Follow Your Dream

by Patricia Burns

  ‘That was brilliant. You’re a natural,’ James told her. ‘Did you enjoy it?’

  He could see that she was shaking from the effort and concentration.

  ‘It was terrific.’

  ‘Just wait till you can go out on your own. Do you remember what it was like when you first had a bike of your own?’

  ‘I do. It was wonderful, just being able to get on and whizz off wherever you want, with the wind in your hair and everything. And so fast, compared with walking.’

  ‘Driving a car is all that and more,’ he assured her. ‘Get yourself a provisional licence, then we can go out on the proper roads. Now, how about fish and chips on the seafront?’

  ‘Perfect,’ Lillian agreed.

  She was so easy to be with. A girlfriend would say that chips made her fat, or she’d already eaten or something.

  James drove down to the Golden Mile and they sat on a bench facing the sea with the fish and chips on their knees. Lillian tucked in with gusto.

  ‘It’s so nice to get out in the evening,’ she said. ‘Just to see life going on all around you, you know? It’s so samey stuck indoors all the time. It’s only the PGs who liven the place up a bit.’

  She told him about the young unmarried couple who had arrived that afternoon.

  James laughed. ‘So your Gran didn’t scare them off, then?’

  ‘Gran doesn’t have it all her own way any more. It’s like you said back in the spring; she knows that she’s only got me to rely on. That really got me thinking, that did. I don’t stand any nonsense, and she doesn’t argue with me half as much as she used to.’

  ‘Good for you. You’re making a real success of Sunny View. I thought how different it looked now when I picked you up this evening.’

  ‘It’s OK. I don’t know about success. But it’s early in the season yet, there’s time to get more people in.’

  ‘You must miss your old life, though.’

  ‘Oh, I do, terribly. I miss the girls and I miss the challenge of learning new dances and I really, really miss the buzz of performing.’ Her voice was full of longing.

  ‘It must be really hard. But you’d never be able to live with yourself if you upped and left your mum.’

  Lillian sighed. ‘I know. There isn’t a choice. I have to be here.’

  ‘From a purely selfish point of view, I’m glad. It means I get to see more of you,’ James told her.

  Lillian flushed. ‘There is that,’ she said.

  He had finished his chips and she had nearly got to the end of hers. She chased the last little bits inside the greasy paper.

  ‘What about you?’ she asked. ‘How’s your big dream coming on? It sounded like you were busy today.’

  ‘We were, very.’ James screwed up his chip paper and lobbed it into a nearby litter basket. This was what had been occupying his thoughts for some time now. Like Lillian, he had found that his big dream was not quite what he had thought it would be. He had his workshop and it was very successful, and While-U-Wait Exhausts was building up well, but now he realised that this was just the start. There were difficult decisions to be made.

  ‘I’ve been turning it over and over in my head and I can’t quite make my mind up what’s for the best,’ he admitted.

  Lillian turned to him, clearly interested.

  ‘What’s the problem?’ she asked.

  It was so good to be able to lay it all out before her. She was more than a handy sounding-board; she had good judgement. He knew he could trust her to give an honest opinion.

  ‘Well, there’s at least three alternatives,’ he told her. ‘I could close the auto repairs and use both workshops just for exhausts, but that would mean either putting Tony out of work or employing him fitting exhausts, and he’s too skilled a man to want to do that all day long.’

  Lillian nodded. She had met Tony, a reliable older man who did a lot of the general repair work while James made sure the less skilled fitters were putting the exhausts on correctly and oversaw both businesses.

  ‘Or—?’ she prompted.

  ‘Or I could leave Tony in charge of repairs and move the exhausts to a bigger premises somewhere else.’

  ‘That sounds sensible.’

  ‘Yes. Well, that probably is the best solution—’

  He had considered doing that. It was the safe thing to do. But the prospect of bigger things lured him on.

  ‘So what’s the third idea?’ Lillian asked.

  This was what had him waking up sweating in the middle of the night, the thought that if he had the balls to try it, he could make it really big. He took a breath. This was the first time he had told anyone else. Supposing she thought he was out of his mind?

