Filia

Manda’s Teams calls with her manager were always painfully pleasant. Nuala was steely yet sweet tempered. She usually had Manda’s back. Nuala wore her blonde hair blowdried into a fierce mane about her gaunt tanned features. It tickled the shoulders of her satin Coast blouses. A fine example of a common breed of senior public sector woman.

‘How are you fixed to attend an in-person in Kent on the 20^th?’

‘I’m sure I could manage it,’ Manda attempted a smile.

Her heart already hurried at the prospect of asking Stu to do the school run and tea that day. And how she would leave the girls for the first time. She’d have to prep veggies for him to put down. It was unlikely he’d clear up any poo.

‘You’re a star Amanda. The regional research collab are hosting a health inequalities session. We need Sussex input. I would go but it clashes with my yoga retreat…’

Manda smiled obligingly into the screen. She hated 1:1 calls for the sheer size of the faces on display.

‘You’re so familiar with the data…’ Nuala continued.

Manda had collated it all, thematic analysis to boot.

‘Is a presentation needed?’ Manda had precious little time to develop any slides.

‘No, just a morning workshop session to kick the tyres on the regional offer. I’ll forward the agenda.’

‘Thanks, can Sarah sort a train ticket?’ Manda asked. At that time of the month she’d struggle to stump up the fare to claim back.

Nuala seemed surprised, ‘Yes. Follow up with her.’

‘Thanks.’ Manda knew Nuala would never have to fret over such expenditure. Her house was all paid off. She was sitting things out until retirement. Optimising her pension.

‘It’s a great opportunity to touch base with Kent and Surrey. Align priorities.’

‘Indeed, look forward to it.’ Manda hoped the venue would be straightforward to get to and provide nice nibbles.

Only later, with the girls on her lap having an evening snuggle did Manda realise the opportunity presenting itself. The event was in Tunbridge Wells. She could slip away by 1pm. Pulling up a familiar website Manda consulted the calendar of events. Nothing of major importance going on that day. Still a chance to check out Selina’s stomping ground though. Manda settled on the notion of stopping off at a pleasant looking church in Tonbridge on her way back towards London – all manageable with her return ticket.

‘So where are ya getting these things?’ Manda’s mother enquired of her guinea pig plans.

‘A rehoming charity. Chichester.’

‘Chichester?’ Her mother was still gaining her bearings since relocating to Worthing.

‘Small cathedral city. We should have a ride out one day.’

The girls had some chewy yellow sweets. Chick-shaped. They clucked about munching them, enjoying the space the flat offered them. Space had been lacking in their Nan’s previous home, to which she’d downsized after Derek died. It’d been bold to make the move at 76 from paid-up bungalow to leasehold flat in a communal block – spending much of her three pension pots on service charges and ground rent to be an in-person grandmother and allay Manda’s concern over her future care. She’d got herself a nice clean place where she could pad about nicely in her dressing gown while she did her dusting and cushion plumping. Manda would have to deal with selling it one day. Cover the monthly charges from the eventual sale. There were ten empty flats in the block – none of them shifting due to short leases.

‘Can we get a chick Mummy?’ blurted Smallest.

Manda shook her head.

Cue her mother enlightening the girls about her own girlhood in Brum, telling them of a rag ‘n’ bone man that visited regularly by horse and cart.

‘Was the horse in the cart?’ asked Biggest who was nine and quick to worry.

‘Was he a skeleton?’ added Smallest who was seven and quick to examine.

‘No! No…’ their Nan went on to describe how he offered little chicks or goldfish in bags in exchange for unwanted tat.

‘A chick in a bag?’ Smallest widened her eyes.

‘No the fish – in water – like at the fair,’ her Nan said.

‘They don’t do that anymore mother.’ Manda rarely missed an opportunity to correct her.

‘Awful really, chicks taken from their Mom.’ The old woman went on wistfully. Her accent turned wholesale Brummie whenever she spoke of her distant past. ‘Our Jack got told off by Our Dad for choosing a fish once. He’d wanted a chicken to lay eggs or roast!’

She continued her walk down memory lane. ‘You know, Our Paul used to keep little white mice. Buried them in the bit of green scruff in the yard. Made crosses from lolly sticks. Millicent One, Millicent Two… Must’ve been twenty-odd! Used to see the crosses when you went out to the bog.’

‘We’re from a long line of pet owners then!’ said Manda.

Her mother’s eyebrows lifted. ‘Paul was lonely see…’

Manda had often heard how Paul was the only one from his school to get into the grammar, with an hour’s walk each way and expensive uniform.

