Unspoken: A story of secrets, love and revenge T. Belshaw (good books to read for beginners txt) 📖

‘Don’t ask me to demonstrate in my condition,’ I said, seriously.

On Saturday afternoon, at one o’clock, Miriam, looking stunning in my mother’s navy, flared skirt, polka dot dress, left the house to find Michael waiting for her in his builder’s lorry. I watched from the front window as he produced a spotless, white sheet and spread it out on the passenger seat. Miriam looked back at the house and waved. I had never seen her look so happy in all the years I had known her.

I waved back energetically.

‘Have lots of fun, my darling,’ I said.

At five o’clock, Frank came back from visiting his mother. He wasn’t in the best of moods.

‘What’s this about a Christening? Going behind my back again I see.’

‘The Christening was your mother’s idea, not mine, Frank,’ I replied.

‘It doesn’t matter whose idea it was. Once again, I’m the last to know.’

I thought I could smell stale beer. I leaned a little closer and then I was certain.

‘You stopped off at The Old Bull on the way back then?’

‘I don’t have to consult you whenever I feel like a pint,’ he said, his voice raising a level.

‘A pint? More like five or six,’ I replied.

‘It’s still nothing to do with you,’ he said.

I bit my tongue and got to my feet.

‘I’m going for a bath,’ I said, more to myself than him.

‘You had one yesterday,’ he replied.

‘I did, and I’ll have one tomorrow, the day after, and the day after that if I feel like it. I’m paying the bloody gas bill, not you, Frank. If, and when, you decide to pay the bills, you can have a say in when I take a bath, until then… well, you know what you can do.’

I pointed out my new gramophone that I’d taken off the table and put beside the tallboy. ‘I’ve been spending again, but, it’s my own money, from my own Post Office account, and it’s my choice of how I bloody well spend it. You throw yours away on beer, I spend mine on things that will give me pleasure for a lot longer than the fifteen minutes it takes you to drink a pint.’

He wasn’t going to let an argument end with me having the last word. He wouldn’t have even if he was sober. He got to his feet and shoved his face up close to mine. The stink of stale beer immediately brought on my nausea.

‘One day soon, you’ll fall off that golden perch of yours, Lady High and Mighty. You might even be knocked off it.’ He pulled his sneering face away. ‘Now get out of my sight. Go on. Piss off.’

I glared at him for a few seconds, but then I felt angry tears well up. I wasn’t going to let him see he’d upset me, so I turned away from him and stomped off to the bathroom, blinking away my tears.

Chapter 56

Jess looked up from the book to see Alice had fallen asleep. Her breathing was shallow, but regular. She stood up, stretched and walked around the carpet in a circle in order to get her circulation moving again. She visited the bathroom and made another coffee before returning to her seat. The big clock on the wall read eight twenty-three as she walked back into the room. She watched Alice closely, ready to wake her on any sign of distress, but she seemed to be sleeping peacefully. Maybe that clock had something to do with her nightmares? She was always complaining about it.

Jess sat down again, sipped at her coffee and continued to read.

June 1938

My waters broke on the Sunday morning as I was working in the piggery.

I had been getting funny twinges in my stomach for an hour or two, but I put it down to wind moving through my bowels.

The waters broke with a gush, soaking me from the groin, right down to my ankles. I knew I hadn’t peed myself because I had no control over it at all.

The pigs thought I’d brought them a watery treat, and all ten of them made a bee line, or should I say pig line, for me.

When they started snuffling around my lady parts I began to panic and I shouted for help, when that didn’t work, I screamed for it.

I tried to make my way to the gate, but the weight of pork crammed up against my legs meant I couldn’t move an inch. The panic switched to near terror as the two boars began to take an interest. They forced their way through the sows to get a closer sniff. One of the buggers butted me on the back of the knee and I went over, ending up sprawled across the backs of the sows.

I really thought I was a goner. As my father had warned me many a time; pigs will eat anything.

I screamed again as the big boar, Horace, started nibbling at the leg of my denim overalls.

Suddenly, the three overly excited sows I was lying across, decided to try to get around to the other side of the two boars, leaving me lying in shit on the floor of the sty, with ten pigs looking for a second breakfast. The boars began to fight amongst themselves over who would have the first sitting, Horace appeared to be winning that particular battle, his trotters pounding my legs as he bit out at Hector, his brother. I can’t remember anything else, because I fainted.

When I came to, I was in Frank’s strong arms, and he was taking me back to the farmhouse. He yelled at Miriam to open the back door, then he carried me inside and looked around frantically for somewhere to put me. He decided on our huge, oak kitchen table.

‘Frank, I’m fine, just a little shaky, let me stand up.’

‘Not until I know you’re all right,’ he replied and stretched me out along the full length of the table. My dungarees were in tatters from