Unbecoming (9 page)

The doctor blinked at Mum as if he couldn’t quite believe she’d asked. ‘It’s pretty clear that there’s some alteration in intellectual and emotional background.’ He glanced at Mary, as if checking just how offended she might be if she understood what he meant. Katie wanted to cover her ears and lead her away. ‘A CT in conjunction with these cognitive tests and recent medical history will provide a pretty accurate diagnosis. At that stage we can discuss prescribing an inhibitor, a drug that promotes communication between nerve cells. We may see some stabilizing of your mother’s condition at that point, but ultimately, this is a progressive condition, Mrs Baxter, and I really don’t think your mother will be living independently again.’

Katie stared at the doctor’s mouth, at the way it moved as he spoke, like some awful fortune teller who knew the end of every story. Mum would feel crap listening to this. It meant she had to keep being responsible.

‘Couldn’t we get some help for her in her own home?’ Mum asked. ‘Some people have live-in carers, don’t they?’

The doctor shook his head. ‘I’m really not the man to be asking. You need to sort this out through social services. Although I don’t think live-in care will be one of the options, not in the current financial climate, I’m afraid.’

Mum leaned forward, as if getting close to him meant Katie and Mary weren’t in the room and couldn’t hear. Katie watched with dismay. ‘This has all happened so suddenly,’ Mum said, her voice low and confidential, ‘and there’s absolutely no support in place. I know we were lucky to get this cancellation today, and I’m grateful, but it took me hours of negotiating. You wouldn’t believe the hoops I had to jump through.’

The doctor laughed softly through his nose. ‘I would, actually.’

This seemed to encourage Mum – she leaned nearer, spoke more rapidly, words falling out of her. On and on about how difficult it had been, how Mary might seem OK for a while, but it didn’t last, how she was definitely getting confused and tired earlier each day, how sometimes she got anxious and woke in the night, how she kept thinking Jack was alive, how Mum was a single parent with a full-time job and one of her kids had special needs and the other one (glancing at Katie briefly) had her English AS level tomorrow and university applications and personal statements to get on with after that. It was horrible, like Mum was chucking up on the man’s carpet. And all the while, Mary sat there listening.

‘I can’t get an appointment from the mental health team or the DWP for love nor money,’ Mum went on. ‘Social services are
digging their heels in, telling me they can’t get involved until she’s been diagnosed. I’m pretty suspicious it suits everyone to let me get on with it. It takes a massive financial and logistical burden away from the state if I blunder on, doesn’t it? Everyone just passing the buck.’

Including us, thought Katie.

Beyond the window, past the hospital gates, cars were crawling by with their windows down. Drivers had their elbows out, and even from here Katie could hear the pulse of music from countless stereos. Over the road, nestled in the middle of some houses was a playground. A woman was pushing her kid on a swing. Outside the playground was an ice-cream van.

If Katie was brave, she’d take Mary’s hand and say, ‘Fancy getting out of here?’

She’d have a go at Mum on the way out:
You shouldn’t talk about people in front of them. You do it to Chris as well, and he hates it
. Then she’d lead Mary out of the room and into the lift and over to the park and she’d buy her a 99 with a chocolate flake and sprinkles. They’d sit on a bench and watch the kid on the swing and the sun would shine down on them.

But that was what would happen in a perfect world. And this was clearly not one. And Katie wasn’t brave, as almost everyone knew. And anyway, it was too late because Mary was crying. She’d cried last night as well – Katie had heard her on the landing and gone out to lead her back to bed. She’d seemed in a daze.

‘Oh dear,’ Mum said now. ‘You’re getting upset.’

‘This isn’t where I’m meant to be,’ Mary whispered. ‘This isn’t what’s supposed to be happening at all.’

Mum hesitated for only a second. ‘What’s supposed to be happening is that you come home with me. The doctor thinks that’s best for the moment.’

‘But you don’t want me.’

‘Well, I don’t have a choice right now. I have to do what the doctor says.’

