The Lost Child

III. GOING OUT

She wiped Tommy’s mouth with her hand and then shoved the remains of the food into a bag that she slung up onto her shoulder. She had saved a salad cream sandwich in case her older boy was hungry, but when she looked around, she still couldn’t see him. The sun had gone behind a cloud, and it looked like it might rain, so she knew that it was time to leave this sorry excuse for a park that was littered with dog mess and empty beer cans and pop bottles. Having straightened Tommy’s shirt, she looked again and spotted Ben playing on the swings with a group of Pakistani children, but when she called to him, he ignored her and kicked his feet up in an attempt to climb even higher. “Don’t you make me have to come and fetch you.” She could feel the intrusive stares from the foreign men and women, who sat on the grass in a circular group around a seemingly endless supply of food that the wives had no doubt slaved over. They behaved like it was their park, which in a way it was now.

When Ben saw her striding towards him, he jumped from the swing and ran and hid behind a tree. “Ben!” Ten years old now, she thought, and still playing the fool. “You stop right where you are or I’ll give you what for.” He darted out into the open and then hid behind another thick oak, but he knew it was no use.

“Okay, I give up,” he said as he walked towards her. She twisted her grip on his wrist and accidentally gave him a Chinese burn.

“Oi, leave me alone!”

Then, with her free hand, she slapped the back of his head, which served only to make her palm sting. The Pakistani kids began to laugh out loud and point, irritating her no end. However, she didn’t want to say anything to the little buggers in front of their parents, so she just glared at them as she frog-marched Ben back in the direction of his temporarily abandoned brother. Ben turned up his nose at the salad cream sandwich, so she asked him again just to make sure. “So you’re not hungry then?” He shook his head, but he still wouldn’t meet her eyes. “Right then, it’s staying in the bag, and don’t bother me with any nonsense on the way home. Come on, we didn’t bring a brolly, so we’ll have to be lively.”

The wide entrance to the park bespoke a civic ambition that had never truly come to fruition. To the left of the iron gates stood an immodestly large statue of a former lord mayor that was now speckled in bird droppings, while the ceremonial urns on top of each gatepost sprouted thriving weeds. As she passed out of the park and turned right into Stanhope Lane, she silently reattached Ben’s hand to that of his brother and looked at the older boy in a manner that let him know that he should not let go. The roots of the trees had cracked and displaced the flagstones on this stretch of pavement, so it was treacherous for an adult, let alone two kids to try and walk here. They wandered by dismal-looking pubs and corner shops with paint peeling from their facades and windows that were securely grilled, but she understood that these places had no need to attract clients, for the faces that appeared each day, and the words they uttered, were as depressingly predictable as the cast and script of a long-running soap opera. After four years as a librarian in this run-down city that, despite the evidence of increased poverty, recently had the temerity to make a bid to host the Commonwealth Games, she was quietly desperate to escape back to Oxford, or even back to London, where she thought she might make a better fist of it given a second chance. Stamping out books five days a week, and rearranging shelves, and keeping the periodical subscriptions up to date, and shooing tramps, before spending her weekends at the park with the kids, was doing her no good at all. But what choice did she have? When she finally worked up enough courage to contact the admissions office at her old college, they wrote back and told her that she would be most welcome to return and complete the final year of her degree, but only after she had “established a domestic situation that would be compatible with study.” She scrutinized the piece of yellowish notepaper embossed with the college’s crest, and she read and reread the offending words.

Monica kept this news, and all her other business, from her boss at work. Denise wouldn’t shut up about how smart the city was getting, especially down by the river, where a cake shop and a place that sold flowers had recently opened up. Some of the greasy-looking blokes who liked to come into the library with the express purpose of trying to chat her up, they too wouldn’t give over about the virtues of the newly revitalized city centre. However, she felt that if you’ve never been anywhere, then you don’t know, do you? And what’s more, it was all well and good talking big about a place if you didn’t have children to bring up. She assumed that anywhere, even this dump, could look acceptable to you if you didn’t have kids.

Ben kept hold of Tommy’s hand as instructed, but he tugged at her skirt with his free hand.

“I’m hungry, Mam.”

“Well, we can’t stop now, understand? I don’t want to get wet, and your brother’s tired.”

They waited by the side of the dual carriageway, which ran like a scar through this part of town. On one side were the older terraced houses and run-down factories, including the town brewery, which they were now standing beside, but the sharp, sweet smell of malt and hops turned her stomach, and so she was always anxious for the traffic lights to change. A brand-new footbridge spanned the road at this point, but hardly anybody used it as you had to climb up two dozen steps to reach the bridge proper, and in her own case how were you supposed to do so with two kiddies who treated it like something you’d find in a playground? The cars and lorries thundered by in both directions, but once the lights turned green they hastened over to the far side, where the houses had been knocked down and replaced with a warrenlike collection of grey low-rise flats that the council had named after battles in the Second World War. On this far side of the road the only evidence of the past was the decrepit redbrick swimming baths building, which stood out like a rotten tooth all by itself. If you looked at the estate from a distance, you might easily imagine the swimming baths to be some weird architectural reminder of the Edwardian past, but despite the fact that it was falling to pieces, most mornings of the week school kids still used the place. When they first moved in there used to be a grassy picnic area and a place for kids to kick a ball outside of their range of flats — Arnhem Croft — but the council had decided to gravel it over and make a stab at a play zone. Of late, teenagers had claimed the area, and from dawn till dusk they colonised the place and exchanged their cigarettes and swigged cider, and occasionally a boy and a girl would slip into the tunnels of the concrete castle for a snog, but the adults just watched and left them alone as long as they didn’t bother anybody.

