The Woman Who Went to Bed for a Year (20 page)

Eva started to cry.

Brian took her hand and said, ‘Eva, darling, I had
no idea. Why didn’t you say? I didn’t want that bloody iPhone 4, it’s been in a
drawer since Boxing Day.’

But Eva was inconsolable. ‘Beg cashier to try one
more time. She does — but mutters under her breath — think she used the f-word,
this against Currys policy. Tell her so, consider making formal complaint, but
brain and mouth not working, so let it go. Machine accepts card, weep with
relief. Drive home with turkey and must-have gadgets on passenger seat, held
secure with seatbelt. Return home and, through fog of anxiety and sleep
deprivation, unpack turkey, leave on kitchen table. Drag stepladder up cellar
stairs, untangle fairy lights, drape along picture rails, start with artistic
plan in head, end with fairy lights thrown over any ledge or surface. Bulbs go,
search for replacements. Ask for help to decorate the tree. Twins and Brian
traumatised by the sadness in turkey’s eyes and claim to be incapable of
movement, swear they will never touch any kind of meat again. Cross pork joint
and gammon off Christmas food list. Go into kitchen, find next-door’s cat
mauling turkey’s head, turkey’s eyes expressing woes of world. For once don’t
hit cat with wooden spoon but usher cat and turkey head outside. There are
seventeen carrier bags on kitchen table. Bite into a carrot, pour tiny amount
of whisky into small glass, take bite out of mince pie, arrange on a festive
plate, bring through to sitting-room fireplace. Will I still be doing this when
twins are thirty-five?’

‘Eva, I can see you’re tired. I can google the
rest… There must be a Delia’s Christmas app —Eva said, ‘No, let me finish
doing Christmas Day.

Cook full English breakfast. Drink toast with Buck’s
Fizz. Open presents. Pick up wrapping paper, fold and place in recycling bin.
Ring and thank relatives for presents. Change from dressing gown into sequinned
cardigan and lace skirt, Brian says look like madam of whorehouse, change into
jeans.’

Brian said, ‘Eva, that lace skirt barely covered
your bum!’

‘Cook Christmas dinner, almost collapse after assembling
food on table. Drink too much, ask Brian to help wash up, he says, “Later.”
Twins gone somewhere, make Christmas tea, turkey sandwiches, trifle, Christmas
cake. Twins come back, refuse to play games, play maths games with Brian.
Refuse to watch Christmas TV, all three watch DVD lecture series on advanced
topology from MIT. Eat half tin of Quality Street. Prepare supper. Drink self
into stupor. Feel sick from Quality Street and vodka, go to bed.

‘So, that was my Christmas last year. You may find
it useful,’ Eva concluded. ‘And, Brian, I am. Never. Doing. Christmas. Again.’

32

It
was teatime on Christmas Eve and snow was still falling. Eva liked the snow —
the beauty of it, the interruption it made to daily life — and she enjoyed the
chaos it caused. She was looking out of the window for Stanley Crossley, who
had sent a message that he wanted to talk to her. It was a meeting she dreaded.
To divert herself she concentrated on the outside window sill, where flakes
were settling and intermingling, all the time forming an even, white ledge.

It reminded her of the time she had thrown the ten-year-old
twins out into the snow when they carried on bickering after she had asked them
to stop. They had knocked on the sitting-room window and pleaded to be let back
in while Eva pretended to read
Vogue.
A few minutes later, Brian had
arrived home from work to find his son and daughter shivering, coatless in
their school uniforms, while his wife sat by a crackling log fire reading a
magazine, apparently oblivious to her children’s misery.

Brian had bellowed, ‘Our children could end up in
the care of the local authority! You know how many social workers live around
here.’

It was true — there were a disproportionate number of
new-model Volkswagen Beetles parked in the surrounding streets.

Eva laughed aloud at the memory.

The twins had been forced to huddle together for
warmth before Brian let them back inside the house. She told Brian that it had
been a bonding exercise — and since he had only just returned from a
team-building trip to the Brecon Beacons, where he had been forced to catch,
skin, cook and eat a rabbit, he had believed her.

