by Jo Verity
Within thirty seconds of trying, she’d found Paul Crosby and discovered where he’d been for the past forty-two years. A second tap and she was looking at a map showing the location of the practice. She pulled the coat around her and leaned back, staring at the red marker. Technology made everything dangerously easy. How could a blob induce such… such… agitation? Heart-stopping information like this should be harder-earned.
She made a mug of tea and took a packet of digestive biscuits from the tin, dunking one after another, taking comfort from their soggy sweetness. Did her parents know he was back? They read the local paper. They gossipped with neighbours. It was perfectly possible. They’d looked so harmless last night, telling her to ‘sleep well’, perhaps knowing that the young man they’d ruthlessly eliminated from her life had returned and was working a mile or two away. Fuck their toxic vulnerability. She would wake them and demand an answer.
But as she stood at their bedroom door, she felt her rage giving way to frustrated acceptance. Even without their interference, it was unlikely she and Paul would have made it through those student days. She’d been over it often enough to convince herself of that. Was there any point in revisiting a mistake made all those years ago?
The sun had not yet risen. Frost rimed the lawn lending it a ghostly luminosity. Her breath fogged the air. The car windows needed de-icing and it took half a dozen attempts before the engine stuttered into life. The only living thing she encountered on her short drive was a black-and-white cat, a wraith streaking across the road, yellow eyes catching her headlights before it vanished over a garden wall.
Monkton Square. A shabby public garden enclosed within a dog-proof fence and surrounded by three-storey buildings. The houses had started life as homes for affluent Victorian families but now, judging by the nameplates, they were occupied by solicitors, dentists and architects. She drove slowly around the square until she came to number eighteen. Stopping, she leaned across the passenger seat and peered at the sign. ‘Monkton Square Surgery’. It was light enough to see his name on the list of practitioners, ‘Dr Paul Crosby’, followed by a string of letters. She got out of the car. The thermometer on the dash was showing minus three and she could well believe it. She pulled up her coat collar, buried her nose in her scarf and studied ‘Surgery Hours for the holiday period’ on the noticeboard. The practice wouldn’t open again until next Monday. Three whole days.
Of course Angela might have got it wrong. Maybe Paul wasn’t divorced. Or maybe he was but he had a new partner. He could have been married several times. Doctors – real and fictional – held limitless potential for romance. Doctor Zhivago. What’s-his-name in Brief Encounter. The whole cast of ER. If Paul had retained even a modicum of his good looks, he would have women throwing themselves at him.
She had dressed in a hurry, foolishly choosing the thin-soled pumps she’d worn to the party and her feet were numb. With her phone, she took a picture of the practice details and returned to the car where, abandoning her duty to the environment, she sat with the engine running and heater at full blast.
What should she do? What could she do at eight o’clock on New Year’s Day morning?
Slipping the car into gear, she drove on around the square but, when she reached the turn that would take her home, she kept going and, for the second time, stopped outside number eighteen. Opening the glove compartment, she took out the spiral-bound pad she kept for making shopping lists and jotting down interesting bits she heard on the radio. Whilst she was here, she might as well leave a note. What harm could it do?
After several false starts, she was reasonably happy with what she’d written.
Dear Paul
I only heard last night that you’ve moved back. I shan’t attempt to précis the past forty years. Suffice it to say, I was widowed last year. My parents live in the same house and I visit them often.
I hope life has treated/is treating you well.
Best wishes,
Miriam
She added a single kiss, her mobile phone number and, after some deliberation, her address.She couldn’t simply push it through the letterbox for anyone to read – although it was perfectly innocuous. She rooted through her bag and found a tatty but unused envelope. Putting her note inside, she sealed it and addressed it in bold letters. ‘Dr Paul Crosby – PERSONAL’. Before she could change her mind, she shoved it through the outsized letterbox.
