‘Terrible. I feel awful. It’s my breathing. I can’t get my breath. And there’s nothing worse, is there? Not breathing? I’ve been like it months. Ever since I come home. Ever since I had the fall. I was going out to the garage. I can’t think why. A slipper come off and I missed the step. Went backwards. Right over the mobility scooter. Pulled a ladder down on top. I was stuck there ages. Calling for help. Brian come out, eventually. When he was hungry. He’s no help. He’s got dementia. He just stood looking at me from the step. What are you doing down there? he said. Then he went back inside. Six hours I was out there. In the freezing cold. The paramedics had a hell of a job. They had to use special equipment. Special blankets. Took me up the hospital. Found I’d broke three ribs. Caught pneumonia. Shocking state. Couldn’t sleep. People dying all around. There was one on the right. I heard them work on her. I watched her legs kicking up and down. Course – it was no good. They called it a day and went. Only they didn’t draw the curtains properly. I could still see her head on the pillow. All that long grey hair. I couldn’t stop staring. I couldn’t help myself. Eventually they showed up. The men in green. I heard them zipping up the bag. Wheeled her off. Later on I told the nurse. Why didn’t you say anything? she said. We would’ve shut the curtains. But I didn’t say anything, did I? I just sat there, staring. The long grey hair, hanging off the pillow like that. I went home the day after. But I can’t stop thinking about it. The gap in the curtains. The hair on the pillow. I mean – what are you supposed to do with something like that?’
sketches
a question of time
‘I was a clockmaker’
‘Horologist?’
‘Well – I was going to use the official name, but you see – I didn’t want you to think I was showing off.’
‘Fair enough. It’s just I don’t get to say the word horologist very often. And now here I am saying it twice.’
Ray turns his filmy gray eyes onto me.
‘Of course, a person can use a thing too much,’ he says.
I help him back into his favourite chair, and then re-arrange his blankets, hot water bottle and padded stool for his feet.
‘Restored!’ he says.
Whilst I finish writing out the paperwork I ask him about his work.
‘You must’ve had such a steady hand.’
‘Everyone says that, but it wasn’t something I thought about. You get used to these things. You adapt.’
‘I suppose you do.’
I write some more.
A clock on the wall sounds the hour. It has a dark and sombre look to it, reliable, relentless – the kind of thing I can imagine hanging on the wall in a Victorian station master’s office. And as if the chimes have prompted the thought, Ray says: ‘If you could go back in time – anywhere at all – where would you go?’
‘Me? Ooh – loads of places. The Aztecs? Dinosaurs? I’d love to see a dinosaur, although depends very much on the dinosaur. If I had a protective suit I’d feel happier. Or I was invisible. Erm – I’d love to see a Shakespeare play, with Shakespeare in it. Dunno. What about you?’
‘I would like to see Stonehenge. As it was.’
‘Now that would be cool!’
‘What were they doing there?’
‘Stonehenge. Definitely!’
‘I mightn’t like what I saw, though. One thing that’s always struck me – how cruel people can be.’
‘Absolutely. And it’s not something that’s restricted to one period of time. There’s no end to it. So I suppose what you have to take from that is that there’s always a potential for cruelty in humans, and the best you can do is take it seriously, and not get complacent.’
Ray adjusts his hot water bottle, drawing it up his body a ways, nearer to his heart.
‘Yes,’ he says after a while. ‘Stonehenge. Like an enormous stone clock. I think I should like to see that.’
‘Well if you go this afternoon, leave a note so we know where you are.’
He laughs.
‘Don’t worry,’ he says, and then reaching out a hand, extra-warm from the hot water bottle, ‘…and who knows? Maybe I’ll send a cart back for you.’
the very hungry caterpillar
‘I’m sorry if I was snippy when I answered the door,’ says Marjorie. ‘I thought you’d come to read the meter.’
‘That’s okay. I’d be the same if someone knocked me up first thing on a Sunday. I did try calling you…’
‘Yes. Well. We don’t answer if we don’t know who it is.’
