Secrets My Mother Kept (18 page)

‘You don’t want to be getting too close to ’er,’ he advised, ‘she’s got ’er young uns see, makes um a bit vicious.’

‘Can we look round?’ asked Anne.

‘Yep if you like, but be careful, farms is dangerous places!’ he added, smiling now. ‘Does you want to hold one of the piglets?’

We all nodded our heads enthusiastically.

He passed us a piglet each to hold. They were so sweet!

‘I as to watch ’er in case she rolls on ’em.’ He bent to the side and picked up a lifeless purpley blue body. ‘See,’ he continued, ‘this is wot can ’appen. Squashed ’im, poor little thing.’

We looked on in fascinated horror at the poor little stiff-legged piglet.

We would also play in the barns if we could get away with it, and Anne wasn’t averse to relieving herself in the corner when necessary, which Margaret and I thought was outrageous!

The sun seemed to shine every day, and the lure of the petrol station on the main road, with its mini doughnut stall, was great, so quite soon the little bit of spending money we had was gone.

Margaret sent Mum a postcard saying: ‘Dear Mum We haven’t got any money but it doesn’t matter Love Margaret X’

Anne decided that we needed to get a job. We walked round the lanes knocking at each house we came across to see if we could get one. One lady had us weeding her garden for the whole day. The sun was hot and we were thirsty, but she didn’t even offer us a drink. By the end of the afternoon we were getting excited at the thought of how much we had earned. The lady came out into the garden and gave us a few final jobs to do. Then she pulled her purse from her pocket.

‘You’ve really worked hard girls, and have got most of the weeds out – well done,’ and then gave us 6d between us for our efforts! Luckily most people were a little more generous.

Not too long after that we heard that Mary and Dave were going to emigrate to Australia. There was a special offer that meant that they could go all the way to Australia for just £10! Australia – the other side of the world. At that time it was almost the same as saying goodbye to your family forever. The distance was so far and the cost of airfares was so high that the possibility of them coming back home or us going to visit was tiny. Emigration wasn’t something new, of course. The potato famine in the 1850s resulted in the slow starvation and collapse of society in rural Ireland. Many families had no choice but to leave the land they loved, to search for work and be able to feed their families. The older people had little chance, but the younger men, and in some cases women, could find an escape. So my great grandfather had joined the British army and been sent to India. In Ireland when family members went away like this they would have a wake as it was thought to be like a death. I think we thought of Mary’s going as something equally final, and I felt sad to think I would never see her again. When the time came for her to leave, Mum became quite withdrawn. The rift between them had healed over time. Although there had always been a lack of closeness between them, I think Mum felt the loss keenly.

I was growing up fast, and although life at home was still full of turmoil, my friends were very important to me. The poverty at home should have lessened. Pat, Josie, Marge and Marion were all working now and contributing the majority of their wage to the household budget. Mum still got her family allowance and benefits for Margaret and me and Aunty paid the rent. If Mum had been a manager, life might have been reasonably comfortable, but she wasn’t. She had a desperate addiction to the highs of life, times when she would spend money we didn’t have on things we didn’t need, and couldn’t afford. Of course the result of this were the mirror images: the desperate lows, times when there wasn’t enough money for food and gas, times when we had to hide from the tally men who knocked on the door with a terrible regularity, week after week after week. It also meant that many necessities of life were absent.

The winter after Mary and Dave left was a particularly harsh one. Snow had begun to fall before Christmas and there was a bitter biting wind that cut through my thin coat as I waited for the bus to school every morning. It was just over a week until school finished for the holiday and as I jumped off the bus at Becontree Station I saw Anne and Jane standing on the other side of the road. I waved and crossed to meet them.

‘We’re just talking about going carol singing tonight,’ said Anne, ‘Mrs B’s collecting for her son’s school.’ Mrs B was our needlework teacher, who we really liked. Unlike some of the other staff at the school, she took a genuine interest in us and although we were hopeless sewers she never gave up on us. She encouraged us to persevere and spent time helping us sort out our messes. Her son attended a ‘special school’ as he had a severe disability, and she often talked to us about the things they did there. Recently she had mentioned that they were collecting money to have a hydrotherapy pool installed.

