‘Well, you look beautiful. No more beautiful than when you don’t have hair, but . . .’
He pauses and she wonders whether he is trying to work out how to pull that remark back to the compliment she knows it was meant to be.
‘. . . but differently beautiful. I’ve always thought you have a beautiful head, as you know, but now you look . . .’ His eyes flick over her head and face again. He smiles. ‘You know, I think that hair makes you look pretty as well as sexy. I don’t know many women who can do that.’
‘God, you are such a flatterer! Keep it up.’
He laughs and looks down at the chickens, who crowd around his feet as if they’re pleased to see him too. ‘Hello, girls,’ he murmurs. Then he bends down to pick up his backpack again. ‘So, what’s new?’
‘Quite a lot, actually. Come on, let’s go over and get some coffee. I’ll tell you all about it.’
*
When Eleanor finishes speaking, Dylan sighs. ‘I don’t know what to say. You’re brave, taking all that on.’
‘Either brave or stupid.’
‘You know, growing up without parents is shit, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, but when I hear about people having to put their lives on hold—’
‘I don’t have to.’
‘You know what I mean. At least that’s something I’ll never have to worry about. I was so young when my grandad died that no one expected me to take any responsibility anyway.’
Eleanor puts a hand out and squeezes his arm. ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t moan. You had it much tougher than I did.’
‘Not really. I had a few rough years, but it taught me to look after myself. Anyway, do you think you’ll actually move back? Aren’t there special homes where—’
‘Yes, but not until it gets a lot worse. She wants to stay in her own home for as long as possible.’
‘Understandable, I suppose. But does she need you down there full time?’
‘Maybe not full time, not yet. But I think I feel like . . . like this is it.’ She drains her coffee cup and turns to him. ‘It’s my last chance, Dylan. She’s losing her mind, basically. So I need to try and, not put things right, exactly, but maybe talk about it all for once; make some sort of connection before it goes completely.’
‘How long?’
‘It’s still coming and going at the moment, but it’ll get worse over time. They say she’d probably had it for quite a while before she was even diagnosed, and that was nearly four years ago.’
He looks thoughtful for a moment. ‘Bit ironic, isn’t it? Your mum losing her memory when she was so keen for you to lose yours.’
‘It is, isn’t it?’ I sometimes wonder whether she’s aware of that herself.’ She sighed. ‘It was always so simple with her – forget it ever happened; if you don’t think about it, it can’t hurt. Talk about burying your head in the sand.’
‘I suppose it’s not that unusual, is it? And when you think about it, you may have repressed that memory anyway, even without that quack and his screwed-up ideas.’
‘Yes, that’s possible, I suppose. I used to be so angry about it. When I was younger, I used to think it would serve her right if she lost her memory. But you grow up, don’t you? And it wouldn’t change anything; what happened, happened whether we remember it or not.’
*
Later, as they lie in bed with the early evening sunshine pouring through the window and bathing the room in a golden glow, he runs his fingers ever so gently through her new hair. ‘Funny how things change, isn’t it? And odd that it’s happening to both of us at the same time, given how we’ve both managed to avoid much responsibility up until now.’
‘It’s a bit different, though, isn’t it? You’re going off to Italy to do the thing you love.’
‘Not quite. It’s not real art – most of my designs will probably end up on wallpaper. But I take your point; I’ve got the better deal. I suppose what I meant was, we’re both moving on, both finally doing grown-up things instead of . . .’ He looks at her. ‘Sorry.’
She smiles. ‘Don’t apologise. You’re right. I’ve avoided being grown-up, too. And for far too long. You’re still young enough for it to be reasonable. I’m . . .’
‘Not exactly ancient.’
‘But definitely old enough to know better.’
‘Eleanor,’ he turns to face her; he looks serious. ‘You will come out and see me, won’t you? No strings, just . . . you know, it was weird last summer, not seeing you. Made me think. Do you realise that apart from last year and that year I was ill, we’ve spent every summer together? Sometimes the autumns as well? We’ve probably spent more time together over the last thirteen years than a lot of married couples.’
