The Love of a Family

by Rebecca Shaw

  Piers, proud to bits of the card he’d done for her, hesitated about giving her it. He couldn’t understand what was happening, didn’t she like getting presents? Anyway he’d give it a try. So he handed it to her saying ‘I’ve made this for you to get you better.’

  Myra thanked him politely and managed a few stilted words to Oliver, too, but her gratitude was clearly lacking in enthusiasm.

  ‘How thoughtful of you two boys to make these for Myra,’ Graham said instead. ‘When yours comes back from the Exhibition, Oliver, we’ll find a place at home and we’ll put it up won’t we Myra?’

  Myra nodded, her face bleak and miserable. ‘I’m sorry, the three of you, I’ve got such a headache, you shouldn’t have come.’

  ‘Shall I fetch the nurse?’ Graham hovered over her, making her feel worse.

  ‘No, thanks. I’ll have a little sleep. Thank you for coming, all of you.’

  ‘Right then, Myra. Ring me tomorrow – let me know when you can come home. OK?’ When he got no reply, he patted her shoulder saying ‘Bye-bye!’ The boys said nothing. What was there for two young boys to say in the face of such disappointment?

  Myra held herself together as best she could, but eventually, as the ward doors swung shut behind Graham, she had to give in and the tears began pouring down her cheeks. At first they fell silently, and then more noisily and before long she was sobbing and thrashing about in her bed so alarmingly, the other patients became concerned.

  One of them in the bed directly opposite her rang for help. The sister, the bossy one who appeared to believe that patients were there to annoy her and not because they needed to be nursed, hustled in. ‘Now, Myra, now, now, dear, are you in pain? Tell me where the pain is.’ Sister propped her up on an extra pillow, felt her pulse, stroked her forehead with her ice-cold hand, and rang the bell for more help when she didn’t appear to be having any effect.

  ‘Have her visitors upset her? Does anyone know?’

  The patient who’d rung the bell shook her head. ‘Didn’t look like it, they were lovely, it was her husband and two boys.’

  A nurse rushed in responding to the demanding bell.

  By now Myra was even more hysterical and out of control, and the other patients were becoming increasingly anxious.

  ‘Cup of tea, nurse please.’

  ‘Yes, Sister. Straight away.’

  ‘Calm down ladies, we’ll soon have her right. Now, Myra, I’m going to have to give you some pills to calm you down if you don’t stop, we can’t go on like this. If you don’t want one then stop this, you’re tearing yourself apart.’ She drew the cubicle curtains round the bed and Myra took in a huge halting breath. ‘That’s better, that’s much better. Now try to lie still and we’ll have a talk. There, there. I’ll straighten your sheets, and we’ll get that clean nightie out of your locker and we’ll put it on, this is soaked with sweat. Better now? Here comes the nurse with a cup of tea for you. Get her face cloth out of her toilet bag, nurse, and we’ll wipe her face and then we’ll put the clean nightie on.’

  ‘Sorry. Sorry. So sorry.’ Myra stuttered as she still tried to catch her breath and speak without a sob catching in her chest.

  ‘No need to apologise, Mrs Butler. But I do need to know what brought this on. Has someone said something to upset you. A nurse? A patient?’

  Myra shook her head. ‘No. No. He gave me a picture he’d made at school.’

  ‘Who did? One of the boys that was just here? That sounds wonderful. Look it’s right here. Can I have a look?’

  Myra nodded.

  ‘Why it’s beautiful, very artistic, he’s a very clever boy isn’t he?’

  Myra nodded. ‘I couldn’t say thank you. I can’t, not to him.’

  ‘You’ve just said the words. “Thank you”, you said, right this minute.’

  ‘I didn’t want him, you see, and I still don’t. Neither him nor his brother.’

  The sister passed her the cup of tea. ‘Drink this, now you’re all tidy. I’ll sit on the chair here and wait for you to explain.’ Sister found Piers’ card on the floor and admired it. What more could a woman ask for but two sons so thoughtful? She watched Myra gulping down her tea and felt nothing but pity for her. There were thousands of women who would love to have two such caring boys.

