by Annie Murray
It was so warm that, for once, Mr Gittins was out in the yard too. He was on a chair, close to the factory wall, half turned away from everyone. Melly kept looking across at his limp figure. She was fascinated by Mr Gittins. He always wore a hat – a battered trilby today. He had no hair, people said. His scalp was burned, puckered as a wasps’ nest. The running, screaming children grated on his nerves and if they went close he would sometimes shout and lash out.
‘Come on, Melly, I’m gonna do your hair up,’ Cissy commanded. ‘You get a chair from indoors and this’ll be our salon.’
When Cissy bossed her Melly usually obeyed, though none too fast. She liked to put up a bit of resistance.
Gladys was sitting inside at her usual vantage point, at the end of the table, looking out across the yard, fanning herself with a folded newspaper. She shifted to let Melly take a chair out past her. Melly carried it to their corner of the yard and put it down beside Tommy. She kept casting longing glances at the intent figures of Reggie and Wally Morrison up the far end, hunched over their pride and joy. The two of them had clubbed together to buy an old Norton motorbike. Wally had waited for Reggie to come back on leave before they went to get it, yesterday.
She kept sneaking a look at them. Wally the wider, stockier of the two, his hair a few shades darker than Reggie’s. He was very aloof and always the boss. Reggie was slimmer, a shade taller than Wally now. They were completely absorbed in the bike. She could hear the rumble of their voices as they exchanged comments, heads bent over, smoking, treading the butts into the yard. Gladys would be after them to clear up, Melly thought.
Turn round, she urged in her mind, towards Reggie’s curved back. Look at me. But the brothers were lost in the wonders of the bike’s engine. Reggie didn’t even know she existed. As ever.
As she settled on the chair, near Tommy, Kevin came tearing across with a couple of his little pals and nearly charged into her.
‘Oi,’ Cissy said, comb poised at the ready. ‘Go on – shove off.’
‘Just stop getting in the way, Kev,’ Melly said. She felt scratchy and angry. Reggie, Reggie . . . His name beat like a pulse in her mind.
‘Right – I’ll put your hair up like mine.’ Cissy’s wavy ginger hair was caught up in a swinging ponytail. Melly winced as Cissy scraped the comb through her own boring old brown hair. ‘Ow – go easy. That hurts!’
‘Sorry,’ Cissy said breezily. Melly caught glimpses of her pale, freckly hands moving around her head. ‘But beauty has to bear a pinch,’ Cissy instructed. Hair and clothes were the main things Cissy seemed to think about. She leaned down and Melly felt her hot breath in her ear. ‘Hey – you fancy Reggie, don’t you?’
‘No!’ she retorted, all blushes. ‘What’re you on about?’ She didn’t ‘fancy’ Reggie. The way Cissy said it made her sound silly and crude. She barely knew what it meant to ‘fancy’ someone anyway. She felt a hero worship, a sense of looking at a higher being. She didn’t want Cissy anywhere near these feelings.
‘He’s too old for you,’ Cissy decreed. ‘He’s not gonna want a little kid like you. Wally’s much better looking, anyhow.’
Melly clamped her lips shut and sat with her face burning. Who the hell did Cissy think she was, coming and trampling all over this sweet, secret thing she felt? How did she think she knew anything anyway? At that moment she hated Cissy. Cissy didn’t care about anyone – she always did just what she wanted. She, Melly, was the one who always had to look after people.
As she sat, red-faced, her head down, she realized Tommy was shifting about in his chair.
‘You all right, Tommy?’ she said. ‘D’you need to go?’
‘Yes,’ Tommy admitted.
‘Get off me.’ She pushed Cissy away. ‘I’ve got things to do.’
‘All right,’ Cissy said. ‘There’s no need to be so mardy. Just cos I said—’
‘Just shurrit – all right?’ Melly pushed on Tommy’s chair. She felt important now, in charge of things. All her little life she had taken charge. It was what she did – keeping Mom and Dad happy; looking after Tommy.
She wheeled Tommy along to the lavs at the end of the yard. He could stand out of the chair on his turned-in feet and shuffle in to do his business, so long as he held on to something.
