Tiny pieces of enid, p.1
Tiny Pieces of Enid, page 1
Alongside his accidental career in finance, TIM EWINS performed stand-up comedy for eight years. He also had a very brief acting stint (he’s in the film Bronson, somewhere in the background) before turning to writing fiction. His first novel, We Are Animals, was published by Lightning Books in 2021. He lives with his wife, son, dog and cat near Bristol.
Praise for Tiny Pieces of Enid
‘A powerful and poignant story about love and loss, frailty and courage. Beautifully imagined and peopled with strong, endearing characters, this book both gripped me and touched my heart’
Hazel Prior
‘A poignant, poetically fractured tale of two women trapped by circumstance, the bittersweet circle of life and love. I found it strangely hypnotic and very moving’
Beth Morrey
‘One of the most beautiful portrayals of love I’ve ever read. I will always remember Enid and Roy’
A.J. West
‘A wonderful, poignant and powerful read. I absolutely loved it. There’s such tenderness there, and great clarity too’
Matson Taylor
‘Incredibly moving. The pages are filled with characters you can’t help but fall in love with. A heartfelt tale focusing on the realities of life with dementia’
Louise Hare
‘He’s done it again. Tiny Pieces of Enid is warm and moving and full of heart. If it doesn’t make you cry more than once, I don’t know what’s wrong with you’
Frances Quinn
‘Like a bird layering twigs to build a nest, Ewins has woven together past and present, memory and reality to create a startlingly beautiful novel with complex characters walking the fine line between fragility and strength. An absolute delight’
Laura Besley
‘A moving and thoughtful examination of memory and ageing, with a central character you can’t help but root for. A wonderful story about love, friendship and the “tiny pieces” that make us who we are’
Rebecca Ley
‘Compelling and sad and hopeful, but never sentimental. A warm hug of a book, as comforting as chicken soup and just as nourishing’
Polly Crosby
‘A poignant, warm and thought-provoking story’
Susan A. King
‘A beautiful, sensitive, lyrical portrait of the reality of living with dementia, and the twists and turns our lives take, up to the very end’
Victoria Scott
‘I was deeply moved by this delicate, beautiful book. A sensitive and poignant story’
Victoria Dowd
‘A powerful and moving story about dementia and love that lasts a lifetime. Unflinching and heartbreaking. I love it’
Nicola Gill
‘Moving and timely. Brilliantly evokes the drama of the everyday that may go unnoticed by others but, for those involved, takes on Titanic proportions. Superb’
Tom Benjamin
‘A beautiful book, its pages suffused with warmth and humanity. It truly moved me and will stay with me for a long, long time’
Louise Fein
‘This lovely book reminds us that character and love both outlast our lifetimes and these are the things we remember in the end’
Jacqueline Sutherland
‘Tim Ewins brings his own brand of quirky to something very different. If you don’t love Enid like a member of your own family after reading this book, then you have no soul!’
Cat Walker
‘Enid is a delight. Her story tells of a love that defies everything, while the rendition of her mental decline is drawn with sensitivity and compassion. I couldn’t put this down’
Paula Greenlees
Published in 2023
by Lightning Books
Imprint of Eye Books Ltd
29A Barrow Street
Much Wenlock
Shropshire
TF13 6EN
www.lightning-books.com
ISBN: 9781785633102
Copyright © Tim Ewins 2023
Cover by Nell Wood
Typeset in Dante MT Std and Zona Pro
The moral right of the author has been asserted. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
For my mum,
and for her mum:
Nanny Enid
Contents
PART ONE
PART TWO
PART THREE
PART FOUR
THE REAL NANNY ENID
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
PART ONE
TWIGS AND WEEDS
1
Enid lay motionless on the hospital bed with her eyes closed. She wasn’t sure if she could move; she hadn’t tried, and she didn’t want to.
‘Your mother hasn’t responded for over twenty-four hours.’ The voice was short but not unfriendly, not addressing her. Male and important. Enid couldn’t guess the voice’s age though. In fact, she found she couldn’t recall any numbers at all. ‘We’ll keep her where she is. We can monitor her through the night, and then do a few more tests in the morning.’
Enid hadn’t understood any of the words that the voice had said, but she had the distinct feeling that they had been about her, rather than to her. She wanted to know where she was, but her eyelids didn’t even flicker when she attempted to open them. Some parts of her body felt numb, and the other parts ached. She felt sure that she was positioned flat on her back with her arms by her sides, arranged like a corpse. It was not comfortable.
‘Alright, thank you. I’ll come back tomorrow. What time’s best?’
Enid knew that voice. It was her daughter’s. Always busy. She had such a fast-paced life. Enid didn’t recognise any of her daughter’s words though. It was like she was talking a foreign language. Enid wanted to say her daughter’s name, to ask for comfort, to ask for her husband, Roy, but her mouth didn’t move. What was her daughter’s name? She began to doubt that it could be her daughter at all. Or even that she had a daughter.
‘Visiting hours are 5.30 to 6.30.’
‘Ugh,’ Enid’s daughter exhaled, short and busy. The abruptness frightened Enid. Where was she? Where was Roy? She seemed to be paralysed, but her mind was restless. Other noises came into focus; a squeaking wheel, a repetitive beep, stifled, distant chatter. Then, her daughter again.
