Unlike a Virgin (32 page)

I don’t know about him having a heart, but I definitely have one and I can feel it beating. It’s like there’s an angry man in there trying to get out. I’ve never known anything like it. It’s literally thrashing around in my chest. I’m down to fifty-seven minutes and there are still three people ahead of me in the cashpoint queue. I would tell them that some heavies have given me a time frame in which to get my hands on four grand, but they’ll just think I’m a London crazy, tut and tell me to wait in line. These brick-throwing blokes can’t be legal. I mean, this isn’t a Ray Winstone film. I’ll have to talk to whatever company they work for. We must be due some compensation. I’ve never been so scared in all my life.

Finally I reach the cashpoint. My hands shake as I type in my pin, select ‘other amount’ and tap in 4000. There’s a small pause, then, ‘Sorry. £300 maximum withdrawal today.’

I stare at the screen. I try the whole transaction again. It must be a computer error. It’s my money, why can’t I get it out?
Still no luck and my watch now says 8.11 p.m. I withdraw £300. Under normal circumstances that would be a lot of money, but today it isn’t even ten per cent of what I need. I step away from the cashpoint and call Wendy.

‘Hey, babe,’ she sings.

‘Wend. I’m really in it. Mum’s in trouble. These violent men came round. Seriously massive, throwing bricks through the windows and everything. I need to give them four grand by nine o’clock tonight or they’ll wreck the house.’

‘What?’

‘Sorry, I’ll give it back tomorrow, but I need whatever money you’ve got. I haven’t got time to explain now. You just have to just trust me.’

‘Yeah, yeah, cool. Shit. Right. I’ll get all I can and meet you at your mum’s. Is that OK?’

‘Yeah, thanks. I’m going to try Bob and Lube, but get as much as you can. I’ll see you there.’

I dial Lube’s mobile number.

‘Gracie Flowers,
mi amiga,
is everything all right with you?’

‘Lu— Ken, where are you?’

‘Stansted, darlin’. We’re on our way to Spain.’ He’s shouting against the sound of a plane. ‘You must come out with us for a trip, you’d—’

NO!

‘Thanks,’ I sing quickly. ‘Have a lovely time.’

I hang up. Heart, calm down. It can’t be healthy for it to beat this hard. It feels like it might explode. I dial Bob the Builder’s number. I don’t know why I bothered with Lube. Bob’s always about.

‘Please leave a message after the tone.’

NO!

‘Beep.’

‘Bob, Bob. It’s Gracie, Bob. Can you call me? I’m in a spot of bother. Call me, please.’

I hang up. Spot of bother?! I’m starting to sound to sound like Posh Boy. Posh Boy! Could I? Should I? Yes, Grace. You haven’t got a lot of options here.

I call him. It rings once, it rings twice.

‘Please, Posh Boy. Please, please. I’ll do anything.’

It rings a third time, then clicks onto voicemail. I don’t leave a message. I’m too busy racing back to Nina. I’m going to go to Bob the Builder’s yard. Bob always works late, so he’s bound to be there. My car clock says it’s eight twenty-seven. The roads are heaving and I break all my time-honoured driving rules to get to Bob’s yard by eight thirty-four, but there are no lights on and no Land Rover parked outside. I knock on the door just in case, but there’s no answer. I’ve just wasted seven minutes! Heart, please, please, stop it. I slam the car door shut and start the engine again. Stupid idea, Gracie. Stupid. THINK!

‘Someone, somewhere, help me, please,’ I whisper. And then it comes to me. I know who’ll help. I should have gone there first. The Festering Carbuncle. I make it in six minutes. I double park and don’t even lock my car before racing inside the pub.

‘Anton. Where’s Anton?’ I gasp to the young guy serving.

‘Haven’t seen him.’ He shrugs.

‘What?’ I pant.

‘He’s not here.’

‘What?’

‘He’s out.’

‘Freddie? What about Freddie?’

‘I don’t think he’s home yet.’

