Chapter 10 #4
He leapt up, shifting again to the bedroom, any place where she was not, and ran back towards the bedroom. She thought of Finn and considered for a second how lovely it might be to simply run away . . .
The boys had been at school for a whole week, and there had been little change.
It took all her resolve to remain upbeat and to keep momentum going on her job search.
She spent hours with her face inches from the laptop screen, firing off letters and applications to companies she thought might be hiring in the future.
The money had dwindled to two grubby twenty-pound notes and a handful of coins.
To think about the situation caused her to nearly choke and made sleep damn near impossible.
As she waved across the street to Lucia one morning and considered the girl’s love of art and the advice she had given her, Nina had a light-bulb moment.
And there was only one person she wanted to share her realisation with.
She climbed into her jeans and boots and pulled a sweatshirt over her pyjama top before locking the door and tramping the pavements, heading towards The Bear.
She covered the two miles with a small seed of hope growing in her gut.
After ringing the doorbell, she stood back, looking up at the lattice windows of the flat above that showed no sign of life.
‘You’re a bit early, love!’ a man called from the passenger seat of a white van that drove past. She nodded a small smile in his direction.
When she turned again to the front door, Tiggy was there in her pyjamas and dressing gown.
Her hair was mussed and her cheek held a faint line of a pillowslip crease.
‘Have I woken you up?’
Tiggy looked at her, with one eye still clamped shut, and nodded. ‘Tell me this is a matter of great urgency.’
‘Not really, but it’s quite important to me.’ She put her hands in her pockets.
‘It had better not be about a cushion you’ve found in a charity shop.’
‘No! I’m sorry. I forgot that you have very late nights.’
‘Is everything okay with the boys?’ Tiggy now had both eyes open.
‘Yes! Well, I think so. They haven’t been expelled yet, so that’s something. Mind you’ – she glanced at her watch – ‘there’s still plenty of hours left in the day for that. Can I come in?’
‘Sure.’ Tiggy stood back. Nina walked past her, watching as her sister secured the bolts and relocked the door.
Her eyes roamed the spacious bar. It was as she remembered it from her last visit two years ago, with its wooden floor, clusters of tables and red-velvet-backed chairs, all looking rather forlorn and abandoned in the early hours of the day.
Large lanterns hung down near a vast, brick-built inglenook fireplace.
The scent of stale beer and floor wax hung in the air; blindfolded, no one would be in any doubt that they were in a typical, slightly run-down English boozer.
‘So how are the boys doing? I’ve been thinking about them. How much did they love knocking down that wall?’
‘A lot!’ Nina smiled. ‘They’re still a little edgy, nervous.
Dec had an upset tum on his first day, poor little thing, and Connor perpetually looks like he wants to kill me, but they are definitely calmer than they were.
Slowly, slowly, and all that . . .’ She looked skywards and crossed her fingers.
‘Would you like a drink?’
‘God, no! Are you kidding?’ Nina waved her hand. ‘It’s way too early for me.’
‘Jesus, Nina, I meant coffee!’
‘Oh, coffee would be great, I thought you meant . . .’
‘It’s nice to see you here.’ Tiggy stated as she reached up onto the shelf for two white china cups.
Nina looked around. ‘I like this pub.’
‘Thanks. I like it too.’
‘And actually, taking control and getting back on my feet is what I wanted to talk to you about.’ She bit her bottom lip excitedly.
‘Go on.’ The welcome smell of coffee brewing filled the air.
‘I was talking to Lucia – pink-hair Lucia?’
‘Oh, right, yup. I know who you mean,’ Tiggy said.
‘I wanted to tell her it was important to live her life and follow her dreams, but that advice feels very easy to give out and not always that easy to follow.’
Tiggy grimaced. ‘It is hard, otherwise I’d be working on the Space Station right about now.’
‘So I am going to follow my dreams. I am going to go back to school. Not now, but eventually, part-time evening and weekends, or whenever I can fit it in. I am going to sit my exams and I am going to become a nurse.’
‘Oh my word, that’s big news!’
‘I think so. It might take ten years, longer even, but I am going to do it. And just making the decision feels like a big step towards my future. I am going to have a career so that I can take better care of me and the kids.’
‘You always used to want to be a nurse. I remember when you were little, turning the couch into a hospital with your teddies and dolls lying in rows, with tissues stuck to their limbs as bandages,’ Tiggy said.
