The Last Night

by Cesca Major

  ‘It’s busy. It’s his christening next week.’ She nodded at the bundle in her arms. ‘So we’ve been making plans, but everyone’s been so kind, dropping us in food and all sorts.’

  The baby was sleeping, his eyes shut, his pudgy hands clutching at the woollen blanket over him, a solemn expression on his face as if he were in the middle of a very serious dream.

  ‘He’s gorgeous,’ Abigail said, wanting to walk across the lawn and stroke his skin, impossibly smooth and new, feel his fingers curl around one of her own.

  ‘He was a lot less gorgeous last night! But you’re right,’ Beth said, unable to stop a smile from spreading across her face as she looked down at him.

  Richard emerged from the house and leant against the doorway, his arms folded. Abigail felt her face move into a smile, everything else melting away as she took him in. His shirtsleeves rolled up, his skin browner from the recent good weather, his hair curling over his collar.

  ‘Hello there,’ he said softly, walking across to her. He bent over the fence too, grinning down at George, who was still rootling around in the earth near the terracotta pot. ‘Digging for treasure?’

  George looked up. ‘Treasure,’ he mumbled, at the same time as Beth called out, ‘Richard, do not give him ideas!’

  ‘What?’ Richard laughed as Abigail nudged him. ‘He could find gold.’

  George had raised his head, twisting back and forth from his mother to Richard, the whites of his eyes more pronounced than ever. ‘Gold?’

  ‘Oh goodness.’ Beth laughed, the baby snuffling as she rocked.

  ‘Right, we need to get out of here before Tom comes back and skins you alive.’ Abigail giggled, automatically reaching out a hand to Richard’s arm. She felt everything unclench within her, the last few days insignificant in this patch of sunny garden.

  He threw an arm across her shoulders as they walked back towards the cottage and she felt herself leaning into his warmth, a thrill running through her body, her breathing faster. They entered the house together, the hallway dark as their eyes adjusted. The cottage was so familiar to her now she’d become a regular visitor, and she felt her whole body unfurl as she stepped across the hallway. The door on the left was open, revealing Martin’s bedroom, his slippers resting next to the bed, shafts of sunlight spilling into the room.

  ‘You’re right on time,’ Martin called out from the living room opposite.

  For a second she stared up at Richard, their eyes meeting in the silence.

  She moved through, leant down to kiss him on the cheek. ‘That’s a new tie,’ she said, admiring the jaunty yellow spots.

  Martin adjusted it with a half-smile. ‘See, Richard, a lady of taste. Boy hasn’t noticed,’ he added.

  ‘Just jealous, Dad,’ Richard called from the pantry at the back, the steam from the kettle whistling on the range.

  She was fussed over, told to sit, already happier, being back in the small front room, fresh flowers from the garden in a jug on the windowsill, jigsaw boxes piled up on the window seat, the latest laid out on a table in the corner, a painting of a steam engine emerging from the shapes. They sat and chatted and ate coffee cake, Richard missing a spot of icing on his mouth, Abigail grinning at Martin as he pointed it out.

  It had started to spit lightly, droplets clinging to the panes of glass, the sky now a milky grey. She knew she had to leave, had to head back to the house. She’d told her sister she liked to walk up on the moors, but lately Connie had started to ask more questions. She wondered if she suspected something, if she wanted to ask. She bent to kiss Martin on the cheek, moved to the doorway, spilling thanks.

  ‘Wait there,’ he said, reaching for his walking stick, shooing Richard away with the other hand. ‘I’m fine, just let me.’

  Richard stepped back, taking Abigail’s hand in his. For a second she froze, then allowed her hand to relax in his grip, enjoyed the sensation of their skin touching. Martin was rifling in the top drawer of a dresser, taking things out, placing them on the side, rummaging. Finally he produced a small box.

  Resting back in his chair, his chest rising and falling with the effort, he looked up at her. ‘For you,’ he said, holding out the box to Abigail.

