Southend U3A

Writing for Fun

October 2017

Secrets - The Saga Of Henry - Anne Wilson

The environment felt alien to Patterson, as if he had somehow been spirited away, together with his belongings, and placed in a room a fraction of the size he was used to. The furniture was tired and old – a bit like the room’s inhabitant, he mused. Despite, or maybe as a direct result of the size, it was cluttered and objects haphazardly resided in the most unlikely places. The carers were kind and he was comfortable but it was not the ending he would have wished for.

His open window overlooked the garden, the leaves on the oak tree still because of the pleasant weather. The carers had wheeled some of his fellow inmates outside and seated them under umbrellas but their puce faces displayed the same lack of animation as they did when sitting in the lounge and he wondered if the endeavour had been worth the effort. Bizarrely, their teacups clinked audibly in sporadic synchronisation as they were returned to the saucers. Patterson, still compos mentis despite his illness, had distanced himself from them. Their conversation, such as it was, did not interest him and their needy frailty only served as a reminder of his own beckoning mortality.

He closed his eyes as he lay back in the chair, his gnarled hand reaching for his own tea cup. The days were long and there was little to do other than look back, simply because there could be no looking forward. The image of the oak tree obstinately remained, even though his eyes were firmly shut, the image it evoked of the playground being almost palpable.

He’d liked to have thought the immediate post-war years of his boyhood days at school were pleasurable but they were not. Boys dressed in short trousers in those days until puberty, a custom dictated not only by convention but by austerity. Hair styling relied on the application of a pudding basin, with only an occasional visit to the barbers and those who weren’t riddled with acne were covered in unsightly freckles, their bodies smelling of carbolic soap and sweat.

Despite all these drawbacks it should have still been possible to enjoy the simpler pleasures of life but it proved impossible. He never felt a part of them, the gang of boys who comprised his classmates. They were confident. He was shy. They were talkative. He was taciturn. They were sociable. He was a loner, a trait borne out of their unwillingness to accept him as one of their own.

His nemesis was a chubby boy named Toby – weighty despite rationing. Scabby legged, with trousers clinging to his corpulent bottom, his innate self-confidence had made him an object of admiration amongst the other boys rather than one of ridicule, despite his unprepossessing appearance. No target was considered too sensitive to curb his vitriol and no remorse was evident – even if his jibes elicited a distressed response.

‘I saw your mother out the other day. God, she’s fat,’ shouted Toby at him one morning during their break, appearing suddenly from behind the oak tree out of nowhere and pointing his finger in accusation. In truth he could have done with some dietary advice himself but no-one was bold enough to point it out. ‘She looks old too. What is she? Thirty?’ There were audible gasps of amazement from his peers that anyone could have lived to that great age and survived.

‘She’s having a baby,’ Patterson replied sullenly. His mother’s announcement at home had not been received with elation and there had been mutterings from his father about being unable to make ends meet, which he didn’t quite understand, although inferred it involved money. There had been a distinct chill in the air ever since, which inexplicably seemed to have increased of late and was seemingly unrelated to finances. Voices had been raised, only to abate when he came into view, and resuming when the coast was thought to be clear.

‘That’s horrible,’ roared his baiter in mock disgust. ‘Absolutely disgusting. That old woman doing it with your father!’ He shuddered and laughter peeled through the air from his sycophants.

Patterson was reluctant to admit to anyone that he was unclear as to what gross act had brought about his mother’s predicament. Several possibilities had sprung to mind but nothing had been confirmed and he was none the wiser. He had ultimately come down to the view that it was either due to both his parents drying their most intimate parts on the same bathroom towel or that they had kissed and not cleaned their teeth afterwards. They seemed logical explanations in the absence of anything more substantial. This carelessness had obviously occurred once before and resulted in his own birth.

Avoiding Toby and his cohorts was a difficult task as Toby held most of the class in his sway and his taunts were part of the daily ritual of school life. Lessons were Patterson’s only respite and he dreaded the breaktimes, when one or the other of them would emerge from under the tree to confront him – sometimes with accusations so wild they could have been laughed away if he could have only summoned up enough courage to treat them in that fashion.

Patterson’s mother grew larger and larger and he fervently hoped that none of his fellow classmates would see her out and report her increasing girth back to their ringleader. To his surprise though, he found that jibes of any description gradually lessened, culminating in them ceasing altogether. One or two half-hearted attempts had been made by one or two of the other boys but Toby’s reaction had been to redden noticeably in the face and kick the ground in frustration. An influx of younger boys made them the objects of derision in Patterson’s place but it was evident that Toby had become less of a focal point anyway and was no longer leading the faction of tormentors. Patterson noticed that he had come into school with pink eyes on more than occasion and wondered if he had been crying. He should have been triumphant but the change in his former adversary was so jarring that it disconcerted him and put him even further off his guard.

Divorce or even separation amongst those from ordinary backgrounds was rare in those far-flung days, mainly due to the financial constraints placed on the woman. Despite rumblings of discontent in his own family, it never occurred to him that the parents of all his classmates were anything other than blissfully happy in their unions and so he was surprised at the nature of the subject broached by their form teacher just before the end of the final lesson one afternoon. Looking around the room Patterson saw that Toby was conspicuous by his absence and wondered what had prompted his early departure.

The teacher, clearly embarrassed by the occasion cleared his throat. ‘I have something to tell you all,’ he intoned gravely. ‘Sadly, Toby’s father has moved away from home and his parents will eventually be getting divorced.’ There was an audible muttering. ‘This will be a very difficult time for Toby and I would ask all of you to be very kind to him and be sensitive to his situation.’ This exhortation produced some elbow nudging, given that Toby had not spent very much of his time being either kind or sensitive. ‘Toby will be back in class tomorrow morning,’ he continued ‘and I think it best you let him speak to you about this matter if he wants to rather than to approach him. Is that understood?’ Heads nodded, and the boys dispersed in stunned silence.