  ‘Sister?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘They’ve no business bringing me presents. I don’t deserve such kindness. I know it’s mad but I rather hoped they’d go away, that they’d have somehow gone when I get back home after this.’ She pointed to the dressing on her forehead. ‘I don’t know where, but I wish they would just go. I want my old life back.’

  ‘But you’ve brought them up so far, what’s gone wrong?’

  ‘They’re not mine, not ours,’ Myra whispered. ‘They’re my brother-in-law’s children. He died recently and their mother died nearly ten years ago, so they’ve had to come to us. It’s all too much.’

  ‘I think it’s the fall you’ve had, you’re not feeling A1 at Lloyds, that’s the trouble, it’s all been such a shock. We’ll keep you in another day, don’t go home tomorrow, stay with us, give you time to think, eh? How about that? We’ll talk again tomorrow, shall we?’

  Myra nodded her agreement, still half in shock at her own outburst.

  ‘Now, supper’s coming soon. What did you order?’

  ‘The salad.’

  ‘It’s fresh salmon salad, you’ll enjoy that. See you later.’ The ward sister turned smartly on her heel, leaving Myra alone behind the cubicle’s flimsy paper curtains.

  Myra slithered down under the sheets and felt ashamed. No, embarrassed more than ashamed. She couldn’t understand why she’d screamed and cried like that. It was like the outburst of a teenage girl. But making such an exhibition of herself! How could she? She who’d been so self-contained for so long. What had happened to that woman who’d married Graham? She’d been reasonable then, able to chat to people, a bit shy, but able to overcome it. But being back in a hospital meant she couldn’t hide from the truth. It had been having a miscarriage and then the stillborn boy . . . well that had almost killed her. Outside she still functioned, inside she had died.

  Clear as crystal in her mind was that moment when Graham had gone to the office for the first time since they’d lost the second baby. She’d stood in the hall at home, her arms shaped as though rocking a newborn baby, and the searing pain had been unbearable, the emptiness so appalling. Who was that howling with the agony of it all? It must be her, it must be her because there was no one else in the house. Oh God! Where was this baby she should have been holding? Why wasn’t he in her arms right now? When her tears had finally dried that day she’d sworn she’d have to keep a tighter hold on her emotions if she was going to hold it together.

  Six months after their second loss Graham had timidly brought up the subject of adoption but she wouldn’t even discuss it. Hadn’t he realised that she couldn’t take a chance again, hope that something might work out? It was too much to expect of her.

  She’d only survived all that because Graham had been so understanding, so kind, so patient. And what had she done in the face of his love? When he too had been distraught by their loss, she’d rejected him, left him comfortless, abandoned him. Myra cringed at her thoughtlessness, her lack of compassion.

  All that dreadful time, John and Mo were so lucky by comparison. It had been hard enough when Oliver was born, but when Piers arrived Myra fell apart completely. What had she done for life to treat her like this? Why should Mo have such joy while she was rotting away? Nothing in the world touched her heart any more after that. Whatever tragedy she heard about in the world, she shrugged her shoulders and said to herself, ‘So . . .?’

  Myra caught sight of Piers’ card standing on her locker. How kind he was. Then she looked at Oliver’s collage, really looked at it for the first time and saw all the detail. She loved the mermaid, the realistic way the sails appeared to billow out in the wind. Sister was right, he was a clever boy
. She wasn’t even one thumbnail’s worth as creative as Oliver. One look at those stupid, boring tea cosies would have told you that. But, for once, she didn’t feel jealous of someone else’s good fortune.

  The salad arrived. Every mouthful choked her. One half wanted desperately to eat it but the other half, the half that dealt with her emotions, the half she’d crushed all this time, rebelled. She left it barely started and never touched the pudding. Her head pounded, she ached inside, her legs felt numb, she didn’t know if she was hot or cold, happy or sad, alive or dead. She felt both trapped in her body, lying there on the hospital bed, and also very far away from it all. She stared ahead of her letting the noises of the ward wash over her, barely registering the passing hours, and the nurses who came and went, checking various readings. The upshot of it all was the sister asked the consultant to take a look at Mrs Butler before he left for the day.

