”

  That had been the spring of 1998, and although she’d been gone for seven years now, she’d returned home every Christmas and summer holiday without fail.

  Her last visit had been only a matter of weeks earlier, which was partly why, even when Joyce was rushed to the hospital five days ago with breathing difficulties after developing pneumonia following a chest infection, he hadn’t suggested she come home. Anyway, over the past year they had been in the same position at least half a dozen times, Joyce gravely ill, Rose ready to jump on a plane to be by her side, only for her to rally at the last moment.

  Even after all these years of Rose living in Australia, Hubert still marveled at the technology that meant a person could sound crystal clear, as if they were in the very same room, and yet be the best part of ten thousand miles away. As he waited, listening to the sound of the ringing tone, he wondered what invention they might be dreaming up next. Maybe there would be moving pictures, like talking to a TV screen, or some sort of teleportation device where you could be with your loved ones in an instant just by calling them up.

  It would be half past nine in Melbourne, thought Hubert. If Rose was home she might still be working, even though he was forever telling her that she needed to rest. She didn’t have a man in her life at the moment, at least not as far as Hubert was aware. There had been someone a few years back, and once or twice he had even joined her on one of her visits home. Hubert couldn’t recall his name now. He had been nice enough and was clearly smart and well-read, but over time she stopped mentioning him, and so Hubert stopped asking.

  These days, Rose seemed happy enough on her own. She had lots of friends, a successful career, a lovely home, and even a swimming pool. Hubert couldn’t see a reason why not having a man should make any difference. As far as he was concerned, she’d won the lottery.

  “Hello, Rose Bird speaking.”

  Even under the circumstances it was lovely to hear her voice, well-spoken and yet warm and calm, undoubtedly English, but with the tiniest hint of Australian creeping into her vowel sounds.

  “Rose, it’s Dad here.”

  Her voice brightened immediately.

  “Pop! How are you? How’s Mum doing?”

  “Me is fine. Or at least as fine as can be expected. But, Rose, your mother… she… she… Well, them just tell me she hasn’t got long left.”

  He thought of the poor young doctor who had been sent to break the news less than half an hour ago. How kind he had been, how genuinely upset he had seemed that there was no longer anything to be done to make Joyce better.

  Hubert relayed the little he knew to his daughter.

  “But I don’t understand. I thought it was just a chest infection. She’s had them before and got better with antibiotics; why not now?”

  Hubert desperately shoveled more coins into the voracious belly of the telephone.

  “Because she tired, Rose,” he answered. “She’s been fighting nearly ten years now, ten long years of this disease eating away at her. I know it’s hard, my love, the Lord knows it’s hard, but it’s time to let Mummy go.”

  Hubert tried his best to comfort his daughter, but with ten thousand miles between them, there was little he could do other than listen to the sound of her heart breaking. Finally, as Rose sobbed, the beeps sounded, signaling that their time was up.

  “Tell Mum to hang on for me,” said Rose before they were cut off. “Tell her to hang on and I’ll be on the first flight over.”

  Returning to the ward, a little slower, a little heavier, a little more broken than before, Hubert entered Joyce’s room to find Sampaguita chatting to his wife and holding her hand.

  “Here he is,” said the nurse cheerily. “I told you he wouldn’t be long.”

  Joyce mumbled something as he and the nurse exchanged places.

  “She said, thank you very much for looking after her,” he explained, and then paused as Joyce mumbled again. “And she said to tell you that you’ve got a lovely smile.”

  Once they were alone, Hubert told Joyce that Rose was desperate to see her and was on her way. When she muttered something that Hubert felt sure was their son’s name, he assured her that David was on his way too, even though Hubert had no idea where in the world he was, or even if he was still alive. Hubert remained by her side as she slipped in and out of consciousness, talking softly about things he hoped would reassure her, never once letting go of her hand.

  Later, when the nurses came to change and wash Joyce, Hubert returned to the shop and got himself some more change, this time to use to call their family and friends. He called Cora in Jamaica, asking her to pass on the news to Vivian and Fulton. He called Gus, who fell into a deep silence.

  “She’s one in a million, your Joyce,” he said, and promised to let all of the boys from the Red Lion know. “Give her my love, and if you need anything, Smiler, anything at all, just call.”

  Finally, Hubert called Eileen, Joyce’s oldest friend and her very first employee at the nursery, now living in a tiny village in County Clare with her daughter. He broke the news as gently as he could and asked her to let all of those who knew and loved Joyce know what was happening. At the end of the call, Eileen tearfully assured him that he had done an amazing job looking after his wife over these past ten years.

  “It was an honor and never a chore,” Hubert replied, fighting back tears of his own.

  And he meant it too.

