Pam Weaver - Pack Up Your Troubles

The door clicked open and she raised her head to see Pip come into the room. He came to her bedside and laid his muzzle on the sheet beside her. Funny how he always sensed when she was upset.

‘You’ll get yourself into a heap of trouble if Ga finds you upstairs,’ she whispered and she heard his tail thump against the chest of drawers as he licked her tears away.

The atmosphere between Connie and Ga remained frosty for a couple of days. They avoided talking to each other any more than they had to, although they made polite conversation whenever Gwen or Mandy were around. Left to her own thoughts, Connie went over and over what Ga had said until there came a moment when she told herself she had to stop. It was beginning to make her feel ill. If only she had a close friend she could confide in, but Rene Thompson was living in Scotland now and recently married. She would have her mind on other things, and besides, it was difficult to write everything down in a letter.

‘Clifford is coming home,’ said Gwen as she sat at the breakfast table with a letter. Her voice was choked with emotion. ‘He’s being demobbed at last.’

‘Oh Mum, I’m so pleased for you,’ said Connie. Pip was standing next to her resting his head on her lap. Connie fondled his ear as her mind went into overdrive. If he got back before September she could still go to nursing school.

Gwen pulled a handkerchief from under her watch strap and dabbed her nose.

‘About time,’ said Ga rather pointedly. ‘You and I can’t keep the place going forever on our own. And get that dog away from the table, Constance. You know I can’t stand it.’

Pip slunk into his basket but Connie ignored the jibe. Ga could be insufferable at times, making mountains out of molehills and keeping up her hostility for days.

‘It’ll be good for Mandy to have her dad back,’ said Gwen. ‘She’s missed him dreadfully.’

Being an older man, Clifford wasn’t called up until the final big push. His regiment ended up in Holland supporting the Canadian troops who had surrounded Amsterdam. After VE Day, he was sent to Germany itself.

‘Do we know when he’s coming?’ Connie tried to sound casual but her voice was a little tremulous with excitement.

Gwen shook her head. ‘“Soon”, that’s all he says.’

Connie was aware of Ga’s eyes boring into the side of her face. ‘I can pick Mandy up from school when he comes, Mum,’ Connie said. ‘That way you can meet him at the station on your own.’

‘Thank you, darling. That would be nice.’

‘And what about the shop?’ said Ga.

‘We’ll manage,’ said Connie throwing her a look and Ga jutted her chin defiantly.

‘Perhaps when he gets back, you and Clifford could have a little holiday, Mum. A bit of time to yourselves. I could look after Mandy for you.’

‘I don’t know about that,’ said her mother coyly.

‘Well, think about it,’ said Connie. ‘Wait until you’ve talked to Clifford before you say no.’

Ga stood up with a harrumph. ‘People never bothered with holidays in my day,’ she announced as she gathered her plate and cup and saucer and put them in the sink with a clatter. ‘They just got on with it.’ She didn’t see Connie and Gwen share a secret wink behind her back. ‘There’s plenty to do today,’ Ga said as she limped to the door. ‘Connie, you can plant the leeks and some winter cabbage in the plot by the fence and Gwen, we need to get the carrots up for winter storage.’

The back door slammed as she left the room. ‘No rest for the wicked,’ Gwen sighed good-naturedly.

At the weekend, the pattern of life at home was slightly different. The shop closed at noon on Saturday and normally on Sunday the whole family went to church in the morning. They were Anglicans but preferred to go to the Free Church which, because the war had interrupted their building programme, met in the local school. The services were bright and cheerful and it had a large Sunday school.

‘After Sunday school,’ Connie had told Mandy when she’d tucked her up the night before, ‘if you’re good, I’ll take you to see the gypsies.’

They ate their Sunday roast, and while Gwen sat with her knitting listening to the radio and Ga sat at her writing desk, Connie and Mandy and just about every other child in Worthing set off for Sunday school. In the main it was fun and the hour was precious to parents because it was the one time that they could have an hour to themselves with no interruptions. Pip went along with them but Connie made him wait outside. The class was held in a small room at the back of the church. The teacher, Miss Jackson, was a little older than Connie but they had both gone to the same school.

‘Connie!’ Jane Jackson, an attractive brunette, was now a librarian. ‘How good to see you. Are you back for good?’

‘Looks like it,’ Connie smiled.

‘We must get together sometime,’ Jane smiled. ‘No, William, stop hitting Eddie with that hymn book. That’s no way to behave in church.’

The children sat in a semi-circle on a large mat on the floor. There were about thirty of them in Jane’s class, nearly all of them the children of church members although there were a few who had been sent along by their parents so that they could have a bit of peace and quiet and a little time to themselves. They began with a prayer and then some choruses. Jane and her fellow teachers were ably assisted by Michael Cunningham, the son of the church treasurer, a pimply faced youth who was waiting to go to university. Michael hammered out the tune on the school piano.

The choruses brought back memories of her own childhood. They were as timeless and as meaningless as they had ever been. ‘ Jesus wants me for a sunbeam …’ ‘ Bumble bee, bumble bee, buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz …’ and ‘ I am H-A-P-P-Y …’ The Bible story was based around the woman with the issue of blood . Connie wondered if five- to seven-year-olds had any idea what ‘an issue of blood’ meant, but she was surprised to see that the children listened enraptured. Apparently Jane was a gifted storyteller. One more chorus, this time one relating to the story itself, ‘ Oh touch the hem of His garment and thou too shalt be whole …’ and Sunday school was over. At the end of the session, as they said their goodbyes, Jane produced a box of sweets. Each ‘good’ child, namely the ones who had sat still while they’d had the story, was allowed to take one. Connie permitted herself a wry smile. Clever old Jane. No wonder the children sat still and listened.

‘There’s a dance at the Assembly Rooms on Saturday,’ said Jane as they were leaving. ‘A few of us from the village are going. Sally Burndell comes. You know her, don’t you?’

‘She works part time in our shop,’ Connie nodded.

‘Do come to the dance,’ said Jane. ‘They’re great fun.’

A couple of days slipped by but at the earliest opportunity, Connie climbed upstairs to the attic with a torch. It was hot and musty but she’d only been there for about ten minutes before Gwen came to see what she was doing.

‘It’s chock-a-block up here, Mum!’ Connie gasped. ‘I had no idea we had all this junk.’

Her mother looked a little surprised too. ‘I suppose it’s years of saying, “Oh … put it in the attic for now”,’ she smiled. ‘What are you looking for anyway?’

‘My old school books,’ said Connie. ‘I’m teaching Kez to read.’

‘Try that box over there,’ said her mother.

The first of the boxes contained an old photograph album. Connie flicked through and smiled. The box Brownie had recorded so many happy occasions but it was a shock to see her father’s face again. Out of respect for her new husband, her mother had moved his pictures up here when Clifford came into the family. She turned a page and there was Kenneth. Her heart missed a beat and she sighed inwardly. He looked about twelve. He was bare-chested and wearing short trousers. His fair hair was tousled and he had obviously been looking for something in the pond. He was proudly holding up a jam jar tied with a string handle and something lurked in the water. She stared at her long lost brother and wished he was here. Memory is selective, she knew that. She’d forgotten the times when they had been at loggerheads, or the times when he’d thumped her for getting in his way. All she could recall were the picnics on the hill and her mother reading them endless stories, or fun and laughter at the beach and being pushed on the swings until she was so high it was scary. She ran her finger over Kenneth’s face and slipping the photograph from its stuck-down corners, she palmed it secretly into her pocket.