The Stranger She Knew. Rosalind Stopps
the way they carry on, something from a Batman film that could burn through floors, walls and bones. She looks at me, Kelly, not a look that anyone would want to receive, especially from the person who is operating the hoist that gets you to the toilet. I look away, settle down a bit into the sling, so that she can see there isn’t going to be any more drama.
Something catches my eye. The room across the corridor, not the one with the open door and the booming television, but the other one. The one that’s usually closed and silent. There’s someone in there, a man I think. It’s difficult to tell once you get old. The person is tall, because I can see the back of his head over the top of the chair he is sitting in. There’s something familiar about the tilt of his head as he faces the TV. As if he’s breathing it in, listening hard. I can hear a man’s voice and the hollow sound of questions being asked. I’m not sure until I hear the music, dum diddy dum, all threatening and serious, but I’m right, it’s Mastermind.
Alain used to love that show. He was good, too, he often got more right than the contestants. Mastermind. I haven’t thought about that show in ages.
September 1977
Hull
‘May,’ called Alain as he opened the front door, ‘May, do you want the good news or the really, really good news? Don’t worry about the lovebirds,’ he said as May looked towards the top of the house, ‘they’re out, I saw them in town. And we won’t have to worry about them for much longer, I promise. We’ll have our own place soon, our very own with no housemates to worry about.’
May smiled. She hadn’t minded living with the student couple at first, in fact she had liked having other people around, but as the baby’s birth got nearer, May felt a nesting instinct. She wanted to be on her own with Alain and her bump, thinking about baby things and preparing. She didn’t want to make conversation or worry about how she looked. In fact, she didn’t want to think about the world outside of her bubble at all.
‘Go on then,’ she said. ‘I could use some good news, anything you like, bring it on.’
She washed her hands and moved away from the stove.
‘That smells great,’ Alain said. ‘Let me guess, tomato mince?’
May blushed.
‘I’m going to learn some new recipes,’ she said. ‘I’m working on it.’
Cooking did not come naturally to May, but she had bought some old recipe books at a jumble sale and she was trying. Her mother had gone for the easy stuff, baked beans, fish fingers, frozen peas, and that had always been good enough for May until now. Now she had a husband and a baby on the way, and she wanted to do it well.
Alain put both arms around her and lifted her slightly off her feet.
‘No need,’ he said, ‘men can cook too, you know. I’m going to cook every night when this little one is born.’ He dropped to his knees and kissed May’s pregnant stomach.
‘Hello, little tiny,’ he said in a quiet voice. ‘Any chance of some kicking for your old dad?’
‘He’s been quiet today,’ said May, ‘probably waiting for you to come home.’
‘He?’ said Alain. ‘He? Isn’t that a bit sexist? If she’s a she, she’ll be listening and she’ll think we want a boy.’ He stood and kissed May on the side of her neck. ‘I’m happy with anything,’ he said, ‘boy, girl, alien, I’m just so happy that he, she, or it, is there.’
May was happier than she had been for ages, possibly forever. It had all been so quick, meeting Alain, marrying him and getting pregnant, only not in that order, and sometimes she still had to pinch herself to make sure it was real.
‘So, the good news things in order. First, it’s Mastermind on TV tonight and we can watch it together, score sheets and everything. I read in the Radio Times that one of the contestants is going to answer questions on the poems of T.S. Eliot for their special subject. I bet we know all of the answers between us.’
May smiled. It still seemed amazing that Alain liked the same sort of things that she did, and that he understood her so well, so intimately. May and her mother used to watch Mastermind together, especially when she was ill.
‘Did I tell you,’ May asked, ‘about the last time Mum and I watched Mastermind?’
‘You did,’ said Alain, ‘but I’d love to hear it again.’
‘Really?’ said May. She was worried that she was boring him. It still seemed inexplicable to her that someone like Alain would look at her twice, let alone marry her. He was six years her junior for a start, handsome, funny and clever. He knew about politics and poetry and he could play the guitar and sing like Paul Simon. Everyone who met him loved him. Her mum would have loved him too, she was sure of that.
‘Really,’ said Alain. ‘Come on, you sit down and I’ll take over the cooking. I’ll tell you my other piece of news later – it’s worth the wait.’
‘No,’ said May, ‘no, go on, I want to hear it now, right now.’
She put the memory of her mother out of her head. Sorry, Mum, she thought. I’m not ignoring you, but I’m moving on. It’s OK, she could imagine her poor old mum saying back, smiling even though she’d been dismissed, go on, you have a good time.
‘Are you OK, merry May?’ Alain said. ‘It must be so difficult for you, I’m sorry if I forget that sometimes. I read an article the other day about grieving, and it said that it’s even more difficult to grieve when you’re pregnant, because everything is invested in the future, all your hopes and dreams, but that’s hard when the loss is still there to make you sad. I think that’s what it meant, anyway.’
Fancy that, May thought, reading articles for her sake, how lovely. Alain lit a cigarette. May decided not to mention again how much she hated the smoke now that she was pregnant.
‘So, here’s my good news. I’ve got a job! I’ve got a job, just when we were starting to panic, a real job with real money and everything. And a flat! We won’t have to live with Love’s Young Dream upstairs any more, it’ll be just us: me, you and Jiminy Cricket in there.’ Alain patted May gently on her bump, and looked at her. She could tell he was keen to see her reaction.
‘Al,’ May said, ‘Al, I can’t believe it. Where? Teaching? How come there’s a flat? I don’t understand.’
‘OK, OK, well, I haven’t only been applying for teaching jobs. There’s nothing around now, term has started and there are loads of good teachers without jobs, we both know that. I didn’t want to tell you, because I wasn’t sure if it would come to anything and I didn’t want to get your hopes up. But my dear May, my merry May, I got out my special skill, my superpower, and it’s going to save us.’
May wondered for a split second whether Alain had been drinking. She didn’t know what he was talking about. They were both teachers, newly qualified, in fact they’d met in college only nine months ago. He’d never mentioned applying for other jobs or having a special skill and May realised again how little they knew about each other, how quickly everything had happened.
‘You don’t know,’ said Alain, clapping his hand to his head in a pantomime gesture. ‘Perhaps I never told you about my superpower. You’re going to be so surprised.’
Alain rubbed his hands together. May waited.
‘I can speak Welsh, that’s my hidden talent, my special thing. I can’t believe I didn’t tell you before, but I guess I didn’t?’
‘Really?’ said May. ‘Proper Welsh? But you come from Sevenoaks, we went to see your nan there.’
May was surprised. Surely it would have come up before, a whole language? She wanted to believe