Marjorie is sitting one end of the table, her husband John the other, making me feel less like a clinician and more like a family counsellor. It’s John I’ve come to see, though. He doesn’t seem anywhere near as bad as the referral suggested. In fact I’d go as far as saying he looks perfectly fine, chomping enthusiastically through a small stack of jam toast, with occasional gulps of tea to wash it all down.
‘Ahh!’ he says, setting the mug aside, and then, after picking up another slice of toast and holding it in front of him for a moment with something like a lover’s gaze, begins again. It’s like watching a giant caterpillar methodically working round a leaf – a caterpillar dressed in an Arsenal bobble hat, fleece and jogging bottoms.
‘Mind your fingers’ says Marjorie.
He nods, his eyes closed.
‘He fell off a ladder, you see,’ sighs Marjorie, securing her dressing gown with a resolute tug of the cord. ‘A few years ago now. He didn’t fall that far, but it was down onto the patio, and all the pots. He was pruning the jasmine. I’d told him to wait till I got back so I could foot the bottom. But no – he’s always just carried on regardless. And now look. One leg shorter than the other. He wears an insert in his shoe, but it doesn’t make any difference. And of course, everything else gets thrown out of whack. He’s got permanent back pain.’
John finishes his toast with a sigh, pushes the empty plate forwards and leans back in the chair.
I ask him what he takes for the pain.
‘Paracetamol!’ he says, slapping his tummy. ‘Four times a day.’
‘You shouldn’t be taking so much,’ says Marjorie. ‘It’s not good for you to take it all the time.’
He shrugs.
‘The doctor says it’s okay. If the doctor’s happy, I’m happy.’
‘It’s bad for your liver.’
‘I don’t see what it’s got to do with you,’ says John. ‘Are you a doctor?’
‘Everyone knows paracetamol are bad for you.’
‘Are you a doctor, Marg?’
‘Doctors don’t know everything, John.’
‘I say again – are you a doctor?’
‘I’m not having this discussion.’
‘I’m happy with paracetamol. The doctor’s happy with paracetamol. Let that be an end to it.’
It’s obviously a sore point between them. I try to take a middle position.
‘It’s difficult,’ I say. ‘Chronic pain is different to acute pain. You handle it differently. I mean, if you get a headache, you take something to help with that. But if you have pain all the time, you need to take regular doses to keep yourself on an even keel. If you let the pain get too bad, it’ll take more of something to get you back into the okay zone. The idea is to maintain a good cruising altitude.’
To illustrate, I make a half-hearted rising and falling gesture with the flat of my hand. Marjorie watches me with a slack expression.
‘I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re on about,’ she says.
‘I do’ says John, sucking a glob of jam off his thumb. ‘I do.’
how far is anywhere
Derek is sitting on the sofa, both legs stretched out on a stool, a tartan throw neatly draped over his lap – so precisely aligned it’s like a draughtsman has lain a grid over the lower half of him pending further work. Derek is cradling half a mug of tea on his belly, only freeing a hand now and again to point aggressively, either at me, or at Mia, the nurse who’s come to do the assessment with me.
‘Listen to me… just for one second,’ he says, in a hoarse and curiously fractured way, zoning in and out, soft one moment and aggressively emphatic the next, as if he’s speaking from a great distance and the signal keeps getting distorted, ‘I do not appreciate… I do not appreciate…yeah? All this, what you are doing. It irritates me, high up, in here…’ slowly transferring the pointing finger to his right temple and tapping, firmly, twice. I wonder if that’s the side he had the stroke, and I make a note to ask his wife Sandra about it. ‘I do not appreciate this,’ he says. ‘I do not want it. Let me tell you something. I have been round the world. A few times. I’ve walked it. The entire world. And I’ve seen things. You wouldn’t believe what I’ve seen. I’ve seen people killed. Yeah? You cannot imagine…’
‘You’re absolutely right,’ says Mia. ‘I can’t. But – if I could just explain why we’ve come here today…’
Mia is unflappable. She wears her long years as a community nurse lightly, but with great warmth. It’s impressive to see how patiently she’s able to maintain her focus in the face of Derek’s behaviour, not rising to his challenges, progressing the meeting as best she can, slowly and neutrally, her clinical objective always in mind. I feel like a naturalist taking notes on a species of big cat, stalking its prey on the prairie. It’s instructive to watch her work, to see how she continually makes tiny adjustments to her approach, the way she sits, the way she puts her notes to one side, the way she holds him in her attention. If she had a tail it would be switching, infinitesimally, at the tip.
