There was an ambulance parked outside Three Elms, its rear doors gaping, a stretcher standing beside it on the tarmac. Eve’s heart flipped, before she saw an elderly man being led down the steps, care assistants on either side, their hands grasped so firmly under his stick-thin arms that they were virtually carrying him.
She shot them a sympathetic glance as she walked past, and ran up the steps, embarrassed at the relief that was flooding through her.
There was no reason why anything should happen to Flora; at the moment she seemed relatively fit and strong for her age, despite her increased confusion. But that didn’t stop Eve expecting the worst. If the care home’s number came up on her mobile, a jolt of dread pulsed through her, and she answered tentatively, hoping a stranger’s voice wasn’t about to break bad news. She was being paranoid, of course she was. But although Flora seemed to be settling in at last, and accepting her new life, at the back of Eve’s mind there was still the constant fear that her mother might somehow manage to carry out the threat she’d made on her first day at Three Elms, and do herself harm.
As she walked in through the main doors today, she was hit by a blast of noise. Two rows of children were lined up in the foyer, their excited chatter bouncing off the walls, strangely incongruous in this place that was usually so still and quiet. The children were possibly a year or two older than Daniel, both girls and boys, dressed in grey uniforms with scarlet blazers.
‘Okay everyone, listen up!’ called a man, walking past the disorderly rows. ‘We’re going to go quietly out of the door and down the steps. Keep to the right and hold your partner’s hand.’
The man was wearing a tweed jacket over a pair of bright red trousers and he made Eve think of Jake, although she had no idea why – physically they were nothing like each other. Maybe it was their taste in clothing.
She’d been trying not to think about Jake over the last day or so. She cringed every time she remembered the hurt expression on his face when he’d invited her to The Comedy Box, the perfunctory wave as he wheeled his bike away. Had he been asking her out? She still couldn’t decide, but longed to be able to wind back time and rerun those few minutes.
She would wipe the astonishment off her face, smile sweetly, thank him for thinking of her and come up with a believable excuse for not taking his second ticket. Poor Jake; he was such a lovely guy. The more she thought about it, the more she wondered why she hadn’t just said yes. So what if it was a date? It would have been fun to do something different.
The children began to move forward and Eve stepped back and smiled at them as they went past.
Barbara and Flora weren’t in the lounge, and she eventually found them in the library, sunk into a pair of deep armchairs, Flora sitting so far back that her toes weren’t touching the carpet.
‘I’ve read that one,’ Barbara was saying. ‘And that one.’ She had a pile of books on her lap and, after looking at each one, she tossed it onto the floor beside her chair. ‘This one is rubbish!’ she said, holding it up and showing it to Nathan, who was picking up the books as fast as she discarded them. ‘Worst thing I ever read. Stupid story.’
‘Please don’t throw them like that, Mrs Harrison,’ begged the boy, his arms full of books. ‘If you don’t want to read them, leave them on the table and I’ll put them back onto the shelves.’
‘Why haven’t you got anything decent in here?’ Barbara said. ‘I don’t want to read the boring Brontës or yawny old Charles Dickens. Have you got any Jilly Cooper?’
‘I don’t think so,’ said Nathan, looking confused. ‘I don’t know who that is.’
‘You don’t know who Jilly Cooper is?’ Barbara was almost shouting now. ‘What do they teach young people in school nowadays? Jilly Cooper should be in every library in the country. The woman’s a genius! Her equestrian knowledge is phenomenal and she knows quite a lot about sex as well.’
‘Oh goodness,’ said Flora.
‘I’ll see if I can find some of her books for you,’ said Nathan. ‘But please stop throwing everything else around. You’ll break the spines.’
‘He’s right,’ said Flora. ‘Books should be treasured, Barbara.’ She looked up and saw Eve standing in the doorway. ‘Hello darling. Have you got any Jilly Cooper books?’
‘Um, I’m not sure,’ said Eve.
‘Doesn’t just have to be Jilly,’ said Barbara. ‘Have you got Fifty Shades of Grey? I’m told it’s very good indeed. Highly educational.’
‘I’m certainly not getting you a copy of that,’ muttered Nathan as he went to the shelves at the side of the room and started slotting books back onto them.
‘I saw the children from St Barnabas just now,’ said Eve. ‘They must have been in here for the carol concert rehearsals?’
‘Oh yes, they’ve been around all afternoon,’ said Barbara. ‘Irritating little sods. Most of them can’t sing to save their lives, and they’re so noisy! Even when they walk past the door they’re chattering away like a bunch of monkeys.’
Eve moved across the room and perched on the arm of Flora’s chair, leaning over to kiss her on the cheek. ‘I bet their singing is wonderful,’ she said. ‘I can’t wait to come to the concert. It’s a great thing to be doing, linking Three Elms with the school. I hear you’ve been taking part in the rehearsals, Mum! I’m so pleased – you’ve got such a good voice, and you’ve always loved carols.’
