A Distant Dream (3 page)

But she had her two best friends, George and Betty, and they both meant the world to her. She wiped a tear from her eye with the back of her hand and got on with laying the table. Tiddles, the family cat, strutted into the room with his usual proprietorial air and rubbed himself around her legs meowing demandingly. She picked him up and stroked him, loving his shiny black fur, yellow-green eyes and the feel and sound of his vibrating purr. He was a glutton for cuddles and that was fine with May, because she enjoyed making a fuss of him.

Her father came into the room and sat in the armchair by the hearth, unlit at this time of year. As he opened the newspaper she noticed a picture of the American athlete who was doing so well in the much-publicised Berlin Olympic Games that were on at the moment.

‘Has Jesse Owens got another medal, Dad?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ he replied, peering at her over the top of the paper after glancing at the headline.

‘The star of the games so they say.’

‘He certainly is, and Mr Hitler will be none too pleased about that,’ he said.

‘Is that because he only wants his own people to win?’ she enquired.

‘Something like that,’ replied her father.

May knew that there was some sort of controversy about the games in Germany and that it concerned Hitler and the Nazi party. But her interest in the Olympics was purely sporting and everything else went over her head.

‘Grub’s up,’ called Flo from the kitchen, and May went to help her bring the food in.

There was an argument in progress when George Bailey got home from work, which wasn’t unusual because his sister and their mother were always at daggers drawn lately.

‘Oi oi,’ he said, hearing shouting coming from the kitchen. ‘Pack it in, the pair of you.’

‘Tell your sister that,’ said his mother Dot, a sad little woman with dark shadows under her eyes, her once black hair now almost white. ‘She started it.’

‘What’s it all about this time?’ he sighed, and turning to his sister added, ‘Sheila, what have you been saying to Mum to upset her so much?’

‘She’s pathetic,’ declared Sheila, a feisty thirteen year old. ‘Why can’t she be like other mothers and do the things they do like shopping and ironing our clothes? Why do I have to go to the butcher’s before I go to school every morning and do the household jobs when I get home?’

‘It doesn’t hurt you to help out,’ said George.

‘Help out, I’ll be doing the bloody lot before long,’ declared Sheila, who was similar in colouring to George and had brown hair worn in long plaits. ‘All she does is mope about the house all day.’

‘That’s enough of that sort of language,’ admonished George.

‘Who are you to tell me what to do?’ she shouted. ‘You’re not my father.’

‘No, but seeing as he isn’t here, I’m standing in for him,’ he said. ‘Mum’s had a bad time, so go easy on her and treat her with respect.’

‘That’s right, take her side like you always do.’

‘She’s our mother,’ he reminded her sternly.

‘Huh. I thought mothers were supposed to look after their kids,’ retorted Sheila.

‘She does her best,’ said George.

‘For what it’s worth.’

‘I don’t know what’s got into you, Sheila,’ he told her. ‘You didn’t used to behave like this when Dad was alive.’

‘She used to be a proper mum then, didn’t she?’ she said, her face suffused with red blotches and eyes brimming with angry tears. ‘Now all she does is feel sorry for herself.’ She looked at her mother, who was standing in the doorway crying silently. ‘There she goes, booing her eyes out again. She’s not the only one who suffered. We lost our dad.’ Sheila’s voice broke. ‘I’m sorry, Mum, but I just can’t stand it, coming home from school every day to your miserable face. Why don’t you try to cheer up and give us all a break?’

With that she ran from the room sobbing.

George went over to his mother and put an affectionate arm around her. ‘She doesn’t mean it, Mum,’ he said. ‘She’s growing up and getting stroppy with it.’

‘I try, George, but I can’t shake it off,’ she said thickly. ‘This terrible despair.’

‘I know,’ he said kindly, holding her close. ‘But maybe if you were to keep busy it might help somehow. It’s two years since Dad died. You’ve done enough grieving.’

‘He didn’t just die, he was murdered,’ she reminded him.

Hearing it was like a physical blow, but he didn’t want her to know how much it hurt because she was in no state to take on anyone else’s problems. She needed him to be strong and supportive. ‘Yes, I know, Mum,’ he said. ‘But it’s all over now and Dad’s murderer has been hanged. It’s time for you to start living again.’

