Love Untold, page 23
‘Hey, careful,’ Grace said gently. ‘You’ll topple me over!’
‘Sorry,’ said Elin, burying her face in Grace’s neck and sobbing. They stood like that for a couple of minutes, Grace smoothing Elin’s hair and soothing her with gentle coos and ‘There, there’s.
Having finally pulled herself together, Elin broke out of the hug and shook herself down, wiping her cheeks and attempting to regain some authority.
When am I going to do it? thought Grace. When on earth am I going to find the right moment to tell her that Alys has come back?
Elin was like a dog with a bone right now, and so fragile. To break the news that the mother who’d abandoned her had returned after decades away might just push her over the edge …
‘What we need to do now,’ said Elin calmly, ‘is think about next steps, that’s all. And that’s what we were discussing, isn’t it, Beca?’
‘I’m not resitting and I’m not going to sixthform, so forget it.’
‘Oh yes you are, young lady!’ And Elin was back on the attack, her emotional outburst forgotten, her head-teacher mantle restored.
But Beca was in fighting mood. ‘I’m staying here. I want to live here with Grama Grace.’
‘Well, we’d need to talk about—’ said Grace, but her voice was drowned out.
‘DON’T BE RIDICULOUS! WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO LIVE ON? AIR??’
‘I’LL GET A JOB, AT NEETA’S CAFÉ OR SOMETHING!’ shouted Beca triumphantly.
‘What about Soozi?’ asked Grace, but again she was drowned out by Elin.
‘Oh well, that’s just marvellous, you’re going to wait tables and scoop ice-cream into cones for the rest of your life, are you?’
‘At least I’d be HAPPY doing that! You’re ALWAYS complaining about your job. D’you know what they call you in school? THE MISERY MAGNET! – YEAH! ’Cos you’re always so FUCKING MISERABLE!’
‘THAT’S ENOUGH!’ shouted Grace at the top of her voice. ‘JUST STOP IT! BOTH OF YOU!’
Beca and Elin immediately shut up. If they’d been dogs, they’d have whined self-pityingly, their tails pointing firmly between their legs.
Grace shut her eyes and put her hands to her face, gathering her thoughts, mustering her strength. She turned to them both. ‘A couple of hours from now, the ambulance will be bringing Cissie here to stay—’
‘Cissie?’ asked Elin, confused.
‘She’s coming home to … well, y’know.’ Still Grace couldn’t say the words.
‘Why didn’t you tell me? When did this—’
‘Grama Grace, I’m so sorry,’ whispered Beca.
Grace nodded, taking a deep breath and trying to fast-track recovery from the turmoil of the row – turmoil that her home hadn’t seen in a very long time.
‘Well, if you really mean that, then you’ll put all this nonsense behind you, because quite honestly life is too precious to be arguing over a few silly exams. Don’t you think?’
Beca readily agreed, but Grace could tell that Elin was just going along with her. They hadn’t heard the end of this row, that was for certain.
The doorbell rang, breaking the tension.
‘I’ll go!’ said Elin, understandably glad to leave the room.
Grace and Beca stood in silence for a moment. The storm that was about to break was unavoidable.
‘I take it you haven’t told her?’ whispered Grace, surrendering to the inevitable. And Beca shook her head. Walking out into the hallway, they both waited for the fallout.
They watched as Elin opened the door.
And listened to the silence that followed.
Alys.
Smiling nervously at the daughter she hadn’t seen for three decades, and struggling to find the right words. All she could manage to say was …
‘Hello, Elin.’
Alys and Elin
* * *
1982–1992
48
Elin
aged eleven
She’s walking down Newport Road in Cardiff, the city-centre traffic performing its traffic-light dance alongside her – stop, wait, slow, slow slide then move; fast, slow, stop. Vehicles, open-windowed and dusty, let in the hot smog and let out a mish-mash of notes, tumbling from competing radio stations and cassette players. The sloppy musical chaos combines with horn toots and engine thrums, and mechanical clanking from a nearby building site. Summer in the city.
Elin recognizes one tune that everyone in her class loves singing – the Steve Miller Band repeating the phrase ‘Abra-abra-cadabra, I wanna reach out and grab ya’.
