A/N
This story is based partly on the characters from Jennifer Worth's life, partly on those formed by HTMG's wonderful writing, and partly on characters from my life (hope that is not breaking fandom etiquette.) The story begins in 1979. Not sure how this is going to go down, so reviews, good or bad, would be appreciated.
The last Saturday in June was a bright and sunny one, the sort of day that a person should spend out of doors. But that morning, boredom had led Shelagh to deep clean the house, even though she always kept it immaculate. The kitchen, living room, hallway, stairs and bathroom were complete, before she turned her attention to the bedrooms, beginning with hers and Patricks, then moving on to the empty ones.
She switched the Vacuum cleaner off and stared around what had once been Timothy's bedroom. It had been redecorated and the furniture replaced over the last few years, so all evidence that this had room had belonged to a teenage boy was now long gone, as was the teenage boy. Her son was now a man in his early thirties, a successful barrister, married for four years with a second child on the way, and living in Carlisle.
"Carlisle of all places, could he have gone any further from East London?" Shelagh thought.
Timothy had met Lucy, a native of the Lake District, whilst he and his university friends were on what he had described as a "walking and drinking holiday." Lucy was a barmaid in one of the places they had stopped and they immediately hit it off. They kept in touch whilst Timothy was still at Cambridge, and when he was qualified, he arrived at the pub one night and proposed. They then married, and settled down in a large newly built house in a quiet area of town. They used to visit Patrick and Shelagh regularly but since they had their son, Robert, the visits became less frequent. They had not been down since last Christmas. Shelagh had offered many times to come and look after Robert, and whilst Timothy was agreeable, Lucy was never so keen. Shelagh suspected that Lucy preferred to have her own mother, rather than the mother-in-law she had only met occasionally, look after her son. Deep down, Shelagh understood Lucy's attitude, but no amount of understanding could ease the sadness in her heart.
Shelagh pulled the Vacuum cleaner back out onto the landing and went to open the door of the third bedroom. She put her hand on the door, its paint was chipped and the wood had several long thin cracks in it as a result of being slammed shut repeatedly. She sighed before opening the door to what was Angela's bedroom.
"Is Angela's bedroom," she corrected herself, though more in hope than in truth.
Shelagh stole a quick look around the room. Unlike Timothy's room, Angela's bedroom still bore evidence of the girl to whom it belonged. The walls were still covered in the posters which she had pinned to it, the faces of ABBA, Queen, The Rolling Stones, a shirtless, toned, male model reclining on the bonnet of a flame-red Ferrari and the blue-shirt-and-tiny-short clad Chelsea football team beamed back at Shelagh from the faded images. Her books and cassettes were still neatly stacked, a few items of clothing remained in her wardrobe, including the lilac satin dress she had worn when she was the Maid of Honour at Timothy and Lucy's wedding. Several drawers and doors of the bedroom furniture were open, just as she had left them. The teddy bear which they had bought her as a newborn lay discarded by the bed, knocked to the floor as she left the room for the last time. A layer of dust had settled over everything during the past eighteen months, but Shelagh could not face cleaning it. The dust cradled memories, memories of all that had happened in that room, she could not sweep it away, she could not dispel them into ethereal clouds. She sighed, bit her lip to stop her tears and closed the door behind her.
Shelagh went downstairs into the living room to where Patrick was sitting slumped into the corner of the sofa. He was holding his newspaper close to his face trying to read the small print, but his failing eyes and shaking hands were making it almost impossible.
"Shelagh," he slurred, "can you read this to me please."
"Yes of course darling," Shelagh responded, taking the paper from him, unfurling the edges crumpled by his tight grip and began to read.
Reading the newspaper to her husband had become a regular feature in Shelagh's life. Patrick had retired at sixty-five, tired and ready for a rest but apparently healthy. They had begun to form plans of how they would spend his retirement, travelling the world, making up for all the time they had had to be apart thanks to his work commitments. But Patrick's diagnosis less than a year later dashed those plans asunder. Shelagh knew her husband was always forgetful, so she barely noticed his memory getting worse. He had always suffered aches and pains, which he put down to the effects of forty years of hard work, so he did nothing more than take a few aspirins to deal with the constant pain he was in and carried on. He had been wearing spectacles for years but without case notes and medical journals to read, he did not notice the marked deterioration in his vision. His handwriting had always been illegible and now he was no longer working he had very little need to write anything longer than a shopping list. They only noticed the pronounced tremor in his hand when he failed one morning to lift his cup of tea from the breakfast table. The neurologist at the London later confirmed their worst fears.
"What have you been doing this morning?" Patrick asked when Shelagh had finished reading the articles he had asked her to.
"I've given the house a good clean" Shelagh replied.
"Why didn't you go outside?" Patrick replied, "It's sunny."
"I needed to do things inside, dear," Shelagh replied gently, "but they're done now."
"Well let's go out this afternoon," Patrick said, "I could drive you to Nonnatus, pick anyone who is free and we could go into the countryside."
