Disappeared, page 20
‘Good, then you don’t accept from any man what you wouldn’t want for Drew.’
‘That’s how I found the courage to go in the end,’ she said falteringly. ‘I was too scared to do it for myself, but I didn’t want Drew growing up seeing that, her being poisoned by it like I was. Her turning into me.’
The overwhelming sense of emotion that rocked Cerys at those words could only be described as pride. That her ‘adopted’ daughter had found the strength to do that. That she had protected her own child to the best of her ability. Any lingering feelings of bruised ego she felt that Lily hadn’t told her about Drew earlier vanished like mist in the morning sun. She understood completely that visceral, primitive need to protect your children at all costs.
And when she thought back to that girl she’d found sobbing on the picnic bench because her child had dropped their food on the floor, dear God, no wonder she had wept after everything she’d been through.
You were meant to find her, a voice inside said. You were meant to not walk into that sea. You were meant to be there that day at that time.
And there was no logic to that at all. There was only a mother’s instinct and if Cerys had one thing left in her wretched life, in the wreckage of that world she’d inhabited, it was that. She was still a mother and she could still give this girl what she so badly needed, even if her own children had moved on.
‘You’re going to come out of this stronger,’ she told Lily. ‘You’re going to be that mother you want to be and that Drew needs. Look how far you’ve come already. You listen to me, I know how hard it must have been for you to leave. I don’t understand how it feels because I’ve never been you, but I know you and how scared you must have been. You did a tremendous thing there for Drew. I am so proud of you! I don’t think I can find the words to tell you how proud of you I am. And you’ve kept going, keeping your secret to protect her. So, cariad, I am not disappointed or mad at you. Not in the slightest. I’m devastated that you’ve been so hurt, I’m mad as all hellfire at that man for doing that to you, but most of all I’m prouder than I’ve ever been of anyone in my life that you did what you did for your little girl – you are a fantastic mother!’
And she stopped, totally out of words and choked up by how strongly she felt. It overwhelmed her, and what lifted it beyond the effect of her words on herself, of that outpouring of emotion that she hadn’t understood before she said it, was the look on Lily’s face. She looked as if she’d been waiting for her whole life to hear someone say that, but only in a dream – as she’d never believed it could actually happen in real life.
It was a crazy, heady thing to realise you’d made somebody’s dream come true. Cerys didn’t quite know what to say any more so instead she followed that well-honed mother’s instinct and flung herself over to Lily to hug her as tight as she should have been hugged by the mother who had never been there for her. And it was as if she could put all of the love that Lily should have had but didn’t into one embrace. Cerys wanted her to remember the feel of that hug whenever trouble came and she needed a mother’s love. As she remembered her own mother’s arms every single time she’d needed her.
To lose a mother like Cerys’s was a dreadful thing. It could tear you in two and you could never be the same again once they’d gone. But she understood that far worse was never to have had a mother like that in the first place.
Lily hung onto her too like she could receive everything she’d missed. Like it was making her whole.
‘I do feel better,’ Lily said finally when they let go of each other and weren’t quite sure what to do next. She said it wonderingly. ‘You were right. I really do feel better.’
Cerys’s eyes were brimming as she said, ‘You always do when you talk to your mum and get the world put right.’
And Lily nodded, because she understood who they were talking about and also that Cerys had just made her a promise.
‘Can you sit with Dilys now for a minute?’ Cerys asked her. ‘I need to make a phone call. I need to call my daughter.’
Lily’s eyes widened but she just nodded in response and went through to see the old woman.
Cerys went into the hall and picked up the phone. She dialled the no caller ID code and then the number. It did go to voicemail and she was relieved she didn’t have to run the whole gamut of emotions she’d had when she’d called Gavin. It was hard enough hearing Katie’s voice on the recorded message.
‘Hi, this is Katie. Sorry I can’t answer but leave a message and I’ll get back to you.’
‘Hi, sweetheart, it’s Mum. I’m okay and I love you – I need you to know that. Bye, love.’
She couldn’t have said any more and not lost control. Besides it was enough. She didn’t know what she was going to do next so it was best not to be drawn into more.
She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall. She could feel her daughter on her lap as a child, feel those little toddler-chubby arms round her neck as they cuddled, feel the soft weight of her and the scent of the strawberry shampoo on her hair.
‘I want to go home,’ she whispered, ‘but I don’t know where home is any more, Katie. Please forgive me.’
51
Dilys was still coughing badly when Cerys left to see to the sheep. Dawn was coming faster now at the beginning of spring but it still wasn’t light when she left. The dog was behaving strangely. It wouldn’t get off Dilys’s bed. Cerys went to give his collar a quick tug and he growled at her.
She pulled back startled and it whined and laid its head on the old woman. Its tail wagged in appeasement. Cerys eyed him, thinking. She didn’t like the look of this. Whether Dilys wanted it or not, she was calling the doctor back again when she returned. It was only a week since she’d had him out but that time had been at Dilys’s request and she’d not improved any since then.