Not music that Elin likes.
Though she knows she should like it. To be the same as the rest of them.
But she’s not. Not when it comes to music. Not when it comes to anything.
Today was her last day of primary school. Mrs Rogers cried when she said goodbye to them all in their final assembly and gave everyone in the leavers’ class an individually wrapped present – a key ring in the shape of a four-leaf clover made from shiny green enamel. Some of the boys chucked theirs away as soon as they’d run out of the school gate, in an act of bravado, chanting Pink Floyd’s ‘Another Brick in the Wall’ at the tops of their voices – We don’t need no education. But she’s held on tight to hers. Because she loves her good-luck clover. She will always treasure it. She’s already attached it to her front-door key – forcing it between the double metal rings until it’s safely affixed.
She opens the dirty, cracked glass door at the side of Mac’s – a run-down greasy-spoon café, the smells of which fill their home daily. She likes Mac. He’s kind. And so is his wife. She has given Elin many a free breakfast. Not that she’s ever asked for one.
She hears shouting. Fearfully, she treads the stained purple carpet that leads up the stairs to her home. The door is ajar and she steps inside. There’s a man she doesn’t recognize standing with two others, arms folded and scary. Her mother is crying – nothing new there.
The men don’t see Elin straight away but her mother does and she changes gear, screaming now at the men. ‘And this is my child! You’re just going to throw her out as well, are you? Like a piece of unwanted rubbish?’
‘You are squatting, Miss Meredith. You have no right to be here.’
Her mother grabs Elin’s arm and pulls her daughter to her. Not out of love, Elin suspects, but to use her as a pawn in some domestic negotiation. ‘Look, just let me stay here another week. Give me time to—’
‘You said that last time. And the time before. You have one hour to gather your things and leave, otherwise my friends here will do it for you. Your choice.’
Her mother sinks to her knees and wails, ‘I can’t cope, I cannot deal with this. Please! Please, help me.’ This isn’t a shock for Elin. This is a regular occurrence and she has long become used to seeing her mother like this.
The men also stand unmoved. One of the arms-folded fellows attempts a kind little smile at her, but she scowls back. It’s not a happy situation. It doesn’t warrant a smile.
‘We can call Social Services – get the child removed, if you like. Do better than she is at the moment—’
Her mother catches her breath and gasps, ‘Don’t you dare!’
‘Come back in an hour, we’ll be gone by then,’ Elin says, helping her mother to her feet.
The men look unsure, floored by the maturity of this schoolgirl. When the bailiffs leave, the room is silent.
‘I’m sorry, baby,’ weeps her mother, wiping her eyes.
‘You’ll need to pull the suitcase down from the wardrobe,’ Elin says, as she begins to extricate her key from its enamel clover.
49
Alys
aged thirty
‘It’s just until I get myself sorted,’ she says, red-eyed and shaking. She needs a drink. But she daren’t ask, daren’t push her luck.
‘Just tonight,’ he says. ‘And the kid sleeps in the kitchen. Can’t have her in the same room, wouldn’t be right.’
To call it a studio flat is a tall order. In reality it’s no more than a bedroom with three doors leading to a landing, a bathroom and a tiny kitchen. There’s a tired two-seater sofa in the corner, a couple of hard-backed chairs and a yellow Formica table adorned with several empty beer cans and an overflowing ashtray. It’s the last resort. The only place Alys could think of; the only person she could ask for help. She can hardly call him a boyfriend – more of a pub acquaintance whose bed she’s shared a few times. And the bed was on the more glamorous occasions: a deserted beer-garden table and a damp alley also spring to mind. She flinches at the thought.
Looking down at Elin, Alys forces a smile.
‘That’ll be fun, won’t it? Sleeping in a kitchen, of all places!’
Her child stares back. Boring into her with that guilt-inducing look that Alys has come to know so well. The look that tells her she’s failed her. Failed them both. Again.
‘Are you sleeping in the kitchen as well?’
Alys hesitates.
And before she can answer, he jumps in, ‘No, your mummy’s sleeping with Uncle Jack. Keep his feet warm at night.’ And he laughs and slaps Alys’s backside before heading to the bathroom.
