by Chloe Mayer
‘Please! Please!’ I tried to push my way out. ‘I was just joking about the stories, I’m sorry! Please!’ But they were laughing and laughing as they kept me trapped.
Eventually, I realised I had to stop begging because that was making them worse.
‘All right,’ I called through the door, forcing myself to step back and stand in the dark. ‘All right.’
I squeezed my eyes shut and thought of my fairy stories for help. Maybe I could make the magic world surround me in here and keep me safe. But the magic wasn’t strong enough that day and I knew if I opened my eyes I’d still be standing in the dirty, smelly outhouse in the playground. I thought of Hansel, who was kept locked in a cage by an evil witch. Gretel used her wits to kill the witch and save her brother, so maybe I could come up with a plan too. As I thought about Hansel and tried to come up with my own ideas for how to escape, my breathing and heartbeat started to slow down and I began to feel calmer.
One by one, they must have grown bored with having to lean against the door and gradually drifted away. After a while, I could tell there was no one there, and I slipped out and went and sat on my own in the corner of the playground where no one would see me.
7
‘I forbid you to go into that little room, for if you do, my anger will know no bounds.’
From Bluebeard
The news had thrown her into a panic: Reggie was coming home on leave for a twenty-four-hour visit.
Annabel wished she’d had more than a few days’ notice. Weren’t these things usually planned some time in advance? She was sure his previous visits were. In any case, there was now a tremendous amount to do and she was desperately trying to prepare the house for his arrival.
The upstairs seemed to have got a bit out of control. There were magazines and newspapers lying slumped where they’d fallen, and piles of laundry and dirty cups and plates on the landing and by the side of her bed.
It wasn’t so much what Reggie thought; but his visit meant his parents had booked a room above the Royal Oak in the village so they could see as much of their son as possible – and they could never resist a snoop.
Annabel hadn’t gone into Reggie’s study even once since his last leave – the room had doubled as his bedroom since the boy was born – so luckily there was no work to do in there apart from a quick dusting. The room smelled a bit stale, and the sheets could probably do with changing, but she opened the window wide to the sunshine, deciding the fresh air would do the job for her just as well.
Heading downstairs, she grabbed a pile of papers in the hall and dumped them by the grate in the sitting room, to burn later in the evening.
My goodness, but all this housework was exhausting. A little rest and pick-me-up was what she needed. She poured herself some gin and sat in her armchair to catch her breath with a soothing cigarette. She inhaled deeply and tried to decide how she felt as she expelled the smoke with a sigh.
The boy was obviously delighted, but it would be strange having Reggie back in the house. While she worked hard to maintain the look of the house outside – diligently picking up stray magnolia petals from the lawn, and keeping the downstairs tidy on the remote off-chance of unexpected visitors – she was able to be much more relaxed in other areas. And she liked that she didn’t have to get up and get dressed or clean the house if she didn’t feel like it. In some ways, she felt she was finally getting the rest she’d been desperate for ever since the boy was born.
She stood up and crossed to the bureau to pull out a pile of Reggie’s letters. The thin envelopes were battered and creased from their journeys, but they were probably no more damaged than when they’d arrived because she didn’t tend to look at them again after the first reading.
Settling back in her armchair, with her cigarette still smouldering between the first two fingers of her right hand, she fanned the letters out across her lap. It was hard even to visualise her husband. What had it been – eighteen months since the last visit? Perhaps, if she re-read a few letters while she finished her cigarette, it would help remind her of him.
She selected a letter from the back of the pile, one of the older ones, when he’d still been training at Invicta Lines, the barracks in Maidstone. She noticed there was a note for Daniel tucked inside – she must have forgotten to give it to him.
20th May, 1940
Dear Annabel,
How are you and Daniel? Both well I hope? I’m absolutely fine so you mustn’t worry about me. The food isn’t very good, but I mustn’t grumble!
It’s been very busy. Quite tiring – all this physical work is a bit of a shock to the system after the bank!
I hope you’re well?
I’m not sure when they’ll be shipping us out although there are rumours it’ll be next month. They’re still training us up. It’s strange to know how to use a gun; we’ve been doing lots of target practice and all that.
Sharing a room with the fellows in my unit almost makes me feel as though I’m at boarding school all over again. Although some of the men here have strong working-class accents so that’s a little bit different! They’ve given me some good-natured ribbing because I pronounce all my Ts and Hs! Ha ha! But they’re all very nice chaps, the lot of them. It’s been surprisingly fun, considering the seriousness of our occupation.
I received a letter from my parents. They said they’ve been to see you. Have you sent any letters? I know it hasn’t been very long since I left, but I haven’t heard from you.
Mother said you seemed well. How’s Daniel? I hope you’re getting on all right with the cooking. You were always a better cook than me, so I hope you’re enjoying it again. Are you still reading to him? I know he likes that. I’ve enclosed a letter for you to read to him.
Please write back so I know you’re well.
Love, Reggie.
