Last Request. Liz Mistry

       To my family, for all that you do and all that you are.

       Prologue

       1983

      Her hand, scaly and trembling, reaches out. The flash of shocking-pink nail varnish that I’d applied with painstaking care whilst she’d been sleeping is incongruous against her yellowy skin. The stench of death hangs heavy around her, as if she’s rotting from the inside out. I take her hand, careful not to grip too tightly. Every worm-like sinew, every frail tendon, every arid vein a braille pattern against my palm. Still, she flinches, the pain flashing in her milky eyes. A sheen of sweat dapples her forehead. Her nightdress is soaked with perspiration that mingles with fetid pus and piss, creating a cacophony of odours that make me want to retch. Her pink scalp shines through matted hair. Her cheekbones, jutting against paper-thin skin, bear raw scabs.

      The room is dire – stinking and filthy. I should clean it, but I don’t know how. That was never one of my jobs – cleaning up, keeping things neat, tidy. That had always been her job. Her eyes look heavy. Soon, once the morphine kicks in, she’ll doze off. The dim light from the bedside lamp illuminates the layer of dust that covers the cabinet top. We don’t use the main light anymore. It hurts her eyes. With the curtains drawn against the outside world, we are cocooned in this hell hole together … slowly disintegrating … decomposing like two worthless corpses thrown on an unlit pyre.

      The carpet’s gross. I’ve spilled more piss on there than has made it into the bedpan and that’s not mentioning the stains where she’s thrown up. No matter how much Dettol I use the overwhelming stink of vomit still hangs in the air.

      When she drifts off into an uneasy sleep, I switch the television on. Casting anxious glances her way, I wait. Today’s the day. The court hearing. It’s like the entire country is on tenterhooks waiting for the verdict. I’ve tried telling myself I’m imagining things – the looks, the surreptitious glances, the whispers every time I go to the shops – each one a piqueristic experience of both pleasure and pain. Each one grounding me in the reality of what he’s done to us. Deep down I know that everyone – the postman, Mr Anand at the corner shop, Mrs Roberts two doors down – everyone in the entire fucking world is waiting, holding on to their bated breath, with the heightened anticipation of an illicit orgasm.

      They barely noticed me before this. Now it’s as if, in the absence of my mother’s presence, I’ve been thrust into minor celebrity status, my every move scrutinised. At least the paparazzi have slung their hooks, for now. Not before Mum had to face them though. When the story first hit the news, she was forced to run the gauntlet, her head hung in shame, her eyes swollen and red, her gait unsteady. It took its toll. Well, that and the shit that he’d infected her with. It all combined to drag her down, drain her.

      The recording I’ve seen so many times, the standard one they played on endless repeat when the shit first hit the fan, flits across the screen. He looks so suave, sophisticated. All spruced up in his suit, beard trimmed, sleazy smile playing around his lips. Like he’d done nothing. Like none of this was his fault.

      I daren’t put the volume up so I flick to subtitles …

       ‘Three more students under the care of Professor Graham Earnshaw have come forward, with accusations of rape. This brings the total number of victims to fifteen. Professor Earnshaw’s solicitor still maintains his client is not guilty and as the trial enters its fifth day, the court heard how Professor Earnshaw is alleged to have infected not only his wife, but four of his victims, three male and one female, with the HIV virus. It looks like this case could run into its second week, if not longer.’

      The camera flicks to the front of Leeds Court and after a quick glance to make sure Mum is still asleep, I pull forward to hear what the Dean of Social Sciences is about to say about my father.

       ‘… and the department has responded to student concerns as quickly as possible. We are doing our best to support our …’

      A groan from the bed and I press the remote. The screen goes dark and I look round. She’s holding her hand up in front of her, a slight smile tugs her thin lips into a toothless grimace. ‘Thank you. I like pink, always have.’

      I lean over, tuck the sheets around her emaciated frame, ignoring the wafts of decay that hit my nostrils. Her frail hand grips my arm and I pause, turning my head towards her. ‘What, Mum? What is it?’

      Her smile widens, and I try not to flinch at the bloody cracks at the corner of her mouth and the gaps inside. She nods once and swallows. I go to lift the half-filled glass from the bedside table but she shakes her head – a painful movement that pulls a frown across her forehead. When she speaks her voice is low and raw. ‘Promise me.’

      I lean closer, hardly able to hear her words.

      ‘My last request – you’ve got to promise that you’ll do it. Live your dream. Do everything you always planned to do before this.’

      Her hand gestures towards the TV. She saw it. I haven’t been quick enough.

      I bow my head and promise her. I’d promise her anything right now, but still, I keep my fingers crossed. I curse my carelessness but there’s no point, for when I glance back her eyes are closed. She is on her final journey and, as if on cue, my entire body responds to the smash of a train hurtling through my core, pummelling me to the ground and, as she gasps her last breath, I cower on the floor hugging my knees tight to my chest. My heart shatters into a jigsaw of fragments that can’t ever reconnect; a sense of relief coddles me like a woollen blanket and guilt and anger swamp me.

      *

      Days pass with those whose slurs had previously scorched us, now offering platitudes. Each false word drips like acid, as I take in the detritus that is my life from here on in, and all the time her last request plays in my mind like an annoying jingle.

      There’s