The Doorstep Child

by Annie Murray

  They stood looking out of the front door. The street was quiet. It was warm and Jack unbuttoned the top of his shirt and lit a cigarette.

  ‘When you think of what we’ve come from . . .’ There was wonder in his voice. He angled his head back and blew smoke into the air above him. ‘Thank Christ we got out of there.’

  And in those moments, having seen their bedroom with its double bed, the living room and her new, neat little kitchen, all she could do was agree with him.

  Jack turned to her and took her in his arms. He removed the cigarette from his lips and kissed her.

  ‘Well, Mrs Harrison. We’re gunna be Canadians!’ Already he sounded different, trying it out.

  She looked back at him, uncertain, but again she smiled. ‘I s’pose we’ll have to learn to talk different, won’t we?’ she said.

  That night Jack made love to her with more force than usual, with a frantic kind of energy. Straightening his arms as he came, he put his head back and let out a cry, as if of triumph. For a moment he was lost in his own thoughts and sensations, before righting his head and looking down at her.

  ‘You all right?’ She smiled up at him. She had found it exciting, this reaction, but was not sure of it.

  ‘This is me.’ He was still moving in her, enjoying himself, gently circling his hips. ‘I’ve arrived. This is really me.’ She knew he meant here, Canada, all of it.

  ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Good, my love.’ She pulled him to her, holding him close, hoping to goodness that in the end she was going to feel the same.

  Thirty-Four

  That first morning Jack disappeared, full of eagerness, to the Rosette Tube Company. Don had said take a couple of days for goodness’ sake, get settled in. But no. Jack wanted to get in to work, get cracking, he said. Don laughed and said he would call by and give him a ride.

  Evie was glad of his hurried departure because once again she was feeling sick. She had made Jack breakfast from the supplies Don’s wife had left for them – eggs and toast, which she certainly couldn’t face herself.

  For a moment she had wanted to cling to him and beg him not to leave her alone in this strange place, feeling like this. But of course, she did not do it. This was a big day for him. She could feel the tension in his body as she kissed him goodbye.

  ‘Good luck,’ she said. ‘Knock ’em dead.’

  Jack grinned and kissed her again. ‘Don’t get into any mischief, will yer?’

  She watched him with the front door open a crack so that Don Sorenson could not see her in her nightie. Jack, in his new black trousers and shirt, his fast, muscular walk, raising a hand to Don. Going off into his male world of work. Jack’s world which did not include her. She felt a pang, a sense of being left out. But she smiled as well, proud of him. Then she allowed herself to crawl groggily back into bed.

  As her stomach buckled with nausea she felt lonely and desperate lying in the silent house. A couple from next door had come round the evening before to say hello – both in their forties and pleasant. But apart from that she had no idea who was around her. How was she ever going to get started on this place feeling like this? Last time, with Julie, it had not been anything like this bad. But of course Jack didn’t know about last time. He didn’t know about this time either. For a few minutes she pressed her head into the pillow of this new wooden-framed bed and had a cry, feeling very sorry for herself.

  As she wiped her eyes, a thought struck her, fully for the first time. Here she was, with her husband, who had come to do a job in Canada, so many miles from home that it might as well have been on another planet altogether. Their coming here was all about Jack – but what was she going to do, here all on her own?

  Another twist of queasiness reminded her: she was not alone. Not even alone in this room, because a small, beginning of a person had taken root and was developing inside her. She laid her hands side by side, like a little roof over her stomach, feeling the soft warmth of her flesh.

  ‘Julie . . .’ she whispered, stroking her hands back and forth. ‘No, I know you’re not Julie. And I’ll never ever give you away – not like her. You’re mine, and whatever happens, we’ll be together, my little one.’

  Filled with new, determined thoughts, she got up, first to be sick, then to begin on building a new life for a family. Because whatever Jack or anyone else wanted, that was what she hungered for more than anything.

  Once she was dressed and had managed to eat some toast, done under the eye-level grill of the newest cooker she had ever seen, she felt better. Cup of tea in hand, she opened the back door. The day was already warm, the sky a hazy blue. Stepping out onto the strangely wiry grass, she looked around, at the neighbouring houses, all similar to their own, and wondered nervously who might live there.

