by Maureen Lee
'Don't talk so stupid.' Marie's grey eyes blazed. 'If I'd ken precautions, I wouldn't be up the bloody stick, ould I? Anyroad, where the hell was I supposed to get recautions from?'
'It's no good getting stroppy with me,' Annie said in a urt voice. 'I only want to help.'
'I'm sorry,' Marie muttered.
If only it weren't such a horrible day! It was still hot. Lit the sky was black and heavy, as if there was going ) be a storm. The light was on, but the dim bulb behind le dark yellow shade made the room look even more liserable and depressing.
As if Marie had read her thoughts, she said, 'I hate lis room, I hate this house and I hate this street. I went ito another girl's bedroom once, and it was full of ictures of film stars: Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly and lontgomery Clift. This place stinks.'
Annie, sitting crosslegged on the bed, began to fiddle ith the eiderdown, feeling at a loss. Marie's attitude '^as so belligerent, as if the whole thing were Annie's lult. Perhaps she should have done more to protect her ster, she thought guiltily.
Thunder rumbled in the distance, and seconds later le room was lit by a brilliant flash of lightning, allowed by another and another.
'We've got to sort this out today, Marie,' Annie said rmly. 'I take it you don't intend to have the baby?' A hild would be the last thing Marie wanted. She was ttle more than a child herself.
She was surprised when Marie's hard expression 3ftened. 'I wish I could,' she said longingly. 'I'd love a aby of me own, someone to love and love me back, here's no way I'd be like themV She gestured at the
door as if their mam and dad were outside. 'But I'm only thirteen, I couldn't stand living in one of them homes for unmarried mothers.' Her voice became harsh. 'I suppose I'll just have to get rid of it, though apart from having hot baths and drinking loads of gin, which doesn't usually work, I haven't a clue how to go about it.'
An abortion! Annie hated the very word. It actually sounded cruel, and so very final. 'Neither have I,' she said. 'We could ask Dot.-*'
Marie shook her head. 'Once Dot's had a good yell and called me all the names under the sun, she'll be all right, but she won't help get rid of it. Some woman from down the street had an abortion and Dot hasn't spoken to her since. She'd offer to bring the baby up, that's all.'
'Perhaps that would be the best solution,' Annie said hopefully.
'No!' Marie said vehemently. 'I couldn't bear to see me own child being brought up by another woman.' Rain splattered against the window and within seconds became a downpour. The panes rattled in their frames.
Annie began to play with the eiderdown again, pleating and unpleating the shiny cotton between her fingers. Marie was so grown up at times, and seemed to have feelings and emotions she found alien. There was far more to her sister than the flighty, hard-hearted impression she usually gave. It made Annie feel rather inadequate, as if she herself were incapable of feeling strongly about anything.
'Abortion is against the law,' she said. 'You have to have it done in a back street or something.' Ruby Livesey had known a girl who'd known a girl who'd had one and she'd bled for days and ended up in hospital where the nurses treated her like dirt. 'Have you any money?'
'I've still got last week's pocket money, five bob.'
'I've three pounds saved for Christmas. I wonder what it costs?'
Marie shrugged. 'Search me!'
'I bet that's not enough. What about the father, would he help?'
'No, he wouldn't,' Marie snapped.
'Are you going to tell him?'
'No!'
'I think you should.'
'I think I shouldn't.'
'Why not?' Annie persisted.
'Because,' Marie breathed on her nails and polished them on the sleeve of her dress, 'it could be more than one person.'
'Oh, Marie!' Annie felt herself grow very hot. She stared at her sister, scandalised.
Marie said furiously. 'Don't look at me like that! Sometimes, Annie, you're so holier-than-thou it makes me sick.'
'You're taking it out on me again,' Annie said through gritted teeth. More than one person! She could easily be sick herself. She was about to say how utterly disgusted she was, but noticed Marie's jaw was trembling as if she were about to cry. All the nonchalance, the couldn't-care-less attitude was put on. Marie was hurting badly inside.
Annie got off the bed and reached inside the wardrobe for her best coat. She'd ask around at school as tactfully as she could to see if anyone knew about abortions - and how much they cost.
'Where are you going?' Marie demanded.
