Andrew O'Hagan - The Illuminations

‘That’s right. He could always give tongue to an idea.’

‘Really?’

‘Oh, yes. He can see what happens behind a photograph.’

‘That’s nice,’ Jack said.

‘Oh, it’s everything,’ Anne said.

JUNGLE

Anne liked to use the laundry room because it was spacious and it had a big drier and she felt she was going on an outing when she went along the corridor with her washing basket and her powder. It was important, Anne used to say, to feel that you had your independence. You could close your back door or you could join the others, it was up to you. Nobody forced you to spend time in the common area if you were having a bad day or couldn’t remember the names. Some days are like that. Some days you are just muddled and every day is different.

It was a long walk down the corridor and the lights would come on at night because of the sensor. She sat in the reception area. She placed her things on the ground and just looked at the plants. The gardener from the council had made a sunken forest

with a border of breeze blocks. A forest of yucca, jades, banyan and palm grew all the way to a glass ceiling and you could see stars up there, as if they, too, belonged to Scotland. Anne loved looking into the tangle of plants at Lochranza Court. She felt it was alive with shadows and stories that couldn’t be captured in words.

Someone to love, someone like you.

The corridor was quiet at night, but even if someone passed Anne wouldn’t notice because she was so absorbed in the plants. It was silent but she could almost hear the busy life of the undergrowth. She forgot why she was out. Her basket of washing would often be sitting there in the morning and the warden would find it and know it was Anne’s.

HER OLD SELF

She left her washing the day she read out Harry’s biography and her mind was a bit unsettled. Harry didn’t come often enough. It was only a car journey and she’d promised an editor some prints. She’d been back in her flat for a while and the rabbit was looking at the microwave. She was going to use the speakerphone to tell the night warden there was a noise at her front door but then she realised she could answer the door herself, so she got up and took off the chain. ‘Mrs Quirk,’ the voice said when she opened the door. ‘It’s me, Russell. I was round today to test the smoke alarms. Can I come in and talk to you for a minute?’

Maureen heard them speaking through the wall. It didn’t happen often because Anne didn’t have many visitors, since her grandson was away on service and her daughter wasn’t that

welcome. It was nice to hear because Anne used to have such a lot to say, and now she went up and down because of her health and she could be silent for days. Maureen turned down her television and guessed it was a man’s voice; maybe one of the neighbours had taken her in a cup of tea. That’s nice. Maureen continued to watch television in silence. Nothing in the room was old, no pictures, no wood and no books, nothing with a memory. Esther had once asked her why she had no photographs of her grandchildren. And nothing of her own mum and dad, especially her dad. ‘They just gather dust,’ Maureen said, ‘and the shops want a fortune for frames nowadays.’

She had gone that morning to see the warden in her office. She kept her own cup and saucer there, but, for some reason, that day, Maureen didn’t bother with tea. ‘We should have a drink,’ Jackie said. ‘It’s your birthday. It’s a nice glass of fizz we should be having.’

‘Birthdays. I’m past caring about them.’

Jackie closed the door and they spoke about Anne.

‘How long?’ Maureen asked.

‘I don’t know, darling. Maybe a few months. It’s a shame because we’ve tried to keep her here. Her mind’s so alive. We’ve really tried. But it’s getting to the stage where she can’t cope in the flat. Even with you and me covering for her.’

‘She can’t do the cooker.’

‘The kettle. She can’t work the kettle.’

‘And then there’s the rabbit.’ Maureen kept biting her bottom lip in an unconscious display of pity. ‘She’s not quite as bad with the rabbit,’ she said. ‘She still likes to know where he is, but she’s not trying to feed him the way she was before the summer.’

‘You always say “him”,’ Jackie said.

‘Well, that’s what Anne does.’

‘The whole thing’s horrendous, Maureen.’

‘I know.’

‘To see it happen to such an intelligent woman.’

‘I know. Feeding the rabbit. It was me opening the tins. But she seems to have moved beyond that now. I don’t understand it. Every day she’s different and some days she’s like her old self.’

‘She can still talk. And she has a strong imagination. That’s probably what keeps her going.’

‘But it probably makes her seem better than she is.’

‘Exactly,’ Jackie said. ‘It’s mild dementia, but it’s progressive. That’s what the health workers are saying. The people at the Memory Club are monitoring the whole thing, to see how bad she is. We’ve been hiding it …’

‘The whole community’s been hiding it. We don’t want them to take Anne into a home.’

‘It’s always the end,’ Jackie said. ‘But then, you can only cover up for so long. Then you’re not doing the person any favours at all, really. You have to let them go.’

‘Oh, don’t say that,’ Maureen said. ‘Not yet, Jackie. She’s still all right and we can —’

‘I’m just saying,’ said Jackie. ‘It can’t go on for ever, and these health workers, they know what they’re doing.’

‘Yes.’

‘We can’t have residents setting fire to things.’

‘No.’ They sat in silence for a moment. ‘Maybe my Esther would have an idea of how to make it easier,’ said Maureen. ‘She’s very well qualified and she has a secretary.’

‘Aye, well,’ Jackie said. ‘It’s worth a try. But Anne will be moving out at some point, Maureen. That’s just a fact, hen, and you need to start preparing for it.’

Maureen was staring at the desk. ‘I saw some of the pictures she took when she was a young lassie,’ she said. ‘Unbelievable, Jackie. You really wouldn’t believe them if you saw them. Just taking an ordinary thing like an old sink full of dishes and making it, well, you know, I don’t know anything about these things.’

‘Beautiful,’ Jackie said.

‘That’s the right word: beautiful. As if life was just pictures. Like things you would see in an old magazine, you know? And when I asked her about her photography she said it was one of the things her late husband Harry did for her when they were young. He was a teacher and he taught her the new methods. She said it was Harry’s technique that made the photographs special.’

‘Is that right?’

‘That’s what she said. He knew about chemicals.’

‘Oh, my,’ Jackie said, ‘it’s great to have a man who knows things.’

Maureen replayed the conversation in her mind with the sound down and the mumbles coming through the wall. She didn’t know what she’d do if Anne ever left Lochranza Court. Maureen recalled when she saw her with a whisky in a crystal tumbler and thought, Good God, here’s Anne. A wee lady she is and she knows her own mind.

BEFORE THE WAR

The young man was nice and he made his own tea by pulling back the tape from the cooker and boiling a pan of water and finding a tea bag. Anne noticed his face was red but it calmed down. He looked like all the boys look nowadays with their cropped hair but he wasn’t wearing a boiler suit like before and his shoes were

polished. She sat down and said to herself that the fellows can certainly iron their shirts nowadays. He had things to say about the courage of the soldiers and he felt they were doing an amazing job and he said it took something special to sign up and go out there and fight.