The Extraordinary Hope of Dawn Brightside

by Jessica Ryn

  They’d been so very young, but they still would have got married eventually, even without the baby, Dawn was sure of it.

  She hadn’t believed her luck when Rob had first spoken to her. He’d worked behind the counter at the university café and had served Dawn a sausage roll and a shy smile during her first week. He’d asked Dawn what she was studying and seemed interested when she’d told him she was training to be a midwife.

  ‘You must be dead clever then,’ he’d said in his thick Mancunian accent. ‘I’ve heard it’s hard to get into, that. Way more people apply than there are places.’

  Dawn had noticed his blue eyes, dark hair and the cute mole on his left cheek and prayed that he didn’t have a girlfriend. She’d been almost at the end of her first year by the time he’d asked her if she wanted to go and see Twelve Monkeys at the Odeon. She hadn’t had the heart to tell him she’d already seen it with the girls from her cohort and hadn’t understood much of it then. If she was being honest, she still didn’t really get it the second time around either, but at least she’d had Rob’s Lynx-infused arm around her shoulder.

  But that was all before. Before the trips to the hospital and the unit. No one believing that someone was after her. Her midwifery career snuffed out so soon after her graduation.

  That life belongs to someone else now. Someone long gone.

  ‘If you don’t like remembering,’ Shaun says as he wipes cream off his chops with the jam-encrusted napkin, ‘perhaps coming to a wedding fayre wasn’t the best idea.’

  He’s sharper than he looks, that one.

  Chapter 7

  Dawn

  DAWN IS WAITING BEHIND the door of the resident’s lounge. Staff at St Jude’s hold an Equip session each Tuesday evening and judging from the noise from the other side of the door, the room is already full. At least this way she can make an entrance and meet all her neighbours at the same time.

  A hush falls across the room when Dawn walks in. Several tenants are squeezed onto the sofas and others are taking up most of the green swirly carpet. Grace and Peter are standing in front of the TV either side of a whiteboard.

  ‘Before we start our session, please can we give a St Jude’s welcome to our newest resident, Dawn,’ Grace says in a bright voice.

  The responses vary. Some clap, one person cheers and others mutter words towards the floor. Dawn expects they’re just shy. She’s sure they’ll all become great friends by the end of the week. Then they could have sleepovers and pillow fights and midnight feasts. This place has been such a fun place to live since Dawn moved in, they’ll all say.

  Grace introduces the tenants one by one. There’s Terry with the huge shoulders and a curtain rail of rings across his eyebrow. His frizzy hair is sticking up at all angles, making his teardrop tattoo look almost clown-like.

  ‘Pleasure,’ he grunts as he shakes her hand with his very hairy one.

  Jack has the most welcoming smile in the room; he’d been one who’d cheered. His hair falls to just below his chin and he keeps trying to tuck it behind his ear. His eyes are light and bright and he has a dimple that has probably got him out of trouble a few times.

  Cara wants to know why Dawn had been allowed in the office to help her with her GP form and looks unconvinced when Dawn explains that it was a roleplay exercise to ascertain whether she was ready to move into St Jude’s.

  ‘Well, I’m never allowed in the office, and I’ve been here almost a year,’ Cara grumbles as she pulls at the locket around her neck. The chain has left green patches on her skin. She scrapes her straight black hair into a tight ponytail and pulls down the sleeves of her hoody.

  ‘These sessions are designed to equip our residents for when they move on and to hopefully prevent future cycles of homelessness. Sometimes we invite past residents to come and speak to us about how they are doing now. Tonight, we have our very own staff member and former tenant, Peter.’ Grace has put her bright voice back on again and gives an enthusiastic clap. ‘He’s leading a session on budgeting and dealing with debt, then afterwards, he’s going to tell us his story.’

  Dawn keeps her eyes to the front, enraptured as Peter draws an ‘income and expenditure’ chart on the whiteboard. She listens as he explains how to prioritise rent, bills and living expenses and what to do if you owe money you can’t yet pay.

  ‘Debt is one of the leading causes of homelessness,’ he says. ‘And one of the worst things you can do is ignore it and hope it goes away.’ He explains how to contact companies, what forms to fill in and gives out phone numbers for organisations that can help.

