Family of Women (46 page)

Their eyes met. ‘Yes,’ Linda said bitterly. ‘She is.’

Without either of them having to say more, there was understanding. Linda didn’t know why Rosina had run away all those years ago, nor anything much of her life now, but she sensed that they were in some way the same, that there was something they both needed. It was an exciting feeling. It gave her butterflies in her stomach.

They became aware of a thin man approaching the table. Rosina seemed to recognize him. Before she could stop him he unwrapped a piece of cloth he had taken from his pocket and showed something to Rosy. Linda couldn’t see what it was but she could see the panic on Rosina’s face.

‘No,’ she said sharply. ‘Not now. Get lost, Pete.’

Suddenly her aunt was strange to her again. What was going on? But the moment was interrupted by Mario swooping towards them with two plates of food.

‘Here we are, ladies! Here you – clear off and leave these ladies alone!’

The thin man melted away. When Linda turned, she couldn’t see him anywhere.

‘Rosy . . .’ Mario tutted at her. ‘You gotta look after yourself better.’ No more was said, but Linda saw, in the looks they gave each other, his affection and reproachful care for her.

‘Thanks, Mario. That’ll keep us going all right!’

He had cooked them a feast: rashers of bacon, two fried eggs each with perfect, gleaming yolks, sausage, fried bread and chips piled along the side. From under his arm, magician-like, he produced a bottle of ketchup. ‘You want tea?’

‘Yes – oh ta, Mario.’ Rosina laughed. ‘He’s good to me, he is.’ She smiled at Linda.

‘You ladies got to keep your strength up!’ He stepped back with a flourish. ‘
Buon appetito!
Tea coming up!’

‘He’s golden,’ Rosina said as he strode off again. ‘He’s been like a brother to me – no funny business, nothing like that. Got a wife and four kiddies and he’s good as gold. I’d trust him with my life, and there’s not many you can say that about round here. Eh – tuck in, girl!’

Mario soon produced large mugs of tea, and as Linda ate, ravenously, she started to feel better. More colour came
into Rosina’s cheeks as well, and after a short time they ate more slowly, talking between mouthfuls. Rosina did nearly all the talking.

&lsn a p qfy">&lsn quo;Do they . . . I mean, back home . . . Do they ever say anything about me?’

‘Mom wanted you to stay – after the wedding. They wanted to know why you ran away again.’

‘I lost my bottle that day. Lost it bad.’ She hesitated, kept looking at Linda as if unsure how much to say.

‘Do they know you’re here today? Did your mom send you?’

‘No. I just came.’

‘Where d’you get the fare?’

‘I’m at work. It’s my money.’

‘You’re at work! Blimey, yes, I s’pose you are! So you just took it into your head . . .?’

Linda looked up at her and nodded. There was another moment of unspoken understanding.

Rosina leaned forward, elbows on the table, lighting another cigarette. ‘You want to know about me – is that it?’

Linda nodded slowly.

‘Will you tell them?’

‘Dunno. Not if you don’t want.’

Rosina laughed suddenly. ‘You’ve got a mind of your own all right, haven’t you?’ She sat back again, blowing smoke away at the ceiling. ‘All right. I’ll tell you. I’ve never told anyone – not the full thing. ’Cept Irene of course – she knows most of it. But you – ’ she jabbed the cigarette in Linda’s direction. ‘You’re a bit like me. Dunno how I know. I can just feel it. There’s some in our family can’t see over the wall and all they ever do’s sit on their hands. That’s Charlie, for a start, and Vi. God knows with Marigold. Probably she’d’ve been different, given the chance. And there’s those of us who get up higher and can see over and we want something of what’s over there. That’s me – and that’s you, Linda, isn’t it?’

Goose-pimples came up all over Linda’s skin. She was filled with emotion suddenly, as if she wanted to cry. Someone could see her, see what she was like! But all she could do was nod again.

‘Well, who I am’s nothing to be proud of, believe you me. But you pays your money and takes your choice and this is me. OK?’

‘I s’pose you want to know why I left? I dunno – look at you. You’re only a kid yourself. I shouldn’t be telling you all this – but you want me to, don’t you? Seems a whole lifetime ago now. I don’t even remember you being born. ’38? Yes, I was long gone by then. I remember Joycie arriving. Vi’d had all her problems with babies. I s’pose that’s why I wanted to come for the wedding. And ’cause Vi’d written to me. She never has otherwise. S’pose she’s had too much else going on.

