Handle With Care and Other Stories

by Ann MacLaren

  “Gluttony is a sin, Patricia,” she had announced to the whole dining hall. “Think of the starving children in Africa.”

  Trish should have kept her mouth shut. But the opportunity to draw attention to the nun’s faulty logic was too good to miss.

  “Is it not a worse sin to waste the food, Sister? All these leftovers just go to the pigs.”

  “And isn’t that why you’re eating them?” said the nun, smiling around the room to give the other girls permission to appreciate the joke. Which they did. Loudly.

  “Pat the pig!” someone squealed, pointing at the bright pink Trish, and some of the girls at her table stretched out their hands, laughing, to give her a pat on the head. The name had stuck for months, the gesture even longer.

  As soon as she left school she began calling herself “Trish”.

  The Mars Bar roll had whetted her appetite. Trish peeked out from behind the kitchen door to see if the coast was clear, took two large steps towards the front hall, and grabbing her jacket with one hand and the doorknob with the other took a deep breath and shouted towards the living room.

  “I’m just off out to post a letter!”

  She was downstairs and out in the street before the door banged shut. No chance for Josie to catch her. Her sister would know she was lying, know she was making a beeline for the chippy and the welcoming, hot embrace of a pie supper or some such forbidden pleasure. But Josie wouldn’t follow her, wouldn’t want to embarrass herself by remonstrating with her in public, telling her to exercise some self-control, to stop gorging herself on that fried muck, and if she didn’t lose some of the layers of flab hanging around her body she’d never get any man to look at her twice.

  Trish hurried down the road and out of sight of the house, sweat beginning to prickle at every fold of her skin. As she rounded the corner she could see that there was no-one at the bus stop, which was unfortunate, because there was a bus stopped at the lights behind her, and she’d have to sprint if she wanted to catch it. Well, not a sprint actually, more of a fast wobble. She wondered if she should let the bus go, and walk to the chippy, use up some of the calories from the Mars Bar roll. Everybody said you’d be quicker walking to the shops because there were so many sets of traffic lights in the area. But it was quite a distance, and anyway, running for the bus would use up the same amount of calories, wouldn’t it? She hurried forward and got to the bus stop in time, although she slipped, exhausted, as she was getting on and ended up on one knee in front of the driver, who had to come out of his cab to help her up and into a seat. That’ll have given the other passengers their money’s worth, Trish thought. Nothing like seeing somebody else coming to grief to give you a good laugh. Just like that programme on the telly with the video clips of people crashing their bikes into telegraph poles or falling off swings or cracking their heads on tables when they fall while they’re dancing at some wedding. Hilarious.

  It was at least five minutes before she got her breath back properly, and more before the feeling of nausea that she always got after any physical activity left her. The bus was filling up, mostly young people going to the pub or the pictures, and women heading for a night at the Bingo. An old man got on and stopped beside Trish’s seat, looking down at the enormous thighs taking up the space of two people and waiting for her to somehow magically reduce her bulk so that he could squeeze in beside her. She ignored him.

  “It’s no’ healthy that,” he said in a loud murmur as he staggered towards a seat further back. Trish stayed calm.

  “You wouldn’t say that to an anorexic,” she called back to him for the rest of the bus to hear, “and that’s not healthy either.”

  “You tell ‘im hen,” one of the Bingo women backed her up, and another added “Cheeky auld bugger.”

  “At least he only takes up wan seat,” shouted a young boy who was sitting opposite Trish, grinning arrogantly, arm wrapped round a delicate young set of bones covered in skin. But as the target of his remark stood up his smile faded and he clutched his girlfriend protectively, thinking that maybe he should have kept his stupid mouth shut like the woman behind him was suggesting. Trish, who had only stood up because the bus had reached her stop, laughed at his obvious assumption and nodding towards him announced to the bus in general, “Big man, eh?” They were all laughing as she got off the bus, triumphant. Just as well Josie wasn’t there. Josie would have been not just plain old embarrassed. She would have been mortified.