‘No! Now – wait!’ says Derek. ‘Let me tell you something.’
‘Please let them help you,’ says Sandra.
‘It’s okay, Sandra,’ says Mia, reaching over to touch her on the arm. ‘We’ve got time.’
‘And you!’ says Derek, stabbing the air in the direction of his wife. ‘You I’ll deal with later.’
‘Oh, Derek,’ says Sandra.
‘You know what you did. You let them in. You know I didn’t want them.’
‘But you’re ill.’
‘You I don’t mind’ he says, turning his attention back to Mia. ‘‘I don’t … have trouble with women. And I’ve known a lot of women in my time. You would not believe. But men? I’m a fighter. I’ve always been like it. Him,’ he says, flashing a sideways glance at me. ‘Him I would’ve had outside in a second. In a second.’
‘I’m sorry you feel like that,’ says Mia, smiling at me. ‘Now – look. it’s important that I explain to you why we need to see you today.’
‘No. Wait a minute. Listen.’
‘Derek! They’ve got people to see. They’ve got lives of their own.’
For the first time in the visit Sandra looks utterly forlorn.
‘I do not want a thing,’ says Derek, adjusting his position on the sofa with an uncoordinated lurch and slopping tea onto his t-shirt.
‘Oh now look! I’ll go and get a cloth,’ says Sandra, taking the mug from him. ‘Would either of you like a cup?’
‘That’d be great. Thanks.’
Sandra hurries into the kitchen.
‘Derek. We think you have an infection and we’d like to do something about it,’ says Mia, taking advantage of the distraction to strike the point home. ‘If you don’t let us help you it’ll just get worse and you’ll end up in hospital. Again. We respect your decision to say no, and we certainly wouldn’t go against that. But you have to understand what’ll happen if you don’t accept treatment.’
Derek closes his eyes, compresses his lips into a ghastly smile, and slowly shakes his head from side to side.
‘Just you listen a minute to me,’ he says. ‘You’ve had your say. Now it’s my turn.’
‘Okay.’
Weirdly, he almost seems to go to sleep, but when no-one speaks he suddenly opens his eyes again and points at Mia.
‘I’ve been round the world,’ he says. ‘I’ve seen people killed. I’ve seen people kill themselves, but it’s worse when they get killed. Can you – appreciate – what it is I’m trying to say to you? The whole world? Because I do not appreciate …. it gets me irritated …. up here. You do not get what I am telling you. I have been round the world, I’ve seen it…’
Sandra comes back in with a tray of tea.
‘There!’ she says, handing me and Mia a cup. ‘Although what I think you really need is a medal.’
‘I’ve been round the world. I’ve seen it,’ says Derek.
‘I know darling. And got the t-shirt.’
‘What?’ he says. ‘What t-shirt?’
‘Never mind, never mind,’ says Sandra, ‘I’m sorry.’ And sinking back down into the chair facing her husband, she straightens her skirt and takes a breath. ‘So. How far did we get?’ she says. ‘Anywhere?’
party line
When Agnes finally reaches the front door, she looks so beautifully turned-out in her vintage, poppy-print housecoat it’s like she set off from the back kitchen sometime in the nineteen fifties.
‘Hello!’ she says, through a crackle of thick, coral pink lipstick. ‘Thank you so much for coming.’
She leads me slowly through into the lounge, and after gesturing to the sofa, perches herself on the edge of an armchair and fixes me with a bright smile.
‘Now. What’s this all about?’ she says.
I explain that her doctor has made the referral, but as I carry on talking I can’t help wondering if I’ve got the right address. Struggling with ADLs the referral said. Recent UTI. Needs TDS care & help with meds. Really? The room’s as perfect as Agnes. No sign of dust or disorder; nothing out of place; a clock and two porcelain clowns equally spaced on the mantelpiece; a TV remote symmetrically aligned with paper, pen and reading lens on a discreetly placed, Moroccan side table.
