Better Days Will Come (45 page)

As Rita reached Bob at the front of the church, Mrs Dawson turned around and looked at Grace. Both women had been so sure Bob and Rita belonged together, they couldn’t resist a mutual grin of triumph.

As they sang the first hymn, Archie whispered, ‘Happy?’

Grace nodded vigorously and sang with great gusto.

The bride was making her responses now and as she did so in clear ringing tones, Grace looked up at Archie and mouthed the words they had spoken to each other just a few short months ago:

For better, for worse. For richer, for poorer. In sickness and in health …

‘Remember what you once said to me?’ she smiled.

He frowned thoughtfully. ‘Was it … what’s for tea?’

‘No,’ she said shaking his arm playfully. ‘You once told me, “Better days will come.”’

He nodded. ‘I remember.’

‘I’m glad that from now on, I’m going to be spending all of them with you,’ she smiled.

A recipe from Pam, as featured in this book

12oz dried fruit

4oz margarine

4oz sugar

¼ pint cold water

Simmer ingredients on the hob for 20 minutes in a saucepan. Allow to cool, then add

8oz self-raising flour

2 eggs

Bake for 1½ hours at gas mark 2 (300˚F/150˚C)

Back in the late nineties,
Kilroy
, a chat show TV programme hosted by Robert Kilroy-Silk, was very popular. One episode in particular had a profound effect upon me. In it, a woman in her sixties was confessing that as a very young woman she had been forced to give up her newborn baby for adoption. It was a heart-rending story but the audience was completely unsympathetic. Young single mums with their own babies in their arms rounded on her. ‘There’s no way I would ever give up my baby!’

Today’s society has little concept of neither the difficulties nor the pain that the previous generation experienced when it came to having illegitimate children. Our culture has evolved so far that it is no longer a ‘shame’ to have a child outside of marriage and government allowances mean that single mums can keep, house and feed their offspring. Up until the sixties, women who had illegitimate children were stigmatised in all sorts of ways. It takes two to make a baby but the man was seen as merely a bit of a Jack-the-lad, sewing his wild oats, while the woman was regarded as a slut and a tart. If she was unsupported by her own family, and most were, she had no choice but to go into a mother and baby home. There she was subjected to a constant pressure to give up her baby for adoption. There were no brickbats, it was subtle: ‘You do want the very best for your baby, don’t you? He’ll have a mummy and a daddy to love him. They can give him a good education, a place of social standing, the security of a good home
…
’ When the alternative was a one-room bedsit, no childcare, no job and no social security, it is hardly surprising that mothers gave up their children for adoption.

In the sixties and seventies, I worked in children’s homes and nurseries, and saw at first hand how hard it was for a mother to make that life changing decision. In this day and age, great care is taken when placing a child that his or her ‘roots’ are well documented. Back then, the authorities believed that it was better to sever all knowledge of a child’s background and start afresh. I was adopted myself and speaking personally I still haven’t a clue about any of my father’s personal details.

In my book
Better Days Will Come
, there is a mother who was locked in the cellar when her baby was taken away for adoption. That is a true story, told to me in person by a woman who has already put her experience into the public domain. Once she had dressed her little son in an outfit she had bought from Woolworth’s (the last thing she ever did for him), she was taken downstairs into the laundry room where she had to stay until her boy had gone. It was done, they said, for her own good and with a misguided belief that it would stop her making a fuss. Even as she talked about it, forty years after it happened, the pain was still so raw there were tears in her eyes.

Following the 1975 amendment to the Adoption Act, many biological parents and their children have been reunited. But when this woman’s son came to find her and she told him what had happened, he simply didn’t believe her. He revealed the same level of incredulity as did the young women on
Kilroy
.

Many adoptions were kept within the family or done amongst friends. Apparently, I was the child of an American GI over here for the D-Day landings. My parents were not married and most likely my father died on those beaches in France. The friends of my natural mother adopted me but an added complication was the fact that my father was black. However, like Patsy in my first novel
There’s Always Tomorrow,
I was lucky enough to end up in a loving family environment with my biological mother as part of the same community. Unfortunately, I never found out that she was in fact my natural mother until after her death. Nobody talked. Secrets were secrets back then, but with an older and wiser head, I don’t condemn my mother for giving me up. She did the best she could and I applaud her selfless love, which let me go.

A short story from Pam Weaver

It was wonderful to be able to enjoy a day out together at the shopping centre. By end of the morning, Jim and Rita were weighed down with bags, a new sweater for Jim, a dress for Rita, some lovely cushions and a few new ornaments. It felt like Christmas all over again.

For once they didn’t have to worry about what Terry Andrews was up to. Terry was their next-door neighbour, the life and soul of any party, but he was always playing pranks on them. Jim enjoyed a laugh the same as any man but Terry was becoming a real problem.

‘Lighten up,’ Terry laughed when Jim complained. ‘Can’t you take a joke?’

No one actually saw Terry throw the bucket of mud over Jim’s car but they knew it was him. The galling thing was, when Jim washed it off, a small stone had scratched the bonnet. It was going to cost quite a bit to have it re-sprayed and Jim would have to dip into their holiday money.

‘Whoops,’ said Terry, giving Jim a hearty slap on the back, ‘Sorry about that, mate. I’ll buy the next round in the pub to make up for it.’

When their front gate ‘walked’ off its hinges, Jim bought a new one. As soon as it was in place, he found the old gate leaning against the hedge.