  I could plant roses, she said to herself. But where do you get them from? What do you have to do? Helplessly, she thought, I don’t know the first thing about gardens . . . To the child growing inside her, though, she whispered, ‘But I’ll learn. I’ll make it nice for you, so you can play . . .’ She felt dreamy in the warm sun.

  ‘Hello!’

  Evie jumped, only just managing not to spill tea all down her. For a second she could not tell where the voice was coming from, then realized someone had walked round to the side of the garden. A young, slender woman in a pale blue skirt and chocolate-coloured short-sleeved shirt, her dark brown hair cut in a bob. ‘Sorry,’ she said, laughing. ‘I didn’t mean to make you jump.’

  Evie realized the accent was English, though different from her own. Smiling uncertainly, she walked towards her. Between the white palings of the fence, she took in that beside the woman stood a little child and that from the curve of her at the front, she was clearly expecting another. She was carrying a round dish, covered by a white plate.

  ‘Am I glad to see you!’ the woman said. She held out a hand across the fence and they shook. ‘We could do with a few more Brits in this neighbourhood, I can tell you. Though there are quite a few of us scattered about town. I’m Cath, by the way. Cath Laker. And this is Robbie.’ She looked down at the little boy.

  Eve was overjoyed at the warmth of this greeting. A neighbour. A friend! She already felt desperate to make the woman like her.

  ‘I’m glad to see you too,’ she said. ‘We just got here. And I got up this morning and thought, what the hell am I s’posed to do now?’

  Cath laughed. Evie thought how nice looking she was, with her brown eyes and sallow skin.

  ‘I know the feeling – well, except I was just about to have Robbie by the time we got here, so I wasn’t in a fit state to do much anyway.’

  Evie was on the brink of saying that she too was expecting and that this was how she felt but she stopped herself. It was strange how much easier it would have been to blurt all this out to a stranger than to say it to Jack.

  ‘D’you want a cup of tea?’ Evie said eagerly. ‘That’s all I’ve got really – I don’t even know where the shops are.’

  ‘That’d be nice. And I can show you. That’s partly why I’m here. David – my husband – said you’d both arrived and I knew you’d be in a tizzy. Don’t I remember it!’ She came in through the side gate, carrying the dish and leading the little boy with the other hand. He had dark hair like hers and a sweet, wondering expression. They followed Evie into the house. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Oh, sorry.’ Evie turned from running the tap. ‘Evie Harrison. My husband’s Jack.’

  ‘Well, Evie, I’ll take you to the shops, if you like, a bit later. But I made you a pie.’ Cath wrinkled her nose. ‘It’s bottled plums.’

  ‘That’s ever so kind,’ Evie said. Tears pricked her eyes for a second and she blinked them away. But Cath noticed.

  ‘You might not think it’s kind when you taste it.’ She made a wry face. ‘I’m a lousy cook. Don’t worry, I’ll show you everything.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Evie said, making the tea in a pan as there was no teapot. ‘That would be such a help.’

&nb
sp; ‘You’ll get settled.’ Cath picked her little boy up and perched him on her hip. ‘But Canada takes some getting used to, I can tell you. Everyone thinks it’s going to be more or less like England and it isn’t at all. I didn’t think I’d survive the winter when it arrived and it goes on and on . . . Long after the snowdrops are out at home there’s snow and more snow. It takes an age to get out of the house.’

  ‘I’d better get some more clothes,’ Evie said. ‘We’ve only got what we brought with us so far.’

  ‘Oh, you’ve got a while yet,’ Cath said. ‘The summer’s only just getting going, and that’s blistering.’

  They talked and drank tea, sitting at the table in the living room, little Robbie cuddling on Cath’s lap. Evie ate a slice of Cath’s plum pie and it was pretty terrible and soggy but the kindness of it meant most. She learned that Cath and David were from Bromley, in Kent, that nearly everyone who came here now was working in the oil industry or something to do with it, and that there were a few Brits scattered across Rosette, as well as the Canadians and others from Ukraine and Germany and Scandinavia, which Evie gathered meant Norway and Sweden.