  Caring for Joyce had been much more than a fulfillment of some sort of duty. Instead it had been a daily expression of his love for her, and he knew without a shadow of a doubt that she would have done the same for him had the tables been turned.

  At the time of their wedding, lots of people had doubted whether the marriage would last, the odds being so stacked against them, but what they didn’t know, what they couldn’t know unless they were in Hubert and Joyce’s shoes, was that even though they had been married in a down-at-heel register office in Brixton rather than a fancy church, even though there had been no big wedding party, no lavish gifts, no honeymoon, they had meant every single word of their vows: “For better, for worse… in sickness and in health, till dea
th us do part.”

  Visiting time that afternoon was a flurry of activity, with a steady stream of people come to pay their last respects, so many that by the time the bell rang, Joyce’s hospital room looked like a florist’s. She’d been barely conscious for most of it, her papery eyelids fluttering open and closed from time to time, but now that it was just the two of them again, she seemed more peaceful, more like she was just enjoying an afternoon nap.

  Rather than dragging, the hours seemed to fly by, so much so that it seemed to Hubert as if one moment he was being asked what he would like for lunch, and the next it was pitch-dark outside. During this time he chatted to Joyce, recalling fond memories of their forty-seven years together, or sat quietly, saying nothing and holding her hand. Occasionally he even sang softly to her, songs that he knew she would enjoy, a bit of Frank Sinatra, a touch of Ella Fitzgerald, and, of course, Nat King Cole. His voice wasn’t brilliant these days, if indeed it ever had been, but it was enough to help put a smile on his face in these dark times, and although it may just have been a trick of the light, he felt sure it made Joyce smile a little too.

  He didn’t remember falling asleep but he woke with a start in the chair by the bed and realized he must have nodded off. It took a moment for him to remember where he was and another to realize that Joyce’s hand was cold. He stood up and leaned toward her, terrified at what he might discover, even though he’d known this moment would come. Seeing that she was no longer breathing, he panicked and, desperate for a little bit more time with his love, he reached across to press the button to call the nurse but stopped at the last moment. He’d become so accustomed to seeing Joyce in distress or pain and now here she was looking so peaceful, so serene, finally free from the prison of this terrible disease. Sitting back down, he took her hand and pressed it to his lips.

  “Thank you, Joyce Pierce,” he whispered. “Thank you. For everything.”

  37

  NOW

  Hubert and Jan were looking through the glass of the double doors to the main hall of the community center where the weekly session of the O-60 was already in full swing.

  Hubert turned to Jan.

  “You okay?”

  “To be honest, I’m feeling a bit nervous. Silly, isn’t it? Worrying about what a bunch of strangers are going to think of you.”

  “It’s not silly. Me know exactly how you feel. But at least we have each other to lean on, eh? At the worst we can have a cup of tea and then leave.” And with that, Hubert pushed open the doors and they both strode into the room.

  What with Rose coming in just over a fortnight and all the preparations for the campaign launch and week of activities, the idea of making a return to the O-60 Club hadn’t been on Hubert’s radar at all. He’d made his peace with the fact that he wouldn’t be able to present anything like the life he’d pretended to have to Rose. Jan would be it, his one and only age-appropriate friend. But then something odd had happened a few days ago while he was accompanying Jan to the post office to renew her passport.

  “You’ve written your name wrong,” he’d said, pointing to the box on the first page of the form that she’d asked him to check over as they waited in the queue.

  Putting on her reading glasses, Jan peered down at the form and laughed. “That’s no mistake. It’s my given name. My mum wanted to name me after a friend of hers at nursing college but my dad wasn’t keen. So the compromise was they’d put it down on my birth certificate to keep Mum happy, but the name everyone called me was actually my middle name.”

  “So your real name’s not Jan?”

  “Well, not officially, no, and it’s caused the odd problem over the years cashing checks and the like, but I can’t think of myself as anything else.”

  “So… your real name is… Dorothy?”

  Jan gave him a strange look.

  “Are you all right, Hubert?”

  Hubert laughed so hard that he had to lean on Jan for support. After all this time, after all this searching, he’d actually had a Dotty right in front of him.

  Jan was mildly affronted.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if me tell you,” said Hubert, once he’d recovered himself. But as he mulled it over that evening, he couldn’t help thinking that perhaps this was a sign. Not that he should continue his lies to Rose, but rather that somehow he had been given an opportunity to do the very thing he should have done all that time ago. Even if he miraculously found himself a Dennis and a Harvey to go with his Dotty, he’d still tell Rose the truth, because that was what she deserved. But given that it had been his first lie about going to the O-60 that had forced Hubert to spin such an elaborate web of deceit, it now seemed fitting that he take this last opportunity to finally put things right.