She saw Stanley approaching the house and watched as
he hesitated at the gate. He was entirely coated in snow, from his trilby hat
to his black brogues. She came away from the window and heard him stamping his
feet in the porch. The doorbell rang as Eva got into bed and readied herself
for whatever was coming. She had asked Brian to make sure that Poppy was out of
the house.

Brian had said, ‘The only way I can guarantee that
is to take her out somewhere myself. It will be a bloody nuisance, but I
suppose I’ll have to do it.’

Even though Stanley had been released without
charge, Eva didn’t want to risk him bumping into Poppy. There was no guarantee
that she would not make the same accusations again. Eva would have to explain
that the false stalking was only one of many such painful Poppy dramas. The
hypochondria, the deep-black lies, the hysteria if anybody touched ‘her things’,
the household items that had gone missing…

Had Stanley come to burden her with an account of his
near-death experience inside a burning Spitfire? Would he sob as he recounted
how his face had melted and fallen away? Would he try to describe his agony?

It was the details Eva feared.

Brianne led Stanley up the stairs. She was mute with
embarrassment and horror. ‘His face is gross,’ she thought. ‘Poor Mr Crossley.
If I was him, I’d wear a sort of mask.’ She wanted to tell him that she was not
Poppy’s friend, that she hated Poppy, didn’t want her in the house and couldn’t
understand why her parents didn’t throw her out. But, as usual, the words
wouldn’t come. When they got to the top of the landing, she called, ‘Mum! Mr
Crossley is here.’

Stanley stepped into a white space in which the only
colour was a yellow embroidered armchair with an orange and red stain that
reminded him of a dawn sky. He gave a slight bow and held his hand out. Eva
took it and held on to it for a fraction longer than was usual.

Brianne said, ‘Can I take your coat and hat?’

As Stanley struggled out of his coat and handed Brianne
his hat, Eva saw from the light above his head that his scalp was a relief map
of scars. ‘Do sit down, Mr Crossley.’

He said, ‘Had I known you were indisposed, Mrs Beaver,
I would have waited until you were better.’

‘I’m not indisposed,’ said Eva. ‘I’m giving myself a
break from the usual routine.’

‘Yes, it’s rather good for one, it shakes one up and
invigorates mind and body.’

She told him that Brianne could bring tea, coffee or
some of the mulled wine that Brian had simmered overnight.

He waved the suggestion away, saying, ‘You’re too
kind. Thank you, but no.’

Eva said, ‘I’m glad you came. I want to apologize to
you for what happened the other day.’

‘You mustn’t apologise, Mrs Beaver.’

‘That girl is a guest in my house. I feel
responsible.’

‘She’s obviously troubled,’ Stanley said.

Eva agreed. ‘Troubled and dangerous.’

‘It was very good of you to take her in.’

‘Not good… I had no power to stop it. I’ve got
nothing but contempt for her.’

Stanley said, ‘We’re all fragile, and that is why I’m
here. It’s important to me that you understand, I did nothing at all to frighten
the girl. I did glance at her extraordinary clothes, but I did nothing more
than that.’

Eva said, ‘You don’t have to tell me this. I know
you are a man of honour, and I imagine you live by the strictest of
principles.’

‘I have not spoken to a living soul since I returned
from the police station. This is a statement, I am not asking you to pity me. I
have many friends I can call on, and I’m a member of many clubs and
institutions, but as you can clearly see, my face is not my fortune.’ He
laughed. ‘I confess to wallowing in self-pity during the early days, after my
little accident with my plane — most of us did. There were a few who denied
they were in pain — sang, whistled — at least, those with lips. They were the
ones who tended to crack. The smell of rotting flesh was indescribable. They
tried to disguise it with Izal disinfectant — made from coal, I believe —
but… it was always there, in your mouth, on your uniform. But we laughed a
lot. We called ourselves Guinea Pigs. Because Sir Archie McIndoe experimented
on us, told us he was pushing the parameters of plastic surgery —which he was,
of course. For six weeks I had a skin flap from my upper arm attached to where
my nose used to be.