  When she told Cath she was from Birmingham, Cath joked, ‘No, really? I’d never’ve guessed!’ It seemed as if they were already making friends and Evie felt a great deal better, even though the pie made her stomach feel terrible.

  ‘I’ve just got a few chores to get done,’ Cath said, getting up to go. ‘But I’ve got the car today. I’ll take you out and show you the fleshpots of Rosette!’

  By the time Jack came home that evening, Evie had been introduced by Cath, in another enormous, American car, to the town of Rosette, its main street of shops, its pretty expanse of water known as Lake Glass, with a church spire reflected in it which Cath said was something to do with the Ukrainians – ‘not sure which kind of church really,’ Cath admitted. ‘But a lot of life happens round the lake in summer because it’s the nicest part of town for picnics and so on.’ They drove past the squat warehouse that contained the Rosette Tube Co. in the north of the town, and Evie bought some food from one of the stores.

  As she was trying to think what she needed, Cath appeared with another woman beside her.

  ‘Evie, this is one of our number in the neighbourhood – Bea Henshaw. Meet Evie, our new arrival.’

  Evie saw a young woman with blonde hair loose on her shoulders, a neat, bird-like figure and kindly blue eyes. She was also, very obviously, expecting a child.

  ‘Hello, nice to meet you,’ she said. As she talked, Evie could tell that she came from somewhere northern and that there was a lovely warmth about her. ‘You just arrived?’

  ‘Yesterday,’ Evie said. ‘I don’t really know where I am yet.’

  Bea chuckled. ‘I’m not surprised. Takes a good while before you stop feeling like that – I found, anyway. Listen, Cath, I’m due at the doctor’s in a minute. But bring Evie round for a cuppa soon, eh?’ She touched Evie’s arm. ‘Nice to meet you, love. We’ll get together soon.’

  Her wiry little figure hurried away. As they drove home, Cath explained that Bea was a nurse who had been working until recently at Rosette Hospital where her husband was also a doctor.

  ‘Course, she’s far more worried about having a baby than the rest of us. Knows too much, I s’pose. Ignorance is bliss the first time, for most of us. She’s a real good sort, Bea is,’ Cath said. ‘You’ll like her.’

  Evie had already decided that she did. Rosette, however, she found very strange as they drove along. There were all the usual things of home – shops and houses, factories and timber yards – and yet it felt so low-lying and spread out and somehow unfinished.

  ‘The roads are very wide,’ she said to Cath, gazing out as they drove along a street of shops. Some of the buildings looked pretty, she thought, with canvas awnings draped from the windows, and some with wrought-iron balconies. There were cars and ‘station wagons’ parked along the street, like she had seen in American films back at home. The sun brought out the vivid colours of everything.

  ‘On a really clear day you can just see the Rockies,’ Cath said. ‘Just the little tips of the high ones. It’s a bit hazy today, though. They look magnificent when you can see them.’

  Evie peered out to the west but could not see anything. But she decided she liked Rosette that day. Or at least that she could get used to it. And Cath’s friendly company helped, and meeting Bea. All in all, she felt much better.

  Back in their neighbourhood, Cath helped her unload the car and then said, ‘Come on. You come round to mine now.’

  The inside of Cath and David’s house was much like hers and Jack’s, except that as they had already been in Rosette for eighteen months, it looked established and homely, with Robbie’s toys in a corner and a high chair and coloured crocheted rugs on the backs of the chairs.

  ‘Tea OK?’ Cath said, as Robbie ran in and went to his toys.

  ‘Yes,’ Evie replied. ‘I don’t much like coffee. I try because it’s all coffee bars at home, isn’t it?’

  ‘You all right?’ Cath said, looking closely at her. Evie had had a moment of faintness, having to hold on to the back of a chair.

  ‘Yeah. Ta.’ She sat on one of the chairs by the table. In a moment of longing, of not being able to resist confiding in this new friend, she looked up at Cath. ‘Thing is . . . you’re not the only one who’s expecting.’

  ‘Oh, isn’t that lovely!’ Cath clasped her hands together under her chin, beaming. When she smiled, she had very even, white teeth. Evie thought how pretty she was. ‘Your first! When’s it due, d’you think? That’s nice – our kids can be friends!’ Evie felt warmth steal through her at this reaction. She ignored the comment about it being her first and smiled, as if with first-time nerves.