She was getting back in the car, when a figure appeared from nowhere, muffled from head to toe against the cold, shuffling along the pavement towards her. As the figure drew nearer, Miriam saw that she – from the UGG-type boots, she guessed it was a woman – had a white rabbit tucked beneath her arm.
‘Hello,’ she said as the woman drew parallel with her. ‘What a gorgeous rabbit.’
Ignoring her, the woman shuffled on.
Only eight hours old, this new year was already proving interesting.
By the time her parents came downstairs, Miriam had showered, dressed (properly this time) and was stirring a pan of porridge.
‘You enjoyed the party?’ her mother said.
She gave a noncommittal smile. ‘Your friends are very chatty. I got all the local gossip.’
Was she mistaken or did a frisson of unease pass between her parents?
‘I could have sworn your car was parked facing the other way,’ her father said.
‘I’ll make the toast,’ her mother said. ‘After breakfast there’s something you can give me a hand with.’
Her mother had taken it into her head that a glass-fronted cabinet in which she kept her best china needed moving from one side of the fireplace to the other.
‘I need to give everything a good rinse,’ her mother said as they emptied the contents onto the coffee table.
Miriam was tempted to remark that it couldn’t possibly be dirty but washing cups and saucers seemed as good as any way of passing the few hours before she could leave for home. ‘Why not?’ she said.
Her mother muttered something which she only half caught.
‘The better the… what?’ she said.
‘The better the day, the better the deed. My grandmother used to say that.’ Her mother’s face took on a faraway look. ‘She had the loveliest voice. And the tiniest feet.’
As Miriam stood at the kitchen sink, swishing fragile, never-used porcelain in sudsy water, she took the opportunity to ask, ‘Did I see Dad with a pill dispenser?’
Her mother was drying a tea plate, turning it round and around, seemingly hell-bent on erasing the gold paint from its rim.
‘Mum? Is Dad okay?’
Her mother looked bewildered, and it struck Miriam that her father might be shielding his wife, protecting her from bad news, and she let the matter drop.
Callum phoned from Scotland where he and his family were visiting friends. He wished her a ‘Good New Year’. It was nice to hear from him, sweet of him to think of her, but his voice wasn’t the one she wanted to hear. She pictured her shabby envelope, thrown out with a pile of junk mail or scuffed under the doormat by a patient scurrying in from the cold. Anything was preferable to his ignoring her note.
Rosa and Max weren’t due back at school until Thursday. Naomi had arranged a couple of ‘play dates’. Playdates. Sleepovers. The inexorable creep of Americanisms. And, rather too cheerfully, her daughter had returned to work. Miriam didn’t object. To be truthful it was good to have something to take her mind off her silent phone. The children were hooked on the Monopoly set David’s parents had given them for Christmas and were happy to play for hours on end as long as she played too.
On Wednesday morning, she woke around six-thirty. The duvet had slipped to one side and her shoulders were cold. It was dark yet an unusual brightness penetrated the narrow gap between the curtains. The customary morning noises – a car reversing off a driveway; the hum and rattle of the milk float; a dog barking in a neighbour’s garden – were absent. The world was silent.
Pulling on her dressing gown, she
went to the window and drew back the curtain. Snow. Heaps of it. Meringue toppings on cars and wheelie bins and garden walls. Hedges and shrubs bowing and sagging under their white burden. Unblemished pavements crying out to be trampled. Indigo shadows, almost as dark as the sky, spilling across the garden. And the snow was still coming down, small flakes swirling in front of the streetlights. It was impossible not to marvel at it.
The children were delirious, bolting breakfast and pestering Naomi to dig out the toboggan before she left for work.
‘You’ll take us to the park, won’t you Gamma?’ Rosa said.
‘I’m going to make the best snowman in the world,’ Max said. ‘Have you got a carrot, Mum? And some coal?’
The low, grey clouds hung heavy and the local radio station was warning of more to come, reeling off lists of impassable roads and cancelled buses, advising against ‘non-essential travel’.