  Glancing at Richard, she released his hand and crossed the room, taking the box from Martin. Looking at him for permission to open it; he nodded almost imperceptibly and she lifted the lid.

  Inside, resting on a velvet cushion, was a brooch: the silhouette of a woman in profile, in cream on a lilac background.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ she said, not wanting to sound false or over the top. It really was a lovely piece of jewellery, delicate, the cream woman made out of shell.

  ‘She wore it often. She would have loved to have seen someone have it, someone special to us.’

  The lump in her throat had returned and she blinked, placing the brooch back on its cushion. ‘Thank you. I love it.’

  ‘Well now, don’t start crying on me, I haven’t made a lady cry in years and I don’t plan to start now.’ His voice was gruff as he said it, and he clapped a hand on his thigh.

  Richard had appeared at her side, one hand on the small of her back, looking at it over her shoulder before she closed the lid. ‘She adored that brooch,’ he said, his voice low and controlled.

  For a brief second Abigail panicked that he was unhappy she’d been given it. It did seem like such a generous gift, and it had belonged to his mother. She felt the box grow heavier with this responsibility.

  ‘She would have loved you having it.’ He closed her hand over the box. ‘Thanks, Dad,’ he said quietly, his eyes watering so that he had to look away.

  ‘Pah!’ Martin waved them both away with a hand and a laugh. ‘Get out before we all start weeping on one another. You make sure this one looks after you, Abigail, and you come back and see us again soon.’

  ‘Definitely,’ Abigail said, leaning down again to kiss the old man’s cheek, feeling the bristles under her lips, smelling Old Spice.

  He turned as red as the teapot. ‘Well don’t be expecting presents every time. I’ll be wanting you making the tea next time you’re about.’

  ‘Naturally.’ She laughed as she crossed the room, the box gripped tight in her hand, safe with her: Maisie’s brooch.

  She clutched the brooch to her all the way back, leaving Richard at the bottom of Mars Hill, his promises to meet again soon still in her ears as she climbed the hill away from him, grinning goofily as she let herself in, straining her ears for noises before taking the stairs two at a time.

  Her room seemed different somehow. Had she left the bedspread with those creases on the right? Had she not plumped her pillow? There still seemed to be a depression where her head would be. She had thought she’d left the window open on the first notch of the fastening, had she closed it without thinking? Had she left her hairbrush resting on its bristles, the smeared silver facing up?

  She traced a finger along the chest of drawers, straightened the lace doily under the wash bowl, turned the handle of the jug to ninety degrees. The book she had been reading was still resting on the bedside table, a bookmark sticking out. A glass of water, almost empty, alongside it. Her eyes flicked over to the wardrobe, which was ajar an inch. She lifted the brass handle to push it closed, pausing momentarily to wonder why it had been open in the first place. Taking a breath, she pulled the door back, revealing lines of blouses, skirts, pressed and hung in neat order, her cardigans folded up in a pile, the drawer with her underclothes shut.

  Feeling silly now, paranoid, she pushed the door shut, hearing the latch click into place. She sat on the trunk at the end of the bed, breathing evenly as she calmed herself. He hadn’t been here. And yet the room felt different, smelt different, not hers.

  That night she hid the brooch between layers of undergarments, secreted between silk, thinking of Maisie an
d Martin and their marriage, their sons, imagining the woman in the photograph wearing it.

  She wished for the twentieth time that there was a lock on the door and that she was mistress of the only key. She felt fidgety, restless as she went to lie on her bed, reached for her book, tried to focus on the words and stop her mind creating things that hadn’t happened. She couldn’t help but have one eye always watching the doorknob, a shadow in the crack below, one ear listening for the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. She chewed her lower lip and lay back. The words, focus on the words. She rested her head on the pillow and, for a moment, imagined the scent of pipe smoke and mothballs filling her nostrils, then she took a breath and forced herself to read.

  She pinned it to her chest in the morning, under a cardigan so that it remained her secret, another secret. She knew she would have to tell her sister soon, wanted her to know, yet something stopped her, she felt herself wavering on the edge of a confession. She would wait a little longer.