‘Our Mom was paying off his uniform all year you know.’

‘I’m paying off their bloody uniform all year too,’ Manda motioned to the girls hanging upside down off the sofa, chicks gripped between their teeth.

Her mother was on a roll now. ‘After they moved to Daventry, Jack worked in a pet shop. Took stuff from the shop instead of wages sometimes. Got a big fish tank. All the bits. Then two tropical fish. One day he got home and they were boiling! Faulty thermostat overheated – they were floating on the top. Bubbling away.’

‘Ugh!’ This disturbed both girls enough for them to issue joint horror, before bounding off to the bedroom to bounce on their Nan’s bed.

‘Did Grandad want to roast them as well?’ said Manda.

‘Jack joined the Navy after that,’ her mother remembered.

‘Didn’t last long, eh?’

‘Not sure he even got to sea. Made his way with his business though. Clever sod.’

‘Up to his eyeballs in debt mind,’ said Manda, ‘With no retirement plan.’

‘Yeah he’s still working. They’re getting to keep the house now though.’

‘So you’ve never been near a guinea pig then Mum?’

‘No I bloody haven’t. Are they like rats?’

‘More like big hamsters. Less likely to bite. According to Mumsnet.’

‘You had a hamster didn’t ya?’ Her mother seemed proud.

‘For a week!’

‘Longer than that.’

‘Not much.’ Manda bristled. ‘I’m using the girls’ Christmas monies…’

‘Well, they’ve been on at you for a pet.’

‘He was so out of order.’

‘Your Dad said he was giving it to Nige to see if theirs was female. He was gonna bring it back.’ Her mother was indignant. Would never admit she was complicit with her father’s cruelty.

‘Didn’t though did he? How d’ya do that to a kid?’

‘Well he did worse.’

They both sat quietly until Manda’s mother thought how to change the subject.

‘I liked Nige and Lynn. Had that Scottie dog. You liked walking him when we all went to Yarmouth. Nice girls Emma and Selina,’ she stretched the names purposefully, impressed at her own recall. ‘Not sure what happened to them after they moved. We visited them once though.’

‘Yeah I remember, Selina was out bellringing,’ Manda said.

That night Manda left her daughters drifting towards sleep – Smallest with a book, Biggest writing her diary. She showered to scald the day away. Recalling the Yarmouth holiday she placed the dog plus the smell of vinegary cockles and the grit of sand between her teeth as she sampled them. She’d been seven. Selina about nine.

After making some tea she set about scrolling her various social media feeds. Firmly in receive mode. Selina remained in her thoughts. Forever urchin-like with shaggy pageboy hair. A bit gangly-legged with angular features and an earnest manner, looking nothing like her dolled-up short-arse mother. More like her Dad, moustachioed Nige.

The Bakers lived directly opposite across the back – both houses sitting mid-terrace in the parallel rows of The Trent. Manda mused on how the Midlands estate had its streets named after rivers. She didn’t realise back then they would lead her to the sea. The sole occasion Manda had ‘played’ at Selina’s house they hadn’t done much – just pulled a toy with the dog and swung at a Swingball. An image stood out of Selina in the kitchen with a piece of cheese. She’d showed Manda how to chop it into little cubes before cupping them into her palm.

‘I’m a little mouse, look’, she said nibbling at it. Not offering any to share.

Manda wondered how many years Selina had enjoyed her hamster.

Manda couldn’t find any feasible Selina Baker on Facebook or LinkedIn. She googled her, adding Leicester and church – for that was where bellringers hung out. And there she was. Manda downed her warm tea impressed at her sleuthing skills.

There she was. Wiltshire local news articles celebrating the Reverend Baker. Diocese pages wishing her a warm farewell as she moved to Kent to be installed as Archdeacon. Good lord! The accompanying pictures showed a woman at odds with the waif-like cheese-eater. One who appeared to have enjoyed plenty of cheese. Manda studied her hefty frame curiously, searching for the girl she’d known. She was there – in the open eyes and easy grin – yet Manda would never have recognised her if their paths had crossed. The pageboy cut was more a grey tuft. In some pictures she wore cape-like robes, plump cheeks pink and proud, with large round specs resting on them.

YouTube revealed Selina’s voice – in lockdown addresses to her flock. Soft Midlands tones sharing what it means to live out the gospel in our own lives and know the transforming love of God. Manda was captivated. The Venerable Selina in her dog collar and brown cardi speaking from a place where people are not just accepted as themselves, but positively embraced.