‘Are you coming?’ asked Anne. ‘We thought if we went round Barking we would get more money.’ I knew this made sense, Barking was a much more affluent area than where I lived in Dagenham, but I would need bus fare so I hesitated.

‘Oh come on, it’ll be great. We can practise at lunchtime.’

I nodded my agreement and we talked about which carols we would sing as we walked to school. That evening I asked Pat if I could have some bus money. She always tried to help if she knew I really needed anything, even though she wouldn’t have had much left after paying Mum and her fares. She gave me a handful of coins to cover the cost of my fare. It was freezing as I opened the door to go and meet Anne and the others. I waited for the 62 and shivered in my thin coat and plimsolls. The moisture had been drawn up through the canvas into my socks, almost to my knees, forming a dark grey watermark. I always wore plimsolls – they were the only footwear I had. In the summer this was fine, although my feet sometimes felt hot and sweaty, but in the winter months it was desperate. By the time I got to Barking station where we were meeting it had started to snow again. Anne and the others were already waiting for me outside the Wimpy Bar. Off we went, trailing around the long avenues opposite Barking Park where the posher houses were. We had worked out a routine. We would walk up the path of each house, sing a short carol and then knock. It was my job to speak when the door was opened as I had the nicest speaking voice, and was also the only one of us who could say ‘hydrotherapeutic’! People were surprisingly generous, and probably just glad to give us a few coins to get rid of us so that they could close the door on the atrocious weather. Then we had a real stroke of luck. Suddenly we heard the sound of trumpet music. It was the Salvation Army carol singers. At first I thought that this was bad news, as they were much more impressive than our little group, but Anne knew better.

‘Look I know what we can do, we can just follow them round and then knock and shake the box. People will think that we are collecting for them!’ It was a brilliant scheme and by the end of the evening the collection box Mrs B had provided us with was full to bursting and we hadn’t even had to sing!

25

Being Discovered

I think God invented puberty as a form of torture that would make sure we grow up with strength of character!

Mum was sympathetic. ‘I’ve got you some special soap,’ she would say and hand me a bar of Neutrogena soap, which all the advertisements said would miraculously cure spots. Of course the spots remained, my body started to change shape, and each month I would have to spend at least a day curled up in a ball with cramping pains in my stomach. Mum would make me a hot-water bottle, give me an aspirin and tuck me up on the settee. Although I was in pain, it was comforting, and oddly became something I almost looked forward to. Being warm, safe and cared for was a luxury and I revelled in it. Margaret was also growing up fast, but still hardly ever went to school. She was quiet and painfully shy, but I had told her as much as I knew about the birds and the bees, which really wasn’t much at all.

We had a new teacher at school called Miss Leahy. She taught us maths and PE and was also our form teacher, and she was very different from any of the other teachers we had had before. Miss Leahy was Welsh, and was very athletic. She always wore trainers and leggings and bounced around the school with a calm, firm air of authority. No one dared cheek her or misbehave in any of her classes. No one except Anne, of course. Anne could get away with anything. Perhaps we were such good friends because I saw in her something of my mum. That same charisma, that sense of fun that drew people in and made them want to be near her, and also that same sense of underlying mischief. Anne had an effect on teachers as well as pupils – even on Miss Leahy.

Our popularity in school meant that we were given certain privileges. We didn’t deserve them, and pushed the boundaries at any opportunity. I can remember the many tricks we played on unsuspecting teachers, the salt in their cups of tea, the whoopee cushions, the itching powder, but we seemed to survive each attack with a kind of invulnerability. Our reputation grew, and with it an intoxicating sense of power. Then Miss Leahy discovered my brain.

