CHAPTER 40
That was the start of a new and very different part of my life, but for some years I didn’t see it that way, more as a life new in every way. It took so long for me to understand that it was all one that I very nearly missed some of the lessons.

Susie quickly became one of the lads, a description that I am sure would have horrified her, but the years of pretending to be one of them had given her insights other women could never match, and her warmth and delight in simply being alive won many over that might have hesitated.

The phone call had been what I have heard the Chinese call ‘interesting’.

“Hiya Mam, it’s Susie”

“No, Mam, we’ve had that conversation and I’m not having it again”

“No, I’m not in trouble. I’ve got a new job, and I’m moving”

“House share, if you must know. And no, it’s a proper job”

“Oh for god’s sake, I’ve been taken on as a bookkeeper, OK? Not a junior, not an assistant. Not an office girl a bloody bookkeeper for a decent company”

“Yes they know. Couldn’t really miss it, could they?”

She took the phone away from her ear at that point, pulling faces and waving her spare hand about. I tried to mime a question: did she want some privacy? She shook her head ‘No’, short, sharp oddly positive movements for the negative. She put the phone back to her ear with a sigh.

“Dobbs and Barker boatyard, Mam. Out at Acaster Malbis. Look, boss is sat by me. It’s his phone, aye? Want a word?”

I frantically shook my head, but she was already passing me the handset. Had to be done, I suppose, but why right then and there? I realised a few seconds later that Susie could only hold the bravado up for a limited time, and this was her chance to recover her balance.

“Hello?”

“To whom am I speaking?”

“Gerald Barker. I’m owner of Dobbs and Barker, boatyard as Susie said”

“Why do you call him that? You know it’s not his real name”

Oh hell. Find some strength, Ginge. “Look, Mrs Lockwood, how can I help? I’m not looking for an argument, but I think I’ve found someone ideal for the job, and I’m going to be blunt. The rest of my staff like her. The locals like her. I like her. I’m setting up PAYE account in the name of Susan Lockwood, or rather Susie and Doreen my other office lady are, because they know what they’re doing. Tax people have no issues with name. I have no issues with name. I want her here, on the dot, each day for work, and I want someone with a smile. Can you help me with that, help your daughter—“

“Son!”

“We’ll differ on that one, but never mind. Can you help your CHILD, then, to rise out of what was a very bad place and make something of…themselves? Yes?”

There was silence at the other end for quite a while, and when she spoke again, there was an edge to it.

“And what exactly is your… interest in my child?”

“Oh, for god’s sake, if that’s your worry, I’m too old for that, and… and she’s met my wife”

I turned to Susie and mimed swimming. Her mouth tightened, and then she nodded.

“Mrs Lockwood, look. I owe Susie my life. I slipped the other night, ended up in Ouse, and it were Susie who pulled me out. Saved my life, aye? “

Another short silence, the sound of her breath catching at the other end of the line. “What was… what were they doing there? My Valium, wasn’t it? Can you put her on? Please?”

‘Her’? I handed over the phone again.

“Hi Mam”

“Oh”

“Yes, I did. I thought… I thought they would make it easier”

“You have no fucking idea---“

“Sorry. Sorry. But you really have no idea how much you have hurt me. No, listen, just this once. If you had been willing to listen, just once—“

“Want me to hang up? I’m trying here!”

She suddenly thrust the handset back at me, walking out of the room with tears starting.

“Hello?”

“Where’s… she gone?”

“Taking breather, I would suppose. How are we going to sort this one out?”

“Do you have children, Mr Barker?”

Knife to the soul. “Didn’t survive, Mrs Lockwood. Her name was Susie”

There was another catch to her breath, so I pushed on. “Mrs Lockwood, can I ask a direct question?”

“Depends on what it is”

“Simple one, really. When was the last time you saw your child”

“Not that long. Time she must have taken pills, I suppose. Why?”

“Did you see the real person, or did they hide?”