That night Manda dreamt of her hamster. Cradling him to her chest in the kitchen diner her parents had done out with new units and fancy tiles. The same year they’d made it to Majorca and Benidorm in the same summer hols. Her father was telling her the hamster had been stuck under her bed all along and laughing madly.

Next time Manda visited her mother she was quick to share. ‘You know you were on about the Bakers. Found out Selina became a vicar.’

‘You what? Bloody hell. She always was a bit… different, eh?’

‘Dunno. She’s quite senior.’ Manda straightened herself, sitting higher in the sticky leather armchair.

‘Well, each to their own.’ Her mother’s stock phrase when passing tacit judgement.

‘Nice work if you can get it – they get a nice house out of it…’

‘Not so silly girl then…’

‘Not silly at all,’ Manda said, swallowing her annoyance to feed on later. ‘Nice to have a vocation. She must’ve studied theology – interesting, even if you don’t believe.’

‘Ain’t that what you did?’

‘No Mum, Philosophy.’

‘Oh. Well you’ve got a job for life in the NHS ain’t ya?’

‘Hardly, this is my first ever permanent contract. And we’re restructuring again. Bloody change of government.’ Manda knew her mother had no idea what her job entailed. She climbed further on her high horse. ‘Anyway, a vocation is more than having a secure job. You spent decades wiping old people’s bums – was that your vocation?’

‘It suited me doing nights. And you. And I liked them little cleaning jobs I had in the day. The headmistress and accountant. Lovely houses they had.’

‘To think you were gonna go to art school.’

‘It weren’t for me. That teacher left anyway…’

‘You could’ve still tried.’

‘It wasn’t what you did. When you left secondary modern you had to pay your way. I was on a nice little wage at Woolworths. Helped Our Mom. She’d just had Jack.’

Manda had taken her mother to Shoreham when Biggest was small. Long before she’d persuaded her to up sticks and join her down South. Before lockdown when her mother happily got on the National Express every few months, bringing countless knitted garments. Keeping her hands busy had always been her way.

Manda had led the way with the pushchair down the strip of infamous mud-moored Shoreham houseboats, enthusing about the eccentric design and cheap living. Pointing to a couple of For Sale signs and their affordability.

‘Where do they have their wheelie bins?’ was all her mother could offer in disgust. It weren’t for her.

In the evenings Manda scoured her phone for insight into guinea pig keeping, amassing a few shopping carts of stuff to cater for her forthcoming floofs. The girls’ Christmas money needed adding to. Clearpay came in handy. Soon she was expert on Cavy welfare, excited knowing that tunnels, fleece liners and cage panels were on their way. School run conversation centred around choosing names for the one-year old pigs they were due to collect once it was all received and in place. They’d settled on Destiny and Dawn. The roundest brownest pig would be Destiny. Her leaner pale pal, Dawn.

One Sunday evening after the girls were stowed in bed and uniforms and lunch boxes seen to, Manda set about assembling the cage. The girls’ dad Stu had shown his face that afternoon. He’d been messing about in the garage with some wood. Stu came through the house as she was connecting grids and clear panels with plastic corner pieces using Krypton Factor effort.

‘How much did that all cost ya?’ he asked.

‘Not much,’ she lied. More than you give me a month, she realised.

‘Big ain’t it?’

‘Big enough.’ The rehoming charity insisted on photo evidence of sufficient square-footage.

The cage was being installed inside on account of Manda’s fear of fox attacks. Plus, the very real possibility of her forgetting its existence if left out of sight. She’d resigned herself to having a farmyard smell about. The psychologist running her Managing Emotions group reckoned pet smells made a home, which pleased her.

‘Landlord got back to ya then?’

‘Yeah, in the end. Was in China.’

‘Good for him. Tosser. If you leave that I’ll put it up on Saturday.’

‘No!’ Manda was clear. ‘I’m quite capable. Gonna do it now while they’re in bed.’

As Stu left for the sanctuary of his seafront bedsit she hissed to herself, ‘This is mine. No one is gonna take it away from me’. And they didn’t.

Once the pigs arrived no one wanted much part in the glorious rituals she developed. That which saw her waking earlier than ever in the manner others rise for a workout. Coming downstairs to relentless hungry panic. She ministered to their mewling gratefully. Slicing Cavelo Nero, cucumber and round lettuce. Exchanging their water. Retrieving poo. Replenishing hay. Occasionally changing fleece liners and washing them in white vinegar enclosed in a zip bag to protect her machine from the hay.