‘How are you feeling today?’ I ask her, opening the yellow folder.
‘Oh. You know,’ she says, smiling even brighter. ‘Annoyed with myself. I took the Christmas decorations down yesterday and now I can’t find them.’
‘I’m sure they’ll turn up.’
‘I hope so. Some of them were very old. Falling to pieces, but – well – you get used to these things.’
I know what you mean. My favourite decoration is a snowman playing the violin. He’s looking pretty shabby these days, but it’s nice to see him every year.’
‘I bet!’
‘I’m sure your decorations will turn up.’
‘I hope so,’ says Agnes. ‘I feel so cross with myself.’
-oOo-
After the examination I review the facts. All Agnes’ observations are normal. Her medication is nicely ordered in a dosette box that her son, Barry, organises at the beginning of each week. She is perfectly able to wash and dress herself; before her recent illness she was driving once a week to bridge club.
‘Shall I ring Barry and see what he has to say?’
‘That’s a good idea!’
‘Do you mind if I use the landline? Only – if I ring using the work mobile, the number won’t show and he might think it’s a sales call.’
‘Of course! Please – help yourself…’
Barry is on the address function. I press call – and it’s immediately apparent that the phone is on loudspeaker.
‘How do I take it off?’
‘Oh – it’s always like that’ says Agnes. ‘Don’t worry. Barry won’t mind.’
The phone keeps ringing – extremely loudly – and I’m still trying to figure out how to mute the thing when he picks up.
BARRY MOSS says Barry, in a voice so thunderous and sharp I want to hold the phone away from my ear.
‘Hello Barry. My name’s Jim. I’m a nursing assistant from the hospital…’
YES. UR-HUM.
‘Barry? The doctor’s asked that we come round to see your mum’s alright – to do her blood pressure and so on….’
YES
‘…but before I go on, can I just say… you’re on speakerphone at the minute and I don’t know how to take it off’
I smile and nod at Agnes; she smiles back.
YOU CAN’T. IT’S LIKE IT ALL THE TIME.
‘Would you like me to call you back on my work mobile?’
NO. IT’S ALRIGHT.
‘Okay. Agnes is sitting right here with me…’
I can’t make it any clearer that he’s being overheard, but if Barry’s understood, he makes no sign.
HOW IS SHE?
‘She’s fine. Aren’t you, Agnes?’
‘Absolutely!’ says Agnes, shaking her head and smiling. ‘Never felt better!’
YOU CAN’T TRUST A WORD SHE SAYS, YOU KNOW.
‘Oh, now – I don’t know about that…’
Agnes straightens in the chair. Although her smile doesn’t falter, I can see her fingers whiten round her knee.
Because I can’t immediately think of a way of stopping him saying anything else, I look to buy myself some time.
‘Let me hand you over so you can have a quick word with your mum,’ I tell him. ‘Then we can all have a chat about what to do next.’
HAND HER OVER, THEN
‘Hello darling!’ says Agnes.
HELLO MUM shouts Barry. WHAT’S ALL THIS? A PARTY LINE?
strange dreams in a blue house
To paraphrase a movie tagline from the seventies: Rich means never having to say your address.
‘The Blue House, Ocean Rise’ isn’t much to go on. It sounds distinctive, though, and as I have some time before the appointment, I take a chance and drive straight there, figuring I’ll spot a blue house easily enough, especially on Ocean Rise, where all the houses are a transcendent white, following a brutalist style of architecture that’ll one day be known as ‘bunker chic’.
Ocean Rise is a grand, slow ascent of the cliffs to the east of town, an eclectic throw of old and new money, each house with a panoramic view of the sea, secure gates, and landscaped gravel drives leading to doors wide enough to walk through with a saddlebag of gold over each shoulder.
I’ve driven up and down the road twice when I admit defeat and pull over to call for directions. Even doing this gives me a prickly feeling, security cameras zooming in on the small, suspiciously old car as the driver flips through a diary and glances anxiously through the window. With any luck they’ll see the NHS lanyard and reassuring blue of my uniform and put the phone back on the hook. I mean – this isn’t the US. The worst you see here are signs that say: No Hawkers or Canvassers. In the US it’s Armed Response.