  IRINA

  Her mother looked smaller, sunken, surrounded by a sea of white sheets. The doctor had told her she’d collapsed, had been brought in for tests.

  As she looked down at her she felt their roles were reversed and she was her mother visiting herself as a child in the hospital. Maybe it was the familiar line of other beds, the distant spluttering, the curtains pulled back to the sides, the smeared windows through which Irina could see waiting ambulances and a couple of off-duty nurses, coats over their uniforms, puffing furiously at cigarettes. The cloying smell of disinfectant and rubber seemed to fill her nostrils and she was transported back to her childhood, to lying in a hospital bed, woozy, lifted gently as someone checked her for other injuries.

  Her face had hurt, burning as if she’d had acid thrown at her. She’d learnt about acid in school, the chemistry-lab floor was pockmarked from spillages. That was her face. She put a hand to it, wanting it to stop, but it was covered in a dressing; someone lightly held onto her arm, trying to put a soothing note in their voice to make up for the fact they couldn’t soothe her face. Irina realized with a start that it was her mother’s voice she’d heard, her mother drawing her arm back to her side as the doctors worked on her. The world had grown blurry and distant after that; she remembered having to count backwards – how silly, she’d thought, wanting to show them she was a big girl and could do that, that it was easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy. It was Joshua who couldn’t count, Joshua who always missed out ‘seven’.

  Irina hadn’t realized she was frozen in the centre of the room as the memories washed over her. Her mother had her eyes closed, sheet pulled up to her chin and arms resting at her sides on top of it. She looked like a corpse. Irina took a step forward, scared that a new chapter in her life was being revealed. What would happen now?

  She drew up a small plastic chair to the side of the bed and sat, feeling comically low down, reaching up awkwardly to hold her mother’s hand so that her arm was bent at a strange angle. She thought she saw her eyelids flicker, her chest barely rising and falling with each breath. Irina glanced at the monitor next to her, at the nonsensical numbers and lines that were charting her mother’s progress. Were they good numbers? The drip that was sticking into her hand made Irina feel nauseous, liquid flowing into her from a squashed bag by her side. She didn’t seem at all like her mother in this environment. She would have hated the stark light in the room, showing up the lines on her face, the creases around her eyes whisper-thin as she rested. Her brow smoother than Irina remembered – was her mother permanently frowning?

  ‘Excuse me, could you tell me what’s wrong?’

  The nurse looked her in the face, eyes shifting slightly to her right when she noticed, momentarily distracted, despite the fact that she must see worse every day. Or perhaps not.

  ‘Doctor Georges will be along shortly, ten minutes or so. Your mother came in a few hours ago, collapsed, but we have her on a drip and we’re monitoring her now.’

  ‘Will she be alright?’ Irina blurted. A hopeless question, she knew that, the moment it fell out of her mouth, but she needed to know; ten minutes seemed an interminable wait.

  The nurse picked up the chart at the foot of the bed. ‘Her condition seems stable now and the doctor will talk you through the results of her blood test.’

  ‘Test?’

  ‘She had one when she came into A & E.’

  Irina thanked her twice, turning back to see her mother’s eyelids fluttering. She scooted round to hold her hand.

  ‘Mum, it’s Irina. I’m here, it’s OK.’

  Her mother’s voice was croaky as she tried to focus on Irina’s face. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, her hand half-lifting from the bed.

  And for a moment the words seemed weighted with something more.

  MARY

  Abigail’s letters were still infused with something, a hint behind the sentences. She straightened out the latest one on the table in the pub garden, frowning as she drew her finger along the lines, mouthing the words as she read. She wanted to ball it up in her fist, fed up with letters and words when their friendship was all about shared looks, sounds, chatter. She remembered the days just after they’d found her dad, how she’d moved senselessly along pavements and had found herself wandering into Abigail’s house, the whistle of the kettle on the range, a warm embrace from Abigail’s mum, Mary’s tears falling onto thick woollen knit, being fed soups and scones as they sat with her.