‘I can move some things around.’
Enid felt someone lift her hand, squeeze her palm softly, and then lower her fingers back to the bed, but it wasn’t Roy.
‘Alright Mum, I’ll be back tomorrow. I love you.’
A few winters ago, Roy woke up at three in the morning to an empty bed. Where was Enid? She’d always been a good sleeper. She was fiercely proud of it in fact. She’d never sleepwalked as a child, and unlike many of her friends, she hadn’t suffered from insomnia as an adult. Unless they had over-indulged in some homemade wine and lost track of time, Enid was rarely up between the hours of 10.30 pm and 6.00 am. It was almost a source of frustration for Roy, who had always been a very light sleeper.
So, to wake up and find her gone was worrying. He sat up in bed, though it hurt to do so. His back ached. Slowly, he pushed his legs out from beneath the warmth of the duvet and fumbled his feet into the fluffy slippers Barb had given him the previous Christmas. When he stood, his legs shook under his body weight. He was already wearing his pyjamas, but he put on his dressing gown for added warmth and made his way downstairs.
Enid wasn’t in the kitchen, as he’d hoped she would be. The lounge was empty too.
‘Enid,’ he whispered, though he hadn’t meant to whisper, so he cleared his throat and tried again. ‘Enid.’ There wasn’t any reply. He walked through the kitchen and into the lounge-diner. Enid wasn’t there either. Roy quite often sat in the lounge by himself with a cup of tea at 3.00 am, but now the house felt even more still than usual. Quieter, although he knew it couldn’t be. The knowledge that Enid was not asleep upstairs was unsettling. He became agitated and scared for his wife, and for himself. He shuffled to the phone in the hall.
They had an old rotary dial phone which they’d purchased just a few decades ago. Who should he call? He couldn’t dial 999, although that seemed like the obvious choice. Both Enid and Roy had reached an age where any call to the emergency services might result in them never returning to their own home again.
Of course, Barb would be over in a flash if he rang her. She only lived down the road and it would be reassuring to see her, but she would insist on ringing the police. Barb thought that Enid and Roy’s concern about having to leave their home was unfounded, but she was young. She was young and she was wrong.
Enid had Sellotaped a piece of notepaper listing the contact numbers of their family and friends on the wall above the phone; some had been crossed out and replaced over the years, some were faded, and some had been traced over again and again with an ink-deprived pen. Roy ran his finger down the page.
The number at the bottom wasn’t in Enid’s handwriting. It read: Neil (neighbour) – 07800231340 – call if you need me.< br />
Roy started to dial. The number didn’t lend itself to a rotary dial phone, and as the dial returned back to its starting position, Roy heard a noise upstairs.
He froze.
‘Enid?’ Silence. After a few seconds the dial tone sounded from the phone to indicate that it had timed out. Roy replaced the receiver and slowly shuffled upstairs. He could hear someone sniffing sadly. It was his wife.
He found her in the spare room sitting on the bed. She was looking down into her hands and quietly crying.
‘Enid,’ Roy said softly, and she looked up at him.
‘I’m lost,’ Enid said.
‘You’re at home. This is the spare bedroom.’ Roy shuffled over to the bed and held Enid’s hands in his hands. It was worth the ache in his back when he bent down. ‘You sleep in the next room, with me.’
Enid allowed him to guide her out of the spare bedroom and back into their shared room.
‘How silly,’ Enid said when they were back in bed. ‘Lost. Dear me.’
‘Indeed,’ Roy agreed, ‘whatever next?’
Time dragged at the hospital. Barb scrolled through Facebook on her phone, reading aloud any posts innocuous enough to be overheard by nearby patients on the ward.
‘Vicki’s having another baby,’ she said. ‘You wouldn’t know her, Mum. She used to work with Calvin.’ Barb looked up at Enid, and then back at her phone. ‘Claire says she’s bored. I don’t know why she posts that stuff.’ Barb sighed. She could really do with Calvin now. He was better at this kind of thing than she was, and he’d always got on so well with Enid. Calvin wouldn’t be reading other people’s posts to his mother-in-law; he’d be soothing her properly. Except he wasn’t Enid’s son-in-law any more, and Barb’s pride wouldn’t allow her to just ring him and ask him to come to the hospital. He lived in a different house now, with a different woman.
‘Oh, Mum,’ Barb said, leaning her elbows on the hospital bed and feeling deflated. ‘What are we going to do with you?’ She sighed, before widening her eyes.
Enid’s lips had moved, ever so slightly.
‘Mum, can you hear me?’
Enid let out a small whimper.
‘Mum?’
Another noise escaped Enid’s lips, a fragment of a distinguishable word. Both her eyes twitched, and then one of them opened, wide and full of panic.
Barb had never seen her mum stare like this. Her whole face was strained, one eye open, tight-lipped and intense.
‘Mum,’ she said again, ‘it’s Barb.’ Enid looked at her desperately. ‘You’re awake.’ Then, maintaining eye contact, Barb called back into the ward for help.
