Song of the Skylark

by Erica James

  The girl looked at her hard and just as Clarissa was wondering if she’d gone too far, a smile brightened her face. ‘With any luck, especially if you make a formal complaint, I’ll be asked to leave by the end of the day.’

  Clarissa chuckled. ‘Just as I thought! You’re here under duress, aren’t you? Well, you’re not alone in that, my dear.’

  Chapter Six

  Next morning, and with the dread of a second stint at Woodside to look forward to that afternoon, Lizzie was tempted to stay in bed and pull a sickie. Many a time when she’d been a child she had fooled Mum into thinking she was at death’s door and couldn’t possibly make it to school. Once, to give extra credence to her story, she had persuaded Luke to pretend he’d gone down with the same bug and they’d spent the day wrapped in their duvets on the sofa watching back-to-back episodes of The Simpsons.

  But fooling Mum in this instance was never going to work; it would be too obvious a ploy. And anyway, an element of pride compelled her to prove that she could present herself at Woodside for another five hours of voluntary work, and do it with a smile on her face. If only because she knew everyone doubted she would see it through.

  There had, of course, been no way of stopping Mum once she had the idea in her head that Lizzie should sort of cover for her at Woodside while she was busy at home with Freddie, and while it was the last thing she wanted to do, she felt she owed it to Mum to fall in line. So before she knew it, she had been interviewed by Jennifer Hughes, the matron in charge, and the rigorous checks insisted upon in order to do any kind of work with the young, old or vulnerable had been carried out and she was all signed up and ready to be a befriender.

  Hearing the sound of footsteps pattering across the landing, she turned over to see Freddie peering round her bedroom door. Dressed in his blue and white stripy pyjamas and with sleep-tousled hair and rosy cheeks, he couldn’t have looked cuter. ‘Hello, sweetie,’ she said, ‘have you brought me a wake-up cuddle?’

  He grinned and hopped comically from one foot to the other, then scooted off in answer to Mum calling him. Seconds later there was a knock at the door and this time it was Dad with a mug of tea.

  ‘Have you been up for hours with Freddie?’ she asked, sitting up.

  ‘No, he only woke a short while ago.’

  Her father set the mug down on the bedside table, then went over to the window, side-stepping the bin bags and boxes of her things, and pushed back the curtains. ‘I’m happy to report that it’s another fine day in paradise,’ he said. ‘I think I might cut the grass this morning.’

  Lizzie smiled at her father’s words. Even when it was pouring with rain and blowing a gale, he’d greet the day with, ‘It’s another fine day in paradise!’

  He turned around from the window. ‘What are your plans, then?’

  ‘I’ll do some more job-hunting online this morning, ring round a few people and then brace myself for another afternoon of fun at Woodside.’

  He came and stood at the end of the bed. ‘Did you hate it very much yesterday?’

  ‘Hate would be too strong, but I don’t think I was much use, or that I’ll be asked to stay on. Don’t tell Mum, but I very nearly managed to tip one old dear out of her wheelchair.’

  He smiled. ‘You’ll get the hang of it, and it’s not as if you’ll be doing it forever. A new job will soon come along for you.’

  As ever, she was touched by her father’s eternal optimism and belief in her capabilities. She knew he was doing his best to make her believe that this really was another day in paradise, and that just around the corner was her very own crock of gold at the end of the rainbow, or whatever the saying was.

  ‘I can’t help but think I would be better suited to looking after Freddie than running the risk of harming some poor old person,’ she said.

  Her father shook his head. ‘You don’t want to be stuck at home all the time, not in your situation. Better to be out and about and meeting people. Fresh perspective and all that.’

  ‘You’re beginning to sound like Mum,’ she said with a frown.

  ‘Don’t be too hard on yourself, first days are always tricky.’

  ‘That’s what the old lady said yesterday before I nearly jettisoned her into a flowerbed.’

  Again he smiled. ‘But the good news is that she survived to tell the tale.’

  ‘Well, she was certainly alive when I left her.’

  He laughed, then, presumably imagining that he had imparted sufficient optimism for her to believe her life was about to be restored to its former glory, he left her to drink her tea alone. Listening to him whistling ‘Oh What a Beautiful Mornin’’ as he went downstairs, she thought how wonderful it must be to be her father. A large-hearted man who was incapable of harbouring a grudge or a negative thought, he took everything in his stride, his whole attitude one of easy-going cheerfulness. Which didn’t mean he was insensitive to her situation; he simply believed that everything would come good for her.

  What he didn’t know, and which she didn’t have the heart to tell him, was that she was staring into the bleak abyss of another day that would once more smack her in the face with the reality that there were no jobs to chase, and any phone calls she made would yield absolutely nothing. To put it bluntly, she would get more luck out of a PPI nuisance call.

  Every contact she had tried so far had drawn a blank. Not a single radio station in London was looking for a researcher right now. If they were, they were using interns who they didn’t have to pay.

