Dandelion Clocks (13 page)

And now everything is happening very quickly. Dad went to see Mum without me and Isaac, and then last night he brought Mum home from St Mary's. Instead of going to bed, she came to sit at the kitchen table and told us all – Dad, Leah, Isaac and me – that she wouldn't go back to the hospice or the hospital again. She had wasted enough time and now she wanted to be here with us.

‘Hurray!' said Isaac, immediately getting up to put a smiley face on the wall planner – his way of telling us that he's having a good day. ‘Aunt Leah cooked pasta for tea yesterday, but it wasn't the right sort. We need you here, Mum.'

As soon as I wake, I go out to the studio and grab my camera. I know exactly what I want to take photographs of now and it feels good to have
a mission, something to be focusing on. These are the most important pictures I'll ever take – proof that my mum is the bravest, strongest, best mum in the world.

I stay off school again today. I don't even think about going and Mum and Dad don't say a word. I help Leah sort out Isaac's packed lunch and remind him that he needs his (now dry) trainers, and then I wave him off in the taxi. But after that I just go upstairs and sit down on a chair next to Mum. She's asleep so I take a photo of her and then read my book, but when she wakes up I know that she's glad I'm there.

This afternoon, a nurse comes to check up on Mum and give her some medicine. Dad tells me to nip to the corner shop for some teabags and milk while she talks to him. I haven't been there since Isaac's meltdown a couple of months ago and it seems weird – the shop is exactly the same yet my life has changed beyond recognition.

When I return I go back upstairs to give Mum the Mars bar I've bought her as a little treat. She's properly awake now and sitting up in bed, propped up on lots of pillows. She asks me to open the curtains as wide as they'll go.

‘We need to let the air in, Liv. Open the window
too,' she says. ‘Let me feel that gorgeous summer breeze on my arms!'

I do as she asks and then sit down on the side of her bed.

‘Are you OK, Mum?' I ask her. ‘Do you need me to get painkillers or something?'

‘That lovely nurse has given me everything I need, sweetheart. Try not to worry,' she tells me.

I look away, out of the window, so that she won't see my tears. ‘How can I
not
worry?' I mutter.

Mum gently turns my face towards her. ‘I'm OK, Liv. And I can be OK because I know that
you'll
be OK. And Dad. And Isaac.'

‘Aren't you sad?' I ask her.

‘Of course I am, and I'm angry. I never imagined that I wouldn't see my beautiful children grow up. But I'm starting to realize that I'm lucky too – because I've had all this time with you already and that's better than having nothing at all.'

‘But –' I start, and she just carries on.

‘I might never have met your dad and then I wouldn't have had the joy of knowing you and Isaac. I wouldn't have seen Isaac grow into a young man who works
so
hard every day that it humbles me and makes me realize how easy my life is. I wouldn't have had the honour of watching
you become a confident, caring young woman who makes me laugh more than she will ever know. I didn't
have
to have any of these experiences but I was lucky because I did have them. And I know that I've helped give you both the start you needed – now it's time for you to spread your wings and get ready for a solo flight.'

‘I don't think we're ready,' I say, starting to cry.

‘Oh, my darling, we never think we'll be ready,' says Mum, holding me tightly, her voice sounding croaky and strange. ‘If I'd lived to a hundred and two I'd never have felt prepared to let you go. But life is ready for you, Liv – and I
know
you are capable of living your life as loudly as you can.'

We hug each other for a while longer, both crying a little, and then Dad comes in.

‘What's that window doing open?' he exclaims.

‘I wanted it open,' Mum tells him, reaching for a tissue and wiping her eyes.

‘Honestly, Rachel, you'll catch your death of cold!' he says.

Mum raises one eyebrow at him, very slowly. ‘I don't think that's much of a concern, do you?' she drawls and starts laughing.

Dad looks at her and smiles. ‘You're a terrible patient,' he tells her.

‘I know, I know – I'm demanding and bossy and ungrateful,' she says, and they both laugh again.

If someone had told me, a few weeks ago, what my family would be going through, and asked me to describe the mood in our house, I would never have known that laughter and fun and silly jokes would be such a big part of our days.

