At school the next day Piers found time to make a get-well card for Myra. He decorated it with sparkly stuff held on by glue from the craft box and wrote ‘Please get better soon, Piers’, after all, he thought, she belonged to Uncle Graham who was the nearest he could get to his dad, and . . . he didn’t love her, but you never know, he might in time if she just cheered up a little. He remembered he’d gone to tea with a boy from his old school one day and he’d really wished he belonged to that boy’s mum because she was so cheerful and jolly. He could feel the boy loved her and she loved him and he longed that day for a mother who could be like that. For every day his dad had been enough but just sometimes . . . a mum would have been nice. So underneath he wrote ‘with love’ and drew a scroll around it to make it important.
Oliver had art that day too and he was finishing a collage made with quilted fabric. He’d made a sailing ship on a beautiful blue sea and he’d crafted the sails so they looked as though the wind was making them billow out by padding them slightly and covering them with pristine white fabric, and for a moment you would swear the ship was sailing along, it was so realistic. In the marine blue of the sea he had placed a small pinky octopus he’d made with minute shiny glass beads for eyes and a mermaid with shining pearl sequins to represent fish scales on her body.
His teacher had given him an option. ‘Do you want to take that home, Oliver, or shall I keep it for the exhibition?’
Oliver thought about this and about Myra in hospital and he said, ‘Could I take it home for my Auntie Myra, and bring it back to hang for the exhibition? She’s in hospital you see.’
‘Of course you can. She’ll love it.’
Oliver’s teacher was right, she did love it, but Myra froze, completely unable to express any emotion about it, and therefore giving the impression to Oliver that she’d rather not have been given it. It had taken Graham some effort to persuade the boys to come with him to evening visiting hours, and now they were all here it felt awkward. He’d realised on the way over that the last time they’d been to a hospital would have been to visit their father. But mercifully, Oliver had seemed distracted by looking forward to seeing what Myra would make of his collage.
‘Don’t you like it?’ he asked. ‘I’ve to take it back to school to hang in the Parent’s Evening Art Exhibition and then I can bring it home again.’ He waited for Myra to give her opinion, then as she could muster nothing more than a strained smile, he quietly put it back in the carrier bag he’d brought it in and leant it against the bed leg.
Piers, proud to bits of the card he’d done for her, hesitated about giving her it. He couldn’t understand what was happening, didn’t she like getting presents? Anyway he’d give it a try. So he handed it to her saying ‘I’ve made this for you to get you better.’
Myra thanked him politely and managed a few stilted words to Oliver, too, but her gratitude was clearly lacking in enthusiasm.
‘How thoughtful of you two boys to make these for Myra,’ Graham said instead. ‘When yours comes back from the Exhibition, Oliver, we’ll find a place at home and we’ll put it up won’t we Myra?’
Myra nodded, her face bleak and miserable. ‘I’m sorry, the three of you, I’ve got such a headache, you shouldn’t have come.’
‘Shall I fetch the nurse?’ Graham hovered over her, making her feel worse.
‘No, thanks. I’ll have a little sleep. Thank you for coming, all of you.’
‘Right then, Myra. Ring me tomorrow – let me know when you can come home. OK?’ When he got no reply, he patted her shoulder saying ‘Bye-bye!’ The boys said nothing. What was there for two young boys to say in the face of such disappointment?
Myra held herself together as best she could, but eventually, as the ward doors swung shut behind Graham, she had to give in and the tears began pouring down her cheeks. At first they fell silently, and then more noisily and before long she was sobbing and thrashing about in her bed so alarmingly, the other patients became concerned.
One of them in the bed directly opposite her rang for help. The sister, the bossy one who appeared to believe that patients were there to annoy her and not because they needed to be nursed, hustled in. ‘Now, Myra, now, now, dear, are you in pain? Tell me where the pain is.’ Sister propped her up on an extra pillow, felt her pulse, stroked her forehead with her ice-cold hand, and rang the bell for more help when she didn’t appear to be having any effect.
‘Have her visitors upset her? Does anyone know?’
The patient who’d rung the bell shook her head. ‘Didn’t look like it, they were lovely, it was her husband and two boys.’
A nurse rushed in responding to the demanding bell.
By now Myra was even more hysterical and out of control, and the other patients were becoming increasingly anxious.
‘Cup of tea, nurse please.’
‘Yes, Sister. Straight away.’
‘Calm down ladies, we’ll soon have her right. Now, Myra, I’m going to have to give you some pills to calm you down if you don’t stop, we can’t go on like this. If you don’t want one then stop this, you’re tearing yourself apart.’ She drew the cubicle curtains round the bed and Myra took in a huge halting breath. ‘That’s better, that’s much better. Now try to lie still and we’ll have a talk. There, there. I’ll straighten your sheets, and we’ll get that clean nightie out of your locker and we’ll put it on, this is soaked with sweat. Better now? Here comes the nurse with a cup of tea for you. Get her face cloth out of her toilet bag, nurse, and we’ll wipe her face and then we’ll put the clean nightie on.’
‘Sorry. Sorry. So sorry.’ Myra stuttered as she still tried to catch her breath and speak without a sob catching in her chest.
