Poppy Day (8 page)

‘Peaceful in there,’ she said, but felt desolate, couldn’t bear another second in his company suddenly, because with every fibre of her being she wanted to reach out and touch him and knew she must not. As he stood close to her, the hairs rose on her neck and arms. ‘We ought to go back,’ she managed to say. ‘We shouldn’t be ’ere. Neither of us.’

He looked into her face and saw her eyes were full of tears.

‘What’s the matter?’

‘Nothing. I just want to go home.’ A tear rolled down her cheek. ‘I want . . .’ She turned away. ‘I don’t know what I want. Just leave me, Ned. I know the way ’ome. Please.’ She put her hands over her face, wanting to pull them away again and find him gone, yet feeling she’d fall apart if he wasn’t there. She was afraid of what he would think of her.

‘It’ll be the shock,’ he started to say, but had to stop and swallow to clear the sudden tightness in his throat. ‘From this morning. Look – I’ll take yer back and make sure you’re safe. You might faint or summat. We’ve had not a crust to eat.’

She’d given no thought to food, but knew it was nothing to do with that. I mustn’t say a word, she thought. If I say anything, it’ll be all wrong. Silently she wiped her cheeks.

‘Jess—’ There was a tone in his voice which made her raise her eyes to him, but he’d turned away abruptly, was staring across the park, his broad shoulders black against the green beyond.

After a moment he turned back to her, finding his resolve. ‘We’d best catch a tram.’

All the way back, they were silent, sitting on the tram’s hard seats, pressed together at the hip. Jess felt cold and desolate inside. Ned stared out of the window. He seesmed hundreds of miles away to her. Of course he was, because that was right, he felt nothing for her and she was a fool.

‘Will yer be all right walking from the Bull Ring?’ he asked as they got off. The afternoon had darkened again.

‘Yes, course,’ she said flatly. ‘And thanks, Ned. For ’elping me, and the walk and that. We’ll be seeing yer sometime I s’pose, with Mary.’ As Jess spoke her goodbyes she was scarcely able to look at him. She crossed the road, not turning to glance back, so she was unaware of how long he stood watching her as she walked away.

He picked her out among the crowds, straight backed, with a solitariness and proud dignity which made him clench his fists as he fought the desire to run after her. He walked exhaustedly back towards Hockley to meet Mary out of work. His mind was in a tired, feverish turmoil, a confused array of feelings strung between his fragile, trusting wife, and the lonely, bewitching girl with whom he was falling passionately in love.

‘Oi – are yow listening to me or am I wasting me breath?’

Even as the grim-faced woman in charge of the workshop showed her how to lay the coloured enamel powders on small round sheets of metal ready for firing, it was Ned’s face Jess could see before her. The way he’d said her name that day – what was he going to say that he never finished, didn’t dare to say?

She shook her head to dislodge him from her mind.

‘Yow awright?’

‘Yes – course.’ She tried to concentrate on what the woman was saying to her.

‘After they’ve been fired, they’re ready for filing and polishing – so they go to them lot over there . . .’

Once she was left to do the job, arranging the blue and white powders on to make the badges, she quite enjoyed it. Care was needed and she became absorbed, hearing the chatter of the other workers. Eavesdropping was no problem as they worked in such a small, dark room. It might once have been someone’s bedroom over the street. But at least there was the work to distract her. The ache in her heart let up a bit. She ate her dinner with a freckle-faced girl called Evie, who was chatty and cheerful. Afterwards she went back to work much less weighed down.

Put him out of your mind, she told herself. He’s someone else’s. There’s not a thing you can do about it now.

But the next week, one morning she started crying. She wet the enamel powder with her tears and had to start again.

‘’Ere – what yow playing at – it costs, that does!’ the gaffer was on to her straight off, seeing her scraping the powder off the badge again. ‘What’s the matter with yow today?’ She scowled at Jess’s tearstained face. ‘Look – go outside and pull yowerself together, and then get back in ’ere and make a proper job of it.’

Mortified, Jess went out of the workshop with everyone having a good nose round at her from their benches.

There was nowhere much to go. She sank down on the stairs, put her head in her hands and burst into tears again, sobs rising from somewhere deep within her.

‘Oh Ned . . .’ she cried. ‘Oh God, Ned, please . . . please . . .’

Tears dripped through her fingers on to her work overall as the words poured out. In her state of turmoil she only knew that everything felt wrong. She would have to live with Ned calling on them in Allison Street with Mary and the baby when she had such overwhelming feelings for him as she’d had for no one else and she could not tell him or show him.

He was being kind to me, that’s all, she told herself. He doesn’t
need
anyone else. Of course he don’t feel the same. Even if he did like me he couldn’t say, could he?

She pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes.

I’ve got to stop this. To pull myself together, or I’ll lose this job as well.

‘Hope yer feel better tomorrer,’ Evie said to her as they packed up work. Evie always tried to look on the bright side of everything. ‘I feel a bit any’ow meself today. Let’s ’ope the wind changes, eh? See yer then – I’m in a rush!’

Jess stepped out along Frederick Street. The evening was warm, the air seeming to stroke her skin. She always walked home instead of using up money on tram fares, and this evening she set off head down, not looking about her. Other people were coming out from the factories and workshops in the surrounding streets. She stopped for a moment as a crowd came out of the Griffiths Works, afraid that Mary might be among them.

