How to cheat death

Snyde and Smyth were old school lawyers. Even the alphabet didn’t work too hard to separate them. One, or the other of them, had represented me in a drunk driving charge in which I’d fallen asleep whilst giving a breathalyser sample. I couldn’t remember the legal terminology he employed, but I do remember being very impressed. Technically, Mr Snyde, or Mr Smyth, argued that I hadn’t refused to give a breathalyser sample. The prosecutor fiscal was less circumspect. I was outraged that he used such a word as ‘bullshit’ in a court of law. The judge, one of those modern sorts, tended to side with the prosecutor and because the seriousness of the crime and my apparent lack of remorse, or respect for the law, and taking into account a long list of similar convictions was looking at a custodial sentence. But, he was also taking into account, the fact that I was the sole carer for an elder relative and was therefore willing to commute the sentence to 240 hours Community Service, 12 penalty points, and the mandatory year ban, which I thought was a bit much.

‘Let this be a warning to you Mr Watson!’ tolled the judge.

Justice moves swiftly. I had to get the bus home. Before that I had to see a dreary little man, in the annex of the court, who compensated for his lack of presence by having a big voice and wearing a built up shoes on one foot, which no doubt gave him some kind of psychological complex that he tried to take out on me. He made some kind of judicious remark about Community Service not being a soft option, not being like Butlins. I tried to talk him into letting me do my 240 hours Community Service doing his job I settled for serving my time as an Entertainment Officer in Surfield, an old folks home. It was a stupid idea, of course, old folk didn’t need entertained. They just needed to be left alone. The name, however, was vaguely familiar.

I went for a few drinks to celebrate. And the first person I went to see, after I’d seen a few other people, was my dear old mum.

‘I’m Tony,’ I barked. But she wasn’t really listening.

I turned to her nurse. ‘I’m her son.’

‘Here he is. That’s your son,’ bellowed the nurse, shaking mum gently by the shoulder to get her attention.

‘Don’t shout dear. I’m not deaf.’ Mum patted the nurse’s hand, which was still lying on her shoulder, to console her for not being deaf. ‘I thought he was some kind of doctor wanting to prod at me, or change my medication again.’ Mum leaned forward, screwing up her face to get a closer look at me. ‘A doctor or some kind of nitwit,’ she said, settling back down into her chair with a groan. ‘Ask him what he wants dear. Ask him what he wants.’

Mum was in the dayroom, sitting in a semi circle with the other residents, watching nothing much, in the space between morning tea and lunch. Methuselah’s elder sister was sitting in a straight back chair next to her, slumped sideways and drooling enough phlegm to stick her face firmly to her white lambswool cardigan. I didn’t want to say anything to the nurse about the old gentleman on the other side of mum, because he kept trying to get up and had shouted ‘Tommy’ at me, which confused me at first, because I thought he knew me, but had somehow gotten the syllable in my name wrong. I quickly worked out it was just a general term of endearment, and the thing was, he stank, as if he’d done a number two. I kept waiting for the nurse to do something about it. But she just stood brooding. Her ham hock arms were folded, in a no nonsense manner, across the polyester blue uniform, with the logo of the home’s name on it, Surfield, which kept her breasts shelved. She looked at me as if I was the entertainment and wasn’t up to scratch. I wasn’t sure that I wanted the Tommy shouter’s seat even if he did happen to get his gentleman’s’ incontinence pad, or nappy changed. There was nowhere else to sit, so I kinda crouched at mum’s feet and moved my hand gently over the parchment skin of the hand she had perched on the chair’s armrest. I moved the band that dad had given her over seventy years ago, that was too big for her fingers now, and turned it gently in the way that I used to do when I was a child marvelling that there was such a thing as gold and my mum had it.

‘Bugger off.’ Mum snatched her hand away. ‘Tell him to bugger off.’ She’d on her angry face and turned to the nurse to demand that she tell me what I already knew.

The nurse smirked, but said nothing.