She laughs at the comparison. ‘Possibly.’ At one time, when she was a teenager, she just assumed she’d be part of a married couple one day, and then she’d have children. Two, or maybe three. She sits up and swings her legs over the edge of the bed before the sadness can engulf her. ‘Come on, lazybones. We need to get over to the house for dinner.’
Marjorie, November 1972
Marjorie stood in front of the dressing table, wishing she hadn’t drunk so much gin with Peggy last night. It was a good job Eleanor was away with the Brownies – she couldn’t have coped with her today. It wasn’t fair that Ted got smashed on whisky night after night without any ill effects, while the one time she allowed herself to get a bit tipsy she ended up feeling awful all day. She looked at her reflection; she hated how the three mirrors showed her from different angles so she was forced to see herself as others saw her. Ted used to say she was beautiful, but he couldn’t possibly think that now. Something had happened to her face, making her look permanently cross. She had no figure to speak of; she’d never had a particularly big bust, but she’d lost weight over these last four years and now she was virtually flat-chested. Her neck was too long, and her face too sharp and angular. Ted was due in a few minutes, and although she’d applied some mascara and a little lipstick, she lost her nerve now, grabbed a paper handkerchief and wiped off the lipstick, which was too pearly anyway and didn’t suit her.
She recognised the distinctive sound of Ted’s Hillman Imp pulling up outside. She sprinted across the room and switched the light off because she didn’t want to let him in down here, where he’d have to walk past the bedroom. She hurried upstairs and along to the main front door. He still had his key, but so far he hadn’t used it and she was grateful.
‘Tea?’ She said as he drew out a chair and sat at the kitchen table. He’d shaved, she noticed, and his hair looked recently trimmed. She could smell Vosene shampoo.
‘Please.’ He took out a pack of Senior Service, put one out for Marjorie and lit his own.
‘Thanks,’ she said, picking it up after she’d set the teapot down and leaning towards him for a light. Things felt almost normal. It was quiet, the silence broken only by the sound of a slow drip plopping into the bowl of water she’d left in the sink. The washer in the cold tap must have gone again. Perhaps she could ask Ted to fix it.
‘So,’ he said, ‘what are we going to do, Marjorie?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What the hell do you think I mean?’
She realised it sounded simplistic. ‘Well, do you mean about the immediate future, or do you—’
‘That would be a start.’
She sighed. ‘Ted, you sound so cold.’
‘What do you expect?’
He looked more sad than angry. She lowered her eyes. ‘Sorry.’
‘Look,’ he ran his hand through his hair, ‘I’ll say my bit first, then you say yours, all right?’
She nodded.
‘What I want is to move back in here to be with you and Ellie. I know I’ve done wrong, Marjorie, but we’ve been over that again and again; I’ve apologised until I’m blue in the face.’
She sighed. ‘I know you have, Ted.’
‘I don’t know what else I can do. I hate this, stuck living at my mother’s like
a flaming teenager, seeing my daughter for a few hours a week. I want to come back, Marjorie.’ There was a catch in his voice. ‘I don’t like sleeping in a single bed.’
‘I see. It’s all about bed again, is it?’
He rolled his eyes. ‘Of course it isn’t.’ He stubbed his cigarette out and immediately took another from the pack, then offered one to Marjorie. She shook her head. ‘You know,’ he said after he’d lit the cigarette, ‘maybe it is about bed. After all, that’s why we’re in this mess, isn’t it? I went to bed with someone else. I shouldn’t have, and I didn’t plan it, but . . . It was one time, Marjorie. One miserable, lonely time in four years. Did you realise it’s been that long?’
‘Of course I realise how long it’s been. Do you think the date isn’t etched on my memory?’
‘I meant since we—’
‘Same thing,’ she snapped.
He sighed. ‘I know you’ll never get over it properly; I don’t suppose I will, either. But you have to carry on living, not only for my sake, but for yours as well. And Eleanor’s. She needs you too, you know. And you can’t go on blaming her.’
