by Sue Nicholls
Millie and Twitch wrap Fee in their arms while she weeps.
‘Is it bad?’ Asks Millie.
Fee picks up the teaspoon again and winds it through her coffee. ‘Weeks, possibly months. She won't accept treatment or come to me. She’s going to stay with that… my father. I can't help her.’ Fee throws the spoon into her saucer and it clatters onto the table leaving beads of coffee in its wake.
‘If you need me to have Kitty or,’ Millie’s lips skew, ‘Come and thump your dad, just ask.’
‘Anything you want,’ Twitch interjects, ‘We’ll be here.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Is she managing?’ Twitch returns to her seat.
‘She seems OK at the moment. She doesn’t want me to put myself out, but I think she understands my need to visit.’
They drift into silence. Sipping from cups, even after they are empty.
While Millie threads her way to the bar to order more drinks, Twitch leans towards Fee.
‘Has the doctor put you in touch with a hospice?’
He may have. Fee had not taken much in. ‘I think so.’ She rakes her hair back.
When Millie returns, they discuss the forthcoming performance. It is a variety show, and Kitty is singing a solo.
‘Your mum will enjoy that Fee. Bring her along.’
‘That's a good idea, Twitch.’ Fee nods.
‘What about your dad?’ Millie cocks her head.
‘He won’t be coming.’ Fee’s tone brooks no discussion, and Millie moves on.
‘My parents are on holiday for the next month. They won't be here either.’
‘Mine live in Australia.’ Twitch tells them, ‘It's a long way to come.’
Millie’s lashes almost touch her eyebrows. ‘We know so little about each other, and yet so much.’
‘When all this is over,’ Fee wafts her hand through the air, ‘We'll have to spend more time together. Maybe take the children for a day out.’
‘Yes. Let’s.’
‘That would be good.’
***
At home, Mick is padding around the kitchen in the shorts and baggy tee shirt he slept in. The hailstorm has abated but it is still icy outside, and the heat from the kitchen welcomes Millie and the children.
‘Hi guys. Had a good time?’ Mick’s palm rasps across his Saturday morning stubble.
‘Not bad. Livvie had a lovely time at drama, didn't you Liv.’
‘I'm gonna be a flower, and sing a song, and dance.’ The child beams.
‘Well, I need to see that.’ He winks and Olivia screws her face to try and wink back.
‘I think you'll be working.’ Millie pulls Olivia towards her and unzips her padded coat.
Mick rubs the little girl’s coarse curls. ‘Sorry Babes, I'll have to come to the next one.’
Olivia shrugs and dances off and Mick lowers his large body onto a kitchen chair. ‘I wish I could be there more.’
‘Well, you could cut down your hours. If I went out to work too, we could share the childcare.’
Mick waves a finger at her. ‘Don't start, Millie. You know how I feel about that.’
‘I do.’ Millie sighs and pulls Lucas from his romper-suit. ‘Fee’s mum’s got cancer.’
‘God, that's terrible. Poor Fee. Can you do anything to help?’
‘No doubt we can help some time.’ She flings the romper suit into the laundry basket.
Mick stares out of the window then rises and reaches for Millie. When he wraps her in his big arms the lingering odour of bed rises from the warmth of his chest. ‘Millie. Give me a break. I only want to look after you. Is that so bad?’
She stiffens in his embrace. ‘I appreciate the sentiment, but I wish you wanted to keep me happy instead of safe?’
‘We need you at home babes.’ He squeezes then releases her.
She is a caged panther.
Chapter 8
‘We’ll do what we can to maintain your mother’s comfort.’ The doctor’s raspberry tinted eyelids droop over pale blue irises and his hand trembles in Fee’s grip.
She has dragged a bedside table from the master bedroom and piled it with books and magazines to make the small, spare bedroom more homely, but it is hard to ignore the metal morphine driver attached to Mummy by a plastic tube. The nurse smiles efficiently and indicates the cannula protruding from Joy’s arm. ‘If she feels any pain, she just needs to press this.’
‘I am here,’ Joy protests from the pillows.
‘Yes dear, I’m just putting your daughter’s mind at rest. She’s going home now. You wouldn’t want her to worry, would you?’ The nurse, with the doctor, leaves the room. Fee can hear their lowered voices on the landing then the doctor’s feet creaking away.