‘I remember that too. I lost my way with that, stepped off the path, but it’s not too late for me. For us. You are right, Tig, I have decades of work left in me yet.’
‘Wow.’ Tiggy looked at her squarely.
‘Is that good wow, or you-must-be-crazy wow?’ She cowered a little, awaiting her sister’s response.
‘It’s . . .’ Tiggy was clearly searching for the right words. ‘My-little-sister-just-might-have-walked-back-into-the-room wow!’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, really.’
Her chest swelled at the compliment; it was good to know her big sister thought this.
‘I think about when you were young and first left school. You were bursting with energy for life and . . .’
‘And what?’ Nina wondered which words now faltered in Tiggy’s throat.
‘I don’t know . . . A drive, I guess, that made you seem invincible. That was when you went with Dad to Bath. I couldn’t believe you opted to go with him. But nothing fazed you.’
‘As I recall, you didn’t want to come. You were in love with what’s-his-name,’ Nina said.
‘Dad was relieved, I think.’
‘Oh for goodness’ sake, you were twenty-odd, Tiggy. And Dad adored you, did everything he could for us. For you . . .’
Her sister sighed. ‘Really?’ She folded her arms over her chest.
‘Yes, really! I went with Dad to Bath so he wouldn’t be alone.
I knew he’d spent lonely periods of his life wandering the UK after he lost Mamma, working wherever the next dead-end job took him, and I could see he wasn’t well.
I didn’t want to leave you here, and you could have come, but you were keen on Ross Baker at the time and didn’t want to.
’ The boy’s name sprang into her head. ‘I remember it clearly. You chose Ross-bloody-Baker over us!’
‘Yep, and look where that has got me! I didn’t get the life we had always dreamed of, the fairy tale, I got to stay here in bloody Portswood, sitting with Gran and Pop and scrabbling enough cash together to go out and snog boys like Ross Baker outside Jesters.
And then after they died, it was just me. ’
‘I hate to think of you unhappy here on your own,’ Nina said.
‘I wasn’t really on my own. I have always had mates, and a job, people around, you know?’
Nina nodded, wishing Tiggy didn’t always feel the need to be so brave. ‘But it would have been better to have me here, though, right?’
Tiggy ran her tongue over her bottom lip, as if deciding whether to speak frankly again. ‘Yes. Yes, it would.’
‘Thank you.’ Nina felt a little overcome. ‘Thank you, Tig, for saying that. It makes me happy.’
The two sipped their coffee and Nina followed her sister up the narrow, winding staircase to Tiggy’s room.
It was spacious, and well fitted with a bed at one end and a sofa and TV at the other, but it was still just a room.
The bathroom she shared with the landlord was down the hall.
Nina realised that the flat she and the boys lived in, that she had bemoaned on countless occasions to her sister, was spacious in comparison, and she felt a pang of guilt. She took a seat on the unmade bed.
Her mobile phone rang. She fumbled for it in her pocket, racing to answer it, fearing it might be from the boys’ new school. She squinted at the screen – she didn’t know the number.
‘Nina?’
‘Yes, hello?’ She vaguely recognised the voice on the other end of the line but couldn’t quite place it.
‘It’s Fiona Walters, from Celandine Court.’
‘Oh, Fiona!’ Nina gripped the phone and waited, trying to imagine why she would call. Maybe Nina had inadvertently broken the law in turning up unannounced. Her mind raced at all the unlikely possibilities.
‘I hope you don’t mind me calling, but I wanted to talk to you about something.’
‘Yes, I . . . I quite understand, and I am so sorry for turning up like I did. I’m more than a little embarrassed,’ she stuttered, nerves filling her stomach with butterflies.
‘I . . . I didn’t think it through.’ She closed her eyes and faced the bedroom wall, as if this might give her a bit of privacy from Tiggy, who stood only feet away.
‘No, no need to apologise, and please don’t feel embarrassed. But safe to say you aren’t the cook we are looking for.’
‘That much I know.’
‘But I do think I have a role that might suit you, if you are interested.’
Nina felt her heart race. ‘Oh my God! Really?’
‘Yes, really. You were wonderful around the residents. Very relaxed and tactful. A natural. It’s a real gift you have, and I would like to talk to you about an opportunity that I have been thinking about for a while.’
