by Dawn French
Or both.
Twelve
Cat
Saturday 8pm
Cat is concentrating on Silvia’s face. She was furious to discover a couple of scratches there when she arrived this evening, and when she heard the farcical story of stupid Jo and her stupid neighbour’s stupid dog, she could hardly believe what had been allowed to happen. In a hospital ITU! She had stern words with the nurses, who were adamant that they cannot control visitors’ errant behaviour and that despite Cat’s pleas they didn’t want to bar Jo from coming since she is, after all, Silvia’s CLOSEST RELATIVE.
That did not please Cat. Not at all.
She is now painstakingly trying to apply the delicate drawn-on eyebrows exactly as Silvia does them. It’s impossible. Silvia has been doing it for years, she is expert. It’s a matter of the slightest flick of the wrist and such a light touch. Cat is never never going to get it right for one simple reason. Although she is using the very pencil Silvia uses, it is blunt. Silvia never allows it to go blunt, because then, each hair is too thick. The secret to this trick is subtlety, artifice.
Cat is an heroic keeper of secrets, but full-strength and enduring pretence is not her strong suit. More’s the pity. If only she could hide her feelings and her temper better, she might have succeeded in many areas of her life where her pathological need to express herself has landed her in plenty of trouble. Cat can deal with almost anything in life. Except rejection or injustice. When she is confronted with either of those, she is automatically propelled into a response. Cat’s bonnet is a virtual hive of bees.
Silvia often says to her, ‘Let it go, Cat.’
Despite knowing full well that Silvia is usually right, Cat just cannot ‘let it go’. And the one thing Cat is definitely not going to let go presently, is Silvia. Silvia has changed everything. Since Cat has known her, she has become the centre of Cat’s world, and Cat is feeling severely untethered with Silvia in this state. She is trying to hold it together, but in reality, Catherine O’Brien is screaming inside.
She is lost without her Silly.
The eyebrows are dreadful, Silvia looks like an unsuccessful cross-dresser. They are too heavy and, frankly, wonky. Cat decides unwisely to attempt a lip line too, and some coral lipstick, but again her unfamiliarity with make-up doesn’t help, and the unsatisfactory result looks nothing like it does when Silvia does it. She’s even watched Silvia do it, so why is it so hard to copy?
Some of Cat’s happiest moments with Silvia have been sprawled on the bed whilst Silvia sits at her dressing table painting on her dayface and primping her gorgeous red hair. That’s when they are both relaxed, when Silly is at her most unguarded and when they yap away and share all their secrets. This is when Cat gets to know the real Silvia, the one with doubts and fears like everyone else, rather than the somewhat fearsome figure her reputation would suggest. True, that is also a side of Silvia, but it’s not the whole picture. Cat likes to think she is one of the very few, perhaps the only one who knows Silvia – the full story. Silvia is seen by everyone as an assured person, but Cat knows that by being steadily, relentlessly pushy, she has eroded some of Silvia’s confident veneer, and inveigled her way into her very core.
At the centre of Silvia, there is Cat.
One lodges within the other. Feeding.
Cat finishes the lips. Silvia looks like a latter-day Lucille Ball. The outer line is too heavy and Cat has over-emphasized the bow, making the philtrum seem freakishly small and the lips seem oddly tall, rather than full. Completely wrong. Cat has no idea how to correct it, so she leaves it, reassuring herself that Silvia would prefer some, any make-up, to none.
Then Cat moves to the bottom of the bed and, very carefully, she untucks the neat hospital corners and unpeels the bedding back from the bottom, revealing Silvia’s feet.
‘There, darlin’, you hate your feet being trapped in the bottom of the bed, doncha? Too hot, too tight. You hate that. Let your feet breathe. Much better.’
