The Last Letter from Your Lover

suitcase.
    Anxiety rose, like a tide, within her, and the traffic sloshed past, sending great sprays across the legs of the unwary.
    It was when she saw the man in the red shirt that she thought of it. She began to run, pushing past the people who blocked her way, for once uncaring of the impression she made. She ran along the familiar streets until she found the one she was looking for. She parked her suitcase at the top of the stairs and ran down, hair flying, into the darkened club.
    Felipe was standing at the bar, polishing glasses. Nobody else was there other than Sherrie, the cloakroom girl. The bar felt petrified in an overwhelming air of stillness, despite the low music in the background.
    ‘He’s not here, lady.’ Felipe didn’t even look up.
    ‘I know.’ She was so breathless she could barely speak. ‘But this is terribly important. Do you have a car?’
    The look he gave her was not friendly. ‘I might.’
    ‘Could you possibly give me a lift to the station? To Paddington?’
    ‘You want me to give you a lift?’ He took in her wet clothes, the hair plastered to her head.
    ‘Yes. Yes! I only have fifteen minutes. Please.’
    He studied her. She noticed a large, half-empty glass of Scotch in front of him.
    ‘Please! I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t terribly important.’ She leant forward. ‘It’s to meet Tony. Look, I have money—’ She rummaged in her pocket for the notes. They came out damp.
    He reached behind him through a door and pulled out a set of keys. ‘I don’t want your money.’
    ‘Thank you, oh, thank you,’ she said breathlessly. ‘Hurry. We have less than fifteen minutes.’
    His car was a short walk away, and by the time they reached it he, too, was soaked. He didn’t open the door for her, and she wrenched at it, hurling her dripping case with a grunt on to the back seat. ‘Please! Go!’ she said, wiping wet fronds of hair from her face, but he was motionless in the driver’s seat, apparently thinking. Oh, God, please don’t be drunk, she told him silently. Please don’t tell me now that you can’t drive, that your car’s out of petrol, that you’ve changed your mind. ‘Please. There’s so little time.’ She tried to keep the anguish from her voice.
    ‘Mrs Stirling? Before I drive you?’
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘I need to know . . . Tony, he is a good man, but . . .’
    ‘I know he was married. I know about his son. I know about it all,’ she said impatiently.
    ‘He is more fragile than he lets on.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Don’t break his heart. I have never seen him like this with a woman. If you are not sure, if you think there is even a chance you might go back to your husband, please don’t do this.’
    The rain beat down on the roof of the little car. She reached out a hand, placed it on his arm. ‘I’m not . . . I’m not who you think I am. Really.’
    He looked sideways at her.
    ‘I – just want to be with him. I’m giving it all up for him. It’s just him. It’s Anthony,’ she said, and the words made her want to laugh with fear and anxiety. ‘Now go! Please!’
    ‘Okay,’ he said, wrenching the car around so that the tyres squealed. ‘Where to?’ He pointed the car towards Euston Road, bashing the button in an attempt to make the windscreen wipers work. She thought distantly of Mrs Cordoza’s windows, washed until they shone, then pulled the letter from the envelope.
    My dearest and only love. I meant what I said. I have come to the conclusion that the only way forward is for one of us to take a bold decision . . .
    I am going to take the job. I’ll be at Platform 4, Paddington, at 7.15 on Friday evening . . .
    ‘Platform four,’ she yelled. ‘We have eleven minutes. Do you think we’ll—’

Part 2

NOT WANTED DON’T COME
    Male to Female, war bride, via telegram

12
    Summer , 1964
    The nurse moved slowly down the ward, pushing a trolley on which sat neat rows of paper cups containing brightly coloured pills. The woman in bed 16c muttered, ‘Oh, God, not more . . .’
    ‘Not going to make a fuss, are we?’ The nurse placed a beaker of water on the bedside table.
    ‘If I have any more of those things I’ll start to rattle.’
    ‘Yes, but we’ve got to get that blood pressure down now, haven’t we?’
    ‘Do we ? I hadn’t realised it was catching . . .’
    Jennifer, perched on the chair beside the bed, lifted the beaker and handed it to Yvonne Moncrieff, whose swollen middle rose, dome-like, bereath the