‘You stay there and look after her then,’ she told Kip as Dilys still dozed. ‘I’ll see you later.’ The cup of tea she’d brought her before she got dressed was still untouched on the side table. That wasn’t like her – she was normally awake in time to tend the sheep, even though she couldn’t do it any more. Years of habit still woke her though. Kip wagged appreciatively back at Cerys for understanding that he needed to do this, and he settled himself in closer to his mistress.
Cerys set out on her own. Without Kip, the work took three times as long and there was a pale sun well up in the sky by the time she returned back down the hill. At least she didn’t have to worry about getting back to care for Drew as Rhys was there and didn’t have to go into the hospital until late afternoon. On the way back, she noticed a lame sheep struggling to get up the hill and stopped to check on her. She was a hard catch without the dog there, despite her lame foot, and then Cerys had to administer some first aid and a spot of spray to the sheep’s fleece to make her easy to locate again for daily checking to make sure the cut was healing. It looked like she’d torn it, probably on barbed wire, and there was some inflammation but no infection yet. Cerys suspected it might turn nasty though so definitely one to check tomorrow before bacteria took hold and she had a big job on her hands.
She trudged down the hill slowly. The ground was soaked after days of rain and it made for tough going in places. It gave her time to think about what she was going to do next, what she really wanted.
It was probably time to talk to Dilys again about what she wanted. The old woman wasn’t getting better at all at the moment and it was clear Cerys couldn’t leave without some form of plan. Dilys would need a nurse and someone to look after the farm for her if Cerys did go.
If Cerys even wanted to.
Did she?
Dilys’s offer turned over and over in her head, slow graceful cartwheels of promise.
She could stay. She could have a life here. A completely different one to what had gone before, but there was peace here. Her heart was at rest. The blackness was held at bay.
The trouble was she didn’t know if that was a temporary thing or if Dilys was right and it was her time of life and she’d be released from its claws as she moved through that. Up here in the hills, what she understood was that life moved with seasons and the slow turn of the earth from day to night. The rhythm of the country still lay deep in her bones, for all she’d rejected that for years. But in times of trouble, her soul turned towards it again gratefully, like a compass needle to the north. Her heart aligned with relief.
She would stay, she thought. She would contact her children and explain and that would be a hard conversation. Maybe they would drive over and go out for lunch somewhere and she could talk to them about it.
Gavin would move on with his life; he had the business. He’d been weary of her for years anyway. Perhaps he’d be glad to be cut loose. She rather thought he would.
And she would have peace. After the last few years, that was really all she wanted now. That quiet stillness that brought a gentle joy, and an escape from the blackness. That was enough for her.
She went into the farmhouse and pulled off her waterproofs. The dog didn’t come to greet her but after his behaviour this morning she wasn’t surprised. She filled the kettle and turned it on and went to see if Dilys was ready for a cup of tea and some breakfast.
When she padded into the bedroom in her thick welly socks, she heard the sound immediately and she froze. The dog lifted a quick sorrowful head and whined softly.
Dilys lay motionless under the quilt. Her chest rising and falling and that dreadful, cracking wheeze that Cerys knew.
The death rattle.
She’d heard it before from her own parents and as a child from her grandmother when she was taken to say goodbye for the last time. Her mother had told her what it was then.
Dilys stirred slightly, and Cerys hurried over to the bed to take her hand. ‘Don’t bother the doctor,’ she croaked. ‘It’s time, I know that; I’ve felt it coming for a while and he told me last week I was right. I wouldn’t let him tell you – didn’t want you worrying before you had to.’
This was how her dad had been. A last generation of farming folk who understood tides and rhythms well enough that they accepted their own with an equanimity that was lost in the rest of society. It didn’t surprise her. These folk didn’t make a fuss when their time came. They let it happen like the wild things did and they went with a grace that escaped those battling and out of place in hospital beds.
Cerys knew what Dilys wanted now and it was her duty to provide that, as it had been for her own parents.
‘Give me a few minutes and I’ll be back,’ she said.
Dilys nodded, the horrible rattle adding impetus to Cerys’s movements. She sped over to the cottage, leaving Kip on the bed with Dilys to keep her company, and indeed nothing would have moved that dog from her side.
Rhys was playing Snap with Drew at the table.
‘Hi, what’s up?’ he said when she burst in.
‘Dilys,’ she said, nodding at Drew to indicate she couldn’t say more.
Rhys, with a few years of hospital experience under his belt, understood immediately. ‘Drew, let’s move this over to the farmhouse and Cerys will help you set up while I just go and do a doctor-type thing, then I’ll come back and play.’
Drew still lived in that inhibited world where she didn’t pout or argue with grown-ups in case of repercussions, but Cerys had a minor moment of pleasure to see that she allowed a faint expression of disappointment to gleam through. Cerys helped her collect everything and when they got over to the farmhouse, she drew Rhys aside.
‘I think she’s passing.’ She marvelled for a second that her mother’s old term for it was the one she found on her lips, and then continued, ‘and she doesn’t want a doctor again but I need to know it really is her time and there’s no more we could do.’
He nodded. ‘Leave it with me,’ and he headed off to Dilys’s room.
Cerys helped Drew arrange the cards into the correct piles again and by the time that was achieved to Drew’s satisfaction, Rhys was back at the door. ‘I’m just going to hand over to Cerys and then I’ll be back – let me steal her for a moment.’