20th May, 1940
Dear Daniel,
How have you been, old man? Being good for Mother? It’s very exciting being a soldier – just like the games we play together. I’m a real soldier now, and I’m officially called Private Reginald Patterson of the Royal West Kent Regiment. When I get back – I’m sure I’ll have a visit soon – I’ll tell you all about it. I’ll teach you the tricks of the trade!
I miss you very much but it’s important to be a man and serve your country. So I want you to be a big boy – after all, you’ll be starting primary school soon – and be a man at home.
It would be marvellous if you could draw me a nice picture of you, me and Mother. I’d like that very much. Love, Daddy.
Annabel replaced the letters in the envelope. There was no point giving Daniel a letter that was now years out of date. She’d given him all the others.
She read a couple more letters then pulled another from the pile. This one had been written a few years after he was first sent to join the fighting. She remembered reading it and recalled it was different from the others; the tone had changed, and Reggie had written in a tiny, cramped hand to use up all the available space on the paper. She remembered not quite knowing what to make of it at the time.
8th June, 1943
Dear Annabel,
I don’t think all your letters are getting through, because it’s been a while since I heard from you.
Things can be hard here and I like to hear about the two of you safe and well in Bambury. I miss it!
I worry when I don’t hear from you for so long. I know you’ve been doing really well without me though, and I’m very proud of you. I was so worried about you when I had to leave that first time to go off for training – you seemed so anxious at the thought of me not being there.
It was terrible when we had to say goodbye at the train station, wasn’t it? I think about that day a lot. That was the last time I was an ordinary civilian in ordinary clothes and I still didn’t know what being a soldier would really involve.
I’d imagined us saying a quiet goodbye, but instead there were hundreds and hundreds of other soon-to-be soldiers packed on that con
course with their families. It was chaos, and I wonder if you noticed the feeling in the air that I did then – that emotional but somehow festive atmosphere feeding off the crowds of parents, wives and children waving goodbye to the men.
I almost regretted saying goodbye to Mother and Father at our house that morning – it would have been nice to have a little group with me as well. But they were probably right that Daniel might’ve become too upset when he realised I was leaving. As it was I don’t think he realised the significance at all, do you? He just let me kiss him and cuddle him as normal, as if I were off to work. He was only five though, which is very young, and maybe that’s a blessing.
I saw your eyes watering, Annabel, as the train was announced ready to depart – everyone suddenly hugging and crying around us. There was that couple who kissed right on the lips, remember, in front of everybody! You looked so shocked. I don’t think either of us quite knew how to say goodbye.
I think about you in your pretty cream hat, clutching your handkerchief in one hand and your handbag in the other. You looked so stricken that day, and so very young.
That was the moment I felt frightened about leaving you. I was suddenly afraid you might not be able to look after yourself and Daniel without me there making sure everything ticked along. I was worried poor Daniel wouldn’t understand and he’d keep asking for me and that might upset you even more.
I wanted to say: ‘Give him time – he is such a wonderful little boy, you’ll see. You two will end up as thick as thieves without me there!’ But that busy platform didn’t seem the place to say any of this.
I miss him so much though. It’s so easy for me to love him and sometimes I wonder if other men feel like this about their children, because the chaps here don’t really talk about those sorts of things. I remember you told me once you didn’t feel a thing for him. This was when he was just a couple of months old. I’m sure you’re horrified now that you could ever think such a thing, but it’s the sort of remark you can’t forget hearing. And I wonder perhaps if hearing that has made me attempt to make up for it with Daniel somehow.
I’m sorry if this hurts you Annabel, but I panicked at the station because I suddenly thought you could very well fall back into the state you’d been in after you first had him. How could I help, and step in to look after our son, if I was miles away without knowing what was going on?
In the end, I settled for a friendly squeeze of your arm. ‘There, there,’ I think I told you. ‘It’ll be all right.’
But your mouth was quivering and your eyes were full.
‘I can’t do it,’ you said, and I remember your voice cracking at the end. ‘I won’t manage.’
‘It’ll be fine.’ I said that more loudly than I’d intended. I didn’t mean to be brusque, Annabel.
They made that final tannoy call just then so I couldn’t put things right and then we both looked away, back over to the train, and the crowd was pushing past us as everyone started rushing. Then I squeezed your arm again and had to leave you standing there on the platform and get on the train. I pushed my way over to the window – I wanted to wave to you like all the other men were waving – but I couldn’t find you. Maybe you left, maybe it was too upsetting for you – it’s all right.
All the men were pushed up against the glass waving and calling out as the train started to move forward, but I went and found a good seat and sat down to have a smoke. I was the only one sitting down at that moment in the whole carriage. It hit me that I was leaving and it’s embarrassing to admit it but my own eyes nearly watered. I realised you hadn’t told me to be careful or anything like that. You didn’t seem very worried about me. But there I was, so afraid about what would happen to you. You and Daniel.
