My Name Is Rose

by Sally Grindley

  Rose found herself being wheeled along the grim, grey corridors she knew so well, away from the ward. Mrs Luca tottered alongside in red high heels, while Mr Luca followed behind, huffing and puffing, his walking stick clunking on the concrete floor. When they reached the doors and pushed through to the outside world, Rose flinched as though someone had thrown a punch in her direction, and squeezed her eyes shut.

  If only Papa hadn’t been so independent. If only he hadn’t insisted that we go off on our own after the carnival.

  ‘It’s a little bright, isn’t it?’ said Mrs Luca. ‘It must be a bit of a shock for you after spending so long in hospital.’

  Rose hoped she would go on to say how long it had been, but Mr Luca interrupted her.

  ‘Too hot, if you ask me,’ he said. ‘Especially if you’ve got bandages all the way up your leg. Itchy, they are too.’

  ‘We’ll soon be on our way home, dear,’ said Mrs Luca.

  ‘Not before time.’ Her husband snorted. ‘I can’t wait to get out of this awful place.’

  Rose was panic-stricken. Where are they taking me? Who are these people anyway? Why are they concerning themselves with me? She didn’t even like them, this woman with her saccharine voice, this man with his hostile glare. She wanted to cry out, but couldn’t. It was too agonising. She shrank back in the wheelchair as Mrs Luca ordered the chauffeur to make his way across a busy car park.

  They stopped by a large black estate car.

  ‘Here we are,’ said Mrs Luca. She opened one of the back doors. ‘Now, Petr, please lift the child gently on to the back seat.’

  Rose thought about beating the chauffeur with her fists as he put his arms round her. She had had enough of being handled by gadje strangers. Keep away from me!

  ‘Keep away from gadje,’ Nicu had warned her. ‘They’re different from us. They have their ways and we have ours. The two don’t mix.’

  She had never been in a car, however, and curiosity took over. She had often wondered what it would feel like to sit inside and look out as the landscape sped by. For a brief moment, her mind tricked her into thinking she was sitting on the bench of a horse-drawn wagon, but it quickly threw her back to the present, where Mr Luca was groaning loudly as he manoeuvered himself into the front seat and cursed the absence of his own car.

  Mrs Luca climbed in next to Rose and patted her on the hand. ‘I expect this feels like a big adventure, doesn’t it?’ she said. ‘There’s no need to be scared, though.’

  Rose bit her lip and felt her stomach lurch as Petr switched on the engine and drove out of the car park. I don’t want to be in here. Fear took over from curiosity. Let me out! She turned to Mrs Luca and noticed that she, too, looked anxious. Her new guardian forced a smile when she saw Rose’s face and began a running commentary about the sights they were passing. Rose turned back to the window and gazed at the people going about their business; some were striding purposefully in smart suits, briefcases in hand, others were strolling casually in the warm sunshine, stopping to gaze at grandiose buildings or to peer into shop windows filled with glamorous fashions and glitzy items for the home. None of them would have cared that she was being taken away against her will.

  Where is this place? Rose wondered as they crossed a bridge over a wide and winding river.

  ‘We come back here every year,’ she heard Mrs Luca saying. ‘It’s our favourite city in the world. It’s a pity it has one of the worst hospitals in the country, but we weren’t able to move you to a better one.’

  Rose knew of the big cities in her country, but she had no idea which one this was.

  ‘Have you been here before?’ Mrs Luca asked.

  Rose shook her head. They had travelled through small towns, but her father preferred to take a long route rather than attempt to ride through a city.

  ‘Cities aren’t for the likes of us,’ he used to say. ‘You can lose your soul in a city. In fact, you can lose your life in a city and nobody would care.’

  Her mother had laughed and told him he exaggerated. ‘People are people,’ she said. ‘We’re lucky we have such freedom, but not everyone is so lucky. If you’re forced to live like a caged animal, you might behave like a caged animal.’

  ‘Ha!’ scoffed Nicu. ‘People make their own choices.’

  People are people. Rose’s lips sketched the words, her mother’s voice echoing softly from somewhere deep inside.

  ‘Are you trying to speak? Darling, the child is trying to speak!’