The close proximity of the WC affords no privacy and the sound of him peeing for an interminably long time fills the room. Alys watches a flicker of light go out in her daughter’s eyes.
Replaced by comprehension.
Disappointment.
Shame.
‘Let’s make a little den, shall we?’ she says, trying to muster enthusiasm, and she takes the cushions from the sofa, placing them on the kitchen floor to fashion a makeshift bed. From the hastily packed suitcase she pulls out a couple of pullovers to act as a cover, rolling her coat up as a pillow. ‘It won’t be for long, I promise,’ she whispers as she tucks Elin into the pathetic excuse for a bed. Next door, the two-gallon lavatory flushes.
50
Grace
aged forty-nine
‘There, there, bach,’ she whispers. ‘All will be well, you watch.’ She holds the child tight, kisses the top of her head. They are sitting in the visitors’ room of Cardiff Royal Infirmary, the August sun powering through the window, turning the fixed orange seats plasticine-soft. How familiar it feels to wrap her arms around her charge: familiar yet novel. Because she’s only met this grandchild, her only one, a handful of times. Such a quiet soul, she thinks. Not like her own daughter was at this age.
A doctor comes along the corridor towards them, smiling, and sits down on the plastic chair next to them.
‘Where’s my mother?’ asks Elin.
‘She’s having a little rest at the moment,’ he says. ‘She’s very tired and needs us to keep an eye on her.’ The doctor gives Grace a meaningful not-in-front-of-the-child look.
Grace takes her purse out and finds a few coins. ‘Tell you what, bach. Go and fetch Grama Grace a cup of coffee, is it? And a hot chocolate for yourself.’
Elin looks back at her and sighs. She knows this is her grandmother’s distraction technique, but accepts the mission without complaint.
Maybe the poor girl’s tired of being kept in the picture, Grace thinks. She’s seen too much already.
They watch Elin take herself off towards the vending machines and the doctor launches in.
‘Alys is doing well,’ he says.
‘Can I see her?’
‘Not yet. She’s heavily sedated and will need to be transferred to Whitchurch Hospital. For psychiatric care.’
The words jar. They shout failure and weakness and Grace wishes she could just tell her daughter off, chastise her for being such a drama queen. It need not have come to this, after all. If Alys had just not been so stubborn. If she’d just let herself be helped.
‘I’ve let her down.’
‘No. That is absolutely not true.’
They sit there in silence for a moment, watching Elin in the distance navigating the instructions of the vending machine.
‘We need to focus on the positives for now,’ says the doctor.
‘What’s positive about an overdose?’
‘The fact that it wasn’t an intentional one. That makes a huge difference. It was a cry for help, for sure – but Alys cried for help and we heard her.’
Grace feels enraged at this and cannot bite her tongue. ‘No, we didn’t hear her – that eleven-year-old child over there found her. It’ll scar the poor mite for life.’
The doctor nods. He’s not disputing this. Grace tries to banish the image from her head, but it stubbornly remains: Elin in some godforsaken bedsit trying to rouse her comatose mother and failing; finding the pill bottle, running on to the street and stopping a stranger for help because there was no phone to call an ambulance. Taken by Social Services whilst her mother had her stomach pumped, being asked who else they could call. Elin knowing of nobody, no friend of the family, only some man in a café called Mac, who thank God had stepped in and taken control. Grace dreaded to think what would have happened had Elin not remembered visiting her – five years earlier, for the Silver Jubilee – not remembered this dim and distant grandmother whom Alys had since cut out of their lives. Her selfish, selfish daughter. Who had now left her eleven-year-old child stranded, almost orphaned, and terrified.
‘Mrs Meredith?’
Grace realizes she’s not been listening. ‘Sorry, what?’ She watches Elin approach, precariously holding two hot drinks in beige plastic cups, concentrating hard on not spilling them.
‘I was saying that if you’re not able to look after Elin, then Social Services will need to find temporary foster care until Alys is well enough to—’
‘Oh, Elin will be staying with me,’ she interrupts. ‘There’s no question of that, Doctor.’