'To the Grand for tea. Afterwards, me and Sylvia are going to the pictures in Walton Vale.'
'Leaving me all by meself! Thanks, Annie. You're all heart.'
'I promised.' Earlier, she'd thought of ringing Sylvia from the phone box at the end of the street and cancelling the arrangement, but had changed her mind. It would be embarrassing, but she'd ask Sylvia for a loan. She'd bring the subject up on the way home.
They'd been to see The Last Time I Saw Paris, and were strolling arm in arm along the little stretch of sand where Dot had taken the girls when they'd first moved to Orlando Street. No-one brought their children to play on the sands these days. It was stained with oil and littered with debris from the sea, and with human debris; rusty cans and sodden mattresses, old clothes and scraps of paper. After the thunderstorms that afternoon, the air was refreshingly cool.
'Isn't Elizabeth Taylor too beautiful for words?' Sylvia breathed. 'As for Van Johnson!' She put her hand to her forehead and pretended to swoon. 'I think I'm in love.'
'Mmm,' muttered Annie.
'What's the matter, Annie? You've been awfully quiet all night. Didn't you enjoy the picture?'
'It was dead lovely,' Annie had scarcely taken it in.
'There's something wrong, I can tell.'
Annie took a deep breath. 'I want to borrow some money,' she said in a rush. 'I'll pay back every penny, I promise. I hate asking, but it's an emergency and I've no-one else to turn to.' She was glad it was dark so Sylvia couldn't see her shamed expression. She kicked violently at a tin can, suddenly angry that it was her who'd been put in the awkward position of having to get her sister out of the mess.
'You can have all the money you want,' Sylvia said instantly. 'How much: five pounds, ten, a hundred?'
'Oh, Sylvia!' Annie felt close to tears.
Sylvia squeezed Annie's hand. 'Don't be upset.
What's it for? Don't tell me if you'd sooner not,' she added hastily.
'It's for Marie,' Annie sniffed. 'She's pregnant. I don't know how much, because I've no idea what an abortion costs.'
'Pregnantr Sylvia stopped dead and her mouth fell open. 'Pregnant!' she said again.
'Isn't it terrible? It makes me go all funny, thinking about it.'
'I wonder where she did it?' Sylvia shuddered.
'I didn't ask.' Annie had visions of her sister under shadowy trees or in dark back alleys with men who had no faces.
'Where will she get the abortion done?'
'I don't know that, either.'
'Come on.' Sylvia veered them towards Crosby Road. 'Let's go back to the Grand and we'll discuss it over a cup of coffee.'
Annie paced nervously up and down the pale cream carpet. The coffee had long been drunk, and it was half an hour since Sylvia had gone downstairs promising, 'I won't be long.'
Cecy might regard Annie as a bad influence when she knew what her sister had done, and refuse to let Sylvia see her again. She'd think there was bad blood in the family and Annie could do the same thing.
The longplaying record finished, but she couldn't be bothered to turn it over. Anyroad, the music, the jazzy score of Guys and Dolls, had begun to get on her nerves.
Suddenly, Sylvia burst into the room. 'It's all settled,' she said breathlessly. 'Marie's booked into a nursing home in Southport this coming Saturday. She'll have to stay overnight.'
Annie sat down, overcome with relief. 'I can't thank
Cecy enough,' she began, but Sylvia interrupted with a horrified, 'Don't mention a word of this to Cecy! She'd never approve. It's ail Bruno's doing, with the help of the bloody Marxists.'
'I'll pay him back as soon as I can,' Annie vowed.
Sylvia shook her head. 'Bruno's only too pleased to help. It makes him feel good, doing something for the proletariat.'
Bruno Delgado picked Annie and Marie up from the corner of Orlando Street on Saturday morning. Sylvia was in the front of the big black Mercedes car.
Marie was subdued throughout the journey to South-port, overawed by the handsome, garrulous Bruno, who lectured them on politics the whole way. The law should be changed, he declared, so women could have an abortion legally. 'A woman's right to choose,' he called it.
'Your Parliament makes me sick,' he exploded at one point. 'All those middle-aged, middle-class men pontificating on what should happen to a woman's body. What the hell do they know about it? It's even worse in Italy, where the church makes all the rules.'
