Chapter 20
Fern at home:
Soft pink cords
White lace collared blouse
Pink Shetland wool cardigan
Pearl earrings
Dainty gold watch
It was never an easy journey for Annie to get out of the snarl of late-in-the-day traffic and onto the motorway east to go and visit her mother.
But twice a week, she made it. And twice a week her sister Dinah made it too.
So their mum, who had live-in care, felt as loved and well taken care of in her old age as Annie and Dinah had been in their childhood.
Annie loved, loved, loved her mother, a fiercely proud, independent, encouraging, interfering, infuriating, constant in her life.
She couldn’t think when Fern (she and Dinah sometimes called her by her first name amongst themselves) had ever let her down.
Their dad had left – or more likely been booted out – when they were small and Fern, their stalwart, their bread-winning chiropodist mum had recovered remarkably quickly.
She had taken charge of everything and worked tirelessly.
With the help of a no-nonsense childminder, she brought Annie and Dinah up and even wangled scholarships for them to one of London’s smartest girls’ schools.
As adults, Annie and Dinah had found that Fern interfered in the best kind of ways in their lives.
She gave sensible and honest advice. She was a lovely grandma, who gave thoughtful, well-chosen gifts and had been such a reliable presence in their lives.
There at parties and gatherings, endlessly trying to matchmake Annie with a new man, when her first husband had died suddenly.
Yes, Fern had never, ever let them down.
But the thing that had happened quite slowly over the past few years was that’s Fern clever, hard-working brain – the one that had provided all that sensible advice, all those clever income-boosting schemes and unconditional love – that brain was now letting her down.
She wasn’t ‘gone’ but she wasn’t her full, vibrant, no-nonsense vital self. She was fading.
Sometimes she forgot small things and got very upset, sometimes she forgot big important things but hardly seemed to notice at all.
The erosion of her memory and her thought processes was just endlessly sad, especially to her daughters, who would have given anything to have her around, the way she once was.
And Annie often wondered if she’d really appreciated her mother to the full, ten years ago, even five years ago, when she was still vital and fully in charge of her life.
She wished she’d spent more time with her and that they’d done more things together that she could look back on and remember.
But she’d been caught up in the swirl of busy family life and trying to build her career.
And she reminded herself, even in retirement, her mother had been busy, too, filling her days with friends, day trips, gardening, redecorating, and trips abroad with her two besties.
She’d always seemed content, never lonely.
So, maybe Annie didn’t need to feel so guilty, but still there was this feeling that the time left was limited and was she making enough of it.
Once people were fading, or once they were gone – that was always the regret you were left with: if only we’d had more time together.
She’s still here! she told herself firmly, she’s not dead yet!
There were still long chatty cups of tea to be drunk together, and trips to the garden centre to be had.
Annie would take Fern out Christmas shopping in the months ahead, maybe even a trip into London together…
to The Store even… or Liberty. Her mother had always loved Liberty.
And Fern would come to theirs for one weekend every month and for three or four days over Christmas.
There were still many happy times ahead she reminded herself.
The traffic stopped and Annie found her lipstick in her handbag.
As she applied it carefully and patted the skin under her eyes dry, she let the music from the car radio lift her heart.
She pulled her shoulders back and smiled at her reflection in the mirror.
Her mum was still here. There was every reason to be happy and to make the most of today.
* * *
‘Hello, my darling, so what are we going to do today?’ were Annie’s words of greeting as she hugged her mum tightly and followed her into the kitchen, where her carer, Rosalia, was setting teacups and a plate of biscuits onto a tray.
‘We’re having tea in the sitting room, aren’t we, Rosalia?’ Fern replied. Rosalia smiled and confirmed. Then Fern added, ‘Then we’ll talk about the big show, Annie, and how you will have some clothes from me.’
‘Tea sounds lovely and I am loving the look of those biscuits! Absolutely famished. Been about five hours since anything passed my lips.’ Rosalia immediately offered to make her a sandwich, but Annie refused this saying the biscuits would keep her going until she and Fern had dinner together later in the evening.
