by Susan Lewis
I close the wardrobe door, turn the key in the lock and wrap my coat tighter around me. He’s still reading in there, putting on all the voices, acting all the words. I hit my toe on something and look down. A potato’s rolled out from under the bed. I kick it back and think about dragging them all out and dumping them in his side of the bed. You can smell the bloody things, all that earth and damp on my carpet. Why couldn’t he have put them under sacks in the shed, the way other people do? No, not Eddie. He’s got to be different and put them under our bloody bed. Always different.
Instead of getting ready for bed I find my slippers and go back downstairs to put on the kettle. The heat from the flames is lovely. I cup my hands round them and lean my face in above to thaw out me nose. Wouldn’t mind a drop of the beef stew I made earlier. I wonder if Eddie would like some too, before going to bed. He can warm it up himself if he does. There’s a bit of an ache under my arm, probably from carrying Gary up the stairs. It’ll be all right though. Nothing to worry about. It’s all over. Dr Tyldesley says I don’t have to go back to the hospital for another six months, and that’s just for a check-up. Nothing to worry about, so I won’t. It don’t matter a tinker’s cuss how I got it in the first place, just as long as it’s gone now. I don’t want to hear about what Tyldesley told Eddie, or what the radium doctor said either. It don’t do any good to dwell on it. We just need to put it behind us now and forget all about it.
‘All right?’ Eddie says, coming in the kitchen.
I don’t answer, just go on waiting for the kettle to boil.
‘Is that for Susan’s hot-water bottle?’
Blimey, I’d forgotten about that. I take the bottle from him.
‘She’s asleep now, but Gary’s woken up. I’ll go and sleep in with him, keep him warm. You can have the bottle.’
I sniff and look the other way.
He’s got as far as the bottom of the stairs when I say, ‘Gary can have the hot-water bottle.’
He comes back in the kitchen. ‘Is this your way of saying sorry?’ he asks.
‘Don’t push it,’ I warn.
He turns round and starts to walk away again.
‘All right, I’m bloody sorry,’ I call after him. Honestly, he can be really bloody petty sometimes.
‘What are you sorry for?’ he says.
‘I don’t bloody know. Whatever you want me to be sorry for, I suppose. And think yourself lucky I’m saying it, because if you ask me, it’s you who should be apologising, not me.’
He doesn’t say anything, so I don’t either. I just go on staring at the wallpaper, liking the pictures of copper pots and pans, and grudgingly admiring how he managed to get the joins just right when he put it up. After a bit I start wondering if he’s still there. I can’t hear anything, so I turn to have a look. He’s still there, watching me, and I can see he’s trying not to laugh. I’m telling you, if he makes me laugh too I’m going to bloody swing for him.
‘Come here and give us a kiss,’ he says, holding out his arms.
‘Don’t be soft,’ I say.
He keeps his arms out.
I still hold back, but then I think, well, what’s the harm?
A couple of minutes later the kettle starts to whistle. He tells me to go on up to bed, he’ll sort out the hot-water bottle for Gary, then he’ll be in to keep me warm instead. I don’t want to do it, but I have to, for him, don’t I?
Chapter Five
Susan
Lots has been happening. People are always in and out of our house, our aunties and uncles, my cousins and everyone, but they’re here a lot more now that Christmas is coming. My aunties sit round the dining table with Mum, smoking and drinking tea. They all have the same sort of hair, quite wavy, though me and Mum are the only ones with our colour, and they all wear big wide skirts, or trousers with loops under the feet, with spotted blouses and thick jumpers. They gossip a lot, about prices in the shops, knitting patterns, people they know, or us children. They laugh a lot, and say saucy things, and the air gets thick with smoke, so you can hardly see, and biscuit crumbs fall onto the tablecloth with stray speckles of ash and the bits of silver paper from fag packets. Sometimes they shout out rude things to the men in the next room and shriek with laughter when they get a reply. I don’t take much notice though, because I’m too busy playing with my cousins, or some of my friends from the street, who’re allowed into my bedroom to get out of the cold. Gary’s friends come in too, so sometimes we all play together, mums and dads, doctors and nurses or shopkeepers, or schools.
