Swimming Upstream (10 page)

“Oh yes,” said my mum. “For your birthday, that
year...” she tailed off, got up off the bed and opened the curtains, letting
the sun beam in onto the bed. “And the doll,” added my mother. Her voice
sounded tight. She was looking away, out of the window, onto the street. “Don't
you remember the doll we gave you? We chose it together. For your sixth
birthday.”

“No.” I shook my head. “I don't. But I should. I
should remember being six, right? There’s so much that I seem to have
forgotten.”

My mother turned to face me with an expression
that looked almost like relief. She gave me a quick smile, picked up my empty
soup bowl and started to leave the room.

“Only things have started coming back to me,” I
said. My mother stopped in the doorway, turned and then came back again. She
placed the soup bowl down on the oak chest of drawers next to Keri’s bed and
sat down again beside me.

 “Little things,” I continued. “Like the street
that we were living in. I close my eyes and I can see it. A quiet avenue,
leafy. Lots of trees.”

My mother nodded. “That’s right.”

“And I had a pink dress.”

“It had a kitten on the front. You loved that
dress.”

“Was the kitten white? And furry? When you stroked
it?”

“Yes.” My mother smiled.

“And I remember, dad was a postman, wasn’t he?”

“Yes. But you knew that.”

“You told me that. But I didn’t have any memories
of my own of him dressed like that, in his uniform. Until now, that is. It’s
just a tiny picture of him in my head, though, just a tiny picture of this big
man in a postman’s uniform, that’s all I’ve got. I can’t remember
him
.”

“He was very handsome. He had your lovely red hair.”

“It’s auburn, mum.”

“Auburn, then.”

“And I remember the ambulance coming. And there
was no-one there. Just me and the ambulance.”

My mother’s face tightened. “I was there. I was
there as soon as the ambulance arrived, Lizzie. I know it was awful, you seeing
him die like that. But I didn’t know until I heard the siren…it was nothing we
could have helped…”

“I’m not saying it was, I just -”

“You always went to the end of the garden to wait
for him to come home at the end of his round…you waited for him, you sat on the
gate and waited for him, every day. And that one time…well, you just stayed
there, you didn’t come and get anyone. You just stayed there, standing in the
street and that’s where we found you. You must have been in shock…”

“The car came too quickly,” I said.

My mum looked at me for a moment as if she had
seen a ghost. “That’s what you said. ‘The car came too quickly.’ Those are just
the words you used. That’s all you said. All you
would
say.” She reached
out her hand and touched my arm. A tear slid down her cheek.  

“I remember the street,” I said. “I remember his
uniform. I remember the ambulance. I even remember the
words.
But I just
can’t seem to remember
him
.”

“It was a long time ago.” My mum put her arms
around me for a moment and we were still. She leaned her head against my
shoulder. Then she stood up and picked up the soup bowl. I noticed her wiping
her face with the sleeve of her cardigan as she turned. “Get some rest,” she
said. “You’re tired.”

I nodded.

After she had gone I
picked up ‘The Water Babies’ and read it from cover to cover.

The following day I felt much better and decided to go for
a drive and a walk. There was a forest nearby that I remembered visiting as a
child. I ate a big breakfast and soaked for a long time in a hot steamy bath. I
hadn't brought anything with me except the pyjamas that I had been wearing when
I arrived, but my mum offered me free reign of her wardrobe. I settled for a
pair of black tracksuit bottoms and a black polar neck jumper. I looked like a
cat burglar but I didn’t care. I was just glad to be well again. I found a pair
of Wellington boots in a cupboard that my mum had bought in a jumble sale and
that were two sizes too big for both of us. My mum offered me the use of her
car.

“Lizzie,” she called, as I left. “Here’s something
you might want to think about.”

“What?”

“You know my old friend, Lynne?”

“The paediatrician? The one who lives in London?
Hampstead, isn’t it?”

“Marylebone. Baker Street. Except that she’s just
been offered a job in Edinburgh. It’s only a two year contract, a locum
position. But I think she wants someone to look after her flat for a bit.”

“Me?”

“Well, anyone. But she’d be happy for you to take
it, I am sure.”