She waited outside, aware that Mr Gittins was only steps away from her. It was as if his uneasy presence tingled through her. She felt she ought to do something though she didn’t know what. He looked normal from behind. He was sitting on an ordinary wooden chair, positioned so that his view was mainly of his own house, number five, and an oblique view along the yard. He was another one, like Tommy, who scarcely ever ventured out on to Alma Street, let alone any further. Everyone was used to this, but now, looking at him, Melly felt very sad. Very rarely, one of his old mates came round to the house but mostly he just stayed in with Lil.
Melly moved closer to him. Stanley Gittins sat very still and seemed to be staring ahead of him, his only movements that of his right hand raising his half-smoked cigarette to his lips, nipped between finger and thumb. A broken thread of blue smoke rose from the tip of the cigarette. She ventured further. The right side of his face didn’t look too bad so far as she could see.
‘Hello,’ she said.
Stanley Gittins moved his head slightly, turning to her. He had no eyelashes. She caught a glimpse of the left side of his face and it was a strange, shiny pink. She waited, nerves on edge, for him to shout, to tell her to get lost.
But he said, ‘Hello, missy. All right, are yer?’ His voice was low and gravelly but sounded ordinary enough.
Melly was taken aback. ‘Y-yes,’ she said. ‘Ta.’
He didn’t say anything else. She stood for a moment, thinking, he’s all right with me. She had a feeling that people were all right with her. She seemed to soothe them in some way. She looked across to check whether Reggie could see her talking to Mr Gittins. She ached for him to look up. Reggie threw her the odd word now and then, but nothing more. She was just a child in his eyes, she knew. He still had his head stuck down over the bike.
There seemed nothing else to say and then she heard the door of the lav open, so she went back to fetch Tommy, feeling gratified by what had happened.
She couldn’t be bothered to be cross with Cissy any more and let her haul her hair up into a high ponytail while Cissy rattled on about her favourite subject – John Christie and Rillington Place, where all the murders had happened. Christie had gone to the gallows last month at Pentonville prison and Cissy had been full of it ever since.
‘They found his wife under the floorboards!’ she said, scraping Melly so hard with the comb that it brought tears to her eyes. ‘Ooh – and those other women hidden in the kitchen. Just think of it – getting invited inside for a cup of tea, not knowing that you’re never going to come out again!’
Just as Melly was shuddering at the thought of this, there came a loud throttling roar and the motorbike erupted into life, accompanied by loud cheers. Mo Morrison shot out of number one and across the yard, waving his arms.
‘You’ve never got it going! God Almighty – I never thought you two prats’d do it in a month of Sundays!’
‘See, Dad –’ Wally, just turned twenty, stood proud, hands on his hips, yelling over the roaring engine. ‘You owe me that pint!’
Reggie was grinning. Melly was filled with a helpless, melting feeling at the sight of him. She got up and inched closer, pretending to be interested in the bike. A second later the thing backfired like a gun going off. Everyone jumped and a terrible yell came from Mr Gittins. He leapt to his feet, his arms crossed over his chest as if he was collapsing in on himself. He crumpled forwards from the waist, howling.
‘Oh, Lor’.’ Mo went towards him. ‘Eh – Stanley . . . It’s all right, pal . . . It’s just the bike . . .’
But Stanley straightened up and fled into the house.
‘Oh, dear,’ Wally said. ‘Poor old fella.’
This put the dampers on the
boys’ triumph. Melly went up to Reggie, wanting to make it better.
‘It’s lovely,’ she said. ‘It looks ever so fast – and you’ve made it go . . .’
Reggie gave her a fleeting smile, which she folded into her heart, precious as a jewel. He would be gone again soon but at least she had this to hold on to.
‘Yeah,’ he said. He moved away immediately. ‘C’mon, Wal – let’s try her out!’
III
1954
Eight
August 1954
Rachel lay beside Danny in their attic room. Threads of moonlight seeped in through the cracks between the slates. Things scuttled about. It was a stifling night and in this room with its ceiling so low that they had to be careful not to bash their heads on the beam and with its tiny window, it was impossible to get any sort of breeze passing through. From across the yard, she could hear the grating cry of the sickly Davies baby.