My uncles are a rowdy bunch, and don’t seem to listen much when Dad tries to explain about books and political things. They’d rather talk about football or where they work. Because we’re the only ones with a telly, they all came to watch the match between Wales and England a few weeks ago. Dad supported Wales, because he’s Welsh, so they all jeered and called him a Taffy, but Dad didn’t mind. He didn’t mind either when England won, because he likes England, and anyway he’s a good loser and just laughs when my uncles get on at him.
We’ve put up all our Christmas trimmings now and decorated our tree. It’s not a real one because they have spikes which drop off on the carpet, and it’s too much fuss to keep vacuuming them up. Instead, we’ve got a lovely big silver tinselly one with loads of ornaments and crackers all over it, bags of chocolate pennies and a fairy on top. Piles of presents are building up all around it, wrapped in coloured paper with holly and sleighs and reindeer on. Some are for us to open, others are for us to give. I’m learning to play ‘Away in a Manger’ on the piano so that Dad and Gary can sing it to everyone on Christmas Day. Carol singers are knocking on our door every night, so we’re collecting ha’pennies to give them. Best of all though, we’ve been to see Father Christmas twice now. The first was in Jones’s, the big posh shop up Kingswood that sells great big underpants for men that Gary and I always go to have a look at so we can have a good laugh. Dad took us there while Mum went downtown with Gran and Aunty Phil. (Aunty Phil is Mum’s older sister with a sweet shop in Longwell Green, so she’s our favourite aunty.)
Father Christmas in Jones’s gave Gary some fuzzy felts and me a French-knitting set. Then we saw him in Lewis’s down town with Mum and Dad together. That time he gave us a balloon each on a stick, Gary a clockwork train and me a box of paints. After that we went to A.G. Meek where Dad treated Mum to a black handbag, gloves and shoes, then all the way home in the car we sang the advert from the telly:
The matching’s unique,
at A.G. Meek.
Oh yes, we had a cup of tea and a cake in British Home Stores before we left, where Gary’s balloon got squashed between two fat women and popped. He was so angry he called them bloody buggers. Mum made him say sorry three times, and said he had to go straight to bed when we got home, but after, when we were drinking our tea, none of us could stop laughing, especially Gary, until he said it again, and got a smack.
Now it’s only two days, five hours and twenty-three minutes to go to Christmas. We’re lucky to be having a Christmas though, because last week, when Gary and I sent our notes up the chimney, you’ll never guess what happened. The chimney caught fire. Dad had to charge round the phone box to call the fire brigade, while Mum threw a bucket of water in the grate. We ran outside and flames were still leaping out of the chimney. Dad came back, then the fire engine turned up and all the neighbours were standing in their gardens watching. Mum laughed so much when the firemen left that Dad wrestled her into an armlock and told her she was mad. We were all laughing by then, and when Dad went to get some more coal from the shed and the bottom fell out of the bucket, spilling coal all over the kitchen floor, tears were pouring down Mum’s cheeks she was laughing so hard.
They’re a bit strange really, because I never know what they’re going to laugh at, and half the time it’s at things that aren’t even funny. It makes me a bit cross sometimes, because it nearly always seems to work out that when I’ve done something really funny, they suddenly start
shouting at me, or each other, and everything turns all horrible. Then, just when I think I’m in dead trouble over something and I’m getting all scared, they start laughing their heads off. Like the time with the rabbit, which definitely didn’t start out very funny, because it was in a stew that Mum had made for our tea. I really, really didn’t want to eat it, but we’re almost never allowed to leave the table until our plates are wiped clean. It was all right for Gary, he’d eat anything, but I was afraid if I ate this stew I’d be sick.
In the end I said, ‘Please can I go and eat mine in the kitchen?’
Mummy looked at me in one of her funny ways. ‘Go on then,’ she answered, sounding as though she knew I was up to no good.
Once I was out there I wasn’t really sure what to do. I couldn’t open the back door and throw it out, because then it would be all over the garden. I couldn’t put it down the sink either, because Mummy would be bound to hear the water running and come to find out why. Besides, I didn’t have anything to stand on to reach the taps, and even if I did, what would I do if it didn’t all rinse away? Then I spotted my satchel, hanging on the back door. We’d already broken up for the Christmas holidays, so I could put it in there and have a bit of time to work out how to get rid of it.
