Escape From Evil (15 page)

When the door opened and Grandpa was standing there, I was taken aback. Apart from visiting shortly after we’d moved in, he hadn’t been round. I wasn’t looking forward to explaining that Mum was out. I knew he didn’t like it when she left me alone and now he could see for himself that she wasn’t at home.

Before I could say anything, though, Grandpa said, ‘Your mother’s quite ill. She’s been taken to hospital.’

Ill? That wasn’t news. She was always ill. I wondered why Grandpa looked so concerned.
If she came home I would look after her. Like I always do.

‘Grab your coat, Cathy, and I’ll drive you to visit her.’

Was he serious?

‘I can’t go now,’ I replied. ‘The cake’s in the oven. Mum will need her cake when she’s better.’

Grandpa sighed. ‘I’m sure it will be fine if you finish it later.’

‘I can’t finish it later! That’s not how baking works.’

‘For goodness’ sake, Cathy, just leave it.’

But I refused. In my head, Mum would need something to eat when she came home and it was my job to make sure she got it. And if she was as ill as Grandpa reckoned, that just made it twice as important to get it right. So we stayed. Grandpa couldn’t relax and conversation was stilted. Eventually I announced that the sponge had risen and it was time to take it out.

‘At last!’ Grandpa exclaimed theatrically. ‘Can we go now?’

‘Of course not. I’ve got to ice it first.’

I can’t believe now that I put him through this torment. It was my mother in hospital, but she was also his daughter. He was desperate to get back there – that’s obvious now – but the last thing he wanted to do was alert me to the severity of Mum’s condition. He was only thinking of me, but it was tearing him apart.

Before you can ice a cake, you must let it cool, so that used up another twenty minutes or so. Finally, with icing sugar everywhere and cocoa powder all over my clothes, I was ready to leave.

‘Better bring your school things,’ Grandpa warned. ‘I think you’ll be staying with us tonight.’

That’s nice,
I thought. It never occurred to Grandpa that I was used to spending nights alone. Nor did it occur to me that Mum wouldn’t be joining us. I insisted that we go to Salt-dean to drop off the cake before, eventually, setting off for the hospital.

On the drive there Grandpa didn’t say much, although he did mention something about Mum catching a bug while she was out late at night. He sounded confused. ‘Why would she be out so late?’ he asked, talking to himself more than me.

That, in turn, confused
me
. Mum always went out late. She stayed out overnight and I had no idea where. But it wasn’t a problem. She’d done that all my life or for at least as long as I could remember. It was normal. But obviously Grandpa had no idea.

I don’t know if I was in denial about the gravity of the situation, but I remember feeling surprised by everyone rushing around, worried about Mum. I genuinely couldn’t escape the sense that they were overreacting. Of course I craved for Mum to be cured of whatever it was that ailed her, and if the hospital could do that then, great, let them. But really, even as we parked the car, walked through reception and caught the lift up to Mum’s ward, I just wanted to shout out, ‘This is normal! She’ll be fine! Let me look after her!’

Seeing your mother hunched over a toilet bowl or, occasionally, failing to wake up before she vomited was one thing. Witnessing her strapped to a high hospital bed with tubes and pipes coming out of her nose and arms and myriad machines lining the wall was an experience I just wasn’t prepared for. I don’t know what I’d expected to see, but it wasn’t Mum lying there unconscious. Even then I tried to justify it.

‘She’s tired,’ I told Granny who was sitting at Mum’s side, holding her hand. ‘She’ll wake up soon.’

Granny smiled. She didn’t seem convinced.

We sat there for ages, it seemed, and then a doctor came in and asked Mum something. Out of nowhere, she managed this slurred, quiet ‘Yes’.

‘See?’ I told Granny. ‘She’s waking up!’

But that was about as much as we heard. She squeezed out a few more yes/no answers and in between gurgled and burbled like a baby talking in its sleep. Still, though, I wasn’t concerned. My biggest priority, in fact, was the cake.

