1973 – aged 18 #3
‘I’m afraid he is currently teaching.’ The woman sounded friendly, welcoming, sweet, exactly the kind of voice you would want answering your phone if you were a school. ‘I’m the headmaster’s secretary. Can I take a message?’
A message? What to say?
Tell him he broke my heart. Tell him I can’t sleep.
Tell him I miss him day and night. Tell him my body yearns for him.
Tell him it was love, at least it was for me.
Tell him that if there is the slightest chance that we might grow from this, I will pack up my life on the riverbank, abandon Old Mother Thames and head north.
I would do anything for one more night with him by my side .
. . the spring that follows his winter . . .
Of course she said none of these things. Instead she found a smile and did her best to keep her tone as even and unflustered as possible.
‘Erm, no, that’s okay. When is it best to call back?’
‘Well, that’s a tricky one, I’m afraid. He’s teaching most of the time, and then there’s playground duty and clubs after school. As I’ve said, I’m more than happy to take a message, or would you like to leave a number so he can return your call?’
Lilly let her eyes rove the grubby interior of the phone box.
‘No, that’s okay.’ It seemed hopeless, and she felt the stutter of tears at the thought that her lover was so very far away.
‘Is it anything I can help you with, or another member of staff?’ the woman asked most helpfully.
‘Not really, no.’ She drew breath. ‘It’s just that he left something in London, and I was wondering how to return it to him.
’ It was a ridiculous fabrication, the first thing that popped into her head.
Lilly pinched the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger, as if this might help relieve the unseen pressure.
‘Oh, right. Are you calling from Mrs Horn-Havering’s boarding house? I know we haven’t spoken before, but Wilkie has spoken very fondly about his time with you in Chelsea.’
‘Yes, I am,’ Lilly lied, eyes closed, heart racing, unsure of how things were getting so muddled, even more muddled! But it wasn’t entirely untrue, he had left something in London: her. He had left her. He had left them, abandoning the beautiful beginning to their story, left it all behind.
‘Ah, well, it’s wonderful to be in contact. I’m Georgina Jones, Wilkie’s wife.’
Wilkie’s . . .
Lilly felt her body slide against the wall of the phone box as the strength left her legs and she thought she might faint.
Her preference would have been to sink to the floor, were it not covered in a nasty pile of compacted dirt, newspapers soaked in fish and chip grease, empty cans of Tennent’s Extra, cigarette butts and a mammoth stack of peanut shells.
‘I would suggest,’ Georgina Jones carried on in her sing-song voice – a happy voice! – ‘that anything he’s left can be popped in a box and sent to the school. I know you have the address. We live on site. He’ll be more than happy to pay for the postage.’
We . . . we . . . we . . .
‘I will,’ she whispered. ‘I will do that, Mrs Jones.’ To say the words felt surreal, disgusting and jarring all at once.
‘Right, better let you get on, and thank you so much for calling. I know Wilkie really appreciated your hospitality. I’ve joked that I might come down myself for a holiday; with two little ones under five, I think I could do with a rest!’
Two little ones under five . . . children . . . children! The words were knives that cut her skin and pierced her heart and hurt her in the way that she deserved.
‘Anyway, must dash, the bell is about to go for end of school, but thanks again!’
She heard Georgina replace the receiver and stood with the phone in her hand, thinking of her dad, who had gone after his wife, had written to her, begged her, visited her, sitting in a chair while his wife made tea in a strange kitchen and he could see her bed jacket hanging on the back of the open bathroom door.
Her dad who had fought and lost, and still Georgina’s words echoed in her mind, two little ones under five .
. . Georgina Jones, who, whether she was aware of it or not, had fought and won.
A banging on the side of the telephone box made her jump.
‘Get a move on, love, I haven’t got all day!’ an older woman in a headsquare growled, her voice muted through the little panes of glass etched with graffiti, the word repent scrawled in large uneven letters.
‘Give me a minute!’ Lilly mouthed through the glass as she pulled the coins from her purse and made a second call, this time to Mr and Mrs Brooks’ house, hoping, praying, Glenda was home.
Reluctantly, with shame dripping from her mouth, she’d finally told her friend about Wilkie when he hadn’t shown up.
It was a sweet relief when Glenda answered the call.
‘Lil? Are you okay?’
She could hardly speak, as shock and distress almost rendered her mute.
‘Glen . . . Glenda.’
‘Oh my God, what’s happened? What’s wrong?’
‘He’s . . . he’s married.’ She hid her mouth with her other hand from the old woman, who sneered at her through the window.
‘No!’ Her friend’s gasp of air confirmed her thoughts, that this really was the very worst thing a girl could experience. ‘Oh, Lil, no!’
‘I don’t know what to do.’
‘Let’s meet at college tomorrow, let’s go and find somewhere to sit and talk it out. It will all be okay. Just hang in there, we can talk about it all then.’
‘Thank you, Glen.’ Relieved that her friend offered no judgement, she wiped her face as the call ended, knowing she would hang on until she could see Glenda, a girl of her age who understood.
Not that quiet, reliable Norm was anything like Wilkie, and Lilly was glad, never wanting her friend to feel how she did now.
As Lilly stumbled from the dirty space, the impatient woman pushed past her.
Lilly stood for a while, facing the stream of traffic, the headlamps of buses blurring under her tears as she attempted to walk on legs made of lead, trying to make sense of the newly presented facts.
Wilkie was married with children, married to Georgina, the headmaster’s secretary.
Georgina . . . who had a lovely voice and kindly demeanour.
Lilly realised in that moment that she was “that woman”.
He had made her that woman, one just like her mother, who had no regard for the vows of marriage, one who messed up the lives of kids, one who was selfish, brazen and morally slack, a terrible, terrible person.
Wilkie had done this to her, and she had let him.
She made a silent vow to never call her mum again like that, never to endorse the woman’s shitty behaviour – the shittiest!
Knowing that with the same damaging, destructive streak marbling her veins, she too quite obviously had the capacity to break the heart of someone lovely, someone worthy, someone like Georgina Jones, who sounded sweet and was a mum to two little ones, and it was best she kept her distance from everyone.
Love, she decided, just wasn’t for her; how could it be?