A Song for Tomorrow

by Alice Peterson

  ‘I don’t mind him painting me,’ I join in, ‘as long as he makes sure it’s flattering and he doesn’t emphasise my button nose.’ I touch my nose, all of us laughing, before the man looks at me and says, ‘it’s charming. I’ll take it.’

  Jake mouths a discreet ‘thank you’ before telling our buyer that he’ll introduce him to the gallery owner to complete the sale. When they head downstairs I am thankful to be left alone. I gaze at the painting. It’s incredible that this is Jake’s art; that people are here investing in his talent. I can’t deny a small part of me wants his success. Who am I fooling? A large part of me wants his success. I long to be in the limelight, not a guest at the party but hosting the entire show. Jake was always determined to be an artist, as insecure a profession as that might be, and however much Dad and I thought art could mean a wasted career. ‘You’re clever enough to do anything so why be a painter?’ I’d asked him once during one of our film evenings, much to my shame now. Of course I knew he’d spent most of his time at boarding school in the art room, but I’d always assumed that it was a phase, a childhood passion. Jake has taken risks, working hard and knocking repeatedly on gallery doors until someone heard. Deep down I realise now that my reaction had subconsciously been a jealous one; he was following his dream and I wasn’t.

  His career is going from strength to strength.

  Mine ended today.

  A waitress in a black cocktail dress approaches carrying a tray of champagne glasses. A wave of tiredness hits me as I take one. My liver doesn’t get on with alcohol. It’s like a very bad date. I know I shouldn’t but . . .

  I’m hungry, too. Where is Phil? Just as I’m determined to go and find him, once and for all—

  ‘I’m Tom.’ He holds out his hand.

  ‘Alice,’ I reply, surprised by how pleased I am to see his face again. One of the first things I notice are his eyes, a clear blue, vivid against his pale skin. ‘I feel underdressed,’ he says, gesturing to his jeans and jacket over a round-neck navy jumper. He turns to the picture of me in my black sunhat. ‘Looks like I’m too late.’ He points to the round red sticker on the corner of the frame. ‘She’s found a home.’ I catch him stealing another look at me. ‘You make a good model.’

  Oh, the irony! ‘My brother painted it. I make sure he flatters me.’

  ‘He doesn’t need to. He has a great subject.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I say, for a brief moment feeling self-conscious in front of him. There is something about his eyes. The way he looks at me makes me feel as if there is no one else more important in the room.

  ‘What do you do?’ he asks.

  I think about this, unsure if it’s easier to be a model for one more night. ‘Music,’ I say finally. ‘I write music. I love singing.’

  He looks impressed. ‘Would I have heard of you?’

  ‘One day,’ I promise. ‘How about you?’

  ‘I run my own website business. Very dull.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I spend most of my time swearing at my computer.’

  A small group of people approach us. I overhear one of them complimenting Jake’s work, saying he’s an artist to watch. Another mentions he is clearly influenced by contemporary British painters such as Richard Foster, along with the French Impressionists, Monet and Pissarro. He has the same lightness of touch.

  When Tom’s mobile rings he hesitates before I insist he takes it, even though I don’t want him to. ‘Hi, George,’ he says, his eyes remaining on mine. ‘I’m on my way, OK? Just got slightly held up.’

  He puts his phone back in his pocket.

  ‘Listen.’ Tom touches my arm. ‘I could stay here all night and chat to you but unfortunately I have to meet some friends. I’m already embarrassingly late, but how about a coffee or a drink . . .?’

  I feel an arm around my shoulder. ‘Aren’t you going to introduce us?’ Phil says to me before staring at Tom. I register the look of ‘back off’ in Phil’s eyes, and a flash of disappointment in Tom’s.

  Awkwardly I introduce them before Tom says he really has to go. As he shakes my hand there are so many things I want to say that I’m reluctant to let him go. I want to give him my number and tell him how I’d love to meet up for a coffee but I can’t, not in front of Phil. As I watch Tom leave, a part of me considers running after him. But it’s too late. He’s gone.

  Phil looks disgruntled, saying it’s time we left or we’ll be late for dinner. Our table is booked for eight thirty. He can’t help but add, ‘Who the hell was he?’

