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“I’m a good listener, Lydia, indulge me.” I handed her a fresh glass, poured the wine. She drank it down quickly and held her glass out for a refill. I topped her up. “Talk to me, Cat’s-eyes. Maybe I can help.” A shiver ran up my spine as I realised my offer was genuine.
She was about to wave it all away, I know she was. Her eyes sharpened as she choked back the upset, and I was losing her, losing the moment. I resigned myself to the inevitable, the public-facing Lydia Marsh, who pushed the pain deep inside and offered up nothing but slick-smooth persona, but something seemed to change in her. She stared me out for long seconds, so intensely it was almost uncomfortable. I kept quiet, sipping at my wine while she worked out her next move. It surprised me.
“I’m not good at talking,” she said “But I’ll give it a try.”
“Please do.”
“My mum is a very emotional person, always has been, as long as I can remember. She has problems coping with life. She’s a good person, but she makes stupid decisions.”
“What kind of stupid decisions?”
“Men, usually,” she said. “She falls in love every other week, normally with losers with no prospects and loose morals. I guess they see an easy ride, easy prey. They move in and use her up, then leave again when she’s all spent out. She falls apart every time, says she can’t take it. She’s suicidal at least four times a year, depending on how many relationships go down the drain. If I’m lucky she’ll be happy for six months straight, but that’s unusual. Her men don’t usually stay longer than a few months. She’ll replace this latest one with another, and another after him. I give it three weeks tops, but in the meantime she’ll be a wreck. She drinks and she gambles her money away on the slot machines. She claims she doesn’t, but it’s always the same. I bail her out and she falls apart again, over and over and over.” She paused, looking across at me with honest eyes. They pounded me in the stomach so hard it almost pained. “So, there you go. That’s my world.”
“How do you bail her out?”
“Money mainly, time when I can. For a while I was paying her bills direct from my account, just to make sure it got done. She seemed to be getting better at it, so I gave her back control earlier this year and just gave her money when she needed it. A big mistake. She’s now three grand in rent arrears and they’re threatening to throw her out. She claims Colin needed the money I sent her, to fight a custody battle for one of his kids or some shit. He promised he’d pay her back before she got evicted, only now he’s done a runner.”
“So she blew your money on some loser named Colin?”
She flinched, eyes narrowing to shards of pain. “It’s not the first time. I’ve tried to get her professional help but she won’t take it, saysI’mthe only one who can help her, but I’m too far away living it up in the big city. She hates that I moved here, wants me to go home, but I couldn’t go home, even if I wanted to. The money’s better here, and she always needs all I can spare. One day I hope I’ll be earning enough that I can get a bigger place, have her come live with me, if she will, that is. At least then I could keep an eye on her.”
“You said she’s been like this as long as you can remember, was it the same when you were growing up?”
“It wasworsewhen I was growing up,” she said. She looked away, but not in time enough to hide the sheen in her eyes, the threat of tears. She choked it back well. “When I was little I couldn’t help her, I’d just have to watch and tell her it would be ok. Weak words from a seven year old, of course. She’d cry all night, say she couldn’t cope and kiss me goodbye, telling me that I’d have a new family soon, with a mum who could take better care of me. I’d be so scared, watching from the stairs all night while she drank herself unconscious. She never seriously attempted suicide, but she got out the pills a few times. I hid them in the end, in the cupboard under the stairs, she’d shout at me when she had a headache, but I’d never tell her where they were. I was too scared. I used to pray every night that God would help me save my mummy, but God never answered, only a string of losers, with foul mouths and fouler manners. I lost count of how many men I should callDaddy.”
“Did any of them hurt you?” My mouth was dry as sand, no matter how much wine I sipped. I inched my chair closer, holding back the urge to reach across the table for her.
“Hurt me? Like physically? No. It wasn’t that bad. I wasn’t abused or anything, most of them ignored me entirely.”
I breathed out in relief. “You shouldn’t have had that on your shoulders, Lydia. You were too young, much too young. Did nobody help you?”
“Mum had a friend I called Auntie Sylvia, she’d come round often, try and help out. She’s still there with Mum now, living round the corner. I’d never have been able to leave if she wasn’t. She’d cook for us sometimes, when Mum was too depressed, and bring me toffees and a pat on the head. She’s nice, Syl. She helped.” I heard her breath hitch again and this time she struggled to bring it back in line. She put her hand to her mouth and her fingers were shaking. “I shouldn’t talk about this, I’m sorry. You’ll think I’m a right freak.”
“I don’t think you’re a freak, Lydia, I think you’re a bloody saint. A lot of people would have cut that shit off long ago.”
“I can’t cut her off,” she said. “She’s my mum, she needs me. I promised myself I’d be able to save her, just as soon as I was old enough... brave enough... clever enough... I’m not any of those things yet, it appears.”
“You areallof those things,” I said. “But you can’t save other people, no matter how much you want to. People will always walk their own path, dance with their own demons.”
“I have to try,” she wheezed. “I have to try harder. I let her down again. I always let her down.”
Her pain broke my resolve, and I was off, dragging my chair to her side, so close. Her delicate little hands in mine, so small. Bright eyes staring up at me. “No, Lydia. You didn’t let her down.Sheletyoudown.”
“She letherselfdown. She’s worth so much more than this, if only she could see what I see. Why can’t I make her see?” Her eyes were pleading, searching, open and raw.
My heart raced, buckling under the pressure to touch her, to pull her close. “People only see what they want to see, and they only do whatever they want to do. You can make excuses for them all you like, but you’llalwaysbe making excuses for them, Lydia. Always.” I lowered my head to hers, eye to eye. “It was the same with Rachel. She had different men every week, and then she’d cry and say she was sorry, that she’d try and be better and she needed me to love her, that I was all she had. I blamed her for lettingherselfdown, blamedmefor trusting too much, but ultimately she letmedown, andyourmum letyoudown, too.”
A single, lonely tear slipped from her eye, trailing a slow path down her cheek. I wiped it away before she could, choking on the urge to taste her pain.
“Thank you, James,” she said, squeezing my hand. “That means a lot.” She leant forward to land the softest little kiss on my cheek. I closed my eyes to blank her out, fearing I’d kiss her back. “I think I’ve done enough talking now,” she said. “Can I have another wine?”
I released her tiny hands from mine and reached for the bottle.
I didn’t pull my chair away from hers, not even when the conversation lightened and we were back in the realms of friendly colleagues. Lydia perked up well, firing off a couple of text messages to her vampiric mother with the promise that she’d sort her life out in the morning. I could have throttled the woman. The image of a scared little girl peeking through the bannisters at her drunkard mother twitched at my fists. The girl was made of steel, steel housing a whole load of pain, years of pain and fear and desperation. It made her all the more beautiful to me.
Cat’s eyes danced in the candlelight as we finished up the second bottle. She leant forward in an uncharacteristic display of closeness, resting her forehead on my shoulder. “I’m drunk,” she said. “But I had a great night.”
I rested my chin on her head, breathing in the scent of her hair. Coconut and lavender. “As did I.”