Mummy is fading. Each day her face is drawn more tightly, and her voice is weaker, meanwhile her volatile father is downstairs, his demeanour sad, almost kind.
Fee visits as often as she can, fitting in the odd half hour after work.
Today, her mother looks sicker than ever. The skin on her face and arms is papery.
When Fee bends to kiss the fragile cheek, a veiny claw-hand shoots out and grips her by the wrist.
‘When I die,’
Fee frowns, but Joy looks hard at her then loosens her grip and Fee sits down on a chair beside the bed.
‘It’s going to happen, Fifi, and quite rapidly. We can’t ignore it.’ Her face pleads. ‘We can talk about this, can’t we?’ She lifts her eyes to Fee, who nods once. ‘I can’t thank you enough, darling girl, for everything you’ve done for me. I appreciate your visits when I know how busy you must be.’
The hot room is suffocating, and Fee heaves her chest to draw a breath.
‘I loved seeing Kitty in the show and meeting your friends. You need girlfriends in life, Fifi. You and I have always had each other, but now…’ The words are jagged in the soft, bedroom stillness.
‘Mummy.’ Fee’s voice cracks.
Joy closes her eyes and lapses into silence, while Fee sits, frozen. Her mother does not move, and a moment of panic sends Fee to thrust her face close to her mother’s. Soft breath kisses her cheek then Joy’s eyes jerk open revealing pale rivers of blood-vessels crawling across yellowing sclera. Fee drops back onto the chair and takes her mother’s hand.
‘Fifi, I want to ask you a big favour.’ The wispy skull stretches towards Fee, neck sinews tautly strung. ‘When I go.’ She shakes her head to silence Fee’s objections. ‘I hope you understand sweet girl, I can only think of it as freedom.’ Her grip tightens on Fee’s hand. ‘I don’t want to be revived. I’m begging you. Please.’ Her mouth is straight and sure. ‘I have no desire to live any longer my dear. I’ve had enough.’ She collapses onto the pillow her eyes still on her daughter. ‘Darling Fee, you’re the most precious thing in my world. I’ve never asked you for anything before but this…’
Dropping to her knees beside the bed Fee wraps her mother in her arms. Aromas of talcum powder, medication and putrefaction, rise from the covers. They embrace in silence until Fee makes the requested promise. If it is in her power, she will not break it.
***
Paul is home from work. He has picked up Kitty from the child-minder and they are playing their favourite game, Bucking Bronco. This involves a lot of springing on hands and knees by Paul and shrieks and bumps from his mount.
To Fee they may as well be screaming. Their enjoyment brings her almost physical pain. She creeps upstairs and lowers herself onto the bed with her head bowed, longing for someone to remove the overabundance of jobs still to be done. She wants only to curl up somewhere like a dead leaf. Two pairs of feet, and possibly some hands, paddle up the stairs, and two vivacious faces breeze into the room. She rubs her palms over her eyes, holding them there for a few extra seconds, then removes them in time to see Paul’s cheerful expression extinguish.
‘Kitty, go and play for a while,’ he says.
‘But…’
‘I said go.’
Kitty’s bot
tom jaw shoots out, and she turns and wiggles her small behind from the room.
‘How was she?’ He stuffs his hands into his pockets and leans on the door frame.
‘Not good - I don’t think she’s got much longer. There’s a nurse. She knows to ring if anything happens.’ Fee does not meet his eyes. ‘Paul, I haven’t organised any food. Can you manage dinner?’
‘No worries.’ He leans into the landing. ‘Kitty. Come on. We’re going for fish and chips.’
‘Yippee. Is it a special occasion?’
‘No, but Mummy’s tired.’
Kitty maintains an excited prattle as they descend to the hall. Her trills are muffled as she rummages for a coat, then the front door slams and the house is finally quiet.
***
It is night-time and Fee gropes her way out of a dream. She was beating someone with a mallet. Who? Surely it was not Kitty. The shrill of the telephone stabs the stillness and Paul moans beside her, ‘Get that bloody thing before I throw it across the room.’
She leaps into wakefulness and out of bed. ‘Hello.’
‘Mrs Thomas?’ The voice is too kind.