‘I feel as though I can’t do anything because I’m so weak,’ she said.

George felt completely unequal to the problem of his mother. Common sense told him that the persistent low spirits that had troubled her for such a long time must surely be something more than just grief. But even if he could find the money to seek medical help he risked having her carted off to the lunatic asylum. That was what they did to people who got sick in the head. So all he could do was be kind to her and encourage her to get back to doing normal things, like going out and looking after the home properly.

‘I know,’ he said sympathetically. ‘Why don’t I make you a nice cup of tea and you sit down quietly and drink it.’

‘Thank you, son.’

‘Have you managed to get a meal ready for us?’ he asked hopefully.

‘It’s in the oven.’

Thank God for that, he said to himself. More often than not when he got home from work his sister was out with her pals, having rebelled and refused to cook a meal yet again, and he had to go and get fish and chips, which he couldn’t afford often on his wages as an errand boy. And his low pay was something else he had to deal with as a matter of urgency.

‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ he said.

‘You’re so good to me, George,’ said Dot.

Filled with guilt for sometimes being irritated by her hopelessness, he said, ‘And you’ve always been good to me, Mum. Together we’ll get you through this rough patch, don’t worry.’

‘I know, son,’ she said pitifully, twisting his heart. ‘I know.’

‘Can’t you try to be a bit kinder to her, sis?’ asked George, finding his sister sitting on her bed sobbing.

‘I do try, but all this misery of hers is driving me mad,’ she said. ‘I miss Dad and I know you do too but we don’t go about like the living dead every day, do we? At first it was understandable for Mum to be upset, but it’s just going on and on.’

‘We’re young, we’ve got more stamina than she has and our lives ahead of us, as well as friends and outside interests,’ he said. ‘Whereas Dad was her husband and her whole life.’

‘I know I’m awful and I hate myself for being so mean to her,’ said Sheila, wiping her eyes. ‘But it’s all wrong the way she is. My friends think she’s loopy; they talk about her behind my back and are always making remarks about my having to do all the shopping. I won’t put up with that so I end up defending her and quarrelling with them. And that makes me feel even worse. I’ll be glad when I’ve left school altogether. I wish I could leave home too.’

‘Well you’re not old enough to do either yet, so how about giving me some support with Mum to help her get back to her old self instead,’ he said.

‘S’pose I shall have to,’ she agreed miserably.

‘You can start by telling her that you’re sorry for your outburst, and then we’ll sit down together and eat our meal and you can try not to lose your temper again.’

‘All right, George.’

‘Good girl.’

‘I don’t know how you manage to stay cheerful with Mum the way she is.’

‘It must be in my nature,’ he said, but he wasn’t as happy-go-lucky as he seemed. Unbeknown to anyone else, he suffered from fierce bouts of fury towards the man who had robbed them of their father and broken their mother’s heart.

Their dad, Joe Bailey, had been a small-time boxing promoter who had been in the business for the love of the sport, not for the money. Other people in the boxing community were more materialistic, and when Dad had refused to agree to allow a fight to be rigged, he had been attacked by a man called Bill Bikerley outside a pub in Shepherd’s Bush and had died of his injuries.

Even though justice had been done and Bikerley had been given the death penalty, the anger remained in George’s heart, and when he saw the broken woman his mother had become, it grew almost unbearable. Senseless he knew, since there was no one to direct his rage to now that Bikerley was dead. But still it came, especially when Mum had a bad day as she had today.

‘Oh, by the way, George, there’s a school trip coming up and I need tuppence to pay for it,’ his sister was saying. ‘Will that be all right, do you think?’

He hesitated for a moment, then said, ‘You’ll have your money, I’ll make sure of it.’

‘Thanks, George,’ she said, cheering up.

Following her down the stairs he was thoughtful. Thanks to a persistent insurance agent who had called at the house every week, their father had taken out a life insurance policy, so Mum hadn’t been left destitute when he died. She had enough for rent and food and other essentials to keep the house running, but there wasn’t much left over for unexpected expenses such as his sister’s school trip. Of course he paid for his keep now that he was working, and bought his own clothes, so he was no longer a drain on Mum, but his sister still had a year left at school.

The wages of an errand boy just wasn’t enough. It really was time he did something about it.

