Born to Be Trouble

by Sheila Jeffries

  ‘Nothing, Tessa, they’re beautiful,’ Dorothy said warmly.

  ‘Art loved my eyes. He said they were like the eyes of an angel.’

  ‘I agree with that.’

  Tessa managed to raise her eyes from staring at the floor to look at Dorothy and it was the first time the two women had eye contact. Dorothy’s eyes were compassionate and sustaining. Tessa touched the skin around her own eyes and it felt hot and sore. ‘I must look a proper wreck,’ she said, ‘after all that crying.’

  ‘You look fine, especially after what you’ve been through.’

  ‘I should go,’ Tessa said, and looked at her watch. ‘Oh no! I can’t believe I’ve been here for two hours!’

  ‘It’s okay – I’ve got plenty of time. You talk as much as you need to, Tessa.’

  ‘No, really, I should go.’

  ‘Okay – but will you come back? Tomorrow? There’s a lot more, isn’t there?’

  Tessa looked at Dorothy in silence. She felt hollowed out like a Halloween pumpkin, and two hours of crying had left a burning ache in her throat and shoulders. She hadn’t eaten since she’d read Art’s letter, sitting under a tree by the River Thames.

  ‘I’d like to ask you two questions, Tessa,’ Dorothy said, ‘if that’s okay. But you don’t have to answer them.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘First – have you got somewhere to go? Somewhere to sleep tonight?’

  Tessa looked at the floor again. She looked at the endearing sultana stuck to Dorothy’s shoe, and imagined her as a slim teenager, like herself. She wondered what kind of journey had brought Dorothy to this quiet, life-saving listening. Life-saving! People are always saving my life, she thought. Why can’t I save my own life?

  ‘I’ve got a lovely home, in Somerset,’ she said, ‘and nice parents. But they want me to CONFORM – and if anything bad happens, they won’t talk about it. They shove it under the carpet. It’s like they don’t want to know the real me. They seem – afraid of me – and I’m afraid. All my life I’ve been terrified of doing or saying something wrong. And the fear comes out as anger. Whichever way I turn, it’s there, like a guard dog – a dog with red eyes.’

  Dorothy nodded, still patient, still listening with her velvet-grey serious eyes fixed on Tessa.

  It was like a door opening. A door that had been slammed shut all those years ago. ‘We don’t TALK about it, dear,’ her mother had insisted, and Tessa had grown up like a time-bomb. ‘I can’t possibly go home,’ she told Dorothy. ‘I have to be strong to go home and maintain the image of the successful daughter. Even now, I can’t – daren’t – talk about it, even to you. But maybe I will, if I can come back and see you again.’

  ‘I hope you will, Tessa. Come tomorrow, if you like.’

  ‘What was your other question?’ Tessa asked, fidgeting. She needed to move now.

  ‘When you thought about killing yourself – was it because you really wanted to take your life, or was it because you didn’t know where to find the kind of help you needed?’

  Tessa was silent. Art had saved her life. Cornish lifeguards had fished her out of the sea. Jonti and Selwyn had saved her. That thought persisted. Why can’t I save my own life? Maybe I just did, she thought.

  ‘I didn’t really, truly want to die,’ she said, ‘but I don’t know which way to turn. I’m so useless. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with my life!’

  Kate knocked on the door of Art’s bus. Her heart had almost stopped when she saw it parked in a layby high up on the Polden Hills. She’d been searching all the morning, driving through the lanes around Glastonbury, and was on her way home, tired and worried sick about Tessa.

  When no one answered the door, she tried the handle. It was locked. Kate walked round it and peered in the windows, looking for Tessa’s little corner where she kept her books and seashells, and she was alarmed to see they were gone. Instead, a pile of grey-looking towels and a grubby white pot of zinc and castor oil cream were there. Kate frowned. She couldn’t see a single item that belonged to Tessa. She looked at the washing line strung between the back of the bus and the hedge. Two pairs of jeans, a threadbare towel that had once been yellow, a frayed black bra in a small size. It would never have fitted over Tessa’s beautiful size 38 bust, and anyway Tessa didn’t like black underwear.

  Kate sat down on the steps, and allowed the chill of knowing to dawn in her mind like a November morning. She waited for an hour, hungry and very thirsty. Both my girls have gone, she thought sadly. She’d been so happy to see Tessa come home. Now she had vanished again in typical Tessa fashion. Kate was afraid Tessa had found out about Rowan. She tried to imagine how she herself would have felt if Freddie had betrayed her, but he never had, and never would.