My knees were killing me, so I was glad to stop crouching and stand up straight. I didn’t want to disturb her anymore. She was a character. And I had tried. I put on my best breezy Cary Grant smile for the nurse.

‘I’ll come back another time.’ I flashed the nurse the full set of my white teeth, like a credit card, to get in her good books. ‘When she’s better,’ I added, trying on a smile.

I leaned over to kiss mum’s thin lips, but she jerked away, like a fish on a line, her eyes flashing, and I caught her on the tip of the nose. ‘Bugger off,’ she said again.

I made a note to myself that when I talked about my visit to my sister I would also have to mention that mum might now also have, but I couldn't remember the word for it . The only term she seemed to know was bugger and she kept repeating it. I was sure there would be some kind of medication for her condition.

The nurse was getting restless moving from foot to foot like an elephant on its hind legs doing the can-can. I figured she was probably dying for a fag or a cup of tea. I forced another smile for mum’s sake.

‘I really enjoyed our chat,’ I didn’t try to kiss mum, just kind of bent over to give her a hug, which ended up as a quick pat on her bony back, but it was enough to get the smell of her rotten breath once more. I was sure she had thrush and I’d need to speak to my sisters about that too.

‘Tommy. Tommy,’ sounded in my ear as I beat a retreat.

A silver haired old woman buttonholed me in the hallway and clung onto my arm. She was presentable enough with a well-worn brown cardigan and matching blue blouse and skirt and the standard black shiny shoes. The one distinguishing feature was an overly large gold crucifix around her neck. That made me think she was nun, or something. I was waiting for her to ask me for a donation. When she said, ‘Good Lord, I’m glad you visited George,’ I knew her game was up and she slipped as easily off my arm as she had onto it.

I signed myself out of the visiting book, scrawling that I’d been there an hour and a half. Not that anyone ever checked those books, of course, apart from my sisters.

But I was determined to do right by mum. The following week I met just the man I was looking for in our local boozer The Park Bar and it was as if God had sent me a sign, because his name was also Tommy. He was a short balding man, with that androgynous kind of body that was a polite way of saying that his flash golf jumper was too tight and made him look as if he had breasts. I watched him for a bit, before I made my move. Someone threw a packet of cheese and onion from the bar to one of his mates and he said, ‘nice throw,’ in an inoffensive jocular manner. What he was good at was talking. If anything moved he talked to it. I sneaked up beside him, and elbowed in beside him at the bar. Within five minutes I’d put my proposition to him.

‘But we don’t look anything alike,’ he said supping his pint.

I was pleased that he hadn’t rejected the idea and I’d already thought about that. I knew that I was more Elvis to his Abbot Costello, but they didn’t notice those kind of things in Surfield . All he had to do was sign the visiting book as Tony Watson and report to the Matron and do a couple of hours Community Service whilst he was there. I’d only ever visited once for about five minutes. My sisters were down in England and they’d be none the wiser.

I was feeling a bit flushed. ‘Just say you’re me… and I’ll give you a tenner an hour for every visit’ I bought Tommy a pint of Stella, we shook hands and he signed up. ‘What’s the worst thing that can happen?’ I asked.

The first week I paid Tommy Whinn £50.

The second week it was £120. ‘What are you doing, living there?’ I asked him. But I thought it would look good, for me, when my sisters came up the road to visit.

The third week it was £190. ‘You’r getting paid more than the Surfield care staff,’ I shouted at Tommy and knocking over my bottle of Whitbread.

All he could sheepishly offer was to buy me a pint with my money and say that they let him have lunch with his mum and there was Bingo now. I felt like bingoing him.

I decided that drastic action was needed. I called in sick on Monday and decided to visit my mum. I rung the bell. It was one of those modern ones, set to play the ringtones of ‘In the groove,’ as if every day was a 1920’s party. The residents zimmered up to the reinforced glass door, as if they were gold fish and I’d dropped some feed into their tank. I didn’t want to excite them too much by ringing the bell again. I hadn’t thought about what would happen if the same nurse was on duty, but with the kind of luck I’d been having that’s what happened. She came to answer the door. I almost didn’t recognise her because she was carrying a smile, as if somebody had said something nice to her and the anaesthetic of working in Surfield hadn’t Botoxed her face enough.