My watch says eight forty-two. No one has called my phone. My brain says nothing. I always thought I was resourceful, but I can’t think of any way to get this money. All I can think of is the £120 I keep in the drawer in the kitchen for emergencies. I run and get it from the flat and am back in the car by eight forty-five.

I’ll have to beg them to give me a few more hours until the banks open in the morning. That’s what I’ll have to do. Beg.

I let myself back into Mum’s house. I don’t even acknowledge Mildred. There are voices coming from the kitchen, so I walk towards them. It’s Wendy and Freddie. They’re sitting round the kitchen table with Mum. I can’t look at Mum. I’ve failed her.

‘I … I … I couldn’t get it,’ I tell them.

‘Grace, there’s four grand in here,’ Freddie says, standing up. ‘From Dad.’

He hands me a big soft envelope, squidgy with notes, and as if on cue the big brass Victorian door knocker slams three times against our front door.

‘I’m coming with you,’ Freddie says.

‘Thank you,’ I whisper.

We walk to the front door, avoiding the glass debris and the brick.

‘What you got for us?’ Brick Man asks.

‘Four thousand,’ I say, holding out the envelope.

‘Now that’s more like it.’ He smiles.

‘Tell me,’ says Freddie. ‘Who do you work for?’

‘Who don’t we work for?’ he grunts.

‘Well, you’re acting outside the law with your methods of extracting payment.’

‘Acting outside the law.’ Brick Man laughs. ‘The lady inside took out a loan. She knows the terms. See you next week,’ he says, before smiling and turning away.

I watch him go. I feel faint, my head is thumping and my tummy hurts.

‘Is Anton here now?’ I ask the young barman again.

‘Yeah, you just missed him earlier. He’s upstairs.’ He nods, then squints at me. ‘You all right?’

‘Yeah. Fine, thanks.’

‘Sure? You want a drink of water or anything?’

‘No, thank you.’

‘Just go up.’

‘Is that OK?’

‘Yeah. Knock when you get to the top, though. Yeah?’

‘I will.’

I walk behind the bar. I don’t feel at all well, to be honest. I feel a bit other-worldly and unsteady on my feet. I need to eat. I can’t remember when I last ate. That awful hour took it out of me. I owe Freddie and Wendy something expensive. They’re still with Mum now. And Anton. I really owe him. He saved the day. Again.

I tiptoe up the creaky stairs. The door is open at the top
and it sounds as though Anton is listening to music. I creep nearer and nearer, but when I get to the doorway I stop. I hover on the top step and watch Anton. He’s sitting on a leather sofa, crouched over a guitar. He’s not listening to music, he’s playing music. It sounds as though he’s trying to learn a song. He plays a chord or two, then stops and tuts and tries again or moves on. He’s deep in concentration. I lean my head on the door frame and close my eyes. I know this song. Whatever song it is, it’s a song I love. A song that’s meant a lot to me at some point. If he could just play a bit more I know I could remember it.

‘Argh!’ I scream. My foot slips and I topple back for a moment. I manage to steady myself on the banister, then I scream again. It’s my stomach. It feels as though someone’s punching me.

‘Argh!’

Jesus, it hurts! My fingers turn white as I clutch the banister.

‘Grace!’ Anton runs to my side.

I’m doubled over on the stairs.

‘Urgh!’ I bawl again.

Oh, no. Don’t be. Please, please. Don’t be what I think this is. ‘No!’ I scream.

‘Grace, let’s bring you up here to sit down.’

I shake my head and grimace as another wave of pain comes.

‘Right, let’s get you to hospital,’ Anton says suddenly. He doesn’t even go back upstairs to get his coat or drop off his guitar. He just leads me downstairs and outside to his car.

‘She’s lost the baby. I’m so sorry,’ the nurse tells Anton. He remains still for a few seconds, then he nods and turns back to face me. I don’t move. I’m curled up in a hospital bed. It’s late now. It’s all over.

