Chapter 3
A Grey October Day at Selham Railway Station
This time, I find myself back at Selham railway station, that cold October afternoon just a few weeks ago, watching myself sitting on a rickety bench just moments before my life was about to implode.
I like Selham railway station. It’s like stepping back in time, one that’s confined only by the limits of your imagination.
You see, there are no trains here. In fact the last one went through several decades ago, making it the perfect place to sit, daydreaming about how things used to be.
I was lost in nostalgia that afternoon, gazing at the track overgrown with brambles, the platforms lost under banks of bracken; the air carrying echoes of trysts and assignations – if only I knew how to listen to them.
Of course, I can see now, it didn’t actually start that day.
I mean, what happens in our lives is usually the consequence of everything that’s gone before.
And what was about to happen that day had so far remained invisible.
It was also unexpected; filtering in like the softest whisper of a breeze – or something less perceptible than a whisper, because that afternoon, I was completely and blissfully unaware that anything in my life was about to change.
Don’t get me wrong. I liked my life. But just for a moment, as I sat there, I wished I could peel back the veil of time, slip through it into a ghostly carriage of one of those trains and let it speed me back through the years to a time when nothing bad ever happened, when my mum and Lizzie were still here.
Losing my mum was one thing. But three months ago, Lizzie died too, stranding me at a derelict station, without a signpost. That’s what sisters are, aren’t they? Guiding stars, signposts?
I knew what Lizzie would have said. Stop looking back, Tilly! You can’t change the past. It’s about the future… Now the twins have grown up, you could have an adventure! Think about it. What do you really want from your life?
Lizzie’s belief in following her heart led her to embark on many adventures.
But in my ordered life, responsibility won out over impulsiveness.
And I was the one everyone needed. I was a wife and mother.
My widowed father’s helpful daughter. There was my part-time job as a legal assistant with a fairly smart law firm.
In other words, I was one of those people whose role in life was to be a hub.
The holder of many threads leading to other lives, which floated around me like vibrant, multicoloured balloons, as I liked to think of them.
In my case, mostly male ones. Gareth’s, for example.
The twins, even though they were away at uni and hardly ever came home.
My crotchety father’s. But it gave me a sense of purpose in my life.
Since Lizzie’s death, Rick had become another.
Rick was her broken-hearted husband. He hadn’t expected to lose his wife any more than I was ready to lose my sister, but men don’t cope with loss as well as women do.
My father was a case in point. His life locked down, never to evolve after my mother left this world.
It meant that now, he depended on me. But it was kind of how it was meant to be, wasn’t it?
I mean, when our parents raised us, it was only fair that as they got older, we were there for them.
But while Lizzie was the shining star in his life, the looking-after role had fallen to me. I glanced at the dying bouquet abandoned on the platform, that was once a joyous declaration of love; the withered flowers a reminder. Nothing lasts.
Shivering, I pulled my jacket more tightly around me. Then as I gazed across towards the trees, the barely perceptible breeze suddenly became a powerful gust sending a swirl of golden leaves cascading around me, before they settled again and the first raindrops started to fall.
The rain rapidly became a downpour and as I drove home, I was still thinking about Lizzie.
The bright, vivacious, go-getting one, she started an interior design business in her twenties that went from strength to strength; had a gorgeous husband who adored her.
They’d never had children – Lizzie was younger than me; parenthood consigned to a future that neither of them dared to imagine wouldn’t happen, both of them believing time was open ended.
But even the best planned futures could go off-piste.
On reaching the house, I ran inside and closed the back door behind me.
The rain was lashing against the windows and standing for a moment, I looked around our kitchen that was an homage to Lizzie’s design skills with an artfully battered wooden table and pale floor tiles, the walls painted white, bold splashes of green and blue from carefully chosen pieces of china.
On the table were the scores of cards that had kept arriving since Lizzie died, holding anecdotes and memories of the sister I wanted to remember from before her illness; triggering memories of our childhood, our parents, how our lives used to be when we were younger.
Looking at them, I suddenly felt much older than my forties. At least you’d never know how that feels, Lizzie… Being old and rather pointless. Though not entirely so because as I sat there, my mobile rang and Dad’s number appeared on the screen.
‘Hi, Dad. How are you?’
‘I’m er… I’m not calling about me. It’s the cat.’
It was Lizzie’s idea for Dad to have a cat after Mum died. Another heartbeat in the house, was how she put it. And Dad was rather taken with Moses. He just wasn’t terribly practical about cat ownership. A sense of alarm filled me. ‘What’s wrong with him?’
‘He’s had, um… a bit of an accident. On the carpet. I don’t have a clue what to do about it.’
