What Was Lost

by Jean Levy

  ‘I wish I could remember you. But …’ I tried to summon up an image I could describe. ‘It’s like a grey mist and I can’t see through it except in some places there are bright holes that I can look through, that lead back to when I was little. And I can see my grandma’s garden and my classroom at school. But I’m scared the holes will fill in. And then there’ll be nothing left of me. Only what there is now.’ I could feel my hands wringing, Matthew holding them steady.

  ‘Hey, Bob Gray’s hopeful that your memories are still there, that they’ll come back.’

  I pulled my hands away. ‘What if my mind doesn’t want them back?’

  ‘Well, if they don’t come back we’ll make new memories. About the things we haven’t done yet. And, perhaps, if your memories were bad enough for your mind to confiscate them, then it’s better you never remember them.’

  ‘But what if it isn’t over? What if my mind is going to carry on confiscating, so no memories are safe? Not even our new memories that haven’t happened yet. Or my memories from when I was with my grandma.’

  ‘There’s no reason why that should happen.’

  ‘But nobody can know, can they?’ I clutched at his jacket. ‘What happened to me, Matthew? You must know things you’re not telling me.’

  He was silent for a moment. I could sense he was choosing what to tell, editing the truth down to an unrevealing scrap. He gave a resigned sigh. ‘You were unconscious. On the beach. You already know that. They thought you’d fallen overboard and been washed ashore. The coastguard airlifted you to the Devon and Exeter Hospital.’

  ‘Devon and Exeter?’

  ‘Yes. You were found in a place called Beer Cove.’

  I shook my head. ‘I’ve never heard of it.’

  ‘You were unconscious for six weeks. I sat by your bedside. Your eyes were open but you weren’t aware of anything. Then they transferred you to the National and, just after they moved you there, Geraint Williams suggested my presence might be perpetuating … they called it a fugue state. So Dr Gray suggested I stayed away for a few days.’

  ‘And did you?’

  ‘Yes, and the following day you sat up and asked for a drink of water. Bob Gray said it was possibly a coincidence but that I’d better make myself absent for a while. Then they discovered the severity of your amnesia and you were moved to Greystone Park Clinic. The police were keen to find out how you finished up where they found you. Bob Gray allowed them two sessions early on, but I don’t think you were able to tell them anything. Do you remember the police interviewing you?’

  ‘No, I can’t remember anything about those first weeks at Greystone Park.’ Again I could sense that Matthew was deliberating over yet another shred of restricted information. ‘What are you thinking of not telling me now?’

  Another sigh of resignation. ‘Two police officers came to interview you. An old guy called DI Broderick, ex-military, I think, and a female officer. Sarah, that was Della Brown.’

  ‘Della Brown interviewed me at Greystone Park?’ I paused to consider: that awful woman had already met me by the time Geraint Williams introduced her to me. No wonder she’d looked awkward. In her wrong-size white coat. ‘Did Geraint Williams know she’d interviewed me before?’

  ‘Yes. He must have told her you wouldn’t recognise her. He probably advised her that she could take advantage of your dynamic memory loss … that’s what they’ve been calling it. Nick said we could argue it was an abuse of the privileged patient-doctor relationship. And accuse him of professional misconduct.’ He frowned. ‘Although hitting him was far more rewarding. Anyway, the police interviewed you around the middle of February. A month later they brought you here. Just to visit at first. I was warned not to interfere. Williams suggested that seeing me might cause you to relapse. They kept me informed but there didn’t seem to be any improvement. Damn it, they had no more idea what was going on in your head than I did! So, first of all I phoned but you never answered, then I started supermarket-stalking you.’

  ‘Which phone?’

  Matthew frowned. ‘The house phone. Bob Gray gave me your new number but advised me not to call you. So I did. Four times, I think.’

  ‘Only four?’

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  I pulled him into the kitchen and opened the tea towel drawer, retrieved a pile of notelets and spread them into a row on the worktop. Matthew prodded four of them out of line. ‘That’s my mobile. Didn’t you recognise it from my card?’

  I shook my head. Arranged alongside one another like that, it was clear that most of the remaining scraps of paper bore the same number: ‘Do you recognise this number, Matthew?’

  ‘I might!’ He pulled out his mobile and checked his contacts. ‘I thought so: it’s Annabelle. I gave her your new number in a moment of stupidity and asked her not to call.’

  ‘Who’s Annabelle?’

  ‘She’s your best friend. Annabelle Grant.’

  ‘I have a best friend?’

  ‘Yes. She’s a complete liability. Totally incapable of not saying exactly what she’s thinking. Ten times worse than you.’

  ‘I don’t do that!’

  ‘Yes, you do!’ He pinched my waist. ‘There’s no filtering system.’

  ‘Perhaps I’ve forgotten how to filter.’

  ‘You’ve always been like it, although the constant reference to sex shows a much greater lack of propriety than before. At least you used to know when not to talk about that. Which is most of the time. And never mention marks on sheets. Parkin looked as if she was about to die!’

  ‘I didn’t realise she was there. Have I always embarrassed you?’