After all the family tension earlier, George was so delighted to see May when she knocked at the door after they had finished their meal that he wanted to take her in his arms and smother her in kisses. But he didn’t have the skill or confidence to smother anyone in kisses yet and she was a decent girl, so he gave her a beaming smile instead.

‘Just wondered if you fancy coming for a bike ride with me,’ she explained. ‘We might as well make the most of the light nights.’

‘Yeah, I’d like that, May,’ he said. ‘I’ll just tell them where I’m going and I’ll be with you. Won’t be a minute.’

While she walked to her bike at the front gate to wait for him, he went back inside.

‘Is it May?’ asked Sheila.

‘Yeah, and we’re going for a bike ride, that is if I can trust you two not to kill each other while I’m out.’

‘You can relax,’ said his sister, seeming calmer. ‘Mum is going to undo my plaits and brush my hair for me when we’ve done the washing-up, and we might listen to the wireless.’

‘Thank God for that,’ he said, relieved that things seemed to have improved and his mother had finally stopped crying. Mum did seem to be better in the evenings – he’d noticed that before – and Sheila had apologised as she’d promised. So all was well, he thought; for the time being anyway.

May and George sat on a bench by the river at Richmond, watching the river traffic go by, a medley of pleasure craft and working boats, listening to the gentle splash of the oars as the rowing crews practised along this stretch. The wildlife was abundant here; swans and ducks preening and pecking and gliding by in groups. The air was balmy, the orange sun low in the sky behind the trees on the other side of the Thames, the image softened by the beginnings of a pearly mist.

‘Sorry I didn’t ask you in when you came to the door earlier,’ he said.

‘It doesn’t matter, George,’ she assured him. ‘Is your mum not too good again?’

‘She was a bit dodgy earlier on and there was all-out war between her and Sheila,’ he explained. ‘I wanted to spare you the atmosphere of the aftermath.’

‘I didn’t mind, honestly,’ she assured him, smiling at him and melting his heart.

‘I’ve decided to try and get another job,’ he announced out of the blue.

‘Really?’ she said, surprised. ‘Why is that?’

‘Dosh,’ he replied candidly. ‘I need more of it to put into the pot at home. It’s hard for Mum without Dad to support her, and Sheila still being at school.’

‘What sort of job are you hoping for?’

‘I’m thinking of trying one of the new factories over Acton way,’ he replied. ‘You can earn good money if you put in the hours, so I’ve heard.’

She looked doubtful. ‘But I thought you liked the freedom of being out delivering.’

‘I do, but it pays peanuts and I have to face facts,’ he said. ‘Anyway, I can’t be an errand boy all my life.’

‘No, but you are only fifteen,’ she pointed out.

‘I have family responsibilities.’

‘Yeah, I suppose you do.’

She thought it must be hard for George to be burdened at such a young age, and was sad for him too because she knew how much he’d wanted to work with his beloved father in the boxing business. He might have even become a boxer himself when he was old enough if his dad hadn’t been struck down as he had.

His father’s murder had been a shocking thing at the time; the whole of the neighbourhood had been reeling and everybody had been talking about it. Joe Bailey had been a popular man in the area and the streets had been lined with well-wishers for the funeral procession.

George had been amazingly brave but May knew he’d been devastated because his dad had been his hero and they’d been close. But he’d faced up to it and at thirteen years of age had become the man of the house.

‘Anyway, I’ve heard that one or two of the factories are looking for unskilled labour, so I’ll go to the Labour Exchange in my dinner break one day soon.’

‘If that’s what you think is best, I hope you find something soon,’ she said.

‘Thanks,’ he said, taking her hand and sounding gruff because he found it hard to cope with the strength of his feelings when he touched her these days.

Of course he knew all about the birds and bees. Embarrassingly, his father had given him a rather garbled version and his mates passed on any information they had and it was the subject of much speculation and laughter. You had to pretend you knew as much as the others to avoid mockery. But it was all a bit smutty and on the quiet; no one ever talked openly or seriously about it.

So he had no idea how he was supposed to cope with loving someone as he loved May. Fifteen-year-old boys weren’t meant to indulge in such sentimental feelings. It was supposed to be all about biology and restraint. There were times when he wished he was older and had more savvy. At this age he was still in between, neither man nor boy, even though his father’s death had made him grow up overnight in some ways.