Mary wiped her tears away with her fingers. It was shocking – something intimate and private about it, like no one should be looking. The doctor shuffled his papers. Mum reached out a tentative hand to Mary’s arm. Katie sat on her chair, feeling utterly useless.

Twenty, thirty seconds went by before Mary stopped crying very suddenly, almost as if she’d forgotten why she was doing it, which maybe she had. She brushed Mum off and looked around the room – at the doctor and his desk, the chairs and carpet, at Katie by the window.

‘Well, this is nice,’ she said, ‘isn’t it? They’ve done it up nice.’

‘Very nice,’ Mum said. ‘Aren’t we lucky?’

Katie stood outside the bedroom door and leaned her ear against the cold wood. Inside the room, Mum was on the phone
again
.

‘I see that, yes,’ Katie heard her say, ‘but surely you can see my predicament? I was told
one
night by that social worker,
one
. It’s been well over two weeks now and no end in sight. She’s got an appointment for a CT scan in another fortnight. That’ll be over a month I’ve had her. A month! And goodness knows how long the results from the scan will take to appear. I’m having to arrange a funeral on top of everything else.’

There was silence then, or actually no – a tapping sound, a soft rhythmic thud. A pen against a knee? A finger on the table?

‘So what if I told you I could no longer manage?’ Mum said. ‘What would you do then?’ More tapping. A sound that expressed increasing stress. Katie had watched it building for days. ‘So the state is forced to step in and make emergency arrangements only if I threaten to dump her? No, I’m not having a go at you, I’m stating the facts. It becomes all about me and my failings, rather than what’s best for her, doesn’t it? I become the evil daughter who abandons her mother and you all get to tut at me. Oh, I don’t care if that’s not how you see it, it’s how it looks from here. Yes, I do have a pen. Right, well I appreciate that. Please go ahead.’ More silence now – she was clearly writing something down. ‘OK, so I
ring this number and ask for Eileen Thomas. She’s the manager of the care home, is she?’

A sigh. A brusque thank you. The chair sliding back on the carpet.

‘What?’ Mum hissed and Katie knew this was aimed at her, although how her mother knew she was there was beyond her.

‘Didn’t want to disturb you,’ Katie said as she opened the door.

‘Then why were you eavesdropping?’

Katie felt herself blush. She wanted to say,
This is my room too now, remember? I have a right to loiter!
But then Mum would say she didn’t find it easy sharing either and weren’t they all making sacrifices and couldn’t she just have a moment’s peace?

‘I just thought I’d come and let you know how my last exam went.’

‘Oh, Katie, I’m sorry.’ Mum took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. ‘I hadn’t forgotten, really. I’ve been thinking about you all day.’ She put her glasses back on and smiled wearily. ‘So, tell me all about it, every detail please.’

Katie gave her what she wanted – told her the questions she’d chosen and why and how many pages she’d written and the fact she’d checked her work and finished in plenty of time (but not too soon because then Mum would think she could have written more) and yes, she felt confident and yes, very definitely relieved that exams were finally over.

‘What did the others say?’ Mum asked. ‘Did everyone find it so manageable?’

‘What others?’

‘Well, you’re quite late back. I’m assuming you hung about and discussed the paper?’

Katie nodded. ‘Yeah, I did for a bit. Most people thought it was fine.’

She was too ashamed to admit the truth – that she’d spoken to no one after the exam. She’d come walking out into sunshine, feeling relieved and eager to celebrate. She’d dared a text to Esme, asking if she wanted to meet, but got no reply. Determined not to let it deflate her, Katie went to the shopping centre, bought herself a double chocolate muffin and a large mocha latte and sat on a bench to celebrate by herself. It was only when a woman with a little kid in a buggy came and sat next to her and started making small talk about the under-fives club at the arts centre that Katie had a wave of feeling so pathetic that she had to leave. Everyone else was probably at a pub or in the park and she hadn’t been invited. Instead, she was in a shopping centre cramming sugar in her face and talking to a total stranger about rubbish.