– Who is this?
Hello Mrs Shand. It’s Jim, from the hospital. I’ve come to see Mr Shand, to check his blood pressure and so on.
– Well where are you, then?
I’m on Ocean Rise.
– That’s it. That’s where we live.
I’m afraid I don’t have the number.
– We don’t have a number. We’re The Blue House.
I haven’t seen any blue houses.
– You won’t see it from the road.
No?
– No. We’re set back. On a hill. Behind a hedge.
Where on the road?
– (Oh for goodness sake) You know the new block? Moana Heights?
Yes.
– Turn in there, and then sharp left. It’s not signposted, but that’s where we are. Got it?
Yes. Thanks. See you in five minutes.
She hangs up, saying either Good, or possibly Good God, the ‘god’ part truncated.
I spin the car round and head in that direction, half a dozen outraged CCTV cameras capturing my registration plate.
-oOo-
Luckily, Mrs Shand is sweeter than her phone voice suggests. I can see that the stress of the situation is beginning to tell on her, giving her the alarmed and dangerously taut look of frayed rope.
‘He’s upstairs,’ she says, turning round in the hallway, bending down to pick up the post and in the process dropping half of the clothes and folders she already has in her arms.
‘Here. Allow me,’ I say, helping her sort things out.
‘He’s not well at all and I don’t know what to do,’ she says. ‘He’s leading me a merry dance, I can tell you.’
I follow her upstairs to a bedroom that’s like the deck of a ship, one great window stretching entirely across one end of it, the ceiling low, the only furniture in that vast space a simple double bed, an elderly man with wild, white hair lying placidly on top, both hands behind his head.
‘Hello?’ he says, stiffly pushing himself up on an elbow. ‘Who’d we have here, then?’
‘For goodness sake, Alfred! It’s the nurse!’ says Mrs Shand, trotting round the far side of the bed and fussing with some pillows. ‘You see what I mean?’ she adds, as if I’d just witnessed some outrageous display. ‘You see what I have to put up with?’
‘How are you, Alfred?’ I say, putting my bags down and then reaching out to shake his hand. His fingers are long and cool and frail, with so little pressure to them that if I closed my eyes it would be like shaking hands with a shadow.
‘I was having such a dream!’ he says, laying back down again and lacing his hands across his chest. ‘All those people! Coming out of the walls!’
He closes his eyes, then opens them again with a start, and looks straight at me, as if I was part of the same, ghostly parade.
‘Who did you say you were?’
‘Jim. From the hospital. Come to see how you are.’
‘Ah!’ he says, and then turns his pinched face up to the ceiling again, and closes his eyes.
‘Not good, Jim. Not good at all.
marvellous in moustaches
‘Call me Ellie. Everyone does.’
La Contessa is sitting in her riser recliner, one hand clapped over the business end of a cordless phone, the other held out to me – whether to shake or kiss, it’s hard to tell.
Are you still there, Doctor? she shouts into the phone, flapping her free hand for me to come in and sit down somewhere, anywhere. Hello? No – that was the nurse. Come to sort me out, I should think. I should HOPE. Now – this really is the most awful bother I’m in. Those pills you gave me aren’t doing the trick and I need something stronger. Something with a bit more of a kick. Mildred my domestic was telling me about the lovely liquid morphine she was given for her knee. She said she took a slug of it every time she had a twinge and it sorted her out nicely. I rather like the sound of that. So I’d be awfully grateful if you could see your way to organising that for me…….. Well, I’m hardly like to do that, am I? I haven’t moved from the chair in the last day or so…..No, not even for that….. which is why I’m rather hoping this kind nurse may have brought a special something to help with that aspect. (She glances over at me, raises her eyebrows, and nods.) Yes, she says into the phone, he just made a gesture to indicate that he HAS brought something…….Okay Doctor? Thank you Doctor. I’ll say goodbye for now, and I look forward to seeing you soon. Lovely. Cheero.