  ‘The third idea is to think beyond just one little local enterprise. I was right about the exhausts. There is a market for on the spot specialist fitting, and if there’s a market in Southend, then it’s the same elsewhere and I should get in there before someone else steals it. What I’d like to do is to open up Kershaw’s While-U-Wait Exhausts in other towns. Chelmsford next, maybe, then Benfleet, Grays, into the outer suburbs, up into Colchester and Ipswich—the sky’s the limit, really.’

  ‘Wow!’ Lillian’s face was alight with an excitement that matched his own. ‘If anyone can make it work, you can.’

  James glowed. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘I mean it. But—’ She frowned, thinking. ‘It’s the finance, isn’t it? You haven’t got a gran with a shoe box of notes hidden away and, anyway, it would need a pretty big shoe box for what you’re thinking of.’

  Trust Lindy to get to the heart of the matter.

  ‘Yup. You got it. Though I think I could get a bank loan if I show them my books,’ he said. He was confident that his bank manager would back him on this. He’d proved himself as a good bet so far.

  ‘So what’s the problem?’

  There wouldn’t be a problem if he was on his own. He could take risks and if it all came crashing down round his ears, he could always go back to repairing cars again. But he wasn’t on his own. He had his mother to consider. If his dad had lived, his mum would be living in a nice house of her own by now and, for as long as he could remember, it had been his ambition to make that up to her.

  ‘If I do that I can’t buy a house, which I could do if I carried on with the business as it is at the moment,’ he explained.

  ‘Ah.’

  There was a silence. They both watched a green and cream tram trundling down the pier.

  ‘Mmm,’ Lillian said. ‘Difficult. Look—let’s leave Tony and your mum out of it for now. If it was just you, which way would you want to go?’

  ‘Expand. Definitely,’ James said, without hesitation.

  ‘And that could make lots of money?’

  ‘That’s the idea, yes. It could all go belly-up, though. That’s the chance you have to take.’

  ‘OK—’ Lillian spoke slowly, evidently thinking her way through it. ‘Now, is your mum happy where you are now?’

  ‘Well, yes. She likes the flat and the neighbours are nice and it’s not too much for her to manage,’ James admitted. ‘But that’s not the point—’

  ‘It is the point. If she likes it where you are, then she won’t mind waiting a bit longer, will she? And if you make lots of money in a few years’ time, you can buy a house then.’

  ‘Well—yes—’

  It was as if a light had been shone through the fog in his mind. At first he couldn’t believe it was as simple as that, but the more he thought about it, the more obvious it became.

  ‘Yes, you’re right. I had it so fixed in my mind that I should buy a house as soon as I could afford it, that I couldn’t see another way round it. Mind you, if I expand and it fails, I’ll never be able to buy a house.’

  Lillian smiled at him. ‘But you’re not going to fail, are you?’

  He smiled back, lifted by her faith in him. ‘Not if I can help it.’

  ‘Now, about Tony—’

  He had to laugh. ‘Blimey,
Lindy, have you got an answer for him too?’

  ‘Possibly. How about making him manager of While-U-Wait in Southend while you’re setting up the next one? You know you can trust him to do a decent job.’

  ‘Lindy, you’re a genius!’ James grabbed her and planted a kiss on her cheek. ‘A total genius! What would I do without you?’

  Lillian leaned into him. He could feel the softness of her body against his, the swell of her breasts, the pressure of her thigh. She was warm and pliant and wholly desirable. His own body responded with a surge of need. Embarrassed, he pulled back. He had to put a lid on this. This wasn’t right. He had girlfriends. Lindy was more important than a mere girlfriend. She was supposed to be his best mate, little sister, even. He jumped up and pulled her to her feet.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘We’re going to have a drink to celebrate the success of Sunny View and the expansion of While-U-Wait.’

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  ‘AND where did you get to last night, young man?’ Gran asked.

  Frank shrugged. ‘Just out.’

  ‘It was three o’clock in the morning when you came in. I heard you.’

  ‘Wasn’t me. Must of been one of the PGs.’

