The Funny Thing about Norman Foreman, Julietta Henderson [best novels to read for students .TXT] 📗

right, Leonard, no more beating around the bush. What were you doing going off like that yesterday morning? Did you . . . I mean . . . well, I’m sorry, but I have to know. Are you on the run from the Wheeler Centre?’

I braced myself. Literally. I held on to both sides of the seat, fully expecting Leonard to veer off the road with the shock of being found out and head off Dukes of Hazzard style across an expanse of Scottish cow pasture. But the wheels stayed steady and he gave it to me with both barrels to the heart.

Leonard’s story was bit like walking into a movie for the ending without having seen all the best bits. And, of course, I’d got it all wrong. The first year into her ninth decade of life, it wasn’t him but Iris who had developed full-blown dementia. And after two years of soul-destroying decline, two months previously she’d virtually stopped recognizing him, except for a few lucid moments once or twice a week.

In measured tones that seemed to follow the shape of the road Leonard told me that even though he’d tried his best, he’d eventually found it impossible to manage Iris on his own. The early-morning cleaning job at Pearl’s had been a distraction to help him fill the hours when the carers came in, so he didn’t have to watch as strangers tended to the body he’d promised to protect and worship since he’d dropped to one youthful, unwrinkled knee and proposed to her some sixty-odd years before.

In recent months Iris had rarely left her bed, except to occasionally fling the covers and her nightie off without warning and stand at the window staring at some invisible point in the ocean. On those days Leonard would wrap his arms around her from behind, put his head on her shoulder and gently hold her to him. Most of the time she’d step away or arrange her frame into such a shape that her bones slipped through his fingers, but every now and then he’d feel her relax into the well-worn nook of his arms and, for a few precious moments, the girl with the hibiscus hair was back.

‘It’s all I live for, Sadie. Those rare little spaces in her mind that she’s saved just for us.’

His gnarly hands gripped the steering wheel tighter and as we came up to a bend in the road I found myself leaning into it with him.

‘Until I met you and Norman, that is.’

Hell’s bells, old-timer, way to break my heart.

After the latest of Iris’s all-too-frequent falls out of bed, which had resulted in a broken arm, Leonard had finally conceded defeat and accepted he could no longer keep her safe in their home. She’d been given a place at the Wheeler Centre and the doctors had advised him to refrain from visiting for the first few weeks to allow her to settle into a new routine.

‘So when you told me about Norman and his plan, well, it seemed like the perfect distraction. And oh, how marvellous it has been, my dear. But then . . . when we got to Edinburgh, I . . . I couldn’t sleep and . . . well, I just started thinking about how it was all nearly over and that I’d have to go back home soon. And . . . and Iris wouldn’t be there in her kitchen or her garden . . . not ever again. And I’ve spoken to the nurses in the centre regularly, of course, and they say she’s doing well, but . . . well, I must admit, my dear, the thought of . . . of . . . well, I just got myself a little upset over it all, if the truth be told.’

It seemed that window-seat bed had been just about as uncomfortable as it looked and, wide awake and worked up, rather than attempt the impossible task of trying to get back to sleep for a couple more hours, Leonard had come up with his own little early-morning plan.

‘I would never have wanted to worry you, Sadie, but I thought I’d be back before . . . I didn’t even take my coat. The thing is, I remembered . . . well, being in Scotland reminded me about the heather. Iris just loved it. She said it always brought her luck, ever since her grandfather used to send her a dried sprig in the post every year for her birthday as a little girl. She even had it in her wedding bouquet. So I thought . . . it grows wild everywhere here, and if maybe I could just go for a little drive until I found Iris some heather, I might . . . it might bring her some luck for the next stage of her journey. At the Wheeler Centre and . . . and all points beyond.’

We rounded a corner and a long straight section of road stretched out in front of us. Leonard glanced in the rear-view mirror, sat up a little straighter in his seat and put his foot down. A sudden gust of wind slipped through the half-open window and my hair whipped around my face. I closed my eyes and imagined Leonard driving along this road in the direction of the sun, surrounded by all that beauty as dawn and his heart broke. He cleared his throat and gave a small cough.

‘I know I’m just a silly old man, Sadie, but I just thought maybe it . . . well, one just never knows, does one?’

I realized, and not for the first time in my life, that I knew exactly nothing. But the flash of purple peeking from the crumpled, aromatic Tesco bag on the back seat of the Austin made me wonder if, quite possibly, that old guy might have known everything.

51

It was nearly 4.30 p.m. by the time Leonard and I swept into Edinburgh in the Austin. And yes, I said swept. All medication aside, I wasn’t kidding when I said Leonard drove well under pressure. I was almost sad when we got