Cathy Kelly 6-Book Collection: Someone Like You, What She Wants, Just Between Us, Best of Friends, Always and Forever, Past Secrets

He pointed out that Alzheimer’s worked along a step system: a person could be on one level for a while, then drop to the next step, never to go back up. The descent was irreversible.

Drugs could help in the early stages but, ultimately, the progression continued. Because Anne-Marie was a young patient, she could live many years with the illness. Moreover, as she was energetic and had a tendency to move around a lot, caring for her could ultimately be harder than for an older, less mobile person. She would need a secure, specialized unit which would inevitably be expensive. If she became more agitated than she was now, he would advise admitting her to the psychiatric hospital to try and help her with drug therapy which would at least help her to sleep.

‘Some people wear themselves out walking constantly; others want to eat all the time because they forget they’ve been fed, and then they put on huge amounts of weight. Every patient is different, each one is unique. But,’ he leaned forward in his chair, ‘the patient isn’t the only patient, if you understand what I mean. The whole family is affected by Alzheimer’s. The family needs to be looked after and often that’s where the biggest problems occur. The principal carer has a lot to put up with. Will you be the principal carer?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said honestly. ‘I have a job and, up till now, my father was trying to work from home on the phone. I’d drop in every evening to see how things were going. But the past month, he’s had to take time off because my mother wouldn’t let him leave in the morning.’

The specialist nodded. ‘She’s afraid. Think about it: she looks at her house and she doesn’t always recognize it. She knows she’s alone but she has no concept of for how long or when someone she knows is coming back. It’s terrifying. She needs someone with her all the time, I’m afraid.’

It had been a long hard road since they’d been given the diagnosis. A combination of family and friends had chipped in to help look after Anne-Marie. Emma spent most Saturdays with her mother and dropped in three times a week in the evenings, cooking and cleaning. Her father now worked part-time, leaving the bulk of the work to his second-in-command, while two neighbours sat with Anne-Marie for a couple of mornings each week, to give Jimmy time to work.

Kirsten turned up on Sundays to help, but was no good during the week as she said she was worn out with her new job as a dentist’s receptionist. Even awful Aunt Petra rolled up on Friday mornings to sit in the house, although Emma wasn’t sure if this was a good idea or not, as Aunt Petra had a bad hip and osteoporosis and was likely to break something going up and downstairs after the constantly moving Anne-Marie.

What they really needed was some qualified help, Emma felt. Her mother was no longer sleeping well and was reaching the point where she needed more specialized care than a well-meaning band of friends and family doing their best.

But Jimmy wouldn’t hear of it; it was as if he’d managed to convince himself that nothing too awful could really be happening if they didn’t have specialist care for his wife. Having family and friends around meant things were all right, weren’t they? Once there was a care worker or nurse in the house, then he would have to give in and admit that there was no light at the end of the tunnel.

Stubborn as usual, he and Emma had had several rows about this.

‘We’re not having any nurse,’ he’d said angrily. ‘There’s no need. I can look after your mother myself.’

But you’re not looking after her yourself, Emma wanted to say. You’ve already got help and you need more. Hating herself for not saying it, she left. Over eight months of therapy had taught her that when she found herself unable to say what she wanted to, it was wiser to simply leave. That way her father would know she was angry and didn’t agree with him, even if she wasn’t strong enough to say so to his face.

As a stand, it wasn’t emphatic enough but it was something. She poured her mother some more tea, making sure the cup was out of her reach until enough milk had been added to make it suitably lukewarm.

Anne-Marie took it and drank it straight down, spilling a little down the front of the pink pleated blouse she’d adored when she bought it in a sale in Ashley Reeves years before.

‘Twenty pounds down from fifty!’ Anne-Marie had crowed delightedly that day, waving the pretty blouse with the mother-of-pearl buttons. ‘It’ll go beautifully with my grey skirt.’

Emma wiped away a tear from the corner of her eye at the memory of those days and sighed. Heartache and tiredness fought for supremacy. Exhaustion won. It was the second outfit her mother had spilled food on that day. More clothes to wash.

Emma had been bringing her parents’ clothes home to wash them herself because Jimmy really wasn’t much good with the washing machine. The amounts were getting bigger all the time and Emma was struggling desperately to keep up. Anne-Marie had been so conscious of how she looked; always immaculate and beautifully dressed and made up. Emma was determined to make sure she stayed that way, no matter what.

She wondered briefly whether a nurse would apply Anne-Marie’s beloved make-up every day the way she tried to. Probably not. Make-up would be far down the list and yet it was strangely important.

