The Windsurf Boy, page 6
She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, feeling some of the tightness vanish from her chest. Her arms flopped, open-palmed, upon the supporting chair; she allowed her still knees to relax and fall apart. Sunlight from the window was pale gold, to blue, to red, to white upon her eyelids; time suspended and the bright neutrality returning. Then there was a brief knock and the door opened.
Barbara looked round, expecting to see one of the nurses, but young Dr Elkins stood in the doorway, fiddling with his moustache.
‘Sorry to disturb you, Mrs Lewis. I just wondered if everything was all right?’
He was still learning, this doctor, she thought. Probably guilty about private medicine too, and partly despising us all, so that even the politest inquiry sounded cool.
‘Oh, I’m fine.’
‘Dr Jacobs would like to come and see you this afternoon.’
‘Oh – today?’
‘Yes … er … it will be convenient; it’s not your treatment day?’ He made as if to glance at the notes he was carrying, but did not open the file, waiting for her to tell him.
‘I don’t go today. I’m here all day.’
‘Good … er, so that will be fine. I might see you later then. Goodbye.’
He closed the door behind him and Barbara settled back, closing her eyes again. Another knock. This time she refused to open them, clenching tightly so that the colours became blackness.
‘Mrs Lewis? Are you all right, Mrs Lewis?’
The voice was gentle, and Barbara smiled, looking up.
‘Hallo Sandra. Just having a rest after my visit.’
Sandra Massey was the only nurse Barbara called by her Christian name, although she had not invited a reciprocal intimacy. The large patient woman in her forties, who had returned to nursing now that her children were grown, occasionally reminded Barbara of a milky ruminant creature which necessarily accepts its own usefulness.
‘Why don’t you make yourself nice and comfy on the bed?’
‘No, I’ll have to be in there soon enough. Might as well make the most of my time outside it.’
‘I wish you wouldn’t always say things like that, Mrs Lewis. You sound so … so … er …’
‘Bitter?’
The woman looked confused. ‘No, I wasn’t going to say that. Sad, I was going to say. Didn’t you enjoy your visit? Wasn’t it your daughter who was coming today?’
‘You’ve got a good memory, Sandra, after two days off. Yes, it was Anna, the older one, with her little boy.’
‘Oooh, that’s nice. How old is he? What’s his name?’
Sandra’s face lit up as if the imagined pleasure were her own: real, experienced.
‘Tom. He’s seven, I think. Or is he still six? You forget, with grandchildren.’
‘Of course you do. I said to my three, don’t you be too quick about making me a grandmother. But our Susan’s is due in a month’s time now, so I’ll soon be a granny like you!’
‘Oh, but a very young granny.’
The nurse sighed. ‘Not so young now, I’m afraid. I can’t do as much as I used to. You get tired. Backache – things like that.’
Drily Barbara murmured, ‘Yes, indeed you do. I know,’ deliberately, to see Sandra’s cheeks grow pinker with consternation. ‘Oh I’m sorry, Mrs Lewis. I wasn’t moaning. I’m lucky to have health and strength, and not a poor back like yours.’
‘Don’t worry, Sandra, I don’t mind at all. I don’t mind anything.’
The nurse shook her head slightly and looked cowed, without reason, as she walked across to the washbasin and took the thermometer from its glass. ‘Oh well, let’s get on with the routines.’
Barbara said, it’s funny you know, with one’s children … You’ll find it too, one day, if not now. There comes a time when they suddenly seem strange, like creatures on another planet … as if you’re looking at them through a telescope. There’s Richard, so successful, and by the way did I tell you they’re expecting a baby too? Oh yes, I did. And there’s Hilda who’s so happy with her husband and her two boys – she’s good at nearly everything. But Anna …’
‘It must be awful for her, left alone with Tom.’
‘Do you think so? I suppose.’
Sandra Massey looked up sharply, not prepared to tolerate such questioning of the obvious. ‘Well, of course!’
‘Anna always adored her father. That was the worst thing, when he died, for her I mean. I think so. It’s hard to know.’
