Page 44 of A Miracle on Hope Street
She leads me through a pristine hallway past a coatstand that still displays a man’s overcoat, hat and stick and a sideboard filled with smiling family photos. The house smells like furniture polish and an air freshener that catches my throat. It looks like poor Marian has been cleaning from the early hours of the morning.
We settle on a wicker chair each in the conservatory to the back of the house and Marian pours hot water into a teapot that I can tell doesn’t get used very often these days. She takes the greatest of care as she carries it with matching cups and saucers on a tray in true ‘here’s one I made earlier’ fashion. I imagine this visit means a lot more to her than I could even have guessed.
‘I don’t go out any more,’ she explains to me. ‘I just can’t bring myself to, so I’m very appreciative that you were able to come to me instead of meeting up somewhere.’
She is a small, rounded woman with soft bubbly curls that look like they’ve been dyed at home and are in need of a trim, but apart from that she is as smart and tidy as her home in her matching lilac tunic and wide trousers.
‘Why don’t you leave the house any more?’ I ask her, wanting to cut to the chase. ‘Are you afraid to?’
Marian holds her tea cup in her hand and looks out onto her back garden which, in comparison to the interior of her home, looks like it has seen better days.
‘Since Billy died,’ she explains to me, ‘the only people I’ve spoken to regularly in real life, apart from my daughters when they phone, is the postman or one of the young chaps who deliver my weekly shopping. I used to love going to the post office, popping by the dry cleaners or calling into that nice café for a scone and I had so many friends to do so many nice things with, but even friends have to give up eventually when all they are hearing is “no” to their invitations. One might say my confidence has gone. I’m talking a lot now though, aren’t I?’
She lets out a little laugh and I do too in response. She certainly does seem to have found her vocal chords this morning, at a time when mine aren’t even awakened yet.
‘Well, that’s all very understandable, Marian,’ I say to her. ‘When we lose someone close like that, it really does take the wind out of our sails, but I’m sure your Billy wouldn’t want you to be so sad and alone at Christmas, would he?’
I think of the irony of my words and how I could easily have shut myself off from everything and everyone this Christmas had I not decided to host this dinner. I wonder what my own father would think if he were watching over me now. Would he feel proud of me for reaching out to these people? I know he wouldn’t want me to be so sad and alone either.
‘No, Billy certainly wouldn’t want that,’ says Marian. ‘And that’s why I called upon you for some guidance. My daughters are away this year and I’m really feeling it, Ruth. Oh, it’s awful, really. Not for them, of course, but for me it is. Rebecca is in Africa, working as a doctor and my youngest, Steph, is parked up somewhere in Singapore as she backpacks her way around the world.’
She pauses for my reaction.
‘It’s great for them to travel and see the world,’ I say to her. ‘But I understand your loneliness without them and how hard it must be for you, especially without your husband. It can be so hard facing up to all those milestones of the year that you shared together for so long.’
‘Forty-five years,’ she tells me. ‘We were together forty-five years. It makes me very down just thinking about how much my life has changed. I read your column every week and I admire your advice so much, so I hope you didn’t mind me dropping you a line.’
‘That’s exactly what I’m here for,’ I say to her. ‘If people didn’t writetome, then I’d have nothing to writeabout, would I?’
She goes silent for a few seconds and just when I’m about to ask if she is okay, she speaks again.
‘I used to love to play golf with Billy,’ she says with a smile. ‘Every Sunday we’d go to the local course and have lunch after playing nine holes, no matter what the weather was like, but now every Sunday I just sit here, watching the garden grow and listening to the radio or watching some nonsense on the television. We had a little caravan too that we towed around all summer and we’d go hill walking and mountain climbing and do all sorts of things together, sometimes at the drop of a hat. We were companions, the very best of friends, right till the very end, Billy and I. I think that’s what I miss the most about him being gone. I can do things on my own, of course I can, and once I start I’ll soon get used to it and I might even enjoy it, but it was always so nice to have someone by your side when you needed them. I miss our walks and our chats. I really do. I miss going places at a moment’s notice and the laughs we had and just . . . I just miss him so much.’
I lean across on my wicker seat and touch Marian’s hand in support. She looks like she might cry. The poor woman. Her loss is tangible and her loneliness radiates from her voice and from what she says and even what she doesn’t say. I chose her for this dinner because she hit a chord in me, reminding me of the pain my father felt when he closed his bedroom door at night, missing his life partner, but also the grip that loneliness has had on me since I lost him twelve months ago. I understood that helpless feeling of drowning in your own sorrows, in your own company, your confidence on the floor and that sheer desperation to snap out of it but not knowing how.
‘You know, when it hits me the worst is at the simplest of times,’ she tells me, putting her teacup down on the glass coffee table. ‘I walk around this house, waiting to bump into him, or trip over his shoes or tell him to turn the damn television down, but instead it’s just me and the silence and the creaking of doors.’
‘Oh Marian.’
‘And what really kills me the most is that I don’t even have anyone to make a cup of tea for any more,’ she says and at that the tears flow. ‘That’s when it hits me hardest. I always loved making a pot of tea and now I’ve no one to share it with. I feel like no one needs me any more, Ruth. I’m of no use to anyone.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ I say, knowing exactly what she means and a tear rolls down my cheek as I hear her sob.
‘I’m really dreading Christmas, Ruth,’ she whispers, with a sniffle. ‘It was our favourite time of year. Billy was my very best friend.’
I have to compose myself, so I pinch the tears from my eyes and try not to get too caught up in Marian’s sorrow as I’d probably end up bawling my eyes out with her and that wouldn’t be helping her much for now. I need to be practical. Marian represents so many lonely women who have lost hope but just need to feel empowered again and I hope by meeting her that she will find the energy to get her spark back. She deserves to.
‘Please know that there are still people who care for you and need you, and you’ve already made the first step to finding them by reaching out to me in your lovely letter,’ I say to her as she sobs. ‘You don’t have to be alone, Marian, not this time, anyhow. Come and have dinner at mine and we’ll all pull together to get through this most wonderful time of the year, even though it might be painful.’
‘Thank you, darling, I’d love to join you,’ she says in a tiny whisper that I know comes right from her heart. ‘And who knows, maybe this is the nudge that I’ve been waiting for to start living again? Maybe I’ll get the courage to take up some new hobbies of my own and maybe even make some new friends along the way.’
‘One step at a time is all it takes,’ I say to Marian. ‘And you’ve made a very brave move by taking the time to contact me and I’m very glad that you did. Now, what are your plans for the rest of the day? And don’t say watching the garden grow! I bet you can come up with something just a little more exciting than that?’
I hate the thought of her sitting here alone, reminiscing on the past and fearing the future and having no one to have a cup of tea with. Being alone can be the best thing in the world when the time is right but feeling like you have no one you love to turn to, even to have a chat on the phone when you’ve something on your mind or just fancy a giggle, that’s when it can swallow you up and tear you apart inside. I know exactly how Marian is feeling.
‘You know, I might go for a walk in the park today,’ she says, as if I’ve lit a spark in her. ‘I haven’t walked in the park since Billy got sick but I might just wrap up and do that today in his memory. He loved that park, Ruth. You know the one with the big butterfly in the middle? I’ve always wondered what that meant and I must make it my business to find out. Yes, I think I will do that. I’ll go there right now whether it’s raining or whether it’s not. There’s no such thing as the wrong weather, just the wrong clothes as my Billy used to say.’
Hearing the chirp in her voice really fills me up inside.
