Furniture
All their married life Mo had complained about her taste. Being a cabby, he picked up the latest trends. She’d bowed to him on decorations but she’d been firm about the furniture.
A second-hand table saved my life in 1945. They’d had an indoor shelter—steel sheeting and wire screens around your ordinary table. She felt so safe sleeping under it. Then the V2 hit Bacon Street. Mum at the pictures. Dad catching a few hours upstairs. The ARP dug her out. Bruised, stiff and wheezing, but unhurt. Just this permanent allergy to dust. She could feel her skin coming up now. The Mirror had called her “The Miracle Girl.” There’d been quite a few miracles in 1945.
She loved to see the sun come up over St Paul’s. If she had a wish it would be to enjoy one more London sunrise without all these new buildings in the way.
Mo had insisted on buying their flat. He’d seen ahead. You could ask any price you liked for a ground floor since the boom. Business people wanting somewhere near the City. Not much of the flat left now! Just the table, the chair and her. The basics.
She was surprised by her own spontaneous laughter. She was almost relieved. She spoke aloud, into the settling dust.
“I could do with a cup of tea.”
Still, then she’d need to go to the toilet. So it was probably for the best. She wondered what the time was. She’d find out soon from the wireless. When she knew they were searching for her, she’d turned it off to save the battery. These new headphones were so good she hadn’t heard the loudspeakers outside. What a fool! Everyone safe but her. Even the cat. People thought she’d left in the first evacuation. Mistaken her for the other Mrs Corren. Ticked her off the residents’ list. The other Mrs Corren wouldn’t have said anything.
They’d double-checked. But even if you stuck your head round the door you couldn’t see a person sitting in this big chair. So while everybody else responded to the bomb warning, she’d been in a world of her own, looking out of her window at the grey drizzle, the slow, reflective concrete, listening to her tape. Velia, O, Velia, the witch of the wood… Looking forward to Mo bringing in their usual Friday fish and chips.
According to the news, it had been a huge explosion centred on the bank next door. As warned, it had gone off at exactly eight p.m. She must have blacked out when it happened.
Terrible devastation. All the surrounding office blocks affected. The wireless had said Mo was on his way home when he heard the news. He usually rang her on his mobile. A real worrier, Mo. She felt so sorry for him. He hadn’t had her happy childhood.
Her mum had just been glad she was alive. Aunties all over the place. So much space. So much freedom. Ruins to play in. A vast adventure playground. And something more: That rediscovery of a wise, safe, dreaming, dignified, permanent London only made visible again by Hitler’s bombs.
A high price to pay, though.
She remembered when she’d run barefoot over grass, through the rosebay willowherb and dandelions and cow parsley down to St Paul’s. Good old St Paul’s. Thanks to the bombs you had a clear view across the city. Ludgate Circus. The Old Bailey. The way it had been centuries ago. The Tower. The Mint. Not much in the way of tourists, then. She’d known so many people. She’d loved it, running everywhere she wanted to go, cycling over footpaths trodden down to Smithfield, the river, the Customs House, Billingsgate. Wild flowers blooming. All the markets doing noisy business. In the evening, when the office workers had gone to their stations, you could sit on a ruined roof and watch the sun set over great stretches of river. Timeless security in the heart of the city.
