Will You Remember Me? (7 page)

Simon laughed. ‘Ah, I knew it wouldn’t be long before Little Miss Nosey appeared.’ He beckoned with his hand and up on the screen popped a little girl with cornrow braids, large, clear eyes and a smile that split her face in two. ‘This is Matilda,’ he announced.

Matilda pushed her face close to the camera so she filled the screen, which made Poppy and Martin laugh. ‘Hi, Matilda, how old are you?’

‘Nearly ten,’ she whispered.

‘Hey! We have a little girl, Peg, she’s not far off your age.’ Poppy felt herself relax for the first time: talking to a little girl was something she was well practised at.

‘Can I see her now?’ Matilda peered into their room.

‘She’s tucked up in bed. It’s quite late here and she’s got school tomorrow.’ Poppy smiled.

‘Me too.’ Matilda beamed before running out of view, her curiosity satisfied.

‘Isn’t this something, Poppy? Technology, eh?’

Poppy nodded. No need for Plan A; talking to Simon was easy, he was far from a weirdo and she was fascinated. ‘I’m so glad you got in contact with us, Simon. It’s lovely.’

It was his turn to nod. ‘Yes, it is lovely. Unexpected and wonderful!’ He clapped his hands together and they all laughed.

‘This is Martin. My husband.’ Poppy stretched out her palm towards Martin.

Martin came into view and waved. It was his turn to feel a little awkward.

‘Hey, Martin, how you doing?’

‘Doing great – apart from the Spurs at the weekend, not the best result.’

‘Well I’m an Arsenal fan, so you won’t hear any complaints from me!’

‘You are? What a shame, I was just beginning to like you.’ They both chuckled. ‘How come you support Arsenal?’

Simon considered this. ‘I think my mum and dad, despite having whisked me off to Canada, wanted me to retain some of my Britishness. I’m a Londoner after all, thanks to Dorothea.’

‘It feels really weird hearing you talk about my nan.’

Simon sighed. ‘It is weird. Strange for me that you knew my birth mother. I have so many questions, I have to stop myself from bombarding you with them.’

‘You can ask me anything!’ Poppy meant it.

Simon hesitated. ‘Do I look anything like her?’ His voice was quieter.

Poppy stared at him. ‘You look familiar and so I suppose yes, a bit.’

Simon exhaled and pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Ain’t that something? I wish my wife were here. She’s the one that got the ball rolling, made the first enquiries. She’s just nipped out, she’ll be mad to have missed this momentous occasion.’

‘There’ll be others,’ Poppy confirmed. ‘Why don’t you call later in the week, when she’s with you and we can have a proper catch-up.’

‘I’d like that very much. God bless, Poppy. Bye, Martin, and thanks both, it means the world to me that you got in touch.’

Poppy waved goodbye to her uncle and just like that, he was gone.

They sat back in the dining chairs. ‘That was bloody surreal.’ Martin spoke for them both. ‘He seems like a really nice bloke, apart from being a Gooner.’

‘He does, doesn’t he?’ Poppy agreed. ‘I can’t believe we’re related, but it’s true what I said, he does seem familiar, and there’s something about the way he looks.’

‘And not too vicary,’ Martin added.

‘No, not at all vicary, in fact quite normal really. It was lovely when he said “God bless”, wasn’t it? Special.’

Poppy wondered if Matilda was his daughter or his granddaughter. She couldn’t get over how Simon looked so much younger than her mum; maybe that was what a life of Jesus instead of gin did for you. She laughed as she considered whether she should recommend it to Cheryl and imagined her mother’s two-word response.

Dr Jessop called and left a rather chirpy message asking her to ‘nip in’. Poppy was delighted at the lack of urgency in her tone.

She pushed Max through the light drizzle, which was melting the very last dregs of snow that lay in thin grey clusters on the verges and kerbs. She wandered up past the shops, waved at a mum from school who was out walking her dog and nodded at the man who owned the kebab shop as he unloaded cans of drink on cardboard pallets from the back of his van.

Max laughed and counted out loud. ‘Two… three… four… six…’

Poppy patted the plastic roof of his pushchair. ‘That’s close enough, Maxy.’

In the warmth of the surgery waiting room, she watched Max fall asleep in his little anorak and blue wellies and rocked the handles to keep him dozing. Finally her name flashed up and she entered Room 4 with a sense of déjà vu. Dr Jessop wasn’t quite so smiley today and there was no hint of the jovial tone that had brightened her phone message. This did nothing to ease Poppy’s nerves. She watched the doctor’s eyes widen at the sight of her little boy.
Yes, I’m a mum.