Soon after the Suttons vanished, the Davies family moved in – or what remained of it. Mary Davies’s husband, a foreman in a foundry, had taken his own life, leaving her with no income and three children, one of them very young.
‘It did for him, that foundry,’ Mary told her new neighbours in her plaintive whine. ‘It ground him right down, my Bert. Sensitive sort of man, he was.’
Mary Davies was not a young woman: this had been her second marriage. Somewhere there were grown-up children. Her belly sagged and her teeth were as black-and-white as a crossword puzzle. Rachel struggled to recall the names of her children. Frankie – was it? – the eldest, was eight. There was a solid, silent girl called Carol, of about five. The babby, another boy a year or so old, seemed to do nothing but blart and Mrs Davies did a lot of shrieking.
They all felt sorry for her, but it was just that Mary Davies herself seemed enough to grind anybody down.
‘That babby again,’ she murmured to Danny. ‘What is it about that flaming house? Why can’t we get someone decent in there?’
Or better still, she thought, get out ourselves and find somewhere better than this.
Danny shifted beside her and flopped over on to his back.
‘That place is in a worse state than all the others,’ he said. ‘You gotta be desperate to move in there.’
‘There’s plenty desperate,’ Rachel said. She nearly added, I’m desperate. She longed with a passion to get out of here now, away from this stinking yard and cramped little house. None of it had mattered when the war was on, when she was young and in love. When she and Danny first had this room in the attic they had rejoiced to have a place and bed of their own. They hadn’t cared then about the leaking roof or the mildew which crept along the walls, however many times they added coats of distemper, or the bugs and silverfish scuttling along the floor. None of that was important. They were together – and after Danny went away to war, she was too busy struggling to get by with Melly as a baby.
But these days she was tired of living under Gladys’s thumb all the time on this mouldering old yard – in an ever worse state now with all the neglect of years. At least when the war was on, the right thing to do was to keep hanging on, hoping – but now what were they waiting for? Even rationing had finally ended, after they’d endured fourteen years of it, but somehow Rachel felt as though she was still waiting. She was exhausted and worn down with it all – struggling with the family, the shortages all these years. And she wanted her own house. But plenty of families were crammed in together the way they were – and worse. Two families to a back house like this sometimes, or with lodgers squeezed in. There was scarcely a place to be had anywhere, especially from the council. Bloody Hitler had seen to that.
‘God, it’s hot,’ she said. She felt dragged down and out of sorts. She blamed it on the muggy heat.
‘It’s warm, all right.’ But it didn’t seem to bother Danny. He’d had far worse in India. He reached over and she felt his hand on her breast, like a warm coal. He began fondling her nipple under her light cotton shift.
‘Danny!’ She wriggled. ‘It’s too flaming hot for all that!’
His face loomed over her. ‘Too hot? You always moan enough when it’s cold. Come on, wench . . .’
‘Danny.’ She grabbed his wrist. ‘When’re we going to try and get out of here? I’m sick of it. We’re like wasps in a bottle . . .’
‘We’re all right.’ His eyes were half closed. He was beginning to get lost in his arousal. ‘There’s plenty worse. Tell you what though . . .’ His eyes snapped open. ‘You know what we ought to do? Go to Australia. I met a bloke today, says he’s going – ten quid a ticket!’
‘Australia?’ Rachel laughed. ‘What the hell’re you on about? I bet you don’t even know where Australia is!’
‘I know where you are though, gorgeous . . .’ He ran his hand up her body. Rachel gave a low giggle, relenting. These were the times that made life worth living, she and Danny, close, in bed. Especially now Ricky was sleeping down with the others and they had the room to themselves again. She often heard other women muttering about men and their demands and what a dreadful thing it was, but she liked being with Danny like this, always had. Except that it led to babies and more babies . . .
Danny lifted her nightdress and started to reach between her legs. He shifted himself up and kissed her lips, starting to move himself on top of her.