They were nearly there when he enquired, 'What excuse did you give at home to explain Marie's night
away
'We didn't need an excuse,' Annie said carelessly. 'They won't notice she's gone.' She could have bitten off her tongue when she saw in the rear mirror Bruno's dark eyebrows draw together in astonishment. Marie stiffened at her side. 'I feel invisible,' she'd said once. In a moment of awareness, Annie knew why she'd let the men make use of her body. They'd made her feel wanted, though for all the wrong reasons. She pressed her sister's hand. 'It'll be over soon,' she whispered.
Sylvia's attitude didn't help. She completely ignored Marie, not once even glancing in her direction. Annie had known she disapproved since Christmas Eve, but she didn't realise the dislike was so intense.
'She's led a charmed life,' Annie thought wryly. 'She doesn't know the half of it.' Marie had only been trying to survive as best she could.
Bruno and Sylvia remained in the car when the sisters went into the nursing home, a gracious detached ivy-covered house in a wide tree-lined avenue. 'They're expecting you,' Bruno said. 'It's all arranged.'
A woman in a white starched overall came towards them, her face expressionless. 'Miss Harrison.-'' She looked from one to the other. Annie pushed Marie forward. 'Come with me, please.'
Marie turned, and Annie felt a fierce stab of pity at the sight of her stricken face. 'Do you want me to stay?' she said.
The woman in the overall said coldly, 'That's not allowed. You can pick her up at the same time tomorrow.'
Annie put her arms around her sister. As their cheeks touched, she said softly, 'Don't worry, Marie. We'll come through. One of these days, everything will be all right, you'll see.'
'I'm glad the summer holiday's nearly over,' Annie said with a sigh. 'School seems a nice change when you've been off six whole weeks.'
'I suppose it does.' Sylvia echoed Annie's sigh. They were bored, having done everything there seemed to be to do; gone to Southport and New Brighton numerous times, seen so many pictures that the plots had become
muddled in their minds, and they were sick to death of Liverpool city centre. School offered variety to what had become tedium.
They were sitting on the sands, having removed rubbish to make a clear space, watching a small cargo boat sail towards a rippling green and purple sunset,
'Have you made up your mind what to do when you leave?' Sylvia enquired. 'You'll be fifteen in October.'
Annie frowned. 'Dot thinks I should stay at school till next July. After that . . .' she paused, picked up a handful of sand and let it fall through her fingers. 'The thing is,' she burst out, 'I can't imagine things ever being different. I've got to look after me mam and dad.'
'You can't look after them for ever, or you'll end up with no life of your own,' Sylvia said warningly.
'Dot said that. She suggested I go to Machin & Harpers - that's a commercial college,' she explained in response to Sylvia's puzzled look.
Sylvia nodded her smooth blonde head. 'Good idea, but it doesn't solve the problem of your parents. What happens when you fall in love.^'
'In love?' Annie burst out laughing.
'All women fall in love,' Sylvia said wisely, 'even if all men don't. I can't wait. Bruno gets angry with me. He wants me to go to another school and get some qualifications, then go to university, when all I want to do is fall in love and get married.'
'You never told me that before!' Annie said in astonishment. Sylvia seemed too much in love with herself, her clothes, her hair, her figure. 'I thought you didn't like boys much. When we went on that double date, we decided afterwards it was more fun being with each other.'
They'd gone out in a foursome, their first dance and first date. The boys had them in stitches when they met
on the New Brighton ferry, pretending to be Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, but on the date, the spark had gone and everyone was stiff and formal. Annie and Sylvia kept going to the Ladies for a laugh.
'We won't always feel that way. One day we'll each meet a man who'll be far more important to us than anyone else in the world.'
Annie felt slightly hurt. 'Will we?'
'Yes, though we'll still meet. We can take our children for walks together and ask each other to dinner.'
But no matter how hard Annie tried, she couldn't visualise Sylvia's version of the future. It was impossible to imagine living anywhere other than Orlando Street, and leading a life different from the one she led now. She would merely go to work each day, instead of school.
'How's Marie?' Sylvia asked politely.
It was almost two months since Marie had had her 'termination', as the nursing home called it. 'Quiet. She stays in watching television.'
'She'll bounce back up again. She'll feel better at school.'