It was always hit or miss as to whether the lifts would work. Monica pushed a button, and as she waited, she heard the thunderous clamour of debris tumbling down the central rubbish chute.

“Mam, I’m really hungry.”

The lift doors opened, and she looked at Ben and nudged him forward. Truthfully, she was too tired to scold him, so she jokingly pinched his mouth shut and gave him a fatigued smile. A few moments later they all stepped out of the lift, and she looked down over the balcony to the gravel pit of a play area three stories below, where she could now see one of the teenagers urinating behind the slide. She had spent her first month in Leeds in a mournfully stark one-bedroom flat that Denise had arranged for her, but the council then informed her that because she was one of their employees, and a single mother, they could relocate her to this award-winning estate without her having to spend any time on the waiting list. The woman at the council office told her this in a manner that made it clear that Monica was to regard this as a great privilege, but from the moment she pulled up in Denise’s Mini and squinted out of the window at the bleak, characterless landscape of this new community, she instantly knew she would never be happy in such a place.

But she was stuck, for Julius never sent her any money, and she couldn’t afford to move out into private accommodation, so she reckoned she’d just have to make the best of things. The elderly man next door, who said he’d retired from the merchant navy, but who had no stories to tell — real or invented — of adventures he had experienced, or far-flung places he had seen, was forever taking the heel of his shoe and banging on the wall and complaining that the kiddies were making too much bleeding noise. At first she took it personally, imagining it to be a vendetta that was aimed at her, until she met flashy Pamela at the rubbish chute and discovered that she lived on the other side of the retired seaman, and being a single mother with a nine-year-old daughter, she too was receiving the same treatment with, no doubt, the heel of the same shoe.

By the time she had manhandled the boys into the flat and closed in the door behind her, Ben was once again moaning about how hungry he was, and so she reached into her bag and pulled out the sandwich, which she thrust into his grateful hands. It wasn’t until she had got Tommy out of his coat that she realized the flat was cold and the pilot light to the boiler must have gone out again. For the past fortnight she had arrived at work each morning and immediately called the council office and asked them to send somebody to fix the boiler, but their excuses were becoming increasingly abrupt, and she had now accepted that she would just have to wait until they were ready. A box of matches lay on the kitchen countertop for exactly this situation, and as she removed the glass panel and struck the match, she wished, above everything else, for somebody to help her out, for she knew that things couldn’t go on like this for much longer.

On the third match she managed to light the damn thing, but by then something had broken inside of her, and she stopped and stared into midair.

“Mam, what’s the matter?”

She looked down at Ben and smiled.

“Is something the matter again, Mam? Are you alright?”

“Your mother’s just tired, that’s all. You just go and squeeze up next to your little brother and give him a warm, there’s a good lad. I’ll put the kettle on.”

She heard the impatient clatter of the letter box, and as she moved to answer the door, she pointed Ben in the direction of Tommy.

“Go on, give him a quick rub.”

“Alright, Monica,” said Pamela, in her overly familiar way as she pushed her daughter forward and into the flat. The walkway was covered, but it had started to pour now, and the wind was sweeping the rain in towards the flats so that it made a light tapping noise as it struck the walls and windows. Monica closed in the door and then turned to face her neighbour, whom she might normally avoid, but on this wretched late Saturday afternoon she was glad for the company.

“The kettle’s just on. Do you fancy a cup of tea?”

“Well, I’m not stopping, but if you’re having one. It’s been a bugger of a day.” Pamela cast a quick glance at Lucy, whose mouth was smeared with chocolate. “Now,” she said, “I don’t want to hear you using any rude words.”

“I don’t know any rude words.”

“No, you don’t, and let’s keep it like that. Go and play with Ben and Tommy.”

But Tommy immediately bent over and picked up the toy train that he had inherited from his brother and clutched it to his chest, clearly aware of what might happen next.

“Well, Ringo Starr’s been giving it with the drumming on the walls again, so I went round and gave him a gobful, but you’ll never guess what he tells me. The cheeky bleeder says he’s reporting me to the council because I have too many visitors late at night. Like who? I said, not that it’s any of his business, but he just kept insisting that we understood each other, gormless sod. I was steaming, but I couldn’t just sit in the flat, so I went to the bingo with Lucy, and we were dead jammy and we won. Two quid. Amazing, isn’t it? I keep telling you, you should come with me. Perhaps we’d get lucky and win some money, and then maybe we could go on holiday together.”

She handed Pamela a cup of tea with a saucer, and then sat opposite her at the kitchen table.

“So where have you been all afternoon?”

“I took the boys down to the park by Stanhope Lane.”

“But it’s always so crowded down there, and it sometimes smells funny, don’t you think? Bloody thousands of them. But you know I don’t mean anything by it, don’t you?”

Pamela’s idea of a conversation was to occasionally draw breath and ask if Monica agreed with her before continuing to talk.

“Look, I’ve got an idea. I’m famished, so why don’t we all have tea together? I’ll go down the chippy and get us some fish-and-chips with the winnings, and then we can sit here and cheer each other up.”

“Are you sure?” Monica tried to remember where she’d left her bag. “But we don’t need to spend your winnings. We can pay for our own.”

“I know you can, but you won’t. It’s on me.” Pamela finished her tea and stood up. “Just excuse me a minute, will you?”