  ‘Always!’ He tugged on a strand of my hair. ‘Can we please do the shopping?’

  *

  As I got ready to go to the supermarket I tried to come to terms with this latest avalanche of revelations. I remember wondering how my mind was organising this new information. Hoping it was not too close to the forbidden memories. And I wondered about this best friend, how we had been with one another, about our shared memories that now only this unknown person could access.

  ‘Matthew, how long have I known Annabelle?’

  ‘Since university.’

  ‘Will Dr Gray let me meet her?’

  ‘I’ll phone him. This whole isolation thing is falling apart anyway.’

  ‘I won’t know how to speak to her.’

  ‘From what I know of Annabelle, I doubt that will make a difference.’

  ‘Do you know her?’

  ‘I do now.’ He grimaced. ‘And no, I haven’t slept with her.’

  ‘I didn’t ask that!’

  ‘You were about to. Shall I make tea while you check the plugs twenty times?’

  ‘Have I always done that?’

  ‘You’ve got worse.’

  Beer Cove

  It was a grey, blustery day but the sun was just breaking through as Sarah turned in past the dilapidated sign that said TO THE BEACH. She followed the crumbly road downhill until she caught sight of the sea opening out in front of her. None of it was familiar. But then the last time she’d been there, it would have been with Granny Clark twenty-six perhaps twenty-seven years before. Yes, that would have been the last time she’d seen him. Perhaps he had come back and tried to find her. Perhaps someone knew where he was. It was probably one big waste of time but it was worth a try. It’s always worth a try. She pulled into an overgrown layby and glanced down at the slim volume on the seat beside her. The first of a series. Her series. Granny Clark had always said she’d be a writer. And now she was. She had been allowed four advanced copies: one for herself; one for Annabelle; one for her mother, although Diana was unlikely to read a children’s book; and this one other copy that was lying next to her. To give or to post. Just in case anybody knew where he was.

  She re-checked her map. The lane she was looking for ought to have been around there somewhere. She scanned the scrub to her right. Surely that wasn’t it. That skinny little path. She needed to ask s
omeone. She stepped out of the car and looked around and spotted a solitary bucket-and-spade shop about two hundred yards down towards the sea. So she refolded the map, eased it into her rucksack along with her book, secured her car and then hurried to enquire.

  It was out of season and the sign in the window said CLOSED but there were several bunches of buckets hanging outside and, when she prodded the door, it opened. She stepped inside and waited by the counter. After a few minutes an elderly man emerged from the rear of the shop. ‘Excuse me,’ she said. ‘I’m looking for Headland House. I used to visit it when I was small and I was …’

  ‘Now, there’s a name I’ve not heard for a long time. If I’m remembering correct, that’s what they used to call the old house along the cliff path … ’bout a mile. Young man used to live there on his own. Don’t know what happened to him.’

  ‘Do you know if anyone’s living there now? I was thinking of paying a visit …’

  ‘Oh no, dear, you’ll not be getting along that path no more. Part of the old cliff fell away. Almost twenty years back. So the council fenced it off. Put up warnings. It’s all grown over by now. And that old house along there have probably fallen into the sea years ago. It were right on the edge.’

  Sarah felt a little dispirited.

  ‘Oh well, I’ll probably just wander down and look at the sea instead. Thanks for the information.’

  She noticed a flash of disappointment in the old man’s eyes. She ought to buy something. She took a quick look around and her eyes alighted upon a shelf of tacky souvenirs. One in particular caught her attention: a plastic, water-filled dome inside which was a mermaid sitting on a fishing boat and a banner which read: WELCOME TO BEER COVE. Sarah collected snow globes, the tackier the better, and this one was five-star tacky and to add to its allure a small postcard propped against it read GENUINE ANTIQUE. Sarah made her purchase then went back up to her car and, with only slight trepidation, walked straight past it and veered towards the forbidden path.

  For the first four hundred yards or so the track was so dark and overgrown that, more than once, she considered abandoning her quest. Just as she was about to turn back, though, the view opened up. The cliff had fallen away taking the wind-beaten scrub with it on the seaward side. She could see the path ahead, the rusted remains of the old barrier scattered around. She judged that there was still sufficient distance between the path and the cliff edge for it to be safe to continue if she was careful. So she marched on with the sea on one side and an impenetrable mass of tall brambles and gorse on the other.

  Eventually, after perhaps another quarter mile of exposed track, the cliff edge moved further away and the path opened out onto high plateau. And in the distance, beyond the plateau, she could just make out the stark grey silhouette of Headland House.

  She quickened her pace and soon arrived at the old front door. A plank had been nailed across between the doorposts at the exact level that the doorknob should have been. She tried pushing one of the panels but achieved nothing. Then she remembered the big window that used to be to one side of the door. A mass of hawthorn had grown up to conceal it. She stepped round to investigate and discovered that the tangle of roots had undermined part of the wall so badly that the entire window and the bricks beneath it had fallen in, leaving a gaping hole. She managed to negotiate her way past the hawthorn and broken glass and squeeze herself inside. The downstairs rooms were all derelict and empty. One still housed the remains of a kitchen sink. Nowhere could she see the big table that used to be covered in books and shells and fossils.

