September Starlings (8 page)

‘Well?’ she yells. ‘Lost your tongue?’

‘Mother, I can’t leave Ben till Les comes at six o’clock. If he’ll stay for a while, I’ll nip down to the Ten Till Ten.’ The Ten Till Ten opens every day, makes its money from forgetful people like me who make lists and leave them in a safe place, too safe to be discovered until the next major clear-out. I spend hours in supermarkets, stare at the shelves, try to conjure up what has been written by me on the previous evening. I’m an incompetent, a total failure. Especially when my mother’s on the phone. ‘So you’ll have to wait,’ I add lamely.

‘What do I do till then?’

As far as I am concerned, she can bite her toenails. And she probably could, too. She’s eighty-one years old, will be eighty-two in November. She marches every day to the shops, pretends to me that she has not been out, insists, mournfully, that she is permanently confined to barracks. The woman could complete a triathlon after three big meals and sixty Embassy Regal. She is a living monument to the saying about exceptions proving the rule, has defied medical science since the 1960s, during which decade she began to die. Now, almost thirty summers and winters on, she sits in a blue fug, terrifying the life out of a succession of cleaning women, many of whom have grown old during their first few days with ‘that rotten owld Woollyback’. My dear mother screams down the phone daily at me, at my cousin Anne in Bolton, at anyone who fails to pay regular court to her royal flaming highness. ‘There’s nothing I can do for you till six o’clock.’

She inhales, fuels her lungs for a renewed assault on me, her beloved daughter. ‘You’re stubborn. You always were stubborn, you. Many a time you treeped me out, wouldn’t listen to sense, would never do as you were told. If you’d had half a brain, you’d have stayed away from the first queer fellow, and from the second one too. But oh no, you treeped me out even then, and I knew you’d finish up divorced from that Tommo, told you right at the start that you were going off your trolley. Madness, that’s what it must be. You’ve married wrong twice, but you still treep me out.’

‘Treeping out’, a term she culled from a mixture of Lancashire idioms, means not agreeing 1,000 per cent with everything she says. ‘I am not going to discuss my shortcomings on the phone,’ I say mildly. With Mother, it is best to be mild.

‘No, you’re not. If we talked about you and your waywardness, we’d be here till Christmas on my phone bill. King size.’ She means the cigarettes, not the bill. ‘And I want three packets, they’ll do me till weekend.’

Three packets will do her till tomorrow. At the crack of morning, while all self-respecting birds are still snoozing, she’ll be toe-tapping outside Mapley’s, waiting to pounce on the
Daily Mirror
, which she will hide inside
The Times
, as the latter is a better class of paper to be seen in the company of a lady. A carton of 200 Regal King Size will sit in her handbag alongside rolls of money in rubber bands, my father’s death certificate and a heap of mouldering premium bonds. In the side pouch of the said handbag, there is always an apple and a small, sharp knife.

The one time she was supposed to have been mugged, Mother put the boy’s eye out, impaled him on three inches of finely honed steel. The police accepted her sweet and appealing story. ‘Oh, officer, what have I done? My poor stomach cannot digest the peel of an apple, so I carry my little knife when I go to Moorside Park. I was just about to take the skin off, because there’s a litter bin just there, outside Mapley’s. So when that misguided young man grabbed me, the knife was in my hand, and I simply lashed out.’ Much wringing of hands accompanied this heart-rending ‘confession’. ‘What have I done?’ she cried repeatedly to me and to the sad police sergeant. ‘I shall never forgive myself. Never.’ In fact, my mother had waited years for this opportunity, always longed for the chance to fight back. I’ve often wondered who was the real criminal. Did he grab for her, or did she make the first move?

These Scousers don’t know what they’re talking about, really, don’t know what they’ve taken to their bosom here. ‘Woollyback’ is a term applied decades ago to Lancashire miners who wore sheepskins on their backs as a layer of protection between skin and heavy burden. It is used these days as a derogatory yet affectionate name for Lancastrians, is comparable with the southern term ‘yokel’. But Mother has not the gentleness of those brave working men, could knock them into a cocked pit helmet plus lamp when it comes to sheer determination. And she’s no yokel, no simple-minded peasant.

‘Are you heeding me, Laura?’

‘Yes.’ She pored for weeks over local presses, even read about her heroism in several of the national tabloids. The boy has a glass eye and hunched shoulders now, could wear a raincoat and double for Columbo on the telly. Most people who come into contact with my mother look older than their years.

