“And did she ever…?”
The solicitor understands the question without Lily needing to finish the sentence. His voice is quite gentle as he speaks, “Once she had the facts spelt out to her, I never heard from again.”
“How did you know she was dead?”
“I saw the notice, rather the article, in the newspaper.”
Lily nods. ‘Ten pallbearers needed to carry couch potato’. She had seen the headline too. She rubs her forehead, feels a trickle of sweat running down her shoulder blades. “So, I’m going to get one hundred and thirty-seven thousand pounds?”
“It will take some time to organise, but yes. It’s a lot to take in but I’m sure your grandfather would be pleased to know it’s with you now. I have an influence on how the money should be spent until you come of age.”
“Come of age?”
“Turn twenty-one. After that you are on your own, but I can’t think we will have any problems. I’m a reasonable man, providing you don’t want to bet it on the horses.” He starts to laugh at his own joke, but it turns into a wheeze. He takes a moment to recover his breath. “I think we’ll be able to come to some arrangement.”
Lily’s head is in a daze as she follows him through to the front room. She carries her rucksack on one arm. “Right then,” she says, not sure what she’s going to say. Not sure how to act, what to do with her arms. She sees the open door and feels drawn towards it.
Miss Farnley looks up from her small desk. “Dear, we need to take some details. Your address…”
Lily turns in the doorway. “Oh yes, actually I’m staying with my grandparents at the moment, my father’s parents.”
The solicitor is standing behind his receptionist. “Your father?” His voice betrays little emotion, and when he’s standing it’s difficult to read his facial expression without crouching, and Lily feels that would be rude.
“Yes, it’s a long story. We’ve only just met.”
There’s a long silence. The old man holds onto the back of Miss Fernley’s chair. When he does speak, his words are measured, well chosen. “I would advise caution, Miss Appleyard… Lily. I don’t wish to perpetuate ill feeling, but I feel I should inform you. Another of the conditions of your grandfather’s will was that your mother would vow never to have any contact with any of your father’s side of the family ever again.”
“Oh. Well, if he’s up there listening, he might be pleased to know she kept to that one. Doesn’t take my feelings into account much though, does it? What if I’d wanted to know who my family were?”
“Your grandfather would have spent a great deal of time considering the best course of action.”
“Yes, but the best course of action for who? Anyway, there’s nothing to worry about. My dad’s been great, so far. And I’ve got a sister.”
“Lily, I urge you to be careful.”
“Right, well, thanks for everything. I guess we’ll be in touch.”
“It’s been a pleasure to meet you my dear. May God bless you.”
It’s not until Lily reaches the bus station that she remembers where she last heard that phrase. It had been on the bottom of the letter from the Salvation Army.
Lily shivers and pulls her jacket tighter round her. The lukewarm sun makes the frost on the gravestones glisten. She makes her way up the hill to the north of the graveyard, past the mounds of disturbed earth, to her mother’s final resting place. On the ground lies a headstone waiting to be erected. Lily reads the script, ‘Pamela Appleyard. 28.4.44 – 28.9.89’.
Lily pulls a SPAR carrier bag from her rucksack and takes the two bottles from it. Then she puts the bag on the floor and sits on it. She takes the top off the orange Fanta and pours a third of it out, then she pours the half bottle of vodka into it. It’s her first drink in over a week, and her mouth salivates at the sight of it. She raises the bottle to the heap of earth. “Cheers.”
She takes a swig, feels the heat slide down her throat, and stares at the mound of frozen earth. “Well,” says Lily, “your dad doesn’t sound like a bundle of laughs. ‘Full-time employment or education’, what’s that about? Didn’t he know you had a child to look after? Jo would’ve have put him straight, ‘What is it with men? They think if you spend your day in an office, it means you’ve achieved something.’”
Lily watches a groundsman wheel his barrow between the gravestones. She hears the faint sounds of his whistled tune. “If only it were that fucking easy.”
The warmth of the vodka spreads like a fire through her belly. She feels her shoulders relax half an inch. “So, I’ve met Dad,” she says, feeling suddenly bold. She pauses, half expecting her mother’s spirit to rise from the ground and start berating her. ‘That bastard’ she can almost hear her mother screaming. But after a moment or two she realises there is only silence.
