Blood Line: Sometimes Tragedy Is in Your Blood

She glanced at Reggie now, and her hand went immediately to her stomach. It was flat now – she was a slim girl – but it wouldn’t be for much longer. Which was okay – their hasty marriage wouldn’t seem unusual, not with all the servicemen coming home and rushing to wed the girls they’d been reunited with. But it had also shown her the kind of man Reggie was in that department; a man, to use her mother’s parlance, who expected to be serviced on demand. She’d have to nip that idea in the bud quick smart.

It was amusing, though, watching Doris and the rest of her friends giving her cheeky winks – implying that she was in for a great surprise tonight. Annie snorted at the thought. She’d already had that; the surprise being that, contrary to what everyone had told her – about it being a chore and a bind that she’d just have to get used to – she’d actually enjoyed it, rather a lot.

No, she thought, the surprise would come in seven months, near as good as. But hopefully it would be a late arrival so it wasn’t too blindingly obvious that she’d been such a wicked, wicked woman.

The wedding breakfast, which actually took place in the afternoon, was held at the McArdles’ house. Like the Hudsons, they lived on the Broomfields estate, and in the same row of small terraced houses that they rented from the corporation.

Usually a bit of a hovel, it had put on its best face for the day – swept out and cleaned sufficiently to be smart enough to receive guests, of which there were now 30 or so, all piling in through the narrow doorway, and falling hungrily on the feast of bread and dripping Annie’s mum had prepared, washed down with cupfuls of her dad’s mead.

Billy McArdle’s mead was a legendary tipple locally. Mostly because it was potent enough to be the cause of many a sore head, even after downing just a couple of cupfuls. Well, in today’s case, as was the case when there was any sort of occasion, jarfuls – many would be drinking from washed and scrubbed jam jars, there being far too few cups to go round.

But Billy’s mead was also famous because he was a bit of an enthusiast, often experimenting with flavours, depending on what kind of fruit he could nick from various gardens. Sometimes it was raspberry flavoured, other times scented with blackberry, but at this time of year there was little to add, so the wedding drink was just made with the usual honey.

‘A toast! A toast!’ he cried now, as he swung his mead upwards, and Annie felt her heart swell with love. She never really understood why her mam was so mean to him. To her he was a very fine man. ‘To our little Queen Annie and her prince charming, Reggie Hudson,’ he continued, beaming at them. ‘Long may they reign!’

Annie’s mum, Queenie, picked up her husband’s pipe from the stone fire top and puffed on it. ‘And good luck, my girl,’ she called across to her daughter. She roared with laughter then. ‘Because you’re gonna need it. Mark my words!’

‘Oh, Mam, give up,’ Annie chided. ‘You know he’s not a wrong ’un. Well, not half as bad as some of them, anyway. And at least we’ll have a roof to call our own over our heads.’

This had been a great source of pride to Annie. But an even greater source of relief. Two of her friends, Doris and Florrie, had already been married for a couple of years now, and were still living with their in-laws, all crammed in together. Hardly the most romantic way to start married life. And though she got along with Reggie’s family, she certainly didn’t want to live with them. She was 18 now, and sick of being treated like someone’s child. No, she wanted to be in charge now – rule her own roost.

Queenie tutted and pointed over to Reggie. He was standing by the window, laughing and roaring with the other men. ‘Really?’ she said. ‘Look at him! Drunk as a lord already, he is, pound to a penny. And it’s not yet six o’clock.’ She then smiled, giving Annie a nudge on her arm. ‘Mind you, girl,’ she whispered, ‘if he carries on like that, at least you might miss out on a bit of how’s yer father.’ She winked knowingly. ‘Now that you can do without!’

Annie felt her cheeks redden. How could her mam say things like that? She moved away from her. She certainly didn’t want to talk about that sort of thing and definitely not with her mother. Not with someone who didn’t have a good word to say about the man she’d supposedly once loved. No, she’d find more agreeable company with her friends. She caught her new husband’s eye as she went over to join them, pleased to feel the same flutter of excitement she’d always done as their eyes met, remembering what he’d said earlier about how he loved the way she looked with her hair up, how she looked like a painting of a goddess. Slightly less agreeable was the lewd, suggestive wink he responded with, specially when he followed it up by grinning at Doris and Florrie, causing them to dissolve into a fit of giggles and blushes too.

They knew him too well, she thought, as she joined them. But then, that was probably to be expected. All four of them worked at the local Punch Bowl pub and had done for over a year now – Reggie as a waiter and with Annie, Doris and Flo serving the drinks.

‘Right ladies’ man, that one is,’ Doris warned, as Annie took a sip from her drink. ‘You’ll probably have to keep him on a leash.’

