My Daughter, My Mother (46 page)

Joanne laughed. ‘I wish I had a camera!’

‘What the hell’s got into Mom?’ Karen said when she phoned later.

Joanne was in the middle of giving Amy her tea. It wasn’t a good time to talk.

‘What d’you mean? Is she poorly again?’

Karen laughed. ‘No! She’s asked me to go into town with her on Saturday. Says she wants to get some new clothes, and I’m a better judge of what’s in fashion.’

Joanne grinned. ‘Well, that’s true. But . . . that’s good, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah, well, I s’pose it is. She just seems . . . different. I think it’s because of that group – the war thing. It’s really perked her up. I mean, she won’t say much about it, but it only goes to prove that letting it out’s the answer.’ Karen had got her ‘counsellor’ hat on again.

‘Umm, I s’pect you’re right,’ Joanne said, trying to cut up Amy’s toast with one hand. ‘Or maybe she’s got a fancy man?’

‘Pigs might fly,’ Karen said.

‘How’s the course going?’

She almost heard Karen stand up straighter down the phone. ‘It’s
brilliant
! And the woman running it says I’m a natural.’

‘Oh.’ Joanne was leaning down to the table with the phone jammed between ear and shoulder, scraping out Amy’s egg. Amy giggled. ‘I expect you are. You’re getting plenty of practice anyway.’

‘How’s Dave, Joanne?’

She righted herself again.

‘Fragile,’ she said.

They had agreed that when he came, it should be for a limited time. An hour and a half, Joanne had said at first. She had to set a limit, to make sure he would leave, and not spread his difficulties like an oil slick all over the house. The time had extended now to two hours. Megan, the social worker, had come for one of his visits to see how they were getting on, and Joanne found her presence comforting.

He arrived at two-thirty on Friday afternoon, planning to get a bus back before the rush-hour. Joanne had taken his keys off him and he had to ring the bell. To her surprise Dave had submitted to all this without a fuss.

Amy was asleep when he arrived. Joanne opened up to find him talking to Jim Coles over the fence. Jim was brisk, but friendly.

‘Go on then, lad – there’s yer missis,’ he said. ‘Mustn’t keep her waiting.’

As soon as they were inside, he wanted to hug her. They stood for a few moments in the hall with their arms round each other. He felt different from how she remembered. Still solid, but somehow slacker. He made a small sound of relief, as if being in her arms was all he needed. She breathed him in.

‘Where’s Amy?’ he asked, still holding her.

‘Having a nap. She’s been down a while, so it won’t last much longer.’

This was the moment she expected to step back, but he still held her close and nuzzled the top of her head. In a moment she realized he was becoming aroused and she tried to pull away.

He looked at her pleadingly. ‘I miss you. I need you, Jo.’

She wanted him too, in those moments, longed to be held, naked and warm. But she also knew it was too fast. Things had to go a certain way, slowly, carefully and on her terms, or she would be lost.

‘Not yet,’ she said. ‘You know what we agreed. And Amy’ll wake anyway.’ She stepped away from him in a business-like way, protecting herself. ‘Cuppa tea?’

He sat waiting as she brewed up. When she went to sit with him he said, ‘I was thinking. Those albums you’ve got – shall we have a look at them?’

‘What, the old ones of us?’

‘Yeah.’ He seemed eager.

She hesitated, not knowing if she could stand going over it all again. ‘D’you think that’s a good idea?’

‘I just . . .’ He looked down as if embarrassed. ‘The counsellor woman said about looking at the past. Trying to see it differently – feel it. I just thought if I looked, with you . . .’

Joanne was moved by this admission. She could see he was working at something – really trying.

‘Okay then.’

There were only the two albums that she’d looked at not so long ago. She sat opposite him as he went through them. She didn’t really want to see them, or sit next to him. He lingered over pictures of his mom and dad.

‘Mom looks older now,’ he said. ‘Doesn’t she?’

He didn’t say anything about his dad.

There were the triumphant pictures of him as a young, promising footballer. He stared for ages at the one of him at the Villa ground, foot on the ball.

In the end he looked up at her. ‘That was a dream all right, wasn’t it? But that
was me
– there in that picture.’

His face crumpled and again he was weeping, but gently. She could see that grief was washing its way through and out of him.

