Authors: Annie Murray
Family of Women (33 page)
‘Remember those hamsters we bought, first time we ever went out there?’ Violet said with a smile as they sat on the bus.
Linda’s lips curved up for a moment. ‘Didn’t last long, did they?’
‘You wouldn’t think something so small could be so savage, would you?’
There was a silence in which she looked at Linda, at her old navy slacks and threadbare jersey, the tired green of old dry herbs.
‘Look at the
state
of you! How long’ve you been wearing that jumper for?’
Linda shrugged. ‘Dunno.’
Violet fingered one of the loose threads. ‘One pull and the whole thing’ll just fall to pieces! Why d’you go about looking such a mess? Anyone’d think you did it on purpose. I mean, your hair! You know Rita’d cut it for you –
I’d
cut it for you. We’ll do it when we get back. What’s up with you?’
‘Nothing.’
But she felt angry and tearful. Being looked at was hard. It was easier in a way to carry on feeling invisible. That way she could hold on to her angry feelings and didn’t have to answer for herself. All the hurt and disappointment in her which she usually directed at her mother was hard to keep up when they were just there together, side by side on the bus, and she could see Violet’s tired face. That was when she would realize Mom was just a skinny girl who’d got bigger and older but still didn’t know all the answers about how to deal with her own domineering mother ori> Q.
‘I’m all right,’ she snapped. ‘Just leave it.’
But it got worse because Violet’s eyes filled with tears.
‘I’ve not been much of a mom to you. All of you – but you especially, Linda.’
Linda didn’t say anything. She wanted to smash her hand through the window of the bus and jump out and run away.
‘We’ll go shopping, shall we? Just you and me?’
She shrugged. ‘If you want.’
‘Well, if you’re going to be like that . . .’
‘I
said
, didn’t I?’ She turned sulkily away. ‘If you want.’
As they walked along the ward of sick children, she could see Carol’s face turned towards them, alight with excitement. She was still lying almost flat, in the plaster cast, facing the long doors at the other side which opened on to the garden. It was too cold for them to wheel the beds outside today though.
‘Guess what!’ she cried, almost before they’d reached the bed. Her brown eyes were full of joy. ‘She came! Sister Cathleen came today – just to see me!’
Linda smiled, watching her mother kiss Carol’s cheek. She could tell Mom didn’t want to hear about Sister Cathleen.
‘She came specially for me! She said you’d been to the convent to find her Lin – ’
Violet’s head snapped round, astonished. ‘Did you?’
Linda nodded, smiling at Carol’s delight.
‘When the hell did you do that?’
‘A while ago – when she first came back.’
‘Well, blow me – you’re a dark one.’
‘They said she could come over – her superior nun said. And she came and took me to the chapel to Mass . . .’
‘Oh,
did
she?’ Violet said, folding her arms tightly. ‘So that’s what she was after!’
‘Mom!’ Linda protested. Why did she have to be jealous when Sister Cathleen had such a kind heart?
‘Well, how did you do that when you’re flat on your back?’
‘They’ve got these special beds in the chapel – sort of stretchers. They lie you on them at the front and you can see the priest and everything. And Sister Cathleen sat on one of the chairs behind me. Oh, and it’s so pretty in there. They say I can go again next week if I want.’
‘I brought you some comics,’ Violet said, and out of her bag she fished
Girls’ Crystal
,
Beano
,
Girl
and a little book of
Amazing Stories
. ‘That keep you going for a bit?’
Carol beamed. ‘Thanks, Mom. Least I’ve got my hands free – not like before.’
Linda thought of Mom’s description of the iron lung with a shudder.
‘Here’s some sweets for you.’ Secretively, as if it might not be allowed, Violet slipped some mints and Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut on to the bed. Sweets had been off the rati
on for months now, so they could treat her.
Carol seemed very happy. Once more Linda was humbled by her sister’s patience. She liked the girl in the next bed very much, she said. Her name was Bernice and she had had polio as well. Her mother was a lovely-looking, dark-haired woman who had smiled at them as they walked past.
‘Guess what – Mr Bum’s got a new car,’ Linda told her. ‘It’s parked out the front and he has fifty fits every time we go anywhere near it.’
‘I don’t know what he thinks we’re going to do to it,’ Violet said indignantly.