The mead tasted warm in her throat. Pleasant. She took another gulp, almost downing it. ‘Oh, don’t you worry,’ she said. ‘The bugger’ll be wearing a leash, more like.’

Flo clearly didn’t want to linger on such a depressing line of thought. She stroked the arm of Annie’s wedding dress and sighed. ‘Aw, your gown is lovely, Annie,’ she cooed. ‘You look the bee’s knees, you really do. Like a princess. I wish I’d had a dress like that when I married my William. We had bugger all, us, compared to this. Still don’t!’ She sighed then, and looked across to where her own husband was. ‘And you know how folk say things like “It seems like it was only yesterday when you married him”?’

Annie nodded.

Flo stopped stroking the soft material and looked wistfully at her friend. ‘Well, it doesn’t. Not to me. It seems like a million years ago that I felt like a princess.’

‘Even more reason for me to make the most of it, then!’ Annie said quickly, not wanting to spoil the happy mood that was overtaking her now the mead had started taking effect. ‘Look,’ she said, doing a twirl so her friends could see how prettily the dress moved. ‘See the way it flips up at the bottom?’

She really wasn’t looking forward to having to take it off, not really. Well, she was, because Reggie would be helping her. But it still seemed a shame – seemed all wrong that once it was off, it was all over. That you only got to wear something so beautiful for a single day.

‘It’s just gorgeous,’ Flo said, planting a kiss on Annie’s cheek. ‘And I’m so happy for you. And I bet you can’t wait to get carried over that threshold later, too, Annie. Imagine that, eh? Annie McArdle with her own corporation house!’

‘Annie Hudson now, Florrie, remember? I’m not a McArdle any more. Thank God,’ she added with feeling, glancing across at her parents, and seeing them already engaged in one of their regular angry rows, probably about nothing in particular. It wasn’t going to be that way with her and her Reggie. She wouldn’t let it. She’d have him dancing to her tune before he even realised.

She looked at him again, not quite believing her luck. He was a catch, was her Reggie. There was no doubt about it. With his coal-black hair sleeked back so he looked like one of those film stars, his dad’s posh suit fitted him perfectly. He wasn’t a tall man, but he was built well, with muscles in all the right places, and looks that could melt a girl’s heart.

Oh yes, Annie thought, she would have to keep an eye on this one. Right now, though, she would cut him some slack. It was supposed to be a party after all.

And it was a party that went on till midnight. One minute the house was full and it seemed the next it was suddenly empty, and Annie realised her dad was passed out on the floor while her mam was busy shoving the last remaining guest out. ‘Go on, bugger off!’ she was shouting, all the niceties obviously over with. ‘You’ve all got homes to go to, haven’t you?’ she barked.

All but one, it seemed. The guest who’d bagged the one decent armchair and who was slumped in it, only just awake.

Her husband. ‘Are you ready then, Reggie?’ she asked him, shaking his shoulder. But he merely grunted and shook her arm away. ‘Reggie!’ she said again more sharply. ‘It’s time to go now!’ He at least opened his eyes at this, but what Annie saw wasn’t encouraging. He looked boss-eyed and could hardly keep them open.

Now sure quite how she was going to rouse him, let alone manhandle him to their house, she called Queenie over to help. ‘Mam,’ she called, ‘come and see if you can get him up for me, will you?’

Queenie looked at him and smiled, then she shook her head at her daughter. ‘You could throw a pan of water over him,’ she suggested, ‘but it wouldn’t do you much use. No, you go on and get yourself home, girl. He’s going nowhere, is he? Any more than your ruddy father. No, leave him here to sleep it off – best thing for him, really. And for you, love,’ she said more gently. ‘It’s not often you’ll have a night off, so if I were you I think I’d make the most of it.’

‘I can’t do that!’ Annie exclaimed, mortified. ‘It’s my wedding night! Come on, Mam – help me at least get him on his feet.’

But her mother just looked at her sleeping son-in-law of not quite a day, tutted at Annie and shook her head again. ‘You really want to take that lump home with you? Really? Trust me, love, even if you do manage to stagger home with him, what then? When they get into that state, it only means one of two things – either a good hiding or a bit of the other. You’ll enjoy neither tonight, so go on – enjoy this last night of peace, girl, because it’ll be a long time before you can enjoy another.’

Dejected by this unexpected turn in developments, yet without the energy to argue, Annie suddenly felt overcome by weariness. So she simply hitched up the hem of her dress, grabbed her mother’s shawl from the door knob and made her way out of the house and towards her new home. Have I been expecting too much? she wondered as she traipsed through the empty streets. Was her wedding day over now? Done? Was that it? Because it wasn’t the end to the day she’d envisaged at all. She was a bride and she was supposed to be carried over the threshold. That was the rule. Instead, she was going to have to carry herself over it – not to mention the dress she’d been so looking forward to Reggie helping her out of – and go to bed, in the cold, all alone. He might be drunk but at least he’d have made a half-decent hot-water bottle. Not to mention the rest of it, as well.