  The hall was just as busy as it had been on Hubert’s first visit, if not a little more so, although the activities on offer appeared not to have changed a great deal. The only differences Hubert could see were that the table-tennis table had been replaced by a small portable badminton net and at the opposite end of the room there was a game of darts in progress.

  Suddenly the confidence Hubert had mustered for Jan leached away, leaving him temporarily frozen to the spot. He didn’t know what to do first or who to approach. Should they join those sitting at the tables doing a jigsaw puzzle to the left, or the group having a cup of tea to the right, or something else altogether? Of course, the moment Jan started for the jigsaw table was the exact one Hubert decided to go for the tea and coffee stand, and as they still had their arms linked, it was almost as if they were improvising their own moves to the line dancing going on at the far end of the room.

  They were saved from any further embarrassment, however, by a voice calling out from just behind them. As they turned, they saw a tall woman with mousy-brown hair, wearing a short-sleeved lemon dress. She was carrying two portable hot water dispensers, one in each hand.

  “Hello there!” she said cheerily. “Welcome to the O-60! The name’s Audrey, I’m club secretary. I’d shake your hands but I’m afraid mine are a bit full at the moment. I just nearly killed myself struggling to get through those blasted doors.”

  “Let me help you,” said Hubert. Glad of anything that might lessen his feeling of awkwardness, he took the dispensers from her. “Just point me in the right direction and me take these where you want them.”

  Audrey gestured toward a row of three trestle tables, with biscuits and cakes at one end and a collection of tea bags and coffee jars at the other.

  “You’re a lifesaver,” said Audrey. She removed the empty dispensers to give Hubert room to put down the fresh ones. “Thank you so much, Mr.…”

  “Bird,” said Hubert. “But there’s no need for ‘mister’; you can call me Hubert.”

  She smiled and her eyes crinkled slightly as though she was trying to recall something as she shook his hand.

  “You look familiar. Have you been to the O-60 before?”

  “No,” said Hubert, keen to leave his alter ego, the Windrush Warrior, to one side for the moment. “First time for me.”

  Audrey turned to Jan.

  “And you must be… Mrs. Bird?”

  The words caused Hubert a mini coughing fit.

  “Ooh no!” said Jan quickly. “We’re not married.”

  “Well,” said Audrey, “I’ve always said it’s only a bit of paper, after all!”

  “No,” said Hubert emphatically, looking at Jan in horror, and this time, even through all her makeup, he could see that she’d turned crimson. “She means we’re just friends.”

  “Ah,” said Audrey, “of course! Sorry for the crossed wires! You must think me very dense!” She grabbed a cup and saucer and, with a somewhat theatrical flourish, turned to Hubert and Jan. “Let’s get you both some drinks sorted and I’ll introduce you to the rest of the gang. Now who’s for tea and who’s for coffee?”

  Following Audrey’s introductions, Hubert and Jan worked on a five-thousand-piece jigs
aw puzzle with Sue, a former school cook; Barbara, a retired pub owner; and her husband, Cliff. Half an hour later, after making themselves another drink, they sat and enjoyed a piece of cake with Margaret and Colin, who had recently moved to the area to be closer to their family. Following on from this, they played a few hands of whist with Alfredo, a former landscape gardener, and his brother, Enzo, a retired builder. After which they ended up having a good chat with Gordon and Marion, ten-year veterans of the O-60 and the most terrible gossips you could hope to meet.

  Bolstered by Jan’s company, Hubert was considerably less nervous than he had been on his previous visit and, with her by his side, tried his best to bond with all of these people, even to the extent of choosing to overlook a few comments from Cliff about his problems with “the Polish.” Even so, Hubert struggled to find much common ground beyond the usual chat about gardening, public transport, and the weather.

  He could tell just by looking at Jan that she was feeling the same, and her usual bubbly personality was somewhat muted. As midday approached, with just an hour of the session remaining, Jan whispered in Hubert’s ear, “This isn’t for me,” and Hubert was just about to reply, “Me neither,” when a couple he’d seen earlier taking part in the line-dancing session came over to introduce themselves. The man was a few inches shorter than Hubert, had close-cropped white hair, and was wearing a short-sleeved checked shirt and navy-blue shorts. The woman by his side was small, with peroxide-blond hair and an open, friendly face.

  “Had to come over and say hello,” said the man, shaking Hubert’s hand. “Since the moment you stepped in here, me and my partner have been racking our brains trying to think where we know you from and it’s just come to me: you’re that bloke off the telly and in the papers, aren’t you?”

  Hubert squirmed with embarrassment.

  “Yes, that’s me.”

  “What was it they called you again? That’s it… the Windrush Warrior! The pensioner declaring war on loneliness!”