‘He’ll be out there carrying on if a bird messes on it,’ Linda giggled.
‘Linda!’ Violet hissed, but she looked reassured to see her laughing.
‘How’s my dad?’ Carol asked.
For a second Linda saw a strange register of emotion in her mother’s face, as if someone had probed a hidden scar.
‘Harry? Not very good, is he, Linda? He’s not been out for days now. Says he just hasn’t got the strength. I mean the doctor’s been in and that – a few times . . .’ She stopped herself pouring out all her worries. This was not the place. She could do that to Rita, about how she didn’t know how Harry kept going at all, the way he was, and Rita would say, ‘He’s a strong man with a strong will, love, that’s what it is.’ But she shouldn’t burden Carol with it. ‘I s’pect he’ll pick up – he always does,’ she finished, brightly.
They left Carol at the end of their visit, delighted with her comics. As they left the ward and turned to wave, Violet suddenly said, ‘I don’t know what I did to deserve her, that I don’t.’
It was closing time, a week later.
Mrs Richards told Linda she could go and get the early bus. It was already dusk, and quite foggy, when she closed the shop door behind her. Everything seemed sunk in grey except for the red lights on the back of cars, and she liked their scarlet glow, slightly fuzzy in the moist air.
‘Hello!’
She was a good way along the road when the voice calleo;t Qat was whe Dsd out. Her thoughts were on whether she’d make the bus, and wishing she had some gloves, because the sleeves of her skimpy gaberdine were too long to pull down over her hands. She was hungry, and it was cold and raw out there, but at least it wasn’t wet. She had bits of cardboard in both her shoes to cover holes in the soles.
‘Hello – Linda, is it?’
Alan came hurrying up behind her and she stopped, cheeks burning in confusion. At least he wouldn’t be able to see – it was too dark. Why on earth was he coming after her? He was huddled up in a duffel coat and scarf and under one arm was what looked like his usual parcel of bread and cake. He smiled at her in the gloom. She smiled back.
‘She said you’d gone, so I thought . . . I don’t know . . .’ He laughed. He was talking quickly, obviously nervous. ‘I thought it’d be nice to talk to you, but when
she’s
there you can never get a word in, can you?’
Linda liked the way he spoke. His voice was deep and smooth. ‘No. She’s all right though.’
‘Yes, I know. I didn’t mean she wasn’t. D’you live far?’
‘I have to get the bus.’ She found she didn’t want to tell him where she lived. ‘It’s quite far.’
‘Well . . .’ He seemed at a loss. ‘Would you like . . . I mean, if you’re not in a hurry we could try and find a tearoom, or if you like you could come back to my house? It’s only down there and – there’ll be no one else. My father won’t be in.’ He waved the bag. ‘I’ve got Battenberg!’
‘What – me?’ she said stupidly.
He laughed. ‘Yes – you! Only if you’d like, though.’
‘But . . .’ She couldn’t think of a but. There was no Carol at home. Mum got in before she did these days and there was nothing at all to get back for. No homework – nothing.
‘Yes, all right,’ she said, not quite believing she was saying it, and added, ‘please.’ And thought afterwards she should have said thank you, not please, but it was too late now.
Why have you invited me?
she wanted to ask.
You must know all sorts of interesting girls.
Then she told herself off for being silly. He’d only asked her for a cup of tea. Perhaps he even felt sorry for her, seeing how boring things looked in the shop? Or maybe he was the sort of boy who was always asking girls home for tea?
They walked side by side along the road. The shops were shutting up as they passed. Alan’s walk was bouncing, energetic, as if he was full of barely curbed energy and she was having to walk abnormally fast to keep up. His nervousness gave her courage.
‘D’you do all the shopping then?’ She nodded at the parcel under his arm.
‘Well, no. We have a woman in to help a bit. We muddle along, you know.’
&lslt PрMquo;Yes.’ She did know, exactly. ‘Sounds like our house.’
‘Oh – does it?’
He was quiet again for a moment. She liked him for not questioning her too much, for just letting things be.
‘You been at school today then?’ she asked. She wanted to ask him how old he was, but if she asked too many things he’d think she was nosy.
‘No.’ There was an awkward silence. ‘As a matter of fact, they’ve kicked me out.’ He swung his foot at a lump of something dark on the pavement and sent it skittering. It was a beer bottle. With venom, he added, ‘Bastards.’
