The Woman Who Kept Everything

Tilsbury was hopping around in mild terror.

‘Ooo, my love! You gotta get the electricity people out now. Could be a fire! You insured?’

‘Wouldn’t know, Tils. Never really pay for anything any more, do I, ducks. S’all set up out of me bank account or summat. Cleggy sorted it all out for me after Arthur went, as you know. But I can smell summat singeing! Get hold of me son for me, will ya, ducks? Cleggy’ll sort it all out. Bit worried about being burned alive in my bed. You hear of it happening.’

Chapter 3

A few days after the people from the electricity board came to check on the situation, three people from social services turned up; one with a clipboard. They looked official, to Gloria, with their curt smiles and long dark coats. She would’ve said they were calm and sympathetic, if someone’d asked. But they didn’t look that way after their first encounter with 75 Briar Way.

They came into her house, sniffing the air and gagging for some reason. One of them, a man, ran out muttering something. Gloria found it amusing. Tilsbury went round shrugging.

‘Must’ve eaten summat off before they came here.’

The plump, friendlier woman who finally arrived later that first day, Diane, was the most understanding, but even she had a strongly scented handkerchief she kept wafting across her face. Gloria screwed her nose up at the smell and stood a little distance away from her. She wasn’t keen on heavy perfumes.

Oh, but there was nowhere to sit per se. That was the tricky thing about having more than one person over at any one time. And in order to be courteous, Tilsbury had to clamber over a lot of stuff, upstairs, to get the stool off the top of Gloria’s bedside dressing table, so Diane could sit down in the tiny bit of space between the hall and kitchen door. Gloria leant against the architrave and rested her burnt hand on a stack of crumpled magazines.

Now that Diane had finished looking around – her mouth gaping in awe, her handkerchief not far from her nose – she said that her mother had been just like Gloria when Diane’s grandparents died. Couldn’t quite accept it; still didn’t; in a nursing home now.

‘Much better for her. All her woes dealt with and she’s properly cared for.’

Gloria didn’t really know what the woman was talking about. She wasn’t interested to know something about someone she didn’t know and would never know and, anyway, her hand ached. She grimaced as she tried to reposition it.

‘Oh my, that hand looks sore, love. Should’ve wrapped it in cling film or something clean if you had it. But, anyway, don’t you worry about all that, now. We’ve got to get you away from here and do some sorting out,’ Diane informed her, with a bright smile.

Gloria shook her head solemnly. ‘Don’t want to go anywhere else. Been here so many years, ducks, and I certainly don’t want to go anywhere now.’

‘I know that, Gloria! But we’ve, um, we’ve got to sift through all this – er – this stuff to try and find where the electrics blew. Your house’s become a bit of a fire hazard now, so we’re taking you somewhere safe while we sort things out. And that hand of yours needs looking at.’

Clegg appeared at that precise moment, his large frame filling the already clogged front doorway. He was sweating and also trying not to gag. He squeezed past them to try and look at the kitchen, pushing boxes and piles of magazines aside in his attempt to get through, but then he stopped, deciding against it.

‘Oh stuff this! Right, Mum. Bleeerr. God! What a stench! And what on earth is all that crap and rubbish doing over there by the kitchen sink? Wasn’t there last time I came. Good grief, there’s bits of food in it as well, Mother! What on earth’ve you been doing?’

‘I think some hooligans nicked me wheelie-bin, Cleggy. So I leave me household rubbish near the back door. Can’t put it outside. Foxes might get it!’

Clegg gagged and put his hand over his mouth, shaking his head.

‘Un-fucking-believable! Right, well, I got rid of that bloody scoundrel, Tilsbury. Seems to me he’s using your ruddy good nature to wheedle his way into favour, rent-free, and how’s that helpin’ matters? It ain’t, Mother. So you’re coming with me. And I don’t want any more ruddy arguments. Plus it’s not safe for you in here with all this crap everywhere and dodgy electrics.’

He turned his back on his mother and nodded to Diane.

‘Just get rid of the bloody LOT! Don’t care how you do it but just DO it. Give me any paperwork you find in drawers and the like but otherwise there’s nowt of any value. I’ll pay for what needs payin’ for but just get rid of it. And, er, thanks for getting her a place at Green’s Nursin’ Home for a couple of weeks. They’ll clean her up and sort her out a treat, I’m told,’ he said through clenched teeth.