  In the afternoon light, she saw Art and Rowan coming across the hillside, walking together, talking. Holding hands, Kate observed. As they came closer she noticed Rowan had the baby in a sling against her chest.

  ‘Hi, Kate!’ Art looked surprised to see her standing there.

  ‘Don’t you “Hi, Kate” me, young man. I’m Mrs Barcussy to you.’

  ‘Golden bird woman,’ said Rowan, and grinned in a way Kate interpreted as insolent.

  Kate ignored her. ‘Where’s Tessa?’

  ‘Didn’t she come home?’ Art asked.

  ‘No, she did not.’

  ‘Aw – shit!’ Art said. He looked genuinely concerned.

  ‘Don’t you swear at me, Art. Where is my daughter?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘And don’t care by the sound of it.’

  ‘That’s not true. I’ve been good to Tessa. I tried to build her confidence – she didn’t have much – and I brought her home to what I thought was a safe haven, to people who love her. She’s a great girl. She became emotionally dependent on me, Kate. I had to cut loose. I’m a daddy now, and I want to support Rowan and little Willow.’

  ‘But what did you tell Tessa?’

  ‘Exactly that. I wrote her a beautiful letter, and a poem.’

  ‘It was beautiful,’ agreed Rowan.

  ‘We packed all her stuff and left her rucksack in the hedge for her, with the letter.’

  ‘So – Tessa came back to you, with a nice basket of apples and a pie. She was so happy. She must have been DEVASTATED.’

  Kate thrust her furious face closer to Art’s surprised one. ‘What a dreadful thing to do, Art. So cruel! I thought you were better than that. It’s despicable. The lowest of the low.’

  Art stood there looking bewildered. He put down the basket of blackberries and hazelnuts he’d been carrying, and spread his stained hands in the air in a gesture of innocence.

  ‘Don’t pretend you didn’t know it was wrong,’ Kate said. ‘You’ve led Tessa to believe you loved her, and she trusted you. She ADORED you, Art. How could you do that to her? You’ve ruined her life, after all she’s been through. She’s been missing for three days now – and we didn’t even know about it ’til we saw the bus had gone – and my basket of food was just dumped in the field. The birds had eaten it, and Tessa was nowhere to be seen.’

  Rowan looked at her scornfully. Her eyes narrowed. ‘You should ask yourself why, not blame Art,’ she said. ‘I knew you were trouble the minute I saw you. Judgemental, moralistic do-gooders like you are the reason why we choose to be hippies. We want to live in peace. Art and I both came from affluent homes with pushy parents like you.’

  ‘I don’t care what you think, dear,’ Kate said contemptuously. ‘I’m proud of my home and family. I shan’t waste my time trying to talk to you.’

  ‘Hey – hey, let’s not have a cat fight,’ Art said amiably, and turned back to Kate. ‘I thought you liked me.’

  ‘I did,’ Kate admitted.

  ‘I’m still the same guy. So what happened?’

  ‘You have hurt my daughter – in a disgustingly underhanded way. You may even have killed her,’ Kate said. ‘She—’

  ‘Aw – hang on a minute. That’s a serious accu
sation. I loved and admired Tessa.’

  ‘You used her.’

  ‘That’s not the point.’

  ‘We don’t believe in monogamy,’ said Rowan smugly.

  Kate was trembling with anger. And Art noticed. He tried to touch her but she shook him off. ‘Don’t you dare touch me. You – you – scum. That’s what you are. Scum of the earth. Get out of my way.’ She swept past him and marched back to the car.

  ‘You shouldn’t drive when you’re that mad,’ Art called after her. ‘And if I see Tessa, I’ll tell her you’re looking for her.’

  Kate was terribly upset and shaking. She managed to start the car and drive away, resisting the urge to speed recklessly through the lanes. She had to be calm. Freddie needed her. She must arrive home smiling and positive, no matter what.

  She wished Lucy was there for her to talk to, but she wasn’t. Kate thought of her own mum, Sally, who lived in Gloucestershire. Sally hadn’t got a telephone and couldn’t afford one so Kate’s only contact with her was by letter. Sally hadn’t spent much time with her granddaughters, but she’d been there when Tessa was born, and she’d immediately declared the tiny baby to be exactly like Ethie. It had seemed like a bad omen. The thought haunted Kate as she drove home. My daughter is in the river, she kept thinking, I know it.