Quickly I took out the books, hid them in a drawer, and I’d no sooner finished sliding the stew into the satchel than the dining-room door opened and Mummy came out.
‘Have you eaten it all?’ she asked, putting the dirty dishes on the draining board.
‘Yes,’ I answered, showing her the empty plate.
She gave me another of her funny looks, but didn’t say any more, just squirted some Fairy into the bowl to start washing up. I grabbed the tea towel, certain that God would keep my secret if I did something good.
Everything was going well. All the dishes were put away and I was playing inky-pinky-plonky with Dad on the carpet, while Mum did some ironing out in the kitchen. Gary had vanished somewhere, but then, there he was, coming in the door with . . . my satchel over his shoulder.
‘Put that back. Put it back now,’ I shouted.
He ignored me and carried on stomping about the room, chanting, ‘I’m on my way to school, I’m on my way to school.’ It’s his favourite game, because he’s not old enough to go yet, and usually I like chalking on my blackboard and giving him nought out of ten for sums, or telling him to go and stand in the corner or giving him a gold star if he pays me with sweets, or money we get from Grampy, Dad’s dad.
‘I said put it back,’ I raged.
‘He’s all right, let him play,’ Daddy told me.
‘I don’t want him to.’ If Mummy found out what was in there I wouldn’t just get a smack, I probably wouldn’t be allowed out for a whole year, except for school and ballet and piano. She might even report me to the police.
Then the worst happened. ‘Ugh! Yuk!’ Gary cried, pulling a hand out of the satchel.
‘What’s that?’ Daddy said.
‘Nothing,’ I shouted. ‘It’s nothing.’
‘What’s going on?’ Mummy demanded, carrying in a pile of ironing and putting it on the arm of a chair. ‘What’s on earth’s that?’ she said, seeing Gary’s mushy hand. ‘What have you done?’
‘Nothing,’ Gary told her, defensively. ‘I haven’t done nothing.’
‘Anything,’ she corrected, and lifted his hand to smell it.
With a bumping heart I watched her turn to me. I was sliding in behind the curtains, even though I knew they wouldn’t save me. I’d have run if I could, but she was between me and the door. I even thought of throwing myself out the window, but she’d catch me first, so all I could do was stare up at her, knowing I was really for it now.
She started to say something about me being a naughty girl and too crafty for my own good, but then her voice went all strange, and she hid her face with her hand.
I looked at Dad. He had a hand over his mouth too. I didn’t understand what was happening, until I realised they were trying not to laugh.
‘It’s not funny,’ Gary shouted angrily.
I started to laugh too, really loud. Gary rushed at me, and shoved his stewy hand in my face. ‘I said it’s not funny,’ he seethed.
‘Ugh! Get him off! Get him off!’ I wailed.
Mummy whisked him up in her arms. ‘Come on, let’s clean you up,’ she laughed, giving him a big kiss on the cheek. ‘And you, madam,’ she said to me, sounding cross now, ‘can clean out that satchel yourself, because I’m not doing it.’
Dad came up to the bathroom to help me and after we put it in the airing cupboard to dry we did some practice swimming on the tall stool Dad had made. I’m getting quite good at crawl now.
Tonight, which is three nights before Christmas, there’s a special edition of Top of the Pops. The telly’s already on, warming up, and Mum’s putting slices of bread on the end of forks so we can toast them in front of the fire. The big lights are off, with just the tree lights on (Dad had to mend them again earlier because they kept going out – he even swore when they went wrong, which isn’t like him at all. Mum told him off, then I got told off too for laughing). Last week, ‘I Feel Fine’ by the Beatles was number one. We’re hoping it will be this week too, because it’s one of our favourites. I’ve put it on my Christmas list, so I’m hoping I might get it.
‘Oh no,’ we all groan as the picture starts flipping up and up. Dad bangs the top of the telly and the picture settles down again.
‘Here,’ Mummy says, passing me a fork.
I go to sit on the floor between Dad’s legs and the fireplace and hold out my piece of bread towards the fire. He leans down and slips off my glasses.