‘They probably told you I went off with an actor. Michael Albie was his name. I met him in my days hanging round the photographers and the stage doors at the Hip and the Alex. I was mad about Michael. Never felt the same way about anyone after him . . . All right, Mario? Yes, another cuppa’d be lovely. We’ll be here for a bit yet, ta, love.

‘See, I left Brum with Michael because I wanted more – I wanted life and the stage and I was in love with him. And I couldn’t stand any more of our mom. There was no room for anyone in that house except for her and what she wanted. Sometimes you could hardly bloody breathe, and all them babbies and that carry-on. Always had to be queen bee, Mom did, never mind who she walked all over. I mean what she did to poor old Marigold. That was an evil, wicked thing she did. Don’t s’pose you know all about that, though? No, I thought not. You’d’ve been too young . . . But you’re just the age now that she was. See, this’ll shock you, but Marigold had a child herself. A little boy. He was born at home – I’ll never forget that night. It frightened me at the time, hearing it. But I can see him now. Beautiful, he was. But our mom upped and took him straight to some orphanage. Never would say where. She might as well have thrown him out with the rubbish, the attitude she had. Not a by your leave to Mari – she never had a say in anything. Christ, Linda, I can feel myself boiling inside even now, thinking about it. God knows who the father was – she was a poor old thing, Mari. But she loved that babby – you could see.

‘Thing was, when I left Brum I was carrying Michael’s child . . . oh, I’m going to get all weepy now . . . I mean I wanted to go anyway, but if our mom had known . . . I’d never have had a say either. And I loved Michael, wanted nothing else but to be with him. I’d only just found out and his stint at the Alex was ending and he was coming back to London. He wasn’t poor, Michael wasn’t. He was much older than me – gone thirty already and he had money from his family, not like a lot of the stage crowd, all living on a shoestring. He had a little flat – not so very far from here in fact. Anyway, when we got down here he started on me. If I wanted to be in the theatre it was no good thinking about carrying on with the child. He didn’t want it, of course. Most of ’em don’t – that’s what I’ve found. They’re not like us, Linda, men, that’s one thing for sure.

‘I gave in in the end. Course, I was frightened. I was only seventeen when we left, turned eighteen in the December. Michael took me to this woman . . . It makes me go cold now . . . Thing about it was how ordinary it all was. It was her flat, up some dark stairs, and her kitchen, a washing-up bowl and that. On her kitchen table in this flat. I s’pose that’s where her kids ate their tea. She had a great big bottle of antiseptic stuff. It hurt, Linda. Hurt so much I fainted . . . Phoo – makes me go all hot and cold to think of it. Michael had to get a cab to take me home and I wasn’t right for weeks after. When I got better he started on me to look for work and I wanted to, of course, although I’d lost a lot of weight and was a bit too skinny. But he helped and I got a couple of parts – stand-ins in chorus lines. I can sing, see, as well. I’ve got a half nice voice, even now. And then he left me. Locked me out of the flat one night and he was going off to work up north somewhere. Never said where. I was left with only what I had to stand up in. We’d only been together six months, altogether. That night, I slept in Hyde Park. Sounds bad, doesn’t it? At the time all I coulir p
doo;red think about was Michael. Broke my heart, he did. I didn’t care about sleeping on a bench in the park, only that he’d left me and I couldn’t understand why.

‘I was quite presentable still and I managed to get a job the next day. That was a miracle then. Jobs were hard to find and I didn’t have a reference, but it was this woman, see, Mavis her name was, ran an eating joint off the Tottenham Court Road. I dunno if I reminded her of her daughter, or what, but I was bloody lucky is all I can say. She said I was pretty and that was good in a waitress as long as I could do the work. She worked me hard and tried to patch up my heart. Course, any time I could I was round the theatres, trying to get something else. I did get one little speaking part. That was the picture I sent you. I think my face’s always been my fortune because I knew next to nothing. They said I had the right look and it was a play called
The Garnet Ring
. I had two appearances in it. I don’t think it was much of a play but I can still remember the lines now! The first time I went on I had to say, “Mr Fellows, I do wish you could arrange to conduct your private business elsewhere . . .” Well, you can imagine what that was all about – yes, it was funny. And then later I had to say, “It’s no good, I’m going to hand in my notice. Never have I had the misfortune to put up with conditions like these before!”