And it was walking home that decided her. Courtesy of the maths boys, Katie had all the details for Saturday’s party on her phone. Esme never missed a party. If Katie’s life was going to improve, she had to get her best friend back. A relaxed and happy environment with free-flowing alcohol to steady the nerves was the perfect opportunity.

Katie sat at the edge of the bed and folded the corner of the duvet into a triangle and smoothed it flat. ‘I have a proposition.’

‘Oh yes?’

‘Now my exams are finished, why don’t I look after Mary for a few days?’

Mum frowned suspiciously. ‘Why would you want to do that?’

‘Because you can’t stay off work for ever and I don’t mind hanging out with her. I’ll just follow her about and see where we end up.’

‘What on earth for?’

‘You heard what the doctor at the memory clinic said about letting her wander. He thought she might be looking for something
from her past. If I go with her, it might help her remember stuff. It’d be like an experiment, like Pavlov, you know – see if a stimulus promotes a response. It’ll be very educational.’ Katie smiled to lighten the mood, but Mum wasn’t going for it. She was positively glowering, in fact. ‘Maybe she’s trying to get to the seaside.’

‘The seaside!’ Mum made it sound like the worst place on earth.

‘Well, she did grow up near the sea. I could take her on the bus. I talked to her about it a couple of times and she was really up for it. You can make all your calls in peace or go back to work or whatever and I can take her out, and in return you’ll let me go to the party I told you about.’

‘Just because exams are over, doesn’t mean everything collapses, Katie. You’ve got open days and summer courses to apply for. We need to begin work on your personal statement.’

‘I’m supposed to write that myself.’

‘And work experience? Is that finalized?’

‘Well, I was thinking I could look after Mary for work experience. I already asked school and they said it was OK.’

‘That’s ridiculous. You can’t put looking after your granny on your CV! All you do is sit around talking for hours.’

‘I like talking to her.’

‘Think what a difference professional work experience could make to your university application.’

‘I might not go straight to university. I might take a gap year.’

‘And do what in it?’

‘I don’t know. Travel the world?’

‘What? No! God, this is a nightmare.’ Mum stood up, walked past Katie to the door, yanked it open and marched downstairs. Katie pelted after her.

Mary was at the window looking down at the courtyard. She
turned round expectantly as they came into the lounge. ‘Lovely day out there.’

‘The seaside?’

Mary beamed at her. ‘Oh, yes. Shall I get my coat?’

‘You’re not going now!’

‘It’s rather pressing.’

Mum shook her head, exasperated. ‘Of course it isn’t. The only thing that’s pressing round here is you!’ Mum yanked her glasses off and rubbed both eyes, a fist balled in each. She looked like a child silently crying. ‘No one’s going to the seaside. No one’s travelling the world. Now, I’m going to make some more phone calls, so will you please both sit yourselves down and stop being so relentless.’

Katie took Mary to sit on the balcony. Mum stayed inside and Katie shut the door on her.

‘What did she call us?’ Mary said as Katie opened a deck chair.

‘Relentless.’

‘What did she mean by it, do you think?’

‘I think she means we both want something and she doesn’t want us to have it and it’s annoying her.’

‘I
do
want something,’ Mary agreed, smiling sadly. ‘Trouble is, I keep forgetting what.’

It must be terrifying having your memories drift out of your head, yet Mary still managed to find humour in it. Katie felt a rush of fondness for her and an interesting opposite rush of fury towards Mum.

‘Let’s do some writing in your book, Mary. Let’s write down every name of every boyfriend you ever had. And then let’s write down all the places you went with them and all the windows you climbed out of and every country you ever visited in your life and then, if you ever forget, I can tell it all back to you.’

It was fun for a while, but Mary tired easily in the afternoons and she soon fell asleep. Katie sneaked upstairs so she didn’t get roped into any more conversations about summer courses.

Her bedroom was beginning to look like a gallery with the pictures of old movie stars she’d stuck on the wall. She’d been hoping to detract attention from Jack’s Post-it Notes, which Mum seemed to hate.

‘Sorry, ladies,’ she said as she unstuck the pictures from their central position and moved them to the edge. She didn’t want to get rid of them completely – she loved their vulnerable but determined eyes.