‘Kathleen Coates, come out here and finish this problem please,’ she’d say, and I would oblige. I had grown quite expert in concealing any signs of academic ability over the years, and had consequently become lazy. Miss Leahy must have spotted something in me, a moment when I let down my guard, a flash of underlying intelligence. And then there was no escape. During maths lessons she would pick me out to solve problems, to explain things to the rest of the class, to do ‘special’ work which I actually started to enjoy.

‘What are you doing in the C class, Kathleen Coates?’ she asked me one day. I was taken aback. She was the teacher; how should I know? I just shrugged my shoulders in answer and she raised her eyes. ‘You, young lady, are wasting your brain and my time.’

Being noticed for intelligence was exciting and I began to feel that I was special in my own right, and not just as an extension of Anne. It felt strange, and it also felt good, but I knew I was walking a dangerous line. Then came parents’ evening.

Miss Leahy asked if my mum was coming. Mum never came to parents’ evening. What was the point? I was in the C class. No one came and that suited me fine, because it also meant that there was never any danger of me being moved to a higher stream. I was comfortable in my laziness, and I didn’t want to leave Anne behind. But Miss Leahy was determined.

When I got home from school that afternoon, Mum was holding a letter in her hand.

‘Your teacher wants to see me,’ she said. ‘You didn’t tell me it was parents’ evening next week.’ I looked away, pretending my heart wasn’t beating double fast.

‘Yes, it’s on Tuesday,’ I answered in what I hoped was a disinterested way.

‘I think Pat and I should go.’

My heart plummeted to my knees.
Oh God no
. Everyone would mistake Pat for my mum like they always did; everyone would think Mum was my gran. I would be so embarrassed.

‘Oh don’t bother,’ I said. ‘What’s the point anyway?’

But Mum was adamant. I never found out exactly what was in that letter, but it must have been powerful stuff!

When Tuesday came around I wanted to die. Mum and Pat got their coats. They didn’t have good clothes and they were both very overweight. There was never any money spare for hairdressers so they looked dishevelled and permanently untidy however hard they tried. Both Mum and Pat smoked heavily and the evidence was visible in their nicotine-stained fingers. Teenage years are painful for all sorts of reasons, but one of the most powerful is that need to be the same, to belong, not to be seen as different. Even though at school I had re-invented myself, the spectre of home always lurked, waiting to trip me up and remind me that I could never be quite like the other girls. And now everyone was going to discover my secret.

Parents’ evening was held in the school hall and the teachers were positioned at various points around the walls. There were chairs placed nearby so that parents could sit and wait for their turn.

‘Where is this Miss Leahy?’ Mum asked as she scanned the sea of faces.

‘Over there,’ I muttered with my head down, dreading what was to come. As we walked across the hall I saw several girls looking at me, but they weren’t in my class; in fact hardly any girls from the C classes were there. As we approached, Miss Leahy spotted me and called me over.

‘Hello Kathleen, this must be your mum,’ she said, extending her hand towards Pat. Mum stepped forward and took it.

‘Good evening,’ she said in her best voice. ‘I’m Mrs Coates.’ Mum was never intimidated by authority; she was a very intelligent and articulate woman and could hold her own with anyone.

Miss Leahy composed herself and asked Mum and Pat to take a seat. I stood by mortified. ‘Kathleen is in the wrong class,’ she began. ‘She’s a clever girl and has a mathematical brain. I would like her to move to the O-level class next year so that she can take her exams.’

Mum sat nodding, but I couldn’t read her face.

Miss Leahy continued: ‘I don’t know why she’s in 3C. She’s clearly bright enough to take her GCEs but if she stays where she is she will only be able to take CSEs, which would be a real shame. It will mean lots of hard work, but Mrs Lobbit can give her extra maths lessons over the summer holidays to help get Kathleen ready.’

Mrs Lobbit was a young science and maths teacher who was very trendy and wore modern 60s clothes, short skirts and shift dresses. She had shiny straight hair that was cut at her shoulders in a style that made her look like Sandie Shaw and we all envied her.