Sandra – Memory

This is a piece on a character I keep coming back to. This is a scene that may or may not be in a bigger piece. A story I am playing with…

1

‘You have no memories.’ The woman said. That was rubbish, because Mrs Dove could remember just fine. She could remember where she lives, she could remember her way to the corner shop for her favourite tipple which she remembered was Glenlivet, No ice. Where she also bought her woodbines where Vance stocked them solely for her. She remembered she hated the bloody bingo, which the persistent Mrs Argle, convinced she was pining away from loneliness had insisted she try. She did it once and decided never again. She might be seventy-one, but she wasn’t a bongo type gal thank you very much. Mrs Argle had persisted some more until only bluntness would do. ‘I hated the bloody bingo. I was never so fucking bored in my entire fucking life. I am never going again.’ And she had shut her door on Mrs Argle’s shocked face.

Relations had been frosty ever since.

Mrs Dove’s days had had a certain monotony to them, but wasn’t that normal at this time of life. And she had her music. The classics of course, a little Verdi’s Dies Irae if she was feeling riled up by some mad politician. A little Vivaldi: Spring if she was feeling mellow, or Summer if not. Or, for emergencies, Dido’s lament. But that was rare. For tidying up which was even rarer because she found it a waste of time, she put on the Sex Pistols God Save the Queen which gave her the energy necessary to scrub toilets, or even run the hoover round the repellent carpet that was down when she moved in. Green roses, Christ.

Life trundled on.

Until yesterday.

The man and woman she had never seen, she was sure of it, and yet, with very little persuasion she’d let them in, as if she knew something that she didn’t know. Whatever that meant. Perhaps she was going batty, one of her greatest fears.

The woman had been smartly dressed, in a suit and might have worked in an office except the suit, was a subdued red and cut in a way that said custom made. The man was tall, grey and had sad eyes.

‘Can we come in?’ the woman had asked, and Mrs Dove had them through to the living room. She saw the woman blink at the carpet. Most people had that reaction.

‘You’re probably wondering why we are here Mrs Dove?’ the woman sat on the edge of the sofa, the man beside her. he looked like he might cry. She nodded, of course she wondered, but she was sure they’d get to it in time. she felt strangely calm. Why wasn’t she more wondered that these strangers were in her house? ‘

‘Do you recognise us? Mrs Dove looked them over again. she didn’t recognise them and said so. But.

The woman nodded, her hands between her knees as she leant closer.

‘My name is Seline. This is Mr Hart. Or just Hart.’ The man nodded and looked like a wounded animal. Mrs Dove wondered what the news could be. She didn’t have any family that may have met with a sudden accident. And she wouldn’t lose sleep if Mrs Argle had met a sticky end. She would be annoyed if anything happened to Vance. Shed have to find a new supplier.

‘We need you to listen to us. We need to tell you something you will find hard to believe at first. Listen and then I will show you something that will help.’

Mrs Dov’s heart had sped up with these words. Seline’s words and tone sounded serious, almost portentous. She felt a horrible gurgling in her stomach. Upsets like this went straight to her digestive tract nowadays. She might need the toilet if they carried on like this. She calmed herself. They might just be ordinary nutters. Common variety. Nutter vulgaris.

‘This life you’re living, ‘Seline’s hands swept the room, taking in the wallpaper, the ornaments, and the carpet, ‘is a lie.’ Well ok, she could accept the carpet. It wasn’t her. But, how rude. Religious nutters, that was it. She was going to be initiated into ‘Ten ways to Ascend’. Well, she didn’t have time for that nonsense.

‘Look, very kind, I’m sure.’ She pushed herself up from the chair, ‘I have to go.’

Seline continued, ‘Please sit down.’ Her voice was deeper, more commanding.

Mrs Dove sat, although for the life of her she couldn’t see why. Maybe I’m already in their clutches. They’ve got me.

‘It had to be like this, for your safety.’ No that wasn’t right! Mrs Dove stood again. Everything Seline said was wrong and she was developing a terrible headache, a buzzing drone.

‘I’d like you to leave now.’ She wasn’t putting up with this. She’d seen off hordes of Jehovah’s’ in her time, she wasn’t going to be cowed by a posh woman and a sad old man. She looked around for her handbag, ‘I need to go to the shops. Urgently.’