  Lillian doubted it. All the people they had in at the moment were families or older couples. They weren’t likely to be out to that time. She slid fried eggs onto plates already loaded with bacon, tomatoes and fried slices.

  ‘Can you bring the toast, Frank? I got my hands full here,’ she asked.

  ‘What d’you think I am, a flaming skivvy?’ Frank growled.

  To Lillian’s surprise, Gran came to her defence.

  ‘Don’t leave your sister to do everything, boy. And stop slouching. Stand up straight and put your shoulders back. Nobody would think you’d been in the army.’

  Frank gave her a look that would have shrivelled a lesser woman, got to his feet and picked up the loaded toast racks. As they went along the corridor from the kitchen to the guests’ breakfast room, Lillian hissed, ‘I know damn well it wasn’t the PGs coming in at three. What’s it worth for me to keep quiet about it?’

  Frank glared at her. ‘Sweet FA, sis. I don’t give a toss what the old bat thinks. I’m going to be out of here before long.’

  They reached the breakfast room door before Lillian could ask how he was going to manage to leave home, so she just said, ‘Good.’ Once inside, she was too busy to give her irritating brother another thought. As well as taking orders, delivering breakfasts and clearing used plates, some of the guests wanted information, one couple had a complaint about noise and others just wanted to chat. Lillian did the best she could for all of them, hurried back to the kitchen with the dirty dishes and got going on the last two full English breakfasts.

  ‘Any chance of food for the rest of us?’ her father grumbled as she threw bacon and tomato into the pan.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I’m onto it. I’m doing yours with this lot,’ Lillian told him. ‘And yours, Frank, so don’t start, right?’

  As she did so, it occurred to her that she would never have spoken to her father like that a year ago. Frank, maybe. She had never given in to her brother. But her father’s word had always been next to Gran’s in the house.

  ‘PGs come first,’ Gran said, backing her up. And then she said something that really astonished Lillian. ‘Three quarters full in the first week of September is good. The girl’s not doing a bad job.’

  From Gran, that was high praise. Lillian nearly dropped the egg she was cracking. Her father and Frank realised this as well and went quiet.

  ‘Th-thanks, Gran,’ she stammered.

  ‘Hmm. Well. Don’t let it go to your head,’ Gran told her.

  Lillian turned it over in her mind as she hurried through the day’s chores. Once the PGs were fed she went to see if she could coax her mother into eating anything, then helped her out of bed and onto the commode she now used, assisted her in washing, changed her nightdress, made her bed and helped her back into it.

  ‘Gran actually said I wasn’t doing a bad job. Isn’t that amazing?’ she said as she gently brushed her mother’s thin hair.

  ‘Mmm,’ Nettie agreed.

  It was about as much reaction as Lillian was going to get. She still found it very frustrating not being able to get through to her mother.

  ‘I thought I might go over and see Wendy today,’ she persisted. ‘She said Terry was going away on business for a couple of days, so it’ll be safe.’

  This time there was no answer at all. Lillian chattered on a bit longer, put the radio on and made sure the little brass bell was within reach.

  ‘Now, remember to ring if you need anything. I can pop up any time,’ she said.

  ‘Right,’ her mother whispered. Her eyes were already closed.

  Lillian sighed and went down to get on with the rest of her jobs. Once the kitchen was cleaned, there were the bedrooms and bathroom to see to, the hall, stairs and PGs’ dining room, and then Gran’s room. Then there were Gran’s errands to run and the shopping to get for the family’s midday dinner. Her father only had a bare hour to get home, eat and get back to work again, so the meal had to be on the table on the dot of ten past twelve. When that was cleared away and washed up, she was finally free for two or three hours until prospective guests might be expected to start calling. Lillian checked that Gran and her mother were both all right and went to get her old bike out of the shed.

  As she cycled along the seafront, she felt her spirits rise. It was a beautiful late summer’s day, the tide was in, the sea was sparkling and the sun was warm on her back. Despite her hard morning’s work, energy surged through her legs as she pedalled along, revelling in her brief freedom. Good old bike. She had James to thank for this. She wondered how he was getting on today. He was over in Chelmsford, looking at premises for his new branch of While-U-Wait Exhausts.

