I was the last customer to leave and she followed me to the door. I heard her lock it behind me and I could feel her watching me as I walked away.
I started to walk, though I wasn’t sure where I was going. I didn’t know where to go. I had six and a half hours of rainy night to kill and I had no idea how I was going to do it.
And then I saw it, the steeple of St Mary’s church peeping over the top of the dress shop in front of me, lit up like a beacon. Luckily for me this was back in the days when churches were left open twenty-four hours a day, offering a safe haven for the helpless and the needy. God knows that I fell into at least one of those categories, so I made my way there.
But when I got to the door it wouldn’t open and I wondered if I’d been wrong about the safe haven thing. I turned the handle again and pushed a little harder, it seemed to give a bit so I pushed my shoulder against it and the door opened with a creak. Once inside I closed the door carefully behind me, forcing it back into place. Without thinking I dipped my fingers into the font of water by the door and blessed myself.
There was a faint glow lighting the church which I soon realised was from the candles that were alight in front of various statues. I felt myself drawn to the statue at the front of the church perhaps because she was lit up the brightest on account of all the candle spaces in front of her being taken. All except one that was.
I dropped my bag to the floor and dug into my pocket for my purse. I rummaged around for some coins which I dropped into the tin before picking up a candle from the basket in front of me. I touched the candle on my forehead, my chest, both shoulders and finally my lips before I lit it from one of the candles that was already there and secured it into the last place on the stand. I knelt before the statue of Our Lady and prayed. I’m not sure how long I knelt there but it wasn’t as if there was a queue so I prayed until I was ready to stop by which time I felt more at ease with myself.
I stood up and looked at the statue one last time before starting to walk around the church that I’d been in hundreds of times. I’d never been in at night before and to see it in candlelight left me amazed by how beautiful it was. Before it had just been a church but now it felt like so much more. It really was my haven.
There were four or five other people taking refuge in the church that night: a couple of old men who looked like they were wearing every piece of clothing they owned and were badly in need of a bath and, a few pews back, a well-dressed woman who reeked of booze and was fast asleep, leaning back in the pew that she was sitting in. Further back still was a younger woman who was drawing something, the altar I think, and there might have been someone else in the section of the church that wasn’t lit, but I wasn’t really sure.
I selected the pew opposite the younger woman, the one that was drawing. There was a wall at the end of the pew and I settled against it using my holdall as a pillow.
I was almost scared to go to sleep – I had a bus to catch – I didn’t want to miss it but I was so tired I felt my eyes closing. I fought it for a while, then gave in to the sleep that I badly needed. It was a fitful sleep, more like a series of dozes really, and the sound of the priest preparing for the six o’clock mass woke me up completely. Through half-open eyes I watched him for a few minutes as he laid a cloth here and placed a chalice there. I forced my eyes fully open and saw that I was the only one of the night visitors left. When the priest retired to the sacristy I made my escape, being careful to genuflect to the altar again and bless myself on the way out. Old habits die hard. As I walked away from the church I saw a couple of people who looked as though they were making their way to the early morning mass but apart from them the streets were deserted.
When I got to the bus station, the clock above it read 6.15am so I made my way to the right stand and was about to join the queue of people waiting for the number 84 when I had a thought. Julie. I couldn’t leave without a word to Julie. I couldn’t ring her; I didn’t trust myself not to say more than I should. I knew I had a stamp in my purse so I could send her a letter if only I had some paper. I looked around and saw that the newsagent in the corner of the station was open. I went in and bought a writing pad, a pen and some envelopes before joining the bus queue, which had six people in it.
The bus doors had just opened and the first of the passengers was climbing aboard. I waited my turn and then did the same. ‘Single please.’ I said to the driver who paid me no attention as he produced a ticket and gave me my change.
There were two people sitting in the lower deck of the bus. They were both at the back so I took a seat just behind the driver. I had just opened the carrier bag of goodies that I had bought from the newsagent and looked inside when it occurred to me that I was going to need to post my letter before the bus left. If I didn’t, it would bear the postmark of the town I was going to and I didn’t want anyone – not even Julie – to know where that was. There was a post box in the station, I could see it from where I was sitting, but I would need to be quick.
I pulled the pad out, used my teeth to get the top off the pen and wrote the words quickly. I can’t remember what those words were exactly but it was something along the lines of thank you for everything you did for me and that I was sorry to leave without saying goodbye but that I had to keep my baby safe and that meant leaving without anyone knowing where I was going. I ended by telling her not to worry and that I would be all right. The writing was really bad and I hoped that Julie would be able to read it. I had no time to do it again so I would have to take the chance.
I quickly folded the paper and put it into one of the envelopes. I wrote the address as quickly as I could and stuck a stamp in the corner.
I stood up, leaving my bag on my seat and approached the driver. ‘I just need to post this letter,’ I said, ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’
‘You’d better be,’ he said, ‘because we leave in two,’ and I heard him start the engine.
As it happened I was back in plenty of time and the bus was still sitting there a good three or four minutes after I’d got back on. After loading one last passenger who had come running up to the bus, the driver closed the door and we were off.