  ‘I’m only about three months gone.’ She realized she must not sound too sure about anything. ‘I think anyhow. I feel quite bad some of the time. The thing is, Jack doesn’t know yet.’

  ‘Oh, you’re saving it, are you? I did that, the first time – just to make sure. Didn’t want him all disappointed if, you know, anything went wrong. But when I started being sick this time of course David spotted it straight away. Oh, your husband’s going to be so excited!’

  Cath hugged her briefly round the shoulders. She smelt of something nice: talc or perfume. ‘David was like a big kid himself when I told him. It makes them feel they’re real big men.’ She laughed and went back to making the tea. ‘Oh, that’s made my day, Evie, it really has!’

  So when Jack came home Evie was full of excitement. He had had a good day and was happy and he wanted to know everything she had learned about this new country. Evie knew she would soon tell him about the baby, but for now there was enough to say about her day in Rosette. She talked all about Cath and how they went shopping and met Bea and Jack said he’d met David Laker, Cath’s husband, at work and he was a nice bloke. Evie said that Cath told her that the best way to getting along in Canada was if you like sports, especially ice hockey.

  Jack listened, seeming keen to absorb everything that there was to learn about their new home. She even noticed he sounded a little different, already tinged with Canadian. Cath, Evie realized, hardly sounded Canadian. Just a little maybe.

  ‘Well, we’ll have to see what we can do, won’t we?’ Jack said. ‘There’s a hockey rink in town, I know that.’

  Evie beamed at him. He was happy, she could see. They needed him at the works. He was where he wanted to be. And at that moment she was overflowing with love for him and wanted to be here too, where things were so nice and everyone she had met so far had been so friendly and kind and seemed to accept her. She was truly starting to get hooked on the Canadian dream in which she would be a new person, truly someone on the inside and not left to sit out on the cold step.

  Thirty-Five

  A few evenings later, the two of them fell laughing in through their front door.

  ‘Call that a pub!’ Through his chuckles, Jack’s voice held a tone of bewil
derment. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it!’

  Evie giggled, happy that they were having a laugh. Sometimes recently it had felt as if he was very far away from her. He was trying to alter himself to fit in with the Canadian way as fast as he could. Sometimes it scared her, as if he was easing away from her – and they had only been in Canada for a couple of weeks.

  She kept telling herself that she must put him first. He was the one earning the money after all – good money as well. But he barely asked what she had been doing. He just took it for granted that she was there, putting a house together, giving him his dinner when he turned up. She had had some very lonely moments in the long, empty days. Her one comfort was the thought of the baby growing inside her, the family she and Jack were going to make. And soon she was going to tell him the news . . .

  And at least tonight it felt as if the two of them were united. And she had had an unexpectedly enjoyable evening.

  ‘They’re so funny about drinking,’ she said, turning a light on in their living room, so bright, so clean and new. It struck her still, every time she came in. ‘It’s like a dirty secret – bottles all wrapped up in bags if you want to take them home.’ The other women had been telling her about it. ‘Daft, isn’t it? D’you want a cuppa?’

  ‘All right.’ Jack threw himself down in a chair. ‘Christ, I could do with summat stronger after that, but that’ll ’ave to do.’ He sounded like a Brummie now. Like her old Jack.

  Evie made tea and snuggled up beside him on the sofa, relaxing as they digested the evening’s experience. Most of this week Jack had come home and talked about his workmates – blokes with names like Bill, Red, Harry. Some were Canadians born and bred, but just as many were from all over, drawn to Canada by the new Alberta oil finds. Most of these men she had not met until this evening and then, as it turned out, only for a few minutes.

  Canada was already full of surprises: rice was eaten not just as a pudding! And everything was so enormous and spread out. But the so-called pub, a little bar off Main Street, had come as a real shock. For a start, men and women had to enter through separate doors and drink in separate rooms. A few of the blokes from work has asked Jack along. The wives went too and Evie had found herself separated from Jack and among a group of women she had never met before. At first, in the simple room, sitting round tables on wooden chairs, she felt very insecure.