  Trish wondered, as she often did, what life would be like if she was slim and attractive like Josie. Imagine. To be able to walk into a shop and ask for a size ten skirt, or a pair of skin-tight trousers. To be able to get a job in an office where you have to power dress, and have the boss asking for you to be his PA. To be able to go clubbing and have your pick of men wishing they had the nerve to speak to you, to ask you out, to get you into bed as soon as possible. Like Josie. Trish wished she had a boyfriend to get into bed with. She thought about sex quite a lot.

  Right now though, the hot satisfying pleasure she was looking for had a definite calorific slant.

  “Gluttony is a sin, Patricia.”

  That day at school the nun’s voice had crept into her brain and taken up permanent residence. She heard it at every meal, every mouthful. But she couldn’t bear the thought of a life without real food. The kind of food that fills your stomach, that radiates warmth and comfort to the very tips of your fingers and toes. Gravy and mashed potatoes, pie and chips, syrup sponge and custard. Was that gluttony? How could enjoying your food be a sin? She wasn’t taking it out of someone else’s mouth.

  She imagined the menus of a perfect day. Sausages, bacon and eggs for breakfast with a mountain of hot buttered toast. A mid-morning cappuccino with a chocolate croissant. Thick creamy soup followed by a couple of cheese rolls for lunch. Afternoon tea with scones, jam and cream. Stew and dumplings with peas and mash then apple crumble and custard for dinner. Heaven.

  No need to sneak out for a furtive fish supper after that lot, thought Trish.

  Food. She got hungry just thinking about it. As she headed up the road towards the chip shop she wondered what she should treat herself to. She didn’t feel the need for this in-between feed every night. Often she could make do with a couple of bags of crisps or a bar of chocolate. It just depended on how much she had been allowed to eat at dinner time, and that depended on her mother’s mood. One day she would insist they all ate salads to lend Trish moral support, the next she’d cook macaroni cheese and chips, telling Trish that she had only to eat smaller portions. She didn’t know which was worse – a large helping of rabbit food or a tiny portion of something delicious that made her ache for more. The best days were when her mother decided that diets didn’t work and everybody should just eat what they liked because life was short and there was no point in being miserable all the time.

  Her mother wasn’t overweight like Trish, or thin like Josie. She was just normal. About a size sixteen. She wouldn’t mind settling for being the same size as her mother. Ordinary. Not slim, but not fat either. A healthy size sixteen. Maybe that would be easier, thought Trish. More achievable.

  She could visualise herself as a size sixteen, see her own face, complete with double chins, on top of this smaller but still rounded body. Whenever she had tried to imagine herself as a size ten it was always Josie’s face she saw, not her own. So maybe it was impossible to be like Josie, and if she set herself an impossible target she was bound to fail. Surely she could manage size sixteen.

  She stopped, breathless from her physical and mental exertions, opposite the chip shop at the top of the road, and considered the enormity of the challenge.

  Well, she would just cut down a bit. Not her mother’s cutting down that reduced a meal to snack proportions, but just a little less than what she’d been used to. That’s the advice you see in all these slimming books and magazines. A couple of pounds a week, even one pound. Not too
fast, because if you starve yourself you’ll get hungry and give up, and as soon as you start eating normally the weight will pile on again and you’ll be fatter than ever. That’s what they say. Trish knew she ate too much but, she reasoned with herself, if she only had to cut down a little she could still eat quite a lot. She wouldn’t ever need to feel hungry, wouldn’t need to stop eating all her favourite foods. She would take it slowly. Very, very slowly. One day at a time. Or one week at a time. She would give herself a target of one year. And she would aim at a pound a week. Hardly anything at all. But a pound a week, for a year, that’s fifty two pounds. Three stone ten pounds. Say three and a half to allow for any hiccups. That would take her down to at least a size eighteen, not much bigger than her mother. A pound a week would be easy, surely. She might even try to walk a bit more often or buy an exercise video, then maybe she’d lose two pounds some weeks.