Sandra agreed, ‘No, you never know, with people,’ and held out the thermometer. Obediently Barbara opened her mouth. The thing felt hard, almost painful, under her tongue, and yet she was used to its coldness.
‘Being here is never as I thought it would be,’ she thought, as Sandra stared down at the watch that was pinned to her plump bosom, ‘I imagined long, quiet days reading, and visits, and little sleeps, but mainly all the time left, to catch up on the books I saved to read until I had the time. I thought there’d be lots of time to think, too, embroidering and listening to the radio. And yet they come in and out, wrapping that rubber thing around my arm, and sticking the thermometer in my mouth, and marking my visits to the lavatory on the graph – as if all that made any difference! Endless cups of tea, with two dry biscuits on the green plate, and the menus to be filled in, and Dr Elkins knocking on the door, and Sandra coming in to tell me that the ambulance is waiting for me so can I come downstairs. Who would have thought that all the time would be spent making sure I’m keeping alive?’
Without knocking Nurse Anderson bounced into the room, smiling her pink smile, her pearl studs in place.
‘Oh, I didn’t realise you were already doing all that, Nurse Massey.’
‘Yes, I’ll manage, don’t worry,’ Sandra replied.
‘Did you enjoy your visit, dear? Your daughter, wasn’t it?’
‘Auuuh,’ said Barbara, the thermometer in place.
‘That was nice for you.’
Statements, people always made statements, telling you what you needed, what you wanted, and what you must think about all that happened in their little world that had become yours too. Barbara wanted to tear the thing from her mouth and shout that it was not nice, that there was nothing to say, that they should all get out of her room and leave her to contemplate the white light in the sky. But she nodded again and assented. ‘Auuug.’
‘Waterworks all right today?’
She nodded.
‘Bowels open?’
She shook her head.
‘Oh dear, would you like to take something for it?’
Sandra’s pencil was poised; she looked concerned. Barbara took the thermometer from her mouth and held it out, ‘I wish you wouldn’t leave that thing in for so long. I feel a fool with it stuck in my mouth. And do stop fussing about my bowels. There’s all the rest of the day to get through yet, and I might put my mind to making something happen, just to pass the time. Visits to the loo are something to look forward to. And now for heaven’s sake, stop fiddling with me!’
She made an ineffectual brushing-away gesture with her left hand, but knocked her knuckles against the table, so that tears stood in her eyes. Sandra was staring down, looking rueful. But Barbara caught Nurse Anderson’s reflection in the mirror, where she had turned to pat her glossy fringe, and the blue-shadowed eyes turned briefly to heaven in supplication. Then the nurse turned to say coldly, ‘Now, now, Mrs Lewis, don’t let’s get ourselves worked up. Nurse Massey has to go through the routine, and you know that as well as I do. Now then, would you like me to get you out a fresh nightie? We’re having a visit from Dr Jacobs, aren’t we?’
‘This was clean on this morning, because we were having a visit from our daughter.’
‘Well then, you’ll be fine.’
Nurse Anderson’s smile was as soft as neon light; Barbara hated her and sulked. Sandra was looking worried again. ‘Why is he coming this afternoon? It’s not his usual afternoon, is it?’
‘I don’t know why,’ Barbara muttered, ‘Dr Elkins just told me.’
Nurse Anderson was clearing away, clattering briskly, as Sandra never did. ‘Oh, I know what it’s about. He just wants to have a little talk.’ She looked across to Sandra with an expression full of conspiracy, but any significance eluded the other nurse, who smiled in a puzzled fashion and said, That’ll be nice.’
‘What does he want to talk to me about? I know everything he has to tell me.’
Nurse Anderson looked at her coldly. ‘Well, it’s not for me to say, Mrs Lewis, but I think he wants to have a proper talk with you about your plans.’
