Legacy (11 page)

Chapter Twenty Three

The incident with the tea leaves was soon forgotten as it seemed that my baby self was developing some sort of colic. At almost a year old, I had difficulty keeping down anything. Soon I was throwing up every morsel I swallowed. Doctors believed Mum was neurotic and she began to think so too until I began to show worrying symptoms. I lost weight, cried with sheer hunger and became alarmingly lethargic. It was only when Mum took me to the City Hospital that she was taken seriously. Having worked there before and having such a distinctive name had the benefit that she was recognised. Mum was told that her baby needed a barium meal. This thick, gooey liquid once swallowed would show exactly what was going on inside.

Dad arrived home from work the night before my barium meal and to Mum was uncharacteristically calm at the news that his baby was due to go into hospital the following day,

“Max, I don't think she's going to do,” Gabrielle said utterly despondent, “she can't continue like this, all that retching wears the heart down.”

His answer was strange and so much so that it stayed with Mum over the years.

“Oh she'll be fine, this child will be the best you'll have.” He was so confident in his words that for a moment Mum let her fears vanish.

At the hospital Mum and my grandmother were met by the paediatrician who would be investigating my case. They told him all my symptoms, that I was keeping nothing down and therefore making me drink a barium meal would be a wasted effort. Yet he insisted,

“On your own head be it,” Gabrielle told him, “We'll just leave you too it.”

To her mother she said, “let's stand back.”

Sure enough within 15 minutes of swallowing the lumpy mixture, I apparently managed to project it all over the doctor, all over his office and over anything else within the vicinity. Even though my escorts were worried sick they couldn't help but laugh. The paediatrician was disgusted.

Fortunately there was enough of the solution left clinging to my stomach, that they were able to get a picture of what was going on inside. The news was not good. As I had developed my trachea hadn't, meaning that food could not make it to the stomach. On the positive side I would grow, as would my trachea. But for now if I was to receive any nutrients my oesophagus would have to be widened. To make matters worse baby me would require a tracheotomy whilst it healed.

Gabrielle was horrified; this was no solution, a child so young would pull a tracheotomy out. As for an operation to widen the oesophagus she had no objections, but without the tracheotomy the paediatrician and she were at logger heads. She resolved that this operation was not an option and hoped that she could keep my nutrient levels high enough until I grew. Yet her mind couldn't silence her husband's voice only a few weeks earlier when he stated, “
I see a coffin and I don't know who it's for.”

In the middle of all this Dad came home slightly perplexed, not only was his child sick but he had met his friend from home, in Belfast of all places. He had been leaving his office in the city centre, when he heard someone call his name. It was no normal voice; it had the distinct inflection that could only be found in a Nigerian accent. On hearing the familiar tones of his home country he was intrigued. It was the first time he had heard them uttered by anyone in Northern Ireland and was momentarily transported to the dry sandy streets of Nigeria. He was taken aback yet thrilled to see an old friend from Lagos standing there in front of him. They hugged and talked for a while and Dad insisted that *Kayode came home to meet his family and catch up. Kayode was appreciative of the offer, but would reluctantly have to pass; he was in a rush and couldn't be delayed. He reassured Dad that he would see him very soon and embraced him once again.

Dad came home and after checking on me regaled Mum on the news of his friend's arrival in Belfast. Although he hadn't ascertained why his friend was here, he was sure that when Kayode visited the house he would reveal all. The following morning Dad received a letter from Nigeria.

Kayode had been killed in a road accident just two days earlier.

This incident was not the first mysterious incident Mum would tell us about. She would tell us about many more outer worldly experiences which terrified me as an open-minded child. As an adult my mind has become closed to the existence of the supernatural, I tend to look for the logical in everything. However in light of the circumstances I have found myself rather than questioning or judging, feeling only sympathy. After all every one deals with trauma differently.

Chapter Twenty Four

Christmas came and went and for Gabrielle. It was the loveliest Christmas she had ever experienced. Santa came and our childish dreams came true. Boxing Day through to New Years was spent in our Grandmothers. Here any possible dream that Santa could have neglected was catered for.

I had just turned two and seemed to be improving. In the space of three months, I had progressed from a skeletal baby into a chubby little pudding. My prognosis was looking better by the day.