A few silent tears leaked from the corners of Shelagh's eyes as she held her husband's old tired hand, gently stroking it with her thumb.
"Patrick," she sobbed, "you're not allowed to drive anymore, and Nonnatus House was closed last year, the Sisters were all moved back to the Mother House in Chichester, remember?
Patrick's tired eyes looked in the vague direction of Shelagh's. She knew he was trying to remember, but knew he was failing.
"Oh, oh, yes, of course I remember," Patrick snapped irritably.
"We could have lunch in the garden," Shelagh suggested, "then we could both enjoy the sun. And I think we have some ice cream left if you would like some for pudding?"
"That sounds," Patrick paused, searching for the words, "tickerty-boo and marvellous."
Shelagh smiled, it had been a long time since her husband had described anything as "tickerty-boo and marvellous." She knew she had not lost him yet.
As she prepared lunch, Shelagh thought about Nonnatus House. Although she personally had not resided in 'new' Nonnatus House, the memories she had of the people of Nonnatus House would never leave her. Naughty, bubbly and sassy Trixie was now married to Reverend Hereward, and enjoying the quiet life of a vicar's wife in a pretty country parish with their children, how times change! Clever and pretty Jenny was now a music teacher, with two beautiful girls. They were a few years younger than Angela and when they used to meet while the Worth's were still living in London, Angela considered them as her sisters; the sisters that no amount of hope and prayers could give her. Wonderful and hardworking Chummy and devoted Peter had gone back to Africa to work with Christian Aid, taking their boys, then in their teens, and a campervan with all their worldly possessions with them. Quiet and gentle Cynthia had joined the Order, but never made her final vows, and in her late thirties had married Roger, an Oxford academic. And Patsy, a girl Shelagh was always a little unsure of, had moved to New York with a close female friend and, from what Shelagh had heard, was enjoying every minute of big city life.
Shelagh wrote regularly to Sister Julienne after Nonnatus House was closed, but had yet to find the time or the courage to visit her in Chichester. Sister Julienne's most recent letter told her that Sister Evangelina was now very frail, unable to do very much more than be pushed around in her wheelchair, how Sister Winifred, the shy and slightly simpering girl who Shelagh first met when Sister Julienne was ill, was hoping to be elected Reverend Mother, and how she, Sister Julienne, was missing Poplar and that Chichester was far too quiet. Shelagh had sighed on reading this, wondering whether it was only Poplar she was missing. Sister Julienne had continued to act as her mother figure long after she had left the Order, and now that she was not within walking distance, Shelagh missed her terribly, but the elder nun seemed to rarely acknowledge that side of their relationship in writing. Perhaps, like Nonnatus House itself, it belonged to a different time and place.
Shelagh had a sudden revelation. "I'm lonely," she thought.
Her friends from Nonnatus had all left London, her children were far from home and as her children moved on so did the friends and acquaintances she had made through them. She had run Poplar Choral Society diligently for over fifteen years, but the pressures of caring for Patrick had led to her relinquishing her role. She still attended choir practice when she could, but choir practice is not somewhere for chatting, and Shelagh, never being one for the pub, never went for a post-rehearsal drink with the others. And her husband, poor Patrick, although he was physically there, he was rarely completely there in mind or spirit these days. It had certainly been many years since Shelagh felt that they were truly husband and wife.
As she waited for the last of the things for lunch to finish cooking, she flicked through the pages of Patrick's newspaper. She reached the Classified Advertisements and whilst her eyes had floated over "Man-with-a-Van" and "Puppies for Sale" another, quite sizeable section focused their attention. There must have been ten or twelve separate requests underneath the heading "Accommodation Required." Several were students looking for digs for the next academic year, but others appeared to be people who were working in the area. She cast her mind back to the emptiness of the rooms adjacent to hers and Patrick's and an idea formed in her head.
"A lodger," she thought, "someone else in the house, even if they were just about occasionally. There would be someone else to talk to."
Shelagh continued to muse on this thought throughout lunch and as they finished eating, she brought the subject up with Patrick.
"What do you think darling?" she asked.
"Hmmm," Patrick began, "I suppose no-one else is ever going to use those rooms are they?"
Patrick's use of plurals cut through to Shelagh's inner soul. She swallowed a lump in her throat and bit her lip. "What did he mean by "those rooms?" Does he think she's never coming back?" A terrible, horrific thought coursed through her mind. "He can't have forgotten her, can he?"
"I'll leave it in your hands my dear, you can sort it out," Patrick finished.
"Are you sure it's alright, you don't mind?" Shelagh asked unsure whether her husband had fully comprehended her suggestion.
"I, hmmm, I" Patrick slurred "couldn't be more, hmmm, certain."
"I'll start looking right away then," Shelagh said, gathering the plates and heading inside to the kitchen.
Safe inside the kitchen she began to cry. Tears of sadness, pain, uncertainty meandered down her wrinkled cheeks, dripping into the iron-grey waves which now framed her face. She had not felt so alone for a very long time.
"What shall I do?" she thought. "What can I do?"