Manda owned Destiny and Dawn with every poo she collected. And they had busy arses. At first she wore protective gloves but soon realised their emissions were harmless. Quite pleasant in fact. Plant-based products of her labour. It became therapeutic heaping them in her hand amid the breakfast routine that threatened to break her daily. The poo was pretty uniform. Its consistency delighted her. As did the feel of the dry pellets shaking about her palm. Nescafe coffee at its best.

The girls would flinch as Manda reached her hands into the cage but soon became accustomed to her role in upending and correcting their world. Making good. Exerting control.

Manda’s grip on things was diminishing fast when it came to the children she shepherded out the door on the school run each day with exasperated threats. The world was starting to have its way with them. She could no longer hide the worst of it. The headlines of murder and rape. War on Newsround. Porn on the curriculum. She was still slicing their grapes in half yet having to explain what a scrotum was. Coming to terms with their exposure to the world was the perennial challenge. As was their obstinance and continual noise.

In the evening, or between Teams meetings, Manda would catch Destiny and Dawn in turn and hold them to her chest, inhaling their fur like she once did human scalps. An antidote to the day’s madness, especially if any shit had gone down with Stu.

Manda and Stu had crewed along quite happily until the children became their rogue captain. She responded to their steer while he threw his slop bucket around. It proved easier to travel solo. Easier escaping the digs about who got the most sleep or was best positioned for school pick-up. They’d never had a fighting chance. But always chance of a fight. Even now every interaction threatened to become an incident – their nervous systems recognising each other as the children from two ends of the same estate they’d shifted themselves from.

Their daughters were learning thick and fast. Being by the sea suited them. Manda conserved every picture and scrawl they produced – in case they should die. Or wished to audit their lives one day. In the same spirit she kept a lot of her own paraphernalia. She envied those capable of Swedish death cleaning their way to clear the decks.

Manda was burdened with a scale of exhaustion and disquiet that couldn’t be subdued by ten-a-day, a soaky bath or mini break. She’d tried vagus nerve exercises but they proved incapable of addressing the structural inequalities of her foundations.

How long can you continue cracking until you are no more? Manda had separated into multitudes that witnessed each other with regret, in shameful nostalgia of what might’ve been. Seeing the child inside Selina’s portly frame had set her mind on the child in her and the women her daughters would be.

Come the day of the Kent trip Manda prepped all she could at the crack of dawn to ensure a smooth day and well-fed girls.

‘Have a nice time,’ Stu said as she reminded about water bottles, Forest School wellies and pick-up times. ‘We’ll be fine.’

Having him about the house was uncomfortable. ‘It’s a nearly three-hour bastard journey there,’ she snapped. ‘Hardly a jolly.’

She stroked the girls’ soft necks muttering, ‘Be back soon lovelies.’

Biggest and Smallest stopped their arguing briefly to hang off her in a display only ever seen when she was off out into the world by herself. She pecked them both on the top of the head sharply, disentangling herself and making for her train.

Manda thoroughly enjoyed her nearly three-hour bastard journey, finding respite in her earphones with a noughties playlist from when things still felt vital.

The event was much as Manda expected. A fair bit of time spent munching – the Mercure delivered churros, miniature pastries and yogurt topped muesli. Her required contribution was blessingly brief. She passed most of the session ‘actively listening’ and taking pointless notes before making her apologies for lunch.

‘It’s quite the trek on the train, isn’t it,’ said Pam, the Nuala-level host who was scarily taller than her online impression.

‘It is,’ Manda agreed, ‘I look forward to progressing the outputs of the session.’

‘Lovely to see you Amanda. Nice to be face-to-face for once, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes!’ Manda lied, before spinning off purposefully towards the exit. She’d pocketed some biscuit packets to keep her going. The others were welcome to their taxpayer-funded buffet and collaborative drivel.

It felt good to be out and about. Nowhere special but somewhere unknown. Once in Tonbridge Manda soon found the road leading to the church – one of many Selina oversaw. She felt some affinity with the place having watched a video of Selina performing right outside – a spiel about sustainability and social justice. She was engaging in all her videos. Blessed with a slow clear eloquence that Manda remembered in Nige and knew in her Brummie family.

The church had been hosting a senior lunch club. As Manda approached, an A-board outside announced that tea, coffee and cakes were also on offer in the cafe for the next hour or so. It’d be rude not to.

The woman at the café counter looked marvellously old with hair held to each side by childish plastic slides, a warty chin and apron round her waist. ‘’Hello dear. What would you like?’ she asked.

‘Tea please. And one of those,’ Manda pointed to an innocuous looking piece of sugared shortbread within an uninspiring platter of sweet treats.