‘They certainly will, Mr Frensham. They’re one of the best homes in the district. And you say you’re happy to take her afterwards? Is that for full-time care or will you need some additional help?’ mumbled Diane, behind her handkerchief.

Clegg shook his head vehemently. ‘No. We’ll be okay with that, thanks. My Val’s sorting all that side out. She’s a nurse as you know. We’ve got a small en suite extension for my mother. So we’ll all be fine at home together. God! That smell is unbearable! Dunno how she’s put up with it all these years. Nowt so queer as folk, as they say.’

Chapter 4

From the moment Gloria stepped foot inside Green’s Nursing Home she decided she didn’t like it.

Well, it wasn’t 75 Briar Way, for one thing! And where were her belongings? Where was her winceyette nightie? Where was her splayed blue toothbrush for cleaning her dentures with? And where was her little alarm clock with no battery that Arthur bought her, back in the day, which she kept under her pillow when she slept? She liked those things around her. They brought her comfort.

Clegg had driven her to the nursing home. His wife Val was not with him and nor were the children. Gloria felt as though she was being shuttled away somewhere, out of everyone’s hair.

‘Right, Mother. I’ve got to go. Already had more time off work than is good for me. You go in through those doors, there, to reception and ask for Mrs Lal. She’ll be looking after you,’ he’d said, revving his engine. Once Gloria had clambered out, he’d driven off without so much as a wave. Gloria shook her head. Clegg’s behaviour was not what it used to be.

The lady who’d met Gloria in reception, Mrs Lal, was the chief carer. She’d asked if Gloria would like a brief tour first but all Gloria wanted to do was squirrel herself away and have a jolly good think about things. Plus she wasn’t good at speaking to new people because she hadn’t had to do that for a long time.

So Mrs Lal had taken Gloria upstairs via a lift and showed her into a very small room with a single bed, one chair and a wardrobe and nothing else at all. No ‘things’ or ‘stuff’. The décor was insipid. Pale peach walls, pale peach bedspread. Pale this, pale that. Not the mish-mash of colours, textures and chaos she was used to. Gloria felt downhearted. Clegg had told her she’d be here for two weeks while he sorted things out with the house. So she knew she had no choice but to stay and accept this place and the people she found within its walls.

Clothes, not new ones, had been left on the bed for her to change into. They weren’t her own. Mrs Lal had shown her where the shower and toilet were and asked her to have a good shower and hair wash with the gels provided.

‘You okay with that, Mrs Frensham, or do you need someone to help you get cleaned up?’ Mrs Lal had said with a kindly smile.

The very thought had appalled Gloria, that someone might have to clean her one day. It would not be today, however. She had shaken her head so hard that she thought it might fall off.

‘No, ducks. I don’t want touchin’ by no one, ta very much.’

Mrs Lal had said she understood and then told Gloria she was to come downstairs after her shower and she’d be shown where she would have dinner and eat all her meals.

Gloria was a little damp when she finally found her way back to the reception area. In fact, she’d been in the shower so long, just enjoying the sensation of hot water cascading over her, for the first time in twenty years, that dinner had finished and the only food the cook could prepare was a cold chicken salad with two slices of white buttered bread.

But Gloria tucked in hungrily, thinking it was probably the best meal she’d ever tasted. It certainly beat potato soup! And then, feeling completely shattered, she asked if she could go to bed.

Mrs Lal took her back upstairs to her room afterwards and Gloria lay on top of the soft bed, fully clothed, staring at the ceiling. There was a light switch by the bed so she could switch the light off whenever she wanted. But Gloria spent a good couple of hours just staring at the Artexed ceiling, wondering where they were going to put all her things whilst they searched for the electricity fault. And how would they know where to put her things back afterwards? And would the house she’d lived in for thirty-some-odd years ever be the same again, when everyone had finished poking around in it? She felt a tear prickling the corner of her eye and wiped it away. Clegg would sort it all out for her, she was sure. But his behaviour, she’d noted of late, was becoming alarmingly discourteous.