  He was the handsomest of men, Myra thought when he approached her bedside; elegant, white-haired, beautifully mannered, with a peace and a contentment about him that made her feel he’d met with every possible sort of human condition and nothing could faze him. He was the kind of man who made you feel, no matter what kind of a mess you found yourself in, that right then, you were the most important person in all the world.

  He didn’t let go of her hand after he shook it, but held it clasped to his chest as though he didn’t want to let go. ‘Mrs Butler, may I call you Myra?’ He spoke so considerately it seemed he had all the time in the world to spare for her.

  ‘Of course.’ At that moment, if he’d asked her to fly with him to the moon she would have done.

  ‘Now what is the problem? Sister tells me she is worried about you and if Sister Goodchild is worried then so am I.’ He let go of her hand and pulled up a chair. ‘Now tell me, I want to know what exactly is troubling you?’ The emphasis he put on the word ‘exactly’ persuaded Myra that perhaps she could tell him, really truly tell him because she knew he would understand without laying blame on her.

  Myra explained about the fall and then somehow or other began talking about the situation she found herself in. ‘So you see I’m landed with these two boys I don’t want, and I I just want them to go away. I want to get back to my own life like it should be.’

  ‘Describe to me what your own life consists of.’

  ‘I look after my husband, I look after the house, I’ve plenty of time for myself . . .’

  ‘And what do you do with that time?’

  Frankly Myra couldn’t think of a damn thing she did with her time. What did she do? Watch TV? Listen to the radio. Make the tea cosies . . . no not now. So she didn’t answer.

  ‘You’ve no children of your own? Do you mind me asking me why not? Don’t feel you have to answer if you’d rather not.’

  She couldn’t believe it of herself, she who’d kept the whole story from everyone she ever met, bottled up all these years, and now out it all poured to this lovely sympathetic man she’d never met before.

  ‘I see. So after the stillbirth you never tried again?’

  Myra shook her head. ‘And now I’ve had a hysterectomy, so it’s all too late. Too late anyway at forty-five.’

  ‘Have you ever thought that sometimes life takes a turn for which we are totally unprepared? We rebel, we say this isn’t for me, but if we stand still and listen to our inner selves we realise that in fact it’s the best thing in the world? The best for us. That life has worked out just as it should be? That what has happened is our just reward for all our pain and struggles?’

  Myra listened, but didn’t answer him.

  ‘You see, believe it or believe it not you have your answer in your own home. What you would have had if things had gone right was two children of your own. Now you have just that, in a funny roundabout kind of way. How old are the boys?’

  ‘Oliver’s just twelve and Piers is nearly ten.’ She turned to show him Oliver’s picture. He studied it saying, ‘My word but he’s very talented. What a privilege to have the bringing-up of a boy with this kind of life in him. Look what wicked eyes that octopus has, and the mermaid you can see is a lively lass. And the card?’

  ‘That’s from Piers, he did it at school today for me.’

  ‘Myra! Myra! Stand still and listen. Someone somewhere is telling you something. I’ll be back tomorrow before you leave.’

  In fact she didn’t see the consultant the next day, he had an emergency operation she was told and couldn’t spare the time. But he hadn’t forgotten her and there was a note left with Sister Goodchild ready for when she was discharged. Just one line. ‘Remember what we talked about, Myra.’

  She remembered what he’d said but decided she would not be taking his advice. Him in his smart suit, with all his money, who did he think he was telling her to look inside herself. She did and what did she see? A failure. A total failure. She couldn’t even make a career for herself. She’d failed at having children. Her marriage had failed in all but outward appearance. What was there left? Absolutely nothing.

  When Graham and the boys came to collect her Sister Goodchild admired the boys as though they were Myra’s own, and winked at her behind their backs. She could. After all she didn’t have them to look after.