‘Well
…
you needed another one, didn’t you?’ said Terry when Jim challenged him.

‘It’s not funny!’ Jim cried.

‘Keep your hair on,’ said Terry. ‘It was a joke.’

No matter how many times Jim told him the joke was wearing thin, Terry just couldn’t stop.

The latest thing was cold calling. For the past few days Jim and Rita had been inundated with people calling with quotes for garages, or a new roof or double-glazing. It got so bad that they were too afraid to leave the house unattended. There was no telling what Terry might do next and Jim was terrified that he might come home to find a cubic metre of manure or a pallet of bricks on the driveway, so one did the shopping while the other stayed at home.

Earlier in the week, they had heard that Terry’s brother Malcolm was getting married and Terry was to be the best man. Best of all, the wedding was two hundred miles away. When Saturday came, Jim and Rita heaved a sigh of relief and went for a lazy lunch in Beales, a restaurant in the shopping complex. It was wonderful.

They were just paying the bill when they bumped into Bob Clements, their other next-door neighbour. ‘I suppose you heard about Malcolm’s wedding?’ he said sadly.

‘No?’ Jim frowned.

‘The groom was taken ill,’ said Bob. ‘He’ll be OK but the wedding’s postponed.’

Rita went pale. Jim quickly gathered their bags. ‘We’d better get back home, love,’ he said.

But when they stepped out of the shopping centre their hearts sank.

‘Oh no, Jim,’ said Rita, tears springing into her eyes. Jim slipped his arm around her waist and gave her a comforting hug.

A traffic warden was standing next to the car, his ticket machine in his hands. He seemed a little unsure and gave Jim a quizzical look.

‘Hang on, mate,’ said Jim rather belligerently. ‘Give an OAP a break, won’t you? There’s only half a wheel on that double yellow.’

The poker-faced warden leaned back and looked at the back wheel. Then he drew himself up to his full height and began writing the ticket.

Jim frowned. ‘What is it with you guys?’ he demanded. ‘You could see me coming and yet you still write the blinking ticket!’

Rita tugged his sleeve nervously. ‘Jim, don’t,’ she cautioned.

But her husband was unrepentant. ‘If I didn’t know better,’ he began, ‘I would say blokes like you enjoy making people miserable.’

‘For goodness’ sake, Jim,’ Rita gasped. ‘What are you saying? You’ll only get his back up.’

Jim shook his head. ‘Have you no compassion?’

‘Just doing my job, sir,’ said the warden. He gave Jim a long hard stare before carefully putting the parking ticket under the windscreen wiper and moving on.

Jim appealed to some passers-by. ‘Money, money, money,’ he snarled. ‘That’s all they’re interested in.’

The traffic warden stopped and looked around again. His gaze fell on the rear nearside tyre.

‘I know that needs replacing,’ said Jim standing in front of it.

The traffic warden got his camera out and walking round the other side of him, took a picture.

‘Why don’t you take one of me and the wife while you’re at it?’ Jim challenged.

But the warden was busy writing out another ticket.

Jim put down his shopping bags, threw his hands in the air and then put them on his head. ‘If you keep on giving out tickets like that,’ he cried, ‘it’s going to cost an arm and a flipping leg!’

Rita was shaking. She got a tissue out of her handbag and pressed it to her mouth.

A small crowd gathered.

‘We haven’t been outside the door for weeks,’ Jim complained bitterly to them, ‘and we come into town to find this! Why don’t I make life easier for you, mate? You may as well report the faulty brake light too.’

The traffic warden said nothing. He was looking at his watch. The town hall clock struck two and he began to write a third ticket.

‘Now what are you doing?’ Jim gasped.

The warden pointed to the road sign.
Residents’ parking only between 10am and 11am and 2pm and 3pm.

‘So if I hadn’t stopped to talk to you,’ Jim groaned, ‘you would have been well on your way by now and you wouldn’t be writing that ticket?’

The warden smiled and took a picture of the broken brake light.

‘You should have kept your big mouth shut,’ said Rita.

‘I know, I know,’ Jim wailed.

They looked up and saw the number four bus coming round the corner. Jim and Rita picked up their bags and hurried to the stop.

‘Hey!’ shouted the traffic warden. ‘What about your car? I’ll give you another ticket if you’re still here in an hour.’

‘Go ahead, mate,’ said Jim, flashing his bus pass at the driver. ‘It’s not my car anyway. Just my little joke. And to make it easier for you, the owner’s name is Andrews. Terry Andrews.’

To Vivien Hawkins who read this first, to my editor Caroline Hogg and my agent Juliet Burton for her unswerving belief in me.

Adopted from birth, Pam Weaver trained as a nursery nurse working mainly in children’s homes. She was also a Hyde Park nanny. In the 1980s she and her husband made a deliberate decision that she should be a full-time mum to their two children. Pam wrote for small magazines and specialist publications, finally branching out into the women’s magazine market. Pam has written numerous articles and short stories, many of which have been featured in anthologies. Her story
The Fantastic Bubble
was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and the World Service. This is her second novel.

There’s Always Tomorrow

This novel is entirely a work of fiction.

The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

AVON

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Publishers

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First published in Great Britain by

HarperCollins
Publishers
2012

Copyright © Pam Weaver 2012

Pam Weaver asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

EPub Edition © April 2012 ISBN: 978 0 00 745328 3

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher

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