‘Archie was very fond of us boys. Actually, I think
he did love us like a father. He used to laugh and say, “Marry a girl with
terrible eyesight.” A lot of the boys married the nurses, but I followed his
advice and married a lovely poor-sighted girl, Peggy. We helped each other.
Both of us were normal in the dark.’

Eva said, ‘I know you don’t want to hear it, but I’m
going to say it anyway. I think you’re incredibly brave, and I hope we will be
friends.’

Stanley looked out of the window and shook his head.
‘The uncomfortable truth is, Mrs Beaver, that I took advantage of my wife’s
lack of sight and I…’ He broke off and looked around the room, searching for
something for his eyes to settle on. He found it impossible to look Eva in the
face. ‘During my marriage, starting when we returned from a fortnight’s
honeymoon, I visited a very respectable lady once a week and paid her rather a
lot of money to have sex with me.’

Eva’s eyes widened. After a few moments, she said, ‘I
have known for some time that my husband has been having an affair with a woman
he works with called Dr Titania Noble-Forester.’

Stanley felt sufficiently emboldened by this
confidence to tell Eva more. ‘I have been in a rage since 1941. I was irritated
beyond telling when my wife dropped something or spilled her tea or knocked
over a glass of water. She was always blundering into the furniture and
tripping over rugs, and she refused to use any of those gadgets that are
designed to help. She knew Braille. God knows why she learned it — I sent for
the books but she wouldn’t touch them. But I loved her dearly, and when she
died I couldn’t see the point of carrying on. With her by my side in bed, the
horrible dreams were almost tolerable. I would cry out and wake and my dear
wife would hold my hand and talk to me about the things we had done together,
the countries we had visited.’ He gave a tight smile, which he seemed to use as
a form of punctuation.

Eva asked, And your lady friend, is she still alive?’

‘Oh yes, I still see her once a month. We do not
have a sexual relationship now She’s quite frail. I pay her twenty-five pounds
to talk and be held.’

What’s her name?’

‘Celia. I’ve longed to say her name aloud to
somebody who would understand. You do understand, don’t you, Mrs Beaver?’

Eva patted the duvet next to her, and Stanley sat on
the edge of the bed and took her hand. They both heard Brian and Poppy’s voices
as they came through the front door.

Brian was saying, ‘Committing suicide would do you
no good. We’re not asking you for the ultimate sacrifice, Poppy.’

Poppy said, ‘But he was looking at me in such a horrible
way.’

Brian was on the stairs now, saying, ‘He can’t help
but look at you in a horrible way. He’s got a horrible face.’

Brian was disconcerted to see Crossley and his wife
holding hands, but nothing would surprise him now. The world seemed to have
gone mad.

He said, ‘Poppy is asking for money. She wants to
visit her parents over Christmas.’

Eva said, ‘Give her what she’s asking for. I want
her out of this house. And Brian, Mr Crossley will be spending Christmas Day
and Boxing Day with us.’

Brian thought, Well, I’m not sitting opposite the
ugly bastard.’

Mr Crossley said, ‘I’m afraid I’m terribly dull company,
Dr Beaver. I wish I was more gregarious. I do not know any jokes, and most of
my stories are rather sad. Are you sure you want me as a guest?’

Brian hesitated.

Eva
looked
at him.

Brian said quickly, ‘No, of course you must come.
And don’t worry about the jokes — there will be jokes in the Christmas
crackers, and paper hats and little trinkets we can talk about, so there won’t
be any of that English awkwardness. We’ll be a jolly crowd. There’ll be two
sulky autistic teenagers, my mother — who is the most argumentative woman I
know — and my mother-in-law, Ruby, who thinks that Barack Obama is the head of
Al Qaeda. And me, of course, who will no doubt be in a filthy temper, having
never cooked Christmas dinner before. And then there’s my wife, the issuer of
your invitation, who has done bugger all to help this Christmas and who will
be stinking in her pit above our heads as we eat.’

Brian’s speech was greeted with silence. He had forgotten
what he came in for, so he went out, closing the door with exaggerated care.