The Secret of Happy Ever After by Lucy Dillon Page B

on it. Those old ladies in their lumpy skirts once danced with hopeful boys, and wore seamed stockings, and had crushes, and told jokes. And now they were just sitting in their own closed-off worlds, waiting for what? Someone to come in and make them listen to bloody Jane Austen whether they liked it or not?
    It was so quiet. No one spoke, there was no music, no television burbling away, no radio blurting out traffic reports . . . nothing. Just the faint ticking of the radiators and the occasional shuffle of polyester slacks against cushions.
    Michelle pressed her lips together to stop herself saying something to Anna about the horrible mustard-yellow walls; she knew it sounded shallow, but she also knew it’d be the first thing that would drive her over the edge.
    This could be me, she thought, sick with panic. Harvey was right. Mum was right. This could be me .
    ‘Where’s your mother-in-law?’ she whispered instead.
    Anna was fishing in her bag for her book. ‘Not here yet. She’ll make her grand entrance just before we start, to make sure everyone’s looking at her.’
    ‘And what about Mr Quentin?’
    Michelle’s cunning plan seemed pretty loopy now, even in her own mind. There were no books here, she thought. No bookshelves, no magazines, no papers. Mr Quentin must be going mad. He’d be even more determined to preserve his shop.
    Anna looked around. ‘I don’t think he’s here yet either. Why?’
    ‘Oh, I thought I might have a word with him. About his shop.’
    ‘Really?’ Anna’s eyes opened wide; she was too trusting to suspect any ulterior motive. ‘Why?’
    Before Michelle could think of an appropriate response, a middle-aged lady in a tunic and leggings bustled over to them with a clipboard and a pen suspended from her shelflike bosom like a plumb line. She beamed with delight at Anna.
    ‘Anna, my duck! Have you brought a helper today?’
    ‘Yes, this is Michelle,’ said Anna. ‘Michelle, Joyce is the entertainments manager for Butterfields.’
    ‘For my sins!’ said Joyce, flapping her arm modestly. ‘They keep me busy, this little lot.’
    Michelle and Anna couldn’t help looking in disbelief at the silent room of silent old people.
    ‘So, what are we having this week?’ enquired Joyce. She raised her voice so that the nearest residents could feel included. ‘Something Christmassy?’
    ‘I thought I’d read something from Cranford .’
    ‘Ooh, lovely. That’s been on telly quite recently, hasn’t it?’
    ‘Yes,’ said Anna.
    ‘It helps,’ Joyce confided to Michelle. ‘Though they sometimes get things confused with their families. Think they’ve had Joanna Lumley coming in to see them. They haven’t.’
    Joyce and Anna set about chivvying the residents gently, herding them like hens into a circle. Michelle felt awkward, but moved some chairs and sat down herself next to Anna, who introduced herself with an unselfconscious cheeriness, then began reading.
    Anna’s melodic voice easily filled the space around the chairs, and Michelle was surprised by how different it was from her usual conversational tone. She spoke more slowly and carefully, giving each phrase a rhythm that slid it directly into the imagination, building image on image, each character’s voice distinct.
    She’d read maybe a page when a white-haired lady appeared in the doorway, pushing a wheeled Zimmer frame with visible distaste. Unlike most of the others, she was wearing colours with a furious sort of defiance – a bright coral scarf round her neck and a pair of yellow trousers with plastic buttons. Her mouth was a horizontal slash of red lipstick, in a firm, unsmiling line.
    ‘You started without me,’ she said, glaring directly at Anna.
    ‘No, Evelyn, we didn’t,’ lied Anna.
    ‘Yes, you did,’ she retorted. ‘I’ve had a knee replacement, not a lobotomy. I could hear you down the hall. You can bloody well stop until I’ve sat down, thank you.’
    So this was the mother-in-law from