‘He’s dead downstairs, you know.’ The salacious lip-licking is audible. ‘Keeled over last night when his daughter brought him back from church.’ Another loud sniff. ‘She took him out twice a week, did Shirley. I said to her, “Shirley,” I said, “you’ve nothing to reproach yourself for, because you looked after him,” I told her. All of which is a great deal more than can be said for you, Laura McNally.’

‘Starling, previously Thompson.’ My response is automatic.

‘Stupid name. And Starling’s not his proper name, either. What’s he been hiding all these years? Is he one of them like Burgess and Maclean? You should put him away for good, send him where that Ian Brady’s kept. They’ve got all the lunatics there, so yon husband of yours would fit in a treat.’

I hate my mother. I hate her and I forgive myself for the crime. ‘Honour thy father and thy mother’? I cannot love her, cannot even like or respect her. At best, I manage to be another of her servants, a target for her barbs. My father, on the other hand, was a gentle man and a gentleman. All my affection went to him, because he was thoroughly lovable.

‘And me bowels are bad again.’ Mother is passionately involved with her digestive system, has suffered through thirty years from a plethora of disorders with interesting names, anything that caught her eye in a much-thumbed tome which sits constantly by her side. The name of her volume is something I cannot remember, as the lettering on the broad spine has been eroded by regular handling. It’s likely to be called
Diagnosis for Beginners
, or
Treat
Yourself to an Illness
– some crazy name, anyway, probably compulsory reading for the average hypochondriac.

Early on in my mother’s apprenticeship as a sick person, a hiatus hernia was favourite, but this was forced to make way for colourful descriptions of gastric reflux caused by gallstones. She invested in enough Milk of Magnesia to warrant a substantial wad of shares in the company, then enjoyed a brief flirtation with slippery elm food. After a liverish episode – ‘don’t you think the whites of my eyes are on the yellow side?’ – she placed her trust in an ulcerated colon, which merited many X-rays and visits to a private clinic. ‘I’m all bunged up,’ she announces now to me and, judging by the volume, to every other resident in the retirement apartments. ‘I am suffering from chronic constipation.’

‘Then take some un-bunging medicine.’

‘You don’t care, do you? One of these days, I’ll be stretched out at that funeral home and you’ll wish you’d listened to me. It’ll be too late then. Oh and make sure they put me in the green suit, I’m not going in a shroud. Shirley won’t be feeling it as bad as you will, because she looked after that daft man downstairs who was her father. Nothing was too much for her, nothing at all. Whereas you’re not worth the paper you’re written on. I shouldn’t have bothered getting that birth certificate, because you’re no daughter of mine. “John,” I’d say, “I think they’ve given me the wrong one here.”’

I’ve had enough now. But she’s waiting for me to reach the point of saturation, wants to be able to tell her cronies that her daughter’s a nasty piece. ‘I hear you won at bingo last week, Mother.’ My voice is soft. ‘So nice for you to have an interest that gets you out.’

Stunned silence. Then, on top note, ‘Somebody picks me up and takes me in a car, a nice big comfortable car with good springs and plush upholstery, not like that boneshaker you drive. They know I can’t walk, so they help me down the steps and drive me to the Legion.’

She wants driving. With a whip, like beef on its way to
market. Except that I don’t approve of cruelty to animals, even though I have eaten a cow or two in my time. No, a beast should never be whipped, though my mother deserves … I squash my wicked imagination. ‘You walked for your prize, though. I was so thrilled to hear how you managed to move so quickly all the way to the stage without help. It’s wonderful to hear that your health is improving. Must go now, Mother. Ben needs a drink.’

My hand trembles as I place the receiver in its cradle. She frightens me with her venom, has always scared me. I am a woman well into middle age, because few humans survive to the age of 100 and a bit. Real middle age is reached at about thirty-eight, and I passed that marker some considerable time ago. But with her on the scene, I remain a child, her child, her property. My sons have not visited her for some time, while my daughter, who is a force to be reckoned with, chose the occasion of her own twenty-first birthday as a suitable opportunity to tell Granny to eff off.