When Pamela came back from the bathroom, it was apparent that her neighbour had touched up her eyes and tidied up her “Autumn Sunset” hair, and she knew immediately that Pamela must have used her makeup and comb without asking. She didn’t understand why Pamela had to dress the way she did in a narrow miniskirt, with nylons that tended to rasp when she moved, and a tight cream blouse that showed the bones of her bra. She was always dolled up like she was about to go out somewhere, and Monica knew that it was only a matter of time before she would discover Ben staring at Pamela, and maybe then she would be forced to say something to her friend.

Ben had his ear glued to his tiny transistor, but Tommy was sitting on the living room floor with a restless Lucy, who, much to Tommy’s evident disapproval, was jumping up and down and switching the television set from one channel to the other and then back again.

“Now then, Tommy, don’t you be a maungy tyke. Lucy’s just trying to settle on something you’ll both enjoy.” But Tommy said nothing to his auntie Pamela, who turned instead to Monica. “He’s a good lad, isn’t he?”

Monica wished she could say the same about Lucy, but Pamela’s daughter was a mean-faced little sprite with pursed lips who took no notice of anything her mother ever said. Then again, Pamela always made a big show of talking to her daughter in a loud, firm voice when out in public, but she suspected that behind doors Pamela dispensed with the talking and knocked the lass about with the flat of her hand. Which, of course, is why Lucy played up so much when she was out, for she knew she wasn’t going to get hit.

“The boys will share a portion, right?” As ever, Pamela’s question was delivered as a statement. Monica wanted to ask her to bring the boys a portion each, and if they couldn’t finish theirs, then she would eat any leftovers, but she smiled gratefully and nodded.

“A portion between them will be fine.”

She knew that Pamela would get Lucy a full portion and eat whatever her daughter couldn’t manage, but that’s just how Pamela was. Outside, they both heard a rumble of thunder, and then the rain began to sizzle against the balcony.

“Oh, Jesus, I’d best be making tracks before all hell breaks loose.”

Pamela was drenched when she returned from the chip shop, but it would have been really grim if she hadn’t borrowed Monica’s belted raincoat and her flimsy umbrella, whose fretwork was admittedly a little buckled out of shape but had still managed to keep most of the downpour off her friend’s head. It turned out that Pamela had ordered extra scraps for the boys, so their one portion was more than enough, but Lucy could eat only half of her fish. Much to Monica’s surprise, Pamela offered to share the other half with her and quickly broke off a piece and passed it over without further comment. When everybody had finished, Monica balled up all the paper and pushed it in the dustbin, and then rinsed out the empty bottle of dandelion and burdock and placed it on the side so that it was ready to go back for the deposit. Then she set about putting the worn-out boys to bed. Once they were safely tucked up, she piled some blankets on the floor between them and made a makeshift bed for Lucy, and kissed the girl on the cheek before closing in the door to the bedroom.

Pamela was sitting at the kitchen table and had already helped herself to a small glass of brandy from the bottle that Monica kept in the cupboard to the side of the stove in case she ever needed some for cooking.

“Like a glass?”

Her friend poured Monica some brandy without waiting for a reply. There were no windows in the cramped kitchen, but they both knew that if they went through to the living room, they would risk waking up the children with their conversation. In any case, the view through the open curtains of the living room was depressing, with the dual carriageway down below and traffic streaking by in both directions, and then beyond the road the belching emissions of factories that struggled to operate around the clock.

Pamela lit a cigarette and slowly blew out the smoke. “Only a few weeks to go now till the kids’ summer holidays. I can’t wait, can you?” But of course, Monica could wait, for the summer holidays meant putting the kids in the day care centre, and paying for them to be looked after until she finished work at the library. Pamela packed Lucy off to her parents, and so she was totally free, but this option wasn’t open to Monica, who, aside from the odd letter from her persistent mother, had pretty much cut off contact with home. Last year Pamela had come around to the flat with some brochures for Majorca that she’d picked up at the travel agents, but Monica knew full well that the closest that Pamela had ever got to Spain was a weekend in Blackpool with an insurance man called Steve whose name, she had made clear, she never wanted to hear again.

“Perhaps this year the two of us can go off to Scarborough?” suggested Monica. “Or maybe somewhere else, just for the day.”

Even as the words came out of her mouth, she was aware of how impractical this was, for getting somebody to watch the kids at the weekend would mean finding extra money she simply didn’t have. Mind you, the more she thought about it, the more she asked herself if there might be somebody at the day care centre who would be willing to do her a favour and take them on for a Saturday or a Sunday?

“Really? You’d come with me to Scarborough?”

She watched a visibly surprised Pamela pour herself another brandy.

“That’s great, Monica. I’ve always said that you need to get out more. It will do you good, and you’ll be in a better mood for the kids. In fact, how about tonight? Why don’t we just pop out for a quick one, the two of us?”

“Tonight?”

“Maybe we could go to the Mecca Ballroom and have a dance? I went once, and lots of women our age go by themselves. It’s not just young lasses, and it’s not a pickup place if that’s what’s making you go all dithery; it’s just somewhere that people have a good time and talk. You’ve never been, have you?”

Of course, she hadn’t been, and she wasn’t even sure if she knew how to dance properly. She tried to redirect the conversation.

“We can’t just leave the children.”

“Yes, we can, they’re asleep. Our Lucy’s out for the count, and there’s no way she’ll get up till eight in the morning. You don’t mind if she spends the night here, do you?”

She wondered if this had been Pamela’s intention all along, to leave Lucy with her and go off gallivanting.

