‘Good morning! And how are we today?’
Rachel blinked out of her doze to see that a nurse had appeared by her bedside, a different one today, with high Slavic cheekbones and pale blue eyes. It took her brain a few foggy moments to catch up with everything. Pain. A hospital bed. Manchester. Oh God, yes – and the children. Where were they waking up this morning? Who was looking after them? She hoped Sara had helped out. She hoped even more that Mabel hadn’t taken it upon herself to assume responsibility. Aged thirteen, she thought she knew everything about the world but was still such a child in reality.
The nurse’s gaze was expectant, so Rachel croaked out an ‘Okay’, even if it wasn’t true. Really, she was very far from okay – she had barely slept, she had the mother of all thumping headaches and she was dreading the operations that loomed ahead of her that day. Not to mention the fact that she had palpitations every time she thought about her kids, and how they might be managing without her. They must be completely freaked out by now. She had never done anything like this before, never dropped out of their world without warning. With the ripples from the divorce still ongoing, she had done her damnedest throughout to be the constant in their life, the linchpin who kept everything together. Until now, when a whole afternoon, evening and night had passed, and they would have woken up without her. I’m sorry, she thought despairingly. I’ve let you all down, haven’t I? I’m sorry.
That was the scariest thing about being a single mum – that it all came down to you. Homework, arguments, bedtime, nits, dinner money, basic hygiene: she was the one who had to deliver day in, day out, to love them, feed them, keep them clean and safe. But here she was, miles away, having failed to come home and do any of those things. She could already imagine someone from social services knocking on the door, stern-faced. ‘Mrs Jackson?’
Wait. There it was! Her name – Jackson, that was it. Mrs Rachel Jackson. Rachel and Lawrence Jackson. Except they weren’t together any more, of course. ‘Jackson,’ she said, her jaw aching as she formed the word. She struggled to sit up, feeling desperate to impart this new knowledge. ‘Jackson. My name. Rachel. Jackson.’
‘Rachel Jackson – that’s your name?’ the nurse said warmly. ‘Fantastic, Rachel. Great. That gives us something to go on. Has anything else come back to you? A city, or town? A telephone number?’
She frowned, probing around inside her mind as if searching a dark warehouse. A city or town. An image of a house swam up through the murk; a grey house – home. Yes, there was the hall with the coats hanging up, there was the living room painted a lovely soft biscuit colour. Her huge wide bed upstairs, big enough to make her feel lonely sometimes. And the name of her street was . . .
Nothing. It had gone. She mentally paced through the rooms she could remember, recounting the details: the heavy oatmeal curtains at the living-room window. The view outside onto the street. Her car. The front wall where Mabel sometimes sat with friends, getting moss on her grey school skirt. I live in . . . she prompted herself, but still no answer appeared.
Then a name came to her. ‘Birmingham?’ she said tentatively. Birmingham, she repeated in her mind. There was definitely some connection with Birmingham, she was sure. Good old Brum!, she could hear her dad saying. But did she live there? Oh, this was awful. Everything kept jumbling up in her mind, the details slipping out of reach.
‘Birmingham, okay,’ the nurse was saying, though, before Rachel could voice her doubts. ‘Rachel Jackson, Birmingham. Let me pass that on to the police, see if we get anywhere. Try and rest now though, okay?’