‘Anyway, things went on like this for quite a while – can’t say exactly how long. I had a few fellers come and go of course. Nothing serious. I was still in a mess after Michael. And then I met Johnny – just before the war. Hot and lovely it was, that summer. Johnny was an actor and he was no better off than me. Both of us had our rooms in seedy lodgings. But he was so handsome, Johnny was. Dark and
sleek
somehow, with thick wavy hair and sort of little boy looks. His eyes were blue as anything. China blue. He bowled me over. He was going to get somewhere with acting, I thought. With looks like that how could he not? He was quite young, see, not like Michael. He was only a couple of years older than me. I didn’t want him to know how things had been. That I’d begun . . . a child, and that. I was very careful, held off from anything much in the love department. Very prim and proper I was – you should’ve seen me!

‘Course, soon as the war broke out there was trouble – they closed the theatres and that, for a bit. But there were shows put on – Johnny got me into a few things. Bloody frightening it all was then – all those gas warnings, air raid sirens . . . I hated them public shelters. Stank to high heaven and you never knew who you were going to be with. Anyway – the thing was, I couldn’t last out with Johnny. The Virgin Mary bit, I mean. By the time the Luftwaffe were hammering the guts out of us every night I was expecting again. Couldn’t believe it – I mean I thought we’d been careful, you know, taken precautions. I’m one of them only has to look at a man, I reckon . . . Sorry, bab, keep forgetting your age. You seem older, you know, Linda. Well, you’ve guessed it – first hint of a babby on the way and Johnny was off. I mean I didn’t tell him straight away, not after Michael. I thought, bide your time, Rosy, see how the land lies. I tried to get out of him whether he wanted to marry me. But you can’t hide a babby for ever and I wasn’t
doing away
with it . . . Sorry, I have to whisper that. I wasn’t doing that again. It does summat to you, however much you don’t want to keep the baby.

‘Any road, Johnny guessed, in the end, saw my little e i p
ohnre witbelly swelling. “So now you know,” I said. “And what’re we going to do about it?”

‘“I dunno,” he said. “It’s not me that’s having a baby, is it?” Just like that. Couldn’t care less. So I knew he’d be off and I took off first. Found a new room. He’d have come back for his bit of fun otherwise and I wasn’t having that. I don’t know what you must think of me – you’re keeping very quiet. But it gets worse, Linda. I told you, if you’ve come to find someone to model your life on, you’re barking up the wrong tree with your auntie Rosy.

‘Any road – the best thing happened then. I’d finished working at Mavis’s place a while back and I was in another joint in Soho. Course it was a bit different here then – not so many coloureds for a start – and the war was on. That’s where I met Reeny. Irene Bartlett. Best thing that ever happened to me – apart from my kids. Irene’s bloke had joined up, gone in the army, and that was the best thing ever happened to her, an’ all. Proper toe-rag he was. Joined up almost before Neville Chamberlain had finished telling us there was a war on, and good riddance, she said. He came back at the end, you know – but not to her. Had some bit of stuff somewhere. Reeny had her boy, Kevin. He was six then, and she had her mum up the road. We always hit it off, Reeny and me, and she was golden to me. Like a sister – always had been. “Don’t you worry, Rosy,” she used to say. “Us women’ll stick together and sod ’em.”

‘And we did. Not half we did. She asked me to move in with her and Kev and we had some laughs. It was a godsend. But of course neither of us had any money. She was getting by doing a bit of waitressing while her mom was in with Kev. And I was all right till Clarkie arrived. Reeny was there with me, and her mom – one night when there was no bloody air raid for once! Had him easy, I did. I mean it hurts like hell, screamed my head off and that, but I mean it came natural to me. And Clarkie was big and healthy and – oh! Light of my life he is – and Vivianne. But that was later.

‘Things got hard then, see, ’cause Reeny’s mom took sick. It was so quick – she just wasted away in front of our eyes and by the time Clark was six months I carried him to her funeral. Poor Reeny. She always said, if she hadn’t’ve had me she’d have gone off her head. Anyway, this is where things took a turn, as you might say. Reeny was working in the day, and I worked at night, doing what I knew best. See I’m blushing even now. When I’m here, the life I live – well, it’s just how it is, day by day. I’ve got used to it, see? D’you understand what I’m saying, Linda? What it is I do to earn my bread? Course, it’s not
me
doing it any more. Never – not now. I’ve got my girls and I treat them well. Come and work at Rosy’s and you’re as safe as you’re likely to be – not on the streets, fair’s fair . . . You do know what I’m talking about now, don’t you? But I couldn’t come out to face you all, let you see what I was, not all at once. I’ve got a nice little flat, kids at good schools – that’s all I want anyone to see, but it ain’t the whole of me, see?