January soon arrived, bleak, drab and cold. It had always been Mum's least favourite time of year, the winter focus of Christmas gone and nothing left but gloom. However she did have some light on the horizon. As usual my Dad had given her money for her Christmas box. After their first Christmas together when he bought her a sewing machine and bore the brunt of her subsequent reaction, he had never dared buy her a present again; instead he took the safe option and let her choose her own.

The Christmas money soon felt like it was burning a hole in her pocket, because for over two weeks she had been unable to get an opportunity to spend it. If she didn't get one soon she would miss the best of the bargains that the January sales had to offer. She didn't want to lumber the neighbours with three children so sought a reliable babysitter. Eventually she secured one, a kindly lady who would be available for the entire afternoon. She seized the opportunity and acquired the babysitter's services, asking her to take the girls for few hours. At last she could go shopping.

The girls needed new shoes, and she wouldn't mind a new coat. Leaving the girls, she set off and began the process of bargain hunting. The city centre was thronged with shoppers who, like Mum, were availing of the sales; frantically grabbing the bargains which the town was filled with. Some shops offered a massive 50%; Gabrielle was in her element.

She shopped and shopped until she had spent every penny of her Christmas box, the icy weather had slowed her down and she was surprised that it was now quarter to six. By this stage, she was opposite the Europa train station and thought rather than slip and slide all the way back to the main city centre to grab a bus, that she would take a train instead. It would be a little more expensive, but ultimately it would save a walk - or a slide. She'd had enough slips and slides for one day.

She was fantasising about going home, getting us bathed and hopefully settled for bed early. Battling through the crowds had tired her out more than she had expected. Judging by the weary faces around her, she was not alone in this sensation. Perhaps it was the time of year, the dark mornings and dark evenings were taking their toll on everyone.

Date: 15th January 1980
Time: 18.06.
Location: Europa Station Belfast.

The train station was full as shoppers and workers converged all trying to get home. Mum went to the ticket desk and purchased her one way ticket, shuffling her bags to find a free hand to pay. She wished she had researched her timings for going home, had she done she could have avoided all this. She would have to get on the train early if she stood any chance of getting a seat. She took her ticket from the cashier and looked around for the quickest way to the platform.

Her first indication that something wasn't right was when she suddenly became aware of being stared at. She instinctively looked in the direction of where the stare seemed to come from. In the distance, stood a woman that Mum describes as being dressed from head to toe in green. When I heard this I imagined a cloud of dark green surrounding the woman. Mum's initial thoughts were that the lighting in the station needs serious attention; either that or her eyes were playing tricks on her.

The woman was clad in elegant clothes, not the kind that could be bought anywhere Mum frequented and she was looking in Mum's direction. Mum looked behind her in case she was mistaken and she was obscuring the woman's intended target. Yet there was no one behind her. When she looked up again the woman was inches from her face. She couldn't fathom how the woman had reached her so quickly, somehow the woman had made her way across the long expanse of the station and weaved her way through the crowds at a speed Mum just couldn't comprehend. The scenario seemed odd to Mum, whatever could this woman want? Mum was certain she did not know her.

As Mum's eyes met the woman's she was assailed with such coldness that she thought she would never be warm again. She tried to peel her eyes away from the woman's penetrating stare, it was then that Mum realised that the woman wasn't a she; this woman wasn't anything Mum's humble mind had words for. She was faced with a creature - an IT.

Feebly Mum recited every prayer she could remember and when her memory failed her, she beseeched the heavens to take this thing away. Her pleas went unanswered and she stood there powerless.

She tried to scream, but no words came. She contemplated running but her limbs remained motionless. Even the simple gesture of averting her eyes from IT's penetrating gaze, became impossible. Mum was paralysed, her defenceless body forcing her to remain on the spot.

IT opened her mouth and words, lots of words tumbled out. IT spoke in a language that Mum had never heard before or hoped to hear again. IT's menacing tones were infused with vast hatred and malice. Only IT's finale was spoken in a human tongue, six words that shook my Mum to the core, “I curse you and I curse your family.”

Instinct told Mum that she had encountered a being that represented all things evil. She had just been exposed to something that was not of this world.

