Prologue
Sunday, the 7th September 1958
THE GNARLED BRANCHES OF THE YEW creaked in the early autumn breeze. He wished for the umpteenth time his bench didn’t fall under the mammoth tree’s shadow. His navy, double-breasted jacket was buttoned, his trilby hat pushed down, hands shoved in pockets, shoulders hunched. He really should go. His legs were stiff, his posterior complaining. Yet he remained. Eyes firmly fixed on the polished granite headstone displaying his wife’s name in weathered gold lettering. It did her no justice, he thought. The inscription was simple, her name, the years measuring her too short life, and the true, but totally inadequate memorial of Dearly Loved and Never Forgotten.
Whether from his army days or his compulsive patterns, he was a creature of habit. Monday through Friday was a robotic repeat of absolute discipline. Switch the alarm off at six-thirty. Wash, do warm up exercises in the bathroom (a habit from his army days) dress, eat a bowl of cornflakes, and when the Times newspaper fell on the hallway floor at seven-ten precisely, he would tuck it under his arm and stride to the train station. The paper would be read on the train to Manchester, where he worked as a civil servant. He would work dutifully and diligently, and then when the wheels of industry had sucked him dry with endless red-tape and pointless bureaucracy, he would return home. Cook something plain and eat it. Wash, put on his striped pajamas, do the newspaper crossword, and then head to bed with a book.
It had been a desire to escape the aftermath of war that had first driven him to the printed word. He had taken to it slowly; his first book taking six months to complete, because he’d kept falling asleep. But then… it had been Titus Groan, and a labyrinthine castle, madmen locked in the dungeon and a whopping 496 pages had turned out to be an epic just a tad too fantastical for him. And then, a few months after his beloved left him, the petite librarian at the local library had fluttered her eyelashes at him and pushed The Catcher in the Rye into his hands. Caught up in the young New Yorker’s problems, his difficulty in remaining awake dispersed, and now against his better judgement, he found putting books down at night a trifle difficult. Still, when the alarm calls at six-thirty a lack of sleep is undeniably punishing.
On Fridays the routine changed only when he stopped off at the Tail and Hound on the way home, his tipple being two pints of bitter. Saturday he laundered his clothes, which included a fresh white shirt for each day of the week. Sometimes, when the sunlight beckoned him into the garden, he would drop off his dirty clothes with Mrs. Francis, who took in washing to top up the coffers. She always did the sheets for him twice monthly, so it was far too easy to drop off his clothes as well. He thought her mangle was impressive as she seemed to dry the clothes in no time. Plus, he was rather partial to the extra starch she put on his collars. There was no getting around the fact that a woman could do these things better than him, yet… one must push forward and strive to increase one’s expertise in all matters. Continuing with his duties (which quite frankly dulled his senses) he would clean the house, do a spot of gardening – weather permitting, and lastly down his steak with a satisfactory measure of whiskey.
But Sundays… oh Lord, Sundays.
This one day a week, he permitted himself the indulgence of giving in to pain and self-pity, to daydreams and regrets. But mostly he gave in to his memories.
He always sat on the back pew in church. As soon as the service was over, he would slip out the door before the ushers were even out of their seats. He wasn’t one for talking these days. He liked his privacy, and went all out to safeguard his peace and quiet. People knew him as a man of few words, and well since his wife died he’d practically become a hermit. Still, there was no need to be rude, they’d whisper behind their halfhearted smiles and understanding nods.
He closed his eyes. Instantly, her alluring face was before him. The corners of his lips rose slightly as the memory bloomed. This was his favorite one. Their delayed honeymoon had been celebrated in Bournemouth. The war finally over, he had rejoiced not in the silencing of guns, but in the curve of her waist and in the joyous sound of her laugh. They’d drunk Champagne, danced and tried their hardest to make a baby. Oh indeed, it was his favorite memory! Her soft lips, her warm embrace…
“Wind’s picking up.”
Sometimes seconds can stand still in time. Seconds in which, one may ponder several outcomes of one’s current situation, and all swinging on the choice of words one will finally commit to utter.
“It is indeed,” were the words that eventually came from his mouth, while his mind bantered around ‘bugger off, leave me alone.’
“It’s the anniversary next week, isn’t it? The fifteenth?”
He lifted his heavy head and glanced at the intruder into his peace. The young man before him was a decent man. He knew that, besides who else would remember that next week would be the fifth anniversary of his wife leaving him?
“I hope you’re not going to say something like, where does time go?”
The young man smiled, and sat himself down on the bench. “You keep it neat,” he said, nodding towards the grave. “She was lucky to have you. There aren’t many who come every week to remember their loved ones.”
“I was the lucky one.”
“Have you not thought about finding someone to share life with? I’m sure your wife, ‘God bless her soul,’ wouldn’t want you to be alone.” The young man had taken off his checkered work cap and was idly twirling it in his hands. Workman’s hands, rough and scarred, mud buried deep under his fingernails.
He wanted to snap ‘of course not,’ but in truth the loneliness of the last five years, (not in passing years you understand, but in untenable long evenings) had become unbearable. “To be honest, I’ve thought about putting an advertisement in the paper, miserable old git seeks companion, affable women with no baggage may apply.”
The young man tilted his head back and roared. When he’d finished wiping the laughter tears aside with the back of him arm, he turned a little to better regard his weather-beaten friend. “Think you’ll get many takers, then?”
He had to smile. “No, but then I don’t honestly want to make the effort to be nice to anyone. I don’t want to explain the emptiness in my chest or why I don’t eat pickles. It’s only sometimes I get to thinking, perhaps life would be more tolerable if someone quiet was sitting on the opposite side of the table during meal times.”
“My mum always says my dad is her best friend, and what more could she ask for. I’d like that, to be married to my best friend.”
“What’s her name?”
“Oh, I’ve not met her yet.”
“Really?” He examined the young man. He was a tall, muscular man with sun-kissed skin that highlighted his chestnut eyes. Brown curly locks framed his angular face. He wasn’t into studying men per se, but if he had to pass a comment or two, he would say the boy was personable and fine-looking, surely dapper enough to attract the fairer sex. He certainly had a heart of gold.
“Once they find out what I do for a living, they normally skedaddle swifter than a dog with a bone.” The young man’s right eyebrow lifted high, revealing a certain ‘that’s life’ expression.
“My advice to you then young man is not to tell them what you do until they’re asking you to come home and meet the parents. By which time, they will be so desiring of your affection they won’t give two hoots what you do to bring home the bacon.”
“And I would urge you, good sir, to go find that companion. Come out of your secluded safe-place long enough to let someone in, you never know you might get lucky and fall in love a second time.”