She got Blu-Tack from the drawer and several sheets of A4 and wrote one giant letter on each page and coloured them in.
Mary’s Family
. She tacked them across the top of the wall like a banner and moved the Post-It notes directly underneath – all the messages from Jack, including the little stick figure picture. They could have centre space. She didn’t care what Mum thought of them any more.

It still looked a bit empty, so she got out the photo album Dad made for her tenth birthday and chose one photo for each of them and stuck herself, Chris, Mum and Dad in a little row. She’d have to take a photo of Mary and get one of Jack from somewhere if she was going to replicate Jack’s drawing, but this would do for now.

Katie spent the next half hour choosing photos from her phone, printing them out and sticking them to the wall – the block of flats where Mary knocked on the door, the poppies, the primary school, the tables outside the café Mary liked so much. If Mum was going to limit Mary to the flat, then Katie would bring the world to her.

It was only half an hour later when Mum came tapping on the door. She sidled in and shut the door behind her, leaning on it and biting her lip.

‘What’s going on, Mum?’

‘I just got a call from work. They want me to meet a client tomorrow.’

‘That’s fine. I’ll look after Mary. I said I would.’

‘But I don’t want you taking her anywhere. I won’t be able to concentrate if I’m worrying about you all the time.’

Typical Mum. She wanted help, but on her terms. ‘Well, I’m not staying in all day. You can’t expect that.’

‘No, I thought you could sit outside on one of the benches or take her to the local shops. Would that be OK? No buses or trains, though. No leaving Bisham.’

For a second, Katie told herself to say no, because those options were rubbish. She wanted to find out where Mary was trying to get to every morning and it certainly wasn’t the nearest bench. Hadn’t the doctor at the memory clinic said people got agitated if you stopped them going where they wanted?

But Katie didn’t say any of that because there was a deal being offered here. ‘So, can I go to the party?’

Mum sighed. ‘I’ll need to speak to the boy’s parents.’

‘No way! No one does that.’

‘I want to know they’ll be there. I also need to ask about alcohol.’

‘What about it?’

‘Will there be any?’

‘Of course there will, but that doesn’t mean I’ll be drinking it.’

‘Well, those are my terms. Like it or lump it.’

‘I’m going to look like a total idiot if you call the parents. I guarantee no one else will do that.’

‘Well, maybe other people don’t care about their kids the way I care about you.’

Katie felt a thrill of anger – it wasn’t so much caring as
suffocating! ‘Actually, you know what, never mind. I can’t look after Mary tomorrow anyway – I’ve got plans.’

Mum frowned. ‘What plans?’

And because it was a total lie, Katie said nothing, shrugged instead.

‘I’ll pay you. I wasn’t expecting you to do it for nothing. Twenty pounds, I was thinking. Does that seem fair?’

Katie tasted the words in her mouth. It was a game she played sometimes – daring to see how it would feel to say certain things out loud. Words like,
No
and
Can’t
and
Don’t you see?
Money didn’t make claustrophobia a more attractive prospect.

‘Don’t look at me like that,’ Mum said. ‘Come on, you were the one who offered in the first place.’ She went across the landing to her room and came back with her handbag and fumbled around in it. Katie felt a bit strange as Mum took out her purse and scrabbled for notes – sorry for her, or something. She looked desperate. ‘Here you go – payment in advance.’

For a millisecond, their fingers touched.

‘You were right, I do need to get back to work. I was a bit harsh earlier and I’m sorry. I’ve got viewings to sort, appointments to make, and even if I don’t manage to catch up, it won’t do any harm to show my face. I don’t want my colleagues stealing clients in my absence!’ She laughed and leaned in, nestling her head on Katie’s shoulder for a second. It was such a remarkable thing for her to do, that Katie was silenced by it. ‘If tomorrow goes OK, maybe you can do Thursday and Friday, possibly even a couple of days next week?’ Mum sat on the bed. ‘She’ll be gone after that, I promise, and then we can all get back to normal.’