‘I don’t blame her; truly I don’t. It’s just . . .’ Just what? She couldn’t even analyse it herself, but she knew what he was getting at. She knew she hadn’t mothered Eleanor properly since that day. Perhaps it was that she no longer felt she had the right to be a mother.
‘I want to come back, Marjorie. But I can’t live as though we’re . . .’ He looked around as if the words he wanted might be written on one of the walls. ‘Companions.’ He said it with distaste. ‘I want to come back as your husband.’
‘By which I suppose you mean sex.’
‘Why do you say it as if it’s something wrong? Something dirty?’ He looked at her for a moment, then he banged his fist on the table. ‘Christ, Marjorie. It’s not normal.’ He stood up roughly, knocking the table so that the tea spilled into the saucers. ‘You’re not bloody normal.’
She saw the instant regret on his face, but it was too late, he’d said it, and the comment scared her because she could feel it setting her free to say whatever she wanted; she could shout now, insult him, hurt him – anything goes. It was as exhilarating as it was terrifying. ‘You say I’m not normal, but what about you?’ she yelled. ‘How normal can it be for you to put your animal pleasures above everything else?’
‘You know that isn’t true.’
‘But you’ve just said—’
‘I’ve tried to comfort you. I’ve tried so bloody hard, but you won’t have it, will you? You don’t want to be comforted. Well, maybe that’s why I turned to Jeannette.’ He appeared to be trying to control his temper, but his voice was getting louder. ‘She was upset and she let me comfort her. And do you know what? It felt good. Yes, I know you don’t want to hear this, but you can’t keep putting your hands over your ears like a child. You’re going to bloody listen this time. It felt absolutely bloody marvellous to have a woman’s arms around me, to feel the warmth of human flesh for the first time in years. My God, I don’t know how it didn’t happen sooner.’ He turned away from her and muttered, ‘I need a drink.’
She stood in the middle of the kitchen, his words lapping around her. For some reason she suddenly became acutely conscious of her breathing and the beating of her heart; proof that she was alive. So why couldn’t she feel it? Ted went into the dining room and she heard him wrench open the sideboard door. He came back holding the bottle of whisky she’d forgotten was there.
As she looked at him, images flashed through her mind: the way they’d once danced together, winning trophies because they were so perfectly in sync that it seemed as though they weren’t even consciously moving their own bodies; the softness in his eyes as he slipped the gold band on her finger; the tear on his cheek when he held Eleanor for the first time; the way he’d beamed when she told him she was expecting again. It was all a lifetime ago. Now his face bore deep grooves; his mouth was turned down and his whole body looked weary.
‘You know,’ Ted put a tumbler on the table and half filled it, then screwed the cap back on the bottle and sat down. ‘At one point, when I was with Jeannette, I tried to imagine it was you who was holding me.’ He took a big gulp of his drink and then gave a sour laugh. ‘Can you imagine that? Can’t be many men who fantasise about their wives when they’re with someone else.’ His smile was bitter. ‘What a lousy adulterer.’ He took another mouthful. ‘All I’ve ever asked is for you to let me in, to let me love you, properly, like a man should be able to love his wife.’ He finished the whisky in one more gulp. ‘Jeannette was only doing what a wife is supposed to do.’
The room was silent apart from that insistent drip, the sound much louder than it should have been.
A thought rolled into her mind quite suddenly: the idea that she could forgive him, that she could still stop all this if she tried. All she had to do, she realised, was to walk across the room, put her arms around him and tell him that she loved him. If she could only go to him now and tell him that she understood, that things would change and she would be able to give herself to him again one day . . . She tried to make herself take a step towards him, make herself speak, even, or move, or something. But it was as if she was frozen as she stood there, feeling the opportunity seep away and knowing it was too late.
Eleanor, summer 1982
‘Mum, whose baby is it?’ she repeated, surprised at her own bravery. Any minute now she would get told off for looking through her mum’s stuff, but she had to know if she was right.