  After I’ve brushed my teeth I crawl under the covers. Phil is sitting up in bed, dressed in his boxers. ‘Who was that Tom bloke?’ he asks for the third time. Clearly he didn’t believe me when I’d said earlier in the restaurant that Tom and I didn’t chat for long, that he was a stranger. ‘I was looking for you for ages.’

  ‘You were outside smoking.’

  ‘He was chatting you up.’

  ‘He was interested in one of Jake’s paintings.’

  ‘He was interested in you. Bet you didn’t mention the CF, did you?’

  ‘Why would I?’

  ‘He sees you looking all hot, being flirty in your cute little red dress, just like you were with me the first time we met.’ Phil’s eyes are raging with jealousy as he says, ‘Bet he doesn’t know you still live at home—’

  ‘Hang on, I’m independent . . .’

  ‘. . . and you swallow half a fucking pharmacy each morning . . .’

  ‘Phil! Don’t be so mean and—’

  ‘. . . and if he fancies a decent night’s sleep, he can forget it.’ He switches the light off, turns his back to me. ‘And then that one time, when you coughed up blood during sex . . .’ he says as if it’s yet one more thing he has to put up with.

  I switch the light back on. ‘You know what? I’m going to make this really easy for you. Fuck off.’

  He looks at me as if I’m deranged. ‘What?’

  ‘You heard me.’ With renewed energy I get out of bed and grab his clothes that are folded neatly on to my chair, the control freak, before throwing them at him.

  ‘Alice!’ he says as his shirt flies into his face, followed by one of his socks.

  ‘If I’m such a burden, if it’s such a hardship being with me then go.’ I push him out of the back door before he has time to get dressed. ‘No one’s forcing you to stay.’

  ‘I was about to finish with you anyway,’ he shouts, making sure he has the last word, before I double lock the door and find myself slumped on the floor, tears flowing down my cheeks.

  5

  Mary’s Diary

  December 1998

  I heard a door slam last night and wondered if Alice had had another argument with Phil. But I can’t interfere. I have to remember that were it not for her CF she’d live independently. Alice needs her privacy just like any other twenty-something.

  I lay in bed feeling rather guilty that I hoped they had split up. I don’t think he’s right for Alice. Jake and Lucy aren’t mad about him either. She needs someone caring but also someone who challenges her. When I talk to Phil he never looks me in the eye and Nicholas doesn’t like the gel stuff he puts in his hair.

  After breakfast I went downstairs and found her in bed. ‘I didn’t see you leave last night?’

  ‘Phil and me, it’s over,’ she said.

  I had to stop myself from looking even a tiny bit pleased. For all I knew they’d get back together tomorrow. But somehow I knew they wouldn’t. I sensed their relationship had ended some time ago. At Jake’s show I’d seen her talking and laughing with another man – tall, fair hair, attractive. I wondered if he’d had anything to do with the break up. Alice looked too exhausted and tearful to talk. I just held her in my arms, before Charlie and Nutmeg decided to jump on to the bed to comfort her too.

  ‘Mum,’ she said as I stood up to leave, a small smile on her face as she stroked Nutmeg. ‘Having cats is so much better than having a boyfriend, isn’t it? Who needs a m
an?’

  6

  Alice

  It’s been three days since I broke up with Phil and I’m at the Royal Brompton Hospital, sitting in the Outpatients waiting room of the Fulham Wing.

  ‘Anger is good, anger is sweet’, I write in my lyrics book, humming the song. ‘Anger makes you rise to your feet’.

  I apply some lip balm, still thinking about Phil, finding it hard to believe he hasn’t been in touch, even to say sorry for the things he said. ‘Bet he doesn’t know you swallow half a fucking pharmacy each morning . . .’

  He hit a nerve.

  To begin with we were happy. Our relationship was passionate. Was that all it was in the end? Great sex?

  I close my eyes, only to see Tom’s face again. I feel the warmth of his hand around mine. I keep on thinking, what if Phil had turned up five minutes later? What if we had gone out for a coffee?