Enid’s mouth opened, and with stiff, visible cramp in her jaw, she groaned loudly.
‘Are you OK?’ Barb asked her mum, again wishing for Calvin. It was a stupid question, but she felt so helpless. Enid breathed in deeply, as if trying to suck back saliva that wasn’t there. Barb could hear footsteps rushing down the ward towards them.
‘It’s alright Mum. You don’t have to talk. Try to relax.’ Enid’s one open eye appeared even more intense for a moment, before it calmed, and then shut.
As the months had gone by, Roy had grown used to Enid’s night-time walks. Sometimes he would wake up at the same time as she did, just from the movement of the duvet. Enid never made much sense when she woke, but a gentle hand on her arm and another on her back would normally calm her down. Occasionally, she would become violent, which wasn’t ideal because Roy’s body wasn’t quite what it used to be, but it was nothing he couldn’t handle. Once, she had hit him on the leg and a bruise had formed but it could be hidden under his trousers, and it hadn’t hurt. Watching his wife deteriorate though, and watching her grow scared at the loss of her own identity; that hurt.
What worried both Roy and Enid most, were the nights that she left the bedroom without him noticing. When it started, Roy would normally find her in the spare bedroom, just as he had on that first night. After a while, Enid ventured further. A few times Roy had found her in the lounge arranging the placemats on the coffee table, and once she’d been in the kitchen hiding the kettle. The day after the kettle incident had been the first time they’d discussed the night-time walks in the waking hours.
‘We wouldn’t have been able to have a cup of tea,’ Roy said as he flicked on the kettle. Enid looked at him with a questioning face, and he smiled at her. ‘I found you trying to hide the kettle last night.’
‘You didn’t,’ Enid replied with a hint of surprise in her voice. ‘Oh.’ She put her hand to her mouth and Roy chuckled kindly.
‘I did,’ he said, and they didn’t discuss it any further.
Enid could smell hospital food. Some kind of cooked meat. Stew maybe? The smell was warm and surprisingly comforting. She was sitting upright, looking forward. She could see Roy, hunched in a foam chair on the other side of the bed. He looked anxious. Next to Roy sat Barb. The height of her chair made her appear shorter than she was. Enid had no idea how long they’d been there. Perhaps just a few seconds, perhaps a week.
No one except Barb had really said anything for quite a while. Enid had tried but found that she could only produce confused staccato sounds without any meaning, so she’d given up. Occasionally, Barb would look down at her phone and Roy would study the ward, inspecting his wife’s new temporary home. It wasn’t an uncomfortable silence, and Enid was happy to have her family with her.
Like Roy, Enid was finding it hard to understand the institution in which she had become a prisoner. The woman in the bed next to her kept jolting her head backwards before letting it roll forwards again. On the opposite side of the ward, a tall, gaunt, bald man sat in his bed, raising his hand and opening his mouth as if he were about to say something, but then he’d close his mouth and lower his arm again.
Enid enjoyed the repetition.
A woman in a navy-blue uniform walked over, greeted Barb and Roy, and then turned to Enid.
‘I’m going to ask you to drink some water again, Enid.’ Enid flinched. This kept happening; people in navy blue would turn up, asking her to drink water, and then they’d stare at her neck, heads tilted. Enid eyeballed her, letting her know that she was onto her.
‘Mum,’ Barb said, ‘Eleanor is a speech therapist. She wants to help you talk again.’
So, the woman was called Eleanor. Knowing that she couldn’t warn her daughter about the woman in navy blue, and that she couldn’t ask for help from Roy, Enid turned away from all three of them. The tall, gaunt, bald man in the bed opposite was asleep now. He slept on his back with his mouth open and his arms by his sides. Enid focused hard on his breathing, evident from the repetitive movement of his top lip.
‘Mum,’ Barb said, and then again, ‘Mum.’
Eleanor interjected in a voice full of compassion, hiding her true agenda, whatever it was.
‘Enid, we’ve been through this. That’s Malcolm, and he is a nice man.’ Enid ignored her and focused harder on Malcolm’s lip, frowning.
‘She’s been doing this quite a lot,’ Eleanor said to Barb. Not to Enid, and not to Roy. ‘She gets very agitated, very quickly. She’s safe while she remains here on the ward, but it’s worth remembering that when you start making decisions about her future.’ There was a pause and Enid lost focus. She sighed, looking at the man across the ward, wondering who he was.
Barb put her hand on her mum’s forehead. Enid couldn’t remember her daughter ever having done that before.
‘Can we…?’ the woman in navy blue asked, pointing away from the bed and looking at Barb.
‘I’ll give you two a bit of alone time,’ Barb said eventually. ‘I’ll be back in a few minutes, Dad,’ and then louder, ‘Mum, I’ll be back in a few minutes.’ Enid looked at her, expressionless and without moving her head. Both Enid and Roy watched as Barb and the woman in navy blue walked to the desk at the other end of the ward. When they stopped, Roy turned back to Enid.
‘They keep telling me you’ve had a succession of small strokes love. Now, I don’t know what that means exactly, but it’s why you’re finding it difficult to talk. Hopefully, what with all they’re doing now, you should be right as rain soon. You can come home.’