The next day Mrs Lal came to fetch her and took her to breakfast. She was put on a table with two other white-haired ladies: Yvonne and Annie. They didn’t say much. In fact, Gloria wondered if there was something wrong with them. They just seemed to stare ahead without any knowledge of what was going on around them. A carer had to place toast in front of them and encourage them to eat. One man on another table suddenly shrieked, which made Gloria jump.

Gloria got up and went to find Mrs Lal and told her what had been going on.

‘Summat’s not right with Dotty and Lotty, love. And there’s a poor man in anguish over t’other side. Think summat needs to be done about them.’

Gloria could see Mrs Lal was trying to stifle a chuckle.

‘Oh, Gloria. I’d forgot you’re not used to the daily comings and goings in a nursing home, are you. Well there are some people here who need a lot of care, you see. And there’s others like yourself who are just, um, visiting for a short while. Yvonne and Annie are sisters and they’ve both had strokes so they need a certain amount of help and care. We sat you next to them because they’re very quiet. They’re not like Henry who does have a tendency to shout a bit. And some of the others can’t get used to new people straight away. So that’s why we put you there. If you’d prefer to be on your own, of course, we can set a separate table up for you for the duration of your stay.’

Gloria shook her head. ‘No, that’s all right. They don’t make no fuss. And you’ve explained things to me now. So I understands, I do.’

After breakfast Mrs Lal led Gloria into a beautiful light and airy pale green room with trailing plants, an aquarium and bamboo seating and introduced her to Kate, a social worker, who said she was going to have some regular general chats with Gloria, whilst she was here, to find out what she’d been doing since her husband’s demise.

By the second day Gloria was looking forward to her next conversational session with Kate. It had been a long time since she’d had meaningful chats with anyone. In fact she usually only saw the postman, Tilsbury, Clegg occasionally, and a persistent window cleaner who reckoned her windows needed more than a simple hose-down – cheeky git. Plus she was starting to get used to her tiny characterless bedroom, now, and she’d even gotten a chuckle or two out of Yvonne and Annie.

Chapter 5

‘Cup of tea, Gloria! I’ll put it on the table. No, don’t worry about your hand. That shaking comes and goes, I know. Least your sores have been treated. And I like your hair now they’ve cut it. It’s much better shaped like that, instead of long and straggly, don’t you think?’ said Val. ‘You must be feeling much better in yourself now everything’s been sorted out? That nursing home did wonders for you!’

Gloria didn’t look at Val. Her mouth was full of Victoria sponge, anyway. But she had nothing to say to the daughter-in-law she hadn’t seen in ten years.

‘I’ll leave you to look out the window then. The garden’s nice this time of year isn’t it? Nice to look at.’

Val left the conservatory, closing the door behind her quietly, shaking her head slowly. She looked tired. There were grey bags under her eyes, belying her forty-eight years, flecks of grey, also, in her short dark hair; her fringe was clipped back with a hairgrip. Clegg beckoned her into the kitchen.

‘She never acknowledges anything I say to her, Cleggy. Just stares ahead. I get the feeling she either wants to hit me or spit.’

Clegg pulled Val into a tight hug and kissed her cheek. ‘It’s just her way, love. Look – hey! Are you regrettin’ this now? We spoke about this at length, din’t we? She’d’ve never left that place unless summat serious happened and thank God it did, in a way.’

Val pulled away from him, leant back against the sink and crossed her arms.

‘But I don’t think I can stand any more of this silent treatment. It’s only been a couple of weeks. And we can’t keep the kids away forever. Adam says he can’t concentrate on his studying whilst he’s over at Zac’s. He says they’re partying all the time, instead of studying – don’t laugh, Cleggy! He’s just not into partying like his mates, is he? At least he’ll get a decent job at the end of the day. Plus, I’ve heard Zac’s probably taking stuff. So I want them back home. And your mum should be in a home or summat – she really should!’

Val shook her head when Clegg wouldn’t meet her gaze. She loaded the dishwasher with their lunch things, then poured their tea and sat down at the table, contemplating her husband as he sipped his hot drink.

‘Look, Clegg, I know we talked about all this but are we doin’ the right thing here?’

‘Yes I think we are, Val. Look. I know she’s annoyin’. And – hell – she’s agile for seventy-nine! So, yes, she could possibly go on livin’ for another twenty years or so – there’s longevity in the family. But, like I keep tellin’ you, we simply can’t afford to put her into a nursin’ home, just yet. We haven’t got that sort of money, as you well know. Somewhere down the line, of course, we’ll find somewhere for her to go because there’s no way she’s livin’ with us full-time. But you just have to be patient a little while longer.’