‘Liv – are the primroses still out in the back garden?' asks Mum.

‘Yeah, I saw some the other day. There's actually a few left that haven't been trampled by Isaac and his football too!'

Mum lies back on the pillows. ‘I'd love to see them,' she tells Dad.

‘I'm not sure –' he begins but she interrupts him.

‘No, don't worry, Dan, I'm not saying I want to go outside. Crikey – getting downstairs feels like an expedition to Everest at the moment! No – it's just that I've always loved this time of year, when you can feel summer waiting round the corner. I don't want to miss my last spring, that's all.'

‘Don't say stuff like that, Mum,' I say firmly. ‘By next spring you might be better, up and about on your feet and doing the garden yourself.'

‘Liv –' whispers Mum, but I don't want to have this conversation with her again.

‘Positive thinking, Mum – remember? That book I borrowed from the library said that the human mind is capable of amazing things and we can make anything happen if we want it really badly, and try very hard.'

‘I know, Liv – but sometimes we need to face facts, even if we don't like them.'

Mum looks sad again now and really tired. Dad tucks her covers in a bit tighter and beckons me out of the room and we tiptoe downstairs. I start to head into the living room where Leah is vacuuming, but Dad stops me.

‘Actually, Liv, I've got an idea. Something to cheer Mum up, and I need your help.'

And then he tells me the best idea I've heard in weeks and I get to work.

I've been outside since six o'clock this morning. I was so excited about Dad's idea that I couldn't sleep and I'm sure that it's going to help Mum to start fighting back. At half past seven Isaac appears at the back door, looking out at me in confusion.

‘Liv – what are you doing?'

‘I'm digging up primroses and putting them into pots!' I tell him, standing up straight and stretching out. This gardening stuff is actually quite hard work.

‘Why can't you leave them where they are?' Isaac asks.

‘Well, Mum really wants to sit in the garden only she can't because she's too poorly – so we're going to take the garden in to her!' I say. ‘We can put the pots in her bedroom and as soon as the
garden centre opens, Dad's going to buy a little tree – she'll love it and it will remind her how fab it is to be outdoors, so she'll want to get better. Then she can be in the garden for real!'

Isaac doesn't say anything and I can tell he's thinking about what I've said. I carry on potting the plants and after a few minutes I sense him stepping outside and coming to stand beside me on the lawn. I look down and see his bare feet on the grass, toes scrunching up at the cold, damp sensation, and I stare at him in amazement. Isaac cannot bear certain sensations and I have never, in my whole life, seen him go barefoot outdoors – not in the garden, not even on the beach.

‘Let me help?' he asks me, and puts his hand out for a trowel. Wordlessly, I pass it to him and watch as he makes a small hole in the pot of dirt that I've found. Another first –
I can't wait to tell Mum
, I think to myself.

We keep going until all the pots I've found are filled with the last of the primroses and daffodils. I line them all up on the patio and we step back, proud of our efforts. I'm sure this will help Mum see that she needs to make sure she's still here next spring.

‘Mum's really ill, isn't she.' It's not a question and
when I turn to Isaac he refuses to meet my eye, looking down at the paving stones and scuffing his toes against the rough edges.

‘Yeah, she is,' I tell him.

‘What will we do when she's dead?' Isaac asks.

I suck in my breath and try not to show him how shocked I am to hear those words. It sounds so harsh, hearing him just say it like that. I think about what to tell him. I want to yell at him for not having positive thoughts and I'm scared that him saying it out loud might be bad karma or something – but I can't say that. And deep down inside, I'm not entirely sure that thinking positively is going to be enough here. There's no point in lying but I don't know how to make this OK for him. Because it really isn't OK.

I tell the truth. ‘I don't know, Isaac.'

‘Will we forget about her?'

‘No!' I cry. ‘We definitely won't forget about her! How could we? She's always going to be our mum.'

‘I'm scared, Liv,' he says quietly. ‘I'm not good at remembering things. I forget stuff all the time.'

‘But this is different – it's really important!'

‘But I forget important stuff too. I forgot to feed Harold – and he died.'

Harold the goldfish was Mum and Dad's one attempt at giving Isaac responsibility for a pet. It was not a success.