‘How will you get to work?’ Miriam said. ‘The car’s half-buried.’
‘If push comes to shove, I can walk.’
‘It’ll be hard going.’
The children were impatient to be outside. Miriam, too, felt the compulsion and soon the three of them were togged up. First they went into the back garden kicking up the snow, churning around in it, laughing and shrieking, despoiling its perfection.
Naomi came out to say her boss had phoned telling her not to come in and to check again tomorrow.
The children started on their snowman but the snow was powdery and each time they rolled a snowball, it disintegrated before it had reached a decent size.
‘It’s not working,’ Rosa wailed aiming a hefty kick at yet another failure.
‘How about using a shovel?’ Miriam said.
But Max would have none of that. ‘Dad always starts with a snowball,’ he said. His cheeks were scarlet, roughened by the wind. Trails of clear snot ran from his nostrils. ‘I wish he was here,’ he whispered.
Most of the time, the children coped well. But if things went awry, or when the present didn’t live up to the remembered past, it became too much. Max was six years old. Poor little boy. He couldn’t be expected to understand what she, after a lifetime of ups and downs, could not.
‘Why don’t we give it a try?’ she said.
The children trailed after her to the garden shed, watching doubtingly as she rummaged around. Once she’d found the plastic spades they used at the beach, she returned to a corner of the lawn where the snow lay undisturbed and began shovelling snow into a conical mound, slapping each new layer with the flat of the spade trying to get it to stick.
The children watched from a distance, firing off negative comments. ‘That’s a sandcastle, Gamma, not a snowman.’ ‘Where’s his head?’ ‘It’s too small.’ She carried on, hoping that, by magic, the unimposing heap of snow might be transformed into something acceptable. It was starting to snow again. Staring at the tiny flakes whirling across the garden induced mesmerising dizziness.
‘My feet hurt,’ Rosa moaned.
Stray wisps of hair not covered by her hat were dripping icy droplets onto Miriam’s neck. ‘What we need is a hot chocolate,’ she said and they trouped back into the house.
They were peeling off layers of soggy clothing when her father phoned. ‘What’s it like there? We’ve had a smattering but I’ve been watching the news and looks a lot worse where you are.’
Miriam hadn’t given her parents a thought. ‘We’ve had a good few inches. And it’s still snowing. Naomi’s been told to stay home and the kids aren’t due back at school until tomorrow.’
‘Your mother wants me to ask if you’ve got plenty of food in,’ he said.
‘We’re absolutely fine, Dad. How about you?’
‘Every time there’s “two-for-one”, your mother stashes one away. We won’t starve.’
She visualised her parents’ larder, tins and packets relentlessly passing their use-by dates, shelves stacked with more food than they would live to eat.
‘So how’s our granddaughter?’ he said, ‘and our great-grandchildren?’
‘Everyone’s fine,’ she said, catching Naomi’s eye and pointing at the phone.
Naomi grimaced and shook her head.
‘When are they coming to see us?’ he said.
‘Soon,’ she said. ‘They get booked up at weekends what with activities and birthday parties, but I’ll pop up again as soon as the weather improves. Promise.’
Warm, dry and full of hot chocolate, the children were soon angling to be outside again, fretting that the weather might change and the snow melt. She was doing her best to convince them that a game of Monopoly would be just the thing, when the doorbell rang. It was David towing an obviously new and very swanky toboggan.
‘I’ve given myself the day off,’ he said. ‘I thought the kids might like a trip to the park.’
Naomi didn’t seem surprised to see him and Miriam guessed he’d okayed it with her before coming.
‘Don’t stand there with the door open,’ she said. ‘You’re letting the warm out.’
David stepped into the hall and slipped off his boots. ‘Why don’t you come with us?’ he said to Naomi. ‘It’ll be fun.’
‘Yes. Please come, Mum,’ Rosa said.