‘No need to apologise, Mrs Butler. But I do need to know what brought this on. Has someone said something to upset you. A nurse? A patient?’
Myra shook her head. ‘No. No. He gave me a picture he’d made at school.’
‘Who did? One of the boys that was just here? That sounds wonderful. Look it’s right here. Can I have a look?’
Myra nodded.
‘Why it’s beautiful, very artistic, he’s a very clever boy isn’t he?’
Myra nodded. ‘I couldn’t say thank you. I can’t, not to him.’
‘You’ve just said the words. “Thank you”, you said, right this minute.’
‘I didn’t want him, you see, and I still don’t. Neither him nor his brother.’
The sister passed her the cup of tea. ‘Drink this, now you’re all tidy. I’ll sit on the chair here and wait for you to explain.’ Sister found Piers’ card on the floor and admired it. What more could a woman ask for but two sons so thoughtful? She watched Myra gulping down her tea and felt nothing but pity for her. There were thousands of women who would love to have two such caring boys.
‘Sister?’
‘Yes?’
‘They’ve no business bringing me presents. I don’t deserve such kindness. I know it’s mad but I rather hoped they’d go away, that they’d have somehow gone when I get back home after this.’ She pointed to the dressing on her forehead. ‘I don’t know where, but I wish they would just go. I want my old life back.’
‘But you’ve brought them up so far, what’s gone wrong?’
‘They’re not mine, not ours,’ Myra whispered. ‘They’re my brother-in-law’s children. He died recently and their mother died nearly ten years ago, so they’ve had to come to us. It’s all too much.’
‘I think it’s the fall you’ve had, you’re not feeling A1 at Lloyds, that’s the trouble, it’s all been such a shock. We’ll keep you in another day, don’t go home tomorrow, stay with us, give you time to think, eh? How about that? We’ll talk again tomorrow, shall we?’
Myra nodded her agreement, still half in shock at her own outburst.
‘Now, supper’s coming soon. What did you order?’
‘The salad.’
‘It’s fresh salmon salad, you’ll enjoy that. See you later.’ The ward sister turned smartly on her heel, leaving Myra alone behind the cubicle’s flimsy paper curtains.
Myra slithered down under the sheets and felt ashamed. No, embarrassed more than ashamed. She couldn’t understand why she’d screamed and cried like that. It was like the outburst of a teenage girl. But making such an exhibition of herself! How could she? She who’d been so self-contained for so long. What had happened to that woman who’d married Graham? She’d been reasonable then, able to chat to people, a bit shy, but able to overcome it. But being back in a hospital meant she couldn’t hide from the truth. It had been having a miscarriage and then the stillborn boy . . . well that had almost killed her. Outside she still functioned, inside she had died.
Clear as crystal in her mind was that moment when Graham had gone to the office for the first time since they’d lost the second baby. She’d stood in the hall at home, her arms shaped as though rocking a newborn baby, and the searing pain had been unbearable, the emptiness so appalling. Who was that howling with the agony of it all? It must be her, it must be her because there was no one else in the house. Oh God! Where was this baby she should have been holding? Why wasn’t he in her arms right now? When her tears had finally dried that day she’d sworn she’d have to keep a tighter hold on her emotions if she was going to hold it together.
Six months after their second loss Graham had timidly brought up the subject of adoption but she wouldn’t even discuss it. Hadn’t he realised that she couldn’t take a chance again, hope that something might work out? It was too much to expect of her.
She’d only survived all that because Graham had been so understanding, so kind, so patient. And what had she done in the face of his love? When he too had been distraught by their loss, she’d rejected him, left him comfortless, abandoned him. Myra cringed at her thoughtlessness, her lack of compassion.
All that dreadful time, John and Mo were so lucky by comparison. It had been hard enough when Oliver was born, but when Piers arrived Myra fell apart completely. What had she done for life to treat her like this? Why should Mo have such joy while she was rotting away? Nothing in the world touched her heart any more after that. Whatever tragedy she heard about in the world, she shrugged her shoulders and said to herself, ‘So . . .?’
Myra caught sight of Piers’ card standing on her locker. How kind he was. Then she looked at Oliver’s collage, really looked at it for the first time and saw all the detail. She loved the mermaid, the realistic way the sails appeared to billow out in the wind. Sister was right, he was a clever boy. She wasn’t even one thumbnail’s worth as creative as Oliver. One look at those stupid, boring tea cosies would have told you that. But, for once, she didn’t feel jealous of someone else’s good fortune.
The salad arrived. Every mouthful choked her. One half wanted desperately to eat it but the other half, the half that dealt with her emotions, the half she’d crushed all this time, rebelled. She left it barely started and never touched the pudding. Her head pounded, she ached inside, her legs felt numb, she didn’t know if she was hot or cold, happy or sad, alive or dead. She felt both trapped in her body, lying there on the hospital bed, and also very far away from it all. She stared ahead of her letting the noises of the ward wash over her, barely registering the passing hours, and the nurses who came and went, checking various readings. The upshot of it all was the sister asked the consultant to take a look at Mrs Butler before he left for the day.