Poppy took in the bland, box-like room. Its curtained-off area was so small that despite the attempt at privacy, its very proximity to the doctor and her desk made undressing a little uncomfortable. She scanned the poster on the wall, a sketch of the human body without skin. Its veins, organs and bones were exposed. She wondered if that was how medics viewed people – as nothing more than a collection of tubes, pouches, pumps and liquids. It probably made their jobs a little easier.

There must have been some preamble or wider discussion, but Poppy wasn’t interested in that. Only one sentence stuck in her mind: ‘You have cancer.’

Her thoughts flew to the hundreds of people she knew who had been given a similar diagnosis. ‘Poor old Mrs Collins, she’s got cancer.’ ‘Heard about Jake’s dad? He’s got the big C. It’s not looking good, poor thing.’ ‘We’re trying to raise money for Jane at work, she’s got cancer.’ The last three words whispered through pursed lips. ‘She just lost her mum… Cancer.’ ‘My nan died… Cancer.’ The list was endless. All those people for whom she had felt a flicker of sadness as she’d received the news – offered incidentally at the school gate, in the supermarket or over the phone – but without really caring. They had a disease that felt remote from her life. Only now it wasn’t, now it would be underlining her every thought and lurking in every corner.

I have cancer. I have cancer. Cancer. That can’t be right, not cancer, not me! This is something that happens to other people, like car crashes or flooding. This can’t be happening to me. I don’t believe you. I don’t.

It didn’t matter how many times she repeated it inside her head, it still felt unreal.

Dr Jessop was informative, businesslike, and it helped. There was no room for emotion or panic: she made the whole thing sound almost commonplace.

‘They are going to perform some further tests and we will go from there and decide on what will be the best course of treatment for you. I’m referring you to an oncologist, who will be your primary care point, but I’m still here. The thing you need to remember, Poppy, and I say this to all my cancer patients, is that this is new to you and very shocking, but the team that will care for you do this day in and day out. You are in the very best hands.’

Poppy nodded but took little comfort from her reassurances. She was stunned and quite unable to ask the hundred questions that battered her lips.

‘Here’s my number, call me any time and I will get back to you as soon as I can if I can’t take your call immediately.’

Poppy took the little slip of paper with a telephone number scrawled on it and nodded again.

‘The breast cancer clinic will call when they have your other results. We are not quite in panic mode yet, you know that, don’t you?’

And for the third time in as many minutes, Poppy could only nod.

She walked home slowly. The man who owned the kebab shop was placing his ‘Open’ sign on the grass verge; he smiled and waved. Poppy stared at him, unable to reconcile the fact that in the half hour since she had last seen him, her world had changed; changed with the utterance of three words.
You have cancer
.

As Poppy and the sleeping Max made their way up the path towards home, Jo spied them from her sitting room window. She raced to the front door and shouted across to her friend.

‘Cuppa?’

‘Sure!’ Poppy smiled and fished in her bag for her key. Jo disappeared and reappeared seconds later with her cardigan over her arm and her phone and keys in her hand. Poppy had really wanted to lie in a darkened room alone and plan the conversation she would have with Martin, but life wasn’t like that, it didn’t make allowances, not even today.

‘You look knackered, mate,’ Jo observed.

‘I am a bit.’

Jo patted her arm as the two entered the house. ‘Tell you what, you sit down and I’ll make us a nice drink.’

Poppy nodded.
Lovely.
A nice cup of tea was the cure for most ills, but not today, not for this. She felt a bit third party, shocked, and yet chose to carry on as normal, delaying the moment of impact for as long as possible.

Martin was collecting Peg from after-school club today. Poppy relished the moments of silence as she sat on the sofa while Jo pottered in their kitchen. She let her eyes drift over their home. Home. Where they lived. A little family with all their belongings safely under the roof and pictures of them smiling on the walls. Home, where a trampoline sat in the back garden that they bounced on in celebration of new babies, new teeth and new years. She tried to imagine this little house without her in it, but couldn’t.

Don’t be silly, dramatic; it’s a disease, like the flu. You’ll just have medicine and get better and then run that race in a pink T-shirt, grateful for having won.

‘To tell you the truth, Poppy,’ Jo called from the kitchen, ‘I’m really fed up. Danny’s being a right tosser.’