‘Oh no, dear,’ said Flora, shaking her head. ‘I’m not doing that. It’s not my kind of thing at all. Barbara’s right: they’re too loud and naughty, those children.’
Barbara had discarded most of the books now and was tapping her palms on the arms of her chair. ‘It’s a social experiment,’ she said. ‘This carol concert business. What they’re doing is gathering together the very young and the very old – the two groups that cause the most problems in society – then locking them all up and throwing away the key. It’s the kind of thing you read about in the Daily Mail – I think they call it ethical cleansing.’
Flora rested her hand on her friend’s arm and stroked it reassuringly. ‘Don’t worry, dear,’ she said. ‘I know where they keep all the keys, on that big board behind the reception desk. They won’t be able to lock us up for long.’
Eve looked up and almost caught Nathan’s eye as he put the last few books back onto the shelves. He grinned into the middle distance and raised one eyebrow.
‘No one is going to lock you up,’ said Eve. ‘Listen Mum, I just wanted to let you know that the sale is completing tomorrow.’
‘The sale of what?’
‘Your flat?’
‘Oh, jolly good.’ Flora nodded, absently.
‘It should all go through at midday and then the new couple are coming into the office to collect the keys from me.’
Flora’s face fell and she looked at Eve in confusion. ‘But what about all my things? My furniture? They can’t have that. We need to go over there and get it all.’
‘I’ve done that, Mum. I told you. I’ve sorted through everything and the furniture you didn’t need has all been sold.’
Flora was shaking her head vigorously from side to side.
‘We talked about this a few weeks ago,’ said Eve, dread creeping into the pit of her stomach. ‘You said you were happy for me to sell it all. There’s no room for it here, and I can’t fit in anything else at my house.’
‘But I’ll need to have it there when I go home!’ said Flora. ‘What will I sleep on if you’ve taken my bed away? What will I sit on to watch the telly if my sofa’s gone? I’ve always loved that sofa: your father helped me choose it. Burgundy was his favourite colour.’
Eve knew full well that the sofa had post-dated her father: she’d helped Flora order it from Marks & Spencer about ten years ago.
‘Mum, this is ridiculous,’ she said, before she could stop herself. ‘We’ve talked about this so many times, and I’ve kept you informed about all of it. Maybe you’re just a bit tired this afternoon, so you’ve forgotten?’
Flora looked like she was on the point of tears now. Damn it. Eve knew this wasn’t the way to deal with her anxiety. She tried to be patient, but got so frustrated with these increasingly frequent memory lapses. It was exhausting having to repeat herself time and time again, go over the same things whenever she came to visit Flora.
It should have made her feel better knowing she wasn’t the only one in this position, but it really didn’t. The other day she had eavesdropped on a woman of about her own age, sitting in the communal lounge beside her elderly father: over the course of ten minutes, they’d had the same conversation time after time.
‘Has my car gone? My old Audi?’
‘Yes Dad, you sold it a long time ago.’
‘The blue one – the blue Audi?’
‘Yes Dad, you sold it to that man from Birmingham.’
‘But I’d like my car back, Susie. That old Audi I used to have.’
‘I know, Dad, but you can’t have it back because you sold it years ago.’
‘What, the blue one?’
‘Yes Dad.’
‘Has it gone then? My old Audi?’
Eve had caught the other woman’s eye, briefly, and they had smiled at each other, both understanding the frustration and acknowledging the cruelty of this role reversal: middle-aged children having to take on the care of their own parents, whose minds were returning to a childlike state.
Now Flora’s voice was rising. ‘I don’t want you to get rid of my sofa, Eve. I love that sofa. Why are you doing this to me?’
‘It’s fine, we’ll sort it out,’ said Eve quickly. ‘I’ll make sure everything is where you need it to be. Don’t get upset.’
Flora’s shoulders relaxed a little and she nodded at Eve, raising up one hand to run it down her daughter’s cheek. ‘Even my lovely burgundy sofa?’ she asked.
Eve nodded, a lump in her throat: all this lying was so awful. ‘Yes, even the sofa. Everything will be fine.’
‘Thank you,’ whispered Flora. ‘Thank you for taking care of me, dear Eve. What would I do without you? I think I’d like a cup of tea now. Shall we go and find that girl with the trolley? It must be nearly teatime. Barbara, are you coming for a chocolate digestive?’
‘Not just yet,’ said Barbara, leaning down and picking up one of the books from the carpet. ‘I’ve got some more reading to do.’
Eve helped Flora out of the chair and guided her towards the door, her hand in the small of her mother’s back.
As they went past Nathan, he turned towards her. ‘She joined in with the children from St Barnabas again, today,’ he whispered. ‘She sang her heart out.’