‘What do you mean we’re going to get clothes from you?’ Annie asked her mum as she ushered her out of the kitchen and into the sitting room while Rosalia followed with the tea tray.
‘Yes… for your show,’ Fern said, settling down into her favourite armchair, a comfortable upright covered in a cream and pink rose strewn chintz.
Laura Ashley, Annie thought, her mum had bought it not long after she and then Dinah had left home.
She must have enjoyed having more money to herself, wanted to buy herself a comfortable little treat.
Annie ran her observant eyes all over the beloved lady, approaching the eighty mark, in front of her.
Fern, who used to be a stocky, bustling figure, had lost weight over the past two years and had begun to look much more like the little old lady that she was.
She was neatly dressed, as always, in a pair of soft pink cord trousers, a pretty blouse and a pink cardigan.
She coordinated with her chair, Annie thought with a smile.
Fern’s hair was a white bob, shorter and thinner than it had been in the past. In fact, around her face it looked a little wispy.
The weight… gone. The hair… thinning. Fern’s eyesight… dimming along with her memory.
It felt as if she was leaving Annie quietly, in stages, as if she didn’t want the exit to be sudden, or dramatic, she was going to just very quietly fade away, bit by bit.
Annie blinked away the tears that were threatening, took a fortifying gulp of tea and smiled a little harder.
‘I love the idea of your own fashion show, Annie. You are so talented, you deserve every success,’ Fern said.
‘Oh, it’s not really my show,’ Annie jumped in, ‘Svetlana is the brainchild, the main event. She’s set it all in motion. I’m just her glorified helper, really.’
Fern fixed her daughter with a kind look. ‘I love the idea of the show. A charity show, to help women move on in their lives. You will be wonderful, my darling. And I’m going to give you some clothes. Come on, help me up and I’ll show you what Rosalia and I have laid out upstairs.’
So, holding her mother’s arm, Annie guided her up the stairs into her neat little bedroom where a selection of clothes and accessories were laid out over the bed.
‘You and Rosalia sorted this out for me?’ Annie asked, feeling very touched.
Fern nodded and sat herself down on the edge of the bed. ‘That was lovely of you.’
‘I hardly wear anything in my wardrobe any more,’ Fern confided. ‘You and Dinah and…’ now came the momentary pause that suggested the wheels were turning, ‘the girls,’ she settled on, ‘come and take what you want. Leave me with my gardening clothes and practical things.’
‘Mum!’ Annie protested. ‘There are so many parties and Christmases and ladies who lunch events ahead. You’ll need more than just your gardening clothes.’ Fern held out her hand to show that she wanted Annie to take hold of it.
‘Yes,’ she said gently, ‘parties and Christmases. Best to leave a few nice things in the wardrobe. But these…’ she gestured to the pile on the bed. ‘These can go now. To your fashion charity… charity fashion… you know,’ she said with a sigh of effort.
‘I know,’ Annie said and kissed her gently on the top of her head.
Annie cast her eye over the items that had been carefully laid out.
She picked up a lovely camel coat that she remembered helping her mother to buy years ago in John Lewis…
a friend’s daughter’s wedding, she remembered.
Yes, there had been a time… fifteen, twenty years ago when Fern seemed to go to at least one wedding a month as all her friend’s children got married.
The last five years had been much more sombre, as Fern attended one funeral a month as those friends, who’d been planning weddings and partying, just a few short decades ago, all began to pass away.
‘Charcoal grey,’ Annie remembered her mother instructing on a shopping trip a few years ago, ‘I’d like a soft charcoal grey coat for funerals.
Black is so draining on the complexion, even if you’re a bottle blonde like me.
’ ‘With a soft lilac scarf,’ Annie remembered advising, ‘everyone needs a little soft comfort and a soothing colour close to hand at a funeral.’
‘This is a gorgeous coat, Mum,’ she told Fern now. ‘I don’t think I can let you give this away. I remember us buying it together… for a wedding…’
Fern glanced over but just gave a little dismissive wave of her hand. ‘Oh… too heavy,’ she said. ‘I like my little quilt… quilted… one.’