‘Thought I wasn’t going to make it,’ the late-comer said. He was a man of about my dad’s age and looked like he was dressed for work. He had a briefcase in one hand and a newspaper in the other. He sat opposite me and I was glad when he started to read his newspaper because I really didn’t want to talk to anyone.
The journey, which was supposed to take an hour and a half, took longer because of a crash between two cars, one of which had landed on its roof. There were police cars and ambulances at the scene and the bus had to edge over to the side of the road along with all the other vehicles in the queue to allow a fire engine to pass.
The line of traffic moved slowly past, sometimes just a few inches at a time. The late-comer looked up from his paper to look at his watch and then he did it again a few minutes later. I guessed that he was going to be late for work. He must have decided that there wasn’t a lot that he could do about it because he took a pen from his briefcase and started to do the crossword.
As we inched closer to the scene of the accident I could see the carnage. Several people had blankets around their shoulders and were standing together at the side of the road. I could see that someone else was lying on a stretcher in the back of the ambulance. There was a blanket over their head. And I’d thought that I had problems. There appeared to be death in the back of that ambulance; at least I had life inside me. My baby, a life, a living thing. I put my hands on my stomach and rocked with the motion of the slowly moving bus.
Once past the accident the bus picked up speed again and it wasn’t long before we arrived at our destination. I got off and stretched while I looked around. I dug out the piece of paper that had the directions that Sharon had given me on and looked around for stand 21. It was easy enough to find and there was a bus due in fifteen minutes so I stood and waited.
When the time came, I
asked the driver for a ticket to the end of Acton Road and asked him to tell me when we were there. I noticed that he gave me a sort of up and down look followed by a very slight nod of his head. He told me to sit down and listen for his shout. I took my ticket and sat near the front.
The bus pulled away and I settled into my seat. As I looked out of the window this new town that I had never seen before didn’t look much different to the one that I had just left. There were people walking, others tending their gardens and mothers pushing prams.
‘You need the next stop, love,’ the driver called to me, looking at me through his rear-view mirror. ‘This is Acton Road.’
As he slowed down I collected my things together and made my way to the exit. The bus stopped, the doors swished open and I climbed down the steps to the pavement. As the bus pulled away I looked at my directions again to try and work out which way to go and then I headed to my left.
***
The building was set back from the road in its own grounds – not massive grounds but bigger than your average garden. There was nothing to suggest that it was anything other than a normal, large house and I wondered if I’d got the right place. I pushed the gate open, made sure that I closed it behind me and walked up the path to the front door. I pushed the bell and a few seconds later the door was opened by a girl of about my age.
‘I’m looking for Sharon,’ I told her.
She looked me up and down in much the same way as the bus driver had done. ‘Sharon’s not in,’ she told me, ‘but Sophie is if she’ll do.’ She stepped back from the door. ‘You’d better come in,’ she said, so I did. As soon as I was in she closed the door and yelled, ‘Sophie! Someone to see you.’
‘Who is it?’ the voice came from the second floor and soon a face appeared at the top of the stairs. Its owner was crouching down to see who it was that wanted her.
I tried to smile. ‘Sharon told me to come,’ I said nervously.
‘Oh.’ A woman I took to be Sophie stood up straight and ran down the stairs. ‘You must be Susan.’
‘Yes.’
‘Right you are then, Susan,’ she said, putting her hand on my back. ‘You’d better come this way.’ She turned to the girl who had let me in. ‘Mandy, be a love and take Susan’s bag upstairs.’
‘Which room?’
Sophie let her head tilt to one side and smiled. ‘Three guesses.’
Mandy picked up my bag and started the climb up the stairs.
I watched Mandy until she was halfway up the stairs and then followed Sophie into what looked like an office, although there were sofas in there too so I wasn’t exactly sure what the room should be called. I would later learn that it was a room with many uses.
We didn’t sit on the sofas that day. Sophie sat on one side of the desk and I sat on the other.
‘So, Susan,’ she said lightly. ‘Tell me a bit about yourself.’
I didn’t know what to say and shrugged my shoulders. ‘There’s not a lot to tell,’ I said.
The look on Sophie’s face told me that she had heard that before. ‘Well, why don’t we start with what brought you here?’
And that was all it took to start the waterfall of words that fell from my mouth. I told her about Tim and how we had already broken up before I’d found out that I was pregnant. I told her about Dad’s disappointment and Mum’s shame. I started crying when I told her that Mum had wanted to send me away until the baby was born and then give it way. Sophie offered me a box of tissues and, after I’d taken one, she gave me time to pull myself together – a process that took a few minutes.
When I was composed, Sophie said, ‘I’m guessing that what your mother wants is not an option for you.’ She was lolling to one side on her chair, as though she was quite comfortable. Her face was soft and friendly and she made me feel comfortable too. As we talked, she rummaged in one of the drawers of the desk and brought out a wedge of paper. She asked me a few questions then filled in a couple of forms which she asked me to sign.