  ‘Before Peter speaks to us again, I just wanted to finish off the last discussion point on the itinerary.’ Grace holds up a colour-coded chart. The first two points on it have been discussed and ticked off. ‘We need to discuss the rota system for the café. Quite a few of our workers have moved on, so we could do with some more volunteers. Working just three hours per week will pay your rent top-up as well as growing the amounts you have in your resettlement funds without affecting your current benefits.’

  Excitement rises inside Dawn. She sees herself with a nice, neat pinny and a winning smile. Her scones will be out of this world and people will come from far and wide to sample them. The tip jar will need emptying several times per day – Dawn will probably be promoted to café manager by the end of the month.

  ‘I’ll do it.’ Dawn throws a hand in the air, feeling like a pupil who desperately wants to shout out an answer to a question that none of the others know. ‘I’d love to help. Baking is my thing. I taught my daughter to bake when she was little and she went on to win prizes for her cakes and pastries.’

  Grace throws a glance towards Peter and he nods his agreement. She promises to show Dawn the café tomorrow and suggests that Cara shows her the ropes if she wants to help out. ‘Peter’s asked me to leave him to it, so I’ll be in the office if anyone needs me.’

  Peter launches into his story and Dawn kicks herself for not putting a tissue up her sleeve. He tells them about his missions as a surgeon abroad with Doctors Without Borders. About his breakdown and the drinking and losing his job, his identity and everything he thought he was. The long nights in a soggy sleeping bag on the streets of Dover.

  ‘You all have a story, and each of us, by being here, has been given another chance. My road to recovery wasn’t a straight one. I was so angry when I first got here – Every journey begins with a single step, Grace used to tell me at the beginning of our keyworking sessions, and it pissed me off every time. I felt sick every time I thought about how much I owed her. It wasn’t easy being a hot-shot surgeon one minute and being hauled from the gutter the next. Sometimes gratitude sucks. Some days, I just wanted to tell my keyworker where she could stick her inspirational quotes.’

  Chuckles are heard from all corners of the room. Peter looks different when he talks to everyone at once, it’s like he comes alive. He doesn’t even fiddle with his glasses or his grey speckled hair.

  ‘But learning to accept help is important. Yes, it was shit at the time. But I’ve been sober for a year, I live in a cottage nearby and I have a job that means something to me. Don’t tell Grace this or she’ll get a big head, but if wasn’t for her, I might not even be alive today.’

  The only sound in the room is from the dripping tap in the corner.

  ‘Working in the café helped me get my confidence back. Going to a support group with Grace helped me tackle my drinking. I sorted my debts, learned how to cook again, on a budget. I just want each of you to make the most of being here and to see that there is a way out the other side.’

  Dawn gets to her feet and claps and claps, tears in her eyes.

  Peter takes a step back and takes off his glasses, clearly overwhelmed by her support. ‘Anyone got any questions about that or any hostel-related stuff?’

  The rest of the meeting consists mainly of people complaining about one another’s taste in music, Jack requesting a second-hand pool table for the café, and Dawn asking
for clarification on the rules about guests.

  ‘During the day is fine as long as we’ve seen their identification, but for safety reasons, they must be gone by 9 p.m. There’s often vulnerable people staying here, and we have a duty of care,’ says Peter.

  Teardrop Terry ‘pffts’ when she says ‘vulnerable’ and shifts his very solid weight from one side to the other.

  ‘What happens if someone breaks the rules about visitors? Do they get kicked out?’ Dawn asks Cara in a loud whisper. Cara’s eyes dart towards Peter, and Dawn wonders if she’d spoken too loudly. Most of the residents begin to file out of the room with their coffee mugs and Dawn watches Peter as he fiddles with the TV remote. Why had she mentioned overnight rules? She should have kept her mouth shut.

  What if Peter decides to check the CCTV outside number six?

  On her way back to her room, Dawn stops when she sees a tall man in a grey raincoat coming out of number one. He gives her a nod and holds out a hand.