‘Yes?’ she said, holding the door open.

I was sure that she would have known who I was. I’d already put together some kind of elaborate explanation, in my head, about why I was there, but I might well have been a lamppost, as she’d no idea who I was. ‘I’m here to see Mrs Watson,’ I said. I was quite enjoying myself. If I’d been wearing a cape I’d have held it up over my face, so that only my eyes showed, like Zorro.

‘Right,’ she said.

She blocked the door so effectively I had to squeeze past her. The same old woman that had been on my arm the last time I had been at Surfield hooked me right away, ‘George, how delightful,’ she said.

The visiting book was an impressive black leather volume, which sat in a dimly lit alcove, like the book of the dead. An orange plastic Bic pen was chained to wall, presumably in case any of the residents ate it. ‘Anthony Watson’ had signed in first thing that morning at 9am. I didn’t like him taking liberties with my name. I liked to be called Tony. As I flicked through the last couple of weeks it was easy to spot a pattern. Invariably he would be the first visitor to arrive and last to leave. Sometime he was the only visitor. I didn’t like being taken for a mug. Nobody could stay in an old folk’s home for that long without being simple minded. He was cheating, signing in and leaving and saying he’s spent x amount of hours here. I’d done it myself. I scrawled ‘Tommy Whinn’ on the visitor’s book. The nurse had left me to find my own way, which suited me just fine. There were two lounges in Surfield. My mum was usually decamped in the second one, furthest away from the door.

Anthony Watson was sitting beside mum, leaning into her, clutching her hand as if he was going to read her palm. The nurse was standing beside them listening and roaring with laughter. Mum looked thinner, somehow younger, as if someone had done something with her hair. She looked round to meet my gaze. There was something in her eyes. And I was sure that was it. The game was up and I’d need to explain how it had all been an old fashioned ruse. I stepped forward; mum looked away. She had a lipstick sparkler of a smile, but not for me.

‘You’ve got another visitor,’ said the nurse in the kind of long drawn out language that was used for five year olds. ‘And what’s your name dear?’ The nurse had taken to talking like my mum, adding a dear to every name like sugar to a cup of tea.

I was sure my face went white, but nobody seemed to notice. ‘Tommy Whinn,’ I said through clenched teeth.

‘Sit here.’ Anthony jumped from his seat. ‘I’ve got a few things to do. Get odds and ends out of the shops for some of the old dears. You know what these old buddies are like’

He looked at me and I shook my head, as if to say, how do I know.

‘They complain if you get them the wrong paper! And some of them like a little ciggie. And a little…’ he winked at me and mimicked cupping a drink, with his hand up his mouth, and throat glugging effects, so that his specs almost fell off his nose.

‘He’s such a little devil,’ said the nurse and for a moment I was sure she was going to pinch his chubby little cheeks.

I nodded my head and tried to smile, slapping Anthony twice on the shoulder, as he passed, perhaps more firmly than I should have. He stopped his beady little eyes peering at me quizzically.

I grabbed at his elbow and whispered in his ear like a lover, ‘I don’t pay you to enjoy yourself.’

He nodded once. But I knew it was one of those sanctimonious I may not agree with what you are saying, but I fully empathise with your right to say it bullshit they taught in counselling school. I nipped at his elbow as he tried to move away. ‘And I don’t pay you to run errands for blathering idiots.’

The last one hit home. He still wore the same asinine smile, but I felt his body jerking away from me.

‘I’ve got to go,’ he said, lifting one finger and dancing away from me like a bear as the tune from the front door bell played out.

When the nurse went to the front door I sprinted and caught up with Anthony in the hallway. He was still taking order for the shop, with a little bookies pen and a little notebook, like a boy scout. ‘What am I meant to do when you’re away?’ I asked him.

He considered the question before replying, ‘visit your mum’.

‘And what am I suppose to talk to her about?’ I asked.