Her mum held the photo. She was chewing her lower lip and a tear spilled out of her eye and dropped down her cheek.
‘Is it . . . was it ours?’
‘Peter. His name was Peter.’ Her mother put her fist up to her mouth but a sob escaped anyway. Then she turned away to pull a tissue from the box on the sideboard. She held it to her face briefly, then blew her nose and turned back to Eleanor. ‘He died. He was eight months old.’ She turned away again, plucked out another tissue and mopped at her eyes.
‘But Mum, why . . . I mean, what did he die of?’
Her mum stared at her, and for a moment she thought maybe she hadn’t heard her correctly, that he hadn’t died. But then her mum shook her head. ‘He wasn’t very well.’ She sighed. ‘I’m sorry, darling, but I’d really rather not talk about it any more.’ And with that, she walked out of the room.
Eleanor followed her into the kitchen. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ She could hear the undercurrent of anger in her voice. Of course she understood that it was upsetting; it must be terrible to lose a baby, but surely she had a right to know? He was her brother, after all.
‘Eleanor . . .’ Her mum looked at her, then her eyes flicked away again. ‘Hang on.’ She rummaged in her handbag and pulled out her cigarettes and lighter.
The little tortoiseshell cat from up the road was lying in a patch of sunshine on the veranda. Sometimes, if the French doors were open, the cat would come in and purr vigorously while she stroked it. She wished she could open the doors now. Her mum lit her cigarette and drew on it, her face turned away. Her shoulders were shaking. After a minute or so, she took a deep, shuddering breath and turned back to Eleanor. ‘We . . . your dad and I, we thought it would be for the best if . . . Well, talking about it couldn’t change anything, and sometimes it’s not good to . . . I don’t know, dwell on things, I suppose.’
‘But—’
‘Eleanor, I just can’t talk about it now. I have a terrible headache and I need to lie down.’ She stubbed her cigarette out, sighed and went out of the room, closing the door firmly behind her.
*
If only Peggy were here; but she and Ken were visiting Michael in Bristol, where he was at university, so it would be a week before Eleanor could ask her anything. In the picture, which her mother now had in her handbag, the baby looked tiny, and her mum had said that Peter was eight months old when he died, so Eleanor must have been four at the time. The photo was proof that she had one d
ay sat next to her mother in the living room, smiling at her baby brother and holding his hand. In her efforts to remember more, she felt as though she was physically squeezing her brain, but the harder she tried, the more her brain rebelled, feeling emptier every time she tried to conjure up a memory.
It was a few days later when she was ambling home through Ladywell Rec that an image jumped into her head from nowhere. A pram with a shiny ivory-coloured base and a dark hood parked out in the hallway; it had big silvery wheels, and there was a yellow chick hanging on a ribbon from the fringed hood. She tried to bring more from that memory, but nothing would come. Then one morning, early, and before she was properly awake, she had a vivid recollection of seeing her mother standing next to a wooden cradle, rocking it to and fro and looking anxious. Was the baby inside crying? She wasn’t sure, because the scene evaporated as she became fully conscious, like dreams do, only she knew this wasn’t a dream.
Sometimes, when she was thinking about something else entirely, a fragment, a glimpse of something not quite formed, would skip through her brain but it never stayed there long enough for her to read it properly. Her memories of the time before she started school had always been poor, whereas she knew quite a few people who claimed to remember things that happened when they were tiny. Ray said he could remember his first day at nursery – he’d have been three and a half, according to his mum. And his mum said she could remember being three, as well. Her family lived in the country in the thirties, and she remembered her older brother taking her by the hand and leading her to the end of the garden where he had something to show her. He’d pointed to an enamel bucket with a lid and told her to look inside. When she raised the lid, she’d wondered for a moment what the black things bobbing around in the water were, then her brother lifted out one of the dead kittens to show her. Eleanor was horrified, but Ray’s mum said it was only the first of several litters she saw drowned. It had to be done, she said; it was something you got used to.
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