When Val didn’t respond, he took hold of his wife’s hand. ‘Can’t we just give it a go?’

Val pulled her hand away and cut him a slice of her Victoria sponge. He took it and wolfed it down in two bites.

She looked at him thoughtfully. ‘Not even with the sale of her house?’

‘What? Well no, Val! Not even with the sale of her house! There’d be virtually nothing left out of the proceeds if we used that to pay her nursing home bills! It’s more than £24,000 a year just to keep her alive in those places, as you well know. And we don’t have that sort of money to pay for it. So no, Val. The proceeds from the sale of her house are going to benefit all of us! Like I keep telling you. We want to retire early, don’t we, as well as put the kids through uni? All those things cost a lot of money that we simply don’t have on either of our wages. And I, for one, can’t wait to get out of the security business. You know I’m fed up with being a security guard. It’s boring and the hours are crap. That’s why we’re doin’ all this, isn’t it? If her house is worth what we think it is then there should be something in it for all of us – even Mum when the time comes to put her in an old peoples’ home. Hopefully, she’ll see sense, about all of this, and then happily sign on the dotted line and that’ll be that.’

Val slapped the table, which made her husband jump.

‘Look, do you really think she’s just going to say, “Well, here’s the money from the house, Cleggy?” You’re mad if you do. I’ve seen how stubborn she gets, remember? Your poor dad, having to put up with all that junk brought into the house over the years. There was no room to breathe let alone live in. And remember the time we tried to help her? Took us days, remember? We cleared everything out and cleaned the house and put it all outside for the bin-men to take away and then she just dragged it all back in because she said it looked scruffy outside on the kerb! And that time Jessie fell. Well, the house is a ruddy danger zone too. The whole thing’s bloody crazy, if you ask me. And I’m an easy-going sort of person. Bottom line, though, Cleggy, she’s not going to simply roll over and die, whatever you might hope for.’

Clegg growled.

‘All right! I know she’s bloody stubborn, Val. But look at it this way – I’m her only son, so it’s all comin’ to me one way or another. Oh, don’t look at me like that, Val! Me and Mum have never really got on over the years, have we? We’ve tolerated each other, at best. So you don’t ever have to worry about her being a permanent fixture in our household. Plus you know I’ve only ever thought about us and the kids the whole way through this. I’ve had to put my own family first, especially since there was nothing more we could do to stop her hoarding. You can only do so much for someone. But that electrical fault – halleluiah – that was the icin’ on the cake, as far as I’m concerned! So I really do think that now she’ll see sense when I mention the uni bills for Adam and Jessie. She’ll want them to finish their education properly. She’ll want to help us out, Val. I’m sure of it.’

‘But it’s me who’ll be looking after her, Cleggy.’

‘Yes but not for long, sweetheart! Mebbe a year or so. Then we can put her away somewhere. She’s in the annexe, out of our hair, anyway. She’s got her own TV and things in there. She won’t be under our feet all the time. So it really shouldn’t be a problem. You’ll cope, Val. You’re a ruddy nurse for God’s sake; it shouldn’t be so difficult for you. Isn’t that why we planned this?’

Val shook her head again. ‘Yeah but at least with my patients I get to come home and have a rest. This is going to be full on, day in, day out. And what if she decides not to speak to me at all?’

‘Oh, look, you worry too much! Darlin’, I’ve got every intention of gettin’ her into a home one day soon. Don’t worry about that. But for the moment let’s just give it a go. Let’s get the place sold; see what we get for it. We’ll take her out for a drive later and see if we can get her to be more social. It’ll be fine, love. Trust me.’

Chapter 6

In the conservatory, Gloria sat sipping her tea, staring at their wonderful garden, abloom with blue agapanthus, white lace-cap hydrangeas and Nelly Moser clematis, which Val had carefully sown and nurtured over the years, wistfully draping itself along the bottom wall. To give Val her due, she was a very caring sort of person and perfectly suited to being a nurse. But Clegg, even though he was her son and she loved him dearly, Clegg was a bully. She’d always known it. Forgiven it but known it.

