Page 19 of A Midlife Marriage

‘He got kidney disease.’ The arrow of memory was blinding. It had Lizzie blinking and her eyes so bright before, misted over. ‘This,’ she said, ‘was 1957.’ ‘There was no dialysis back then, no transplants. It was only a month from being diagnosed that he died.’

From the corner of her eye, Kay saw her father lower his chin. ‘I never knew,’ she whispered.

‘I still have his letters. The last one he wrote was just two days before.’

She didn’t speak. A decade of working alongside this formidable woman, and she had never known.

‘Please go and live your life.’ Lizzie smiled. ‘That’s what he wrote, Kay. That’s what he ended the letter with. So, I did. I decided I needed to try as many things as possible, visit places, do things, have all the experiences he didn’t.’

‘I see.’ Her throat was sore as she tried to swallow.

‘And you know something, Kay?’

Kay shook her head. What did she know? Compared to Lizzie, what did she know?

‘I’ve been retired nearly thirty years now. That’s almost as long as I was working for. How about that?’

‘How about that,’ she echoed.

‘So go, Kay. Go and live your life. I haven’t been far in the last few years, but I’ve travelled the world since I retired. So, I haven’t just lived one life, I’ve lived two. One for me and one for Gerry. That was his name.’

And as Lizzie finished speaking, her father leaned forward and silently handed the cup of wine back to her, and she silently received it. Like telepathy, Kay thought as she watched. She sat back in her chair, fenced off from the noise and the movement by her own thoughts. Thirty years? Did she also have that long? Because if she did, Lizzie was right. It was another lifetime.

‘If I may… If I may just have a moment’s silence!’ Nick’s voice boomed across the room like a sonic wave, loud and strong. But not loud and not strong enough, to cut through the chatter of what was now a crowd of very merry teachers.

‘They’re not very good at listening,’ Craig mouthed from the other end of the table

Kay laughed.

‘If I may just have a moment’s silence!’ He was standing on a chair now.‘If I may just say a few words.’

The reluctance was tangible, but eventually the chatter receded.

‘Everyone in this room,’ Nick began, ‘knows the dedication that Kay has shown to her work over the last thirty years.’

Murmured approval rippled through.

‘Never more so,’ Nick continued, ‘than when she faced the difficulties of last year.’

As Kay’s smile stuck, the ache in her jaw came back. She didn’t want any public acknowledgement of her cancer. She didn’t want to hear words likebattleorovercome.It wasn’t that she thought by not mentioning it, it ceased to exist. It was more that like a wound healed, the best course of action she had intuitively felt, was to leave well alone. It was better for everyone. She didn’t mention it, they didn’t ask. Her presence was enough. Back in the classroom, still here, still alive. Not much need, if any, for more. She wrapped both hands around her paper cup and looked down at her feet, deeply uncomfortable that after so many months of getting on quietly and privately, her health should now be made such a public thing.

Next to her, Lizzie reached across and patted her hand. Kay smiled. Lizzie understood. Lizzie who had also kept her heartache private.

‘We’ve watched her battling through,’ Nick boomed on.

‘Can you get me over to that young man?’ Lizzie said.

‘What young man?’ Confused Kay looked up. But Lizzie, she realised, wasn’t talking to her. She was talking to Kay’s father.

‘Her cheerful determination …’

Distracted, Kay drew her feet in to let the wheels of Lizzie’s chair pass.

‘Her absolute determination to continue …’

She shifted her weight, smiling back at every eye she met. No matter that these were her friends and colleagues, the speechwas making an object of her. She wished he would stop, she really wanted him to just …

‘And cue the music!’Someone called.

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