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She came down to breakfast on Sunday morning. Al and the children were round the kitchen table looking every bit of a happy family. I did the wrong thing, again. I was too independent and selfish. Why can’t I just shut up and be a mummy like all the other mummies and cook and sew and clean and smile at my husband. Why do I want a life away from all this?
‘Mummy,’ said Jo. ‘Daddy says you’re going to get a new house and live there and we’re going to stay here sometimes and see you sometimes.’ He looked at Al. ‘Does Mummy know yet?’
‘It was her idea,’ he said, glaring at Leah.
‘Will we have our own rooms?’ said Ben.
She sighed. As far as she was concerned it was still an idea. She sat down and helped herself to muesli. She felt quite hungry.
‘Can we have a big garden?’ said Tom.
‘Look,’ said Leah, ‘it might not be for ages.’
‘Oh really?’ said Al, tapping the table with a spoon.
‘Anyway,’ said Leah, looking at Al, ‘it won’t be till after Christmas, will it? It can’t possibly be, can it?’
He was triumphant and she felt how he could use this situation against her. He had told the children: everything to them was now, now, now.
‘You see,’ she said, ‘Mummy and Daddy keep arguing and I thought it might be better if I found another house because if we’re in different houses we might not argue so much.’
‘Why?’ said Tom.
She ignored this. ‘But it takes a long time to find a house, a long long time, like, not until after Christmas and a long time after that.’ To the children this would seem like years. She wanted them to go away. She wanted to talk to Al on her own.
‘What I can’t understand,’ said Jo, going pink, ‘is, why can’t you stop arguing anyway?’
The Project was quiet. Most people were out Christmas shopping or put off by the weather. The morning ticked over in the office. Leah wrote a presents list. At a rough guess it would all cost ₤200. She would have to discuss this with Al. The thought made her sick.
‘Hurry up and have your lunch,’ said Barbara.
The café was nearly empty. It was run by Joan and her son Johnny. He was a neat little man with a long spotless white apron and immaculately manicured hands. His mother left all the talking to him but made her presence felt with strong perfume and loud blouses.
‘Leah, darling. Done all our Christmas preparations, have we?’
‘None at all.’
‘Oh, leave it to the last minute, why not? Mummy, Leah’s done nothing for Christmas and you were making puddings in November. She’s very well prepared.’ She came in with a plateful of mince pies and put them on the counter. ‘And there’s nobody to eat them,’ moaned Johnny.
She sat at the far end of the café and listened to Joan and Johnny planning the next week’s menu. She ate her casserole, mainly for Johnny’s benefit. Then Bailey walked in. All those stupid rows were about you.
‘Mr Bailey, what can I get you?’ Nobody called Bailey ‘darling’.
He ordered a massive fry-up with chips and three cups of tea. He plonked his sportsbag by Leah’s table and sat down with a thump. She looked at him. He was unshaven and grim.
‘Just thought I’d tell you. I’ve cancelled this arvo.’ He drank his first cup of tea.
‘You could have phoned in.’
‘Nah, I wanted me lunch.’ Johnny put Bailey’s steaming plate in front of him. Bacon, egg, sausage, chips and beans and chips. He began to plough into it.
‘What’s the matter? Are you ill?’
Bailey, with a mouthful of food, shook his head. He took a swig of tea: ‘Nah, it’s something else.’ She waited. He finished his lunch and lit up a cigarette. At this point Vic Rodgers came in.
‘Our sports chappy smoking? Can’t have that. Did you tell him about the bins?’
‘Er, not yet,’ said Leah.
‘Well, the compost bins are going to be moved to the back of the sports hall.’
‘So what,’ said Bailey.
‘Exactly. No problems, I thought so. Sometimes the direct approach is needed.’ And he left.
Bailey snorted.
‘You mustn’t mind Vic, he’s terribly influential. He used to be on the Council.’
‘He’s a plonker,’ said Bailey.
They sat without talking. Leah realised he was looking at the faint mark above her eye and instinctively she covered it with her hand. ‘What was it you wanted to see me about?’ she said.
‘Can we talk?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Not here, I can’t talk about it here. Come back to my place.’
She was once again in Bailey’s blue sitting room. She was anxious and he was not helping. He paced about, fiddling with everything: the fire, the ashtray, the newspapers. Eventually he sat down.
‘What’s the matter, Bailey?’
‘I’m going to have to pack in me job. That’s it.’
‘Why? I thought it was OK. Don’t you like it?’
‘It’s not that. It’s not the Project, or you, or nuffin. It’s me. I can’t hack it.’
‘What on earth is the matter with you?’ She was exasperated. Now there would have to be selections, interviews, and all before Christmas. ‘You can’t pack in your work just like that.’ She stopped. This was a man who had walked out on a wife and baby just like that. He was on the sofa looking despondent.
‘Why did you leave France?’ she said suddenly. He looked at her sideways. She had made a connection.
‘I can’t sleep,’ he said flatly. ‘I get bad dreams.’
‘So you have to pack things in. That’s weird.’
He coughed. He was sitting tensely as if holding back an enormous force. She moved on to the floor. She was near him, but not touching him. ‘Bailey, why do you get bad dreams?’
He winced and a look of panic flashed over him. I am stepping on ice here. I can hear it creaking and sighing.
‘It’s my past,’ he said.
