The Betrayal

I ring the doorbell and wait. It’s a moment or two before Helen’s voice crackles onto the intercom, croaky, posh. She buzzes me in and I go through to her flat. She looks ancient today: gaunt, skin paper thin, almost translucent. Her eyes are hollow but still they sparkle.

“Where shall I start?” I ask, looking around me.

She indicates the room with a fragile sweep of her hand. The blinds are up and shafts of sunlight drift down onto books stacked on tables and book-filled boxes all over the floor. She’s having another clear out. She’s had lots recently, on different themes – coats, clothes, papers and photographs. Last week it was kitchenware. Everything is being pared down to the bare essentials. As an expectant mother nests for her unborn child, it seems a primal urge is driving Helen to organise and prepare, but for a different journey entirely.

For two hours we shift books, lugging boxes and making new stacks from existing stacks. I am slightly shocked by Helen’s strength. The books are heavy, mainly art books, monographs and catalogues raisonnés. We label them: keep, Oxfam, give to niece, ABEbooks, question mark. Then we stop and go into the garden for elevenses, an old-fashioned ritual that Helen insists upon.

Helen is immensely proud of her garden and, even in her frailty, I’ve seen her vigorously digging over the beds. We finish our lemonade and get up to walk around. She shows me a single magnolia flower and points out a spot on the plant where a flower has been previously.

“It only lasted for three days, then the petals dropped to the ground,” she says, disappointed. “It’s completely sexual.” She looks at me keenly through narrowed eyes. “They just bloom so they can get properly fucked by the bees then bear this fruit thing.”

I detect the note of bitterness. Helen has no children of her own, in fact no close family except a fickle niece whom I’ve met only twice in all these years. But she has me – solid and reliable old me. Over time there has been a barely perceptible shift in my role. The relationship is still that of employer employee but at a certain point the frantic clatter of her typewriter died, the telephone rang less frequently and her use of me altered. She no longer needed someone to file and phone but there was always work to be done. One day, way back, she began to confide in me – small regrets followed by little words of advice. As I listened I slipped into my new role. It is clear now that I am her companion, devoted, daughter-like. It’s a given that I’ll always be with her.

We sit a little longer in the quiet of the garden, her eyes grow distant and I lose her for a while. Now is not the time to tell her my secret.

We go back to shifting books. Once we have filled boxes and properly labelled them, Helen wants me to carry them to the door. This involves going along a corridor and down four steps. The boxes are heavy. I am reluctant but carry out my duty, acutely feeling the strain each time I lift.

The day comes to an end. I want to leave but Helen is faffing over something by the sink. I glance at the clock on the wall, anxiously awaiting my dismissal. Finally she comes to me with a punnet full of plums.

“From my tree,” she says.

I take them, thanking her, once again indebted to her. There is a moment when I could tell her, but I stand voiceless. She’s looking so frail, fading before my very eyes. Perhaps she won’t need to know.

I let myself out and walk briskly to the corner of the road, cradling my swollen tummy, apologising to it for putting it at risk today. Stephen is waiting for me at the corner. He looks at me askance and I shake my head.

“Not today,” I say. “I couldn’t tell her today.”

He puts his arms around me and we disappear into the twilight.