***
Still in in her night clothes, a coat and boots pulled over the top, Fee holds Mummy’s hand and listens to the labouring breath and watches the impassive face, as pale as the pillow.
Clive lurks at the door like The Grim Reaper.
Despite her efforts, and that man hovering nearby, Fee’s memories creep up and pounce.
Her name was Priscilla but they all called her Silly, which she took in good part. She was everything Fee was not: noisy, open and fearless. In class, whether right or wrong she would stick up her arm. When she spoke her mind, she managed to do so with charm. Fee never understood why Silly had chosen her for a friend. She must have discerned something behind Fee’s raised shield.
The summer term was over. Fee and Silly were walking home from school, arm in arm. Heat rippled up from the paving slabs and sparrows chirruped in the suburban hedges. Silly was chattering about plans for the long break. Fee dreaded the holidays, knowing that she would find herself more in the company of Clive.
They approached the corner where usually they headed their separate ways. Sometimes at this point they would rest their bottoms on top of the road sign to talk and giggle, and make themselves late for tea, but today Silly stood, tense and silent.
‘Fee?’
Fee glanced at her.
‘Can I come to your house for a while?’
Fee’s stomach jolted, even though Clive was not usually home at this time of day. She considered Silly’s troubled face.
‘What’s wrong?’
The girl’s shoulders lifted. ‘My mum’s got a boyfriend. He’s OK, Dan, but he’s there all the time. Mum’s different around him. They keep kissing and looking into one another’s eyes as if the rest of us don’t exist. I’m scared Fee. He might move in with us. He’s all sort of friendly, tries to talk to me. I suppose he wants me to trust him, but I don’t.’ Silly released a long breath. ‘I like things the way they are.’
Fee stared. Silly seemed to have such an uncomplicated home life, and her house was an easy to reach bolt-hole for Fee. ‘Of course. Come back. Mummy would love to meet you. I’m sorry I haven’t invited you before, but I love your house, and your mum, and Caroline and Stuart.’
Caroline and Stuart were Silly’s siblings. Squashed into their tiny Victorian terrace the four formed a joyous and noisy unit.
The girls walked on towards Fee’s house and were crunching across the gravel on the drive when a bellow cut through the baking air, bringing Fee to a standstill. She clutched Silly’s arm. ‘Silly. Wait.’ But to Fee’s utter horror, Silly prised off the fingers and scampered up the drive to fling open the heavy wooden gate. Fee hurried to join her and over her friend’s shoulder beheld an unsurprising scene. Her father, his face suffused and angry, knelt by the swimming pool with one knee on the tiles and the other digging into Mummy’s back. Joy’s head and shoulders hung over the water and rivulets streamed from her straggling hair and the end of her nose as it skimmed the blue surface. Pale arms flapped like the wings of an exhausted albatross. As they gazed, Fee’s father rammed Joy’s face into the pool and held it there, while her legs thrashed behind, her toes churning the edge of the lawn.
Silly screamed and Clive’s head shot up. He bounded to his feet making Joy grunt and stumbled towards the two girls. Silly must have panicked. She shoved Fee to the ground and bolted, as Joy tumbled forwards into the swimming pool with a splash.
Clive lumbered up to Fee and gripped her arm, digging in his fingertips until she yelped. He dragged her to her feet and yanked her into the garden, kicking the gate shut. Fee’s slender limb contorted and twisted in his fist and she was forced to her knees and then flat to the ground. Face pressing on the hard ground, and grass entering her ears and eyes, she made her body limp, the best defence, and waited for the first blow, but instead there was a loud thunk. With her eyes squeezed tight Fee tensed in anticipation, but Clive’s grip loosened, and there was a heavy thud on the ground beside her.
‘It’s OK Fifi, you can open your eyes.’ Her mother’s voice had unusual strength, and Fee relaxed her eyelids to be confronted by her father’s ruddy nose, millimetres away from her own. She leapt into a sitting position, massaging her aching shoulder. Above her stood Joy, a sodden gladiator, dripping pool water and brandishing a garden spade.
Sirens wailed from the road, but Fee and Joy remained still. A freeze frame for the approaching officers.
They travelled by car to the police station, but thanks to a statement from Silly, whose mother had dialled 999, were soon back at home.