Toby’s arrival the next day and his presence during the subsequent few days prompted embarrassed silences in his presence rather than solicitude. Patterson noticed that boys gathered into little groups every now and again when Toby was otherwise occupied, their heads glued together in earnest chatter and, rather in the mode of Chinese Whispers he managed to glean the gist of the parental problem piecemeal. It was rumoured that the senior Toby had been involved with a woman other than his wife and that the woman was now expecting a baby by him.

He confronted his care-worn mother over tea as she flopped out in her chair, swollen legs spread apart and brow perspiring with the heat. He was not normally talkative and embarrassment had precluded him from having told her of his problems with the other boys but his interest had been piqued by the news he had heard on the grapevine and he felt the need to impart it to someone else.

‘I heard something today,’ he said proud in the knowledge.

‘Oh yes,’ she replied wearily.

‘There’s a boy in my class called Toby.’

He sensed a slight wariness in her but dismissed it as his imagination.

‘I know,’ she responded. ‘What about him?’

‘Toby’s father’s left home and his parents are going to get a divorce. Our form teacher called us all together a few days ago and told us to be nice to him.’

Again, a slight wariness.

‘Yes, I’d heard about the divorce,’ she said evenly. ‘Very sad. What else did you hear?’

He sat up in his chair self-importantly, a sudden wave of sophistication washing over him.

‘That some woman who’s not Toby’s mother is expecting his father’s baby,’ he said knowledgeably and thought he saw her flinch slightly. ‘Was it the bathroom towels, do you think?’

‘What are you talking about?’ she said irritably. ‘Where do you get this rubbish from? What bathroom towels?’

‘I knew it couldn’t be,’ he said, feeling secretly crushed. ‘But could it have been the kissing, even though it was forbidden because they weren’t married?’

‘I think it may very well have been the kissing, despite the fact they weren’t married,’ she responded icily. ‘It’s none of our business in any case. The subject is closed, and I don’t want you listening to idle gossip in the future.’

She seemed distracted and tea finished in silence. He wondered if he had said something to offend her but was at a loss to think what it was, unless the reference to the bathroom towels had prompted irritation at his father’s careless behaviour. He went to bed early and fell asleep almost immediately but was awoken by sounds from the room below. Raised voices from the room below prompted him to get out of bed and open the door surreptitiously.

‘I didn’t think they’d announce the divorce to the class,’ he heard his mother protest. ‘That only made the boys curious and it all must have lead on from there.’

His father sounded flustered. ‘Did Hugh tell anyone, do you think?’

‘I doubt if he did and he’s moved away now anyway. He won’t be back,’ she added reassuringly. ‘Hugh’s not a man who likes the commitment of having a wife and one child, let alone an extra one living under the roof of someone else. There won’t be any pangs of regret and a desire to get to know my – our (she added hastily) – son or daughter. I know him only too well. He probably won’t even want to see Toby very often. The divorce will come through and it will all be forgotten in time. People will get on with their lives and certainly won’t be interested in ours.’

‘I hope to God you’re right. What about the boy?’

‘Which one? Ours or Toby?’

‘Toby.’

‘He may put two and two together and make the connection as he gets older as may our son, I can’t make any guarantees. You knew that to begin with. I don’t think Marion will want to hurt and humiliate Toby by telling him he has a half sister or brother living in our house and why, particularly if she wants financial support from Hugh. She won’t want to antagonise him. It’s to her advantage to say nothing.’

‘And the baby?’ His voice softened. ‘What do we tell the baby once it gets older?’

‘The baby will be ours to all intents and purposes. You agreed to that.’

The voices became muffled and indistinct, so he gave up listening.

He shut the bedroom door and went back to bed, sick to his stomach. From what he could ascertain, he and Toby were now connected in a way he had never imagined. He could not then understand the technicality of being a ‘half sister’ or a ‘half brother’ and whether he and Toby fell into the latter category. To his relief he found out as he got older that they did not. It occurred to him that Toby was already aware of the connection and that had been the cause of his uncharacteristic, subdued behaviour.

His mother gave birth to a baby girl who was treated with civility, if not genuine warmth by his father. The circumstances of her birth were never raised by his family – either to him or to her, he presumed. Neither were they broached by any outsider. The secret remained just that. A strain of iciness crept into his parent’s marriage, however, which never left it – as if the betrayal could never be forgotten or fully accepted.

Someone had come into the room and Patterson was suddenly jolted into awareness, opening his eyes and shifting slightly in his chair as he did so. A hand gently touched his arm.

‘Sorry to wake you,’ the carer said as she went over the window and looked out. ‘Time for your medication.’

‘Life’s one continuous round of food and medication,’ Patterson responded wearily.

‘I know’, she said sympathetically. She continued to stare outside. ‘Nice day. You ought to go and sit out there. I’d take you.’

He shook his head in disagreement and she knew not to pursue the matter.

‘Look at that kerfuffle going on,’ she reported, watching two burly carers wrestling with their charge, a large man making a vain attempt to stand up, without success. ‘It’s our newcomer. Poor old Toby. He’s so overweight he keeps getting stuck in his chair. Can’t breathe properly. Can’t hear. Can scarcely see. You think your life is bad with all the medication but there’s always someone worse off’

Patterson smiled a secretive smile. ‘Yes,’ he murmured. ‘Indeed, there is.’

He slept well that night.