Chapter 3
Chapter three
“Gloria, you have to eat something.”
Patsy was the latest carer brave or desperate enough to take on the mission that was Gloria Slater. She pushed the tray back towards her.
“Listen to me, you useless half-wit,” Gloria sneered, hauling herself forward in the chair as far as she could. “I don’t take orders from the likes of you.” She picked up the plate. “You can take your bloody toast and shove it up your—”
“There is no need for that, Gloria.” Patsy snatched the plate from her before she could fling it. Twice last week, she’d taken one to the shoulder.
“Oh, piss off and leave me alone.”
“If only,” Patsy muttered, carrying the tray back towards the kitchen, already regretting agreeing to stay on for another two hours.
“What was that?” Gloria shouted after her. “If you’re not brave enough to say it out loud to my face, don’t say it at all.” She turned back to the television. “Bloody moron, acting all high and mighty just because she can still use both hands.”
She fumbled for the remote, turned the volume up, then wedged it down the side of the cushion where she could still reach it.
Countdown would be on soon. She used to enjoy it. Now she watched mostly out of habit…and because the theme tune got on Patsy’s nerves.
“Bloody toast for a mid-afternoon snack,” she grumbled. “What the hell is wrong with the woman?”
Something clattered in the kitchen. A mug put down too hard? A cupboard shut with more force than necessary, maybe?
Gloria smiled to herself.
“Won’t be long before you sod off too.”
A film was ending on the television, its credits rolling over a sweeping orchestral theme. Gloria’s gaze softened. For a moment, she barely noticed the untouched toast or the ache in her hip.
She remembered that music. She and Kenneth had seen the film at the Odeon when Joan was still a baby. It had rained on the walk home, and they’d laughed the whole way, talking about the future as if it were something generous and waiting for them.
She could still clearly picture that night.
Kenneth, with rain on his coat collar, smiling at her under the streetlights.
Joan at home with her mother, tiny and warm and milk-sweet, and all of life still ahead of them.
Back when a body was something you lived in without thinking.
Back when standing up, walking home, carrying your own child was the norm—none of it having felt temporary.
The credits ended. The spell went with them.
“Right, Gloria, time for your exercises,” Patsy said, coming back in with that bright voice carers used when they were trying not to scream. “Let’s do those seated leg lifts, shall we?”
Gloria’s mouth hardened. “I’ll do them when I’m ready. Not when you bark at me like a bloody dog.”
“Come on, Gloria, doctor’s orders.” Patsy folded her arms. “We want to keep you nice and strong, don’t we?”
“Don’t talk to me like I’m simple,” Gloria snapped. “I know what the doctor said. I was there, remember?”
Patsy let out a breath through her nose. “Suit yourself.”
Gloria turned back to the television, the softness gone. The rainy night with Kenneth dissolved beneath the ache in her bones and the humiliation of being managed. She gripped the arm of the chair and waited for Countdown to begin.
She wasn’t living the old age they’d once imagined for themselves. There was no dignity in it. No comfort. Just pain, dependence, and the slow humiliation of becoming a burden.
She hated every second of it.