He was the handsomest of men, Myra thought when he approached her bedside; elegant, white-haired, beautifully mannered, with a peace and a contentment about him that made her feel he’d met with every possible sort of human condition and nothing could faze him. He was the kind of man who made you feel, no matter what kind of a mess you found yourself in, that right then, you were the most important person in all the world.
He didn’t let go of her hand after he shook it, but held it clasped to his chest as though he didn’t want to let go. ‘Mrs Butler, may I call you Myra?’ He spoke so considerately it seemed he had all the time in the world to spare for her.
‘Of course.’ At that moment, if he’d asked her to fly with him to the moon she would have done.
‘Now what is the problem? Sister tells me she is worried about you and if Sister Goodchild is worried then so am I.’ He let go of her hand and pulled up a chair. ‘Now tell me, I want to know what exactly is troubling you?’ The emphasis he put on the word ‘exactly’ persuaded Myra that perhaps she could tell him, really truly tell him because she knew he would understand without laying blame on her.
Myra explained about the fall and then somehow or other began talking about the situation she found herself in. ‘So you see I’m landed with these two boys I don’t want, and I I just want them to go away. I want to get back to my own life like it should be.’
‘Describe to me what your own life consists of.’
‘I look after my husband, I look after the house, I’ve plenty of time for myself . . .’
‘And what do you do with that time?’
Frankly Myra couldn’t think of a damn thing she did with her time. What did she do? Watch TV? Listen to the radio. Make the tea cosies . . . no not now. So she didn’t answer.
‘You’ve no children of your own? Do you mind me asking me why not? Don’t feel you have to answer if you’d rather not.’
She couldn’t believe it of herself, she who’d kept the whole story from everyone she ever met, bottled up all these years, and now out it all poured to this lovely sympathetic man she’d never met before.
‘I see. So after the stillbirth you never tried again?’
Myra shook her head. ‘And now I’ve had a hysterectomy, so it’s all too late. Too late anyway at forty-five.’
‘Have you ever thought that sometimes life takes a turn for which we are totally unprepared? We rebel, we say this isn’t for me, but if we stand still and listen to our inner selves we realise that in fact it’s the best thing in the world? The best for us. That life has worked out just as it should be? That what has happened is our just reward for all our pain and struggles?’
Myra listened, but didn’t answer him.
‘You see, believe it or believe it not you have your answer in your own home. What you would have had if things had gone right was two children of your own. Now you have just that, in a funny roundabout kind of way. How old are the boys?’
‘Oliver’s just twelve and Piers is nearly ten.’ She turned to show him Oliver’s picture. He studied it saying, ‘My word but he’s very talented. What a privilege to have the bringing-up of a boy with this kind of life in him. Look what wicked eyes that octopus has, and the mermaid you can see is a lively lass. And the card?’
‘That’s from Piers, he did it at school today for me.’
‘Myra! Myra! Stand still and listen. Someone somewhere is telling you something. I’ll be back tomorrow before you leave.’
In fact she didn’t see the consultant the next day, he had an emergency operation she was told and couldn’t spare the time. But he hadn’t forgotten her and there was a note left with Sister Goodchild ready for when she was discharged. Just one line. ‘Remember what we talked about, Myra.’
She remembered what he’d said but decided she would not be taking his advice. Him in his smart suit, with all his money, who did he think he was telling her to look inside herself. She did and what did she see? A failure. A total failure. She couldn’t even make a career for herself. She’d failed at having children. Her marriage had failed in all but outward appearance. What was there left? Absolutely nothing.
When Graham and the boys came to collect her Sister Goodchild admired the boys as though they were Myra’s own, and winked at her behind their backs. She could. After all she didn’t have them to look after.
Arriving home, she found Graham had made a lovely casserole and laid the table in the dining room before they came to collect her just to make it feel special, and Viv had baked a pudding for her homecoming. But all she really saw was a small square patch on the wall. Graham must have taken down that framed picture of Paris they’d bought on their honeymoon (he’d not liked it for years, she knew). As soon as they’d walked through the door, and the boys had vanished to their bedroom, he’d sat her on the sofa, reached into her hospital bag and hung Oliver’s collage proudly on the wall. Piers’ card he stood nearby on the mantlepiece. She tried to look away but the picture on the wall . . . somehow it almost kept making her look at it, demanding she look at it. That mermaid was a lively lass just as the consultant suggested and as for the octopus, well he did have wicked eyes, he was right about that too. Then she saw Piers’ get-well card and she felt her eyes begin to brim with tears. One thing was for certain, she wasn’t going to cry over a get-well card, most certainly not. That was until she read with love in its scrolled border, and that did it. It was ridiculous to be watching the TV news with tears rolling down her cheeks. The more she tried to stop the more the tears ran down.
Graham turned to ask her if she’d like a cup of hot chocolate. ‘Myra, what is it? Is your head bad again?’
He went to sit beside her on the sofa and took her hand. ‘Can I get you one of those tablets the Sister gave you? Is the pain bad?’
Myra answered softly, ‘It’s Piers’ card, “with love”, he’s put. What love have I given him since he came here? None.’ The tears kept coming.