  Mrs Luca leant over and tried to attract her husband’s attention. At the same time, the driver pushed his horn and the car screeched to a halt.

  ‘Idiot!’ Mr Luca yelled at the car in front, which had pulled up without warning. He clutched his leg and groaned theatrically.

  Mrs Luca slumped back in her seat and let out a low moan. Her hands began to shake uncontrollably. Rose tried not to look at her. She stared out of the window, frightened and puzzled, but relieved that the spotlight had turned away from her. Petr apologised to his employers and accelerated again as the road ahead cleared. They continued in silence.

  At last the car turned into a private forecourt.

  ‘Ah, here we are,’ Mrs Luca said with forced brightness. She straightened her skirt and sat forward in her seat as the car pulled up outside a tall, glass-fronted building. ‘The first stop in our journey home.’

  Chapter 5

  Home. Rose pondered the meaning of the word as she stretched out on the deep, soft mattress of her temporary bed. Its sumptuous quilt was kicked unceremoniously to the floor. It was too hot in the room! How do people sleep in such heat? Mrs Luca had set the temperature before wishing Rose goodnight, kissing her on the forehead and disappearing into her own room next door. Rose grimaced at the thought of the kiss and the waft of sickly perfume that accompanied it. She listened to the low rumble of someone snoring next door that the walls of the prestigious hotel failed to stifle. Sometime earlier, she had heard raised voices, though she couldn’t decipher what was being said, nor even what language it was being said in. Silence had fallen briefly, before the rumble had commenced and settled into a rhythm.

  Home. Nicu snored. Nicu’s snore was elephantine, especially when he had been drinking his home-brewed ale. In the confines of their wagon, it often woke them up. Esme would dig him hard in the ribs with her elbow or her fist. He would snuffle and snort, then turn over, and for a while peace would follow, until he cranked it up again. Rani thought it was hilarious and mimicked him, though mostly he slept through his father’s nocturnal ruckus. Rani could sleep through anything, even thunderstorms. Rose didn’t like thunderstorms. No matter how many times Esme told her that she was perfectly safe and that nothing bad was going to happen to her, Rose couldn’t help jumping out of her skin at every loud clap of thunder. She was convinced one of the claps would make the wagon explode and that they would all die.

  The wagon did explode, but not because of a thunder­storm. It had been their home. The only home she knew. Not a house in the country, with its own piece of land. Not a flat in a town, with windows so thick that they cut out all sounds of life outside. Why, Rose wondered, would anyone want to live in a house or a flat? Why would anyone want to live in a place where you woke up, opened the curtains, and everything around you was the same, day in, day out? Rose was sure she would die of boredom. She grew impatient when they rented a trailer and stayed put in the same place for a few weeks over the winter. Yet there were children she spoke to in villages where they stopped who were shocked that she was happy to leave her friends behind, that she didn’t go to school, that her only permanent home was the wagon.

  ‘But it’s tiny!’ they said. ‘How do you all fit in?’

  ‘It’s cosy,’ Rose replied. ‘And we spend a lot of time outdoors.’

  ‘What about when it’s cold?’ they asked.

  ‘Who wants to be in a big place when it’s cold?’ she replied. ‘In a small place you can snuggle up together. And we’ve got a stove. Anyway, we�
��re used to the cold.’

  Some of them envied the fact that Rose didn’t go to school. Others told her she would never get a good job.

  ‘Why do I need to go to a school to study things like geography and nature and science when it’s all around me?’ she used to say, quoting Nicu, who was adamant they would learn far more from travelling than sitting in a stuffy classroom.

  ‘I can show you the stars and constellations while we sit by the fire at night,’ her father was fond of saying. ‘I can show you the tracks made by animals when we forage through the woods for food. I can teach you to recognise birds and their songs when we wake early in the morning to set off for new pastures. I can take you to see mountains and valleys, rivers and seas, forests and grasslands.’

  Rose loved it when Nicu spoke like that, his voice strong and musical, his eyes glinting.

  ‘Your father is a man of poetry and passion,’ Esme always said. ‘And that’s why I married him.’