Anton stays with me all night. We don’t say a word, but I do cry. I let out the tears I’ve been holding back for nearly ten years. There are so many of them it takes all night for me to rid myself of them. Anton strokes my hair and sometimes he holds my hand. He changes my tissue when it gets soggy and he plays his guitar very quietly. After a while I recognise the song. It’s ‘Annie’s Song’. The song my dad sang to my mum on their wedding day. The song that made all the guests cry.

At about 6 a.m., when the sun starts to rise, Anton masters the tune and starts to sing the words, but he gets them wrong. Not really wrong, but pretty wrong. I know because I learned this song when I was ten and I remember it like my five times tables. He stumbles over the lines. He knows
they’re wrong but he doesn’t know what he should be singing.

I lie and wait for him to play the song again on the guitar, and then I start to sing. I sing the whole song for him. I sing the same words that my dad sang to my mum before I was born. ‘Let me lay down beside you, let me always be with you. Come let me love you.’ I sing them to him because I love this man. Amazing, magical Anton, who’s far too old for me and doesn’t even love me back. But that doesn’t matter, because I mean the words and I want to sing them to him, so that he knows. Because we only have now, and because life’s far too short.

By the time I finish the tears have stopped. I lie still. I’m breathing normally for the first time in hours. Anton gets up, leans over me and presses his lips to my forehead. He keeps them there in a kiss. After that I fall asleep and when I wake up he’s gone.

‘Hey,’ says Wendy when she sees my eyes open. I tip the corners of my mouth up to see her, but it’s not a smile, because my brow is furrowed and my eyes are sad.

‘Hey,’ I mouth back.

‘Anton called me,’ she whispers. ‘He thought you might need the girls.’

Over Wendy’s shoulder I see my mum getting up from the hospital chair and walking towards me. I start to push myself up in the bed, but she lightly presses my shoulder back, as if to say, ‘Lie where you were.’ So I lie down again. Wendy steps back and Mum perches on the bed and takes my hand. I just gaze at her, amazed and grateful that she’s there.

It’s one of those days that knows there’s been a trauma: still, grey, solicitous. I’m at the graveyard because life goes on. Well, not for the little one that never was, and not for the bodies lying here, but for me.

I don’t know much about anything really, but I know that when bad big things happen in life you have to appreciate the good little things. Otherwise the bad spreads to every corner of everything and all you can see is pain. That’s what happened when Dad died and Mum started hating me. There was no good in anything for a long time. But slowly – and it really was ever so slowly – I started to find the good stuff again. But I had to look for it. A Saturday job at an estate agent was a good thing, Danny Saunders wanting to go out with me was a good thing, my five year plan was a good thing and coming to the graveyard every week was a good thing. That’s why I didn’t want to miss today. I could have lain in bed, but I didn’t. I got up because I didn’t want to let the bad take over.

I bought extra flowers, a bunch for Dad and a bunch for my baby. I don’t know what I’ll sing today. Not ‘Tears In Heaven’. Not ‘Tears In Heaven’. Well, maybe ‘Tears In Heaven’, but only after Leonard and Joan have gone. I don’t want them to see me cry.

I walk to silver birch corner. At least I still have this. I’ll always be able to come here, and that’s something. I can see Joan standing in front of her mother’s tombstone. I hang back for a moment. She looks older than I’ve ever seen her. She’s seventy now. She must be, because Leonard’s seventy-four. I step closer. There’s no sign of Len.

‘Afternoon,’ I call, trying to sound upbeat and normal.

‘Oh, Grace, hello.’

She turns and I see her face, lined and without make-up. I’ve never seen Joan without make-up. I feel like I can see her skeleton under the skin.

‘How are you?’

‘I’m fine, love, but poor Len’s in the hospital.’

‘Oh no. Why?’

‘He had a stroke late last night, love.’

‘Oh, Joan.’

‘I just wanted to let you know.’

‘Thank you. Where is he?’

‘St Mary’s.’

I was there last night, too.

‘Can I visit?’

‘I’d give it a week.’

‘Is it bad?’

‘I think so, pet. I think so.’

‘I’m so sorry.’

‘Well, we knew it was on the cards, what with his blood pressure.’

‘Oh, Joan.’