  The woman in the frugal navy cardigan reminded Tessa of the teacher she had hated at primary school. But the eyes were different. Thoughtful and medium-bright. The hands were different too – they were small and pale, and there was a wedding ring, as if someone actually loved her.

  ‘You must have an address,’ she said. ‘No one is likely to employ you if you’re of no fixed address.’

  ‘Can’t I give my parents’ address?’

  ‘Not unless it’s in London.’

  ‘But how can I get an address when I haven’t got any money?’

  ‘That’s for you to sort out, not me. I can give you a leaflet on how to apply.’

  Tessa pushed the leaflet back across the table. ‘Thanks, but I have two of these already.’

  ‘Good. Then, there’s nothing else I can do for you.’ The pale hands patted the scattered papers together in an irritatingly pernickety way. She looked over Tessa’s head at the man standing behind her. ‘Next please.’

  Tessa felt his hand tug at the back of the chair she was sitting on. She smelled alcohol and damp dog. She turned angrily. ‘Excuse me. I haven’t finished.’

  His lip curled and the yellowy stubble on his chin bristled.

  The frugal woman held up her hand. ‘Wait please, Mr Parsons. Let her get up from the chair please.’

  Tessa sat mutinously. She straightened her back and gave the woman an assertive stare from her pale blue eyes. ‘I thought you were going to give me some advice about jobs.’

  ‘I will do that when you give me a London address.’

  ‘But I can’t just pluck an address out of thin air.’

  ‘No, but come back and see me when you do have one.’

  ‘I can’t just come back. I walked miles across London to get here. I need to sort it out now. Will you please at least give me a list of jobs? It’s urgent.’

  ‘Everyone’s need is urgent.’

  Tessa felt her temper rising. She wanted to get up and hurl the miserable chair across the room, break its legs and jump on it. She’d trudged through endless noisy streets, the rucksack too heavy and too hot on her back, a disintegrating paper map of London in her hand. She’d had nothing to eat or drink that day and was beginning to feel lightheaded and close to yet another emotional precipice.

  ‘WHAT is the matter with you people?’ she stormed. ‘Why can’t you treat me like a human being?’

  ‘I’m just doing my job, madam – and we don’t tolerate rudeness.’

  ‘You are not doing your job,’ Tessa insisted. ‘You were supposed to give me some advice about jobs.’

  ‘I’ll give you some advice, darlin’,’ said the man. ‘You won’t get nowhere if you come in ’ere looking like an ’ippie, and arguing like an ’ippie. If I were you I’d go ’ome, take that junk outta yer ’air and grow up.’

  Tessa jumped to her feet and slapped his face so hard that his stubble burned her fingers. ‘How dare you criticise me. Look at the state of you. You stink to high heaven.’

  The man laughed at her with a set of mustard-coloured teeth. ‘Go ’ome, Princess.’

  His mocking tone magnified her frustration, and the fear that had burst into her mind from the slap, and the need to conceal it. Tessa stood there, trembling, looking at a room full of shocked, judgemental eyes. Those old demons! ‘I hate you,’ she yelled. ‘I hate the lot of you. I wasn’t born to be tormented by a bunch of morons in a bureaucratic, dysfunctional, malodorous dump like this.’

  She grabbed her rucksack and swung it onto her back with such force that she felt something snap inside her shoulder. She flicked her mane of chestnut hair, its bright beads and ribbons flying, and walked out, through the double doors and down the steps into the heavy air of London. Sod them, she thought, sod the lot of them. I’ll do it by myself.

  The two rhythms began again. The furious heartbeat and the thud-thud of her footsteps embedded in the roar of London traffic. And the new thought pounding in her mind. Sod them, I’ll do it by myself. The thought was wholesome and sustaining, like a Somerset apple, rosy-skinned and ripe, and somewhere deep inside it was a seed, a perfect dark pip that could grow into a tree.

  She walked blindly through endless streets, and came to a halt on a corner where there was a small park. Across the road was a little paper shop. A woman in a beautiful turquoise sari was outside arranging fruit and vegetables in wooden boxes. The pain in Tessa’s shoulder was suddenly sharp and alarming, sending echoes down her back and arm. She felt weak and unaccountably shaky. Dizziness loitered ever closer, like a rain cloud.