“Look, there’s no harm in the two of us going out. It doesn’t make us tarty if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Which was exactly what Monica was thinking. She stared at her friend, who drained the brandy from her glass in one gulp.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather stop in and talk?”

“Well, it’s up to you. If you’re frightened of what folks might say, then let’s stop in, but you know you can’t live your life like that.”

Pamela tossed her hair back and lit another cigarette. In this half-light she looked beautiful, but Monica knew that the real source of her friend’s attractiveness to men would be her confidence, for she never gave out the impression that anybody could knock her off her tracks.

Monica put on her only dress, the blue one that her mother had bought for her before she went off to university. She had last worn it to the library on her first day at work, but it became clear, simply by the way that Denise was looking her up and down, that she was overdoing it, so unsure if she’d ever have an occasion to take it out again, she’d put the dress away. It was made of blue satin, with a bow on the front by the bust, and it was all she had to dress up properly for a night on the town. She felt funny using her own comb after Pamela had used it, but because she’d recently snipped her hair short, these days it needed only a few rapid strokes. Monica gave her face a hasty towelling and then took a deep breath. It was evident that she wasn’t that pretty, and she had long accepted this reality as a bearable fact of life, but when she was set against Pamela, the full extent of her plainness was all the more noticeable. She carefully hung the towel over the side of the bath and realized that at the moment her main source of worry was not her looks but her raincoat, which, having had fish and chips pocketed inside it, would stink, as, in no time, would her dress.

“Well, how do I look?”

She heard Pamela lie and say “marvellous,” but she knew that at thirty-one she looked ten years older, and most days she felt it. A trip to the hairdresser’s was top of the list of things to be done, for having had a good go at her hair with the kitchen scissors, she desperately needed the ends trimmed and the whole mess straightened out. And of course, her nails were a disaster, but it was too late now.

“I’ll have a quick check on the kids?”

Monica stepped quietly inside of the boys’ bedroom and gently moved Tommy’s hand from his face. Then she looked down at a peaceful Ben and Lucy before closing in the door behind her.

“Well, Mary Poppins?”

“The kids are asleep.”

“Good, we won’t be long.”

Pamela insisted that since it sounded like it was only spitting now, they needn’t bother with coats, which was something of a relief. Monica quickly hung the smelly raincoat back up on the hook by the door.

* * *

Pamela had made the Mecca Ballroom seem like a quiet and civilised little place, but Monica had never seen anything like it. From the outside it could easily be mistaken for a cinema, but once they stepped inside the foyer and out of the sprinkling rain, she could feel the combined energy of noise, music, and lights just beyond the double doors. In front of them a shabbily suited man sat behind a desk, tearing tickets off a roll and dropping the money into an oversize metal cash box. He sat up straight when he saw her friend and greeted her by name (“Hey, Pam!”) in what he clearly hoped might pass for a gangster movie accent, but Pamela ignored him and snatched the tickets and then pushed her way through the double doors without turning back to make sure that Monica was following behind.

The dance floor was before them, but Pamela started to climb the circular staircase to their left, and once they reached the balcony she claimed a small table near the railings from whose vantage point they were able to survey the antics below. While Pamela went to the bar for two rum and Cokes, Monica looked all about and could see that the balcony encircled three sides of the dance floor, and was decorated with tables and chairs and the occasional settee where people could relax and drink until they were ready to once again take the plunge. Downstairs, girls were dancing in groups around their handbags, while blokes dawdled against the walls, smoking their cigarettes and trying to muster enough courage to make an approach. She could see that the downstairs girls were all sturdy curves and improbable inclines, and compared with them, she wasn’t much. Up here on the balcony she was marooned with the less glamorous set and the drunken men who, too shy to approach any lasses, had decided instead to drink the night away. She was older than most of the people, and as she saw Pamela teetering back towards her with their two drinks, it struck her how ridiculously formal her own dress must look, and she began to ache with embarrassment.

The two men at the next table kept looking at her and Pamela and smiling, but her friend didn’t seem to notice. Monica knew they were being talked about, and she had a sense that these men were not being kind. She held her glass of rum and Coke in both hands and tried not to look over in their direction, while a preoccupied Pamela propped herself up against the balcony and conducted a running commentary on who was here, and who was with whom, oblivious of her friend’s discomfort.

“Have you seen Angela Marsden’s top? She’s barely in it. Always queening it, she is.”

Monica was fully aware that she had lost the years in which you were supposed to learn what to do in a situation like this. While she was still living under her parents’ roof and studying for her exams, she had no interest in going out to places like the Mecca Ballroom. Other girls went, but they were the types she wasn’t keen on mixing with, and even if she had wanted to go out with them, they would almost certainly have shunned her. During her first year at university she made a conscious effort to attend the Christmas Ball, but the young men there affected to take delight in both her accent and her blue dress without showing any real interest in her beyond the obvious. For Monica this was the final indignity, and she thereafter retreated to her room, where she buried herself in reading for the rest of the year. At the start of her second year, fearful that she might completely lose sight of herself, she decided to seek friendships and alliances outside of her college and eventually discovered the Overseas Student Association, whose members seemed better able to recognize her. And now, all these years later, she found it ironic to think that finally here she was, in the Mecca Ballroom, but suffering from all the same insecurities that as a teenager she had intuited would plague her were she ever to set foot in a nightclub. As she continued to gape at the gyrating dancers, she knew that she ought to get a grip and make the best of the situation, and at least try and enjoy herself.

“I beg your pardon.” She suddenly heard Pamela, who was now leaning back in her seat, addressing somebody. She turned quickly as her friend continued. “Are you talking to us?”

