Cecelia Ahern - Girl in the Mirror

There was never any conversation, but never any awkwardness either. Their previous conversation about Jack was about as long or as intense as it had ever reached. He realised then that he rather enjoyed her company, he who had spent the last forty-one years on his own. He realised that he quite looked forward to her morning arrival, that for the few hours after she left, he felt … well, he missed her. The house was hollow again. Carved out like a tree. Now he felt he was waiting, always had an expectant feeling, for someone to arrive, for something to happen. He hadn’t wished that for a long time. That feeling had long since been with him. He stopped chewing, put his sandwich down.

She didn’t look at him. ‘What?’

She ripped open an envelope.

He didn’t say anything.

She looked a little uncomfortable.

‘I’m trying to discern which pile of letters is the one which moves you beyond belief.’

She looked at him then, aware he’d made a joke. Then she stabbed a finger on the pile on the left. ‘This one.’

He smiled. He wouldn’t have known but it made him feel good. He may not bore her entirely. He looked at his pocket watch; he always left an hour between appointments. He only saw two people a day, sometimes one depending on the memory. He returned to the machine.

‘It’s been twenty-five years since he died,’ Mrs de Lacey spoke with her neck arched out like a swan, her skin stretching and pulling tight around her muscles. The pearls on her necklace nestled into the dips in her craned neck. She was trying to appear strong but he could sense that she was flapping wildly below the surface.

‘I can remember lots of things about him, lots of things we did together, lots of things he said but—’ And now her resolve weakened, her tough exterior crumbled just a little. He neck shortened, her skin loosened, her shoulders lapsed and she appeared to fall in on herself, sobbing.

‘Mummy.’ Her daughter reached out and touched her mother’s arm, surprised and more than a little embarrassed by the display of emotion.

He didn’t say anything.

The daughter looked at him uncomfortably, as if he had the ability to stop the water works.

‘But his face,’ her mother continued, truly sobbing now, forcing the words out whether anybody liked it or not. ‘His face when I close my eyes.’ She closed her eyes. ‘I can’t see him. I just can’t.’

‘Mummy, just stop now. What on earth are you talking about? Give yourself a moment to compose yourself.’ Her daughter’s cheeks were flushed.

‘It’s like a blur,’ she continued, her eyes streaming. ‘I can see him but not closely, not exactly and he keeps changing. Changing age, changing expression. I can’t seem to hold on to one memory, to one perfect moment.’

The daughter rummaged in her handbag.

‘Here, Mummy.’ She shoved a handkerchief into her clenched, angry hands. ‘Your nose,’ she said, with a little disgust.

‘I know what his eyes look like, I know his lips.’ She touched her own lips sensually, remembering. The daughter looked away, shocked, further embarrassed. ‘But all together I can’t see him. It’s like I’m looking too close, I need to move further back, to see the entire picture.’

She squeezed her eyes shut, wrinkles tense. Then she opened them again, disappointed he wasn’t there.

She looked at him then for the first time. ‘I want to be able to remember him at any moment I so please. He’s all I’ve got.’

‘Mummy.’ The daughter’s face fell. ‘You have us.’

‘Oh don’t be silly, Lizzie, you all argue about whose turn it is to take me out for lunch and I know you’re not all arguing to take me out. No, he’s up there, the only place I have him,’ she said jabbing her finger against her temple roughly, against her tough old skin, as if stubbing out a cigar. ‘And I’m losing him.’

Lizzie cleared her throat. ‘I have a photograph of him.’

He took it. An imposing black-and-white photograph of an overweight man wearing a monocle, hands clasped on his lap, staring coldly into the camera. Behind him on the wall was the head of a stag.

‘That’s our hunting lodge,’ she said rather proudly.

‘No, no, no.’ Mrs de Lacey waved the photograph away as though it were a wasp. ‘That’s not him.’

‘Mummy, that was taken right after he became president of the cricket club, I know so because look, his lapel—’

‘I don’t want to remember a damn cricket-club or hunting-lodge photograph,’ she snapped, and once again her daughter appeared shocked, wounded even. ‘I want to remember him as he was in the morning, first thing when I opened my eyes. I want to see him as we made love.’ She closed her eyes then, savouring a moment.

‘Mummy,’ her daughter said, shocked, but she’d softened, as though all of a sudden seeing her mother as a woman.

‘When he first held Ellis when he was born, playing with the children in the garden. The way his nostrils twitched when he was angry.’ She laughed then. ‘I know all these things about him, but when I close my eyes I can’t see them any more.’

He placed the pads on her temples and forehead, he attached the wires to the machine. He switched it on.

‘So paint me the picture and that’s what you’ll see.’

He runs his fingers through her hair, it’s loosely curled and his fingers fall straight through it, it is so soft, like velvet. He hears his name being called. A colleague to his right-hand side coming toward him. He greets him.

She tells him she’ll see him later. He is a little distracted but he agrees. He quickly brushes his lips against the skin on her fingers. Her skin is warm and soft. She takes her hand away quickly so as not to embarrass him in the company of his colleague, and she moves away. He turns to greet his colleague. They begin to discuss a case that has been boggling the offices for a great many months. He hears her call goodbye again but he is caught in conversation, she will understand, he will see her later. He hears a sound. A God-awful sound. A sound he will never forget. Never forget. His colleague grabs his arm so tightly, he feels nails on his skin through his summer suit. And he knows but he cannot look. He does not want to have to remember that sight for the rest of his life, for he knows he will see it everyday. In waking hours and in sleep. Every single day.

When Judith arrived at his home the following morning her brown hair was covering her face. Her eyes were cast down, wouldn’t meet his gaze. With her chin down she pushed passed him in the hallway and made her way to the kitchen. She stalled when she reached the door and saw the table. He had prepared breakfast for the first time. A feast of sausages, eggs, tomato, pudding - black and white - mushrooms of all different sizes. A rack of toast sat in the middle of the table with every condiment imaginable. He quite literally did not want her to have to ask for anything.

She swayed a little and he rushed forward to catch her but her small pink hand appeared from her oversized coat sleeve and she held on to the door frame. That’s when she turned and he saw. Her eye. Her left eye was bruised, the flesh around it had swollen up so much you would barely know an eye was buried beneath. Her skin had the appearance of a rotten peach. She saw his face, the look in his eye and she turned around again quickly. Anger surged through him. Never had so much anger rushed through his blood since Judith. His Judith. And now this Judith. His Judith, he realised. His grip tightened around his cane, his knuckles turned white.