Fifty-Seven

That Sunday, after the dinner was cleared away, Margaret went up to the bedroom and shut herself in.

Opening the cupboard, she stood looking in at her shopping from yesterday, pulsing with excitement. There was a skirt and two pairs of slacks arranged on hangers, and beside them on the shelves, blouses and jumpers – colourful ones! – carefully folded. She put her hands to her face for a moment as a tremor of glee passed through her. All these nice new things! Last night, when she and Karen had got back, she had brought the bags up here, carefully cut off the price tags and hung and folded them all away. She couldn’t stop thinking about them, so much so that she’d only smoked one cigarette all evening.

Taking off her skirt and blouse, which now seemed so drab, she slipped into a pair of navy slacks, a nice new white camisole – ‘You might as well get some underwear as well, Mom,’ Karen had encouraged her – and a pink jumper with a soft turtle-neck. Then the shoes, moccasin pumps in navy suede with a little gold chain across the front. It felt wonderful, as if she was clothing herself in a new life.

She combed out her hair, which was at a good stage after a perm (falling in soft waves, not too tight, but not yet grown-out and slack) and stood in front of the mirror on her dressing table. She could only see half of herself and leaned forward to look down at her feet.

Inside, she was trembling. She looked closely at her face. If only her eye was normal, instead of wandering off to the side! Nowadays something would be done to correct it. It made her look half-soaked, she thought. But otherwise, she had to admit, she didn’t look bad at all. In fact she looked quite spruce – years younger! And she really must try cutting down on the fags as well; that would surely help?

She smiled radiantly into the glass.

‘Hello, Alan,’ she whispered. ‘It’s lovely to see you again.’ Then she looked down, closing her eyes for a minute. ‘Oh God,’ she said. ‘What am I doing?’

‘Surprise!’ Karen cried, opening the door to Joanne and Amy. She waved an arm towards Margaret, who came along the hall feeling suddenly bashful.

‘Mom, you look lovely!’ Joanne said.

‘There’s no need to sound so flaming surprised.’ But Margaret was gratified to see that Joanne looked really impressed. She found herself grinning. ‘D’you like it?’ She twirled a little in the narrow hall. ‘Me and Karen had a bit of a spree. She was a big help.’

Karen had, to Margaret’s surprise, been marvellous. She had expected to be bossed and snapped at by her younger daughter. Instead, Karen had been helpful and encouraging, and seemed to have a good eye for what would suit her. They’d even had a bite to eat, just a baked spud and coleslaw and a coffee, but it had been a treat, making a day of it. Margaret realized she hadn’t enjoyed herself so much in a long time.

‘We got her some nice things,’ Karen said. ‘You know – classics really. It was high time you sorted out your wardrobe,’ she scolded, but jokingly. ‘Bit of a late birthday present for you.’

‘It’s lovely,’ Joanne said. Margaret was surprised to see that they found her transformation very cheering. What had she been like all these years? She could barely remember.

Joanne took Amy into the back room. Fred was sitting smoking, as usual, and looking at the sports results on Teletext.

‘Doesn’t she look nice, Dad?’

‘Eh – what, bab?’

‘Mom, she looks nice, doesn’t she?’

Fred glanced round and took in the sight of his wife. ‘Ar, she does.’ He frowned. ‘You been shopping?’

Margaret rolled her eyes. ‘I
told
you. Where did you think we’d gone all day yesterday?’ Shaking her head, she turned to Joanne. ‘So, is Dave coming over?’

‘No. I went over to see him yesterday. I did ask him, but to be honest, he’s not coping with things easily. He said thanks, but he’ll be round another time. He’s trying to get himself ready to come home this week.’

‘I dunno what’s up with the lad,’ Fred remarked, clicking off the TV.

‘No,’ Joanne said, ‘I don’t suppose you do.’

‘I mean, I’d’ve thought he’d’ve snapped out of it by now.’

Margaret saw Joanne roll her eyes at Karen.

‘Come on – I’ll get the kettle on,’ she said.

Every time she moved, Margaret was aware of her new clothes. Standing in the kitchen, she admired the delicately knitted cuffs of her sweater. She had never had anything as nice before. From the front room she could just hear Joanne trying to explain to Fred what a breakdown was, what had happened to Dave.