“I don’t know. It’s a long way to and from work.”

“Just a thought.”

“Thanks. I’ll see you later.”

As I drove through the Essex countryside looking
for the forest I realised that I was near Dunmow, heading towards Takeley, the
village where we'd once lived. I smiled as I recognised the post office and the
sweet shop. I turned right at the pub on the corner and drove past my junior
school with the climbing frame and the house where we'd bought lettuces and
tomatoes in summer, then halted in confusion and horror at a roundabout I'd
never seen before. The house was gone, so was the neighbouring caravan site and
Lesley Mead's house, whose barn we used to play in. The barn was also gone. And
Mrs McCormick's garden, and the wall we used to climb over, and the apples we
used to pinch (only it wasn't really stealing; it was called scrumping).

Instead, spread before me and glimmering like the
Emerald City, was London's third airport. I looked at the road signs that had
sprung up like weeds in my absence, and guessed that I must have lived
somewhere in the region of the departure lounge.

The road ended there. There was nothing left to do
but leave. I stood in my mum's wellies on the oily tarmac and watched a plane
that was heading down the runway and taking off in the distance. When it was
lost beyond the horizon, I got back into the car and drove south towards the
river.

It was late afternoon. I parked beside the lock
and sat for a while, looking through the windscreen at the water rippling
gently in the breeze. The sun was low but the clouds had disappeared and the
tops of the fir trees stretching into infinity beyond the river were tipped
with an amber hue. I climbed out of the car and locked the door. I crossed the
little wooden bridge to a dirt track on the opposite bank. I reached out to
touch the shrubs that flanked the pathway and the edge of the forest where
willows and poplars loomed up through the undergrowth, camouflaging the birds
that whistled and twittered invisibly around me. I trailed my hand over
thistles and catkins and squeezed the tip of a snow-white cornucopia, which
dutifully popped out of its bud and landed at my feet. I felt a sudden pang inside
me at the sheer beauty of it all, combined with a newfound nostalgia for a
feeling I'd loved and long forgotten, the kind of feeling you're left with
after all the best flying dreams. My mother’s wellies were rubbing at the back
of my legs and I could feel my socks had worked their way down and bunched up
under the arches of my feet, like they used to do when I was a kid. The ground
was dry and the path by the river covered in a springy layer of mossy turf. I
squatted down and yanked off one boot and then the other, and pushed them under
a bush.

It was only a few months since my life had begun
to change forever. But it felt like forever, an aeon ago, in my head. I'd
floated along for so long, with everything just happening to me, but now I had
come to a fork, where several branches led off into uncharted waters. I needed
to make some decisions. But I didn't know how, or what to do for the best. What
I really needed, I told myself, was a big hand to come out of the sky and point
me in the right direction.

I peered into the water and studied my murky
reflection, looking back up at me. A twig bobbed backwards and forwards over my
nose. I looked confused. Was Greg right? I wondered. Did I really sell myself
short? Was I really that good at what I did? And why did I need Greg to point
it out? I had always cared far too much what other people said about me. I'd
always seen myself as a reflection of what everyone else saw when they looked
at me, or at least what I thought they saw.

I thought, I must be giving away a lot of power.

For a moment I stood on the bank and looked deep
into the water. It was unusually clear, so clear that you almost couldn't see
where the rushes began and the water ended. I could just make out the silhouette
of a lone minnow as it fought its way determinedly through the tangled weeds
and up the river.

I turned and followed, padding in my socks over a
carpet of springy moss.

I moved house on a Sunday in late July. On the Saturday, Catherine
came over to help me pack. We stood in my tiny kitchen drinking tea while
Catherine went through my cupboards.

“You mean you’re not taking any of this?” she
asked, opening and shutting the pine cupboard doors and peering inside.

I shook my head. “No. Let them have it. I don’t
care. And anyway, Lynne’s got stuff.”

“But you won’t be there forever. You’ll need
plates, and cups and cutlery at some point. And saucepans,” she said, clanging
two pans together as she pulled them out of the cupboard. “Hey, this is a good
frying pan. You can’t leave this.”

“It’s a wok. And I can’t cook anyway.”

