His & Hers(22)

It’s a brick-built Victorian two-up two-down, with an extension tagged on the end like a twentieth-century afterthought. Our house always used to look like a nice home, even when it stopped feeling like one. Not anymore. I squeeze past the stacks of boxes, until I reach the door that leads to the rear of the building. It squeaks in protest when I open it, and the smell is considerably worse. It hits the back of my throat, and I gag when my mind speculates on what might be causing it.

I pass the stairs, walk through what still resembles a dining room—despite the boxes on the table—and do my best not to trip over anything in the dark. I spot Mum’s old record player on the dresser in the corner, covered in a thick layer of dust. Even when I tried to introduce her to cassettes and CDs, she insisted on sticking with vinyl. I caught her sometimes, dancing around the room with her arms held out, as though she were waltzing with an invisible man.

I reach the kitchen, turn on the light, and my hand automatically comes up to cover my mouth. Dirty plates coated in uneaten food, along with half-drunk cups of tea, litter every available surface. There are a couple of lazy-looking flies, buzzing around what might once have been a microwavable lasagna. It is not like my mother to eat ready meals. She rarely ate anything we didn’t grow in our own garden and would rather go hungry than eat fast food.

The smell is a little overwhelming now. When I manage to look up from all the filth and mess in the kitchen, I see the glow of the TV out in the sunroom right at the back of the house. It’s the place where she always most liked to sit, with the best view of her beloved garden.

I see her then, sitting in her favorite armchair in front of the television, a bag of knitting on the floor by her side. My mother always preferred making things herself: food, clothes, me. Years ago, she helped me knit a Harry Potter scarf for Jack. It was strange and surreal to see him still wearing it today.

I take a step closer and see that she is smaller than I remembered, as though life has made her shrink. Her gray hair has thinned and there are hollow shapes where there used to be rosy cheeks. The clothes she is wearing look dirty and too big, and the buttons on her cardigan are done up incorrectly, so that one side of the white bobbled material looks longer than the other. It’s covered in faded embroidered bees, and I remember buying it for her a long time ago—a last-minute birthday present. I’m surprised she still has it. I glance at the TV screen and see that she has been watching the BBC News Channel, as though hoping to catch a glimpse of me in the background. I knew she did that, but to see it makes me feel even worse than before.

She isn’t watching now.

Her eyes are closed and her mouth is slightly open.

I take a step closer, and memories I locked away a long time ago start to stir. I shake my head, as though trying to silence them before they get too loud. It isn’t just the mess in the kitchen that stinks, it’s her. She smells of body odor, piss, and something else I can’t quite put my finger on. Or am choosing not to.

“Mum?” I whisper.

She doesn’t answer.

Memories are shapeshifters. Some bend, some twist, and some shrivel and die over time. But our worst ones never leave us.

“Mum?” I say her name a little louder, but she still doesn’t answer or open her eyes.

I have rehearsed my mother’s death in my imagination for years. Not because I wanted her to die; it was just something that happened from time to time inside my head. I don’t know whether other daughters do that too—it isn’t the sort of thing people talk about—but now that it might be happening for real, I know I’m not ready.

I reach out, then hesitate before touching her hand. When I do, her fingers are icy cold. I lean down, until my face is next to hers, trying to see whether she is breathing. Despite the pills, the pain in my head is so bad now that I briefly close my eyes, and it feels as though I fall back in time.

I hear a scream and it is several seconds before I realize that it is my own.





Him



Tuesday 10:10



My own memories of this place in the past invade my present.

I watch Anna stand outside the house she grew up in, and it’s as though the years fall away and I’m seeing a little girl. I could get out of the car right now and stop her, but I don’t. Sometimes you have to let things play out, no matter how unpleasant. I already know what she is going to find inside, and I feel horrible about it. I also know that she has her own key, but watch as she bends down to take the spare one from under the flowerpot, before disappearing behind the peeling front door.

The cottage used to be beautiful, but, a bit like the woman inside, it has not aged well. Anna’s mother was a woman who knew how to make a house a home, and it was always by far the nicest cottage on the lane. Picture perfect. At least on the outside. People used to actually stop and take photos because it looked like a doll’s house with its pretty little front yard, window boxes, and white picket fence. Nobody stops to take photos of it anymore.

But, back then, she was so good at cleaning, tidying, and making a place feel cozy, that she did it for a living. Anna’s mum cleaned for half the village for over twenty years—including the house where I live now—and she didn’t just clean. She’d buy little scented candles and flowers and leave them in people’s homes. Occasionally she’d bake a bunch of brownies and leave them on the kitchen table. She even babysat my sister from time to time too. Sometimes, it was just the way she made the bed, or plumped the pillows, but you always knew when Mrs. Andrews had paid a visit. She was never short of work or references.