Well, it’s been three years and I know you’ve done a marvellous job so I needn’t have worried so. It’s just that when so long passes without a letter from you, all those fears I had that day in Waterloo Station come rushing back. Can you understand that, Annabel?
And it’s not just that I’m worried about you both – I’m not trying to check up on you as such – your letters help give me a lift too.
Please write to me soon.
Love, Reggie
Annabel stubbed out her cigarette in the ashtray on the table next to her and folded the letter away out of sight in its envelope.
None of his letters before or afterwards were like that. There was something a bit, well, distasteful about it, really – all that emotion laid bare on the page. And the censor would have seen that! She shook her head in embarrassment, on Reggie’s behalf and her own.
She was unable to remember how she had responded. Most likely she had, when she got around to it, written some assurances – nothing too emotional – insisting that everything was perfectly all right. It was irritating how Reggie – just like his parents and hers – seemed to assume she was completely incompetent.
In fact, she had still been at the station when Reggie’s train had left; she’d had to run to compose herself in the ladies’ on the concourse before beginning her journey back to Bambury alone.
But she was proud of herself for not openly crying out there in the throng. She had looked quite steadily, she thought, into Reggie’s handsome face – his bright blue eyes and neat brown moustache suddenly familiar and reassuring.
When she was on the Tube heading to Victoria, to catch the train to Densford where she’d change again, her eyes began to well up once more so she turned her face to the window and pulled her hat down a little to cover her eyes from the other passengers. She stared at her reflection for a minute or two and then let her eyes unfocus slightly so that she could see through her face in the glass to the black tunnel behind it.
Reggie was the planet she and the child circled around like moons – his orbit the cohesive force binding them into at least a semblance of a family.
When Annabel returned home after seeing him off it was just after half past eleven in the morning. She took a deep breath to compose herself before going inside.
She concentrated on the details of the dark green paint of the front door – it was starting to chip around the little stained-glass window at the top. She would have to arrange for a workman to come and repaint it. She would write the task down on a piece of paper and then accomplish it. She would go around the house checking for anything else that needed to be done. That didn’t sound too daunting. Perhaps she needn’t have been so worried about Reggie’s absence after all. This might actually be a strangely liberating experience.
But as she stepped over the threshold and automatically wiped her feet a couple of times on the rough bristles of the coconut mat, the familiar sights and smells of the house rushed at her to remind her how useless she was. She wouldn’t contact a handyman and arrange for him to do odd jobs.
Reggie’s parents were waiting for her in the sitting room and she could tell they’d just stopped speaking when they’d heard the door opening.
‘Hello, dear,’ Moira called.
‘I’ll be with you in a minute,’ she said, as she unpinned her hat in front of the hall mirror.
She smoothed down her hair, took another breath, checked her face again to ensure the ugly red tear stains had disappeared, then hung her hat on the coat stand along with her mac and went to join her parents-in-law.
‘Hello, Mother!’ Daniel said, looking up from where he sat on the rug pushing some brightly coloured wooden blocks around.
‘Here you are!’ Moira said, as she and Bill stood up from the sofa to greet her.
Moira strode over to clasp Annabel in an awkward embrace for a second or two before she thought better of it. She took a step back and turned slightly to watch Daniel who had returned to his game.
‘Reggie got off all right, then?’ Bill asked.
‘Yes, yes,’ she said. ‘He’s on his way now.’
‘Ah, good. That’s that then.’
They all fell silent, and Annabel couldn’t think how to break the awkwardness. Reggie had alway
s been there to take charge as a sort of intermediary.
‘We were just about to have a cup of tea when you arrived,’ Bill said, gesturing down to the tea tray on the coffee table in front of him.
‘Oh, lovely …’
No one had sat back down and she wasn’t sure if they were waiting for her to invite them to, since they were guests in her house. But they’d been here before she even arrived so perhaps she should wait for them to offer her a chair? She remembered hearing the pair of them plotting with Reggie to have her committed to an asylum.
‘I’ll fetch you a cup, dear,’ Moira said, and Annabel stepped further into the room so Moira could get past her to go to the kitchen.
She could smell her overpowering lavender perfume as she passed; her mother-in-law made it herself and was always giving little bottles to Annabel which she threw away.
Tea! That’s what Annabel should have done. She should have offered to make them a drink as soon she got in. She’d already let Moira down by failing this small test.
Her father-in-law sat down again while Annabel perched on the armchair, wringing her fingers.
The boy turned to look up at her. ‘Look what I made!’
Annabel saw he was pointing to a cube made out of the blocks.
‘It’s a castle. I made it.’
Having Bill watching the exchange made Annabel feel even more awkward than she usually did around the child.
‘Yes,’ she tried to say brightly and even attempted a smile.
‘It’s a castle,’ Daniel said again. ‘I’m the king.’
‘And a very fine one it is too, young man,’ said his grandfather. ‘Why don’t you build something else to show us what you can do? Hmmm, a right little architect, aren’t you?’
Daniel nodded and began to scoop up the scattered bricks.