'As long as she doesn't bounce back up as high as she was before,' Annie said darkly.
There was a new teacher at Grenville Lucas when they returned. Mr Andrews didn't look much more than a schoolboy himself. The girls fell hopelessly in love, despite the fact he wore glasses and wasn't exactly good-looking. There was just something carefree and exhilarating about Mr Andrews that appealed to everyone, girls and boys alike. He had an enthusiasm for life that the other teachers lacked. Nor did he dress as they did, but wore corduroy trousers and a polo-necked sweater under his shabby tweed jacket.
'Good morning, class!' He'd burst into the room,
eyes shining and nibbing his hands as if he were genuinely pleased to see them.
'Good morning, Mr Andrews,' they'd chorus - they'd been ordered not to call him 'sir'. English lessons were turning out to be fun. Shakespeare wasn't rubbish any more, and The Mill on the Floss and A Tale of Two Cities suddenly seemed quite interesting.
'If only we could study something written by a twentieth-century writer,' Mr Andrews grumbled one day, 'but the bloody education authorities won't let us.'
The class gasped. A teacher, swearing!
Mr Andrews decided a drama group was needed. 'Who'd like to join?' he cried. 'It's both educational and enjoyable at the same time.'
The entire class raised their hands. Annie and Sylvia were always on the look-out for something interesting to do.
'Perhaps I should have mentioned, but the drama group will meet after school.' Mr Andrews' eyes twinkled mischievously.
Half the hands went down. He laughed. 'Thought you were in for a skive, did you? Well, you've got another think coming. All you budding Thespians meet me in the gym at four o'clock. What is it, Derek?'
'What's a budding Thespian, sir? It sounds rude.'
'I told you not to call me sir. A budding Thespian, Derek, is someone who wants to be an actor, which you quite obviously don't.'
Mr Andrews thought the new group should cut their teeth on something simple like a pantomime. After a majority vote for Cinderella, he said he'd write the script himself.
'Why turn down a part?' Sylvia linked Annie's arm on the way home.
'I coul
dn't bear to go on stage with everybody looking at me!' Annie shuddered. 'He made me
wardrobe mistress, though the men's costumes will be hired. Wardrobe mistress! Doesn't it sound grand? I'll borrow Dot's electric sewing machine. It can go in the parlour, no-one uses it. I'm dead excited! You'll make a marvellous principal boy, Syl.'
'I hope Bruno hasn't got some prejudice against them. He has some weird ideas sometimes. Shall we go for a coffee?'
'We're awfully late and there isn't time,' Annie said regretfully, 'I've got to make the tea.'
'If only I could help! I've become quite good at cooking since we moved to the Grand. I can peel potatoes Uke a whirlwind.'
Annie felt uncomfortable. 'You don't mind not coming, do you, Syl? I mean, I'm forever in the Grand, yet you've never set foot in our house. It's just that me dad's dead funny about letting people in.'
'Of course I don't mind,' said Sylvia.
'Anyroad, if you came once, you'd never want to come again. Me mam never opens her mouth. It's like a grave compared to yours.'
Sylvia looked sympathetic. 'It must get you down.'
Annie said nothing for a while. 'It's funny, but it doesn't get me down a bit,' she said eventually. 'I scarcely think about it.' She looked worriedly at her friend. 'Dot's always on about how ill me dad looks. It sounds awful, but I don't notice. I just make the tea and can't wait to meet you so we can go to the pictures or the youth club.'
They stopped in front of a small haberdashery shop. The window was piled high with packets of cellophane-covered wool, and half a dozen cheap cotton frocks hung crookedly from the partition at the back.
'Who on earth wears such ghastly rubbish?' Sylvia said scathingly.
'Women who can't afford anything else, I suppose.'
'Oh, God!' Sylvia clapped a hand to her forehead. 'What a terrible snob I am! Why do you bother with me, Annie?'
Annie laughed. 'Because I like you!'
Sylvia looked forlorn. 'I must tell Father MacBride what a snob I've been at my next confession.'
'Is snobbery a sin?'
'I'll confess it just in case.' Sylvia took confession very seriously. 'What do you tell at confession, Annie? I can't imagine you doing anything wrong.'