Cat takes the expensive moisturizer out of Silvia’s familiar washbag, positions her chair at the bottom of the bed, and squeezes the fresh grapefruit and mint cream into her hands. She lays her cool creamy hands on Silvia’s hot feet, and alternately, she kneads away at them, letting the moisture sink in. She puts her fingers through the toes and rubs them back and forth. Cat is starting to relax. She hopes Silvia is too, wherever she is …
‘Liking this? I think I would. Yes. I surely would. Lovely feet, Silly. Very strong but very delicate. And so … white. Feet can be so ugly, but yours really aren’t. I remember the first time I saw them. Was when I first brought you to the cottage. I loved watchin’ you see Connemara. Really see it. You’d seen nothin’ like it ever before. How couldya? There isn’t anythin’ like it. “Connemara is a state of light,” Michael Coady says, and that’s exactly right. I’d grown up with it of course, and you’re not exactly goin’ about marvelling at the light and the scenery when it’s all around you. Never noticed it to tell the truth. Noticed Mary Desmond’s new David Cassidy pencil case, and what Sinead Hogan had for her lunch, is all. Bugger the mountains and the lakes.
‘When I brought you there Silly, I saw it all through your eyes and, well, I was amazed. I’d spent so long in England just getting on with lookin’ after my patients and my husband and not really looking at anything. When I went back home with you in tow, I had my eyes opened. I saw what you saw. I saw the stony greys of the hares and the seals and the granite. The rocks, the mackerel, the bracken and the crooked cottages. The oatmeals of the dunes, the sheep and the tufts of fleece left in the barbed wire, the geese, the flapping sheets on the lines, the salty shores and the skidding clouds in the feckin’ amazing acres of blue sky. So much phenomenal sky. The greens of the moss, the grasses, the hills. Although as you said, they are often purple. And browns. Five thousand different browns on one mountain peak. And orange! And black black lakes. Frightening craters of water. Murderous, you said. I knew what you meant. Powerful water, very deep. Lots of secrets. I knew that was right. I just hadn’t thought it before. And now, when I see’em, never think anything else of course, so thanks for that!
‘Do you remember the cottage we rented, Silly? I was afraid you might find it all a bit too rustic. No heating ’cept the open burner … and brown water. Two rooms and a bathroom. Tiny. Your face was a picture, so it was. God, I was so relieved you loved it. Getting away from everythin’. That’s what you needed and for those glorious four days, that’s what we did, didn’t we? No kids, no husbands, no jobs, we didn’t belong to anyone, we were on our own isolated island of us. I loved that Sill, I really did. It was only when we were away from it all there, that I could see the bigger picture of my life in proper focus. With your help. I could see how empty it had all become, how loveless and habitual everything was. Nothing was as beautiful as us, then, there.’
Cat still massages Silvia’s feet. She doesn’t want to stop. The physical contact helps her to speak. She feels connected to Silvia and, at this particular moment, that private bond is all she longs for. Besides which, the beauty of her feet helps Cat to raise up some memories, slowly and quietly through various complicated stages of the remember sediment where they have been conveniently buried. This kind of dredging can be painful but it can also be delicious, irresistible. Today, Cat wants to recapture it. She desperately needs to.
‘I lived in the flow of your life for those few days Silly, yet you were in my old home. The calm was hypnotic, the turf in the grate, the whiskey in the glass, the books and the cosy. Just the winds making big noise outside, whistlin’ round the chimney and the door to remind us there’s wildness beyond. It’s in that sort of stillness that you get to know each other, isn’t it?
‘Remember Sil, the day we gathered all those mussels? You wore green shorts, your old school PE shorts I think you said. You’d won some running races in them. They still fitted you. Amazin’. I showed you where to look, under the seaweed, where the sunlight glints off glistenin’ rubbery s
trands, where it looks at first like a clump of mud but in fact, it’s handfuls of molluscs clingin’ on. Mostly blue shells, but some olive ones, some black, some glowy green. The lovely hollow clack of the shells as they are thrown together in the bucket where they look immediately appetizin’, and exactly as they will look when they’re cooked, except then, they will be open and hot orange, drenched in briney wine and red onion and chilli. I’ve even cooked them in vodka before but not this time. Oh the taste Sil. With big chunks of buttery bread and clumps of steamin’ spinach. Mmmm. I knew our evening was going to be a delicious one. Knew it.’
Cat finishes rubbing Silvia’s feet, and sits for a few moments looking at them, turning them carefully in her hands as if they were priceless antiques.