Oh, Arthur had always called Clegg a ‘wild card’. He’d sailed too close to the wind in all manner of ways as a teenager and even managed to secure a few nights ‘in clink’ after one particular bloody episode of fighting, when he’d yelled at the arresting officer that he wished him dead in a very gruesome sort of way …

It had piqued Gloria, back then, that her son always dealt with all his problems via his fists. They certainly hadn’t brought him up to be like that. Arthur, usually affably patient, had finally snapped and told him to go get signed up and do his bit. Well, he’d got no other prospects when he left school and fighting with other kids on the estate seemed to be the common order of the day – every time he went out. In fact, he seemed to be a very angry young man, most of the time, and nobody knew why. Least of all Cleggy. So Arthur hoped the army might channel his energies in a more positive way.

‘You know, half me troubles are because of me name, Dad! Who in their right mind would give me the name of some stupid old fogey on Last of the Summer Wine? Ain’t gonna put me right in me mates’ eyes, is it, Dad?’

But Arthur wasn’t to blame. He’d loved all the old comedies, as had Gloria. They’d roared at the exploits of characters in the likes of The Good Life, Steptoe and Son, Only Fools and Horses and the rest. Those were the days of endless good telly and irascible characters. In fact, Arthur had taken pride in the fact he’d given his son the name of a lovable household character, who’d caused millions of people to roll about laughing at the foibles of life.

‘But you’ve got a mate called Baron. What the ’eck is that about, son? Least Clegg is unique.’

‘It’s unique, Dad, ’cos no one else friggin’ wants a stupid name like that!’

Gloria had thought that, perhaps, Clegg’s name hadn’t helped matters. But, finally, after all her son’s troubles and a succession of failed relationships, he met a much older yet volatile woman called Babs who’d entered his life with three kids and a shed-load of her own problems; including a jealous ex-husband who’d sent Clegg flying through the doors of A&E and yet – fortunately – straight into the caring arms of nurse Valerie Robson.

Luckily Val had been his perfect foil and straightened him out, as far as Gloria could tell. He’d met her late in the day, as it were, but they’d still gone on to have the football-mad Adam and little sister Jessie, her perfect grandchildren.

Gloria often found herself thinking about the fun they’d had when Clegg and Val visited with the children when Arthur was alive. Those days were a mixed bag of memories but mainly sweet ones, Gloria chose to believe.

Well, she’d had nothing else to think about whilst being cooped up in her son’s house for these past two weeks with only the TV for company. They wouldn’t let her do anything or help out around the house, not even laying or clearing the table for breakfast or dinner. They just kept telling her to sit down and relax or watch TV. Yet since being deposited here with Clegg and Val, Gloria noted that her grandchildren were nowhere to be seen. She’d adored little Jessie and Adam but they hadn’t been brought to visit her in ages. She was trying to remember their last visit – gosh, probably a good ten or eleven years ago. The last time was when Jessie tripped and fell over some of the clutter in the lounge. My goodness, how she howled! So she’d’ve been around seven. They’d both be teenagers now.

Clegg explained that they weren’t currently at home because it was the school holidays so they were off camping in Wales with a load of their school chums and should be back home next week. Gloria couldn’t understand his emphasis on the word ‘should’. Were they coming back or weren’t they? What was that all about? Or had they turned into uncontrollable tearaways, since she’d last seen them? If they were in their teens now it could be a troubling time for them, Gloria thought, recalling her own problems with Clegg at that age. His problems had brought other boys’ mothers to their door, complaining about her son’s aggression. Or the school always phoning and wanting to see her. Once they’d even had a brick thrown through their window. Very unsettling times, they were.

However, the children’s holiday week had come and gone but there was still no sighting of Jessie and Adam. Gloria crept upstairs into their bedrooms, when Clegg and Val were at work, and looked at their things. There were lots of photos on their walls but Gloria didn’t recognise anyone in them.

Yet, as Gloria sipped her tea in the conservatory, something felt amiss. She didn’t know what it was but there was a lot of whispering going on and she didn’t like that. It made her feel awkward, as though she shouldn’t really be there. Perhaps Clegg and Val weren’t getting on any more. She hadn’t seen them together in a long time. Who knows what goes on in families, she thought. Or perhaps it was something else entirely.