“I made sure they didn’t dress up, if that is what you mean”

I understood that one right away. “Happen you mean they did dress up for you? As a sort of man?”

She took a lot longer to answer that one. “I suppose so”

I pushed it home. “Have you actually met her when she’s not trying to hide from you? I think you should. Not today, like. New job and everything. But soon, aye?”

“I… I could, yes”

“Right. Where are you based?”

“Er, I’m out at Tadcaster, by St Joseph’s”

“Not too far, then. Why don’t we see about having us tea together one day? See if you two can’t get start on sorting mess out. What do you think?”

“They were… she were really, you know, with pills, river…?”

“Aye. She were really, with pills and river, but she gave that up to save an old man’s life. I’ll do all I can for her, but it were good if you could meet half-way, like. Oh, I don’t mean have tea in Bilbrough!”

That suggestion of taking a meal halfway between York and Tadcaster actually brought a laugh. I called Susie back in.

“Lass, your Mam and I want to meet up for a tea or something in a week or two. What do you think?”

She was straight to the point. “Not in Taddy!”

“No, I were thinking of somewhere in City, like. Mebbes just Betty’s? Mrs Lockwood, Betty’s do you? What do you say, a week from today? About six? Want another word with Susie? Here she is”

I left the room and started messing around in the kitchen. Pork chops tonight, boiled potatoes, peas, a few sliced carrots. Proper food. I started peeling, and ten minutes later Susie was in the kitchen with me.

“How do you do it? How do you get her to sodding well talk instead of shouting and ranting?”

“Lass, you just realise that she wants something as well, and let her tell you. And recognise she’s frightened of losing something as well, losing her child. Then you just leave some room to twist about in—“

She hugged me, kissed my cheek and yanked the peeler out of my hand. “Carrots are not being boiled to sludge, no salt in that water, and those chops are going under the grill, not into a pan full of lard. You can get kettle on, lad”

The next supermarket run made some real differences to what was in the larder, and I had a short moment of resentment before I made the conscious choice to simply follow her lead in food. I just asked her not to make it too fiery, but she did fruity curries and Chinese fried mixtures, sausage in cheddar-cheese mash, a bacon broth with proper dumplings, live and onions, such a mix of things I only half remembered, so many new flavours. I did get more porridge than bacon for breakfast, though, and thinking back to what we had lived on in France I had no complaints. Susie was making friends steadily at work, Doreen was smiling more often than not and every now and again one of the lads would drop some cakes or sticky buns by the office for the three of us. I could feel how she was drawing me back out, and while she was no Tricia, for that could never happen again, I was finding it easier to laugh than I had for years.

“No, not those shoes”

“What the hell do you know about women’s shoes, Gerald?”

“I know what they look like and what they say. And I know that you need to give your Mam as easy a time as possible this evening”

“What, wash everything off my face, flatten my chest and wear a sports jacket?”

The familiar prickliness was there in plenty. “No, Susie. Just think on: your Mam gets to see you as you are, and that’s a big step. Show her, don’t slap her in the face. Flat shoes. My choice here. The suit’s fine, by the way, looks professional”

“Well, sod you, Gerald Barker, for actually being right for once. I’ll get the shoes”

I checked my own reflection as she ran off upstairs. I’d gone for the Legion look, blazer and slacks, but with neither gongs nor beret, so as to make my own statement. Respectable businessman, not the pervert her mother seemed to have been worried about. Down to the bus stop on Bishopsthorpe Road, and off the bus a little later for the walk across Lendal Bridge. We stopped halfway across, looking down into the shadows and the darkness of the river pushing through the arches of the railway bridge upstream, and then all of a sudden we were both laughing, no words necessary. She took my arm as we carried on towards the Minster before turning off right for the Post Office, Davygate and Betty’s.

A few seconds with a little mirror from her handbag, then I opened the door and ushered her in. I half expected the sound of an AP round screaming past my head just then. Breathe, Gerald.