The two men from the next table were idling over them, drinks in hand and with what they believed to be winning smiles on their faces.

“Well, we reckoned we’d come over before we go blind with staring. Can we join you?”

The taller, handsome one was doing all the chatting, while his less impressive friend lagged a little behind him, anxiously sipping at his pint of beer and quickly wiping away his frothy moustache. There was something about the friend’s combination of cocky assurance and nervousness that made her immediately like him.

“Well,” said the taller one, “we didn’t know that we had a model agency in the town?”

Pamela rolled her eyes. “Does that usually work for you?”

The man grinned and shrugged his shoulders.

“Well, come on then, help us out. Are you local, because we’ve not seen you around. I’m Victor, and this is Derek.”

“Victor. Derek.” Pamela threw her friend a quick glance as though checking if it was alright for these two to join them at their table.

“Can we sit down? You know we’re not going to bite.”

“Alright, go on then.”

Monica moved her chair closer to Pamela’s, and while Victor sat on Pamela’s right, Derek pulled up a chair opposite her so the two women wouldn’t be hemmed in on both sides.

It was only after the men had settled into their seats that Derek held out his hand for Monica to shake.

“Derek Evans. I’m sorry if we’ve interrupted your evening.”

He was a reasonably handsome, clean-shaven man, and his collar and tie were still firmly fastened, unlike his friend, whose dangling tie was complemented by the evidence of stubble. Derek Evans offered her a cigarette, and when she declined, he put the pack back into his jacket pocket rather than smoke alone.

“I don’t mind if you smoke.”

Derek smiled gently and shook his head. She guessed that he was probably about thirty and maybe a civil servant of some kind. He really didn’t seem the type to be out trying to pull birds on a Saturday night.

“It’s alright, I don’t have to smoke. But I was thinking, if you’re from around here, then I’m surprised I’ve not seen you before.”

She explained to him that she was really from Wakefield, but she lived here and worked at a local branch library. She paused and then added the missing information:

“I live with my children. I’ve got two boys, Ben and Tommy.”

When he asked if she had any snaps of them, she immediately felt bad, and worried that he’d think she was a failure of a mother. In the absence of any photographs she decided to describe the boys to him, and she said a bit about what they liked to do, how they both liked football and how Ben seemed to be taken with pop music. Derek Evans listened to her without once taking his eyes from her face. When she finished, Monica reached for her drink, and then from his wallet Derek Evans produced a glossy snapshot of his nephew and niece, regretting the fact that their mother, his sister, was emigrating to Canada next week because his brother-in-law wanted to make a fresh start out there in the building trade. He wasn’t sure when he’d see them again, but he had a feeling that the kids would be all grown up by then, and he’d particularly miss the lad, whom he’d introduced to the junior football team that he helped out with on weekends.

“You can always make pen pals of the children and keep in touch that way.”

“I suppose I can.” He was quiet for a minute, then tucked the picture back into his wallet. “I hadn’t thought of that. I like to do a bit of writing, and I’m always reading, but I typically use the main library in town, which is probably why I’ve not seen you. I’m partial to taking out books on rambling and bird-watching, as I’m a bit of a nature buff.”

She watched as he took a quick sip of beer, as though eager not to lose the momentum.

“So do you like it then, at the library?”

For all his kindness and good manners, she knew that this was not the time to be sharing her ambitions of going back to university. After all, she hadn’t told anybody, including Pamela.

“I suppose it’s like any job. It can have its frustrations, but it’s a job, isn’t it?”

“I see. Maybe I’ll drop by and visit one day, if that’s alright with you?”

“Well”—she smiled—“it’s a public library, so I can’t rightly stop you.”

Victor tapped the table with the bottom of his beer glass.

“Right then, Derek, it’s about time you offered these ladies another drink, don’t you think? Your round, lad, and look lively.”

By the time Derek returned to the table with the pints of beer and two rum and Cokes balanced precariously in his hands, Pamela and Victor had decided to go downstairs to the dance floor. Monica craned her neck over the edge, but she couldn’t make them out in the swell of heaving bodies, and for a moment she wondered if Pamela had deliberately abandoned her with this Derek. But at least he was a gentleman, so she didn’t feel too worried.

He explained that he and Victor worked on the Post, and while nowadays he’d moved on to the management side, Victor was still a reporter. As she listened to him patiently explaining both his job and his prospects, she speculated as to what would become of her two boys when it was time for them to enter the world of the opposite sex. Would they frequent places such as this and try and pick up lasses? Would they be brash and know-it-all like Victor, or more gentle, caring souls like this Derek?

“Would you like to dance?” When she heard his voice, she snapped back to attention and realized that the music had changed. The dance floor was now speckled in shards of turning light as couples held on to each other.

“I hate to admit it, Monica, but I’m not a very good dancer. That said, it seems a shame to come here and not give it a go, don’t you think?”

She was too nervous to answer him directly, but she knew that it would be rude to ignore his question, especially as she could feel his eyes upon her.

“Will it be alright to leave these drinks on the table?” She coughed nervously. “I mean, nobody will take them, will they?”

The first touch was difficult, as it had been so long, but once she got used to his hand on her waist she started to breathe again as they both attempted to shuffle purposefully in the cloying mist of cheap eau de cologne. She looked over his shoulder for Pamela, but she still couldn’t see either her friend or Victor, so she closed her eyes and didn’t resist when he made a move to pull her closer to him. The music was a mystery to her as one slow song blended with the next, and she assumed that he might expect her to know the names of the groups that were singing, though quite honestly she hadn’t a clue. Sometimes she’d put on a pop music station to liven things up as she made tea for the kids, but while Ben seemed to like the music, she soon grew bored with the noise, and much to her son’s disappointment, she would turn off the wireless and encourage him to go and watch the television instead.