If we don’t get home soon it will be too dry to eat.

Grandpa drove the three of us back to theirs, where I spent the night in the spare room as usual. The next morning he took me to school and then picked me up at the end of the day, announcing, ‘Let’s see if there’s been any change in your mother.’

Hand on heart, I wasn’t very happy at being dragged back to the hospital. I just thought,
Here we go again, another evening wasted waiting for Mum to wake up.
Because I absolutely believed with all my heart that she would wake up. No matter how rough she looked or sounded, Mum always woke up.

But I went in and I sat next to her and I tried to enjoy the magazine that Granny, who was already there, had bought me. It wasn’t easy. I was bored. I couldn’t help it. No one was talking, Mum hadn’t budged since last night and Granny looked like she would burst into tears if you asked her the time.

Why was everyone making such a fuss? Why didn’t they listen?
She does this every week!

The next day Mum was still in hospital. I admit that surprised me.
She’s normally up by now.
Even so, when Grandpa suggested going back to see her after school, I asked not to. Eventually he relented and I stayed and played at their house. It was the same the next day, and the next. In fact, probably a week passed before I returned. Even then, it was against my better judgement. Yes, it had been longer than usual, but nothing was set in stone with Mum. I’d learnt that years ago.

So back I went and tried to talk to her, but she barely reacted to anything.

Fine. I’ll talk to you when you wake up.

I thought I deserved a medal for lasting as long as I had. Eventually though, patience absolutely exhausted, I said, ‘Can we go yet?’

Granny sighed and spoke quietly to Grandpa. Then he said, ‘Come on, Cathy, it’s probably time to eat anyway.’

‘What about Granny?’ I asked, ever the practical little girl I’d been forced to become. ‘We’ve only got one car.’

‘Don’t worry about me,’ Granny replied. ‘I’ll make my own way home.’

I wasn’t happy, but I accepted it. A second later I was skipping out of the hospital entrance, relieved to have escaped that dreary place. I really, really hoped I wouldn’t have to go back there the following day.

When I got up for breakfast Granny and Grandpa were waiting for me.

‘I’ve got some terrible news,’ Granny said, her eyes filled with tears. ‘Your mother . . .’ she paused. ‘Your mother died last night.’

As soon as the words left her lips, she slumped back as though she’d been building up to say them all morning. I took all of this in before the message hit home.

Died.

‘She’s dead?’ I couldn’t believe it. ‘Dead?’ The word sounded wrong even as I was saying it.

‘Yes, dear,’ Granny said and came over to hug me. I didn’t exactly push her away. I was just too shocked. Immobile through disbelief.

‘But there was nothing wrong with her,’ I spluttered.

Grandpa looked surprised. ‘She was very ill.’

‘No, she wasn’t,’ I insisted. ‘That was normal. She’s like that, then she gets up. Normal, see?’

But they didn’t see. They both shook their heads and Granny started crying. The more I protested, the more upset they both became. Whatever they’d planned for this moment, I don’t think it was working out.

‘She can’t be dead. It must be a mistake.’

‘There’s no mistake, dear,’ Granny said. ‘I was there when she left us.’ She wiped her eyes. ‘She’s gone. Really gone.’

Part of me wanted to rush down to the hospital and check for myself. Another part wanted to hare round the garden screaming. But yet another part wanted to gather up my satchel and set off for school. That was how my life worked: you got upset and you moved on. Things to do. Always things to do.

But I did none of those things. Looking back, Granny and Grandpa must have thought I had a heart of stone. But there was a reason I didn’t cry. It wasn’t because I hadn’t loved Mum. It was because I refused to accept she’d gone. It was all a big mistake, I was sure of it. Mum needed me to remain vigilant, to work out how to get her back. Crying wouldn’t help her or me.

In any case, the Beavises were not a crying family. I don’t know if Grandpa ever cried in his whole life; I certainly never saw him shed a tear over Mum. Even Granny would usually remove herself to her room when she became emotional.