Max screwed up his face, stressing the earnestness of his entreaty. ‘Pleeeease.’
‘I suppose I could,’ she said. ‘Okay. Why not?’
Miriam dug out dry gloves and socks for the children and helped them back into their outdoor gear, glad that Naomi and David seemed to be finding ways of getting to know each other again. Having waved the four of them off, she took a cup of tea and yesterday’s half-finished crossword up to her bedroom. Every now and again, when a clue was getting the better of her, she glanced out at the back garden watching the steady, persistent snow restoring the lawn to marshmallow perfection.
Thanks to a meteorological something-or-another, by Saturday the snow had all but disappeared and life was returning to normal. Naomi had taken the children into town to spend their Christmas book tokens and Miriam was sorting through her laundry basket when her phone rang. The screen showed ‘unknown caller’.
‘Hello?’ she said. All that she could hear was a whispery sound that could be the wind. ‘Hello? If you’re trying to sell me double-glazing, I’ve already got plenty. And I’ve never worked in a noisy environment or bought PPI.’
The caller – a man – exhaled, as if he’d been holding his breath for a long time. ‘Miriam?’
‘Who is this?’ she said.
‘It’s me. Paul.’
She sat on the bed, eyes tight shut, leaning forward until her forehead rested on her knees. ‘Gosh. Hello.’
‘Gosh indeed,’ he said, laughing the laugh she’d not heard for forty years. ‘It’s wonderful to hear your voice. How have you been?’
‘Me? Oh. Fine, thanks. You?’ He must be able to hear the pounding of her heart.
‘I’m fine, too,’ he said. ‘Look, sorry I’ve not phoned sooner. I only got your note yesterday. I’ve been in Manchester. On a course.’
‘Anything interesting?’
‘Cross-infection control. Riveting stuff.’ He paused. ‘Where are you at the moment?’
‘At home. Sitting on my bed. In a kind of granny-flat tagged on the side of my daughter’s house. I live with her and my grandchildren.’ It was the sort of thing a needy old woman might come out with. Aren’t I lucky? My family lets me live with them. ‘It’s a temporary arrangement. Until I find something that suits me better.’ Now she sounded ungrateful.
‘What can you see from your window?’ he said.
‘The front garden. The street. Why do you—’
‘Go to the window. Tell me what you see.’
A car was parked opposite, a man standing in the road, leaning against the driver’s door. He wore a long, navy overcoat and a red scarf. His gloved hand was raised to his ear and he was looking up at her window. His lips moved and Paul’s voice sounded in her ear. ‘Hello, Mim.’
> ‘This is crazy,’ she said. ‘What if I’d not been here?’
‘But you are.’
He walked across the road and stood on the pavement outside the gate. ‘It’s freezing out here.’ He was close enough for her to see his face. To recognise him. ‘Any chance of a cuppa?’
Part II
Miriam EDLIN yanked a paper towel from the dispenser and wiped the condensation from the mirror above the mucky wash basin. Tossing the wad of paper into the bin, she checked her reflection. Her nose was shiny. And her hair – straightened earlier with the help of several applications of heavy-duty lacquer – was reverting to the careless waves she spent hours failing to tame.
‘Bing’s shoes are gruesome.’ Frankie’s voice came from the cubicle next to the one Miriam had vacated.
She turned on the tap, letting cold water trickle across her wrists.
‘Mim? Did you see Bing’s shoes? They look like they belong to his dad.’
The driving beat of The Locomotion was coming from beyond the cloakroom door. She pressed her hands against her cheeks, enjoying the shock of the cold. She hadn’t noticed Paul Crosby’s shoes. Her attention had been held by the strip of Elastoplast covering his eyebrow.
‘What’s happened to his face?’ she said.
‘God, I don’t know. And I honestly don’t care.’ The cubicle door opened and Frankie emerged. ‘It’s something to do with this afternoon’s rugby match. I swear he’s keener on groping his mates than groping me.’