Maybe I should move on somewhere bigger when I’ve done a bit of time at Blake’s, she was thinking, when she felt herself gripped forcefully by the arm and pulled to one side against the railings. She let out a cry of alarm before she saw him.

‘Ned! What . . .?’

‘Can yer come with me – just for a minute?’

He led her quickly away from the factories, back down to St Paul’s church yard where she had sat to recover from her run-in with the horse. There were other people about, but all of them on the move, in a hurry to get home and get their tea inside them.

They sat down on the same bench, gravestones behind them. A group of boys were throwing stones at a row of empty bottles. Jess didn’t dare speak. She had to know what he wanted to say. She could feel an enormous tension coming from him. For a few moments he sat leaning forward, arms resting on his knees, looking at the ground.

He feels something for me, he does, she thought. But in her mind she was also prepared for the opposite, for this to be about something else completely. Eventually, the silence had gone on so long that she said,

‘What d’yer want, Ned?’

He put his hands over his face. ‘Don’t yer know?’

‘No. I can’t say I do.’

There was another silence, then he said, ‘This is terrible. I shouldn’t be here. Neither of us . . . I’ve got to go and meet Mary in a minute.’ He sat up and turned to her.

She looked ahead of her.

‘Jess—’

Slowly, frightened, she turned her head.

‘Help me . . .’ He managed the words at last. ‘What yer said about it not being worth it if yer don’t feel more than just a bit of fondness . . . I’d never, I mean I didn’t know what it was, how I could feel . . .’ He looked fearfully at her, then plunged in. ‘Ever since you’ve been ’ere I’ve thought about yer all the time. You’ve taken me over – I keep seeing you everywhere. I didn’t know it could be like this. I mean me and Mary, we’ve always been good pals. She’s a nice girl, a good girl, and I’m fond of ’er, but . . . s’

He waited for her reaction. Her face was solemn, not angry or laughing at him as he’d feared. The emotion in her eyes affected him so he could barely speak.

‘Say summat to me. I don’t know what yer thinking of me.’

Her voice came out barely more than a whisper. ‘You’re in my mind all the time as well, whether it’s right or not, Ned. I can’t seem to help it. I feel as if I belong with yer and I can’t make any sense of it.’

He opened his arms and after a second’s hesitation she leaned into them, clasping him very tightly, raising her head to search for his lips. She felt them urgent, on hers. Then they sat holding each other, his chin resting on her head, both of them rocking together slightly, as if for comfort.

‘You’re so beautiful,’ he said. ‘I’ve never met anyone at all like you before. When I was at yer auntie’s I ’ad to keep looking somewhere else, keep my eyes away, so I didn’t just sit and stare at you all afternoon. It was like an ache in me—’

‘You’re married to someone else.’

Ned pulled away.

Jess was wide-eyed, stricken. ‘That’s the truth of it. You made vows in church. I’m frightened, Ned, by all I feel. I’ve been lonely all my life, wanting someone to love, and now I love you it’s not right. I can’t stop thinking about yer and wanting yer but I don’t see how it can be anything but wrong . . .’

He gave a great anguished groan. ‘Jess – I ’ad to tell yer – to see yer. It was wrong of me. She’s going to ’ave my child any day now . . .’

Jess watched his face as he spoke, her eyes full of tears.

‘I’m stuck with it – all those things Auntie Olive said, about sticking together and keeping bellies fed. That’s what yer marry for, Jess . . . And there’s my mom and dad to think of . . .’

‘I know – I know, I know . . .’ She was weeping. What she wanted, longed for, was an enormous, inconceivable thing.

‘But I can’t do it to Mary – and her mom. Yer should see ’em Jess. Her Mom’s so thin and ill, and all them children she’s got. It’d kill ’er if I broke it off. And Mary . . . I’ve ’ardly slept thinking of it. Not knowing what to do for the best. I ’ad to see yer, to know ’ow yer felt, but I can’t just throw it all away . . . I’m sorry, Jess.’

She pulled herself to her feet, hugging herself as if to nurse her aching heart, her face wet with tears.

‘I don’t know if I wish you hadn’t come to me and told me. I couldn’t stand loving you and thinking you had no feeling for me. But now I know . . . what you’ve said . . . us having to go on as we are . . .’

Unable to bear seeing her in such distress he went to comfort her.

‘Don’t touch me!’ She slapped his hands off her shoulders. She saw his look of pain and made as if to reach out and stroke his face, but she drew back, wiping her eyes. ‘I want you to hold me in your arms forever, Ned, but I don’t think I can stand it if you touch me now.’

‘Please—’ Again he tried to move close to her. ‘I love you, Jess. Come ’ere, just for a minute, while we’ve got the chance.’

She backed away. ‘No. No. I’m going now. You go and catch up with Mary. And don’t come round to ours when I’m in. I don’t want to see yer.’

She walked away, her arms still folded tightly.

‘Jess!’

But she didn’t turn. Ned stood watching helplessly. Her shoulders were hunched, head held at a dejected angle, her thick hair escaping in wisps from its pins. He felt as if she was taking a part of him with her as she left. His whole being ached for her.

He sank down again on the bench and stared desolately ahead of him. He couldn’t stand the thought of going home.