As Derek escorted her to the top of the stairs and began to usher her back in the direction of their table, she noticed that Victor’s hand was resting on Pamela’s leg in the space between the hem of her skirt and her knee. Her friend appeared to be either unaware of this act of trespass or comfortable with his hand, but either way Monica found it unnerving. There was also a second drink standing beside the still-untouched round that Derek had brought from the bar. She took up her seat and spoke to nobody in particular.

“You’ll have to excuse me, but I don’t know if I can drink that much.”

Victor immediately made a grab for one of his pints and raised it in a toast.

“Of course you can. Drink up, Monica. To us.”

She lifted up her glass, but as she did, she noticed how Victor was looking at her, and she now had a good idea of what he thought of the two women that he and his pal were drinking with, but it was too late to say anything to Pamela.

Monica couldn’t really remember what happened next, for everything began to go fuzzy and she felt a headache setting in. Victor insisted that Derek go to the bar for yet more drinks, although she remembered Derek’s suggesting that they finish what they had in front of them first, but Victor teased him and called him tight, and so Derek reluctantly stood up from the table. Once he’d gone she had nobody to talk with, for Pamela had scrunched herself into Victor so completely that her skirt was riding up near the top of her nylons and Monica wanted to throw a blanket or something over her. When Derek came back, he pretended not to notice her friend’s performance, but the awkwardness didn’t last, for Pamela soon came up for air and started talking thirteen to the dozen. Then Victor sent Derek back to the bar for another round, and then another. At some point all four of them were on the dance floor, that much she was sure of, and they were dancing as individuals, not as couples, but Derek never took his eyes off her, which made her feel anchored and grateful. At some point, Monica remembered, the room started to spin, and Derek offered his arm, which she took, but the stairs back to the balcony were definitely steeper than earlier in the evening, and it seemed like there were more of them. Derek sat her down at the table while he went to the bar for a glass of water, and it was only now that she picked up on the fact that the place was starting to empty out, and for the first time all evening she felt truly unsure of what she was doing.

It was Victor who suggested that they go for a drive in his Ford Cortina and look at the moonlight on the river. Pamela jumped in the front passenger seat while Monica slid into the back next to Derek, who kept both hands on his knees and gazed out of the window. She was adamant that she didn’t want to do this, but nobody would listen to her when she muttered that she ought to be getting back. Before the car engine even started, Victor grabbed hold of Pamela and they began to engage in a bout of quick, open-lipped palaver that was only interrupted by Derek’s half-pleading, half-laughing “Hey, come on.” Pamela collapsed in a fit of giggles, and Monica closed her eyes and listened to the laboured cranking of the car engine as Victor tried to start it up. When they got to the river, Victor peeled Pamela from around his neck (“Chuffing heck, pack it in for a minute will you, Pam?”), and the two men excused themselves and began to stumble towards the water. In his haste Victor had left the driver’s door wide open, so Pamela reached over and pulled it shut and then hoisted herself around so that she was facing the back seat.

“They’re alright these two, aren’t they? And they’ve got brass.” Monica shifted her head so that she was now looking in the direction of the two men, who stood on the bank of the river clearly competing to see which one of them could pee the farthest. Pamela began to shriek. “I mean look at them, pair of daft clots. What are they like?”

This was a question that a confused Monica was beginning to ask herself, for in her presence Derek seemed reserved and almost timid, but with Victor he appeared to willingly take on the role of comic sidekick as though the pair of them were some out-of-date music hall act. As far as Monica was concerned, Victor just didn’t come up to scratch. She opened the back door and stepped out of the car, and careful to make sure that she wasn’t facing the river, she began to gulp the warm night air. She looked up at the stars in the black sky, and then she asked Pamela if she could see the clouds moving. Monica began to turn in a circle, and again she asked Pamela the same question, and then she asked it again, but Pamela wouldn’t answer, and then she felt Derek drape his arm around her neck like a warm scarf, and then he moved it down across her moist, sweaty back and lifted her into the rear seat of the Cortina. She heard him tell his friend that they’d best be going as it was getting late.

Victor searched through the cupboards in her kitchen, noisily pushing cups and saucers to one side until he found four ill-matched glasses, which he placed on the small table.

“You don’t mind, do you, Monica?” Pamela was smiling at her. “I told Victor about the brandy, for I’m not sure what I’ve got at my place.”

Victor paused before pouring, as though he had suddenly remembered something. Then he reached over to the stove and hauled himself up and onto his feet.

“What happens at the end of the picture before you go out?” Victor didn’t wait for an answer. “National anthem. Let’s have a good rousing singsong to show some respect.”

Victor began singing, but Derek lunged across the table and pulled him back down and into his seat.

“The children, Victor. We’ll have to keep it down, alright?”

An annoyed Victor smiled sarcastically and began to pour, but Monica took this as her cue to stand up.

“I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go and make sure they’re still asleep.”

Derek also stood up. “Shall I come too?”

“No, please. I won’t be a minute.”

Pamela giggled. “Our Lucy can sleep through a thunderstorm and not twitch a muscle, isn’t that right, Monica?”

Monica stopped and, looking at her friend, noticed that she could now see the black roots of Pamela’s “Autumn Sunset” hair beginning to emerge like blighted crops.