They had gone at last. Barbara picked up her tapestry, then let it fall. Her body was aching, yet she felt determined not to lie upon the bed, not today. Plans! You would laugh, if it were a laughing matter, she thought, stretching out a foot and regarding the twisted blue veins that stood out like lumps of grapes from her feet. ‘Plans? A Caribbean cruise, a flight across the Andes, a run in a marathon, with feet like that?’ She knew what it was, what he wanted to say, and said, I won’t do what they want, I won’t,’ as she heaved herself to her feet, and decided, through the twinges and stabs of real pain, that other movements inside her body made the promised visit to the lavatory urgent.
‘And won’t they be pleased,’ she said.
Chapter Seven
Mary Treadle was not the kind of person who could easily allow the lives of others to meander along, with the slow, steady movement of the Syne, without her intervention. From her shop she felt that she ruled the village; the village (which could not do without her expensive but convenient wares) felt, at times, unconvinced of the benevolence of the dictatorship.
When old Mrs Selway went blind it was Mary who organised a group of willing ladies to go and sit with her, when her son and daughter-in-law were busy in the pub. Equally effective was her dislike of those she described as ‘hippies’. When a shambling young man, with ‘sixties hair fifteen years out of date, took ‘Rose Cottage’ on a long let, and brought a girl, a baby and another shaggy young man to live there, Mary Treadle’s imagination revolved around nameless iniquity. When the hapless girl in her trailing skirts and multi-coloured knits tried, in the shop, to make conversation about the healthiness of stone-ground flour (which the Treadles did not stock) she felt the ice close around her heart. Conversations would stop when the trio entered shop or pub, and Mary would hiss to horrified old ladies that she wouldn’t like to say which of them fathered that poor baby. In the end the three young people left the village, taking their earthenware pots and wickerwork and books on yoga and rosy, well-kept baby, and returned to their friends in Stoke Newington, shaking their heads because the virtues of love and peace and stone-ground had not penetrated the idyllic riverside village they had seen as a retreat.
George Treadle kept apart from all such tittle-tattle. He allowed the wife who stood behind the counter with rolled-up sleeves to rule his life, as she ruled the nervous young men who brought supplies to the shop. With the memory of two coffins laid out in their low sitting-room, and Mary sobbing upon one and then the other, the strong woman beating upon his chest in her rage, he allowed her to mother him as well. But sometimes he would interrupt as Mary imparted a particularly scandalous piece of news to a friend, with a mild, ‘Now, Mary, now. You don’ rightly know if that be true.’
His wife would reply by addressing her confidante, as if he were elsewhere. ‘Oh owd George, he do live in a world of his own, like a babby! Like I was saying, Pat, I just happened to be leaning out the window and I saw her with that bikini top right off, for all to see!’ Then George would hear the ferry bell, and hobble away from their O-mouths of alarm.
He did agree, however, when Mary said to him at breakfast that she was ‘worried about that poor little Anna Lewis’. Anna had reverted to her maiden name, a decision which normally would have met with Treadle disapproval, were it not for the fact that they saw her as a victim; besides which habit had made that name, not the other one, natural. The Treadles liked Anna, accepting her as a part of their own past, before the village sprouted holiday homes from every nook and cranny, so that it was impossible to get to know the changing owners and tenants. The Lewises, said George, were ‘one of the old families’, conveying in that phrase his own nostalgia for the village of the ‘fifties and ‘sixties, a proper village, with children (including his own) playing in the streets, and the arrival of the few summer visitors a genuine excitement.
It was because George thoroughly approved of his wife’s plan that he stomped down the orchard path one grey morning, pushed his head around the kitchen door, and invited Anna to pop up to the shop there and then because Mary had a melon and a couple of fresh chops in, that would be sold soon, ‘but she do want you to ’ave um’. The summons touched Anna, as evidence of their concern.
When she reached the shop, ducking her head as second nature to enter the small room, it seemed as if the floor space was filled by a woman who was stacking groceries into a box. It was not that she was large, although she was in fact slightly taller than Anna herself. But she was dressed as if for lunch in London, in a floral dress that poured forth frills from every seam, and delicate high-heeled sandals. Since everyone in the village wore jeans, tan cotton smocks, or rough sweaters, this apparition with elaborately curled chestnut hair seemed out of place, filling the shop as inappropriately as a piece of bejewelled Renaissance enamel work stuck in a carpenter’s wooden frame.