She presses the phone off in an overly forceful way – more like she’s grinding out a revolting bug with her thumb – then places it on the table of things next to her chair, and turns herself to address me.
La Contessa isn’t all she appears to be. Her fingers may be extensively knuckled with an array of decadent rings; her neck hung with impressive ropes of pearls and pendants, blue and white enamelled things reminiscent of medals, or obscure orders; and she might be surrounded in the room by Regency furniture and paintings of haughty relatives posing in country settings, with featureless children and bug-eyed dogs – but there’s something about the place, a junk-shop utility, that’s difficult to take seriously. I’m tempted to screw a loupe in my eye and hold her hand up for a closer look, but instead I unpack my bag and get ready for the examination.
The referral doesn’t say anything about any of this, of course, but Rae gave us the heads up. Rae is a physio. She came to see La Contessa earlier in the day, and was sufficiently impressed by everything she said about her life as an actress and scriptwriter, and her relation to half the royal family in Italy, to look her up on imdb. When that failed, she turned to Google, and came up with a much richer vein of information, which seemed to show that the only role La Contessa Eleganza di Dramamine had ever played in her life was La Contessa Eleganza di Dramamine. A role she plays to perfection.
‘Now look,’ she says – but then instantly appears distracted, tipping her head to one side like an inquisitive bird and scrutinising my face. ‘Have we met before? On a film set somewhere? What do you do when you’re not nursing? What d’you get up to?’
I’m always a little reluctant to tell anyone I’m a writer. Especially of a blog. It would feel like a duck hunter standing up in the reeds with a whistle, gun and hat with a duck on top. But I’m instinctively honest, and besides, I want to feel like I am actually a writer, and declaring it might go someway to making that happen, even if the next step would probably be to go to a support group, Writers’ Anonymous, and stand up when it’s my turn, and say Hi. I’m Jim, and I’m a writer.
‘I write,’ I tell her, a little forlornly.
‘Fabulous!’ says La Contessa. ‘Look in the drawer to my right, would you?’
The drawer is filled with business cards. I’m tempted to shuffle through them and see if they all say the same thing, but instead I take the first one I lay my hands on, and hold it up. A fancy gilt affair, curly lettering, La Contessa’s name followed by a long line of acronyms.
‘Send me some of your work,’ she says. ‘It’s all about the contacts, you know.’
‘Great! Thanks!’ I say, putting it in my pocket.
‘This back pain really is the most dreadful nuisance. I’m halfway through a project and it’s cutting across everything like mad.’
‘What’s the project?’
‘Oh – you’d love it! It’s called The Heart is Another Country. It’s about a Mata Hari figure in World War One who has to choose between duty to her country and this rather scrumptious German general she falls in love with. It’s in pre-production, but not quite cast. Darling Judi is frightfully keen to play the mother. Do you know Judi?’
‘Dench?’
‘That’s the one!’ says La Contessa. ‘Stephen wants to play the general, but I don’t know how to put him off. He’s frightfully brilliant, of course, and he looks marvellous in moustaches, but I’m just not sure I could take him seriously.’
the big man
Mira is using her zimmer frame for the first time, hobbling slowly and painfully to the hallway from the front room where she’s been sleeping these past few weeks.
‘Excellent! Good work!’ says Bethan, the physio. ‘We’ll soon have you back to normal.’
Mira stops in front of a picture on the wall, a lurid pastel portrait of a crying child in a knitted bonnet.
‘Do you know who this is?’ she says, letting go of the zimmer to straighten the frame.
‘Careful!’ says Bethan.
‘This is my husband,’ says Mira, ‘as a small child’
‘They gathered that,’ says John, her son, holding on to the door, his arm making an arch for her to pass under. ‘Come on, mum. Keep it moving. Keep it moving.’
‘Would you like to know why he was crying like this?’
‘Oh god. You’re going to get the guided tour now,’ says John.