  Ironically, working for Starlight Radio had been one of those lucky breaks which Dad claimed always came along. Previously she had been doing a variety of jobs that hadn’t really given her the satisfaction she’d been hoping for since graduating. Unlike Luke, who had studied Law and had known before going to university that he wanted to be a lawyer, she had chosen American Studies with History almost at random, seeing the next three years as time in which to decide what she wanted to do when she graduated. But before she knew it, the three years had vanished in a blur and she entered the job market with no clearer idea about the kind of career she wanted to pursue. Following a year off which she spent travelling with her friend, Rachel, she returned home and signed up to an agency in London as a temp, doing mostly admin or reception work. One of those temporary jobs led to a full-time post in the HR department of a Swiss bank, which couldn’t have suited her less, but the money was good. From there she moved to a PR company on a permanent basis, and it was while working on a campaign for an American crime author promoting her latest novel and doing the rounds of the commercial radio stations in London that Lizzie learned of a vacancy for a researcher at Starlight. In need of a change, she applied for the job and started work there four weeks later. With the station aggressively chasing a larger share of the audience market, she found herself researching a wide variety of subjects – one minute she could be interviewing a woman about her experience of living in India as a child and how she rode to school on an elephant with her brother and sister, and the next she could be ringing the manager of a boy band that had aspirations of being the next big thing. She loved the high-energy atmosphere in the studio and being a part of a team that made the three-hour programme possible. Curt used to like saying, ‘Guys, we know it’s all smoke and mirrors, but let’s go make some banging magic!’

  He was great like that, he could really enthuse the team, make everyone want to do their best to produce the best programme they could. Of course it was all about the listening figures and satisfying the owners and ensuring the advertisers were happy. Big kudos to Curt – under his management the listening figures were up by 30 per cent. ‘I bet everybody wanted to be your best friend at school, didn’t they?’ Lizzie once teased him.

  ‘Nah, they all hated me.’

  ‘They were jealous of you?’

  He’d laughed. ‘Jealous was the last thing they were. They were terrified of me.
’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Let’s just say I was a big lad from an early age and could land a blinding punch when provoked.’

  Snuggled up to him in the bar where they’d been having this conversation, she’d said, ‘I shall have to be careful never to provoke you, in that case.’

  ‘Punch a lass?’ he’d said with a shake of his head. ‘That’s for cowards.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it.’

  Remembering that evening so clearly, how safe yet at the same time how alive he’d made her feel, a flash of desperate need to be in Curt’s reassuring presence came over Lizzie, to hear him say the magical words that made her heart leap – I love you.

  Whenever he uttered the words, she felt as though the rest of the world no longer existed; it was just him and her, and whatever problems they faced they would face them together. He was like a hypnotist in that respect, he could look deep into her eyes and sweep away any doubts she had. He was not a man who doubted, he frequently said. When he wanted something, he made it happen.

  She wished he was with her now to encourage her to believe everything was going to be all right; that she’d soon have a job as good as the one she’d been fired from, if not something better.

  The only contact she’d had with Curt since leaving London was by email; his were always sent when he was at work and were far too brief to satisfy her need of him. Lizzie pictured him furtively writing them on his laptop at his desk, at the same time looking over his shoulder, checking that nobody could see what he was doing.

  It had been hard enough hearing so little from him, but now she had to endure total radio silence while he was on holiday in Crete with his wife and daughter, a holiday that had been planned months ago and which he said he’d had no choice but to go through with. The thought of him lazing by a hotel pool drinking cocktails with his wife was driving Lizzie mad with jealousy. Was it wrong of her to hope that being cooped up 24/7 with a wife he no longer loved would give Curt the courage to come clean with her?

  Was it also wrong to want to hear from him so desperately? It was a need so strong that just thinking it had her reaching for her mobile on the bedside table. One little text would be all right, wouldn’t it?

  Her hand wavered. She had promised Curt she wouldn’t, that she would think of the bigger picture and let him sort things out his way, in his own time. He had a child to think of, after all.

  Lizzie had only ever seen one photo of his daughter; it had showed a cute four-year-old girl who had corkscrew blonde curls and a happy, smiling face. Her name was Layla and although it scared Lizzie to imagine winning over this little girl, she knew she would have to do it. In time it was very likely Layla would end up being a playmate for Freddie.

  But before any of that happened, there was the small matter of Curt meeting Lizzie’s family. She hoped that would be soon, because then it would feel as though the worst of the madness was behind them.

  Part of that madness was the effect her relationship with Curt had had on her friendship with Rachel. She and Rachel had been best mates since university, but after Lizzie had told her about Curt – after their affair was discovered – things had changed between them, to the point where it wouldn’t be exaggerating to say Rachel now all but shunned her. To be fair, Lizzie could understand why – adultery was a touchy subject for her friend ever since she had found out that Steve, her husband of two years, had been having an affair. It was one of the reasons why Lizzie had kept quiet about Curt.

  ‘How could you do it?’ Rachel had asked her, furiously. ‘Didn’t you ever stop to think of his poor wife?’

  The honest answer was no, no she hadn’t. ‘The love had gone out of their marriage long before we met,’ she’d said instead.

  ‘Oh, you idiot, that’s what they all say!’

  Knowing there was no point in pursuing the subject, Lizzie had had no choice but to let Rachel believe what she needed to about Curt.

