Coming Home by Jim Eldridge

Author:Jim Eldridge
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scholastic UK
Published: 2018-10-10T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

11

I was tired after my first day of work, and the mattress Mam had put on the floor was comfortable, but I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about how to make things better with Dad, for everyone’s sake. It was driving me mad, and it wasn’t doing anyone else in the house any good. I had to do something about it, but the only answer to the problem seemed that I’d have to leave home. But where would I go? I could write to Eric or Billy in Manchester, but going that far away would upset Mam, Tim and Ann all over again. In the next room, Ann started coughing, that same horrible bronchitis cough. I heard her thrashing about, and then Mam’s footsteps on the landing.

“There, there,” she said. “It’s all right. Mam’s here.”

Ann’s coughs grew quieter, and finally I managed to drop off to sleep.

I was up early the next morning to get to work. The road gang started at half past seven, even though it was still dark. Before I set off, I knocked on Arthur’s door. I knew he didn’t start work until eight.

He was eating a piece of bread when he opened the door.

“Joe,” he said, swallowing his mouthful. “What’s wrong?”

I told him about what had happened at supper.

“It can’t go on, Arthur,” I said. I looked at my shoes, embarrassed. “I was wondering if I could come and stay with you for a couple of days, just till things blow over.”

“I’ll ask my mam,” said Arthur. “But I’m sure she’ll say it’s all right. She’s out at the moment on one of her cleaning jobs.”

“Thanks, Arthur,” I said. “I’ll pop in after work to see what she says.”

Arthur’s mam, Mary Graham, is a widow. Arthur’s dad died when Arthur was just six, so Mrs Graham went to work cleaning houses, to keep money coming in. Arthur started doing odd jobs – unpacking stock in shops and tidying up people’s gardens – from when he was seven, to make sure they had money to pay the rent and eat.

When the munitions factory at Eastriggs opened in 1916, Mrs Graham went to work there, the same as Mam did, but now the war was over, she’d been laid off, like Mam and the other women, which is why she was back cleaning.

I spent the day with the road gang, breaking up the road and throwing the old cobbles on the back of a lorry. It was physically exhausting, but I didn’t mind. At least no one was shooting at us.

As it was Friday, in the afternoon I could collect my wages for my first two days’ work. Arthur must have been watching out for me, because his door opened as I neared our house.

“Mam says it’s all right for you to stay,” he told me. “She’ll put down a mattress on the floor in my room for you.”

“Thanks, Arthur,” I said.

I felt a rush of relief and then a surge of guilt. Mam was going to be so upset.

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