Graham got a clean hanky out and dabbed her cheeks, but to no avail. ‘This’ll have to stop, otherwise we’ll have to put the washing machine on just to keep me in handkerchiefs. You have tried, you know.’
‘Tried what?’
‘Not to love him exactly but you have made an effort. All those meals, the school run and they’ve had clean clothes whenever. It all takes time.’
‘I wish I was a natural mother like Viv. She seems to know instinctively what to do and when to do it. I don’t.’
‘Myra! She’s been a mother for over thirty years, you’ve been a mother for not even thirty days. Like I said it all takes time.’
‘I quite like the rabbit, Pete’s a sweet little thing. I’ve stroked him, you know.’ Saying that, she realised that Graham was still holding her hand and she hadn’t snatched it away like usual.
‘Viv’s been very good while you’ve been in hospital, she’s taken Piers to school and met him and brought him home, and both boys went there to tea each day so I could either finish up at work or come and see you. She’s a very nice person, Myra, I’m so glad you’ve got someone like her to rely on as a friend.’
‘Viv?’
‘Yes. Viv. And you know the woman next door on the other side? She came round and brought you those flowers there in the vase. Her name’s Betty, and her husband’s Roland.’
‘It’s taken them fifteen years to speak to us.’
‘And us fifteen years too, don’t forget.’
Myra studied the flowers and decided they were in good taste for someone who hadn’t spoken to them ever before. They weren’t a bunch snatched up in the supermarket, they were from a proper flower shop. If she felt like it tomorrow she might dig out one of her tasteful notelets and write her a thank you. On the other hand she could always call round and say thank you in person, get a chance to meet this Betty properly. But of course she might not be well enough, she quickly reminded herself.
Rather to her surprise Myra found herself feeling much better the next day, the pain relief tablets were obviously doing her good.
She determined that when Viv came across to take Piers to school, she’d go with her. Graham didn’t want her to, but because he said no she decided she definitely would.
She wore sunglasses to help disguise the bruising and the swelling but nothing could disguise the cut and the stitches. She thought of covering it with a dressing but Sister had said it would be better left to get the air.
‘I’m coming with you Viv.’
‘Are you sure? I go right up to school, he seems to like that. Will you manage all that way?’
‘Of course. I go right up to school, too, when I take him.’
‘You know that New to You Sale they keep talking about, it’s tomorrow night.’
‘Oh, right. Are you going?’
‘The clothes’ll all be too young for me. All right for you, though.’
‘I couldn’t wear their stuff, they’re all young women.’
‘You’re hardly an old lady, Myra – wait till you get to my age and you’ll think you were still a spring chicken in your forties!’
Piers joined them in the hall ready for off and unwittingly Viv demonstrated how to be a mum without even trying. ‘Now, Piers, have you cleaned your teeth? Good. Got your homework? Yes? It’s football day your Uncle Graham said, where’s your bag? I knew there’d be something. Go get it. Handkerchief? Yes. Let’s be off then.’
The sharp air caught the wound on Myra’s forehead, making it hurt badly. The cold seemed to worm its way right inside the cut and into her brain, but she wouldn’t give in and turn back. They saw Piers in, and headed back swiftly, harried by the cold.
‘Thanks for looking after everyone while I’ve been in hospital, Viv.’
‘Not at all, it’s been a pleasure. Anytime, they’re thoroughly decent boys, Myra, you’re very lucky.’
Myra was glad to get back home, but not fancying being on her own right now she invited Viv in for coffee on the pretence of her perhaps liking to see Oliver’s picture and Piers’ card. The most ridiculous, most unaccustomed, feeling of pride came over her when Viv showed her delight at Oliver’s collage, but all she said was, ‘It is good isn’t it? The art teacher wants it back for Parents’ Evening so she can hang it in the school art exhibition.’
‘Not one of my children were good at art. Absolutely hopeless they were. The best was Sally in pottery. I’ve got some clumsy bowls and vases in a cupboard somewhere, and that was the nearest any of them got. Here, sit down. I’ll put the kettle on, you look tired.’
So they sat in the kitchen enjoying their coffee until Viv said, ‘Oh God! I’d forgotten I’ve got the the dentist. I should have left already. Blast. Never mind though, he always runs late. Must go. Remember, I’ll collect Piers this afternoon, I’ll be leaving at three. Come with me if you feel up to it.’
Myra slept for most of the morning and woke feeling better able to cope with life. She inspected the cut and decided it was looking a little better than when she’d got up that morning. She put on her coat and went outside to see Little Pete. The sun was out so the cold didn’t strike her so badly as it had earlier.
Pete was hunched up in a corner of his run looking, she thought, rather glum. She hitched her scarf round her throat and bent down to poke a finger through the mesh and touch poor Pete. It must be rather lonely for him on his own, and she wondered about having two rabbits. She didn’t want an army of them though, and surely two buck rabbits would fight. Or maybe they could have separate hutches. One could be Oliver’s and the other could be Piers’.
