Page 15 of Waiting for a Bright New Future

She was wearing a dark cardigan over a long pale nightdress patterned with faded pink rosebuds. She was missing her glasses and her expression was vulnerable and lost. Mud sat between her bare toes.

“Here — take my hand.” She grabbed his outstretched hand and he slowly pulled her to standing. “What are you doing outside so early?”

“I lost my wedding ring. I thought it had dropped off when I was gardening. But it’s not there.” Tears began to roll down her cheeks. “It’s all I had left of him.”

Stuart felt awkward. This confused, vulnerable version of Lillian was a stranger to him. She brought her left hand to her face and wiped it across the bottom of her runny nose, leaving a dirty, brown streak. There was a gold band on her fourth finger.

“The ring is on your finger.”

She raised her hand and stared at the gold as though she didn’t believe it. “I don’t know how it got back on there.” She pulled at the ring but age had made her knuckles too large to let it pass.

As Stuart guided Lillian around the side of the house to the back door, Jayne appeared. She’d obviously dressed hurriedly in grey joggers and a sweatshirt and her hair was still tousled from sleep. She looked less ‘confident legal secretary’ and more ‘approachable human being’. The sort of person with whom he could imagine reconciling differences and building a relationship. But with Lillian clutching at his hand like a small child, he couldn’t dwell on that possibility now.

“Mum! I heard voices. What on earth?” Jayne looked from Lillian to Stuart and back again. Her eyes were anguished and there was concern in her voice.

He had to bow out now, otherwise he’d be late for Mr Rutherford. “Just a bit of confusion,” he said lightly. “Lillian thought she’d lost her wedding ring but it was on her finger all the time. I’ve done it myself — thought I’d lost something and then looked everywhere except the most obvious place.”

“Oh.” Jayne was searching his face for some further explanation that he didn’t have.

He wanted to stay and help but there wasn’t time. Stuart gave a little shrug and gestured at his car. “I’m late for work.”

* * *

“I thought you weren’t coming.” Mr Rutherford’s voice was impatient. “I nearly pressed this stupid button round my neck — I didn’t want to die of thirst and wet myself before someone decided to send a replacement.”

William had already manoeuvred himself into the high chair at the side of the bed.

Stuart took his coat off. “You should stay put until I arrive, Mr Rutherford, even if I’m late. One false move and you’d be marooned on the floor. Or worse, dead.”

“Would that be so bad? I’m waiting to be summoned to the pearly gates. I can’t remember the last time I did anything productive or for the good of someone else. The purpose went from my life a long time ago. If I could bribe St Peter to get to the front of the queue, I would.”

What was the correct response to a comment like that? Stuart wanted to overcompensate, crack a joke and make out that all would be well. But that was papering over a hole that would tear wide open again as soon as Stuart left. The old man needed something tangible to keep him going. But giving someone a purpose to stay alive wasn’t as easy as offering a butter mint to suck.

“You’ll probably be surprised to hear this, Mr Rutherford, but at the moment your purpose is to stay right here and keep me in a job. I need the money. I need the diversion from my own circumstances and I need the company. Sensible male conversation that I can’t get at home. Besides, jumping the queue just isn’t British.”

The old man put his head on one side as though considering the veracity of this. “If you want me to believe that you haven’t just dumped a load of bullshit to make me feel better, you’d better elaborate on your personal circumstances. I’m not some old dear whose mind is shrinking. My mind is as sharp as it was when I was a GP.”

Stuart knew he was in danger of making himself look pathetic in front of the old man.

“I’m waiting. And don’t make something up — I can spot a liar by his body language.”

Stuart told his tale as he assisted Mr Rutherford onto the commode. It was easier to talk while he was doing. He helped the old man to wash and dress. While he was soaping legs and then rolling on socks, he didn’t have to look the old man in the eye and see his pity, or his sympathy, or his eye-rolling at the situation that Stuart had allowed to happen.

“So there you have it: your money, plus Florence’s rent, is just about keeping me solvent until my home is pulled from under me. Then, who knows? Destitution or will a bright new world open itself up to me? Is that enough purpose to keep you alive?”

Mr Rutherford nodded in a satisfied kind of way. “Call me William. I think we can be friends. We need each other, if you see what I mean.”

“William.” Stuart smiled. He liked being called a friend. He didn’t want to be an impersonal body who rushed in and out with rubber gloves and a brusque manner. That wasn’t job satisfaction. Job satisfaction was the warm sensation he had right now.

“How do you actually feel about losing your home? You give an impression of extreme sangfroid, but you can’t be genuinely so indifferent about it.”

This was a scab Stuart had been trying to leave unpicked. If he gave his mind free rein in that direction, his anger boiled and the true ugliness of his personality fought to break free. “I’m not indifferent. Inside I’m bitter and twisted. Sometimes I hate my father and brothers.”

“But you choose not to fight it.”

“I’ve wasted enough years of my life on a family that doesn’t care.” He wondered if William could hear the tightness in his voice. “I’ve chosen to move past that and be my own man.” The words came out stronger than he felt. “Besides, all the fighting in the world will be wasted if the house has to be sold to pay the legal bills. I have no capital.”

William nodded as though he was satisfied. Stuart went to make breakfast.

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