  Confidently, resolutely, she crossed the road and pushed open the door of the chip shop, into the smell of deep frying and the crackling of hot fat. As she moved slowly forward in the queue, past the golden array of crispy, battered food, past the mound of succulent chips glistening behind the glass counter, she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply.

  Slowly, she repeated to herself. One day at a time. It would be difficult. So difficult. But she would try to be strong.

  “A pie and a sausage,” she announced as she reached the head of the queue, and added quietly. “And a portion of chips.”

  Tomorrow. She’d start the diet tomorrow.

  Handle With Care

  As she sat at the window watching, waiting for the baby to arrive, Rose felt as if she was in labour, but without the pains. Excited, worried, wondering if it would all turn out okay – all the emotions she’d felt thirty years ago, as an eighteen-year-old about to become a single mother. She’d coped better than anyone had given her credit for, brought Paul up without the help of family and the support of only a few friends. It had been a struggle; but this would be child’s play in comparison. She smiled at the unintended pun.

  She wondered vaguely what Paul would say, but she didn’t really care. They had always been so close, but when he met Anna that had changed. Once they were married he had moved away, physically and emotionally. She had hoped grandchildren would bring them close again, but when Louise was born she had been allowed to hold her for only a few short minutes before Anna’s mother had arrived to gather up the baby, hand out advice and organise the family. It was clear that it was Anna’s mother who would take precedence, would help out, do the babysitting. Would be the proper grandmother. Paul wouldn’t argue; anything for a quiet life. What was it her own grandmother used to say? A son’s a son till he takes a wife... Rose didn’t have any daughters to compensate.

  Then one day, when Louise was three months old, Paul had phoned her.

  “We wondered if you’d like to babysit. On Saturday night, just for a couple of hours. We’ve got tickets for a show and Laura’s mother’s got flu, so we’re stuck. I’ll come and pick you up.”

  He didn’t even have the tact to lie. She was second choice. She swallowed her pride and said yes, because there was nothing she wanted more than to spend time with Louise. And in spite of Anna’s warnings not to lift her, she had picked the baby up from her cot and cuddled her till her arms ached. Rose didn’t regret it, even though her arms ached still. But now it was from absence.

  As the months passed, the more she thought about her granddaughter the more she missed her. She found herself going for a walk in the park on her days off just so that she could see the mothers, fathers or grannies pushing prams. She’d swallow her jealousy, smile at their babies, ask their names, chat for a while. People were always delighted if you stopped to admire their baby; it was all very sociable. She wished she could have Louise in her pram to wheel along so that people would stop and speak to her. They’d marvel at her baby’s beautiful rosy cheeks and shock of black hair, and she would tell them, yes, she looks just like her Daddy did at that age. Oh, she desperately wanted to have a baby in her arms again. She was too old, of course; well past the menopause. But there were other solutions. She decided to speak to Milla.

  Milla was a therapist in the nursing home where Rose worked. She was from Romania. She only worked part-time at the home; another part of her time was spent on what she called her ‘baby business’. Milla was kind and sympathetic. Rose explained about her granddaughter, about how excluded she felt, and lonely. Very lonely.

  “I think you’d be the ideal candidate,” said Milla after she had explained all the ins and outs. “Have a think about it for a couple of weeks. I know it’s a lot of money. I’ve got a DVD you can watch.”

  She’d thought about it and decided yes. She was sure it would be worth it.

  Rose was finding it difficult to sit still. She got up to make a third cup of tea but decided to make a sandwich instead. It was too early for lunch, but she had been up since six and hadn’t eaten breakfast. It would help the time pass. Watching at the window wouldn’t make Ioana arrive any sooner. Ioana. It was a strange name, but she supposed it was the Romanian form of Joanna. She had already decided to change that, but she wanted to wait and see what the baby really looked like. She’d seen photos, of course, but that wasn’t the same. She wanted to be sure.

