Numbers don’t mean a lot to me. I don’t care about long division or percentages. I don’t know my height or my weight and I can’t remember my dad’s phone number, though I know I used to know it. I prefer words. Delicious, glorious words.
But there were two numbers in front of me that mattered, and would matter for the rest of my numbered days.
‘Between us,’ I said quietly, ‘we’re a hundred years old.’
Lenni Meets Her Peers
SEVERAL DAYS LATER, a slice of fruitcake appeared on my bedside table.
I’m not usually a fan of fruitcake. The way raisins burst in my mouth is exactly what I think it would be like to eat woodlice. The way they are firm at first but then you pierce them and the sweet liquid spurts out, and then you’re left with the skin-like casing.
But free cake is free cake.
I thought about Margot while I ate.
Between us, we have been alive for one hundred years. I suppose that’s quite an achievement.
I’d noticed during our art class at the exact same moment that New Nurse had blushed her way into the Rose Room, accidentally smashing her hip into one of the desks by the door. New Nurse had whispered that she’d found Father Arthur sitting alone in my cubicle. She said I wasn’t technically supposed to be in the Rose Room, and that technically if I didn’t return immediately, I might get in trouble. Which was sweet. For New Nurse, trouble is being shouted at by Jacky. Trouble isn’t the same thing when you’re wearing nightwear in the middle of the day and you’ve named the tube that burrows your dinner into your vein. That’s real trouble. And I’m already in it.
I followed her, though. Because it’s best to leave people wanting more. The trouble I got in was small. I listened intently to it and I promised Jacky I’d stop wandering around. Or wondering around. Nobody was specific about the spelling.
The curtain around my bed drew back just as I was flicking the last of the fruitcake crumbs from my bed.
‘Morning, Lenni,’ Paul the Porter greeted me with a smile. ‘Seen any more spiders recently?’
When I told him I hadn’t, he gestured at my bedside table. ‘They’re going to replace all of these bedside tables over the next few months because they don’t have enough weight in the base.’
I nodded because it was boring.
‘May I?’ he asked.
He pulled on the handle of the top drawer. He pulled harder and then shook it. The yellow silk roses from The Temp looked like they were doing a jitterbug dance. Finally, with both hands, he managed to open it, and as he did so out fluttered a piece of paper.
‘Love letter?’ he asked.
‘Inevitably,’ I told him. ‘I’ll just put it with the others.’
Paul picked it up and, failing to hide his opinion on his face, held it out to me.
Forgiveness: the Lord’s light was printed in swirling text over the top of a pixelated photo of a dove against a cloudy sky with a sunbeam poking through the clouds. Beneath it, the times of the chaplaincy services were printed, and beneath that, scribbled in blue fountain pen, it said:
Lenni, before you ask, I didn’t print this forgiveness pamphlet out specially for you, it’s just a coincidence. I’m always here if you need a chat.
Arthur
Even his email address was tragic: [email protected].
When I looked up, Paul smiled. If I were about ten years older, and could overlook his wonky tattoos, I think Paul the Porter and I would have made a great couple. Weird, but good. The kind of couple you meet and think, How did they get together? He shoved the drawer closed, made a note on his clipboard and sighed. ‘Take care, eh?’ he said, as though it were in any way under my control.
That afternoon, or several weeks later （who can really say?）， New Nurse came to get me for my first scheduled above-board and totally legit trip to the Rose Room. I was going to meet people my own age – people Pippa had previously described as my ‘peers’。 I didn’t actually know what that word meant, but in my mind they were a group of people higher up, more important, or cooler than me who would spend a lot of time peering down, from on high.
The Rose Room was almost empty when I came in and the sky outside the windows was the colour of nothing. Not grey, not quite white, just an indiscriminate thing hanging above us all.
‘Afternoon, everyone,’ Pippa said, sneaking me a smile as I sat down by myself at my usual table. ‘I’m Pippa and this is the Rose Room. The rules are pretty simple: spill something, please wipe it up, no diving, no horseplay. You can paint whatever you like, but I have some props that might inspire you, and sometimes we have themes. For example, this week’s theme is leaves.’ She held up a basket of brown leaves. ‘If you feel ill or need medical attention, please tell me, and … um … that’s about it?’ Pippa has the habit of making the end of every sentence sound like a question. It makes me feel the need to reassure her.