  Maybe I need to stop thinking about Tom too. I need time on my own to focus on finding a studio and a music manager. I’m going to talk to Professor Taylor today. I need to be ready to argue when he tells me singing will put unnecessary strain on my lungs.

  Restless, I try not to look at the other patients but my eye is drawn to a woman with pale skin and tired eyes. I shift in my seat. I’m sure I don’t look that ill. She coughs that guttural cough everyone has in this waiting room, the bubbling of mucus rattling and vibrating in our chests as it tries to find an escape route. I wonder what her lung function is? Mine must be better.

  A nurse comes out informing us that Professor Taylor’s clinic is now running two hours late. I pick up my pen again. ‘The anger’s welling up inside. This is certainly no joy ride’.

  I gear myself up, before breathing out into the tube that looks like an elephant’s trunk. Huff, huff . . .

  ‘Keep going,’ urges my physiotherapist. ‘You can do it! Harder, Alice!’

  ‘HUFF!’ Anyone would think I was giving birth. ‘Done,’ I say, red-faced, spluttering and coughing as she records how much I can blow out in a second and how much puff I have in total, i.e. my total lung capacity. Imagine trying to steam up a mirror with your breath. That’s the action.

  ‘That’s gone down a lot,’ she says, as if accusing the machine of being faulty. ‘Best of three?’

  When she reads the second lot of figures her frown tells me it’s even worse. ‘It’s down by more than ten per cent. Can you think of any reasons why, Alice?’

  After my physio session Professor Taylor finally calls me into his office. It’s hard to miss my hefty medical file monopolising his desk.

  He reads the results of my lung function tests. His white coat is unbuttoned, showing off a blue checked shirt, and a ballpoint is clipped into his front coat pocket. I’ve been under Professor Taylor’s care since I was sixteen. He’s close to my father in age, with silvery grey hair that makes him look distinguished.

  ‘How are you feeling, Alice?’

  ‘Much the same.’

  ‘How much are you coughing up? More than usual?’ He examines my sputum sample. ‘It’s quite red.’

  Shy laugh. ‘Pretty, isn’t it?’

  He glances at my notes again.

  ‘I’ve given up modelling.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

  Ask him about the singing. ‘Oh, don’t be.’ Another smile. ‘My wobbly feet weren’t exactly made for the catwalk.’

  He peers at me from behind his glasses, narrowing those dark inquisitive eyes. ‘Have you had any bleeds since I last saw you?’

  He means coughing up blood. ‘None.’

  ‘Not once?’ We do this, Professor Taylor and me. Dance around the truth. I shake my head, choosing not to tell him I’ve had one. It was only minor.

  ‘Right. That’s interesting. Your lung function is alarmingly low.’ He walks over to my side of the desk and feels my forehead. ‘How do you feel about staying in hospital to get this under control?’

  He knows, more than anyone, how much I hate being in hospital. ‘Not good.’

  ‘My feeling is you have a serious lung infection and we need to get you on a course of stronger antibiotics, but I’d like to monitor you here.’

  ‘Oh, you don’t need to do that,’ I say as if he really doesn’t need to trouble himself for me. ‘I can take them at home with Rita.’ Rita runs a home service linked to the hospital, which means rather than me trekking here for injections and blood tests, Rita comes to our house.

  Professor Taylor returns to his chair, sits down.

  ‘I wanted to ask your advice,’ I say nervously, hoping this will distract him from the hospital idea. ‘I’ve been thinking about—’

  He holds up a hand to stop me. ‘Alice, I’m concerned.’

  My plan didn’t work. ‘I’m fine.’

  He looks at me with those familiar fatherly eyes. ‘You’re not fine.’

  Please don’t admit me. ‘But it’s nearly Christmas . . .’ Christmas is two and a half weeks away.

  ‘The best possible gift I can give you this Christmas is to make you feel better. My job is to keep the show on the road and right now the show has taken a bad turn. The wheels are coming off. We need to get you back on track.’

  Reluctantly I nod. There is no room to talk to him about my singing today. It’s like trying to fit one more person into an already jam-packed lift.