‘Danny –’ she said, moving her mouth away. ‘You’d better pull out this time. Don’t you dare do what you did last time . . .’ She was worried, always. Not another one – please God.
‘Yeah, all right,’ he murmured, reluctant.
Despite the fact that she was the one who had to carry the babies, she felt guilty making Danny pull away at the last minute. He was young and vigorous. And she wanted it too. She felt so tense tonight, so in need of something – closeness, comfort – that she wanted to feel something lovely. To reach the peak of lovemaking, not just to walk beside him as a spectator.
He kissed her ear. ‘Sorry,’ he murmured, close to her. ‘I just want yer, that’s all.’
‘I know, but . . .’ She felt tears rising in her, trapped between the opposing needs of lovemaking and avoiding another baby. It was so easy to give Danny what he wanted. To satisfy his desires in bed. To make sure she took on all the really difficult things: looking after Tommy, always here, doing the worrying, feeling the sadness of it. Danny worked hard, of course he did, and he clowned about with Kev and Ricky, did his cartoons, played football, took Melly to the market and all that. But when it came to his eldest son, however much Danny pretended, she knew he still could not really accept him the way he was. When it came down to it, she was on her own with Tommy.
She tried not to think about where this would all end. She was the one tied to Tommy, trapped inside this jerry-built little house. Sometimes it felt as though the walls were reaching in and swallowing her up. All her young life was tied to Tommy, who despite everything she loved with a burning fierceness. But some days, when she thought about her eldest son’s future, she saw him only ever here with her. What would happen if she wasn’t here?
If she allowed herself to think about what else her own life might have held, she just wanted to break down and weep in the sheer despair and exhaustion of it all. She tried so hard not to feel sorry for herself. She knew there were people worse off. Look at Lil Gittins with Stanley. At least she, Rachel, had a healthy, able-bodied husband. But sometimes it all welled up and got on top of her. Danny never seemed troubled by any of it. He avoided the things he did not want to do or feel. But she wanted him to care about keeping her happy too, not just to keep taking from her like another child.
As Danny kissed her more slowly, taking his time at last, she began to feel the tingle of arousal. She stopped hearing the yowl of the baby across the yard and became lost in her own feelings.
Danny moved off her for a moment. ‘Take it off.’ He nodded at her shift and she sat up and lifted it over her head. In the dim light they could just see each other.
‘That’s my
girl. You’re a cracker, you are.’ His voice was warm and fond.
She was touched at him trying to woo her.
‘Come ’ere,’ she said and took him in her arms. Both of them were slender, but not skeleton thin the way they had been at the end of the war. When Danny had come home, he had been gaunt and sick from India and she had been a skinny shadow of herself from a life lived on low rations and nerves. Sometimes they joked that they could hold each other now without cutting themselves.
Danny stroked her back, kissing her deeply on the mouth, and gradually laid her down again, no longer able to wait, pushing deep into her.
‘Shhh,’ she giggled, putting a hand over his mouth as he thrust into her. Gladys and the kids were just below them. But she wanted him, pressed her hands against his strong back, the powerful spine, his flesh slick with sweat, her own pleasure eventually breaking over her so that they were both clinging and gasping together. She wept a little, released by the force of it.
In the silence, Danny licked a tear from her cheek. ‘Don’t cry,’ he said. ‘Why’re you crying?’
‘I’m not,’ she whispered. ‘Not really crying. It just happened, that’s all.’
‘Love yer, girl.’
More tears ran from her eyes. ‘Love you too, you daft bugger.’ Oh, God, I didn’t make him pull out. What if . . . ? What’re we going to do? She did want to weep then. But so many times over the years she had wanted to wail this question and she knew there was no answer. She didn’t want to spoil this moment now.
Danny slid off her, both of them slippery wet. The air cooled her skin. He settled himself beside her.
‘God, it’s warm,’ he muttered, as if he had just noticed. And she could already hear the sleep in his voice. ‘Australia – that’s where we should go . . . Start again . . .’
Rachel rolled her eyes in the dark. Danny was asleep.
Nine
October 1954