What was the point? Margaret thought. She felt such a long way from Fred. All these wonderful new experiences made her feel she was riding a high on a beautiful wave that had risen right over Fred’s head, taking her to a magical place where she couldn’t even see him any more. It was as simple and brutal as that.

Altogether now she’d been to three meetings at the library.

At the end of the second one Audrey had announced, ‘Next week’s session we’ve called “Joining Up!” Now, this doesn’t just mean the men. It means the women who joined up too, whether it was you or someone you knew – a relative perhaps.’

Margaret and Alan stepped out together into the dark street. A mizzling rain had started, but they only had to walk round the corner into Station Road. It felt strange to her, walking along with this man. The only man she had ever walked beside before was Fred. She was nervous, yet also very excited. There was nowhere she wanted to be more. She’d also promised herself that she wouldn’t smoke in the pub. She didn’t want to go about stinking like an ashtray.

‘What’ll I get you?’ Alan asked once they were inside.

Margaret asked for half a lager and sat down. She examined Alan as he went to the bar, his broad, square shoulders, the way his hair bristled out at the back, then stopped suddenly to reveal a band of flesh above the collar of his coat. His skin was a sallow colour and looked soft. An intense feeling came over her as she looked at his solid outline in his raincoat, of a sense of rightness, of being drawn to him.

As he turned to bring back the drinks, she realized in confusion that she hadn’t even taken her coat off and stood up hastily to do so. She’d put on the navy slacks to come out and felt self-conscious, but of course no one else had noticed. She was glad Alan hadn’t commented, that he seemed to take her as she was, whatever she was wearing. But did she imagine the admiring look that he cast over her as he walked back to the table?

‘There you go,’ he said, placing her drink on a beer mat. He shouldered off his own coat and laid it over the chair-back beside hers. Then he leaned over and fished a packet of cigarettes out of the breast pocket, went to open it, then made an impatient sound and laid it on the table. He turned to Margaret with a wry expression.

‘I’m trying to give them up.’

She smiled. ‘Snap! Me too.’

Reaching for the packet, she moved it over to her side of the table. ‘Out of harm’s way then,’ she said.

‘What about you, though?’

‘I don’t feel like one at the moment.’

‘That’s all right then – you can keep an eye on me!’ Alan gave a laugh, took a sip of his drink, then said, ‘I was just thinking about what Audrey said about women joining up. There was this wench – and she was a wench, if you know what I mean – up the old end where I lived as a kid. Molly Fox, that was her name.’ He shook his head. ‘God, she was trouble, she was! Blonde bombshell sort – always in a scrape of some sort. Her mother was like a prize-fighter – a drunk, no good to anyone. Anyhow, Molly went off and joined the army. I’d love to know what happened to her. The army must’ve wondered what’d hit them!’

Margaret smiled. ‘Well, good for her. My Old Man spent the war avoiding doing anything, if he could possibly help it. They caught up with him, though – got him working in munitions.’

Alan looked across at her. He had a way of looking so interested in what she was saying.

‘Tell me about your family, Margaret?’

‘Not much to tell,’ she said. ‘There were five of us originally – my mother was widowed and remarried. She had a girl and two boys, then my brother and me the second time round. I only ever saw Elsie, my stepsister, after the war – in fact, I lived with her for a fair while. She was good to me. She passed away rather young, though, and her daughters moved away. But the other two: Edwin got killed somewhere in Belgium; and Cyril, well, he was a bad lot. We never heard another thing from him. And then Tommy – well, you know about that.’

Alan was nodding encouragingly. ‘Just tell me,’ he said. ‘You know – how it was.’

She stalled. ‘You really want me to?’

‘If you don’t mind.’

Margaret looked back at him: that rarest of people, someone who would listen and wait to hear what she said.

‘The thing was,’ she began, hesitant to awaken the painful memories. ‘The day war broke out, our mom was very poorly . . . She was dying. It was terrible to see . . .’

She told him everything, about never seeing Mom again, about Tommy and about her stay with Nora Paige. And then she talked about Buckley, about the sisters and all the animals and John and Patty, and how it had been. And about that terrible day when Ted Winters had come to fetch her, and about getting to Birmingham. She had never spoken about any of it before, not to anyone. To him she seemed to be able to talk and talk, and when she looked across at him, with tears running down her cheeks, she saw that his face had creased and he was wiping his eyes as well. The sight moved her so much that it made her cry all the more.