“I can see what you saw in him, I think. I mean he’s good looking and he’s being really kind to me now. Jo’s not so keen. But then she hates all men, so what can you do?” Lily rubs her nose and realises how cold it is. She takes another drink.
“And I’ve got a sister. She’s cool, pretty, knows her own mind.” The image of Fiona standing up to David in the kitchen, that first time he came round, pops into Lily’s head. Fiona with her hands on her hips saying she wasn’t coming home until Lily was accepted into the family. “So you don’t have to worry about me, because I’m not on my own. Just in case you were. I’m really happy, so don’t worry,” she says again, as tears burn at her eyes and start the long slow journey down her face. “I just wish I had someone to talk to, that’s all.”
“It’s like, all the time I was with you, I was dreaming of knowing the other side of the family. And now I’m with them, I’m wishing I’d got to know you. And I wonder if the problem’s me. I can’t ever be with the people I love because in my head I’m always somewhere else.”
She sits and drinks silently, allowing the sadness to well up and flow out of her body. “I met this guy. He was really nice. And now I suppose, I understand what it’s like to want to be with someone and then not be. And I only knew him a couple of weeks. I don’t know him, not like you knew Dad. Aunt Edie told me you were only seventeen. Anyway, it’s never going to happen, so there’s no point going on about it.”
Lily watches a robin hop along the ground, trying to peck something from the frozen earth. “Do you know what he said? He said we were both addicts; me and you. You chose food, I chose spliff and vodka.” She takes another drink and wipes her nose on the back of her sleeve.
“All this time I’ve been so busy blaming you, I never really noticed that I’m just the same.” The sobs rack her body and Lily covers her face with her hands. “I was a shit daughter. I spent most of my energy hating you.”
She wipes at her running nose with the back of her sleeve and takes another mouthful of vodka. “Do you remember that school report, where it said I wouldn’t ever achieve my potential because I never applied myself? That stupid cow, Mrs Hunt? In fact you called her a stupid cunt. I remember because I’d never heard you use that word before. You went mad, saying how could they write me off at thirteen, and maybe it was something to do with their boring lessons; it was their fault if I wasn’t engaged and you said you were going to tell them, and I knew you never would, but it didn’t matter.”
The cold has seeped into her bones. Her shoulders are rigid, like a brace around her neck, and she’s lost the feeling in her bum and legs. The heat of her tears feels like steam under her eyes. “I miss you, Mum. I really, really miss you.”
Lily feels a hand on her shoulder. She looks up to see Bert, standing there in his awful plastic coat and a bobble hat that looks like it’s been knitted by the basket weavers, down at the day centre on the estate.
“Hey, Bert.”
“Lil.”
Lily puts her hand on the cold grey slab of the headstone. “I’m going to get her a new one. Beloved mum. Rest in Peace. Something like that.” She looks up at him and nods at the brown paper bag he’s holding. “What’s in the bag?”
“I just thought she might like the smell. It’s a Big Mac.” He lays it down on the mound of earth, tenderly, like a lover would lay a single red rose. Lily closes her eyes and silently tells her mother she loves her. She can’t see through the tears when Bert eventually pulls her up to standing, and leads her away from the graveyard.
As the National Express Coach pulls into Leeds bus station on Tuesday, Lily catches sight of the new Playhouse, built on the site of the old Quarry Hill flats. The building seems to have sprung from nowhere, making her realise the city never stays the same. She’s only been away for a few months, and yet already she doesn’t recognise it. And she’s not even off the coach yet.
Lily’s skin feels dirty, probably from spending the night on Bert’s sofa, and she thinks she’s been bitten by fleas, as she walks past the market, into the city centre. She decides against taking the bus when she sees the queues at the bus stop for Headingley. Instead she continues up past the Odeon and the new Morrisons, which has scores of students lined up with their carrier bags waiting for taxis, and out north of the city to Leeds Polytechnic, which towers above the top end of town.
Mr Strange is kneeling on the floor in his office, his shirt sleeves rolled up, as he unpacks a stack of new textbooks from an oversized cardboard box. Lily fights the urge to offer to organise them on his shelves. Instead she holds her thumbs and tells him she wants to withdraw from the course. He offers little resistance, although he does offer to keep her place open for a year, in case she changes her mind. Lily thanks him, at the same time as knowing there’s no question she’ll come back to study politics there. She isn’t the same woman anymore.