I gaze through the window. A few brave souls tramp up and down the erosion, dogs at their heels. A clutch of children flies past, all jumbled limbs and colourful training shoes. Two men are in the water, fishing lines extending from their arms. Surely there can be nothing edible in that muck? The tree in my garden looks worried, leaves beginning to curl and darken. Seasons are changing, breaking the rules. Summer arrives earlier now, spills backward into spring. Perhaps Christmas will bring a heatwave in a century or so.

I feed Ben, wait for Les, nip out for Mother’s shopping, rush back and wait for the nurse. A lot of time is spent waiting these days. She comes, bustles off upstairs, returns with a decision plastered across her face. ‘Mrs Starling, he needs changing more regularly than this. I suggest that you have him home for just one day from now on, because he is developing sores. If you insist on full weekends, then you will need a nurse in residence.’

Her words make me weak, take away my breath. Her anxious face swims in and out of focus as I absorb the message. I am about to lose him altogether, will not even have his shell at the weekends. ‘No,’ I gasp. ‘Please.’

She forces me into a chair. ‘Look, let’s cut the bullshit, as the Americans say. No more games, Mrs Starling, no more little holidays. I’ve friends in the hospitals, you know. I’ve been told about your operations and about your breakdown.’

I narrow my eyes to achieve a clearer picture. ‘What about Hippocrates?’

She shrugs, sits opposite me. ‘He’s a bit dead, Mrs Starling, passed on with all the other ancient Greeks. Look, there’s been no law broken, love. Human nature breeds gossip and you’ve an unusual name. I know how ill you’ve been.’

‘Oh.’

‘Listen, here’s my phone number. If you ever need me, give me a call. My name’s Susan, but most friends call me Jenks. There’s an answerphone, so leave a message if I’m out. You need support. I wish I could help all the folk whose relatives are in permanent residential care. The whole family is affected by Alzheimer’s. You need a shoulder, girl.’

She’s a good woman. Goodness weakens me, and I cry buckets. ‘It’s his home,’ I scream. ‘It’s his home and he loved this house. We chose it together.’ Hysteria threatens. Sometimes, I realize how alone I am, and this is one of those times.

‘Mrs Starling.’ I hear the scrape of a chair, feel a substantial arm coming to rest across my shoulders. She smells of iodine, talcum powder, tobacco. ‘Where are your children?’

‘No.’ The tears dry miraculously, while alertness strengthens my spine, forcing me upright, making me rebellious. ‘They are not to be told.’

‘Told what?’

‘That I’ve been ill, that I cannot manage my husband.’
With the three of them as witnesses, I would feel like a totally incompetent has-been.

‘But you’re their mother and he’s their—’

‘He is not their father.’

‘Oh.’

‘My children have their own problems.’ I am a master of understatement. I have not been a perfect mother, partly because I did not understand the role, mostly because of difficulties over which I had little or no control. ‘I have a daughter in medicine. She’ll come home sooner or later. But I will not ask, Nurse Jenkinson.’ No, I will not hang round their necks like my mother hangs round mine.

‘Jenks. Call me Jenks, or Susan.’

I dry my cheeks on a cuff while she pulls away and sits down again. ‘I’m Laura.’

She chews for a moment on a non-existent thumbnail. ‘I’ll visit you sometimes.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Who does the housework?’

‘A woman called Eileen comes twice a week.’ Eileen is the one who got away in time, the one I rescued from Mother’s clutches before true despair could set in. ‘And her husband does the garden.’

‘Good.’ She peers at the watch. ‘I’ll be off now. Have to go to a terminal case down the road. Laura.’ Her voice is stern, yet I can hear kindness lurking in the background. ‘You’ve done your best, queen. Nobody can ever do more than that. When I first … you know, when I met you at the start, I thought you were a bit uppity. I was wrong. You’re hurt. It’s all right to be knocked sideways by what’s happened to that lovely man.’ She nods, glances at my clock, judges me to be worth the delay. ‘My heart bleeds for people like you, and I’m not supposed to let it show. “Be positive,” they keep saying on these community care courses. But I’m telling you no lies. He’s not likely to get better. Brain cells don’t grow back again. You’ve had your breakdown and you’ve faced the worst.’ A hand
touches my shoulder. ‘Make a future, girl. Don’t turn your back on him, but find a life.’

My throat is choked as I walk her to the door. She picks up her brolly, throws the coat over a thick arm. ‘Be good,’ she says. ‘And if you can’t be good, be bad in a corner where no bugger can see you. Ta-ra.’