  ‘Paul,’ he says. ‘You just moved in?’

  Paul’s hair is thick and red. The same bright shade that either lets those images from the past back in or sends her running for the next train.

  ‘Yes,’ she says, and keeps walking, pretending she hadn’t seen his outstretched arm. It’s not him; why would it be? But it’s better not to take any chances. She’ll keep her distance and stay put. She can’t keep running, not anymore.

  Shaun needs her.

  Chapter 8

  Dawn

  DAWN STRETCHES OUT HER leg until it finds Shaun’s shoulder at the bottom of the bed. She’s slept surprisingly well considering the two of them had top-and-tailed in that tiny single bed. He’d offered to sleep on the floor, informing Dawn that it’s ‘weird’ to share a bed with a woman old enough to be his mum. She’d told him to shh and that it was just like having a sleepover.

  ‘Yeah. With your own mum,’ he’d complained as he’d climbed in over the duvet. Dawn had flicked the base of his foot pretending to tell him off, but it had been nice; him more or less saying she was like a mother to him.

  He’s still asleep, his cheeks flushed with warmth and his wispy blonde hair slicked to his head. It must have been wonderful for him to sleep in a bed away from the cold hard ground of the park. Dawn wonders if his actual mother has even missed him or noticed that he hasn’t been to visit. Dawn could help him in so many ways whilst he stayed there with her. Starting with putting some meat on those skinny bones of his. She could pop over to Canterbury on the bus; there are still some clothes shops she’s allowed in there. She could get him some new T-shirts.

  Dawn almost can’t bear to wake him but she’s spending the day in the café today, learning how everything works, and she needs to brief him on how to stay unseen. Can’t have them both turfed back out onto the streets.

  ‘I’ll be careful, I promise,’ he assures her. ‘If anyone tries to unlock the door, I’ll hide in the shower, and if I need to get out, I’ll use the fire escape.’

  ‘Only leave if it’s absolutely necessary though,’ Dawn warns him. ‘I don’t want you to get seen and not be able to get back in.’

  Dawn thinks she may have interrupted something when she arrives at the café for her trial shift. Grace and Cara are behind the counter; Cara’s dark hair scraped back and hidden under a net. They both stop talking and turn towards Dawn when she closes the door behind her, setting off the ‘ding’ sound. Grace places a hand on Cara’s shoulder, which Cara shrugs off before stomping towards the fridge.

  ‘Morning, Dawn,’ Grace sings, painting a bright smile across her face. ‘Why didn’t you come through the resident’s entrance, through the hostel?’

  ‘I thought coming through this way would make me feel as if I was coming to work. You know, more like I have a real job.’

  Cara slams the fridge hard enough that Dawn can hear the contents rattle around inside. ‘Trust me, this feels like real work.’ She makes bunny ears with her fingers over the last two words and Dawn thinks she might have pissed her off.

  ‘I didn’t mean that. I know it is, I’ve worked in cafés before. I just meant…’ she stops speaking as it’s clear Cara’s busy stabbing rolls and spreading butter on them with the vigour of an angry Zumba instructor.

  ‘Don’t mind her, she’s having a difficult morning,’ Grace says as soon as they’re out of earshot and standing in the café’s sun-drenched tea garden. The view across the sea is similar to the one from Dawn’s room but it feels even more majestic with the warm wind slapping against her arms. There are several small garden tables with matching chairs placed strategically under small trees and a pretty water fountain in the centre, surrounded by geraniums.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ Dawn says, watching an obvious burst of pride pull Grace’s lips into a smile.

  ‘The tea garden is my baby.’ Deep blue eyes shine back at Dawn. ‘When I first came to work here, the outside areas were in a right old state. Took me a while to raise the funds for it of course, but now Terry does most of the upkeep. He’s a fantastic gardener.’

  ‘Terry with the tear tattoos on his face?’ Dawn asks, surprised. Anyone could enjoy digging around in soil she supposes; it’s just that Terry looks more like the type to be burying someone beneath it.

