Make no mistake, this gift I bring doesn’t come without certain rules and doesn’t come without consequences. Because here’s the biggie – we can give youanyfifteen minutes.Anyfifteen minutes of your life that you’d like to revisit. As long as it’s spent with someone who is no longer with you.
Did I mention that? It’s about a glimpse, a chance to right a wrong, ask that burning question or maybe just be held, one last time. To have that final conversation or steal a kiss from the one you miss the most, the one with whom you have unfinished business.
Wonderful, right?
Think about it – when or, more specifically, who in your life would you choose?
It just so happens that I am about to make my approaches to the lucky recipients.
Wanna tag along? I don’t mind if you do.
But, please, do remember to keep one eye on the clock.
Chapter Two - Violet Katherine Drummond
Aged 98
Vauxhall, London
‘Which would you prefer, Nan?’ Natalie held up the two cartons, which, to Violet’s milky old eyes, looked exactly the same.
‘What’s the difference?’ she squinted, none the wiser.
‘One’s got bits in it and the other no bits,’ her granddaughter explained with the distinct undertone of impatience, as she lifted first one carton then the next.
‘Oh, no bits. Thank you.’
Natalie put the orange juice with bits back in the fridge and the other into the shopping trolley that was fixed to the front of Violet’s wheelchair – a nifty invention that certainly made supermarket trips a bit easier.
‘D’you need ham? I know you like a bit of ham on Boxing Day.’
‘No, dear. I’m not eating much. Wouldn’t get through a whole packet of ham, it’d be a waste. I hate waste.’
She ate like a little bird. In fact, there were entire days when all the sustenance she required was a cup or two of tea and a reluctant bite of a banana with which to swallow her plethora of glossy little pills that came in an array of vibrant colours.
‘Do you need loo roll, Nan?’
‘Probably.’ She certainly got through enough of the stuff.
Even the questions as they trundled the strip lit aisles were banal and irritating. She knew why Natalie insisted on loading her into the car, folding her wheelchair into the back and pushing her around the supermarket, even though her granddaughter could easily pick up the few things she needed. She did it to keep Violet moving, keep her mind active and to get her out into the real world where real people lurked. It seemed to take on extra importance at this time of year, aware as they all were that this might well be her last Christmas. Violet wasn’t stupid, and knew they’d been thinking and pondering this very thing for at least the last decade.
Yet here they were.
She was thankful, of course she was, to be so attended to, but also, at some level, wished Natalie would leave her be in the warm chair by the window. Let her stay home to listen to the radio, sip tea, and chit-chat to Darling.Darling!This the name of her carer who came in each day and treated her like she was made of glass, a thing so precious. Her little voice was sweet, her frame tiny. It had been a revelation to learn that Darling was actually made of steel. She’d arrived from the Philippines eighteen months ago with no more than a small bag of clothes and the address of a cousin’s cousin, written on a scrap of paper. Violet knew it took mettle to make a move so bold, to be so brave, and she loved her for it.
This weekly trawl around the supermarket, which felt more like a performance than a necessity, always ended in the café inside the superstore, where she and Natalie sipped weak, tepid tea and shared a sticky bun, which her granddaughter always cut into three pieces. Two for her and one for Violet. Today was no exception. The café was bedecked in baubles and thin tinsel. The wan-faced staff wore moronic elf hats and striped tights. She couldn’t imagine being asked to wear such things in her workinglife. Not that it would have been fitting for the secretary of the chairman.
What she’d never say, never would and never could, was that coming out into the real world like this was, in fact, a horrible thing for her. A reminder that she was now no more than an observer, a trick of the light, on the edge of society – waiting to go, be called, keel over, stop. Whatever you wanted to call it. Yet death, it seemed, took joy in making her wait. Well-meaning visitors and family alike told her that a long life was a blessing. She’d smile, nod and fold her knobbly knuckled hands into her narrow lap and silently agree. It was easier than leaning forward with fire in her eyes and raging that it was no such thing! No gift! No blessing! Sitting each day, in discomfort and pain, as the hours limped on monotonously, punctuated only by trips to the bathroom or a visit from an inquisitive robin who might linger on the windowsill.
Old age was a punishment that she had no choice other than to accept graciously, to endure. And here she now sat doing her best to tune out the piped carols that filled the room, to not wince at the shrill call of excited toddlers at play and ignore the stench of fried food that floated in the air and clung to the wipe clean surfaces, while she and Natalie shared a sticky bun. Her granddaughter glanced repeatedly at the clock on her phone which made Violet feel miserable, vulnerable, and burdensome all at the same time.
‘Just popping out to call André.’
Natalie left the table and Violet felt her shoulders relax a little, while simultaneously envying the girl the fresh air that awaited while she purred down the phone and fawned over the weasel-faced loser who treated her like dirt. Natalie’s questions and chatter when she spoke to him, underpinned with a needy whine that was as unbecoming as it was desperate. It saddened Violet to hear. Not that there was any point in stating this orraising a concern. Hadn’t been much point in sharing an opinion on anything since she’d hit her eighties when it felt like she was humoured and tolerated rather than paid heed to. As if all her experience counted for nothing. So she listened, one ear cocked, to tales of woe or joy, conversations between her high-pitched daughters and their daughters who all seemed to think they invented love, sex, heartache, and loss.
The idiots.
Violet huffed, what did they know about loss? These kids who hadn’t lived at the beck and call of a siren, as bricks, burning timbers and life as they knew it fell all around them. Lives and homes turned to ash in less time than you’d think. She heard that siren still in the early hours, woke from sleep to the imagined sound, the acrid smell of smoke still in her nostrils. It had been nothing short of petrifying, hell on earth. During the chaos, among the mayhem, she would mentally reach out, calling silently, to a man who was not hers,come home to me, come safely home to me my love…