Tears or not, there was a horribly subdued atmosphere at Tremola Avenue that morning. I spent most of it in my room, while Granny and Grandpa had visitors or spoke on the telephone. There was a lot to talk about. People had a lot of questions. But I just had one.

How can she be dead? I’ve seen her like that a hundred times.

That was what I couldn’t get over.

Time is a great healer, they say. That may be true, but time doesn’t explain anything. I had so many regrets about Mum’s death. More than thirty years later, they’re still with me, every minute of the day.

The thing is, no one ever told me my mother was dying. I’ve thought about this many, many times over the years and I can’t find it in me to blame my grandparents. They were doing what they thought was best. I was a child. Any responsible adult would have done the same thing. They were trying to protect me from the horrors of death. They could never have known that I’d been living with the spectre of mortality for years. In a way, the horrors of life had been far, far worse.

Whenever I think of the time I spent at the side of her hospital bed, I cringe. I’d seen Mum comatose so many times it wasn’t an event anymore. I’d lost count of the times she’d been unable to answer simple questions. On those days I just went out and played and returned when she’d perked up. Because she always perked up eventually. Not this time.

I felt almost embarrassed for not realizing what was going on. I’d looked at Mum’s limp and bloated body, grunting occasional utterances, and thought she was getting over a night out. In fact, her body was going through the final shutdown. One by one, her faculties were switching off. And I didn’t notice.

As the news of her passing began to sink in, I couldn’t believe how bored I’d been. If I’d known they were her last moments, what would I have done differently? I don’t know. But I would have felt different. I wouldn’t have been desperate to escape. I would have stayed, like Granny, holding her hand until the very end.

As it was, I never got to say goodbye. That was the hardest blow of all. When I’d skipped out of the ward, I hadn’t looked back. I just assumed she’d be there the next day. I couldn’t even remember my last words to her. I’d probably said them when we were still together at home. I was probably on my way to school or looking for my shoes, something mundane like that. Had I told her recently how much I loved her? I couldn’t remember. I should have done. I should have told her every day. I loved her so much, and maybe she never knew.

I didn’t even get the chance to say goodbye at her funeral either. Again, as was customary at the time, because of my age, I wasn’t allowed to go to church for the cremation service, although, as an adult, I have never missed visiting her memorial on the anniversary of her death. My last memory of Mum is her lying there, bloated and incoherent in that hospital bed. I wish I had closure, I truly do. I wish I remembered her in better times. But that was it. That’s the image that stayed with me for so long afterwards.

Three times I went to see her in hospital.
Three times
, and for a grand total of maybe a couple of hours. That was all the time I could spare. And she never did eat that bloody cake! That was something else that made me angry, illogically so. But it’s something I can smile about now. I can’t say that about many things from those days.

I was so stunned by Mum dying that it was a day or two before I asked how. I don’t think children contemplate causes of death that much. You’re either alive or you’re not. Knowing what killed someone doesn’t make their death any easier to bear. It’s a healthy way to think, actually. I wish adults could hold on to that simplicity of thought for longer.

Granny told me Mum had died from the cold. She’d been out, poorly dressed for the chilly spring night, and was found shivering and ill. She’d been taken to hospital and that’s when my grandparents had been called. She’d lasted two weeks.

I couldn’t work it out. I’d seen Mum cold many times. We’d both sat, freezing, in various flats and bedsits. I’d seen her breath come out of her mouth and her nails turn blue in our lounge. I’d never known that cold could kill people. Now I knew differently. Or so I thought.

I was eight years old when my mother died on 30 April 1978.

My father had left when I was two and I didn’t have a single memory of him. I didn’t know his name and I couldn’t have told you what he looked like. If he’d passed me in the street, I would have been none the wiser. To all intents and purposes, I was an orphan.

On the plus side, even at eight, I was mature enough to reason that at least I’d reached rock bottom.
Life can never be this bad again.
How wrong I was.