She quietly cracked the door and peeped through the darkness at the two boys, whose breathing was shallow but regular. Some days it felt as though the two kids were drawing the stamina right out of her body, for she was forever chasing them, or picking up after them, or placating one or the other, or simply begging them, but for better or for worse they were all she had, and not a single day passed when she didn’t remind one or the other of them that they had a responsibility to look out for each other. Ben’s arms were splayed above his head as though he was waving to a friend with both hands, while Tommy was curled into a tight ball with one half of his face entirely buried in the pillow. Between them, on the makeshift bed on the floor, Lucy slept on her back with her thin lips parted so a discordant nasal whistle sang out with every breath. Jesus Christ, what was Pamela thinking of? When they pulled up at Arnhem Croft, her friend didn’t say a word, and she just led the way until they all were standing on the walkway outside of Monica’s flat.

“Well,” said Victor, “are we stopping out here all night waiting for the tooth fairy?”

For some reason Pamela found this side-splittingly funny, and because she began to roar loud enough to wake all of the neighbours, Monica decided that she had no choice but to quickly find her keys and open up the door, feeling, not for the first time, that Pamela had let her down.

When she walked back into the kitchen, only Derek was there. He was sitting at the table and quietly drumming his fingers against the side of the half-empty bottle.

“Where did those two go?”

Derek half stood as she took up a seat, which struck her as an oddly polite way of going about things. However, she had to admit that she quite liked it.

“They went to your friend’s flat to see if she can find anything else to drink. Victor’s not much of a brandy drinker.”

She eyed the bottle and arched her eyebrows. “Really? You could have fooled me.”

She wanted to ask him why he went along with playing second fiddle to his obviously more idiotic friend, but this wasn’t the time.

“What about you?” he asked. “Are you partial?”

What kind of an antiquated phrase was that? It was like this Derek Evans was talking to somebody twenty years older. She guessed that he probably spent a lot of time with his father, or grandfather, down the allotments or going to dog races, or engaged in some other manly pursuit where the vocabulary of one generation could be casually absorbed by the next without any regard for its relevance to the present time.

“I’m not much of a drinker as I don’t get out that often.”

“I see.” He pushed the bottle away from them a little; then he looked at her and smiled. “I meant to say, back there at the Mecca, that I thought your dress was smashing. But seeing it now, in the light, so to speak, it’s even better.”

“I bought it when I went to university. Or more accurately, my mother bought it for me, but I felt a bit out of place in it tonight.”

“No, you weren’t.” He stopped suddenly, as though aware that his response might be interpreted as being overenthusiastic. “You looked grand, but I didn’t know that you went to university. It’s just that you don’t meet many lasses, or lads for that matter, who’ve been to university. Well, at least I don’t, although we’re beginning to get some applications now from students who want to begin on a regional newspaper and then work their way down to London.”

“Is that what you’re hoping to do? Work your way down to London?”

He laughed nervously, but Monica could see she had put him in a bit of a bind, for his eyes made it clear that he was trying to work out what it was that she wanted to hear. Either he wanted to go to London, and he therefore viewed the north as inferior, a kind of stepping-stone, or he was happy to stay put, which might give her the idea that he was a bloke without any kind of ambition. She regretted putting him in this predicament, and wished that she could take back the question.

“London’s a big place, isn’t it? I’ve been, but just the once to visit the Imperial War Museum. I used to be into history, particularly anything about the last war, but I’ve not got much time these days. But it was a great day out, riding on those red buses, and I even got on the tube a couple of times.” He paused and lowered his voice. “Listen, I know it’s none of my business, but I was just curious if there’s a dad in the frame. For the boys.”

Now it was her turn to laugh. “Well, if there is, I think you’d best be making your exit before he gets back.” She paused and watched his alarmed face. “I’m only joking. Would you laugh if I told you that I’ve hardly ever been out with anybody? I once wore this dress on a date with a chap at university. He took me to see a film called Giant, a western, and all I remember thinking was, Is this picture ever going to end because I’m ravenous? And when it did end, he never asked me out again.”

“Is that so?”

Now that she was able to get a good look at Derek she could see that he really wasn’t anything exceptional. Average height, sandy-coloured hair that was prematurely thinning, and a nice face, if a bit podgy; however, his charm was his best feature.

“Well, I’d have asked you out again, that’s for sure. I think I told you, I’m a bit of a nature buff. I’m fond of rambling.”

Monica smiled to herself. She had nothing against nature, but it wasn’t really her thing. In fact, she didn’t even like plants in the flat, for they grew so slowly you could never tell what they were up to.

“I’d like to kiss you, but I’m not one to force myself upon people. But would I be right in thinking that there’d be nothing wrong with a kiss?”

Monica reached over and took a tiny sip from her hitherto untouched glass of brandy, and then she put it down and braced herself, for she knew that she wasn’t going to be able to stop it from happening. She wished that this man could have found the courage to kiss her on the dance floor in the darkness while he’d had his hands on her waist, and while nobody could have possibly seen them, but he had been too busy playing the gentleman. Now he was getting her involved in the process, which she instinctively knew was the wrong way to go about these things. He reached over and placed a slightly clammy hand to the side of her face.

“I’ll stop whenever you say.”

“No, Derek, they’ll be back.”

His collar and tie were now unfastened, and as he listed towards her, she could smell the alcohol on his breath.

“I’m pretty sure they’ll not be coming back, Monica. Not if I know Victor.”