‘It was Vidovdan, feast day. My husband’s Baka had made a wonderful torte, beautifully spread with segments of apple and pear, glistening with the most marvelous jelly and topped with fresh whipped cream. And he just couldn’t resist it. So he dragged his finger across the top, and then he stuck his finger in his mouth. Of course, when his Baka came in she was furious, and she smacked him – like this – on his hand. What you do this for? she said to him. Who will want to eat my lovely torte now you’ve wiped your dirty paws all over it? And he cried and he cried and he cried – just like the picture. And his Baka said to him, she said Why are you crying so much? I did not think I hit you as hard as all that. No he said I’m crying because I made you sad. And that was why they had this picture made of him.’
‘Yeah. And I bet they had to pinch him a few times to keep him going.’
‘John!’ says Mira. ‘Don’t listen to him. He misses Papa as much as I do.’
We continue walking towards the hallway.
They’re an odd couple, Mira and John. She is so small and frail, and her son so huge, it’s difficult to imagine her ever giving birth to him.
‘It might be quicker if I just put you over my shoulder,’ he says, checking his watch. ‘Mind you, I’m not sure I could these days. I carried a heavy machine gun and a radio when I was in the army. Well – it was a few years ago. I was twenty-six, the big man. Seemed like a good idea at the time.’
glad & buttons
‘The physio should be here soon,’ I say, finishing off my notes and putting them in the folder.
‘She’ll have trouble parking,’ says Moira. ‘It’s absolutely terrible round here.’
‘My grandson’s got a car that parks itself,’ says Glad.
Glad is Moira’s domestic help. It’s a funny arrangement. Glad is as elderly as Moira, but she gamely drags herself around the place with a duster and a bin bag. ‘You pull up, push a button and off it goes. Don’t ask me how it works. I wouldn’t have a clue. I can’t even work the radio.’
‘Yes. It’s incredible how these things have come on,’ says Moira, sitting in her riser-recliner, her hands placidly folded in her lap.
‘I expect in the future we’ll all be flying around in silver balloons,’ says Glad. ‘You’ll probably park on the roof and come down the chimney. I won’t be around to see it though, thank God. Here – what d’you want doing with these?’
She holds out a bunch of magazines, the top one Good Housekeeping, Mary Berry on the front. Moira looks a lot like Mary Berry, making allowances for the nightie, dressing gown and absence of make-up. They share the same haughty benevolence.
‘Oh I don’t know,’ says Moira. ‘Perhaps the hairdressers might want it. Or just recycle.’
‘Righto,’ says Glad, hobbling with her gammy hip to the side table by the door where she drops the magazines and then opens a cupboard to fetch out the hoover.
‘Look at this beauty!’ she says, pulling out a brand new, highly technical-looking Bosch. ‘Light as a feather. And the suck on it. Not too noisy, neither. And see this button? You press that when you’re done, and it puts itself back in the cupboard.’
She turns the thing on and starts pushing it backwards and forwards.
‘I’m lying about the button,’ she says. ‘Lift your feet, love.’
a tale of two women
I.
Maud is asleep on the ottoman.
‘She’s exhausted’ whispers her granddaughter, Eve. ‘We thought it best if we let her rest a while’
Maud couldn’t be more comfortable, a pile of crisp white pillows behind her head and a richly patterned duvet tucked around her.
‘Come and have a seat,’ says Eve. ‘We’ll wake her up in a minute.’
Eve leads me to a heavy oak dining table in the middle of the room, where Eve’s mother Lucy and Lucy’s sister, Beth are waiting.
‘Thanks for coming,’ says Beth, standing up to shake my hand.
‘It’s good of you,’ says Lucy. ‘Everyone’s been so kind.’
We take our seats.
It would make a good painting. The Visit. A broad and comfortable room, naturally lit by the low winter sun through the patio windows, a collection of old prints and portraits hung around the walls, ferns in planters, a baby grand covered with an antique shawl and a spread of family photos in simple, silver frames – and then the focus of the picture, the loving family leaning in on three sides of the table, me with my open folder, pen in hand, and Maud, snoozing in the background.
‘Can you just go over for me why Maud was taken to hospital in the first place?’ I say.
‘It was just before Christmas,’ says Lucy. ‘Mummy’s always been fiercely independent. She doesn’t like fuss and she’s absolutely resisted any attempt to get some help in with the garden.’
