DANNY

By Jane Scoggins 

Danny sat at the end of the jetty in Burnham, his head in his hands, legs dangling over the water of the river Crouch. He was trying not to cry. He could hear boys calling to one another, further back on the jetty, as they baited their crabbing lines with bread and bacon fat. The sun shone warm on his back but he felt cold inside. His mum was dying and his whole world was a blur. How could this have happened, how could God be so cruel?  Mum was Mum and Danny loved her with all his heart. His ten years on earth had not prepared him for this. Two weeks ago everything had been fine; well, not exactly fine, but not terrible and out of control like it was now. If only he was not an only child. If only he had an older brother that he could talk to, who would look out for him so that he didn’t have to bear this burden alone. If only he had someone to turn to. But there was no one.

Gran had died last year and he had hated everything about the horrible months before that day in June. Gran had been a happy person. Mum said she was 'happy go lucky’ and Danny thought that suited her just right. She liked dangly earrings and jangling bracelets. She wore make-up even when she wasn’t going out to work or shopping. She even wore makeup when she was doing the chores on a Saturday morning, like mopping the kitchen floor and emptying the cat litter tray. Gran said it gave her a happy face and that’s what people liked to see. When she came home from work she would kick off her high heeled shoes and put her stockinged feet up on the pouffe. She wore fluffy slippers in the house and this almost reduced her down to Danny’s height. He supposed that was why she liked to wear high heels. Gran wasn’t a bit like mum, who was tall and slim and mostly wore skinny jeans and T-shirts. The only-make up she wore was that black mascara stuff on her eyelashes that made her big brown eyes look even bigger. Mum never wore high heels. Danny thought she was beautiful. Gran too, in her own, painted up way, but also because of her smile and her loud laugh that made you want to laugh too. But that had all stopped when she became ill with cancer. Mum and Dad had told him that Gran wanted him to know about it so that he would understand and because she wanted him to keep on going to visit her and not treat her like an invalid. This was even when her hair fell out and she was just left with wispy tufts, and later, when she turned a nasty grey colour, that no amount of make-up could hide. Gran shrank quickly into a frail old lady whom Danny could hardly recognise. It frightened him. Then one day she was gone. He cried for her, alone in his bedroom, surrounded by his beloved West Ham posters of smiling footballers, and, sometimes, when he lay face down on his favourite Hammers pillowcase. He had cried for her with his mum, as they sat on the settee watching children’s television. He had cried for her with mum and dad when they sat holding hands together in the crematorium chapel.

Now he would have to do it all again, only this time for his mum, whom he loved more than anyone in the world, even more, than he loved his dad, probably the best dad in the world.

Mum had not really recovered from Gran dying. She had lost her sparkle and her big, soft, brown eyes were less smiley than he remembered through his growing up. The changes in her had been slow, so he had not noticed that she had slipped from sadness to illness. All he knew was that these days she was often lying down when he came home from school. His noisy arrival, the dropping of his school bag and PE kit on the laminate wood hall floor, caused her to raise herself up quickly from the settee, in a hurried attempt to conceal that she had been lying down as if it were a secret. Danny did not understand why she did that, but he never said anything as he was always reassured to have her put her arm around him and steer him to the kitchen and the biscuit tin, whilst asking him what he had been up to at school. Then, last week, she had been to see the doctor again, for the second time in two weeks and also to the hospital. He knew that because Dad had taken a morning off work to take her to the appointment Danny had overheard his mum telling his dad that the doctor was concerned about the possibility of complications.

This morning Danny had come downstairs from his bedroom and glimpsed his mum and dad in the sitting room when the door was a bit open and they hadn’t heard him come down the stairs. They were talking quietly, with silent gaps in between what they were talking about as if it were something serious Danny heard mum say, ‘‘Doctor Wilson thinks now would be a good time to tell Danny’’ He saw Dad taking Mum in his arms and giving her a big gentle hug. Dad didn’t say anything, he just stroked her hair. Danny remembered that Doctor Wilson had been the name of Gran’s doctor too. Danny ran from the house and straight down to the jetty. It was a good place to sit and think, safe and familiar.

Danny’s parents, Kate and Kevin, heard the back door close and called out to Danny to come back, but he couldn’t have heard them, as he ran out to play with his friends on that warm Saturday morning. ‘‘Never mind, it will keep, how about a cuppa?’’ said Kevin. Kate smiled wanly and said, ‘‘Thanks Kev, you’re my rock’’.

With tea in hand Kate felt better and sat close up beside Kevin on the settee.

‘‘I wonder how Danny will take the news. Poor love, he has been a bit neglected lately. We must make sure he is made to feel special in the next few months so that he is not too badly affected by what is going to happen. I wish my mum was still here, I miss her so much. Dr Wilson is such a lovely GP; I really feel I am in safe hands. He was so good to Mum when she was diagnosed with cancer, and all through her treatment. He says I will have to take care of myself and that you will have to make sure I don’t overdo things or I will end up in hospital sooner than expected. He says I may need specialist treatment. I told him I don’t care, as long as the baby is ok." 

"We never thought we'd be able to have another baby and now a miracle has happened."

"Now that I am more than three months gone Doctor Wilson feels I am over the worst fears for a miscarriage and we should tell Danny that he can expect a little sister. Have you noticed he's seemed a bit out of sorts lately?’’

Kevin was thoughtful for a moment. ‘‘How about if I take him for a pizza and talk to him, man to man, to see if there is anything going on at school that’s bothering him. After all, we boys will have to stick together now that we know there is going to be another female in the house!"

Copyright Jane Scoggins