Page 48 of Statistically Speaking
“Hi,” says Karim, after a brief glance at me, “sorry to bother you. We’re looking for a woman called Sharon Jones. I believe she used to live here?”
The man relaxes slightly when he understands that we are not looking for him. That whatever trouble or debt or dispute he was worried about isn’t what has brought these two strangers to his door. That even if we are the police or social services or working for a collection agency, we’re not bothered about harassing him.
“Nah, sorry, mate,” he says, shaking his head. “Nobody here called that. We’ve lived here for about four years now.”
“Do you remember her?” I ask in a hurry as he tries to close the door again. “The woman who was here before? She had red hair. Could be a bit... strange sometimes?”
If he was new to the area he might not—but just like my mum, a lot of other people never move on. They just move around, in ever-decreasing circles.
I see him turn it over in his mind, and he answers: “You mean that mad one who shouted a lot?”
I nod. It is a terrible description, an awful thing for a human life to be reduced to—but it is also accurate.
“Yeah. I remember her. I didn’t know she was called that, though, and she wasn’t living here when we moved in—that was a young couple, come from Syria, had a couple of kids so they didn’t want to live by the balcony. Why are you looking for her, love?”
“Do you know what happened to her?” I ask, ignoring his question. “To Sharon Jones? Is she still on the estate?”
“No, don’t think so. To be honest, I heard she was dead.”
“Dead?” I echo, as though I’ve never heard the word before.
“Are you sure?” asks Karim, frowning. “It’s her mother, you see.”
The man’s eyes dart to me, and his expression softens.
“Right. I’m sorry—look, don’t take it for gospel, all right? But... well, she was into the drugs, wasn’t she, if I remember right? And someone told me she OD’d. She definitely isn’t on the estate anymore. Wish I could be more help. Do you want to come in? Have a cuppa, slice of toast?”
He looks tough, this man, and I can see the scars that a hard life has left on him. But still, he is trying to be kind. Trying to help. Somehow, it makes me feel even worse.
Karim glances at me, obviously worried, but I shake my head. Going inside won’t help. It will only remind me more of the past, of what I have lost.
“Thank you, but no,” I reply.
The man nods and moves to close his door. Before it shuts entirely, he pauses and says, “Good luck to you, darling. Doesn’t matter what anyone else says about her—she was still your mum, and you only get one.”
He retreats back inside, and Karim and I are left standing there together, on a dull October afternoon, on a concrete walkway lined with doors. Lined with windows. Lined withlives being lived. Lives possibly coming to their ends. Happens all the time.
I am stunned, and silent, and still. I have never imagined that she could be dead. I have never imagined it, despite the logical evidence—she was ill. She made poor choices. She was isolated and had nobody to pull her back from the abyss she stared into on a daily basis. I left her, and there was nobody else, and now the abyss might have taken her. The woman I was relieved to escape from could be gone forever.
“We don’t know it’s true, Gemma,” Karim says reassuringly. “He wasn’t sure—it was only something he’d heard, something he’d assumed. It’s not necessarily a fact. That wasn’t exactly a reliable witness right there, was it? He might even have said it just to spite us. He was that type.”
I nod, because he is right.
He is right, but everything still feels so very wrong.
Chapter 20
The Fifth-Ever Brandy and One Cunning Plan
Karim is determined to remain positive and refuses to agree with any conviction that we should believe my mother is dead on the say-so of a chain-smoking stranger.
He is undoubtedly right to take this approach, and I am grateful to him for his support—but I am also exhausted by it all. Going back there—to that nonhome—has shaken me so much more than I thought it would. The news about my mum has numbed me, and I am struggling to keep my engagement levels up. The dark side of me is calling, and I would dearly love to be alone.
We are now standing outside the hospital where I gave birth. It is only a ten-minute walk away from where we were, and near to a tube stop, so I’d gone along with his logic.
“If she died, someone would have told you,” he insists. “She would have had that card you sent. Maybe an address book?”
I laugh out loud at that one. The thought of my mum being organized enough or bothered enough to keep an address book is the most amusing thing I have heard all day—though admittedly there hasn’t exactly been stiff competition.