I can see! Without that stupid patch over my eye I can see without having to stick my chin in my chest.
‘What are you doing?’ Mummy demands.
‘Just this once,’ Dad says. ‘It’s a struggle for her with that patch on all the time.’
‘It’s forcing her bad eye to see right,’ Mummy reminds him. ‘Put them back on again.’
‘No!’ I cry.
‘I said, put them on.’
‘Leave her,’ Dad says. ‘She’s all right.’
Mum looks like she’s going to argue some more, but all she does is give me a bit of a look to show she’s not pleased, then turns back to the telly. ‘You haven’t forgotten Gary’s got his operation in January, have you?’ she says, holding Gary and his toasting fork back from the fire to stop him falling in.
‘Of course not.’
‘What’s an operation?’ Gary asks, turning to look at her.
She gives him a big kiss. ‘Something to make your eye better,’ she tells him.
‘My eye’s all right,’ he says, wiping the kiss off his cheek.
The bread suddenly drops off his fork into the flames. He lunges forward to get it and Mum grabs him back, just in time. ‘You silly thing. We don’t want roast you for dinner tomorrow, thank you.’
‘It was Susan,’ he says. ‘She knocked it off.’
‘I did not!’
‘Yes you did.’
‘I did not.’
‘She did.’
‘Did you?’ Mum’s looking at me.
‘I never touched it. You’re always picking on me.’
‘We’ll have less of that attitude, thank you. I’m just asking if you hit his bread off.’
‘No, I didn’t. Did I Dad?’
‘If she did, it was an accident,’ he answers.
I want to cry now, because I didn’t touch his stupid bread. It fell off all on its own. Everyone always blames me.
When my toast is done Dad butters it and I climb up onto his lap to watch the programme. It’s really good tonight, with lots of songs from through the year that we know, so we sing along with some like, ‘You’re My World’ by Cilla Black, and ‘Have I the Right’ by the Honeycombs. The Beatles turn out to be number one again this week with their song, ‘I Feel Fine’, so we all cheer and Gary and Dad get up to dance. I look at Mum
and hope she’s not still cross with me. She doesn’t seem to be, because instead of sending us to bed so she can watch Wagon Train which is on next, she turns the telly off and puts on the record player. She even puts on my favourite record first, ‘Do Wah Diddy Diddy’ by Manfred Mann, and holds my hands as we dance together. Gran bought me the record for my birthday when I was eight, back in August, so it’s mine. Next Dad puts on ‘Twist and Shout’. Mum’s a really good twister, but tonight she does a bop with Dad. I want to learn to dance like that. Ballet’s rubbish. It’s for poofs.
After that Dad takes us up to bed and reads us Peter Rabbit, sitting out on the landing so we can both hear. Mum puts the ironing away then comes to tuck us in and turn out the lights. I wait for her and Dad to go back downstairs. It’s bitter cold, but not like it was a couple of weeks ago when the washing froze on the line. We’ve put the paraffin heater in the hall now, so it helps to take the chill off the bedrooms, and it gives off a lovely inky smell that makes it all cosy and nice.
I tiptoe out to the landing and get as far as the top of the stairs when Gary’s door opens.
‘What are you doing?’ he whispers.
‘I’m going to listen. You can come if you want to, but you have to be quiet.’
We go slowly, carefully down one stair at a time, standing dead still and not daring to breathe every time a floorboard creaks. They’ve turned the record player on again. It’s ‘Put Your Head on My Shoulder’ by Pat someone, I forget now. We get halfway down and peer over the banister. The kitchen and living-room doors are open and we can see them, dancing. Ugh, and kissing! I clap a hand over Gary’s eyes and shove him back up to bed.
‘I want to come in and sleep with you,’ he says when we get to his door.
‘All right, but you’re not allowed to put your cold feet on me.’
We slide in under the covers and I start telling him one of the stories I made up. If I could stop him following me, I’d go back to look over the banister again to make sure they don’t end up having a row. I don’t think they will though, because they haven’t for ages now, not a real one, which means God has answered my prayers. He’s even stopped Mum working in the sack factory, so she’s here every night when we come home from school, and Dad’s tea is on the table when he gets in from work. I don’t think she’s got another family any more. She’s just got us.