The woman poured the tea into a tiny cup and saucered it, with gleeful accommodation. Another elder appeared beside her looking Manda up and down from a stately height. Golden hair was lacquered into a neat bud about her head. She leant her cashmere covered torso towards Manda. ‘Hello, I don’t think we’ve met?’. Manda noticed mascara smudged onto both her age-full eyelids.

‘I’m not from here. I’m going to be moving nearby…’ Manda had always been an excellent liar.

‘How lovely, I’m Joan. Welcome in advance!’

‘£2.50 please,‘ the aproned one asked. ‘I’m Rosemary. We’re a nice lot, don’t bite!’

Manda passed her the coins and smiled, remembering the kindly women she knew during her tour of duty of toddler groups those years ago. ‘Pleased to meet you,’ she offered, not thinking to state her name.

Joan motioned to the hall next door. ‘Senior lunch club today – most of them don’t see a soul the rest of the week.’ Through glass doors Manda could make out lots of doddery folk seated at tables. A smell hung in the air like school dinners.

Joan went on, ‘It’s toddlers Tuesdays and Fridays, and women’s group on Thursday evening…’

‘Don’t forget Knit and Craft!’ Rosemary chipped in.

Manda nodded politely as she balanced her purchases. She knew too well the schedule of things from her web browsing. ‘Brilliant,’ she mustered, edging away to a small circular table. She busied herself in her phone deleting spam, feeding Instagram algorithms and wiping sugar from her chin. The shortbread hit the spot.

Manda’s two servers chatted as they started clearing away. They moved with efficiency and grace – the gears of the church operation.

‘I think they quite enjoyed meeting Selina,’ Joan said. ‘She’s always so interesting…’

‘Did you hear Ted ask her about her husband?’ Rosemary stage-whispered.

‘She handled that well,’ returned Joan. ‘Was Lillian here today?’

‘She’s coming to collect her,’ Rosemary confirmed. ‘I’ve put some cakes aside.’

Manda scraped stray sugar onto her plate, ears pricking at mention of Selina and her partner. She returned her crockery to the counter issuing a genuine, ‘Thanks so much.’

‘Lovely to meet you. Good luck with your move,’ the old ladies chimed as Manda closed the door on the place.

Outside Manda withdrew to the side of the building to ponder her next move. She replied to a message from Stu asking which entrance afterschool club was. She looked up to a familiar figure headed towards a bike rack next to her. Selina. In day-to-day dog collar and trousers. Carrying a sandwich bag of cakes and calf-eyed expression.

‘Hello,’ Selina said, collecting a folded cycle from the rack. ‘Lovely day isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ Manda managed. ‘Do you work here?’

‘I work all over Kent. I’ve been speaking to the lunch club today.’

‘June and Rosemary told me about that – sounds like a great initiative.’

‘Aren’t those two fab? Yes, the club keeps most of them going,’ Selina said.

Apropos of nothing Manda said, ‘My guinea pigs keep me going.’

Selina laughed. ‘I’ve got dogs – they keep me on an even keel. Get me moving… which is lucky as I get given lots of cake.’ She dangled the bag in front of her.

‘Seriously, that’s what keeps me going…’ Manda said, ‘Knowing no one else would be there for them. I’m glad I didn’t get hamsters – they hide away too much. My pigs are always there waiting for me.’

Selina was clearly used to seeing people more deranged than Manda. ‘Let me tell you something,’ she invited. ‘When I was a kid I had a hamster that kept me going. I found out years later it’d died. A generous soul across the road gave us a replacement…’

Manda had never heard her father described that way before. With such loving kindness.

Selina continued, ever the orator. ‘We moved away soon after and I found the church. Gained access to the abundance of God’s blessing.’

Manda’s cheeks had grown red processing her own awkwardness. ‘That’s lovely. Sorry for oversharing!’

Selina smiled. ‘Animals are so important, especially if you’re child-free like me!’

‘I do have kids though! Two girls.’ They were walking towards the roadside now. A little Ka was pulling in. Selina waved to the woman behind the wheel.

‘I’m sure they’re glad their Mum has those pigs keeping her going. What are their names?’

‘Stella and Nina’.

As she spoke their names, removed from the challenge of the daily grind they orchestrated, she felt uncommon pride. Missed them. Found them fully in her mind’s eye. As fully as she found herself now before Selina.

‘Cool names. And yours?’ Selina had opened the boot and was placing the bike inside.

‘I’m Mandy.’

‘Nice chatting Mandy, hope to see you again.’ With that Selina got in beside Lillian, cake first.

By Claire Robinson