‘One last thing,’ she said. ‘Does anyone know you are here?’
‘No.’
‘Do you want anyone to know that you’re here?’
‘No.’
It seemed that was that.
***
When we were finished in the office, Sophie showed me to my room. It turned out I would be sharing a room with Mandy, the girl that had answered the door. There were two beds in what was to be my bedroom and I found Mandy sitting on one of them and my bag on the other.
I was blessed the day that Mandy came into my life. She became a good friend to me then and she is still a good friend to me now. That first evening, as we both sat on our respective beds, she explained to me how the hostel worked. Apparently the building had been donated to the charity by an old lady who had died without any children to pass the house on to. As the story went, the old lady had been pregnant and unmarried when she was young. Her family had disowned her and she’d been cast off with nowhere to go and no one to turn to. She had been forced to give birth to her baby in a dirty room somewhere, without any medical help, and had almost died as the baby was being born. The baby had died. Later on, her parents had relented a little – mainly for appearances’ sake – and had taken her back, but she had never forgiven them for not being there for her when she needed them. When she died, the house and everything in it went to what was then a relatively new charity which had been set up to help young girls who found themselves in the same kind of trouble. Mandy told me she’d heard that a male cousin of the woman had tried to contest the will but the judge who had heard the case had told him where he could stick his objection.
‘Bet it was a woman judge,’ Mandy laughed, and I laughed too.
That first night we talked a lot. I told Mandy my story and she told me her own. They were similar in lots of ways but her mother hadn’t suggested adoption; her father had suggested an abortion. We bonded straight away and I was glad that she was there with me. I was in a houseful of girls in the same predicament as I was and I felt at home.
Later on when Mandy was gently snoring a few feet away from me I lay in my bed and thought about the story of the old woman who had made this haven possible. I felt like we had something in common. We had both been let down by those who should have had our best interests at heart but, as bad as my case had been, hers had been so much worse. At least Mum had been going to send me somewhere safe. The old woman had just been turned out on the street, ostracised by her whole family – even the extended one – and, if that hadn’t been bad enough, her baby had died. I couldn’t imagine what that must have felt like and I didn’t want to find out. Because of her I was here in a safe place and I thanked her from the bottom of my heart. Thank God I had found this place.
There were six bedrooms in the main building and four in an extension. Each bedroom could take two girls. We all chipped in with the cooking and cleaning and either Sophie or Sharon was there at all times. There was a third person who covered when one of them was on holiday or had a day off but Mandy wasn’t sure what she was called. ‘Daphne I think, or is it Daisy?’
I met most of the other girls around the dining table on my first evening in the house. Just after six a shout of, ‘Tea’s ready!’ had gone up and I had followed Mandy into the dining room. We’d not had a dining room at home and I’d never sat at a dining table before, not in a house anyway.
Some of the girls had eyed me suspiciously as Mandy introduced me. Some of them were like me – just ordinary looking – others had bumps of various sizes and one girl, Gemma, looked like she was about to explode at any minute. My God, how could a body get that big? I couldn’t imagine my stomach stretching so much and I wanted to ask her if it hurt but I didn’t want to appear foolish.
So there we were, just a bunch of normal girls living in a big house together. Normal girls that just happened to be pregnant.
I fell into the way of life at the house – Sophie didn’t like it being called a hostel – very quickly and wi
thin a few days I started to feel happy and positive about the future. Social Services worked with the charity that owned the house and someone from there came round at least once a week to check on us. We also had regular courses and talks about how to deal with what life was going to throw at us and it wasn’t long before I started to believe that I could actually follow this path that I had chosen.
I realised that I could have this baby and I didn’t care what it cost me personally.
I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t think about the other path I could have chosen, the one that my mother had wanted, but I knew I had made the right decision. Every day I felt it more and more and I tried not to dwell on how things might have been.
I’m not going to bore you with details of everyday life at the house because that was just it, everyday life – mundane, some might even say dull. That was, apart from the times that one of us went into labour.
Gemma, the one who looked like she was going to pop, was – not surprisingly – the first of us to go into labour while I was there. It happened about a month after I got to the house. She’d been complaining about the odd twinge in her stomach all morning and just after lunch when Mandy and I were in the kitchen clearing up we heard her scream. The noise had come from the living room and by the time we got there Sharon was already on the floor beside the sofa that Gemma was sitting on. She was talking to someone on the phone, presumably the hospital.
‘Okay, Gemma,’ she said calmly, after she had put the phone back on its cradle. ‘It looks like your baby is coming and an ambulance is on its way to take you to the hospital.’ Sharon turned and looked at us. ‘Can one of you go and get Gemma’s hospital bag please. It’s the red one by her bed.’ She turned her attention back to Gemma and both Mandy and I ran up the stairs to Gemma’s room.
Mandy was taking it in her stride, as she seemed to with most things, but this was my first experience of what happened to ‘us girls’ and I was really excited. By the time we got back downstairs the ambulance was pulling up outside and I opened the door before the engine had even stopped and showed the paramedics where to go.
Ribbons in Her Hair Page 7