  Taking her rucksack from her back, she sat down on one of the surviving windowsills. She could see the central staircase looming up towards the top of the house. It looked as if it was about to collapse so she decided against any further exploration. Instead she took out her fourth advanced copy of The Lost Red Mitten and wrote ‘To Daddy from Sarah’ on its title page. Then she closed the slim volume, set it down amongst the rubble and took a last look around before abandoning this long-discarded shell of her childhood and crawling back out into the limp afternoon sun.

  Episode Twenty-two

  ‘You haven’t taken your pills.’

  ‘I don’t want to take them!’

  ‘You have to! They send you straight into deep sleep so you don’t dream.’

  ‘Perhaps I’d be able to remember in my dreams.’

  ‘That might be what they’re worried about.’

  ‘Are you going to stay?’

  ‘Yes, if you want me to.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Good … take your pills.’

  *

  The first things I saw, when I woke that morning, were Matthew’s green eyes. Watching me.

  ‘No dreaming, right?’

  ‘No. What time is it?’

  ‘Five to nine.’

  ‘What!’ I sat up and grabbed the alarm clock. ‘Mrs Dickson will be here at ten. I’ll never be ready!’

  Matthew eased the clock from my hand, leaned across me and placed it back on the bedside table. ‘Sweetheart, if you spend more than half an hour in the shower you’ll dissolve. That gives you at least another half hour to have your cornflakes and clean the fridge.’

  I flopped back onto my pillow. ‘Aren’t you going to work?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve got a nine o’clock meeting with one of my authors.’

  I sat back up. ‘You’ll never make it. You …’ I noticed him grinning at me. ‘Very funny! You think I’m daft, don’t you?’

  ‘I might do. Come on, I’ll make some coffee!’

  *

  I busied myself with the contents of the salad drawer, collected up the notelets with the telephone numbers and put them in the bin. Matthew drank coffee and watched me. I noticed him smiling.

  ‘She’ll be here any minute!’

  ‘I’m drinking my coffee. It’s too hot!’

  ‘It’s not hot!’ I clasped my hands together. ‘She’ll tell them you were here.’

  ‘They know anyway. And I don’t care. And neither should you.’

  ‘Matthew!’

  He put down his coffee. ‘I’m not hurrying. I’ll get indigestion.’ I had no choice other than to re-polish the mixer tap and bang things down on the worktop. Matthew responded by folding his arms. ‘You obviously don’t realise how much I’m used to these infantile tantrums of yours. I’m definitely not hurrying and banging things around is going to get you nowhere.’

  ‘She’ll disapprove!’

  ‘Sweetheart, she won’t!’

  I sagged against the refrigerator. I didn’t want Mrs Dickson to be appalled by my recent moral dereliction and Matthew was making me angry and I didn’t want that to be happening either. I inhaled hysterically, walked over and pulled his arm around me. The doorbell rang. I became rigid.

  He stood up and grabbed my hand. ‘Let’s see who’s there, shall we?’

  I allowed myself to be dragged through to the front door, cringing as he opened it.

  ‘Hello, Annie, lovely day isn’t it?’

  ‘Hello, Matthew, dear. I wondered when I was going to find you here. Hello, Sarah, I’ve brought you a nice sponge cake. No balls this time.’

  I was confused and irritated, even more irritated. I resisted the temptation to stamp my foot, stepped back and invited Annie Dickson inside. I glared at Matthew. ‘You think this is funny, do you? Why didn’t you tell me you knew Mrs Dickson? Mrs Dickson, he didn’t tell me!’

  Annie Dickson patted my arm. ‘Don’t you worry, dear. Our Matthew likes his silly jokes. He asked me to come and clean for you when you came home. So I could keep an eye on you for him. He was worrying himself into a shadow about you.’

  I flounced over and threw myself onto a sofa. Matthew ventured over to sit beside me:

  ‘Don’t be angry, Sarah. Annie does the office. And she doubles as tea and coffee maker. And Agony Aunt. And she makes sure the plants don’t die.’

  I said nothing. I just glared.

  ‘Tuesdays, Wednes
days and Thursday morning,’ explained Annie Dickson. ‘I’ll just go spend a penny. Give you both a chance to have a little argument about Matthew’s sense of humour.’ She disappeared into the bedroom.

  ‘It wasn’t a joke,’ Matthew pleaded. ‘I just thought not telling you might reduce the fussing time. You can beat me if you like.’ He offered me the back of his hand. I pushed it away, jumped up and wafted away into the kitchen. He hurried after me. ‘Sarah, they were arranging for someone to help you around the house. Annie was really happy to do it. They were worried you’d recognise her, but you didn’t.’

  I spun round, tears pricking my eyes. ‘No, Matthew, I didn’t recognise her. Or you. Or Peggy Lewis. Or the black and white cat. Or anybody else. Like I never happened and my life is just years and years of empty space!’