Her knees ached bent down all the time, but as she straightened up she decided she quite liked the idea of company so pushing aside her revulsion at touching another being she reached in and picked up Pete. Anxious not to drop him, she rushed inside with him. He was such a dear little thing, rather like a Siamese cat in his colouring, sort of coffee and cream. She took a fresh piece of lettuce from the fridge and gave it to him. Was lettuce, cold, straight out of the fridge good for a young rabbit, maybe there were rules about it? She’d ring Graham, he might know. She never rang him at the office, but just this once she would. Pete was eating it with relish, should she take it from him? She hadn’t the heart to. Myra dialled Graham’s office number and asked to speak to him.
‘Graham! It’s me––’
‘Myra! Are you all right?’
‘I’m fine, I’m ringing about Pete, the rabbit. You kept a rabbit when you were a boy didn’t you? Is it all right to give him lettuce straight out of the fridge?’
‘Won’t do him any harm.’
‘Good. He’s in the kitchen eating away.’
‘How on earth did he get in there?’
‘I carried him in.’
‘Oh! Right. I see. He’ll be fine, Myra don’t worry about him. Anything else?’
‘No. See you tonight.’
Graham put down the receiver and sat staring into space. She obviously wasn’t right, had he better go home? He’d loads of work on hand and couldn’t really afford the time. But Myra carrying a rabbit into the house? She hated anyone touching her at the best of times, and she always said pets were riddled with germs. The rabbit in the kitchen? What was she thinking of? Then he began to laugh, a rip-roaring, powerful, joyous laugh. His PA came in with some figures he’d asked for and stood stock still, astonished. In the whole of the seven years that she’d worked for him she had never seen him laugh like this. Not once. Not even at the office Christmas Party. It was such abandoned laughter and he showed no sign of stopping. She quickly shut the door so no one else would hear.
‘Mr Butler?’
He paused briefly said, ‘In the kitchen of all places . . .’ and laughed even louder.
‘Are you well? Mr Butler. I said, are you all right?’
Graham tried to quell the laughter that kept spilling out. He knew what his PA would be thinking – had he finally tipped over the edge, this hard-working man of few words, devoted to the business of waste as he was? He’d better get himself under control before someone thought to ring Myra. Not that anyone at work knew her – she’d never shown her face at the office, never came to any events as his plus-one, the excuse being she didn’t ‘do’ parties.
‘I’m fine, thank you, never been better. Got those figures? The meeting’s in fifteen minutes and I need to make myself au fait with them before I go in.’
It was all right then, he was back in his usual mode, though he did wonder if she heard him burst into laughter again just as she closed his door.
The rabbit incident was the last thing on his mind by the time he was driving home. The meeting hadn’t gone well despite the encouraging figures, there’d been another minor breakdown of the new equipment, and a promising chap coming for interview tomorrow had rung to say his wife had gone into premature labour and he couldn’t possibly come for a few days.
But the nearer he got to home the more his boys filled his mind. Had they had a good day at school? He’d been enormously impressed by the collage Oliver had done, and by the thoughtfulness of Piers’ get-well card. They truly were decent young boys and well worth getting to know. Thoughts about the challenging day he’d just survived fell away the closer he got to the house and it occurred to him that it was a long time since he’d so looked forward to getting home.
He thought of Myra, too. She’d frightened him to death with the way she looked after her fall. They might not be close like they’d been in the first five years of their marriage but his passionate love for her had never entirely faded away. Put on the shelf perhaps, neglected probably, allowed to wither definitely, but not entirely gone. That was how he felt, but how did she feel about love? It seemed on the surface that for her, all of it had gone. Disappeared in the dreadful double blow of losing their prospective children. Six months after their second loss he’d timidly brought up the subject of adoption but Myra wouldn’t even discuss it. She had withdrawn so thoroughly from life. It was as if taking a chance or hoping that something else might work out for them wasn’t possible any more.
His own profound grief had for a while masked the fact that she appeared to want nothing more to do with him. It was already too late by the time he’d realised that was exactly what had happened. He’d assured himself at the start that the separate bedrooms was a temporary state of affairs. After all, it had taken them a while to try again after the miscarriage, so the mourning after their stillborn son felt completely understandable, but the days turned into weeks and the months into years. Perhaps he should have done something, pushed for more – but instead he’d retreated into the state of limbo they existed in, afraid that rocking the boat would wreck the fragile shell of the relationship that remained.
As he switched off the engine he heard shouting coming from the house. It was Myra and Oliver. Both of them, by the sound of it, were past caring what they said. Graham leapt out of the car and shot into the house to find the two of them screaming at each other, saying unforgiveable things and Piers hiding behind the sofa begging them to stop.
‘Say you’re sorry, Oliver. Say you’re sorry.’
Graham shouted above the din, ‘That will do! Oliver be silent as of this minute! Do as I say!’ It had no effect, so he took hold of Oliver’s arm and clapped his hand over his mouth. ‘I mean it!’
Oliver wriggled free just long enough for him to say, ‘I’ll never apologise, it wasn’t my fault, I didn’t do it.’
Myra burst out with her complaint. ‘He’s come home from school wrong side out and there’s no reasoning with him. I sent him to tidy their bedroom and he refuses to do it. He’s just not grateful, and he should be, he should be grateful to you and to me for taking him in.’