‘Imagine!’ smiles Eve.
‘Quel horreur!’ says Lucy, shaking her head.
‘Anyway. That’s the context. What we think happened is that Mummy was out there planting bulbs and having a bit of a tidy up – overdoing things as usual – came in and then suffered some sort of collapse. Not a stroke or her heart or anything. More a kind of giving out or a weakness in her legs. Whatever the reason, down she went and couldn’t get up again. Wasn’t wearing her red button, of course.’
‘I think it’s upstairs on the bathroom door,’ says Lucy.
‘Exactly. So there she was, down on the floor, and she just couldn’t get herself up again. The best she could manage was to shuffle about a bit – although not as far as the phone, sadly. Malcolm, a good friend and neighbour who lives just across the way, well Malcolm saw the light on quite late and rang Mummy to ask if everything was all right. When she didn’t answer he came over and let himself in with the key we’d given him…’
‘Thank God!’ says Beth.
‘…thank God!’ says Lucy. ‘Thank Malcolm! As soon as he found Mummy on the floor he called the ambulance. They were a while getting here, so once Malcolm had established that Mummy hadn’t broken any bones and so on, he helped her up and waited with her for the paramedics. She had every test you could think of at the hospital. Really – everyone’s been so kind….’
‘Absolutely!’ says Beth. ‘Thank you so much.’
‘…just amazing, actually. But aside from the usual wear-and-tear of Mummy’s osteoarthritis and her habit of doing too damned much, they couldn’t find anything wrong.’
‘A bit of a chest infection…’ says Beth.
‘Oh yes. The chest infection,’ says Ruth. ‘Beyond that, who can say? We’ve got some carers starting this evening. I think Mummy’s been given a bit of a frightener by all of this and she’s finally agreed to some help. One of us will stay tonight and however long it takes to get her back to strength. But she is ninety, you know. You can’t go on pretending you’re a young woman forever.’
And we all turn to look at Maud, fast asleep on the ottoman.
II.
‘I’m ninety, you know!’
‘I can’t believe that!’ I say, touching Renee lightly on the arm. I have to admit it’s a lie, though. One of her eyes is permanently closed, giving her a lopsided, leering look, and when she speaks – with difficulty – she rolls up her mouth at the end of each sentence, taking most of the lower half of her face with it.
Rene is stuck on the commode. She wasn’t able to pull up her nightie, and opening her bowels has resulted in a mess that’s going to take some deft manoeuvring to sort out. At least I’m here with my colleague, Helen, though. Together we manage to stand Renee up, and whilst Helen keeps her steady, I set to work with quantities of tissue and wet wipes.
‘Sorry about that,’ she says.
‘Don’t worry, Renee.’
After a while she says: ‘We’ll have to take the decorations down soon.’
I glance up at the walls. There are three lines of red tinsel stuck with masking tape to the crumbling plaster above the fireplace – not delicate strips of tape; the kind you tear off in a hurry and slap on.
‘Shame. It goes so quickly,’ says Helen, adjusting her position as I struggle to free some more wipes.
‘Yes,’ says Renee. ‘Still. It can’t be Christmas all the time or it wouldn’t be special.’
Her son Graham watches us from the other side of the room. He seems to do a lot of that. He was watching at the front door as I parked the car, not waving back when I did, or even saying hello, merely turning with a flat, mildly irritated look and disappearing inside, like a bear plodding back into its cave when it finds winter still has a way to go.
‘How is she?’ he says, as we struggle to get her nightie over her head.
‘Not sure.’
A microwave dings in the kitchen.
‘D’you mind if I get my dinner?’
‘Go ahead!’ says Helen, dropping the soiled clothing into a bag.
After a minute or two Graham reappears with a plastic dish of curry. Instead of taking it upstairs or out back, he sits on the side of Renee’s hospital bed, and starts tucking in with a spoon.
‘Sure you don’t mind?’ he says.
It’s disquieting to see just how exactly the food looks like the mess we’ve just dealt with.
‘Absolutely,’ I say. ‘Smells good.’
jim clayton 