‘Not sure if I ever told you Sil, but I think it was these that started it all off, actually. Yes. That’s right. Your daps were wet and too slippery they wouldn’t give you any traction on the rocks where you were climbin’ awkwardly to get to the waterside, so you swore a lot, and in between laughs, ripped them off, and flung them to the shore. Then the argument between you and the rocks could at least be negotiated by the skin of your feet.
‘You were suddenly much bouncier, jumpin’ securely from rock to rock, fit as a fiddle and burstin’ with well-being. You just looked so … vital and strong. Fit. Flourishin’ fit. And I couldn’ take me eyes off these amazin’ feet. I can’t think why but somehow I’d never seen them before. So white. Long and elegant with hissing coral-red nails painted on. The audacity of it! Amongst all that nature, all the greys and greens, there they were, showin’ off with not a care in the world. Darin’ Mother Nature’s colours to top your cheeky redness. Red hair, red toenails. Long strong pale feet, clinging on to dark wet rocks. Feet that someone should write songs about, in praise of their many perfections. With lines about even toes and graceful high arches and smooth round heels. Defiant, stampin’ female feet. The feet of Athene. God, so beautiful.
‘The sight of you, wrestlin’ those mussels out of the rocks, it stirred me Sil, truly it did. It lit something in me and I couldn’t deny it. I didn’t mention it. Thought it would sound a bit weird, so I left it … ’Til later.’
Cat gently covers Silvia’s feet back up, being careful not to tuck in the sheets too tightly. She sits down, by Silvia’s side.
‘Soused with wine and whiskey and salty mussel broth, weren’t we? I was. You were. You fell asleep by the fire on the carpet. I brought the pillow for your head and a quilt to cover you for when you woke cold in the mornin’. I put all the lights off and sat watchin’ you sleep. One of your exquisite feet was pokin’ out of the quilt. I must have looked at it, at you in the firelight, for an hour at least, breathing steadily and sliding into deep deep sleep. Bit like now Sil. You miles away, me watchin’ you. Lovin’ you. I like it like this because then, like now, at least the love can flow back and forth. You can’t stop me. You didn’t stop me then. That night.
Cat leans in, whispering, ‘Did you think at first, it was happening in a hazy dream? That you thought you felt a tiny kiss on your toes? The lightest touch. That someone, that a woman, that I was under that quilt next to you, holding you and rockin’ you slowly to bring you up, up a tiny bit, out of sleep, so that you could know the pleasure of it? That each small kiss elicited a faint gasp from you, that not for one second did you resist? That you turned over and in towards me and sought out my mouth? That you invited me in, and submitted to me with moans and eyes wide open. Eyes lookin’ right into mine in the firelight. The smoothness, the softness and the salt of you. The complete happiness of making you move like that. Of making you shudder. Then watching you fall back into a panting, then breathing, then breathing slowly, sleep. Sleep. When we woke up Sil, my world was different. It was female. It was new. It was you. I was consumed with you. Still am. You know that.’
Cat is silent for a moment.
‘Remember what you said in the mornin’? That it was the whiskey? You thought in your cups that I was Ed? It was silly and a huge mistake? That was cruel Sil. Don’t call my love a mistake. Please. Ever. You destroyed me that mornin’. Killed a part of me dead. So you did. And for that Sil, I have always wanted you to have this …’
Cat stands by the bed, and, raising her hand high, brings it down sharply, and slaps Silvia’s face hard, leaving a furious red welt.
She puts on her coat.
And leaves.
Thirteen
Winnie
Sunday 10am
Winnie is bustling about in Silvia’s room, completing her first checks of the day. She always tries to keep this part of her nursing as quick and efficient as possible. Two years ago when she was in wards with responding patients, she was proud of the feedback she had about exactly this part of her job. She would receive cards and letters and presents with tags proclaiming the like of ‘to Winnie the wonderful’, and ‘thank you for the best nursing we’ve ever witnessed, a genuine Florence Nightingale’ and ‘thanks for looking after our Dad with the same loving care you’d give your own’.
Well, huh. That’s not quite true. But great that they thought it was.