All those dreams she’d had about what was going to happen tonight, where were they now? They were going to dance around the house together – and as they danced, he was going to sing to her. Mouth her favourite song – ‘I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles’ – into her ear. He was going to sing that and then he was going to sweep her off to bed, just as he’d swept her off her feet when she’d first met him. Then they’d cuddle up together under the covers, on the lovely horsehair mattress that her dad had got for them specially, and watch the light of the moon from their bedroom window.

But not now! she thought angrily as she stomped across the grass, the moon above her shining brightly as if to spite her. She was all alone, and it was all wrong, and it wouldn’t be happening again. You’re a bloody shower, Reggie Hudson! she huffed to herself as she approached the dark house. This bloody marriage was going to see some changes. That was a promise.

Chapter 2 (#uef994a76-bf06-54a9-9f7c-1395028a6a20)

1923

Annie stretched out her spine, pressing her palms against her hips and groaning. Trying to scrub her step, even from a squatting position, was really the last thing she should be doing in her condition. Not right now. Not with this niggle in her back all the time. And given how much of an effort it had taken even to get down on her haunches, she decided, it would be as nothing compared to the effort it would take to pull herself back up.

Her lower back was hurting now, really quite badly, and a ripple of anxiety ran through her. She was ten days past term now and something told her that the baby inside her knew it. That it was just waiting, the little bleeder, for the worst possible moment, which, given she was out the front, attempting to get down far enough to scrub her front step, might just be now.

She bent back to her task again, scouring swiftly, anxious to finish now. Anxious to have everything ready for when this little one came into the world. Would she be blessed with a boy this time? She hoped so.

Not that she didn’t love her little Margaret, her precious daughter, who had probably saved her. But she really wanted a boy this time. For Reggie.

She’d been punished. She knew that. They both had. Punished by a vengeful God, for their wickedness before they’d married. He’d taken their firstborn, their dear little son, Frank, conceived out of wedlock and born just eight and a half months after. Snatched him from them before he was even a year old.

She could hardly bear to bring the pictures of that day to mind, even now. If she so much as thought about it – and she couldn’t help but think about it, what with a new baby imminent – the images would tumble in, swirling round and round her head, making her feel so sick and panicky that it was all she could do to try and shoo them away again. And it wasn’t like it had been a disease that had taken him, either. It had been an apple, just a ruddy piece of apple, that was all, that had done for her cherished firstborn. Choked him dead – killing him even as she watched. There’d been nothing anyone could have done – they’d all said that to her, everyone. Reggie too, but Annie still felt he blamed her.

Didn’t matter anyway. She’d been punished, and that was all there was to it. Reggie could never blame her as much as she blamed herself.

Annie gave up, puffing as she rose again, and glared at her next-door neighbour. It was always the same: Agnes Flanagan, queen of the perfect ox-blood doorstep, happily scrubbing away at hers with a stiff wire brush, getting a right lather on it with her trusty bar of soap. ‘You’ll scrub the bloody paint off if you carry on,’ Annie said, feeling an irrational amount of irritation that, right now, at least, she couldn’t have a nice, sparkling step too.

But she couldn’t – not with a belly the size of a baby hippo. With a belly, in fact, full of this bloody baby – where was it? Hopefully on its way, she thought, feeling her back twinge again.

‘Oh, be quiet, Annie,’ Agnes snapped. ‘Stop being such an old sourpuss. It’s jealousy is what it is, plain and simple. You’re only narked because you know your old man will notice mine’s the cleanest.’

Reggie wouldn’t. Annie knew that. He probably couldn’t have cared less. Wouldn’t even notice, because these days he seemed to prefer his time at the bloody pub. So much for the honeymoon ruddy period. Even so, just Agnes thinking that he might made Annie annoyed with her. If she hadn’t been so immobile she might have leapt the fence separating them and given Agnes a slap – just for being as annoying as she always was.

Which she had been, ever since they’d moved in two years back. An Irish couple in their thirties, they couldn’t have kids, apparently. Which meant they didn’t have any kids cluttering up their house, which for some reason seemed to make them feel superior. And it meant she had time, did Agnes Flanagan, something Annie sorely lacked. Time to have the cleanest windows, the shiniest step, the tidiest garden.

But she’d show the Flanagans. Show everyone, in fact. Once this little one was born, she’d definitely show them. They’d been talking about it, and Reggie had made her a promise – to dig up the garden and lay some turf for a proper lawn. Annie couldn’t wait to see the old cow’s face when she saw that.