Flo suspected she was probably the only person on earth who knew the real Tom O’Mara, the man who loved and fussed over her tenderly, and brought her little presents. Outside the four walls of her flat, she’d like to bet that Tom was an entirely different person—even his wife and children might not know how soft and gentle he could be. Bel, who couldn’t stand him, had to concede it was decent of him to put Nancy in a posh nursing-home in Southport when her mind went haywire and she could remember nothing since the war.
Music filled the basement flat, reaching every nook and corner, wrapping around her like a magic blanket woven from the dearest of memories. And shadows from the lamp Tom had brought from abroad passed slowly over the walls, the figures lifesize. When Flo felt especially dizzy, the figures seemed real, alive. He had brought the record, too, not long ago. “Close your eyes,” he said teasingly, when he came in. “I’ve got you a prezzie, a surprise.”
So Flo had closed her eyes, and suddenly the strains of “Dancing in the Dark” came from the speakers at each end of the room. Her eyes had snapped open and for several seconds she felt muddled. She’d told no one that this was the tune she and Tommy had danced to in the Mystery more than half a century ago. “What made you buy that, luv?” she asked querulously.
“You’ve been humming it nonstop for months. I thought you’d like to hear it sung by an expert. That’s Bing Crosby, that is, the one who sings ‘White Christmas.’ ‘
“I know who Bing Crosby is. It’s lovely, Tom. Ta very much.”
At first she didn’t play the record much, scared of raking up the painful past, but lately, as her head got worse and she couldn’t read, not even with her new glasses, she played it more and more often. It was soothing, better than a book, to remember her own romantic affair, more passionate and tragic than anything she’d ever read. She saw herself dancing under the trees with her lost lover, making love, whispering what was to be their final goodbye.
Bel had told her she should exercise more, not sit like a lump in front of the telly getting sozzled every day. “I ride for miles every morning on me bike in the bathroom,” she hooted loudly, through her ghastly new dentures, which were much too big and made her look like an elderly Esther Rantzen.
“I’m seventy-six, Bel,” Flo said indignantly. “I’m entitled to be a sozzled lump at my age.” What would she have done without Bel? Without Charmian and Tom, Mr Fritz, Sally, even Hugh, her son, for a while? She’d been lucky to have so many people to love and love her back.
“What time is it?” She looked at the clock. Just gone six.
But was that night or morning? What month was it?
What year? It was frightening when she couldn’t remember things, when she forgot to go to bed, forgot to eat, forgot to watch one of her favourite programmes on the telly. Once she’d nearly gone out in her nightie. One of these days she’d forget who she was. It wasn’t that she was losing her mind like Nancy. She smiled. No, the trouble was, she was either in terrible pain or as drunk as a lord.
She went over to the window and lifted the curtain, but still couldn’t tell if it was dawn or dusk. A thick mist hung in the air, suspended a few feet from the pavement.
There were noises in the square, but there always were, no matter what the time; a car drove away, she could hear people talking, someone walked past and she could see less of them than usual because their knees were shrouded in mist. She heard the clink of milk bottles. It must be morning, which meant she’d been sitting up all night.
The record, which she’d played countless times, came to an end yet again. Oddly, the ensuing silence felt louder than the music. It was a buzz, as if she was surrounded by a million bees. As she listened to the silence, Flo’s mind drained of everything and became completely blank. She sat on the chest in front of the window and wondered what was she doing in this strange room full of shadows.
There was too much furniture, too many ornaments, too many flowers. She didn’t like it. A memory returned, crawling like a worm into her head: she lived in Burnett Street with Mam and Dad.
“But what am I doing here?” she asked of the strange room and the shadowy figures passing overhead. There was no answer. Had she been visiting someone? Whose house was this?
“Is anyone there?” Still no answer. Flo pressed her hands together distractedly, trying to make up her mind what was the best thing to do. Get away from this place, obviously, go home. Even better, go into work early, get on with the pressing left over from yesterday. It would give Mr Fritz a nice surprise when he came in.
She saw a coat hanging behind the door that looked faintly familiar. She put it on and went outside. A man was running towards her dressed in a funny red outfit, just like Father Christmas. “Mr Fritz!” She smiled.
