Another tap at the door. Cher raises her head, then drops it back on the pillow as though the effort is just too much. ‘Who is it?’ calls Vesta.
‘Collette.’
Vesta is relieved. She’s been on watch since eight this morning, and her back and hips are aching from sitting in the battered chair. She limps over to the door and lets her in.
‘All right?’
‘Yes,’ says Vesta, and turns to look over her shoulder. ‘Aren’t we, love?’ she asks, encouragingly.
Cher doesn’t reply; just lies on her side and stares at the bedside table.
‘She’s just had her pills,’ she tells Collette. ‘And she’s had a little sleep. Hopefully she’ll drop off again soon.’
‘And how does she seem?’
‘In a lot of pain. But I think it’s okay. I don’t think anything’s broken. Not badly, anyway.’
Apart from her skin, and her heart, and her spirit, she thinks. But all those things can mend. Scars, yes, but they’ll mend, if she lets them.
Collette advances into the room. She’s got a bunch of flowers – carnations, cheap things that Vesta associates with graveyards – and a bag of tins and packets. ‘Soup,’ she says. ‘I thought soup would be good. And I got some bread. And some grapes. You should eat something, Cher.’
‘Not hungry,’ says Cher.
‘Well, maybe later,’ she says. ‘I got Ribena, as well. Everyone likes Ribena, right?’
Cher looks up, her eyes full of tears again. ‘Yeah. I like Ribena.’
Collette grins. Gosh, she’s lovely when she smiles, thinks Vesta. All that pinchedness drops away and she’s just – pretty. She goes over to the sink and fills the pint glass. Puts the flowers in it and makes a show of trying to arrange them. ‘Hossein sent these,’ she says.
‘There, you see?’ says Vesta, trying to jolly the atmosphere up. ‘Isn’t that nice? Everyone’s done their best, haven’t they?’
‘Big whoop,’ says Cher, and closes her eye.
Vesta closes the door and lets her face drop. The strain of keeping up a good front, of projecting reassurance for all these hours, has drained her. That bloody man, she thinks. I’m going to have a rest for a couple of hours, but then I’m right round there. I can’t believe he’s got the gall. Utter bastard. I’m going to go round there and tell him. Just because they’ve done away with tenant rights doesn’t mean he can just bully people. I’ve had enough. Really, I’ve had enough.
She’s so stiff she has to hold on to the banisters all the way down the stairs, take them one at a time with her right foot first. She feels old today, and hates it when she’s forced to remember that nearly seventy is old. She has always taken such pride in staying young, in fighting all those generational attitudes when they’ve tried to creep up on her, and the thought that in the end it’s all inevitable fills her with dread. She wishes she’d remembered to neck one of Cher’s tramadol while she was up there, but there’s plenty of ibuprofen in the flat. A couple of those, a cup of tea and a lie-down, and I’ll be right round there, she thinks. I’ll bloody well tell him he can’t bully people.
The stink hits her the moment she opens the flat door. Like the rat – rotten and foetid and old – but far, far worse. It’s a thick, viscous smell, and it’s huge.
‘Oh, God,’ says Vesta. What now? Haven’t I had enough already? Really, today, over the last few weeks? Haven’t I?
She turns on the light and goes in, covering her face with the sleeve of her cardy. It’s sewage. She knows it is. It’s not hard to tell the smell of shit and fat and urine, even if it’s not a stench you smell every day.
The carpet is damp and sludgy beneath her feet. Vesta gags, and forges forward. It’s the drains. Those bloody drains she’s been asking him and asking him to sort out. Something has gone terribly wrong, and now it’s all over her kitchen.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
‘I told you. I told you! How many times have I asked you to sort it out? And now look!’
The Landlord sits up and puts on his specs.
‘Who is this?’
‘Don’t pretend you don’t know who this is. It’s Vesta Collins! And my bathroom’s all over shit! I told you that you needed to do something about those drains!’
‘Calm down, dear,’ he says, and hears a shriek of rage.
‘Don’t tell me to calm down! Don’t you dare tell me to calm down! And don’t bloody call me dear. I am not your dear.’
Someone’s set fire to her bra, he thinks. I’m taking that phone out of the hall, first chance I get. I’m not paying line rental to have her shout at me.