She gasped. ‘What – the grammar school?’
Alan nodded. ‘Doesn’t matter,’ he said quickly. But she could hear that it did. Somehow it made her spirits lift. Someone else who’d had it taken away! Someone who would know how it felt!
‘But
why
?’
He reached out and touched her arm for a minute, steering her.
‘We need to cross here . . .’ He released her again. ‘School? I was never there anyway. Hardly ever, anyhow. What’s the point – all that algebra and Latin . . . Bores me to death. Won’t be of any use to me, not where I’m going.’
For a moment rage flickered in her. All that algebra, and Latin and music and history – all the things she craved, that he had been given and seemed not to care about!
‘Well, where’re
you
going then?’
What makes you so blooming special?
, she wanted to add.
‘America. I’m going to write for the movies. It’s the only thing for me. I just know that’s what I’m meant to do. D’you like them? Movies – the flicks, I mean?’
‘Yes. I go to the Odeon sometimes.’
‘I go as often as I possibly can. I’d live in the cinema if I could! D’you like Westerns?’
She looked at him, saw the intense set of his face. ‘Well – a bit,’ she fibbed.
‘They’re my life. They’re just –
it
!’ He made an emphatic gesture with his arm. It all takes you off somewhere else. Away from it all. Oh, that silver screen! I’ve written two scripts already. When I leave school, I mean,
properly
. . . the old man thinks he can talk them into taking me back, saying I’ve been playing the wag because of my mother and everything . . . But when it’s over, I’m going to go to America.’
‘How d’you know?’
‘I just
have
to. My father goes there sometimes. He’s a scientist – works in laboratories in Massachusetts.’ He talked about his father’s interest in a bored, offhand tone. ‘I’ve never been, but one day I shall. I have a penfriend, the son of onearm PрM of his colleagues. We’re the same age – he’s called Stanley . . .’ He stopped and indicated that they should cross another road. They were in a nice area, the houses getting bigger, timber-framed, with tidy front gardens. ‘Nearly there . . . Stanley tells me all about the movies that we haven’t seen over here yet. They’re
mad
about the silver screen over there! Have you seen
High Noon
?’
‘No.’
‘It’s the
best
. Absolute best I’ve ever seen. Stanley got hold of a poster for me – had it sent back with Dad last time he was over there.’
‘Oh. That’s nice.’ She felt stupid, not able to think of anything to say. She didn’t mind Westerns but they all seemed pretty much the same to her, all galloping about on horses and shooting. She liked the quieter bits when there were women in them too.
‘Mrs Richards said your father was a doctor.’
‘The old man? He is – but not of medicine. He’s an industrial chemist. Researches things for various firms. Dunlop – I know he’s worked for them in the past. It’s all very useful apparently. He lives and breathes it but I’m not really interested. Shame for him really – only son and I’m not much good at science. Can’t possibly follow in his footsteps.’
‘What do you like?’
‘Oh – history, English literature, French – that sort of thing. Music. I’m more like my mother, I suppose.’
Linda didn’t like to ask any more questions about Alan’s mother. A moment later he led her up the path to one of the houses.
It was very dark and Alan felt round inside the door for the light switch.
‘Dad won’t be back until goodness knows when – there!’
He snapped the light on and Linda found she was in a spacious hall. There was a deep red carpet with hectic squiggles of yellow on it. Opposite the door stood a coat-rack with various old jackets and macintoshes flung over it, and beside it a small table with a telephone. Around this there were chaotic piles of paper and notebooks. As well as a broken umbrella and some wellington boots near the stairs, there were more bundles of papers stacked in one corner. Under the front window, next to the door, was a little bookcase crammed with paperback volumes.
Linda was a little comforted by the mess. It was different from the down-at-heel, squalid, doggy mess of her own home, but it wasn’t all immaculate like Lucy’s house. At least he didn’t live in a perfect palace of a place, even if it was big.
Alan took his coat off and threw it on to the coat stand, from where it slithered off on to the floor again. Underneath he had on a sea-blue jumper, very large and baggy, and the sleeves hung down partly covering his hands. Linda watched, wondering what his mother was like and what was the matter with her. He stood at a loss for a moment, as if he’d forgotten why he had asked her to come with him.