The man reached her. “It’s Peter Maxwell, Flo, from next door. I’ve been for a run. But what are you doing out so early, luv? It’s awful damp. You’ll get a chill.”
“I’ve got to go somewhere,” she said vaguely.
“Would you like me to come with you?” The man was looking at her worriedly.
“No, ta,” she told him pleasantly.
She set off into the wet mist at a fast pace, along Upper Parliament Street and into Smithdown Road, passing closed shops and empty shops, new buildings and old, Clement Street and Mulliner Street, names that seemed familiar, though she couldn’t remember why. She looked for the dress shop, which had that lovely lilac frock in the window—she’d seen it only yesterday and intended to buy it. Later, in the dinner hour, she might well come back and get it. But she couldn’t see the shop anywhere.
The fog didn’t help—perhaps that was why no trams were running—she could scarcely see across the road.
Worse, when she turned into Gainsborough Road, there was no sign of the laundry. A brick building stood in the place where the old wooden shed should be, a clinic, with notices in the window advertising a playgroup, ante-natal classes, a mother-and-toddler group.
“Oh, Lord!” Flo groaned. The fog seemed to have entered her head. It lifted briefly when she read the notices and wondered how she had got to Gainsborough Road. Why was her heart racing? Why did her legs feel so weak? She didn’t realise she’d walked for miles with the energy of a young girl. The fog drifted in again, smothering the pain and everything that was real.
“I’ll go and see Mam and Dad.” She made her way towards Burnett Street. The fog in her head cleared for a second when she stood outside the three terraced properties at the end of the street and remembered that they’d been built on the spot where the Clancys’ and two neighbouring houses used to be. She stood for a moment, staring up at the tiled roofs, the small windows. The door of the middle house opened and a man in a donkey jacket and greasy overalls came out.
“Are you after something, missus?” he demanded irritably, when he found an elderly woman standing virtually on his doorstep.
“I used to live here,” said Flo.
“You couldn’t have.” He scowled. The and the missus were the first to move in when the place was built forty years ago.”
The fog had descended again, enveloping her brain.
“There used to be a bay window and steps up to the door.”
She put a trembling hand to her forehead. “Did it get bombed? Is that what happened?”
“Look, luv,” the man’s gruff voice became kind, “you seem a bit confused, like. Would you like to come inside and me missus’ll make you a cup of tea, then take you home? You live round here, do you?”
“I thought I lived here.” Flo wanted to cry. She said fretfully, “Is the Mystery still there?”
“Of course it is, luv, but this isn’t a good time to go walking in the park.”
But Flo was already on her way, nineteen years old, with a red ribbon in her hair, about to meet Tommy O’Mara outside the gates for the first time. She felt as if she was walking towards her destiny, and that afterwards nothing would be the same again.
He wasn’t there. He was probably inside waiting under one of the trees, which were shrouded in a veil of mist.
The wet grass quickly soaked through her shoes as she made her way towards them. A whiff of reality returned when she noticed the road leading from gate to gate, and the sports arena glimmering palely through the haze, things that hadn’t been there before.
It was 1996, not 1939. “Flo Clancy,” she breathed, “you’re making a right fool of yourself this morning.”
She’d better catch the bus home while she had the sense to do it. But she hadn’t brought a handbag, she had no money. She wept aloud. “I feel too weary to walk all that way back.”
She plodded back towards the gates. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to take the red ribbon out of her hair. It must look dead stupid on an ould woman. She blinked when she found there was no ribbon there. Martha must have snatched it off before she left the house.
Poor Martha! Flo had never before had such a feeling of sympathy for the sister who’d never had much happiness in her life, if any. “It’s time to forgive and forget, luv.”
Sally must have said that a hundred times over the years.
“I’ll go and see her tomorrer,” Flo vowed. “I’ll take her a bunch of flowers.” At that moment, she couldn’t precisely remember where Martha lived, but it would come.
The fog inside her head kept lifting and falling, she kept drifting backwards and forwards in time, and the present was becoming confused with the past. She was leaving through the gates when she heard a shout. “Flo!”