Can’t you clean it up, Dad? But knowing he wouldn’t know where to start, I don’t say that. Forgetting my plans to start repainting the kitchen a bright and cheery shade of yellow, I sighed. ‘Would you like me to come over?’
He paused. ‘If you wouldn’t mind.’
* * *
There was resentment in my heart as I drove through the pouring rain – for the second time that afternoon.
I wish I didn’t, but I did fricking mind, so much… Driving fricking six miles to clean up my dad’s cat’s shit. In this shitty weather. When I’d rather have been at home sipping a cup of tea and leafing through Lizzie’s cards again.
But in a million years, I would never have told him that. ‘Hi, Dad.’ My voice was bright when he opened the door. I kissed him on the cheek. ‘What’s Moses been up to?’
‘I’ll show you.’ I followed Dad along the hallway into the small room that for as long as I could remember had been his study, the smell getting stronger with each step.
‘There.’ He pointed to the carpet where alongside what was clearly cat shit, there was evidence of sick, too, squodged into the carpet.
He looked slightly apologetic. ‘I think the door went over it.’
I went to the kitchen, gathered disinfectant and a bucket of hot water, then pulled on rubber gloves as I made a start.
But he wasn’t even grateful; just stood there saying, ‘You missed a bit,’ as I scrubbed the fricking carpet, on my knees.
‘Do you have time for a cup of tea?’ he asked when I’ve finished scrubbing.
I had a brief cuppa with him, during which I suggested he made sure Moses spent more time outside.
‘But he won’t go,’ my father said glumly. ‘Moses doesn’t like the rain.’
Which I understood; nor did I. But I liked cleaning up after him even less. ‘Maybe you should think about putting down a cat litter tray.’ I got up. ‘Thanks for the tea. I should get home and change,’ I said, the smell of cat shit still lingering in my nostrils.
Why me? I was silently fuming as I drove home. Two hours of my life down the drain, cleaning up cat puke and shit that somehow ended up on me, too, so that now I stank, too, and so did my car. Then guilt washed over me, for feeling so resentful.
But back at home, after a hot shower, I felt better.
More so as I poured myself a restorative glass of white wine and started to make a risotto; for the hundredth time, wishing Lizzie was here as I heard the front door open, then close, before Gareth walked in.
I pinned on a smile. ‘Hi.’ I tried to assume the bright demeanour everyone expected to see from me.
But for whatever reason, today it felt false.
‘Hi.’ He stood there for a moment, his hair plastered to his head, his jacket damp from the rain.
‘Hi,’ I said again, cheerfully. ‘How was your day?’
But he didn’t respond, just glanced at the pile of sympathy cards as he took his jacket off, a look of irritation crossing his face. ‘Don’t you think it’s time you put those things away? It’s been three months, Tilly. You must know every word by heart.’
Dragging my eyes away from the cards, I met his. ‘The messages are beautiful. People wrote such nice things – it brings memories back. Three months isn’t very long. In any case, I only got home a little while ago. Dad summoned me to clear up – after the cat.’ I rolled my eyes for comedic effect.
But instead of sympathising, he sighed. ‘It isn’t just that.’
Something about the way he spoke made my blood chill. I watched him as he turned away. ‘What do you mean?’ Suddenly he had my undivided attention.
Coming over to the table, he sighed. ‘I was hoping it had been enough time, Tilly – because we need to talk.’ His voice was quiet, a note of sadness in it that tugged at my heartstrings.
Pulling out a chair, he hung his jacket over it, then sat down.
‘I’ve been waiting for the right moment.
I thought by now…’ Glancing at the pile of cards again, he shook his head.
‘I thought you might have started to move on.’
The strangest feeling came over me. It wasn’t the fact that three months was nothing when you’d lost your sister.
It was more as though I felt removed; that in the most bizarre way, I was somehow watching myself.
That I knew what he was going to say before he said it, as in his next breath, he told me he never meant it to happen. But…
I looked at him, stunned. ‘You’ve met someone?’ The words sank in; snaking slowly, nauseously inside me.
Gareth’s sigh was heavy, his face guilt-stricken. ‘You have to believe I didn’t mean to. It just happened, Tilly. But it’s taught me about myself. And what I want from life.’
My skin felt cold, as though the blood had drained out of my veins. ‘And you couldn’t have stopped it? For fuck’s sake, Gareth. We’re married. We have a commitment to each other. How could you do this?’
He had the grace to look embarrassed – for all of about two seconds. ‘Marriages end, Tilly. I know it’s painful. But sometimes, you just know, don’t you? When things just have to change?’