In a green cloud IT was gone, back to the nowhere IT had appeared from. Mum remembers dropping to her knees so relieved was she at IT's departure. She stayed on her knees as she waited for the waves of terror to leave her. Her moment in darkness had seemed a lifetime. Had she imagined the episode?

She glanced at the ground where IT had stood. Sure enough IT had left an ominous souvenir, some sort of green pendant. Then this thing
had
happened. Reassured that her sanity was still intact, she looked to the commuters, the people all around her, they would be shaken too. What had they made of this thing? Yet their faces registered no shock, they were simply the ordinary faces of ordinary commuters in a busy train station.

Everything around her went on as normal; no one looked at all shaken. It seemed only Mum had been witness to this incident. She tentatively reached for the pendant; it was ice cold to the touch. She didn't want it, felt filthy for even touching it but a sensible part of her felt that if she were to recount this story again, she would need proof. With the tips of her shaking forefinger and thumb she dropped the icy object into her pocket. Her relief was replaced by a great wave of sadness as IT's words echoed over and over her mind. Thoughts whirled in her head, faster and faster, they became jumbled and nonsensical, her head began to throb, the pressure too much. Then everything around her became grey then black, the pressure became too much to bear, and then there was nothing.

Chapter Twenty Five

“Thank you so much,” Dad was saying as he closed the front door Mum came to at that point and looked around disorientated. She was uncertain of where she was and for one horrible moment she thought she was still at the station.

Dad came into the living room his brow furrowed in concern.

“You're awake,” he said,

“How are you feeling?”

The events of the afternoon came back to her and she could feel the blood draining from her face,

“Max, something awful has happened,” she whispered.

“Shush, Gabrielle, you need to rest, we can talk about it later.”

She sat up and felt dizziness take her again, so reluctantly she lay down,

“How did I get home, I don't remember?”

“You passed out, some passers-by's got you a taxi, I've just seen them off.”

The worry returned to his face again.

“You look really bad Gabrielle; I think I'll call a doctor.”

“No, Max I'll be fine, just give me a moment,” she sighed. Until she gathered her thoughts and made sense of today, the last thing she needed was a doctor.

“I've called Mum, she says you are to call her a soon as you're fit.”

She nodded.

“I'll just get you a drink,” he turned to towards the kitchen. Suddenly remembering her daughters, panic clutched her heart,

“Max, where are the girls?”

“Alison and Maxine are next door and Jayne's in bed.”

They were safe that was the main thing, but she needed to be sure.

“Max I need to see them, now,” she insisted,

“Gabrielle you will, I just want to make sure you feel better, I'll get you that drink eh? Get some colour back in your cheeks, you're so pale.”

Later that evening Alison and Maxine came home. Mum hugged them and held them to her with more enthusiasm than they expected, for she reports that they looked at her like an alien had replaced their mother. They played a few games before Dad took them upstairs for bed.

When they were settled Max sat down in the living room,

“Max something happened,” clearing her throat to prevent her voice from faltering she continued,

“I didn't just faint.”

He tried to put her off the topic, concerned that she wasn't yet well enough. This time she was adamant, he was going to listen to her recount the day's events.

When she had finished, Dad sat there stunned, but he didn't dismiss her account, instead he said.

“Gabrielle how many times have I told you never to make eye contact with strangers?”

Thank heavens, he believed her, or so she thought when he said, “you've just seen someone that looked a bit different, that's all.”

“Max go to my coat,” she said “look in my pocket - maybe then you'll know I wasn't just seeing something strange.”

He put his hand in her pocket and pulled the green object out; he looked horrified, and dropped it as if it was dynamite.

“Where did you get this?” he asked, raising his voice to a level Mum had never heard him reach before. Dad was a gentle man, would do anything rather than fight or raise his voice, his reaction was completely out of character and it scared Mum.

“Max I told you, IT left it behind.”

“I want it out, out of this house now,” he shouted, storming out the door.

It was at least 15 minutes before he came home, and when he did he hugged Mum.

“Gabrielle it's gone, don't worry anymore and I'm sorry for shouting.”

“It's okay,” relieved that his anger had dispersed.

“Gabrielle if you could do just one thing for me?”

“Of course,” she nodded,

“Just pray,” he said grimly.

My Dad wasn't usually a religious man, he tended to veer on the side of reason but by the look on his face Mum knew not to question him, instead she simply nodded.