Graham winced at her use of words. ‘But what is it he is saying he didn’t do?’
Myra drew in a great breath. ‘He smashed a vase just to annoy me, because he didn’t want to do as I said.’
‘I didn’t do it. Honest, I didn’t break it. I’ve not even been in the sitting room since I came home.’
Myra stamped her foot. ‘You must have. Who else could have done it? It certainly wasn’t me.’
The three of them stood looking at one another and finally their eyes rested on Piers. If it was possible, he appeared to have shrunk, and his bright red guilty face told the whole story.
Graham took charge of the situation. ‘Piers, you and I will stay in here while Myra and Oliver go in the kitchen. We need to talk. Before you go, Oliver, can you bring a dustpan and brush in here, your brother will need to use it.’
Piers, on the point of collapse with the fear that anyone could see welling up inside him, came out from behind the sofa now Myra had left the room. He sat scrunched up on the sofa. Graham could tell he was waiting for his wrath to descend on him. He imagined all the thoughts that would be running through the child’s head – he’d probably already imagined he’d be sent packing for this.
‘Now Piers, what’s this all about?’ He said this in the gentlest voice he could muster. ‘Tell me what happened, there’s a good boy.’
‘I thought she’d get that stick out.’
‘What stick? Myra hasn’t got a stick.’
‘I mean Delphine’s stick.’
‘I should have told you. We broke it in pieces the first night you and your brother were here. As soon as Oliver showed it us, we made sure it could never be used to hurt anyone again. We don’t use sticks on anyone in this house. Believe me.’
Piers looked relieved. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t do it on purpose.’
‘How did it happen?’
‘I was looking out of the window for Oliver coming home, I just wanted him to be here, I couldn’t wait, I felt so lonely and he was late and I knocked the vase with my elbow by mistake. It fell onto the carpet and hardly made any noise, so I knew she wouldn’t have heard it breaking, and I . . . I . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘I thought she’d send me away.’
‘She won’t.’
‘She will.’ He stamped his foot.
‘I’m telling you she won’t. You belong here, this is your house, your home and you won’t be sent away. Now, why did you let Oliver get the blame? That wasn’t fair was it? He’s your brother and brothers look after each other.’
Piers flung hmself down on the sofa face first. ‘I don’t know. I was scared.’
‘So first you apologise to Myra properly, and then, really meaning it, you apologise to Oliver. I prize honesty above everything, Piers, and I want you to grow up honest just like your dad would want you to do . . . if he were here. You understand. If you’re in trouble then you have to face it and be upfront with the truth. People prefer that to great big fibs.’
‘I’ll do it. She doesn’t like me anyway, does Myra. You do, but she doesn’t. She’ll convince you to send me away. I want to stay here, and not go back to Delphine’s or a home.’
Oliver came in with the dustpan.
‘I’m sorry, Oliver, Uncle Graham says he won’t send me away. I shouldn’t have told fibs.’
Oliver gave him a smile and a thumbs-up.
For the first time since the whole horrible incident had started Piers face lit up with a smile.
Oliver said, ‘Go apologise to Myra then, she’s waiting.’
Piers looked across at his uncle wondering if he might just get away with not having to confront her, but he saw from the look on his face that he would have to, so he took a deep breath and marched in to the kitchen, determined to speak up.
Myra was turning down the gas under a pan and didn’t even look up at him, that in a way made it easier to apologise.
‘I’m sorry, Myra, I told a fib and I shouldn’t have. Sorry about the vase, I didn’t do it on purpose.’
Myra stared him straight in the eye and was about to be cruel and then into her mind came the with love on his get well card and the scroll drawn round it and she reminded herself he was the only person who’d said that to her in years.
‘Thank you. No more fibs, Piers? I don’t like fibs.’
‘No more fibs. And I’ll clear it all up.’
‘Thank you.’
Later, they sat down to supper, the flowers from the broken vase now on the kitchen window sill in a pale mauve vase the same colour as the flowers, their bedroom tidied and the water and shards of glass cleaned up in the sitting room, and the two boys reconciled.
Oliver laid his knife and fork together and said, ‘Uncle Graham . . .’
‘Yes.’
‘I’ve got maths to do tonight and I’m not sure about it, could you look at it with me?’
‘Of course. If I can remember my maths that is. Straight after we’ve eaten. What about you, Piers?’
‘I haven’t got any homework tonight.’
‘In that case then you and I have something to discuss,’ Myra said.
Piers’ heart sank right the way down to his trainers. Wasn’t one apology enough? He’d better say it again or else you never knew what might happen. He glanced at his Uncle Graham and wondered if he really was able to say no to Myra, if he could change her mind about letting them stay. ‘I’m very sorry about the vase, Myra.’
‘I know you are. You’ve said it already and I’ve thanked you.’
‘Yes, but I thought . . .’
‘Wait and see.’
Piers saw a mysterious smile on her face and somehow the grilled tomatoes, which he didn’t normally like, tasted better than he’d expected.