Flo turned. Her face melted into a smile, the dimples deepened in her wrinkled face, she could feel the brightness shining from her eyes as she watched Tommy O’Mara emerge from the white mist that swirled and floated in and around the Mystery and come towards her.
She stood stock-still, waiting for him, waiting for him to take her in his arms.
She waved. Oh, he was a divil of a man, with his swaggering walk, a red hanky tied carelessly around his neck, an old tweed cap perched jauntily on the back of his brown curls. She had never stopped loving him. She never would.
“Flo, girl,” he called again.
“Tommy!” Flo held out her arms to welcome her handsome lover, who had never told a lie, had meant everything he’d said, who would have married her one day if he hadn’t gone down with the Thetis. They would have lived happily ever after with their child. Then, from somewhere within the hazy clouds, she heard the orchestra of her dream a lifetime ago, playing “Dancing in the Dark”. Her tired old body was swaying, this way and that, to the music that swelled and quivered in the smoky, dew-spangled morning.
She didn’t hear the lorry backing slowly through the fog and the gates of the Mystery. It hit her full square, flinging her forward, and the phantom figure of Tommy O’Mara was the last thing Flo saw before she died.
The lorry drove away, the driver unaware that he’d hit anyone.
It was a young lad on his way home from his paper round who found the body. He stared at the old woman lying face down on the path. Was she dead, or had she just fainted?
He knelt down and gingerly turned the old girl over by the shoulder. She was dead all right, he could tell, but, Jaysus, never in all his life before had he seen such a brilliant smile.
Millie
The church hall was an Aladdin’s cave of treasures; stalls with handmade jewellery, tie-dyed Tshirts, embroidered waistcoats, patchwork cushions, pottery, paintings, intricately moulded candles far too elegant to burn. But I’m sure I wasn’t prejudiced in thinking our Trudy’s stall was the most outstanding of all—and the cheapest.
Colin had added a shelf to the back of a pasting table so that the glassware could be exhibited on two levels.
Nightlights flickered in painted wineglasses and tumblers that had been placed between the taller bottles so that the flames glittered through the jewel-coloured glass, the patterns outlined lavishly in gold or silver. The stall was alive with every imaginable hue—“Like a rainbow on fire,”
I said, and sighed with satisfaction when everything was done. I’d come early to help Trudy set up.
Trudy was shaking, as if she was about to take the starring role in her first play. “What if I don’t sell a single thing?”
“Don’t be daft. I’ve got my eye on at least five bottles for Christmas presents.”
“I can’t take money off me sister.”
“What nonsense! There’s no room for sentiment now you’re a businesswoman, Trude.”
“Oh, Mill!” Trudy glanced left and right at the other stallholders, most of whom had finished setting up and were waiting impatiently for the doors to open at eleven o’clock. “I feel dead conspicuous.”
“You look perfectly okay to me. Would you like a cup of tea?”
“I’d love one. But don’t stay away long, Sis,” she called nervously, as I went towards the room behind the stage where tea and coffee were being served. “I can’t do this on me own.”
It turned out to be a day when the Camerons came of age, I thought afterwards, when we appeared to be just like any other family. James came at exactly half past eleven, as promised. Declan was already there, deeply interested in the process of tie-dying. Mum arrived at midday, her face red and bothered. Beads of perspiration glistened on her brow, although the November day was cold. I went to meet her. “Your dad turned dead nasty when he realised I was going out,” she panted. “He insisted I made his dinner first. I’ve put it in a low oven for when he comes home from the pub, but I daren’t think what it’ll be like by then.” She dropped her handbag, bent to retrieve it, then dropped the car keys and her gloves. “How’s our Trudy getting on?”
“Her bottles are selling like hot cakes. Half have already gone. She’s not asking nearly enough.” Trudy hadn’t even noticed I was no longer there. Flushed with confidence, she was coping with her busy stall on her own. I clutched my mother’s arm. “Mum, could you come back to Flo’s with me when this is over? There’s something I want to show you.”
“What on earth can that be, luv?”
“You won’t know till you’ve seen it, will you?”
She shook her head. “I couldn’t possibly, Millicent.
Your dad was in a terrible mood. It’d be best if I went straight home.” in that case I’ll come over tonight and fetch you,” I said firmly. “There’s something you’ve got to see.”