  Grace shows Dawn around the spotless café area that holds the dark green tables and shabby-chic painted wooden chairs. The walls are heaving with artwork of varying tastes and qualities. ‘The ones next to the window were donated by a local artist and the pictures on this wall are from St Jude’s residents from our very own art group,’ Grace says. Dawn likes the sound of an art group, even though she hasn’t drawn anything since she was a child. She does have those special drawings that Rosie drew her as a child on her first day of school. They’re glued inside her photo album that Dawn still sleeps with under her pillow every night.

  ‘What other groups do you have?’ she asks Grace who is chewing on her lip and watching Cara as she stacks the rolls up so high, they could probably have a game of Jenga with them.

  ‘We have cooking night, after hours in the café on Friday evenings. Peter normally runs that. Cooking-on-a-budget-type stuff usually. Saturday mornings we have Hazel in to do a creative writing workshop. That’s usually well attended, and often the group go down to the library together afterwards to get books out and chat about what they’ve been reading.’

  Dawn’s mind dances with all the possibilities that could arise from attending those groups. She imagines John Torode granting her an apron on MasterChef or topping the bestseller charts as an award-winning novelist. In either of those scenarios, she’d give a heart-wrenching interview on a daytime TV show about her climb from the streets all the way up to fame and success, allowing nothing to hold her back. The presenters would have tears in their eyes but will carry bravely on with the programme before coming to find Dawn personally in the dressing room afterwards. ‘Such an inspiration,’ they’ll say. She’ll wave their comments away with a modest wave and tell them she couldn’t have done it without all the amazing people at St Jude’s. Then she’ll donate a large sum from all of her new riches to the hostel and they’ll change the name of the place to ‘St Dawn’s’.

  ‘This is where we keep the cleaning supplies,’ Grace is saying. The cupboard squeaks as it opens, yanking Dawn away from her thoughts. ‘Any questions?’

  She stands next to Cara as she fills the pile of rolls with a selection of sandwich fillings and waits to be shown how to use the coffee machine, as instructed by Grace before she’d been called back to the hostel to deal with a blocked-toilet emergency.

  ‘You could help you know, instead of just standing there,’ Cara mutters as she slops egg mayonnaise all over the counter with the force of her knife.

  ‘Of course, it’s just that Grace said I wasn’t allowed to prepare food until I’d got my food hygiene certificate…’

  ‘It’s a sandwich,’ she says, staring Dawn in the face. ‘My three-year-olds could do it without messing it up; I’m
sure you’ll be fine.’

  ‘You have twins?’ Dawn asks as she shoves her hands under the tap, Caution Hot Water, and spends a long time rubbing in the soap. ‘Boys or girls?’

  Cara cuts several slices of mild cheddar before she answers. ‘Boys. Three years and two months. I see ‘em every Friday morning in a room down the community centre. They live with their gran.’

  Dawn steals a look at the side of her face as she chops the onions. Years of hurt are etched deep inside the soft lines around her mouth and under her eyes, making her look older than she said she was on her GP form. She decides not to ask if she’s really only thirty-five as some people can be sensitive about things like that, and she’s holding a very sharp vegetable knife.

  ‘That’s to say I see them every Friday except this week. Just found out the bastard social worker has gone on leave and their gran’s messaged to say she’s not bringing them. So that’s that.’ Cara throws her knife across the worktop and it clatters across the whole length of it before falling to the floor. ‘Bastard onions,’ she says, wiping at her red, streaming eyes with the tops of her arms.

  Dawn doesn’t think it’s the onions.

  ‘What are their names?’ she asks as she begins to stack dirty plates and cups up next to the sink.

  ‘I don’t tell people from here stuff like that,’ Cara says. ‘Some people use things as leverage, you’ll see.’

  A mug slips out of Dawn’s wet hands and splits into pieces on the shiny floor. She looks up at Cara, expecting her to tut but she’s already got a dustpan and brush and is ushering Dawn out of the way so she can clear it up. Dawn’s grateful for that as she’s just noticed how much she’s shaking.

  ‘I have a daughter. Rosie,’ Dawn says, wondering why her voice matches her wobbly hands. ‘She’s twenty-two and lives in Florida. She’s a fashion photographer. I miss her every day. I know what it’s like.’