51
Elin
aged eleven
Elin’s not sure if she prefers making Welsh-cakes or pikelets the most. Welsh-cake mixture tastes nicest, of course, and she loves cutting out the rounds with Grama Grace’s pastry cutter before placing them on the heavy black bakestone so that they can brown slowly. But then pouring the pikelet batter is fun, too – she has to judge just the right amount to make the correct size, and meet the challenge of producing a perfect circle.
Aunty Cissie says Elin’s pikelets are even better than Grama Grace’s. And that’s saying something. Because Grama Grace’s cooking is amazing. Elin likes Aunty Cissie. She gets the giggles sometimes over the silliest of things and it’s infectious. And once she starts, she takes ages to stop. Grama Grace calls her a flibbertigibbet. But she says it with a smile.
Aunty Cissie lives in Grama Grace’s boarding house. She’s Elin’s favourite of all the residents. Mr Hughes is very polite, but keeps himself to himself. Grama Grace says it’s because he’s a very sad man whose wife died and they had no children. He moved into Grama Grace’s because otherwise he might die of loneliness. There are three other people living there – Uncle John, who’s Grama Grace’s boyfriend, and Miss Jones, who teaches Welsh and Music in a private school. She’s tiny and mouse-like and always speaks in Welsh with Grama Grace. And then there’s Mr Harman, who likes wearing dresses. He showed Elin his wardrobe once and let her try on his shoes. They were too big – he has to get them sent in the post from a special mail-order catalogue. He let Elin do his make-up last week when he was going out for the evening. She didn’t do a very good job, but he obviously didn’t want to hurt her feelings and told her she was a natural artist. She’s not. Art is not her thing. Music is her thing. Miss Jones has been teaching her to play the cello. She says Elin should definitely continue. One evening, Miss Jones accompanied her on Grama Grace’s upright piano and they did a mini-concert for the residents. Aunty Cissie cried when Elin played. She said it was one of the most beautiful things she’d ever heard.
Elin presses down lightly on the Welsh-cakes with the spatula. There’s a plate already piled high with the ones she’s finished. This is the final batch. She inhales the sweet baked smell – a comforting combination of butter and currants and spice; an aroma that she will always associate with this house, with comfort and with safety.
‘That’s a shopful you’ve made there!’ says Grama Grace. ‘We should have set up a stall in Dylan’s Quay market and sold them.’ Grama Grace gives her a big cwtch, forcing herself to sound happy. Even though Elin knows she’s not. And nor is Elin. Because today her mother is coming to collect her.
‘Mummy’s all better and brand-new now, sweetheart!’ Alys had said on the end of the phone last week. ‘Isn’t that fabulous?’
‘Yes,’ Elin had said quietly.
She wants her mother to be better – of course she does. But she doesn’t understand why they can’t all live together at Grama Grace’s. Why do they have to go back to Cardiff?
‘But we’re not going to live in Cardiff, sweetpea!’ Alys had said down the crackling phone line. ‘We’re going to live somewhere much more exciting than Cardiff!’
Elin finishes the final batch and stands back to admire her work. She closes her eyes, committing this feeling to memory, the warm, invisible blanket of love and homeliness. She stores it up. Because she’s not sure how long it will be until she feels like this again.
The soft bing-bong of the doorbell disturbs her trance and she opens her eyes. Grama Grace is smiling at her and whispers, ‘Do you want to answer it or shall I?’
52
Alys
aged thirty-one
The shoulder stand is much easier now. And so it should be after over three months of daily yoga practice. Alys breathes out and lowers herself back into lotus, under the shade of the Spanish palms, the grass fresh beneath her feet. She still cannot believe that they are living here – the excitement and beauty of Madrid, free accommodation and an education for Elin at the local Catholic school. All thanks to Eduardo.
She’d met him at group therapy in Whitchurch Hospital, three weeks into her stay there. Who would have thought that that day would have heralded such a monumental change in her life? A forty-nine-year-old Spanish psychiatrist on sabbatical from Madrid University, Eduardo had been observing the group, under the supervision of Dr Powell. At first Alys had barely noticed him. In all honesty, she hadn’t had time to notice anyone else at that stage. All she’d cared about was convincing the powers-that-be that she was better now and should be allowed to go home. Wherever ‘home’ would be.
