Queenie(30)

“I’m no stranger to heartache, you know,” she told me. “You need to get over it, Queenie. Life goes on.”

“You’ve been with Granddad since you were fourteen,” I said. “If there’s anyone who has never known heartbreak, it’s you.”

She kissed her teeth. “You must think you know everything. Your granddad got me pregnant when I was fourteen. Not even Diana’s age!” Maggie’s teenage daughter. “Then he disappeared, and I was left in Jamaica with Maggie, living with Gran-Gran.” My grandmother paused. “I fell in love with a man. He was very kind to me. Always met me at the end of the lane and helped me to carry the sugarcane up to the house. Albert, his name was.”

She put the wet washcloth on her lap and watched as the water seeped into her apron. She started to wring her hands, her fingers settling on her wedding ring.

“Albert loved Maggie as much as he loved me. It was a secret, of course. He looked after us, for two years. I couldn’t tell Gran-Gran about him.” My grandmother laughed. “She almost killed me when I got pregnant, and I couldn’t shame her twice by bringing another man into the house. But Albert, he was everything. He was funny, he was generous, used to listen to me.” She paused to sigh heavily. “He gave me this necklace one day. He’d saved up for the gold, and he’d made it himself. A V, for Veronica. He was so proud to give it to me. Every day he waited at the end of the lane for me.”

“Well, what happened to him? And to the necklace? Also, have you seen Titanic? This sounds a lot li—”

“Your granddad came back. Turns out he’d been over here finding work, squatting in a bedsit in Mitcham and saving some money. He came to Gran-Gran’s house one night, told me that he was taking me and Maggie to London, and two days later we were on the plane. A year later I was pregnant with your mother.”

“And what happened to Albert?”

“I don’t know. I couldn’t ask anybody about him because nobody knew about us. So, you see. We all know heartbreak. We just have to learn to live with it.”

She lifted the cloth and carried on scrubbing my back, her movements softer than before.



* * *



I woke up in the middle of the night. I was half-asleep and I could see a man standing in the corner. I tried to shout, but nothing would come out. He was moving closer. I tried to shout again. “NO!” I finally screamed, falling out of the bed.

“Queenie?” My grandmother flew into the room, her nightie billowing behind her like a cape. “What is it? Wh’appen?”

“Sorry, it’s nothing. Nothing.” I climbed back into bed and put a hand to my chest. My heart was pounding.

“The nightmares,” she said knowingly. “Tek water.” She gestured to the glass by my bed, and shuffled back into her room. I couldn’t sleep, so checked my phone. Two texts from Darcy.

Darcy

Nosy man on floor hovering around your desk. Quite fit. Big glasses. Tweed jacket.



Darcy

Hold on is he Tweed Glasses??





* * *



I went to work the next day physically cleaner than I’d ever been. Brain still tired from eschewing thoughts of Ted, heart still sore every time I thought about Tom. How much more time did he need? How much time did I need? I was beginning to worry that if things didn’t go back to normal soon, my mind would go to places that I wouldn’t be able to retrieve it from. Anyway. I wouldn’t think about that. Surely, surely everything would be fine.



* * *



Later that week, when I made it to my desk by way of the cafeteria and the smoking area and before I could sit down, Gina came over to tell me that she’d been watching me and Darcy “gasbagging” from her office. I apologized and vowed (truthfully) to spend more time at my desk during working hours and less time literally everywhere else, pulled my chair out to sit down, and disrupted a parcel that fell on the floor.

I picked it up and opened it, pulling out a tartan scarf. I put it on and started to walk over to Darcy’s desk. Gina was coming toward me.

“No. Queenie. Back to your desk. Do something, please. You haven’t filed the weekend’s listings yet and it’s Friday, come on.” She turned me around by the shoulders and gently pushed me toward my section of the floor. “You can talk to her at lunchtime.” I dragged myself through the morning, and at 11:59 a.m. went over to Darcy.

“God, Gina is all over the place recently,” I bitched, feeling bad and obscenely hypocritical, given that I was even more all over the place. “One day she’s nice, the next she ignores me, today she’s having a go at me. I can’t keep up. Was it always this bad?”

“No,” Darcy confirmed. “I think she’s having some proble—”

“Oh!” I interrupted, fanning the scarf out around me and spinning around in a mock twirl. “Thank you for this!”

“For what?” Darcy asked.

“The scarf.”

“It’s nice. Looks almost exactly like the old one. But it’s not from me,” she said, standing up and rummaging around in her pockets.

“You were with me when I lost it, at the fireworks display.” My arms fell to my sides. Knowing I couldn’t afford to replace it myself, she probably didn’t want to make a big thing out of it.