Page 29 of The Day Shelley Woodhouse Woke Up
‘And it can be. There’s no right way to be a family.’
It’s true. The other families I saw, growing up, they were all a bit different and the ones that looked like the families in books – the ones with a mother and a father and two children and a dog – they weren’t necessarily the ones that lasted, or were happiest.
‘But then my mum met someone, and he came to live with us, and it all changed.’
She gives a slow nod. Does she know, I wonder? Does she make the connection between this story and the panic I felt earlier when Mick turned up to wheel me to my scan?
‘It must have been hard to adjust, when you were used to it being the three of you.’
‘It was.’
I could tell her, about the nights curled up with Granny Rose, listening to Mick throwing words and sometimes physical objects at Mum. The way Granny Rose would cry, completely silently, and I would feel like I was the loneliest person in the world. And then, later, about the times it was me on the wrong side of his anger. She would be sympathetic. I can see that in her. But it’s just, that isn’t how I want to be seen. I don’t want to be a victim. I want to be me. And as soon as I share that story, I’m something else.
‘I moved out when I was eighteen,’ I say. ‘And we just… lost touch.’
She doesn’t challenge it, but we both know you don’t just lose touch with your own mother. Those words – losing touch, drifting apart – they are for old colleagues and acquaintances and distant cousins. They don’t fit here.
‘Well,’ Angela says. ‘I’ll try her. I’m sure she’ll come, when she hears.’
It’s my turn to nod, though I don’t know whether it’s true. The truth is that Mum chose Mick over me when I was a child and teenager, and I’ve chosen David over her as an adult. What fools we have both been.
I’m just finishing dinner, a tasteless chicken curry, when Matt comes for the second visit of the day.
‘KitKat?’ he asks, holding one out.
I smile, and it’s the first genuine smile for ages.
‘I should bring you up some proper food,’ he says.
‘I would really like that.’ It’s true what everyone says about hospital food. Sometimes it’s cold and often it’s stodgy and always it’s disappointing. ‘What do you serve down there anyway?’
‘Well, mostly it’s sandwiches and salads, but we have a fresh soup every day…’
‘What was it today?’
‘Cream of celery.’
I screw up my nose.
‘Not a fan of celery?’
‘Not really. It’s so stringy.’
‘I mean, I’m not sure how familiar you are with the concept of soup, but we don’t usually get accused of stringiness. Tomorrow it’s butternut squash.’
‘Now you’re talking.’
‘And we have some hot food, too. Fish and chips and lasagne are our standards, plus a daily special. Fish pie today.’
‘Telling me what you had today is a bit “Here’s what you could have won”,’ I say.
He laughs, and there’s a small satisfaction in having amused him.
‘Tomorrow is chicken tikka masala. Shall I bring you some?’
I think about food, about flavour, about how it was missing from the curry I just ate. About the curries David and I would order in and the brilliant pasta dishes Dee would make for us, sometimes at the end of a long shift. I think about cake, about pastry, about chocolate. I haven’t realised, until now, how much the bland food has been getting me down. And Matt must see the enthusiasm in my eyes, but then I remember.
‘I don’t have any money,’ I say. ‘I mean, I do, I have money in bank accounts and all that, but I have nothing here with me. I’ll ask my friend to bring me some.’