‘Because, after what happened, you were not safe. None of us were.’ She was still talking, Mrs Dove shook her head, no more of this. La la la, she wanted to put her hands over her ears. They were utter nutters. Utterly Nutterly. She had a sudden urge to giggle.

‘I know what you’re thinking. I know it’s hard to hear.’ Seline sighed and signalled Hart. He pulled out a packet of white powder.

‘What’s that?’ Were they going to drug her? ‘I’m seventy-one years old. My party days are behind me. I like a nice whisky and a fag, and that’s where I draw the line these days thanks you very much’.

Seline looked apologetic, ‘You look so frightened, please don’t be.’ She turned to Hart, ‘this is harder than I thought it would be.’ And Hart patted her hand. ‘It’s alright. We’ve got to carry on.’

‘I am leaving now.’ She had found her handbag and raised her voice, ‘You need to leave. Now!’

She’d unleash the obscenities next. Noone seemed to think old ladies could swear like troopers. But she would fucking show them if they weren’t on their feet in three…and two…and

Seline had put her hand in her pocket, and pulled something out. She held it out to Mrs Dove, and her breath left her in a sobbing sigh. Her black egg. Her black egg; the egg she was never separated from, not for a moment, not ever. How was it she had forgotten it? That she only remembered now she saw it?

Her trembling legs couldn’t hold her, and she fell back onto the chair, eyes still fixed on the egg. Seline leant forward and cradling it in both hands, dropped it gently into Mrs Dove’s lap, like a small, fragile animal. Mrs Dove caressed it; it was warm but whether from Seline or from its own self she didn’t know. If there was further knowledge of the egg, she couldn’t remember it.

‘Do you believe us? Do you want to remember?

Mrs Dove nodded. She took the powders from Hart’s hand.

2

She had drunk a spoon of powders with a glass of water, swirling the grit at the bottom so she got it all. She was a gullible fool, trusting those two jokers. What was in the powder? Despite her suspicions, the powders looked like ordinary salt, or sugar, but tasteless. Could be anything. Was she drinking arsenic or fentanyl or whatever the drug du jour was? How could a powder like this help her remember? And remember what? But every time her thoughts turned to scepticism, her eyes turned to the egg. It was real, a physical object. And it exerted some pull for her. That was something she couldn’t deny or explain.

Was Dove even her name? Was she a Mrs? Her mind automatically said yes, and he had died. But when she looked at the black and white photo of him in the frame, nothing came. No emotion and scant details. What had he liked? Favourite food? or place? What did he do for work? Something in an office but that was true of lots of husbands. The truth was, she suspected he, like many things, was another thing that was part of the ‘cover’.

‘Dove’ was wrong too. It felt like wrong; not her name. it never had. She was many things, but a soft cooing bird was not one of them. A hawk, or an osprey, maybe. Something that hunted. And killed. Yes, those felt more like her. Dove, indeed. She snorted.

The egg had sat in the fruit bowl at first, the evicted fruit sitting forlornly beside it on the counter. Her eyes had kept returning to it like a cat with one kitten. After going to the toilet upstairs and feeling the thread that seemed to bind her and it grow thin and strained, she had draped her scarf round her into a sling and nestled it there. Next to her heart, where it seemed to pulse in time.

She wondered when she would remember ‘everything’. They had said it could take time.

‘How much time?’ she had asked, suspicion and hope warring inside her.

She caught the look they exchanged. ‘We don’t know.’ Hart had said eventually. ‘We were told they should work. Over time.’

‘Should?’ she had asked, horrified. ‘Should?’ she held the packet up. Was something moving in there? Where had she put her glasses?

‘What will I remember? Why can’t you just tell me?’

‘It is better you remember. That’s the way it works.’ Seline had pointed to the egg. ‘And you have your egg now.’

‘Mine?’

‘Oh yes. It was always yours. I just had it for a while. For safety.’

‘There is that word again. Safety. From whom? Or what?’

‘That too will come to you. In time.’

‘You’re a big help, aren’t you?’ she had said it in annoyance, and been surprised when they laughed.

‘You haven’t changed.’ Hart said, smiling a little. He shook his head. ‘For that, at least, I am thankful.’