They desperately needed a nurse, someone qualified to step in some of the time. It was expensive, Emma knew, but her father wasn’t a poor man. He could afford to pay for some nursing care. Except that lack of funds wasn’t behind his stubborn resistance to the idea.

‘Anyone home?’ called Kirsten’s voice from the hall. ‘It’s me.’

‘We’re in the kitchen.’

Kirsten ambled into the kitchen, threw her jacket on a chair and slumped down beside Emma, not going near their mother to greet or kiss her.

The months she’d been parted from Patrick had certainly changed her: she’d lost that expensive sheen that came from having a husband well off enough to provide endless hair and beauty treatments as well as ensuring that she didn’t have to work.

Now her job as a dental receptionist meant she no longer had the money to have her hair constantly cut and coloured, and the twice-weekly manicures were a thing of the past. Her hair was longer, honey-streaked with darkening roots, and her make-up was patchy after a long day at work and no time to run to the loo every five minutes and primp. Only her flamboyant leopard-skin handbag and large engagement ring were signs of the old Kirsten.

Patrick was fighting tooth and buffed nail to keep his fortune from Kirsten’s grasp, but he hadn’t asked for the ring back.

‘What’s up, Sis?’ she asked. ‘I don’t suppose there’s any tea going? I could murder a cup.’

‘In the pot,’ Emma said. ‘Say hello to Mum.’

‘Hi, Mum,’ Kirsten said without any real feeling. She dragged herself to her feet with the weary air of a post-twenty-six miles marathon runner and investigated the teapot. ‘This is cold,’ she announced. ‘I’ll make more.’

‘What are you doing here?’ Emma asked, irritated by her sister’s lack of interest in their mother.

‘At a loose end. Thought I’d drop in and see what you were up to tonight. Maybe you’d fancy a movie or something.’

Emma suppressed the desire to snap that if Kirsten had time to spare, she could have used it in looking after their mother more often. That wasn’t fair. They had to have a life beyond caring for her. And Kirsten was lonely since the break-up of her marriage.

She no longer had the money to run with her old crowd. Popping off to New York for a spot of shopping or Meribel for skiing wasn’t an option any more, nor was running up huge bills in ritzy restaurants. Too embarrassed to drift back to the friends she’d known before she got caught up with the rich, trendy crowd, Kirsten appeared to live a rather solitary life and had taken to dropping in on Emma and Pete a lot, bringing the newest video release and giant tubs of Pringles.

‘We’ve nothing planned,’ Emma said. ‘Pete’s working late and we were going to have a takeaway. Why don’t you join us?’

‘Yeah,’ Kirsten said, ‘maybe I will.’

When her mother had finished eating, Emma escorted her upstairs for the difficult ceremony of changing her blouse. Anne-Marie coped with being fed quite well most of the time and didn’t seem to mind having her teeth brushed, although she swallowed more toothpaste than she spat out. But having her clothes changed was like a red matador to a bull. As soon as one button was undone, she began to rage at Emma, pulling her arm away and squealing as if she was being hurt.

‘Jimmy,’ she roared plaintively. ‘Make her stop!’

‘Mum,’ Emma said as calmly as she could while dodging blows, ‘we’re just changing your blouse. You know you hate wearing anything dirty…’

‘Jimmy,’ roared her mother louder.

Where was bloody Kirsten when you needed her, Emma fumed.

‘Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy…’

The front door slammed and heavy footsteps pounded up the stairs.

‘What are you doing with her?’ screeched Jimmy O’Brien, appearing at the door, his face like thunder.

Anne-Marie, hearing more yelling, began to scream even louder.

‘Jimmy, Jimmy! Help me!’

‘I’m here!’ he yelled back, trying to hug his wife. But she, upset now, dragged herself away from him.

‘What have you done to her?’ he accused Emma.

Tired after the long morning and afternoon looking after her mother, Emma just sank back on to the bed. ‘Nothing,’ she said dully. ‘Trying to change her blouse because she got dinner on it.’

‘That bloody blouse doesn’t matter,’ Jimmy yelled.

Something in Emma snapped. She’d taken a half-day from the office so her father could have an entire day to work. She was tired after working until nine the day before on paperwork she wouldn’t have time to do today. And it had been an exhausting afternoon with her mother successfully emptying a bottle of toilet cleaner all over the landing, which had taken ages to clean up.

Those bottles were not childproof, no matter what they said on the label.