If Winnie’s father was ill, Winnie would at this moment in life make a point of visiting him just to be sure he was suffering enough. She shudders at quite how unchristian that thought is, but Winnie’s God is a merciful and loving God who has looked into her heart and knows the tribulation she carries there concerning her father, so she feels entitled to a degree of healthy, guilt-free hatred.
Winnie likes to speak to her patients exactly as if they could respond, and so she gives a running commentary about what she’s doing. She pulls back the side sheets of Silvia’s bed, so that she can get to the arterial line entering her groin which monitors her blood pressure and is also used to take samples of arterial blood to analyse oxygen levels. She notices with annoyance that the line is slightly twisted, having been caught in the side bars of the bed rather awkwardly.
‘Eh, eh! A wa dis?! Chu. Aw. Sorry Silvia dats not right for you. Musta bin pyainful, yes? Sorry. Sorry. I’ll mek sure Nurse Helen check it last ting tonight. She should do it every night, every night last checks. See it deh, mi fix it now. Straight, I turn it yahso. Evryting else look good here, your colour better today. Not so grey more pinky. Dat good. Just check de heart monitor pads still stickin. Yes. Good. And tek your pulse. You mus be fed up wid alla dis, Silvia, I h’understand sista, but we got to do it, while you still so mash up and weak. We got to get yu strong.’
Winnie makes up her own ditty to accompany her duties while she washes Silvia. She is amusing herself as she invents it, and she hopes somewhere that her patient is amused too.
Silvia brok ’er head
Silvia brok ’er head
Silvia brok ’er head
But Silvia nah go dead
Winnie wash ’er bum
Winnie wash ’er bum
Winnie wash ’er bum
But … er …Winnie not her Mum. He! He!
She’s pon di road to well
She’s pon di road to well
She’s pon di road to well
But … Sista Jo can go to hell … Ha! Ha!
Sista Jo, she mek mi vex
Sista Jo, she mek mi vex
Sista Jo, she mek mi vex
Obeah man, give she hex! … He! He!
Winnie is helpless with laughter now snorting and giggling, she has to stop for a moment to recover.
‘Sorry Silvia, but dat sister o’ yours she pyure crazy, she mean well but she a fool, she a drive mi to mad an’ back wid all her blouse an’ skirtery. Oh well we see wat she bring next, yes? Maybe dis time it’s a h’elephant, eh?!! He! He! Dere. Tink you done now, Silvia. Nice an’ clean. Ready to greet a whole new day. We hope it a good one fi you. I hope de Lord deliver you a whole heap of peace, so your poor tired body can mend. Burdens an’ hardships there may be but we have hope an’ the sun still shines. Oooo look pon di time, mi late now fe Mrs Wilson, but y’know she fas asleep too, like you,
so she won’t mind too much. Later. Mi gone.’
She bustles out.
Silvia is alone.
Fourteen
Cassie
Sunday 11am
Winnie almost crashes into the young redhead as she bundles out of the door of Suite 5. Cassie was trying to peer in through the glass window in the door. She still hasn’t fully committed to the idea of going in and doesn’t want to be persuaded by anyone else. She’s in that tempting place where she could abandon the whole idea and leave without any further need to feel anything. She can just turn and go, and she won’t be forced to think differently. She will continue to feel as she does right now. Utterly bereft. But she’s used to that incendiary mixture of pain and confusion. It’s become her friend in a way, and a method to escape from every tricky situation and every difficult decision.
When your mother turns you out of home at sixteen, a week after you tell her you are pregnant, it’s the killer excuse for every mistake you make thereafter. Absolutely nothing is your fault because, how could anyone survive that cruel rejection? And so young! She’s survived a lot more since then. That considerable spurning was the fountain from which so much further trouble sprang.
Cassie remembers it all as if it were two moments ago. In fact, it was two million moments ago, but the stinging pain of it is fresh and raw.
‘You’ve made your choices, Cassandra, mostly against my advice, and now you will have to deal with the consequences,’ Silvia had said to her that day. ‘It’s not wise for you to remain here. The house is being sold, we all have to find somewhere … better … somewhere … else to be. I’m sorry it’s like this but life is a total bitch sometimes. Now is one of those times.’