She suddenly remembered how messy and noisy kissing could be. It was nothing like in the films, and as she felt her mouth drawing tight in anticipation, she closed her eyes and promised herself that she wouldn’t resist.

Monica lay back on the bed and looked up as the man reached clumsily for a cigarette and lit one. She watched the tiny orange circle glow into life as he took a deep pull. “I hope you don’t mind,” he said. She touched his cheek with a finger as though making sure that he was for real; then she noticed his surprisingly weak chin. She tried not to think of the chaotic trail of clothes that she imagined lay on the floor between the kitchen and her cupboardlike bedroom, but she realized that at this very moment she should be factoring in the consequences of one of the children’s waking up and walking in on her.

Derek was concentrating hard, and then he blew a perfectly formed smoke ring, which gave him another reason to be pleased with himself.

“Do you have anybody special, Derek? I should have asked.”

He carefully laid the cigarette down on the pack in such a way that the lit end was hanging over the edge of the box and would burn itself out at the filter. Then he rolled over next to her and pulled her close.

“I do now.”

He moved in and kissed her quickly on the mouth.

“I’m not like Victor, with birds everywhere. As I said, I’d be keen to see you again.”

“Go steady, you mean?”

“Well, one step at a time, but something like that. My situation’s a bit complicated as I’ve got a wife, and so has Victor, but unlike him, I’m kind of separated.”

She watched him disengage himself from her, and then he hauled himself out of the confusion of bedding and propped himself up on a supporting arm.

“We were really young when we wed, so things haven’t been that straightforward.”

She felt as though she’d been slammed up against a wall.

“Look, I’d best be going before your boys wake up.”

“They’re fast asleep, but I should probably go and check.”

“No, you’re alright.” He clasped a gentle hand to her shoulder. “You look great just like that.”

When exactly, she wondered, had he worked the wedding ring off his finger? She could see him looking closely at her, as though somewhere inside of himself he was celebrating a kind of muddled triumph.

“I’m sorry, Monica, but I’ve really got to get back.”

She watched him spin slowly out of bed and begin to step into his underpants. Then he lit another cigarette and picked up the now-empty pack and went in search of the rest of his clothes. She heard water running in the bathroom, then the toilet flush, and then he was back standing over her and raking back his strawlike hair with one hand while carrying his shoes in the other. She guessed that he must have flushed both the old and the new cigarettes down the loo. He gestured to the shoes.

“I don’t want to wake up the young ones, so I’ll put these on outside.”

She pulled the sheet around herself and swung her legs around so that her feet were now touching the floor. Doubling his chin, he looked down at her.

“I’ll come and see you at the library,” he said. “Really, I will.”

“It’s the Ladyhills branch,” she said. “Not the main one.”

Monica wanted to add, the one with stained carpet and old volumes that smell of dirt and dust; the branch where men wait for me to climb the ladder before they sneak a look up from their books.

“I know which library.” He stooped slightly and kissed her on the forehead; then he tousled her short hair and smiled. “And I’ve left my work number on top of the telly with my extension and everything, so they’ll put you right through.”

“Thanks.”

“Maybe we can go for a drink after work one night this week? Just me and you, not Victor or your friend. Would you like that?”

It didn’t make any sense to suddenly start feeling bashful, but she nodded and looked down at her crooked toes. When she raised her head, he was gone, and a moment later she heard the painful screech of the front door closing and then the click of the lock as it jumped into place.

Monica was alone, but she could feel herself hovering on a precipice and in danger of being swept away by a torrent of emotions, among which guilt and shame featured with some prominence. She left the bedroom and quickly picked up her clothes from the kitchen floor. She puzzled as to why he had rescued his own but left hers lying there. Then she put the chain across the front door and hurried back to the bedroom and flung her wrinkled dress and knickers and bra on top of the dishevelled bedclothes and pulled on her dressing gown, but she couldn’t afford to linger. Her task in the kitchen was clear. She washed out the glasses and put away the now depleted brandy bottle and continued to try to hide any sign that her flat had been visited by these people. Once she was satisfied, she checked on the children and discovered Lucy staring up at her with eyes wide open, although the girl’s body remained rigid with fatigue. “Go back to sleep, love.” She looked at Ben and Tommy and remembered their afternoon in the park, and what a slog it had been to get them back to the flat as the rain began to fall. But they were good kids, all of them, even Lucy, and it wasn’t their fault. None of it was.

In the living room she leaned up against the window, where drops of rain were shivering to life and then transforming themselves into thin, hesitant lines as they descended the pane. Down below she saw a man crossing the new bridge over the dual carriageway, and then scuttling down the stairs on the far side by the brewery. It was him, Derek Evans. Maybe she would write to him at the Post and simply say thanks, and tell him that she’d had a good time. She already knew that calling him on the telephone would be too much for her. If somebody else picked up the phone, she’d only get flummoxed, and how was she to describe herself? Jesus, Monica, what have you done? She could see that up in the sky there were no clouds to obscure the thin pendant of moon and speckling of stars, and down on the ground no evidence of the late-afternoon storm, aside from the odd puddle that cars continued to splash through. Despite the light drizzle, the world seemed quiet, peaceful almost, and then she noticed that he’d left his empty pack of cigarettes on top of the television set, and a dog-eared business card and a ten-shilling note were tucked underneath it. She picked up the discarded box and moved it to one side. He’d left money for her, which meant that either he’d got the wrong idea about her or he really cared, but as she turned and watched him disappear down the street that ran parallel to the brewery, she didn’t know what to think.