  She boiled an egg, cooled it a little under water and began to peel it; it would be too soft to slice but she would mash it up in a cup. That was how Paul had liked his eggs when he was little. He’d sit up tall in his high chair, watching as she prepared it for him, a finger of toast ready in each hand to dip into the mixture. Rose pictured him too sitting up in his pram as she proudly pushed it through the park or to the shops. People stopping to talk. It was a good way to make friends; except that she hadn’t made many friends. Or hadn’t wanted to. She had no intention of introducing a third party into their domestic equation – friend or lover – who might replace her in her son’s affections. Paul was hers, only hers; she was all he needed. Till Anna.

  Paul would need her again some day. He would phone when he wanted someone to look after Louise, and she was their last resort. And then she would be able to say honestly and, she hoped, without bitterness:

  “Sorry. I have my own baby to look after.”

  The ringing of the doorbell made her jump. Heart thudding, she took a couple of deep breaths and made herself walk slowly to the door.

  The delivery man stood there grinning with a big box in his hands. On the side was written, Fragile – Handle with Care.

  “Another one Mrs T. You’re very popular. Not so big this time. Want me to put it somewhere for you?”

  He took it into the dining room for her and laid it on the table. They had become almost friends, he’d been there so often lately: the crib, the high chair, the changing table, the car seat – he’d brought them all. She usually offered him tea at this point, but today she wanted him to leave. Quickly. She fished in her purse for a ten pound note.

  “Have a drink on me, Andy. You’ve been such a help.”

  Rose had the box opened before Andy had reached his van. She lifted out the top packaging, and carefully undid the bubble wrap.

  And there she was. Her baby. Her Reborn. Her Louise.

  The Reborn babies that Milla used in the nursing home for the dementia patients, to calm them when they were agitated, looked real enough; but they were mere dolls in comparison to this little darling. She could see the difference immediately.

  She picked her up gently and examined her all over. Absolutely perfect as Milla had promised, and looking exactly like Louise. Rose had taken lots of photos on her mobile phone the day she had looked after her, so she had sent some to Milla. She got the idea from the DVD she’d been given: a woman whose little grandson had been taken off to New Zealand had asked for her Reborn to be made to look just like him. She got other ideas too for the baby: a heartbeat, a breathing mechanism, open nostrils and ear
s, heat pads for body warmth, even a little birthmark on her leg like the one Louise had. It all added up, of course – over two thousand pounds when converted from Romanian leu – but she could see the money had been well spent.

  The egg congealed in its cup while Rose sat for most of the afternoon cuddling the baby in her arms, talking softly to her. Later she would open the envelope with the Adoption Certificate and find the space for change of name. She wouldn’t call her Louise, that wouldn’t be right. She’d be Lulu.

  Eventually she took Lulu into her newly painted nursery and laid her on the changing mat.

  “We’ll get you changed and then we’ll go for a nice long walk in that lovely pram I bought for you,” said Rose.

  She dressed her baby in a pretty all-in-one and added a pink woollen jacket with a hood, then settled her into her pram and tucked a blanket around her. On top she laid a quilt edged with broderie anglaise – it was sunny, but still quite cold outside. Lulu looked so sweet propped up on her pillow, her wee rosy cheeks shining and her black hair escaping from her hat.

  Rose wondered if people in the park would see the family resemblance.

  At the Crossroads

  The house had lain empty for years, but it was still standing, could still be lived in if anyone had a mind to do it up. The roof was intact, but there was very little glass in the windows and the frames were collapsing in on themselves. The smaller cottage up the hill wasn’t much more than a pile of rubble now, its roof caved in and grass growing from every gap and crevice. But his father’s house – his house now – had fought for its life against the wind, the rain and the pigeons, and here it stood at the north corner of three roads that led to the village, the hills and the sea. At the crossroads.