Page 2 of The Day Shelley Woodhouse Woke Up
‘How old are you?’
‘Thirty.’
She shuffles on her feet a bit before asking the next question. ‘Shelley, do you know what happened to you?’
I think I’m going to say I’m not sure, but that isn’t what comes out. ‘It was David,’ I say. ‘My husband. He tried to kill me.’
‘I’m so sorry to hear that.’
I don’t know what to say. But it doesn’t matter because Angela is called away by one of her colleagues. She tells me she’ll be back. When she’s gone, I feel unsettled. To my left, the bed is quite a distance away and it’s hard to make outwhether the shape in it is a man or a woman, whether they’re conscious or comatose. Opposite, same story. A thought comes, out of nowhere. Has anyone died in here, since I came? It’s quite possible, surely. This is where you come when things are as serious as they get. What if I have lain here, unconscious, while someone took their last breaths beside me? Does it matter? It shouldn’t, I suppose. I don’t know these people. They don’t know me. But it feels a bit chilling, all the same. I try to push the thought out of my mind. I will concentrate on what I know.
And so, I repeat the things I know, in my mind. My name, which is Shelley Woodhouse. That I am thirty years old. I am the landlady at a pub called the Pheasant. And that, a few days ago, my husband David tried to kill me.
Angela’s back and I don’t remember falling asleep, but I must have done.
‘Do you need anything?’ she asks.
There are so many things I need. To know what happened, why I’m here, when I’ll go home. Whether it’s safe for me there.
‘I feel like my memories are scrambled,’ I say. ‘Confused, out of order. I feel like they’re out of my control.’
‘I think that’s pretty normal, Shelley. Don’t be too hard on yourself. Why don’t you start with something you’re sure of, from your childhood perhaps, and go from there?’
2
THEN
Six years old and gap-toothed. I’m in the playground, trying to cross to where the other girls are playing, while simultaneously scratching my scabbed knee and avoiding the football game that’s taking place. Annabelle Harris turns, puts her hands on her hips and watches me approach. There are five of them. Emma Clacton and Sophie Giles holding either end of the skipping rope, Tessa Lynes jumping in time to ‘Granny’s in the kitchen’ and Lucy Jeffers waiting her turn. Annabelle overseeing things. As I get close, I see that Annabelle is frowning, her eyes squinting as if the sun is too bright. But it is October, and dull. I stop and line up the two sides of my jacket, sticking my tongue out as I pull up the zip.
‘You can’t play with us,’ Annabelle says. A pre-emptive strike.
‘Why not?’ I don’t understand. Yesterday, we were best friends, our heads bent in close, giggling.
‘Because you don’t have a dad.’
Later, I would reflect that there’s one moment in every person’s childhood where they realise that what they thought was commonplace is, in fact, not. In the moment, though, I can’t think of a single thing to say and just stand there, my mouthopening and closing like a fish. I think about other people’s houses, about their families. Sometimes a mum and dad, yes, sometimes brothers and sisters, sometimes pets, but surely not always a dad? I’ve never noticed. At home, it is me and my mum, Tina, and her mum, Granny Rose. My mum told me once that Granny Rose moved in the very day that my dad moved out, when I was still a tiny baby. I kept hold of that piece of information throughout my bedtime story and then wrote it down in my secret notebook along with the other things I knew about my dad, namely that he was a liar and he didn’t deserve to have a family.
‘Oh,’ I say eventually. And then I turn and walk away, pretending not to hear Annabelle and the other girls giggling and whispering as the skipping rope thwacks against the tarmac in a steady rhythm.
Later that day, I sit on the stool in front of my mother’s dressing table, with her beside me. She is getting ready to go to work. I’m dressed in blue and green striped pyjamas, while she is in a tight, black skirt and a clingy top with big flowers and a low neck. She is doing her makeup, carefully applying mascara. I take a blusher brush and swipe it over my cheeks, pretending. Inside, I practise what I want to say.Annabelle said I couldn’t play because I don’t have a dad. But I don’t know how my mum will react. I don’t want to make her upset or angry just before she leaves for the night.
Granny Rose appears in the bedroom doorway, tapping her watch. This is how it is every night that Mum works. I try to stay as close to her as I can for as long as possible, but Granny Rose is strict about bedtime.
‘Have you done your teeth?’ Granny Rose asks.
I haven’t. I jump off the stool and dart into the bathroom. If I’m quick, there might be time for Mum to read me a story. But no, when I emerge, Mum is already on her way down the stairs, calling out to us that she’ll see us in the morning. Disappointment settles in my stomach like a stone.
‘Do you want to choose a book, love?’ Granny Rose asks.
I kneel in front of my small bookcase and run my finger along the spines. I pull out a book about dinosaurs having a party, and once I’m in bed I scooch up close to the wall so there’s room for Granny Rose. We’re halfway through the story when I have a thought. Maybe I can say what I wanted to say to Granny Rose. It won’t upset her the way it might upset Mum. So as soon as she closes the book and leans in to kiss me goodnight, I speak, and the words come out in a rush.
‘Annabelle said I couldn’t play because I don’t have a dad.’
Granny Rose pauses in mid-air, her lips slightly puckered. She pulls back, considers. ‘Which one is Annabelle again? The one with the bunches?’
I nod.
‘Well, I could tell you a thing or two about her family.’
