Elisabeth Jones - Gold Beach

Some months before his death, my father had turned our house into a guest house or Bed & Breakfast, as they began to call it after the war, but it took my mother six months after he passed away to have the doors ready to open for business. At the beginning of August our life changed overnight. The first guests started to show up as if they had been waiting at the door to check in, and I set foot in the schoolroom for the first time. It was there where I met Isobel. Although I was yearning for the first day of school to come, since my mother had told me that it was there where they would teach me to become a man, when I saw that she was staying at the door and a stranger took my hand and walked me inside, my desperation made me scream in terror. I don’t know who was crying more, she or I. Since my teacher knew her, she allowed my mother some more minutes to say goodbye again. She hugged me and managed to quieten me down with her sweet words. ‘Remember what you promised Dad,’ she said, ‘you have to study and become a man to take care of me.’ Of course I would. I dried my tears with my hands, kissed my mother and hand in hand with my teacher I went to the classroom with a mission to accomplish.

From the very first day we never lacked customers. From Monday to Friday I could offer her little help, but weekends were different. Although she never used to wake me up, I would get up as soon as I heard her in the kitchen. I would have a wash, comb my rebellious curls and put clean clothes on to go down to serve breakfast and provide our guests with a little conversation. Everyone used to like the dimples flanking my smile. Later, while she cleaned up the rooms and changed the bedclothes, I would wash up. At first I had to do it standing on a chair until I grew tall enough to reach the sink by my own means.

Saturday afternoon was my favourite time, because after lunch we used to go to the park to play with Betty, the border collie we adopted when my father died, and to take a walk by the river until dinner time. It seemed to be only then that I saw my mother really happy.

The house was never closed to the public except for a single day: the 6 thof June. For the whole day my mother seemed to be absent. Year after year I learned to respect her silence because I thought it was the day to remember my father. And that was the truth. She used to get up early in the morning and even though she walked slowly in the attic not to wake me up, the wood always creaked under her feet. When I heard her coming down to make breakfast, I got up to have it together. Walking across the entrance hall towards the kitchen, I used to find a white candle already burning on the small table by the door and a tiny bunch of dried flowers held together with a ribbon, along with the photo of John she had put there. I used to go into the kitchen almost on tiptoes and sit at the table without even saying good morning so as not to interrupt her thoughts. After leaving my bowl of porridge next to me, she used to crouch at my level, take my face with both hands and look me in the eyes with a smile full of melancholy. For several minutes she would get lost in my features as if she would find the calm she needed on that day there. Then she would kiss me and we had breakfast in silence. When I grew up I came up with questions I never dared to ask. What did the 6 thof June have to do with my father? It wasn't his birthday, it wasn't the date of his death. Could it be the day they met? All those questions were about to find their answers.

The 6 thof June began like every previous one, but that day Isobel's life and mine would change forever. Dawn was breaking when my mother went up to the attic. Her stealthy footsteps woke me up but I waited curled up under the covers for her to go down to the kitchen. Not even an hour had passed when I heard Betty barking desperately. I sat up on my bed with a start alarmed by the barking and Geena's crying for help.

Geena was Isobel's mother and my mother's best friend. Like many women, she had lost her husband in the war so she had no option but to raise Isobel on her own. Although she was a beautiful young woman she hadn't found a man who could match Gareth yet. She was a cook at the town's pub and since my mother had opened her Bed & Breakfast, she worked some hours in the morning at our house to help her and get some extra money. Isobel and I were the same age and therefore we were classmates, but it wasn't until this event that our true friendship began.

I put on my trainers and ran down the stairs to the front door with my mother behind me. During the years that she was married to my father she had become a superb nurse. No one healed wounds in all of Moffat as well as my mother.

‘Geena! What's wrong?’ my mother asked as she held her by her shoulders trying to calm her down.

‘Please help me!’ she shouted desperately, her eyes flooded with tears. ‘A pot of boiling water has spilt all over my daughter!’

When she heard that, my mother cried, ‘My God!’ as she ran inside the house to get her first-aid kit. Betty kept going around her as if she was trying to find a way to help. Geena's voice just repeated over and over, ‘My child,’ with wrenching sobs that made me tremble thinking of the pain Isobel would be suffering. She was hiding her eyes with her hands as if she didn't want me to see her crying. I came close to her not knowing what to say to console her but most of all to hold her tightly for she seemed to be about to collapse onto the floor at any time. Geena clung to me fiercely, seized by anxiety and desperation. When my mother came out again, she literally tore her from my arms and started to run to the front gate to get in the car. Geena let herself be taken away. I stayed at the door not knowing what to do until I saw them disappearing down the road to town. Betty sat beside me and raised her paw to stroke my hand while she moaned with sadness. Back then Isobel and I were not great friends. We were classmates but I hardly used to talk to her, however, I felt I couldn't sit idly by and do nothing. I had to get dressed, take my bicycle and head for her house in case my mother needed me. At fourteen I was old enough to learn how to heal wounds. But as I got to my room to change my clothes, I remembered the trunk. I thought for a moment that the most important thing at that time was attending Isobel but then I reconsidered whether this was the opportunity I had been waiting so long for. Finally I decided to go up to the attic to check whether the trunk had its lock on or, on the contrary, was open. Betty followed me. I climbed the stairs slowly as if aware of making a big mistake, but I kept on steadily. When I got to the trunk and saw no lock on it I closed my eyes frightened. Betty started to bark lightly while she walked back and forth as if she wanted to tell me to get out of there. I crouched down to her level and began to scratch her behind her ears.

‘You’ve got to help me, Betty. I need to see what my mother keeps in this trunk but she mustn't know, so warn me when she comes back. Understand?’

Betty went to the window, stood up on her back legs and leaned on the frame. She looked at me and waved her tail energetically as if saying that she was ready. I said, ‘Good girl,’ and slowly walked to the trunk. As I stood before it I knew I was going to betray my mother's trust, but even though I felt ashamed of my behaviour, I decided to go on. For a moment I thought that if she hadn't thought fit to share with me what she kept inside, there had to be a reason, or maybe it was true that she just kept old clothes and it had been my own fantasies which made me believe that I would find some guilty secret in there. My thoughts battled against each other in two factions, one in favour of opening it and the other against it. How could I possibly please both of them and find some peace? Suddenly I came up with a solution. Before opening it I promised myself that whatever I found, I would never disclose the fact that I had opened it to my mother, that way her secret would always be safe.