‘Anna, I want you to meet Valerie Paul,’ said Mary Treadle quickly, seeing that Anna was about to withdraw and wait outside. ‘Mrs Paul, this is Anna Lewis. I was telling you about her.’
The last words were emphasised. The woman turned to Anna with a bright smile. ‘Hello. You have a holiday cottage here too, don’t you?’
‘Yes, it’s along this lane, but down a bit, by the river. It’s the pink one, called “Ahoy”, with the mast in the front garden. Have you just come to live here?’
Valerie Paul pushed a hand through her hair and laughed, ‘Oh no, we couldn’t live here all year round. Bit too quiet. We live in Bristol, but we’ve had a house here for two years.’
‘Really? Whose house did you buy? I know the village very well, though I haven’t been down for three summers.’
The other woman looked down at her sleeve, and fiddled with the thick gold bracelet on her wrist. ‘Oh, we didn’t buy anywhere old. We had a house built. We found the place first and decided that it would be good for holidays. More for them than for me, it must be said! First we rented a cottage, a broken-down old place full of the most awful junk. So Adrian bought a plot of land … and here we are.’
Anna asked again which house they owned, and had to be severe with the corners of her mouth when Valerie said proudly, it’s up the road and off to the left, down Church Lane. We’ve got brown shutters, have you seen it? It’s called “Hacienda” because Adrian loves Spain. We used to go there every year before it got so common.’
When the shop was empty Anna looked at Mary Treadle and grinned. ‘Gosh, Mary, this village is getting very glamorous.’
‘Well, I do like to see a woman make the best of herself.’
‘Oh, definitely.’
‘It’ll be nice for you to go up there for a drink tonight, won’t it, Anna? I thought it ’ud do you good to meet someone your own age, instead of sittin’ all alone in that cottage, and your mother so sick, and all.’
‘She’s not alone, she’s got me,’ said Tom, who had been peering into the frozen-food cabinet, where multi-coloured lollies lay covered in delicate frost.
Mary Treadle handed him a bar of toffee and said, ‘Yes, my dearie, but I wanted your mum to meet some grown-ups.’
‘Oh, I see,’ said Anna, who had not, until then.
She looked gloomily into the small white wardrobe. Two pairs of blue jeans, one pair of rust cotton trousers, an old flowered cotton skirt and a blue cheesecloth dress – that was all she had brought, except for an assortment of tee-shirts, one cardigan and her cotton jacket. There was nothing fit to clink glasses with crisp frills. What on earth was the woman doing, walking round like an advertisement for Vogue? Anna stared out of the window at the grey water, working out all the permutations she could have worn, had she imported her London clothes to ‘Ahoy’. It was futile.
Music drifted from the sitting-room. She had allowed Tom to sprawl and watch an old film, a Terry Thomas comedy, countering his complaint about the old black-and-white set with the observation that the film was monochrome too.
Sitting at the little dressing-table, Anna rested her chin upon her hands and studied her reflection. A thin face, overshadowed by her heavy fringe and ear-length bob; brown eyes; full mouth – Anna imagined that she looked exactly as she had at twenty-five, and she was not displeased.
She smiled at the reflection, mimicking vivacity, and said, ‘You must be Adrian! How lovely to meet you. I hear you are a Hispanophile. And what a lovely Spanish-style hacienda you’ve built here!’ She giggled, showing her teeth; then stopped, leaning forward to examine them more closely.
It starts with the gums, retreating from the enamel like vulnerable, pink sea-flesh from any probing harshness, and bleeding slightly upon the brush. Around the eyes appears a web of fine lines, more subtle than the feet of any crow, resembling rather the tracery of veins in the tail of a tropical fish, or the work of a demented spider. Smile lines carve a passage down from nose to corner of mouth, and the edges of the lips lose their definition, breaking up into invisible channels. Anna had once read of a model who, knowing this, decided to smile less to preserve her looks. She had wondered at the time what on earth that girl could be saving her face for. Old age?