“That’s not the point.”

“It’s nothing. I’ll get it all new. Or from a boot
sale or something. It’s no big deal.”

Catherine shrugged. “I’d take the lot.”

“No you wouldn’t,” I laughed. “You say that but
you’re soft really. And anyway, it’s his stuff too. How do we decide who gets
what? Two knives, two forks and one saucepan each? I don’t want to seem petty.”

“Petty? You’re hardly that. He’s throwing you out
of your home. You’re taking it really well.”

“He’s not throwing me out. He’s buying me out.”

“Whatever.” Catherine sipped her tea. “I can’t
believe he got her pregnant that quickly.”

“It was an accident, apparently.”

“For him, maybe. I bet she did it on purpose. I
bet he still loves you.”

“Who knows? But one thing’s for certain, he’s made
the decision for us both. There’s no going back now; it’s too late. They’ve got
a connection, now, forever, whatever happens in the future they will always have
their child. It’s over for me and him. It’s time to move on.”

Catherine nodded. She levered herself up so that
she was sitting on the work surface and poured more tea from the pot next to
her. “What about the teapot?” She grinned.

“No.”

“Go on. Take the teapot.”

“No!” I laughed.

Catherine pulled a face and stuck her bottom lip
out. “I can’t believe you’re leaving. I’ve only just found you again and now
you’re going. What am I going to do without you?”

“I know,” I said. “But I’ll be back. I’m still
going to be working here. I’ll be coming back here almost every day. And you
can come and stay.”

Catherine looked doubtful.

“Can’t you?” I persisted.

“Sure.” Catherine picked up a piece of bubble wrap
and with her thumb and forefinger started to burst the bubbles, one by one. I
jumped up onto the work surface opposite.

“That’s if he’ll let you, you mean,” I added.

Catherine looked up, crossly. “Of course he’ll let
me. He’s okay, you know. I know he can be a bit moody sometimes but he’s been
through a lot. He had dreams. They got smashed when he had that accident.”

“I know. But…”

“He’s never quite got over that, not being able to
compete any more. And sometimes it frustrates him, that’s all. But he’s a good
person. He helps other people. You should see how he is with the kids on the
junior swimming team. Really caring. And he loves me. I’m sure of that.”

I didn’t answer.

“What, you don’t believe me?” Catherine pushed her
hair out of her eye and frowned. “You don’t think he loves me?”

I sighed. “I’m sure he does love you. Why wouldn’t
he? You’re gorgeous.”

“But?”

“Well…”

“Go on.” Catherine spoke gently as she always did,
but I could tell she was getting angry. “Say it, Lizzie. Say what’s on your
mind.”

When people say that they never actually mean it.
The last thing Catherine really wanted was to hear what was on my mind. “Nothing,”
I said. “It’s nothing. I’m just going to miss you, that’s all.”

“When I first met him I had nothing,” Catherine
continued, ignoring me. “I was living like a student, in a shared house, in a
rough part of London. And I was on the dole…”

“You had just finished drama school. You were
looking for acting work.”

“But I wasn’t getting any! At least, I wasn’t
getting paid for anything I did. I was just bumming around. Martin sorted my
life out, showed me that I needed to work, helped me get a job...”

“You hate your work, Catherine. You’re a trained
actress and you’ve settled for being a secretary.”

“I’m a PA, not a secretary. And I don’t hate it. Anyway,
there’s nothing wrong with being a secretary, Lizzie. Not everyone has to be a
high flier like you.”

I sighed. Here we go again, I thought. Where have
I heard this before? “No they don’t,” I said. “And no, of course there’s
nothing wrong with being a secretary if you want to be a secretary. Or a PA. It’s
a good job. If that’s what your goal is. But it’s not yours.”

“It’s not what I want to do for ever, no, but…”

“When was the last time you performed?”

“I’m looking into that. I am applying for parts. But
it’s tricky, because you can’t tour when you’re working and there’s a lot of
competition for the local theatre parts. Anyway, we’re getting off the point. The
point is that Martin has done a lot for me. I had nothing when I met him, now
I’ve got a man who loves me, a home, a job…”