  Beyond the Halfway House pub, the seafront opened up, with gardens and tennis courts and bowling greens on the inland side of the road. Cheerful Southend was behind her and she was in sober, well-heeled Thorpe Bay. She turned up a tree-lined side road and again into Wendy’s street. Big detached family houses stood on each side, with driveways and front gardens with trees in and big bay windows and fancy porches. Unlike the houses on Lillian’s street, every one was different and all had plenty of space around them. She leaned her bike against the porch of Wendy’s house and rang the bell.

  No one came. Lillian tried again, wondering as she did so if she should have phoned beforehand. Maybe Wendy was taking advantage of Terry’s being away by going out. Still nobody came to the door, but from somewhere inside the house she could hear a child crying. Lillian tried one more time and backed it up by opening the letterbox and calling through it.

  ‘Wendy! It’s me, Lillian. Come and open the door!’

  This time she heard footsteps and saw the silhouette of her sister through the thick stained glass. The door opened a crack.

  ‘Lill? It…it’s not a good time—’

  There was a thudding of small feet, a cry of ‘Mummy!’ and what sounded to Lillian like a gasp of pain from Wendy. Lillian pushed at the door, opening it enough to put her head round and catch a glimpse of her sister. She cried out with shock. Wendy’s face was swollen and bruised, her eyes blackened.

  ‘My God, Wendy! What on earth happened?’

  ‘It’s nothing—’

  ‘It is not nothing.’

  Lillian slid round the door and closed it behind her. Wendy curled defensively round her small daughter, vainly trying to hide her injuries. Little Coral wriggled and struggled in her arms while Wendy muttered, ‘It’s all right, darling. It’s all right.’

  ‘It bloody isn’t all right,’ Lillian said.

  She took Coral from her sister, swinging her onto her hip and promising her biscuits. Then she put her other arm round Wendy, who flinched at her touch.

  ‘Come on,’ she insisted. ‘Into the kitchen.’

  Wendy looked even worse in the bright
light of the kitchen. Lillian sat her down at the big table, put the kettle on and found biscuits for Coral. Looking out of the back window, she saw that baby Terrance was safely asleep in his pram in the garden. She made coffee and set a cup before Wendy, who was now quietly crying.

  ‘Now,’ she said, gently but firmly. ‘Tell. What’s been going on? And don’t say that you fell or that you bumped into a door. Terry’s done this to you, hasn’t he?’

  Wendy nodded, tears falling from her poor swollen eyes and running down her battered face. Upset, Coral started crying too. Lillian took her onto her lap, but kept her eyes on Wendy.

  ‘He never meant to—’ Wendy sobbed.

  ‘That’s rubbish, Wend. You can’t not mean to do damage like this.’

  ‘I annoy him—’

  ‘Maybe, but he doesn’t have to hit you.’

  ‘I deserve it. I’m stupid—’

  ‘No one deserves this. Wendy, you look dreadful.’

  This only produced more tears. ‘Not…pretty…any…more…’ Wendy sobbed.

  Lillian realised that she had said the wrong thing. Wendy had always put so much store on her good looks.

  ‘You are still pretty, Wendy. You’re more beautiful than ever, without the bruises. It’s not you. It’s him that’s done this.’

  Slowly, the tale came out. Terry hit her because she let him down, said the wrong things, didn’t run the house correctly, looked at his friends the wrong way.

  ‘I can’t do anything right,’ Wendy sobbed. ‘I’m so stupid.’

  ‘You’re not stupid, Wend.’

  ‘I am, I am. He wishes he’d never married me.’

  Guilt dragged at Lillian’s guts. She was partly responsible for this. She had persuaded Wendy to tell Terry about the baby.

  ‘Do you wish you’d never married him?’ she asked.

  Wendy shook her head. ‘No, no. I love him.’

  ‘But—’

  Lillian was dumbfounded. How could her sister possibly still love a man who did this to her?