  Home. Home is where you feel safe and loved and secure, Rose concluded. It’s where you are surrounded by people who mean more to you than anything else in the world and by things that you cherish because they are part of your history and part of your story. Papa would have been proud of me for coming up with such a description, Rose thought to herself. She knew that he might have said something similar once upon a time in his strong, musical voice.

  Alone now in the darkness of a hotel room, she cried for the home she had lost. For Nicu, for Esme and for Rani. For her history and for her story. Next door the rumble continued, persistent and heedless.

  Chapter 6

  Rose was woken by a loud knocking. She had no idea where she was or what time of day it was.

  A door opened, thrusting light across her, and an overly cheerful voice announced, ‘Time to wake up, child. We need to be at the airport in an hour.’

  Mrs Luca placed a tray on the bedside table and opened the curtains.

  ‘I hope you slept well,’ she said, disappearing through the door to re-emerge with an armful of clothes, which she laid on the bed. ‘Eat your breakfast, then get yourself dressed.’

  Rose pulled herself up in the bed, while the woman plumped up the pillows behind her before placing the tray on her lap.

  ‘Bon appétit. Now, don’t you be long. It’s a beautiful day – a perfect day for going home.’

  Rose waited until Mrs Luca had gone back to her own room to lift the silver lid that covered her breakfast. Underneath was a plate piled high with slices of cold meat, cheese, tomato and pickles. In a basket with a white napkin across the top were four different kinds of rolls, and in another, smaller basket were six tiny pots of jam. A bowl decorated with pink flowers contained a large pat of butter. Rose couldn’t help but gape. Is this all for me? She waited to see if Mrs Luca was coming back to join her, but the clatter of knives and forks next door told her that Mr and Mrs Luca had their own trays.

  After endless bland and repetitive hospital food, Rose tucked in. Her first mouthful of salami sent a thousand taste buds into fits of delight, calmed only by the soft creaminess of one of the four cheeses, before being tickled again by the cool, sweet tang of ripe tomato and the sharp contrast of the pickles. She plucked one of the rolls from its nest. It was still warm and quickly soaked up the lashings of butter she gave it. She chose damson jam to go on top, only to be disappointed because it had none of the rich flavour of Esme’s home-made version.

  Rose pushed the roll aside, her appetite spoiled in an instant by the memory of the smell of damsons, sloes or blackberries boiling away in the iron pot on their stove. She had loved it when they stopped the wagon in the middle of nowhere to scour the hedgerows for fruit. While Nicu stayed behind to check the wheels of the wagon, or to feed the horse, Philippos, or simply to smoke his pipe in peace, Esme led her and Rani away like troops on a mission. Rani wore his bowl on his head and marched purposefully in front of his mother and sister. He and Rose picked everything they could find among the lower branches of bushes and trees. Occasionally, they stopped to play hide-and-seek, especially in fields where the grass was long, or in shallow woodland, where there were plenty of trees to hide behind. Rani lost interest in collecting fruit sooner than she did, though he was quick enough to demand his share of the spoils when they returned to the wagon and Esme produced her delicious puddings.

  Rose missed her little brother with a sharp pang of sadness. He was five years younger than she was, but he had made her laugh with his antics and the way he sometimes ran their mother ragged. He was always disappearing when it was time for his wash, and Esme could never find her cooking pots because he took them to collect beetles or slow-worms or frogs in.

  Rose put the tray on the bed and slid out from underneath the covers. She was anxious to get dressed before Mrs Luca started to fuss over her. She took the clothes, locked herself in the bathroom, put them on and stood in front of the full-length mirror. She didn’t recognise the girl who stood before her. This girl was so thin! Her face was gaunt and pale. Her eyes were dull, her hair lifeless. She looked so much older, especially in the neat skirt and blouse, the white socks and shiny black shoes.

  Is that really me?

  She sat down on the toilet seat, feeling utterly exhausted.

  ‘It will take you a while to get your strength back, though you’ve mended well,’ Sister Orta had told her. ‘You were very seriously injured, so don’t go thinking you’ll be able to run around like other children until a good few months from now.’

  There was a tap on the bathroom door.

  ‘Are you all right, child?’ an anxious voice asked.