With Uncle Graham and Oliver sitting hunched over books spread out over the kitchen table and the dishwasher pumping away, Myra gave him a brisk nod of her head in the direction of the sitting room, and Piers followed her.
‘It’s only three weeks to your birthday, so I wondered if you had any ideas about what you would like as a present.’
Piers was so stunned by her question not a single idea came into his head. It was unusual for him because in other years he had always thought a lot about his birthday and would in normal circumstances have had a long list of requests, from little often-craved treats to some totally, impossibly expensive wishes. But since his dad had died, it was as if time had stopped still. ‘I haven’t thought about it.’
‘You haven’t thought about it? Well, you’ll have to won’t you?’
‘Yes, I suppose I will.’
‘Now you and I have agreed to always tell the truth to each other, it can always be like that for the two of us can’t it? So when you come up with an idea, tell me straight away. I have a good idea, but we’ll wait until you come up with yours first.’
But Piers being Piers couldn’t wait to hear her idea. ‘What is your idea, Myra?’
‘Well, I was thinking this morning that Little Pete seems very lonely in that hutch all on his own night and day and I wondered if you’d like to have a rabbit as a friend for him. It would be yours absolutely, no one else’s. We’d have to make the run bigger but Uncle Graham could do that.’
‘Right.’ His birthday hadn’t seemed important, in fact he hadn’t known if anyone even knew it was coming up soon. Piers thought he hadn’t minded. But something about Myra’s suggestion, and the fact that she’d been thinking about what he might like opened up something inside him. Before he knew it was going to happen, he was sobbing with grief: heartbreaking sobbing over which he had no control whatsoever. Between his gasping sobs he said repeatedly, ‘I want my dad.’
Myra felt a wave of tension and panic at this open weeping. Her head throbbed, there was that piercing pain back again in her brain and she realised she longed to sob herself but couldn’t. Instead, very tentatively, she patted his hand, then his shoulder, gave him a tissue and tried to console him with muttered words. Finally in desperation, she put her arm round his shoulders and he leaned against her and sobbed louder than ever. She couldn’t leave him alone while she went to get Graham, so she had to sit there in silence, hanging on to him with both arms now, hugging him because she didn’t know what else to do.
Had she but known, it was the best thing for Piers, he hadn’t had a woman hug him since he could remember. Neither of his grandmas had been the hugging kind and definitely not Delphine. For Piers, Myra’s hug spelt bliss. She was bony and all sharp angles and not very comfortable to lean against but she comforted him in the way he needed most right then. When the sobbing ran its course, he’d cheered up no end and feeling lighter than he’d done for a long time, he went to speak to Uncle Graham. He and Oliver had sorted out the maths.
‘Sorry again, Uncle Graham about telling fibs, I was so frightened I’d get sent away and I don’t want to be, I want to stay here.’
‘That’s right, Piers, you’ll stay here because this is your home now.’
‘You were right, Myra will take time to get used to us. But she doesn’t sound like she wants to send me away. She says she thinks I might like a rabbit for myself.’
Graham’s bushy eyebrows rose up his forehead in surprise. ‘Does she?’
Piers nodded. ‘Yes. I’m thinking about it. They’d need a bigger run though.’
‘Of course, well that’s easy. You have a good think then and let us know what you decide.’
That evening Graham told Myra what Piers had said and she nodded her agreement.
‘You know I never like touching fur or going near any animals normally, but I’ve taken to Little Pete. Two rabbits will hardly be any more trouble than one and if that’s what Piers would like . . .’
Graham went to sit beside her on the sofa, taking her hand in his as soon as he sat down. ‘I’m so glad you’re beginning to feel better about the boys. Just think, by Piers’ birthday this time next year, it’ll feel like they’ve been here forever.’ He added softly, ‘They even look like me don’t they?’
‘They do, yes. Anyone who sees you out with the boys just assumes you’re their father. But I’m still waiting for the big row and the great big upset, because there’s bound to be one, I mean we nearly had it tonight.’
‘If there is and, like you said, I expect there will be, we shall weather the storm together. You know, Piers is terrified of having to leave this house, that was why he lied. We’ll have to be so careful with him – we mustn’t forget he’s still frightened inside, even when him and his brother put on a brave face. I’m surprised they haven’t grieved more than they have.’
Myra absentmindedly stroked Graham’s hand, ‘Piers cried a lot tonight when we were talking.’
‘You didn’t say.’
‘No well, we resolved it, he just needed . . . well . . . I suppose he needed . . . mothering.’
Graham disguised his surprise as best he could. Mothering? From Myra? He supposed she just meant someone to hold him. In a different way, it was what he needed too. Just a sign that love still lingered somewhere. He held Myra’s hand to his mouth to kiss. She snatched it away from him but he knew if he didn’t say something now, the moment would be lost. ‘I’ve never stopped loving you even if you’ve stopped loving me. All these years, turning away from each other, such a waste. Why did it happen, Myra? Why?’
Myra knew that since the boys had arrived she’d found herself in deep water. The kind of deep emotional turmoil she hadn’t felt since she left hospital twelve years ago. But something had been stirred by Piers this evening, and even though she couldn’t answer Graham’s question, for once she wasn’t scared at the very thought of it. She didn’t even know the answer herself, all she knew was that shutting everyone out had enabled her to batten down her emotions and in time, ignore them completely.