‘Oh?’ Poppy focused on her friend’s words, glad of the distraction.

‘He’s being really off on the phone and I keep making suggestions, things we should do when he gets back, and he’s just like,
whatever…
It’s driving me mad. I know it’s tough for him, but it ain’t exactly a picnic for me, stuck here.’

‘You should talk to him.’ Poppy sipped at the mug of tea Jo had placed on the coffee table in front of her; it was too hot.

Jo laughed. ‘It’s easy for you and Mart, that’s what you would do, but it’s not like that for us, we don’t talk about anything. We just muddle through and hope it’s all going in the right direction and we only talk when we argue. That’s how we move things forward and I know that sounds like shit, but that’s how it’s always been.’

Poppy grimaced. It didn’t sound like much fun.

‘You’re so lucky, you know.’ Jo nodded at the photo of Poppy, Martin and the kids on the wall.

In some ways.
Poppy smiled, tightly.

‘Mart’s one in a million, Poppy.’

‘Well, we’ve had a lot of years to get it right, I suppose. We kind of grew up together and so there’s no drama, he’s just always been there and we’ve always been together.’ She was aware that sounded a little smug. She smiled as she heard the noisy duo progressing up the path. ‘Talk of the devil!’

Peg ran up. ‘Aunty Jo! Would you like a makeover?’

‘Oh, well, I hadn’t planned on one, but I think I could probably do with new lipstick?’ Jo pursed her lips. ‘What do you think?’

‘I think yes!’ Peg clapped her hands and raced off to find her make-up bag. ‘I’ll chuck you down some tissue and you can wipe that old colour off. It makes your teeth look yellow anyway.’

Poppy placed her hands over her eyes. ‘Jo, what am I going to do with her?’

Jo laughed. ‘I don’t know, mate, but I don’t think the diplomatic corps will be calling up any time soon.’

‘I’m going to be a pilot!’ Peg yelled from upstairs as she rummaged in her cupboard, locating her collection of lipsticks and brushes.

Martin whipped off his beret and smiled at Max, still asleep in his buggy, his fat little legs hanging down. He had been wheeled into the lounge and parked in front of them.

‘Look at him, proper zonked out.’ Martin chuckled and returned to the hallway to collect the mail.

Poppy stared at her son, wistfully, framing the memory forever. ‘I know how he feels.’ She yawned.

Jo reached out and lightly touched Max’s hair. ‘They are even more beautiful when they’re asleep, aren’t they?’

Poppy noted the resigned tone in Jo’s voice. ‘They are,’ she agreed.

‘I wonder what ours would have looked like.’ Jo stared at the sleeping Max and didn’t seem to require an answer. ‘D’you want a coffee, Mart?’ she whispered.

‘Yes, cheers, Jo, that’ll be lovely. It’s been quite a day. What’s up with my missus? You on strike?’

Martin stood in the doorway of the lounge, shuffling the stack of mail, scanning the logos and text of each envelope before placing it at the bottom of the pile.

‘Ha! I love how you think it’s my job to make the drinks! Actually I was just going to offer everyone some toast, as I haven’t even thought about tea yet, but you can whistle now.’

‘Get in the kitchen, woman! Toast is what we need.’ He pointed towards the kitchen and winked at his wife. Then he turned to Jo. ‘Heard from Danny?’

Jo exhaled through bloated cheeks and shook her head. ‘Don’t ask. He’s driving me bonkers.’ She tapped the spoon against the side of the mug and reached into the fridge for milk, comfortable in her neighbour’s kitchen.

‘How long now till he’s back from his holiday in the sun and can drive you bonkers in person?’ Martin asked. He was keen to defend his mate, who was probably struggling on tour, no doubt missing home and wishing his view was anything but the barren, dusty landscape that lay outside his tent.

‘About six weeks or so.’ Jo, oblivious to his dig, placed Martin’s mug of coffee on the sideboard.

The toast popped up and Poppy went to fetch it. She laid it on the breadboard and reached for the butter knife that was staked into the carton.

Max yelled to alert everyone that he was awake. ‘I’ll grab him!’ Jo eagerly swooped on his buggy.

‘Peg, toast!’ Poppy shouted up the stairs as she cut the slices into triangles. She placed them on two small plates and set them on the table.

Clutching her lipsticks and brushes, Peg took a seat at the table; Jo joined her, with Max on her lap. Max grabbed the toast and began tearing at it with his front teeth.