  With Steve having promised that his straying had been no more than an office fling that had got out of hand, he and Rachel were trying hard to make things work, but what Rachel didn’t understand was that what Lizzie and Curt had was so much more than just a fling. This was real between them, real and lasting.

  Rachel wasn’t the only one to stand in judgement of Lizzie. Work colleagues at Starlight, those she’d thought of as friends, had suddenly become abnormally censorious and turned their backs on her. Luke said it was to be expected; they were scared of management tainting them by association and had distanced themselves from her.

  She finished her tea and, hearing Freddie scampering about on the landing trying to evade Mum as she insisted it was time for him to get out of his pyjamas, she pushed back the duvet. Freddie wasn’t the only one who needed to get dressed.

  Chapter Seven

  In her ground-floor room with its pleasant view of the garden through the open French doors, Clarissa was straining her eyes to peer towards the wooded perimeter of Woodside. She was sure that she’d spotted Ellis and Artie there a few minutes ago. If only her legs weren’t so uselessly shaky, she would haul herself out of her armchair and go in search of them.

  This habit of theirs of popping up when she least expected it was so typical of them; they had always done it. Back then she had taken it in her stride, but now, now that she looked far from her best, she wished they would show her the kindness of giving her a little advance notice. She wouldn’t need long, just enough time to put on a nice dress, do something with her hair and maybe add a dab or two of perfume.

  It was ridiculous to be so vain at her age, of course, especially as Ellis would see straight through any attempt to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. She smiled; dear Ellis, such a blunt, outspoken man, but scratch the surface and there, beneath that smooth, toughened exterior was a sensitive soul hiding a guilty secret.

  Secret … the word echoed in her head, nudging at her to remember something. Something important. Now what was it? Secret … Oh yes, that was it, she had to keep her friends’ visits a secret, she mustn’t tell anyone about them.

  But why?

  She struggled to think why, teasing out the threads that had started getting tangled in her mind. How tiresome it was when this happened. Mostly she could be entirely sure of what she was thinking and then, quite suddenly, it was as if somebody had switched television channels without telling her and she would find herself thinking about something altogether different.

  She forced her brain to cooperate, tried to follow the line of thought, but it was no good, it was lost to her. Well, whatever it was she was supposed to keep secret, it was quite safe because she couldn’t remember what it was.

  With her eyes beginning to water with the strain of watching for Ellis and Artie, she closed them and leant back into the chair, welcoming its familiar softness. The chair was an old favourite of hers; she’d brought it with her when she’d moved here. Woodside had a policy of encouraging its residents to bring with them some favourite possessions and furniture from their old homes to help settle them in. Clarissa had deliberately not brought too much with her, if only to make things easier for when she died – she wanted to leave behind her the minimum of mess for others to deal with. She hated the idea of inconveniencing anyone, and favoured disappearing quietly without trace, like footsteps in the sand washed away by the incoming tide.

  A knock at the door roused her. ‘Yes,’ she responded, ‘who is it?’

  ‘It’s me, Lizzie.’

  Clarissa repeated the name in her head. Lizzie. Did she know a Lizzie? Lizzie. Wait a minute, wasn’t that the girl who had started volunteering here yesterday, the one who turned out to be the daughter of that nice woman who came in to play the piano? There, she thought, pleased with herself, she had remembered that perfectly well, hadn’t she?

  ‘May I come in?’ came the voice from the other side of the door.

  ‘Please
do,’ she said. ‘So you’ve returned to finish off what you failed to achieve yesterday, have you?’ Clarissa said when Lizzie stood before her.

  ‘Finish what off?’ asked the girl with a frown.

  ‘To finish me off. What plans do you have for me today, a dunking in the pond, perhaps?’

  The girl’s face flushed almost to the same colour of her pink tabard. ‘I’m sorry I was so cack-handed yesterday,’ she said, ‘I hope I didn’t hurt you.’

  ‘My dear, I wouldn’t have made it to this great age if I couldn’t survive a few knocks and bumps; I’m not made of china, you know. Now then, I presume you’ve been sent to my room with a purpose in mind – what precisely is it?’

  ‘I’m here to do whatever you’d like me to do. Unless,’ she added with a small smile, ‘you’d rather I went and irritated somebody else?’

  Liking the teasing tone of her voice, Clarissa said, ‘Good lord no, I couldn’t possibly inflict you on the others here, I’d never forgive myself if they came to any harm.’

  ‘In that case, your wish is my command. So what’s it to be?’

  ‘It’s such a beautiful day again; let’s venture out to the garden, shall we? But perhaps we should fix some L-plates to the wheelchair. What do you think?’

  ‘I think I’ll try to do a lot better today.’

  To Lizzie’s relief they made it out to the garden without mishap and, after Mrs Dallimore had requested she take her to sit in the rose arbour, she asked if there was anything else she could do for her.

  ‘Why don’t you sit with me for a while?’

  Surprised at the suggestion, Lizzie hesitated. She knew that a key part of her role here at Woodside was to chat and form relationships with the residents, to view them as individuals and not as just another anonymous old person. But what could she chat to this old lady about? What did they have in common?