  Tessa crossed the road and looked at the prices on the fruit. She picked up a really lush Jaffa orange. She looked at the bunches of bananas. ‘Can I buy just one banana?’ she asked.

  The woman studied her with eyes the colour of black coffee. ‘You are all alone?’ she asked. ‘And you have pain. Bad pain?’

  Tessa was too choked to answer. She nodded.

  ‘This box has cheap bananas – too ripe – I choose a good one for you,’ said the woman, and rummaged in the box. She took out the biggest banana. ‘That is one penny.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Tessa whispered. She followed the woman into the shop, entranced by the jewel-like colours and patterns in the flowing sari. The colours of the Cornish sea – jade, purple, white and gold. ‘Have you got any drinks that aren’t fizzy?’ she asked, looking at the glass bottles of Tizer and Dandelion & Burdock. ‘I wish there were bottles of water.’

  ‘Wait there. I give you a glass of water.’ Moments later she was back with a tall glass of water, and a screw top bottle also full of water. She tucked that inside Tessa’s rucksack.

  ‘Aw thanks. That’s kind of you.’ Tessa drank it down without stopping. She looked around the shop and chose a bread roll and a Crunchie bar. She picked up a local newspaper.

  Again the woman in the turquoise sari seemed to be reading her mind. ‘You have no home?’ she asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Plenty adverts in there,’ said the woman. ‘What is your name?’

  ‘Tessa.’

  ‘I’m Nita.’ She put the fruit, bread and newspaper into a brown paper carrier bag and gave her the change from half a crown. ‘Good luck, Tessa,’ she added warmly.

  Overwhelmed by the kindness from a total stranger, Tessa crossed the road and went into the park. She sat under a majestic plane tree and shared her picnic with a squirrel and a crowd of sparrows. The tree was rustling and full of afternoon sunlight. It felt like a benediction, sheltering her while it gently dropped spectacular orange-gold leaves, each one of them an art form. Seeing them stirred a momentary longing to take out her sketchbook and pastels, and a sudden wave of regret at having dropped out of Art
College.

  She ate everything except the orange. It was too beautiful to eat. Holding it, smelling it, contemplating its journey from the blossom gave her spirits a small oasis of joy. Discovering that something as simple as an orange could shine a mysterious lantern in the desolation of her broken heart. She decided to keep it for a while. She’d write a poem about it. Maybe her creativity was invincible, like her father’s. Freddie had often told her about the stone angel on their bedroom window sill. It was his first ever stone carving. Herbie, the stonemason, had bet him a pound that he couldn’t carve an angel out of a stone gatepost, and he’d done it. At the time he had been broken-hearted, like Tessa was now, thinking he’d lost Kate forever. His story had a happy ending when Kate had come back to him.

  Would Art change his mind? Would he one day come back and declare his undying love for her? Admit he’d made a mistake. Beg her to take him back.

  Tessa took Art’s letter out of the secret pocket in her denim jacket. She’d only read it once and it had made her suicidal. But since talking to Dorothy, it had begun to settle into a kind of grieving. She made herself read his words again. They weren’t unkind. He’d velvet-gloved it. Dumped her, rejected her, but done it poignantly, romantically. But that was Art. A poet. A dreamer. A Romeo. She loved him, and hated him. It was a stark choice between the pain of loving and the destructive power of hating.

  She’d come a long way in three days, from the first terrible night wedged into the iron bridge above the river, to sitting under a plane tree with an orange. To holding a newspaper and hyping herself up to open it, to scan the adverts for accommodation and ‘Job Vacancies’.

  She knew she ought to ring home and tell her parents where she was. Telling them Art had dumped her was beyond her pain threshold. Then explaining why she was in London. Her mother would fly off the handle and beg her to come home. Tessa felt too emotionally fragile to face that kind of confrontation. She wanted to talk to her father, but Freddie seldom answered the phone, and when he did he was tongue-tied and awkward.

  The late afternoon light was a soft, butter-yellow under the plane tree. Only an hour of daylight was left. Tessa opened the newspaper to the JOB VACANCIES pages. She only knew what she didn’t want to do. Cleaning, being a waitress or a shop assistant didn’t appeal. Typing and secretarial work was out of the question. A job in an art gallery? A job as a groom with the Queen’s horses? She dreamed a little, and searched a lot. Nothing! She sighed and turned to the last page. An advert in a box jumped out at her. I couldn’t do THAT, she thought. But her eyes kept going back to it. Why me? But maybe it’s ME they need.