Clive stayed overnight in the hospital, then came home, chastened but free, as Mummy refused to bring charges against him.
A gurgle comes from the bed, then a gentle exhalation of breath like a sigh of relief.
Clive comes to stand beside her. ‘She’s gone, Fifi.’
‘Don’t ever call me that.’ Fee turns and stalks from the room.
THE LEAVING
Chapter 9
Millie squints into the low sun and hangs onto a felt beret and a canvas bag of picnic food.
Ahead, on the bright and blustery esplanade, Fee pushes pukey Lucas in a buggy, with Kitty holding on to the side. Beside Fee, Josh perches aloft on Twitch’s shoulders, while the other two children, Twitch’s Sam, and Millie’s Olivia, prance about like joyful lambs. The gritty beach is divided into ballroom sized sections by thick groynes. Beyond the beach, a few yards away, the ocean slops against the steep margin of the shore.
‘Here.’ Fee halts in front of a faded, primrose beach hut, raised at the front on legs to compensate for the bank. The three older children rush up the few wooden steps and dance on the veranda.
‘Open the door, Aunty Fee.’
‘Come on Mummy. Hurry.’
Millie dumps the heavy bag on the floor and surveys the pastel hut. ‘Gorgeous. You lucky thing.’
‘It’s been in my mother’s family for years.’ Fee appraises the miniature building. ‘I haven’t been to Tankerton since I was a child.’ She pulls a heavy key from the pocket of her windcheater; a crumpled luggage label is attached to it by a piece of coarse string. ‘Let’s go in.’
Inside, the brine-scent of sea mingles with a powerful fug of mildew. Fee hooks back the double doors to let in light and fresh air. The hut’s fittings are of sun-bleached wood, apart from a diminutive, cream-coloured electric stove, and what could be a refrigerator. On one side is a sort of day-bed-cum-settee, with canvas cushions that were once red but are now a faded cherry. Propped against its side are folding chairs and a bamboo gate-legged table.
‘This is quite a bolt hole.’ Twitch gapes.
Fee drags the table to the veranda and leaves it beside the buggy that holds a sleeping Lucas. Twitch follows, carrying seats.
Millie, still inside, peers at the kitchen area.
‘We should have brought cle
aning stuff, it’s very dusty.’ She opens a cupboard. ‘And spidery.’
With whoops of pleasure the children find ancient buckets and a holey fishing net under the settle.
‘There’s not much sand but there may be rock pools, and we can certainly look for shells.’ Fee grins. ‘Let’s walk into town later.’
Without a thought for the grime, Twitch drops onto a seat outside. Fee dusts the seat of another chair with a tissue and sits beside her. She gazes at the waves, breathing the salt air. ‘It’s good to be here.’ Her eyes move to Twitch. ‘This was a bolt hole. Mummy and I often came here when I was a young.’
‘What were you bolting from?’ Millie emerges into the sunshine.
Fee puts her knuckles on her seated hips in mock accusation. ‘I may tell one day, Millie.’
‘Sorry. I’m being nosey.’
‘You wouldn’t be Millie if you weren’t.’ Fee lobs a smile.
The key to the hut pokes from the lock, with the buff luggage label flapping and smacking in the breeze.
Kitty climbs onto Fee’s lap and rests her head on her mother’s shoulder. ‘It makes me think of Granny.’ The golden hair nuzzles closer.
Fee squeezes the little girl and bends to look into her face. ‘We’ll think of Granny watching over us whenever we come here.’
Kitty’s mind trips to more important matters. ‘Can we have ice-cream?’
Fee waits.
‘Please?’
The women laugh. ‘That’s a brilliant idea,’ says Millie, ‘But let’s do it later. I’ve got drinks and cake here.’ She begins unloading the bag and a greedy riot of seagulls materialises in the air round them, screeching and whining, and landing on the deck with brash determination. Twitch waves her arms and shouts, and the enormous birds rise into the air, and land a few feet away, strutting back and forth, with blackcurrant eyes fixed sidelong on the group.
Fee has brought chalks, and after the food is cleared away, they teach the children to play hopscotch on the esplanade. Everyone plays for a while, then Lucas wakes for milk and the women return to the veranda, leaving the young ones playing some chalk and pebble game of their own devising.