It’s dusk as she strolls back through the park, her favourite time of day, as the colours bleed into a single lilac haze. Lily remembers the countless drunken stumbles through the dark on her way home; the time she laughed so much she was sick through her nostrils; an occasion when Jo had chased off an old guy who’d had the misfortune to choose her to flash to. They’d laughed so much Lily had ended up wetting herself right there in the middle of the park.
The house is empty and freezing cold. The front room curtains are still drawn and there’s a collection of beer cans on the coffee table. She spends five minutes trying to get the ignition on the gas fire to light before it finally throws out a steady blue flame. Lily keeps her coat on while she waits for heat to take some of the bite out of the air. Her bedroom is next door to the living room, across the corridor from Jo’s. As she opens her bedroom door she recoils from the smell. Empty bottles, cans, cigarette packets. There’s a plate of something that may once have been mashed potato. Heaps of black clothes lie on the floor, so dirty and damp that when she picks up her favourite black shirt she notices mould all around the collar.
She switches on her electric bar fire, realising for the first time how dangerous the wires look, the flex badly frayed, and sits on the bed until the room starts to warm up. But as the warmth spread the smell seems to get worse, until at last she can stand it no longer. She finds a roll of black bin liners in the cupboard under the sink in the kitchen and sighs to herself as she begins scooping her possessions into them. She finds a handful of scrumpled lecture notes under her bed and stuffs them in there too.
The carpet is just about visible again, when she hears the front door open and close and footsteps on the stairs. A voice calls out. Lily freezes, recognising the voice as belonging to one of the two chemistry students that live on the second floor. Moments later, there’s a knock on her bedroom door.
“Hi.” The door opens and the one she thinks is called Joel appears in her doorway. “You’re back,” he says rather obviously.
“Yeah.”
He stands with his foot against the door, his puffed up anorak making him seem three times the size she remembers him. “I’m sorry, you know, about what happened. Your mum.”
“Yeah. Thanks.” She waits for him to leave, but he doesn’t. She tries to encourage him on his way. “So, I’m just trying to clear this mess up.”
“Do you want a hand?”
“No, thanks.” Still he doesn’t leave. “So, I’d better get on.”
“I didn’t know whether to ring you, but I didn’t have your number.”
“Would have been difficult then,” says Lily, her tone unkind. She remembers how much time Jo and her had spent slagging these two off now. Talk about nerds.
“It’s just, I really enjoyed, you know.”
Lily doesn’t know but as he stares at her intently, a memory stirs and she feels the colour race to her cheeks. She squashes her memory back into its closed box. “Do you mind?” she almost spits at him. “I’ve said I’m really busy.”
“Oh, right. I’m sorry. Maybe we could meet up later?”
Lily walks over to the door and pushes it closed. “Maybe,” she says to his disappearing face. “Or maybe not,” she adds as she leans against the closed door. She pulls the privacy bolt across and wonders whether she’ll ever have the courage to leave the room again.
She’s still sitting on the floor with her back against the door an hour later when there’s another knock. Lily feels her body tense. “Lil? S’me, Jo. Let me in.”
The tension rushes from her body and Lily stands up and pulls back the bolt. “Jo, thank fuck.”
“Wow, I hardly recognise the place. It’s looking great. Hurrah, you’re back.” Jo throws her arms around her friend’s shoulders. “And you’ve put on some meat. Double hurrah.”
“Did I have sex with that scrawny geek from upstairs?”
Jo giggles. “Don’t blame me. I told you not to.” She opens her canvas bag and pulls out her tobacco tin. “How was Christmas with ‘the family?’ I’ve missed you. Term started last Wednesday, but there was hardly anyone around. I’ve been covering for you.”
“Jo, I’ve withdrawn from the course.”
“Oh.” Jo plumps herself down on the bed. “What the fuck will I do without you? Hey, I just saw a sign in The Fenton. They’re looking for bar staff.”
“I’m going to live with Fiona and my dad. We found a house.”
“You’re going to live with your dad?” Jo couldn’t sound more horrified if Lily had said she was considering voting Tory. She doesn’t look at Lily, but instead opens the lid from her tin and takes out a packet of rizlas. She glues three together and Lily notices her fingers are shaking.