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‘Get your coat,’ Val’s voice demanded, and Maisie grabbed her belongings, taking one last look across the room. She saw the young Canadian back in the same place, his leg propped onto the rim of a chair as he stared at the roof.
Was he as lonely as her? Did he want more from life too?
Don’t be daft. He’s already crossed the world to be in another country. He’s busy fighting a war. What more could he ever want?
Maisie’s inner thoughts challenged her. She wanted to ignore Val and stay longer, to enjoy the evening as she’d imagined – and if she was to be honest with herself, she wanted to speak with the Canadian again. He intrigued her. He made her experience feelings she’d never felt in the past. His quiet, almost moody personality drew her into wanting to know more about him.
Go with Val and forget tonight. Forget the stranger. He’s not interested in you.
Charlie had long gone and she’d only Val and Edith for company and their squabbling irritated and embarrassed Maisie as she headed out of the door behind them.
They continued to bicker on the walk home. As grateful as she was for the overnight stay, once inside Val’s home she suddenly felt suffocated. The rooms were small and filled with photographs and bric-a-brac. Laundry was draped on a clotheshorse in front of the fire, steaming up a large mirror on the wall. The fresh laundry smell reminded her there would, without an ounce of doubt, be a pile of ironing waiting for her the following day. As she climbed the stairs in the small terraced house, she realised she’d spent the majority of her life inside a mansion. Turning the corner onto the landing, she had a flashback vision of doing much the same as a little girl. She stood still and let the memories flood her brain. Edith was yelling at her mother from inside one of the rooms, and it brought back memories of two other women shouting in much the same way. She recalled hearing loud screeching voices inside a small room. She remembered thuds when objects hit the adjoining wall and the deep voices of men bellowing at them to be quiet. A flashback of a hand slapping her face made Maisie shudder. Her earliest memory was crying due to hunger and the noise around her – and then a stinging slap across her face with instructions to keep her mouth shut. For a moment, Maisie screwed her eyes shut against Val’s voice berating Edith’s. She took breaths to control the shock of the memory until eventually, her breathing settled into a calm rhythm.
The small box room where she was to spend the night was crammed with knickknacks and spare bedding. Maisie undressed and snuggled under the red and gold paisley eiderdown, far more luxurious than the coarse blankets of the orphanage. Her mind drifted back to the welcome party and she wished Charlie had stayed longer, but she knew he’d rushed off to see Joyce when she finished work. Joyce’s job was somewhere in the city outskirts and something so secret to the war effort that she was not allowed to speak about it. Although curious, Maisie and Charlie knew not to pressure her into telling them. Both Joyce and Charlie worked hard and deserved fun in their lives. She loved seeing him smile. He was a popular lad amongst the ARP team and Maisie felt fortunate to have him in her life.
She thought again of the young serviceman wanting to be alone. He and Charlie were two different young men possibly wanting different things, but the war had interfered with both their lives. Maisie drifted off to sleep knowing that she wanted a different life from the one she had, and soon the opportunity to find it would present itself. She curled under her covers but the strangeness of the room held her back from falling asleep. For so many years she’d shared a room with many others and always under the roof of the orphanage. To tempt sleep her way she tried making up names for the young Canadian she’d spoken with at the dance. It amused her to think he’d made such an impression when all he’d done was ignore her attempts to befriend him. Perhaps she was too young for him, or her hair colour and style were off-putting; perhaps she had come across as pushy. She pondered these and many other scenarios as to why he hadn’t considered her worthy enough to talk to, and, if Val hadn’t interrupted his apology, whether he and Maisie might have made it to the dancefloor.
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