  Perhaps Mary had known her dad would be found like that one day. He hadn’t been back home a year. He was shorter, stooped, would disappear into that other place as he sat in the chair in the parlour, reliving those bleak, endless hours in the camp. He’d shout foreign words in his sleep, the bedclothes patchy with sweat. She used to stand in the doorway, uncertain, one foot moving towards him, then a step back, knowing she couldn’t help him when he was like this. She’d bring him countless cups of tea, digestive biscuits, as he sat unseeing in his chair, not able to work or concentrate on anything as the day darkened and she had to leave for the pub, the braying customers.

  They’d found him at the bottom of the gorge. She hadn’t wanted to listen to the policeman who’d come to her house, taken his hat off, his hair slick with Brylcreem, matted down over his forehead from the weight of the hat. He had rotated it slowly in his fingers as he told her the details. She had gone to identify the body. They let her look at a bit of his face through a sheet.

  ‘Don’t lift the rest, miss.’

  She wondered what she would see under the sheet. There were angles poking up in all the wrong places. The head wasn’t the right shape and one eye was swollen and the skin all puffed up so his nose and cheeks seemed to merge, blood clotted in his hair. He still had the same glassy expression. People told her afterwards that he was at peace now, but she had seen that look, always the same look. He would spend an eternity in that camp, never be able to escape the memories of what they had done to him.

  She’d been given a lift by a policeman back from the mortuary, stood in the doorway of their house, her dad’s half-finished mug of tea on the side, yesterday’s newspaper crumpled on the sofa, a cushion still indented where he’d rested his head. She briefly wondered whether to try and contact her mum, but she’d walked out years ago and Mary knew she wouldn’t care.

  Mary hadn’t waited around, had walked unthinking to Abigail’s, was folded into hugs, Abigail’s mother tucking her up into her bed, one hand soothing her forehead as Abigail sat and held her hand, cocooned there. When she’d moved out of the house and into rented rooms it seemed she spent half the week with them both, falling into an easy rhythm, helping prepare meals, scrub the kitchen. She’d been gradually restored; the nightmares eased, she began to see her father’s face as it had been before the war. He had always loved nature, insects, had wanted to keep bees, used to show her illustrations in books, explain how they made honey, fascinated by the idea of a colony.r />
  Now it seemed that she had nowhere she could feel at home. She scrawled her news to Abigail, the money she was saving, her plan to join her in Devon, then they could leave, find work together. During the war they’d talked about saving up to go to America, their brief glimpse of the soldiers from there, bolder and bigger somehow; they’d imagined cattle farms and cowboys and had paused at the newspaper stand to stare into the faces of the movie stars on the front of magazines. She reminded her of those things.

  She was desperate to see Abigail, knew something was lurking behind the words, her descriptions of the beach and the woods. She talked about Richard, and Mary grinned as she read about fishing from the back of his house, him teaching her which bait to use, her sitting in the sunshine with his father, drinking tea and teaching them their own strange version of gin rummy. Mary could picture Richard now, shirtsleeves rolled up, hair that curled at the back, broad shoulders. She wanted to know more, a little frightened by the thought that Abigail was experiencing something Mary could only imagine.

  She got up, rubbing at the watermarks on the table, moving round to clear the empty pint glasses, the sun warm overhead. There were sweet peas lining the back wall of the pub, in amongst the weeds, cheering up the dull facade. She closed her eyes for a second and imagined someone there whisking her away to the banks of a river, teaching her how to fish, howling as she taught them card games.

  ‘We need you, Mary,’ came the call, shouted through the gap in the kitchen window.

  ‘I’m coming,’ Mary whispered, eyes opening, wrenched away from a mossy riverbank, somewhere sunny and far, far away.

  ABIGAIL

  She could feel his eyes on her through the front window, the small panes of glass breaking his body into parts: a mouth, one eye, his shoulder. Watching her as she shifted the basket onto her other arm, as she closed the gate behind her, pressing on the latch, as she dropped down onto the path until she was just shoulders, a head, a hat, and even then she knew he was still watching.