‘Yes, but, Isaac – Harold didn't die because you forgot to feed him. He died because you thought he might like a day out and put him in your pocket!' Mum and Dad had taken us to an aquarium and didn't know that Isaac had brought Harold along until he took him out of his coat pocket and held him up to ‘show him his fishy friends'.

I take hold of Isaac's hand. ‘I promise you that I won't let you forget about Mum,' I tell him. ‘Now come on – you're going to be late for your taxi if we don't get a move on.'

‘What time is it, Liv?' asks Isaac.

I glance at my watch. ‘Just gone eight o'clock and you haven't had breakfast yet, so hurry up!'

I start towards the back door but Isaac isn't moving. I look back at him and grab his hand, giving it a yank. ‘Come on, Isaac!'

‘No, Liv. What
time
is it?'

I huff, feeling exasperated. Now is not a good moment for Isaac to get weird on me. ‘I already told you. But if you want the
exact
time, then it's now four minutes past eight. Satisfied?'

‘No! Liv – just do the time thing!' Isaac is starting to get frustrated and I am about to leave him in the garden and find Dad so that he can deal with this, when I see what Isaac is holding in his other hand. A dandelion with a head full of seeds.

And suddenly I understand. I remember a few summers ago when Mum showed me and Isaac how to blow dandelions so we could tell the time. I got bored well before he did – and he really drove me crazy making me blow those dandelion heads, one after the other. Every now and then we'd actually get the real time on the dandelion clock and Isaac would burst out laughing – a sound that we don't hear very often.

Gently, I take the dandelion from Isaac. ‘Get ready to count,' I warn him, ‘because this is a once-only event.' And then I start blowing.

‘One o'clock!' chants Isaac. The dandelion seeds flutter a few feet and then fall to the ground.

‘Two o'clock! Three o'clock!'

Just as he says ‘Four o'clock', a breeze gusts across the patio and takes the rest of the seeds. We watch them float through the air and across the garden.

‘Right. It's four o'clock,' I say, throwing the
bald dandelion stem on to the grass. ‘
Now
will you get ready for school?'

Isaac lets me lead him through the back door and into the kitchen, and I'm sure he's remembering happier days when life seemed simple and the passing of time could be told by dandelion clocks, and nothing else mattered.

Later, when Isaac has gone to school, Dad takes me to the garden centre and we choose a gorgeous little tree in a pot. We bring it home and tie ribbons around the branches and then, when Leah comes down to tell us that Mum's fast asleep, we all leap into action. We carry up the pots and put them on her dressing table and bedside table, and some on top of the wardrobe. Dad puts the tree in the corner of the room where she can see it, even when she's lying down. I bring up one extra flowerpot that I planted all on my own, after Isaac had left for school. It's not as big as the others, but I think it's beautiful and that it might make Mum laugh. And then we creep out of the room and wait for her to wake up.

We're sitting round the kitchen table when we hear a cry from upstairs. I stand up and run, Dad just in front of me and Leah behind. My heart is
racing – what if something's wrong with Mum? We burst into the room and look at the bed. Mum is sitting up, smiling and laughing and pointing at the room we've made for her.

‘You did all this? For me?' she cries.

I race round to the side of her bed and hug her.

‘I
love
it! It really feels like summer is on its way, at long last. Thank you, thank you – it's fantastic!'

‘Does it feel a bit like being outside?' I ask her.

‘It's even better,' she says. ‘I can be all cosy in bed
and
be part of the garden too.' She looks over at Dad. ‘I love the tree,' she tells him. ‘It's just like –'

‘The ones we had when we got married!' Dad finishes for her. ‘I know you think I didn't pay any attention to our wedding plans, but I do remember the trees – and the incredibly gorgeous bride!'

‘It must have taken all of you ages,' Mum says. I tell her that Isaac helped, and describe him walking on the grass with bare feet and getting muddy hands. Mum looks teary-eyed. ‘That makes it even more special,' she says.