  Arriving home, she found Graham had made a lovely casserole and laid the table in the dining room before they came to collect her just to make it feel special, and Viv had baked a pudding for her homecoming. But all she really saw was a small square patch on the wall. Graham must have taken down that framed picture of Paris they’d bought on their honeymoon (he’d not liked it for years, she knew). As soon as they’d walked through the door, and the boys had vanished to their bedroom, he’d sat her on the sofa, reached into her hospital bag and hung Oliver’s collage proudly on the wall. Piers’ card he stood nearby on the mantlepiece. She tried to look away but the picture on the wall . . . somehow it almost kept making her look at it, demanding she look at it. That mermaid was a lively lass just as the consultant suggested and as for the octopus, well he did have wicked eyes, he was right about that too. Then she saw Piers’ get-well card and she felt her eyes begin to brim with tears. One thing was for certain, she wasn’t going to cry over a get-well card, most certainly not. That was until she read with love in its scrolled border, and that did it. It was ridiculous to be watching the TV news with tears rolling down her cheeks. The more she tried to stop the more the tears ran down.

  Graham turned to ask her if she’d like a cup of hot chocolate. ‘Myra, what is it? Is your head bad again?’

  He went to sit beside her on the sofa and took her hand. ‘Can I get you one of those tablets the Sister gave you? Is the pain bad?’

  Myra answered softly, ‘It’s Piers’ card, “with love”, he’s put. What love have I given him since he came here? None.’ The tears kept coming.

  Graham got a clean hanky out and dabbed her cheeks, but to no avail. ‘This’ll have to stop, otherwise we’ll have to put the washing machine on just to keep me in handkerchiefs. You have tried, you know.’

  ‘Tried what?’

  ‘Not to love him exactly but you have made an effort. All those meals, the school run and they’ve had clean clothes whenever. It all takes time.’

  ‘I wish I was a natural mother like Viv. She seems to know instinctively what to do and when to do it. I don’t.’

  ‘Myra! She’s been a mother for over thirty years, you’ve been a mother for not even thirty days. Like I said it all takes time.’

  ‘I quite like the rabbit, Pete’s a sweet little thing. I’ve stroked him, you know.’ Saying that, she realised that Graham was still holding her hand and she hadn’t snatched it away like usual.

  ‘Viv’s been very good while you’ve been in hospital, she’s taken Piers to school and met him and brought him home, and both boys went there to tea each day so I could either finish up at work or come and see you. She’s a very nice person, Myra, I’m so glad you’ve got someone like her to rely on as a friend.’

  ‘V
iv?’

  ‘Yes. Viv. And you know the woman next door on the other side? She came round and brought you those flowers there in the vase. Her name’s Betty, and her husband’s Roland.’

  ‘It’s taken them fifteen years to speak to us.’

  ‘And us fifteen years too, don’t forget.’

  Myra studied the flowers and decided they were in good taste for someone who hadn’t spoken to them ever before. They weren’t a bunch snatched up in the supermarket, they were from a proper flower shop. If she felt like it tomorrow she might dig out one of her tasteful notelets and write her a thank you. On the other hand she could always call round and say thank you in person, get a chance to meet this Betty properly. But of course she might not be well enough, she quickly reminded herself.

  Rather to her surprise Myra found herself feeling much better the next day, the pain relief tablets were obviously doing her good.

  She determined that when Viv came across to take Piers to school, she’d go with her. Graham didn’t want her to, but because he said no she decided she definitely would.

  She wore sunglasses to help disguise the bruising and the swelling but nothing could disguise the cut and the stitches. She thought of covering it with a dressing but Sister had said it would be better left to get the air.

  ‘I’m coming with you Viv.’

  ‘Are you sure? I go right up to school, he seems to like that. Will you manage all that way?’

  ‘Of course. I go right up to school, too, when I take him.’

  ‘You know that New to You Sale they keep talking about, it’s tomorrow night.’

  ‘Oh, right. Are you going?’

  ‘The clothes’ll all be too young for me. All right for you, though.’

  ‘I couldn’t wear their stuff, they’re all young women.’

  ‘You’re hardly an old lady, Myra – wait till you get to my age and you’ll think you were still a spring chicken in your forties!’