My Jenny
Short story, life’s heroes and peoples kindness
With clutched hands gripping the arms of my threadbare chair, I sit in empty silence and feel every individual tear fall, each drop of painful memory escaping like rats on a sinking ship… I envy the ease of their leaving.
The life I’ve led, for many decades it was a life worth living, every day a new opportunity, every day safe in friendships. The cruelty of what I’ve become forces fresh tears to flee down my aged skin.
My early years, I sought my fortune and found my way in life, there was no fortune of wealth to be found on my path but I did find happiness, an incredible feeling to behold and one I’ve learned painfully, should never be taken for granted. Happiness seems so alien to me now sitting alone in this chair.
And then love. The purest I believe that can ever be found between two people, soulmates we called each other. Alas, my lovely Jenny, but I am glad you can’t see me now, so thankful that you can’t see the old man sitting here wrinkled and broken.
Marriage. I have photos of that day, the day I married my Jenny. The day we promised to be together forever. I can’t blame you Jenny, but I miss you terribly, as much as you would have missed me if I’d passed first, no doubt. The teases between us of who would ‘go first’ are cruel in memory.
A child we had together, such a joy to hold in my hands, something of our creation, joined with our D.N.A, our new adventure, and our new love. A part of us to walk this earth, to carry our name when we are gone… Life however never works out as it should.
Leaving the army life and working in factories was next in my life, monotony screamed at me daily but I had my family, and friends from the army I would always call brothers, it was enough for me as I never saw those times ending.
I sit here now, thinking of the man I was as I continue to weep silently into nothing. So brave I was at a time, so fearless when with my brothers and so proud of my new family.
My head drops into my shaking hands, I could never have imagined me as I sit here now, a frail old man, a burden on a society that secretly doesn’t care, and then there’s the loneliness, it screams the most.
My son, Jimmy, was 27 when he died in a fire at home. Jenny never got over it, many times I found her crying on her own, hiding herself in different rooms, but I always found her.
I never needed to speak to Jenny at those times as there was nothing I could say. I’d just wrap my arms around her, hold her tight and together we’d share our grief.
With the death of my own parents soon after our Jimmy died, I slipped from society, gave my job up, lost touch with friends and stayed home with my Jenny. We weren’t happy but we were together, we even started going away for the odd weekend, until almost a year to the day of Jimmy’s passing we received a letter from the hospital, Jenny had cancer.
For five further years my Jenny battled so hard with the crushing disease, for five years I stayed with her in our home, every moment of the day nursing her and loving her. There were good moments but she never laughed the same in that time.
We were both sixty when Jenny passed, it was three days after her birthday, we shared it together with nurses and Doctors. I had to leave at one point to make funeral arrangements, we’d been informed the day before that there was nothing else they could do.
There was no cake or celebrations that day, for most of it we cried and held onto each other, for the rest she was sleeping with heavy medication to stop the pain. I will never forget the wonderful people who took care of me, and my Jenny.
It has been twelve years since Jenny passed, I am now seventy-two. I lost our home three years later, the home where we raised Jimmy, and I took care of my Jenny until the end.
I was evicted three months after Jenny died, I’d tried speaking to the banks many times when she was ill, each time they extended my payments until they realised I had nothing. It was the last thing my Jenny needed to know.
She had always taken care of the bills, I tried but computers were never for me. Spending my last money to keep the phone running, sitting there listening to operatic music down the receiver to beg for help until it went dead. The phone had been cut off.
Since the day I was evicted from our home, after living in a bed sit where I was robbed twice I was given a council flat. I had little but I had my memories, and of course our photos. I soon found I could no longer look at her picture, where once I saw happy instances all I see now is pain, and anger, such loss at losing our home.
Aching limbs beg to be heard but I do my best to ignore them, to send the pain back to where it came from. I have more to carry than any man should, and is my reasoning for where I am now, and what I’m about to do.
Three weeks ago the last of my brothers died. Jimbo, we named our son after him, he’d saved my life twice while on tour. For three weeks I have lived with the knowledge that I am truly alone, no other knows my name unless calling for debt.
To my right is a small cheap coffee table, holding the same full cup of tea that has been sat there for two days, my favourite ginger biscuits crumbling beside it. And next to that is the letter I received on the day I made that cup of tea, when I sat in my chair and opened it. A letter of eviction.
The flat I am in has been quiet for so long, with no company for an old man and only enough electric to boil my kettle. I look around at the empty space of my ‘living’ room, it’s clear to me that no matter what happens in life, loss is inevitable.
So lonely, I have laughed occasionally at how alone I am. I never saw it coming. After such a life, filled with the laughter of friends and family, all are now ghosts from a time long gone, and I will never meet such people again.
Letting my bladder release once more as I sit here, this old arm chair the only piece of furniture survived from that time. My Jenny would sit here facing the sun every evening, sewing needles tapping as she smiled and watched Jimmy playing in the garden.
No more. The time I think has come, the time to let go of the memories, the time to wave my white flag in defeat and declare that I’ve had enough, I’m beaten, I’m finished. If you won’t take me with them, then I will come and search for their souls.
In my lap I see the metal pistol I’ve cleaned every day for three months, a bullet sits inside, gleaming in clean oil as my shaking hand grips the handle. It has been with me for over forty years, but as I gaze at its steel I remember how many times I’ve polished and cared for it in that time, even more so lately.
Not once have I ever considered the possibility that it would be me at the end of the barrel, me holding the trigger for it’s final release.
Raising the gun I notice it is the first time my hand has been this steady in a long time. I ignore the photos I have sprawled on the bare floor around me, I have studied them enough to know every detail by heart.
The front door bell rings, I hear someone call my name, it has to be official as nobody knows it. The window is knocked and I see a man in uniform, he calls my name and tells me I have to open the door.
I sneak one quick look at my Jenny, and another for my Jimmy. Raising my hand, I rest the cold mettle in my mouth. The tears have run dry and I hear force being used on the front door, my name no longer being called, and after today it will no longer be known.
With tears now dry I close my eyes, I hear the three small bolts on the front door give way. Such a way to go for a man who at one time genuinely thought he had lived his life right.
Before a fresh tear can form I squeeze the trigger, knowing now I was never good enough to survive and never strong enough to hold on to my world.
The gun is silent. I pull again and the barrel turns, there is nothing. The door to my empty room barges open, a police man sees me and I squeeze harder once more before dropping the gun in anguish.
Fresh tears fall freely with the shame, the police officer holds up his hands, there are others behind him and he asks me to drop the gun, crumpled laughter leaves me as I cry helplessly at its uselessness.
Behind the officer I see a nurse, one become two and both are looking around the room and then to me. One of them speaks my name, asking if they can come in. I throw away the gun and collapse in on myself.
The police man picks the gun up, I meet his eyes and he nods to me, an understanding of sorts I take from the look. I watch him leave the room and hear him speak on his radio.
The nurses walk forward, like angels their smiles warm me and I begin to shake. Their touch startles me, I meet the pity of their eyes with shame and one leans in, her arms around me like cradling a babe. I cried as she told me why they were there.
The last person to know my name, the last person to know who I was and the last person to know who I am now. The last of my friends to die, Jimbo, spoke of me in his will. In his last days he had arranged for me to be checked on and moved to a fully paid residential home.
My friends, my family, my life. I miss you all, I miss your faces, I miss your smiles, but mostly I miss your company. Sitting here, fully fed and healthy I realise you never left me alone. You will always be with me.
I look forward to the day we meet, the day unforced by life and it’s cruelty. A day where I can proudly claim when I hold you that I survived until the end and never stopped loving you.
Colin M Vaughan