‘Why don’t you get a biscuit from the tin?’ Cerys suggested over her shoulder as she followed him out, closing the door behind her.
Rhys cut to the chase. ‘She has a DNR notice in her bedside drawer. She pointed me to it.’
Cerys knew what this was from her own father’s death – a Do Not Resuscitate plan, agreed by the patient following a conversation with their doctor. ‘Did she do that last week when he was here?’
Rhys nodded. ‘She kept it there for when it was needed. She didn’t want to tell you too soon in case you tried to talk her out of it.’
‘She’s going, isn’t she?’ The reality of it hit Cerys like a cold wave from the Irish Sea.
‘I’m sorry, yes, she is. I’ll call the GP and notify them and I’ll also call a friend and get swapped off shift so I can stay here. There’s not much I can do, but you’ll probably feel better having a doctor around and at least I can look after Drew. I’ll let Lily know in a minute.’
‘I will, yes. I’m going to sit with her so it would be a big help having you here for Drew too.’
He hesitated. ‘Not my specialist area, this, but for what it’s worth, I don’t think she’s got long. I’ll pull out all the stops to stay for as long as needed.’
‘Thanks,’ Cerys said, ‘I don’t think she has either.’
‘I’ll bring you a cup of tea as soon as I’ve finished this game with Drew. And I’ll help you if she’s able to swallow any water. Don’t be surprised if she can’t or won’t though.’
Cerys nodded and went back to the bedroom. She pulled the bedroom chair up to sit beside Dilys. She took the old woman’s hand in hers. Dilys stirred and opened her eyes for a moment. She smiled faintly. ‘It doesn’t hurt,’ she whispered and closed her eyes again and drifted back into sleep. The dog whined once softly and snuggled a few inches closer as if he knew his presence would pass comfort through the quilt and into her very bones.
Time passed by softly and slowly as Cerys sat beside the bed. How many more of these passings would she be here for? She’d never wanted to do another after her own mother’s but she was thankful she was here for Dilys’s because otherwise she might be alone when she passed. Cerys had been grateful neither of her parents had died alone and it would have broken her inside if she’d come down from that hill today to find Dilys had gone with only the dog here with her.
The old woman’s hand was cold in hers and she rubbed it lightly to warm it and then pulled the covers up closer under her chin. Soon nothing would warm her again. Cerys wondered if she could feel cold now or whether she was beyond that. She’d said it didn’t hurt. That was a blessing.
‘A good way to die,’ that’s what Dilys would call this if she could speak now. No tubes, no hospital buzzers, no frantic whir of hospital and medical procedures. Dying as she had lived, quietly and in the place she loved, in her home, with that poor faithful dog by her side.
She noticed a corner of paper peeking out of the bedroom drawer and she opened the drawer to see what it was. An envelope, which must have been lying under the DNR notice. It had her name on it. Rhys mustn’t have seen it when he picked the DNR sheet up but it was dark in the room with the tiny cottage window and a dull sky and the writing was faint.
Cerys took it out of the drawer and glanced at Dilys, who slept on, her lungs battling to breathe while the rest of her began to surrender. The name was written on it in the shaky hand of the old with failing sight. She opened it. There was a letter inside written in the same wobbly hand.
Dear Cerys,
Thank you for everything you have done for me. It is more than you can ever know. I wish we could have had longer together but know that you have made my last days brighter and happier than anybody else could have. And you brought Lily and Sammy with you, and you have all given me a chance to have a family even if it was only for a few months, but it has been a blessing I had not looked or dared hope for.
I want you to know, as you enter this new stage in your life, that things are not over and not ended. These are new beginnings. Look out for them and do not be afraid that good things will not come now. It is a hard change sometimes to move into that last third of life and know there is more time behind you than ahead, but do not fear it. We learn wisdom in the life before, that carries us through the life ahead if we let it. It is not the end, but a new time to grow. Change feels hard but, when we look back after, we realise it was good for us.
I wish I could stay to walk through this with you for a few more years but I know you are a strong woman and you will do it without me. I want to give you a little gift to help you though, and I know you will do the right thing with it. It is your choice what to do with it and it is a gift freely given. You know I never had a daughter and I always wanted one. I would have been so proud to have one like you and, for the last few months of my life, you have given me that gift I have always longed for. To me, you have been that daughter. When I asked for my lawyer to visit a few weeks ago, it was to draw up a new will. I have left you the farm, to do with as you please.
I have left my land and property to my daughter, as I always wished to be able to. I have given instructions to the lawyer to make sure I am buried in the churchyard beside my husband. You can just see the farm from where the grave is.
I hope this gift will bring you joy and freedom, however you use it. Please look after Kip for me. He will be happy with you.
With all my love,
Dilys
Cerys put the letter down on the quilt in astonishment.
She let the words sink in slowly, each one feeling as if it etched across her skin and into her memory. A gift indeed, but while the legacy Dilys left her was of huge value in itself – joy and freedom indeed – her words of wisdom were perhaps the greater gift. She knew that deep inside her, a chord that resonated through every fibre.