  Am I all right? Rose asked herself silently.

  ‘It’s time we were going. We don’t want to miss our flight, do we?’

  Rose stood up and looked in the mirror again. She nodded her head slowly, then more quickly.

  ‘Will you come out now, child?’

  ‘What’s she doing in there?’ Another voice. Mr Luca. Impatient. ‘She’ll make us late at this rate. I don’t know why we’re bothering.’

  ‘You know why we’re bothering. It’s the least we can do. Please, child, come out now.’

  Rose waited a few more moments before opening the door.

  ‘There,’ said Mrs Luca. ‘Don’t you look nice? Just let me tidy your hair and then you’ll look as pretty as a picture.’

  Mr Luca tutted loudly as Mrs Luca fetched a brush, and more loudly still as she fiddled with Rose’s hair.

  ‘That’s it. All done.’ She stood back and admired her handiwork. ‘Perfect,’ she said.

  ‘For goodness’ sake, can we get a move on now?’ growled Mr Luca.

  ‘We couldn’t let the child go out looking as if she had just got out of bed, could we?’

  ‘I don’t care if she resembles the back end of a donkey, as long as we catch our flight. And when are you going to stop calling her “child” and tell her her name?’

  The fixed smile dropped from Mrs Luca’s face. ‘Shhh!’ she hissed.

  ‘No, I won’t shush,’ snapped Mr Luca. ‘She needs to know before we reach the airport, before they check her papers. She could make it very difficult for us.’

  Rose stared at Mrs Luca, who looked alarmed.

  ‘I . . . we . . .’ Mrs Luca began. ‘We don’t know your name. We can’t keep calling you “child”, can we? It’s not very friendly. Until you can tell us your real name, we’ve decided to call you Anna. We think Anna is a nice name. What do you think?’

  Rose continued to stare at her, unable to take in what she was saying.

  ‘So your name is Anna Luca,’ Mrs Luca said, smiling again now. ‘My husband is called George and I’m Daphne.’

  Chapter 7

  Rose gazed all around her as Petr wheeled her through the revolving doors into the airport. There were so many people, some of them hurrying, some lounging on seats, some standing idly in long queues, their luggage piled high in trolleys alongside.

  ‘Have you ever been on a plane before
, Anna?’ Mrs Luca asked her.

  Rose shook her head.

  ‘There’s nothing to be frightened of,’ Mrs Luca continued. ‘Much safer than cars.’ As soon as she’d said it, however, she looked perturbed and hurried ahead with her husband to find their check-in desk.

  Rose was petrified. It hit her that she was leaving her country, leaving her people, leaving everything she had ever known. Leaving her family and friends. Where were they? Why hadn’t they come to find her? Why hadn’t she told Sister Orta about Aunt Mirela and Uncle Aleksandar? She could tell the Lucas now. It wasn’t too late. She could tell George and Daphne that she couldn’t, wouldn’t go with them. And if they won’t listen I’ll shout out loud until someone comes to help me.

  She shifted forward in the wheelchair and tried to stand up. Petr caught her and gently pulled her back down. She turned towards him and he smiled at her awkwardly. She tried to say something, but it was futile. She couldn’t bring herself to speak, however much it might change the course of events. Her voice was locked up inside, in a place which she dared not enter. Tears rolled silently down her cheeks. She brushed them angrily away when she saw Mr and Mrs Luca returning. She vowed to herself that they would never see her cry. She didn’t want Mrs Luca’s suffocating concern and she certainly didn’t want Mr Luca’s scowling contempt. It was clear he had something against her and was giving in to his wife’s wishes to provide a home for her.

  Why? Rose wondered. Why have they suddenly appeared in my life and taken charge of me? Why is Mrs Luca so determined to care for me as if I’m her own daughter?

  She stared at her now – the face with its excess of make-up, the bleached hair with its dark roots showing, the close-fitting suit, the high heels clicking inexorably towards her, the forced smile as she caught Rose’s stare.

  ‘We’re being fast-tracked through because of your condition,’ she said. ‘Isn’t that good? Not that there’s much of a queue for first class, of course.’ She was talking very quickly and sounded anxious.