We all sit on the bed and chat for a while, not talking about anything important, just everyday things. It's nice in Mum's room with the sun
streaming through the window – I fetch my camera and take lots of pictures of her, some of her leaning back against Dad and a few of her pretending to eat the Mars bar I bought her yesterday. She says she doesn't really have much of an appetite, but it's funny watching her messing about, pulling silly faces. My favourite photo, though, is one of her on her own, surrounded by all our flowers and smiling at me in a way that makes me feel good inside. After a while, Dad says that Mum needs her rest, so we all stand to leave her for a snooze. Just as I'm about to go, she calls me back and whispers in my ear.

‘Those flowers over there,' she says, pointing to the special, funny little pot I'd placed on the table by the window. ‘They're my favourite. I can't ever walk past one of those without wanting to pick it and blow all the seeds off! And when they've got their flowers they remind me that beautiful things can happen, even when you least expect it. They look so gorgeous, all mixed up together – I've never seen a plant pot like it!' She pulls me to her and kisses me on my forehead. ‘I love you so much, Olivia. Thank you for letting me get to know you. You and Isaac have made me the luckiest woman in the whole wide world.' She lies back on the
pillows. ‘Will you do me a favour, sweetheart? Put that pot over here, right next to the bed where I can always see it.'

I move the pot carefully on to her bedside table and then bend down and give her a hug. She closes her eyes and I start to sing a bit of the lullaby that she used to sing to me. I'm a rubbish singer, though, and I can't remember the words properly so I hum most of it, just singing the last two lines.

Maybe I'm not as awful a singer as I thought cos by the time I'm finished Mum is fast asleep.

‘Sweet dreams, Mum,' I tell her. ‘I love you too.' And then I leave her in peace.

I'm sitting in my room now, by the window. The house feels strangely empty. Isaac came home a few hours ago and we all had tea, although nobody was very hungry. Leah tried to get us to play a game of cards, but we were all distracted and Isaac ended up getting cross because we weren't keeping to the proper rules, so we gave up and I decided to go and read a book.

I can't settle on anything, though. I know I have loads of homework to do but that seems so unimportant right now. I could print the photos that I took today, but I'd have to go outside to the studio and that feels like too much effort.

That's why I'm sitting here, just listening to the sounds of the house. I can hear the faint sound of the television coming from downstairs and I know that Leah and Isaac are watching some silly quiz show. I could go and watch it with them but it doesn't really seem fair if we're all together down there while Mum's on her own up here.

Mum's diaries are on my bedside table – I've got through loads of entries. She's been revising for some exams, although, from the sound of it, she's spent longer colour-coding her revision timetable than actually doing any work. I read something last night that I just can't stop thinking about so I grab her diary and turn to 23 June 1989.

I'm going to try to write more often in this diary to record this crucial time in my life. Maybe I'll use it for future reference. Who knows, one day I might have a husband and kids (!) and I might let them read it! How mega-embarrassing! I hope I'll be a brilliant mum, though – I'll always try to
understand how my kids are feeling and I'll be on exactly the same wavelength as them. I don't understand it when adults forget what it's really like to be a kid – surely it can't be THAT hard to remember? I'm gonna let my kids do whatever they want – I'll trust them to make their own decisions. I'm gonna be more like their best friend than their mum – then we'll all be happy!!

Actually, I'll probably burn these diaries before I get too old. Imagine if they fell into the wrong hands! I'll just have to tell my kids how amazing and brilliant I was when I was a teenager.

I am so glad that Mum didn't burn her diaries and I'm really happy that she hasn't actually tried to be my best friend. I don't need any more friends – I just need my mum.

I hear Dad clattering around in the kitchen, loading the dishwasher, and then his footsteps coming upstairs and going into his and Mum's room. It's funny how reassuring these noises are and how I can picture what's going on in each room of the house just by listening.

Now there's the sound of the noisy kettle going on in the kitchen – there must be an ad break. Leah will be making two cups of that disgusting
chamomile tea that she makes every night and brings up to Mum. She swears that it's healthy, but I can't see how anything that smells so bad can do you any good. I can hear Isaac channel-hopping on the television – he has a few adverts that he really loves and every time there's an ad break he switches channels as quickly as possible, hoping to find his favourite ones. If there were a channel that only had adverts, then Isaac would be really happy.