‘Perhaps if we’d had the courage to try again after . . . our little boy . . . we’d have been successful.’
Myra glared at him. ‘You don’t know that.’ The prospect of trying for another baby and perhaps losing them was one emotional hurdle she most definitely couldn’t have faced.
‘No, but perhaps we should have tried. Cutting ourselves off from one another was no answer.’
‘It was my answer and that should be enough, after all I would have had it all to go through, not you.’
‘You don’t imagine, do you, that the father of a baby experiences nothing at all? I know we don’t do the hard graft but we’re involved. I grieved too, but you couldn’t comfort me, you didn’t even realise I needed comforting, and you certainly wouldn’t let me comfort you. It was as if I didn’t exist. That was when you went dead inside.’
Myra turned to look him straight in the face the first time since they’d sat down. ‘I died inside? Is there any wonder, when the baby died inside me. Inside me, do you hear! You never thought about that did you?’
Graham went still and then said so softly she strained to hear, ‘Of course I did, what do you think of me, that I’m inhuman? Unfeeling? I couldn’t bear the distress, the despair you were suffering, it crucified me, but you wouldn’t let me even talk to you about it.’
‘I shut down, that’s why. If I didn’t talk about it, it was because I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. Every time I passed a woman in the street pushing a pram, I died all over again. I couldn’t even look inside it to see the baby in case the baby was awake and looked at me.’
‘I’m sorry, so sorry, Myra, we could have made things so much better for each other, if we’d both tried. We each had our own private grief – of course, we still do – but there was a shared loss, too; we could have helped each other through it somehow.’
The only sound in the room was the crackle of the log fire, the only light the flames flickering in the grate, the only movement Graham’s hand taking hold of Myra’s again.
‘Graham?’
‘Yes?’
‘I’ve never asked before.’
‘What?’
‘I don’t know if I can.’
‘For heaven’s sake say it, there’s been too much “not saying” between you and me. Just ask.’
He heard the great breath she took in, felt the tremor of her hand, so he begged her again to say what was in her mind. ‘Say it, whatever it is, just say it, please.’
Her reply came out in a rush. ‘What did you do with all the baby things?’
It was Graham’s hand that trembled now. Eventually he answered her devastating, heart-wrenching question. ‘I think you guessed I put it all in the loft before you came home from hospital. I didn’t know what else to do at the time. But a few months later, that day your mother had that last operation and you went to spend the weekend visiting her, I went up in the loft after dark and brought everything down, put it in bags and carried them out to the car when the neighbours had all gone to bed. The next morning, a Saturday it was, I took them to the vicarage because the vicar’s wife knew someone due to have a baby who was short of money and badly in need of help. I thought that was best, thinking we could always buy new if . . . if we had another.’
Myra gripped his hand and thought about what he’d said. The wound inside herself, so long concealed, felt like it was now gaping horribly, and didn’t allow her to speak. Vicar’s wife? They didn’t know any vicars, nor a vicar’s wife. ‘When did you meet a vicar?’
‘It was the hospital chaplin – the one who did the burial service for the baby.’
‘I didn’t go to a service. No one told me,’ Myra replied indignantly, shocked into speech again.
‘No, I did though. I went, while you were still in hospital.’
‘Oh Graham. I’d no idea.’
‘You were too ill, you’d lost all that blood remember? They were worried about you. And you weren’t yourself, you barely knew what was happening, between the drugs and the trauma of it all. I thought even if you were well enough, you wouldn’t want to be there, because that would make it real and I knew you couldn’t face that after everything you’d been through.’
They sat silently holding hands, the fire burning lower, the night getting colder, each with their own thoughts. They’d both lived through it, but the paths they’d taken were very different, and Myra knew it was her inability to speak about their loss that meant they hadn’t shared their feelings before. Perhaps it could all have been so much easier if they had.
Eventually Myra said quietly, ‘Did . . . you give the baby a name?’
‘I called him George, after my dad, and Brian after yours. They were the only ones that sprang to mind, at the time.’
Myra stood up. She dared to say his name. ‘George Brian Butler. I see.’
She drew back the curtains and looked out at the night sky for a few minutes.
She sighed several times. ‘We’ve been such fools you and I. Me more than you.’ She closed the curtains again. ‘Cup of tea?’ It was the closest Myra could come to a peace offering.
Graham nodded. She went into the kitchen and he got up to throw another log on the fire.
As they drank their tea Graham said out of the blue, ‘I kept one thing.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Three vests. I kept three little baby vests. Still in the packet. Untouched. I thought I should, I don’t know why, I just did. I look at them sometimes. Thinking.’
Silence from Myra, then feeling that wound inside once again she asked, ‘Where are they?’
‘On a shelf in my wardrobe.’
‘I won’t want to see them.’ But lurking at the back of her mind was a need to see and a greater need to face up to her memories. She promised herself when she was in the house alone and no one would see her, nor hear her if she cried, she’d take a peep. Just for a moment. Not long. Just long enough.