Page 6 of The Stranger in Her House

‘It’s voluntary. Can’t let an elderly woman struggle alone, can I?’

I fold my arms. ‘She’s not alone. I look after her.’

‘Oh yeah, she said you do a bit of cleaning sometimes.’

I’m about to defend myself and tell him that I do more than just ‘a bit of cleaning’ when he flashes me another grin. He’s joking. Either I need to lighten up or he needs to stop being a dick.

‘Nope, not today,’ I reply. ‘I’m not going to bite.’

‘That’s a shame, I like a little biting.’

He winks, jumps down from the tree and I beg my face not to give me away. I think he might be flirting but it’s been so long since anyone has paid me that kind of attention that I can’t be sure. I’m certainly not feeling like much of a gift to the opposite sex right now. I’m carrying a few extra pounds, all my clothes were bought on the cheap at supermarkets or discount stores and I can’t remember the last time I had my hair cut or coloured at a salon and not by yours truly. I’ve tried telling myself my grey streaks make me distinguished, but in truth I’m one streak away from Cruella de Vil.

I steal a glance at Paul’s wedding ring finger and it’s bare. But once again, he catches me out and holds up that hand and waves it at me.

‘So how’s Gwen today?’ he continues.

‘She has good days and bad days. You’re aware of her situation?’

‘Yeah, the charity tells us who we’re being matched with and why. A lot of my girls are like her. Life can be a bastard, eh?’

I can’t argue with that. Maybe it’s because new people come into our lives rarely that I find myself offering Paul our potted history without him asking first. But he seems really interested. He doesn’t extend me sympathy or pity; he just listens and asks lots of questions about her and the ways I help. We discuss how her memory ebbs and flows, what makes her happy, how I relax her when she’s anxious and what makes her sob like a child. We laugh at the absurdity of the time soon after I moved here, when she took the family car out somewhere and returned by foot. And how, to this day, we still have no idea where she left it. I’ve checked all the car parks in the surrounding villages. I live in hope I’ll come across it one day, waiting for me. Then my bus travel days will be over. I tell him how her medication helped to a point but how I’m seeing another decline. When I realise more than an hour has passed, I apologise for offloading and tell him I should leave him to continue his work. But I find myself not quite ready to go. I’ve enjoyed his company.

‘I thought I might drop into the garden centre later in the week and pick up some bedding plants to brighten the borders up,’ he adds. ‘What’s your favourite colour?’

‘Red.’

‘And your mum’s?’

‘Yellow.’

‘I’ll see what I can do.’

As I’m returning to the house, I realise I haven’t thanked him so I turn to do so. I think he has an in-ear headphone inserted at first and is miming along to a song. But he hasn’t. He’s just muttering away to himself and he doesn’t look best pleased. Then he takes a hatchet and whacks at a sawn branch lying on the ground. I don’t interrupt.

Closer to the house, I spot a figure lurking behind the patio doors. Now it’s her turn to be nosey. She’d been watching us before she starts shuffling away, believing that I haven’t seen her. I almost feel guilty. I think she wants to be the prime focus of Paul’s attention, and now I’ve taken it away from her, when she’s already been left with so little.

Soon after, I’m running a wet cloth over the front door when the postwoman greets me with a friendly smile. Between a handful of envelopes wrapped in an elastic band is one addressed to me. I wait until she leaves before I tear it open. Thank God for that. After weeks of waiting, it’s a letter confirming that I’ve now been awarded a Carer’s Allowance. I open a second letter, this time addressed to her, and discover she will be receiving a regular Attendance Allowance. Together, these payments total around £145 a week. It’s not much, in fact, for an entire day’s work; if you break it down, I’ll be earning the equivalent of an hour and a half of the minimum wage. But it’s better than nothing and will ease the financial pressure for a while. There have been times when I’ve been forced to use her debit card to keep myself afloat. I’m not proud of myself, but then pride always comes before a fall and I’ve had so many of those, I should have bought my own crash mat.

CHAPTER 5

CONNIE

‘Mum, do you want a biscuit with your tea?’ I shout. She doesn’t answer.

She’s where I left her a few minutes ago, sitting in her favourite armchair. A deck of playing cards is spread across an occasional table in front of her, alongside the chair I was sitting in. We played her favourite card game, poker, for about twenty minutes until she began to forget the rules and started laying down any old card.

‘I made $5,000 in one night playing Texas Hold ’Em at Circus Circus when your dad and I were in Las Vegas,’ she told me. ‘I beat every man around that table until the final hand, when I lost it all to a bloody German. Easy come, easy go.’

I struggle to reconcile this carefree version of her with the one who is now staring blankly into a fan that blows recycled warm air into her face.

‘Mum, did you hear me?’ I repeat. ‘I asked if you wanted a biscuit with your cuppa?’

Her eyes meet mine and taper. ‘Who are you?’ she growls.

Oh here we go. Once, she was so convinced I was one of TV’sLoose Women, I ended up playing along and answered to the name Coleen Nolan for the rest of the morning. ‘I’m your daughter, Connie.’

‘I don’t have a daughter.’

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