‘Your past?’ she said, moving closer. He said nothing although several times it looked as if he were about to. He coughed again, and made a choking noise, but she didn’t back away. Then he said it. ‘I get bad dreams. I can’t sleep. My dad used to rape me.’
She was shocked and caught her breath. ‘When you were young.’
‘He did it a lot.’
‘And your mum?’
‘She didn’t know. She worked nights.’
‘And France?’
‘I forgot about it. Until I had Ghislaine. Then I had the dreams and then I started to remember. I thought I was going mental. I thought I was fucking mental.’
‘So you left?’
‘When I came back to England I was off me head. Then it went away …’
‘But it’s come back.’
‘Yes, that’s the probs.’
‘Well, I suppose it will, you can’t run away from it.’ They looked at each other. I have crossed the ice and we are now both hack on the ground. She had a headache from concentrating. Bailey was exhausted.
‘When did you last sleep?’
‘Dunno, seems like ages.’
‘You sleep now,’ said Leah, ‘and I’ll stay for a bit.’ He lay down on the sofa with his head on the cushions. He lay there stiffly.
‘By the way, it’s a secret. I don’t want folks to know.’
‘Of course.’
‘You didn’t flip. When I tell folks they usually flip.’
‘There was no need. Do you tell many people?’
‘No. Because they flip.’
She rested her head on the arm of the sofa. She wanted to sleep as well. Bailey’s eyes were now closed and his face was expressionless. She stayed, listening to the gas fire and the wind blowing up Steep Street.
I didn’t flip. I coped. I always cope. I never flip. Why didn’t I scream, my God that’s awful, that’s dreadful? But he would have ended it. He would have shut up like a clam. I held it. The whole weight of his confidence … I’m not sure I want it … You are so big and noisy it’s difficult to think of you as a small hurt person … but I’m thinking of you like that now, frightened and waiting for a footstep behind a door. No wonder you behave erratically.
But you forgot and that is so odd. How can you forget being raped?
His hand was under the cushion, under his head and then like a page turned in a book where one suddenly sees a shocking picture, she remembered.
There was a baby in a wicker basket … a baby … it was Tom, in a basket by my bed in my room in Garden Hill and I woke up. I thought it was the baby but it wasn’t, it was Alsitting on my bed in the dark and then, he didn’t speak, he got into bed and had sex … I didn’t make a noise or struggle because I didn’t want to wake the baby … but it was horrible. It was brutal and horrible. Then he went away and that was the end of it. I lay there in the dark and I thought, did that really happen? because if it did then he’s in charge and he can have me whenever he wants … but that was so scary and I thought it was a bad dream. He said nothing about it and neither did I. Then I forgot …
She turned away from Bailey and the tears were trickling down her face. And I stayed another four years with Al and I’m an adult with a rational mind. Bailey, you were a child. I remember I was scared because what happened was hate, and I couldn’t accept it, being hated like that. Bailey, I know what it’s like. I want to wake you up and say, I know, I know, but in spite of all this you are still a stranger.
Then Declan came home. He clattered his bike in the hall, but it didn’t wake Bailey. He went into the front room and saw Leah on the floor with her head on the sofa and he said, ‘Oh dear.’
‘He’s not very well,’ she said, unsure whether Declan knew about Bailey or not. ‘He hasn’t been sleeping.’
Declan looked tired as if he hadn’t been sleeping either. ‘Oh dear,’ he said again.
‘I have to go,’ said Leah. ‘My children will be back from school.’
Declan ruffled his hair and said, ‘Oh dear, oh dear.’
Leah got up quietly but Bailey was in the deepest of sleeps. ‘He has bad dreams,’ she said, not sure how much she should reveal.
‘Not again! Oh no, oh dear. He never says. He never ever says.’ He sighed deeply. He too was a part of it all.
‘Will he be all right?’ said Leah.
‘He usually is.’
CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_3448813a-f979-5da6-bb53-ad04d891f12b)
Bailey, I’m worried about you and I can hardly think of anything else. Why did you tell me? We hardly know each other. You said, it’s a secret. I want to talk about this with somebody but I can’t. I can’t discuss it with Al. I mention you and he goes berserk. There are too many things to discuss with Al: money, Christmas, moving out. There are too many rows to be had.
Al gave her ₤80 and said, ‘That’s for Christmas,’ and Leah said, ‘It won’t be enough!’ and Al said, ‘That’s all we’ve got.’ She nearly burst into tears because it meant no presents for her brother and sister and mother. The children had made their Christmas lists long ago including things like mountain bikes, computers and videos – and who would tell them? She ran upstairs with Al shouting, ‘What did you expect?’ She shut herself in her room and looked through her jewellery, but anything valuable had been sold long ago.
Al was calling for her because Rachel was on the phone.
‘I’m back in the land of the living. Do you want to come out?’
‘I’d love to, I would. When?’
‘Tonight.’
‘Tonight? I’ll have to ask Al.’
Rachel made a tutting noise. She didn’t get on with Al. He was listening to the conversation. ‘Yes, go on bugger off, I don’t want you round here.’
‘I think he says yes,’ said Leah.
She took a long time getting ready. She changed clothes at least four times.
‘I don’t know …’ She was in a blue velvet dress and in front of the mirror. The children had just had baths and were jumping about with no clothes on.
‘Mummy’s all posh,’ said Tom.