‘Oh my! I really am interested!’ She couldn’t disguise her shock or delight.
‘Come in and see me this afternoon – shall we say about two? – and we can chat some more. How does that sound?’
‘That sounds great!’ She felt the prick of the second batch of happy tears in recent weeks.
‘I’ll see you then, Nina.’
‘See you then, and . . . Fiona?’
‘Yes?’
‘Thank you! Thank you so much.’
Nina put the phone back in her pocket and turned to her sister. ‘Looks like I might have got myself a job!’ She jumped from the bed. Tiggy came to join her and they leapt up and down on the worn carpet, laughing and whooping.
‘What job is it?’ Tiggy paused to ask.
‘I have no idea!’ She giggled. ‘But right now, I will literally take anything.’
Nina couldn’t wait for the boys to come home from school so she could share her news. The second she heard them on the path outside, she ran to the front door, greeting them with a wide smile.
‘Guess what? I got a job!’ She clapped her hands, rushing forward, giving them the answer to her question before they had a chance to respond, and sweeping them both into a hug from which they struggled to escape.
‘Really?’ Declan asked, not hiding his incredulity.
‘Yes! Really!’
‘What job is it?’ Connor asked, dumping his school bag on the floor in the kitchen. He leaned against the fridge, long legs crossed at the ankles.
‘You are looking at the new Resident Liaison Contact for Celandine Court!’ She held her arms out like a showman.
‘Is that the old people’s home where you said you could cook, and then ran away?’ Declan asked.
‘Yes!’ She laughed. ‘The very same.’
‘It’s an impressive title, but what does it actually mean?’ Connor queried.
Fiona had leaned across the desk. ‘You would be showing prospective families around, giving them the tour and answering any questions they might have.’
‘I could do that!’ she enthused.
‘Yes, you could, once we have got you up to speed on how the place works.’
She smiled at her boys, still not quite able to believe it.
‘I’ll be overseeing the orientation programme for new residents, and when I am not doing that, I will be spending a few hours each day checking everyone is happy, chatting to visiting families, sorting any on-the-spot queries.
And most importantly, I will be on the lookout for loneliness, and those who might be feeling anxious or excluded, kind of like a daily happiness health check.
That way my boss, Fiona, can spend more time in the office dealing with the paperwork mountain that she never quite defeats,’ she quoted.
‘Are there that many vacancies, then? How often will you show people around?’
‘Weekly. There is always a waiting list. And yes, Con, there are that many vacancies.’ She paused. ‘The residents are old and often ill.’ She let this hang.
‘Oh!’ She could see the realisation dawning on him as to why there was such a high turnover.
‘It has a great atmosphere. I felt it again today when I went to chat with Fiona – that’s my boss.’ Nina looked at her boys. ‘My boss! Oh my God, it feels so good to be able to say that! You have no idea!’
‘You sound happy, Mum,’ Declan observed.
‘I am, darling. And if all goes well, I have decided to study, too. I want to go into nursing, eventually. It’s something that has always appealed to me, but I thought the chance had passed me by.’
‘That’s great, Mum,’ Connor offered sincerely.
Nina felt her face split into a broad smile once again.
She felt she was able to breathe again. ‘And it’s the ideal location.
I can walk there or jump on the bus if the weather is bad.
’ She beamed with joy at the fact that, not only would she be earning money, but also someone thought she had ‘a gift’, no less!
‘Are you going to earn a lot of money?’ Declan got straight down to practicalities.
‘You know what? As I said to Tig earlier, I have been earning no money, and so any money is an improvement. It will be enough for our rent and food and other little bits and pieces we might need. I shall still have to budget, but that’s fine. We will have all we need. We will have enough.’
‘That’s great,’ Declan said.
‘I am so excited,’ Nina continued. ‘But also overwhelmed. What if I’m rubbish and they sack me?’ She looked at Connor with a flutter of self-doubt.
Connor stared at her. ‘Dad always said you shouldn’t let yourself be limited by what you think you can or can’t do. You should believe that you can do anything you set your mind to.’
Nina laid her hand on her son’s arm, happy that her boy could mention his dad without the flicker of sadness in his pupils. This was progress. ‘That sounds like good advice.’
Connor looked at her squarely. ‘I am pleased for you. Pleased for us. Congratulations.’
‘Thank you.’
He smiled at her with an expression that looked a lot like pride.