  ‘You’re making the right decision,’ he says as I watch him pick up the telephone to find out if there are any free beds on Foulis Ward.

  My second home.

  How long will I be in hospital this time?

  I can’t help thinking my life is a ticking bomb and I am wasting yet more precious days.

  7

  Tom

  Tom wakes up. He’s had yet another sleepless night, trying to work out how he can get in contact with Alice. It has been almost a week since he saw her at the gallery and still he can’t get this girl out of his mind. If anything he is thinking about her even more. Each time he closes his eyes all he can see is her smile and hear her voice. Is it wishful thinking on his part to believe that she didn’t seem that happy with her boyfriend? He definitely sensed Alice was just as disappointed as he had been when this Phil bloke, unattractive by the way, had interrupted their conversation, placing his arm around her shoulder as if marking his territory. When they shook hands to say goodbye he was certain she’d held on to him for a second too long, her eyes pleading with him to stay. But what had he done? Walked away. ‘What was so special about her?’ George had asked him later that night in the pub, ‘besides being blonde and hot.’ He and George had grown up together; they were more like brothers than friends. Tom couldn’t say why he felt so strongly about her. All he knew was that he had to see her again. ‘But she has a boyfriend,’ George had argued, ‘and you didn’t even get her number. Someone else will come along, they always do.’

  To make life easier Tom had agreed.

  He gets out of bed, takes off his boxer shorts and grabs a towel before heading into the bathroom for a shower. By the time he’s dressed, he knows exactly what he has to do. If only he’d thought of it sooner . . .

  He sits down at the kitchen table, littered with books and paperwork, and searches the index of the telephone directory for galleries in the West End. He knows the exact address so it isn’t hard to find. He remembers the artist had been a Jake someone, Alice’s brother.

  Without thinking he picks up his mobile and dials the number. ‘Oh hello,’ he says when a man answers immediately. ‘I was at the opening of Jake’s show the other night.’

  ‘Hello. This is Jake.’

  Tom hadn’t been expecting Jake to answer. He isn’t sure what to say next. It might have been clever if he’d thought about it first before diving in. Should he pretend he’s interested in one of his paintings? But then he has to buy it and he’s got no spare cash. ‘Oh, hi Jake, I bumped into your sister, Alice, it was great to catch up with her after so many years.’

  Jake waits.

  ‘Anyway, she gave
me her number because we’d arranged to meet for a coffee, but stupidly I lost it, so I was wondering . . .’

  ‘Sure,’ Jake cuts in. He seems flat as he reels off the number. ‘But I’d get in touch with her in a few days. She’s in hospital.’

  ‘Oh.’ There’s a pause. ‘Which hospital?’

  ‘The Brompton.’

  ‘I hope it’s nothing too serious?’

  ‘It’s her CF, usual thing.’

  ‘Her CF?’

  ‘Cystic fibrosis.’ Tom knows Jake is losing patience.

  ‘Ah yes, of course, her cystic . . .’ He can’t pronounce the other word.

  ‘How did you say you knew Alice again?’ Jake asks.

  Slowly Tom puts his mobile down on the kitchen table. Cystic fibrosis. He knows nothing about it, except that it doesn’t sound good if it’s putting you in hospital. Next thing he knows, he is at his computer. ‘Come on Internet,’ he mutters, the dial-up taking what feels like an eternity. The connection fails. It’s been temperamental lately, playing up. Impatient and in sudden need of some fresh air, he flings on a jumper, grabs his keys and is cycling to a bookshop close to his flat in Ladbroke Grove in West London. He wastes no time in seeking out the science, technology and medical section on the second floor. When an assistant approaches, Tom asks her if she knows anything about cystic fibrosis. ‘I know all about it, one of my close friends . . .’ She looks tearful, taken off guard; uncertain if she should say any more.

  ‘Go on,’ Tom encourages.

  ‘She died five years ago.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘She was only twenty-nine.’ She hands Tom a book with a yellow and black cover. ‘Do you know someone who has it?’

  ‘A friend.’

  ‘People get on to transplant lists and survive. Medical advances are being made all the time.’ Tom isn’t sure she really believes this. ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ she says.