A MILLION ANGELS. Kate Maryon
on them where spiders with inky feet have danced. I love the photos. They’re so funny and black and white and old.
“It’s all interesting, Granny,” I say, sifting through the things, “but how do I turn a box of stuff into a presentation?”
“Give it a bit of thought and something’ll come to you, I’m sure. Oh, look,” she says, pointing to a photo of a little girl in a white dress standing next to a big black dog. “That’s me and my dog, Buster; I must only have been about three years old.”
I turn the photo over. The spider has written, Dorothy and Buster, 1934 – Bognor Regis. Then I find another of Granny holding a baby in her arms, which says, Dorothy and Joan, 1937.
“Who’s Joan?” I ask.
Granny wipes a tear from her pale watery eyes. “She was my baby sister,” she says. “She died in the Blitz along with the rest of them. She was only three. She was a beauty, she was; she stole my heart right away, the moment she was born.”
“What happened?” I ask.
“It’s too painful to talk about, Mima. It was 1940 and I was nine years old. The Blitz began and I lost my whole world in a day. My home, my family and a very dear friend.”
“How come?”
“Bombs,” she says, getting up. She fusses with the cups. “The whole house was destroyed in the blast. The entire street. Gone!”
Her hands tremble at the kitchen sink. Her china cup chinks against the tap.
“But what happened to you, Granny?” I ask. “Weren’t you scared, being left all alone?”
“Leave it, pet,” she sighs. “There’s a good girl.”
“But Granny…”
“I said leave it, pet. It still upsets me, see, even after all these years.”
“But I can’t just stand up in class and say, ‘Oh, well, this is my granny’s old box full of interesting stuff that I don’t know anything about. The End.’ Can I?”
“Just look at the bits and bobs, pet,” she says, “and get a bit inspired. I’ll tell you more when I’m ready.”
I look through the photos for clues. There are loads of photos of fat old women. They have sour faces. They’re wearing long dresses and heavy hats pulled right down over their eyebrows. There are some young men wearing stripy bathing suits and cheesy smiles, but there’s no sign of anything Blitz-ish. There’s a row of girls in matching black costumes with white swimming caps on and pegs on their noses, and another of a very old man with a beard so long it’s tucked in his belt. There’s one photo of two girls, one looks about twelve, like me, and the other a bit older. They’re wearing summer dresses and short white socks. They’re sitting on a shingly beach, laughing and eating delicate sandwiches and huge chunks of cake. On the back the spider has danced, Barbara and Sonia, 1938 – Bognor Regis.
There’s a photo of a young woman with dark curly hair like Dad’s and mine. She’s wearing a white wedding dress and standing next to a soldier with a quiff. They’re holding hands and their smiles are like sunshine lighting up their eyes. On the back the spider has scrawled, Kitty and James, 1917 – London.
I hold the photo up for Granny to see. But I’m careful not to ask questions in case I make her cry.
“My parents,” she says, peering at the photo. “Your great-grandparents. Their wedding day that was, pet, and look – you’ve got her hair. Same as your dad too.”
I fiddle with my curls. I twirl a dark lock round and round my finger. I press my thumb over my great-grandmother’s face and her curls bubble out at the sides.
I want to know what happened.
My tongue is itching to ask.
Tucked in one corner of the box is a little red Bible. It’s so tiny I can hold it in one hand and the print is so miniscule I have to squint my eyes to read what it says. The spidery scrawl on the inside cover is big though, and reads, James Taylor-Jones, 29 Sept 1917. From Miss Perks, Soldiers’ Homes, Winchester.
“So this was your dad’s then?” I ask. “My great-grandfather’s?”
Granny smiles. “That’s right,” she says. “I managed to rescue it when… well, you know when.”
“I wish I did know, Granny,” I say, “but I don’t because you won’t tell me anything, remember? I wish you’d given it to Dad. It might have kept him safe.”
“Didn’t do a lot for my father,” she says, “did it?”
“Don’t you believe in the Bible and God and stuff then?” I ask.
Granny sighs, plonks a fresh pot of tea and a huge pile of toast on the table and sits back down.
“That’s a hard question, Mima, when you’ve had a life like mine,” she says. “It’s one of the many questions that have been puzzling me since I was nine. If there is a God, see, then why does He let such bad things happen all the time?”
I nod and stir my tea. I haven’t really thought about it before. I sing along with all the hymns in assembly and I mumble along with the prayers. But I’ve never wondered before if I actually believe in the words.
“I heard Mum say last night that when Dad’s away it’s like she’s waiting for bad news. Like the bad news would be better than the waiting,” I say, “and I understand her. I wish there was something I could do, Granny. Something to make certain that he comes back home.”
“Life’s never certain, Mima,” says Granny. “We can never tell what’s round the corner; I should know. You just have to trust, see. Live for today and get on with loving as best you can. None of us knows how long we’ve got.”
“When Dad left, he said, ‘Trust, Mima, trust,’ but what do you both mean?”
“I never managed to answer the God question,” Granny says, “so I eventually settled on trusting in life and trusting what feels true in me. There’s not a lot else you can do. You have to trust that life will work out in its own mysterious way. That’s the beauty of it.”
“Well, I’m not leaving it to life to work it out,” I say. “I’m going to find a way to bring him back and then I’m going to find a way of making sure he never leaves again. Jess keeps saying bad things; she keeps saying our dads might die and that wouldn’t be mysterious, Granny, that would just be sad.”
Granny tuts.
“She’s trouble, that one,” she says. “You can see it in her eyes. Don’t listen to her, pet. Keep your thoughts on the bright side.”
I turn the red Bible in my hand and think about how to make all these pictures and stuff into a presentation and am just about to put it back in the box when a small photo of a boy drops out. His face is solemn. His eyes are big and soft. I flip the photo over, looking for where the spider scrawled his name, but it’s blank.
“Who’s this, Granny?” I ask.
Her watery eyes sparkle like Christmas.
“There he is,” she smiles. “I’ve been searching everywhere for him. This is the friend I lost.”
She takes the photo from me and plants a kiss on the face of the boy.
“You cheeky thing,” she says to the boy, “hiding all this time.”
“Who is he?” I ask.
“Him?” she smiles. “He’s Derek, my childhood sweetheart. We used to have so much fun together.”
She sifts through the box and pulls out the photo of the two girls on the beach.
“These were his sisters,” she says, “Barbara and Sonia. They disappeared too. It was all a bit of nonsense really, but we were such good