The Lady In Waiting

The clock’s tock echoed around the hallway. Staring absently out through the curtains, Isabelle twisted her black inch-high heel into the worn carpet. An empty fish tank gurgled.

‘It’s nearly time,’ she said to herself. ‘Dear,’ she called up the stairs, ‘It’s nearly time’. A muffled shuffling and the familiar click of a door shutting came from her husband’s bedroom. He would be down now. He was never late.

Albert’s musty musk eased down the staircase ahead of the rest of his lumbering frame. She silently looked on as he descended, two feet per step. Steps could never be rushed.

‘You look very smart,’ she primly remarked while brushing down his jacket lapel. His vaseline combed hair was painted across his head in fine brush strokes. She nodded expectantly towards him. With a little ‘Oh,’ he shot back to life, opening the door for Isabelle, who stepped out under a greying day.

It was a twenty minute journey to the Edmondstown Graveyard which meant they would arrive precisely ten minutes ahead of the hearse. The journey was peppered with a smattering of commentary,

‘The lights are about to change dear. Watch for the van dear,’ and ‘The butchers are open on a Sunday’ Each comment replied in turn with a gentle nod and a compliant

‘Yes dear.’

Isabelle and Albert stood back as the cars emptied out and slowly filed in behind the hearse heading grave-ward. After a time the coffin was lowered, followed by the thud of roses and the scrape of the shovel. As the crowd dispersed Isabelle placed her hand on Albert’s back and steered him forward to the bereaved family.

‘Sorry for your loss.’ Albert issued apologetically. The recipient tightened a smile. Isabelle continued for him,

‘We are Albert and Isabelle Corry, representatives of the Church of the Annunciation. Your father was a cherished member of our community and will be terribly missed by all who knew him. I will personally be dedicating this evening’s Rosary and Glorious Mysteries to his soul.’

The departed’s son hesitated, ‘Eh… yeah, he had a long life, thanks for coming. Look, there will be some tea and sandwiches for him in the community hall if you would like to join?’

`We wish we could, we wish we could, but we must attend to another service,’ grieved Isabelle, ‘As members of the parish’s sacristan committee, we are called upon to provide spiritual solace to so many of our parish’s newly departed.’ Isabelle clasped the stunned man’s hands with her petite leather-gloved hands and offered a reverent half bow as she left, with Albert in tow. She waited for him at the car door and sat in after he opened it.

‘Not the right sort.’

Each week the Corrys attended every wake, funeral, and burial on behalf of their parish church. This was in addition to their other parochial duties; distributing and collecting missalettes and collection baskets, providing holy communion to other church-goers, as well as attending mass for their own personal salvation. Isabelle ensured they took no part in any weddings or baptisms. Lively disrespectful affairs.

Nothing provided Isabelle more privileged satisfaction than bestowing even a glimmer of the Lord’s blessing to the rest of the flock. Her other hobbies involved shepherding Albert around and avoiding his chronic snoring. The four inches of plaster between their respective bedrooms had helped over the past 20 years, in a way.

Albert on the other hand attended to his fish tank, it had once held fish, but in a generous compromise he had given them away. Isabelle hated fish. They smelt. He was encouraged however to attend to his 1966 Chevy Bel Air. Isabelle had purchased it for him for their 40th wedding anniversary. It gave him something to do and Isabelle very much enjoyed the social elements of the vintage car club.

The Corrys stood outside a quaint cottage behind their local village, peering at figures dressed in black through the wooden-framed windows. Isabelle motioned for Albert to knock and he did. The door was opened by a young man with a lump in his throat and tears in his eyes that looked through them. Isabelle started off,

‘We are Albert and Isab..’ The man shook, let out a wail and pressed his fists into his eyes to stem the tears. Isabelle looked to Albert and flicked her head. Albert stiffly clapped his hand on the man’s shoulder, to no response. He did it again.

A figure came rushing past the sobbing man and introduced herself as his sister, Janey, and welcomed them inside. Isabelle stepped around the man and entered the cottage, clutching her bag and eyeing every corner of the cottage. Albert stood with the man and clapped his shoulder again.

The cottage was homely and newly renovated. Its sparkling surfaces were filled with an assortment of sandwiches and finger food. Janey offered one under Isabelle’s nose along with an apology,

‘I am so so sorry about Derek. He has been finding it hard to hold it all together. Who wouldn’t? They were married just 6 months before the cancer..you know. It’s just all been so fast. How did you know Anne?’ Isabelle took a moment to compose herself.

‘Well, we are…’ she trailed off and looked around, there was no sign of Albert. ‘We are here on behalf of the Church of the Annunciation. We attend services for the mourning.’ Janey’s brows shot up, ‘Oh that little church up the road? That’s where they were married. Such a fun day. Wow you guys really keep tabs on everyone.’

‘Yes. Quite,’ responded Isabelle simply. ‘I think I may find my husband, he can get quite…’ The doorbell rang and Janey smiled roundly, ‘Hold that thought.’ She swept past and opened the door to a crowd of people that swallowed her and the cottage up in affection. Isabelle turned away and inspected the cutlery adorning the nearest plate of sandwiches.

The tiny cottage was thronged with commiserating waves of family and friends. More plates of sandwiches, whole chickens, bottles of wine, boxes of chocolates each carried by wide-armed strangers. Isabelle was quickly walled into the tiny kitchen. Albert was nowhere to be seen. After an hour of pointed politeness she had had enough. She pushed past through a group of mourners, out the back door and escaped down the side of the house.

The front door was now wide open and she re-entered, heading straight into the living room where mourners surrounded the open coffin. Her mouth dropped open when she made out Albert in the corner consoling the grieving Derek. With every sorrowful word that came heaving out of the bereaved, Albert gripped him even tighter. He nodded solemnly along with each bitter truth, his arm holding him against the depths of despair.

When Albert’s eyes fell on her open mouth he gave a little start. Derek looked taken by renewed loss as Albert offered his abrupt apologies and bowed out of the room. The only sound on the drive home came from the small motor of the wipers as they brushed specks of rain from the windscreen.

The next day was the Feast of the Immaculate Conception and Isabelle was waiting at the bottom of the stairs listening to the tock of the clock. Her eyes were burning a hole in the wallpaper and her heel was twisting a hole into the carpet when Albert descended right on time. The mass came and went with Isabelle offering sanctimonious smiles to the clergy, stern glares to the altar boys, and subtle side-eyed glances towards Albert. He looked burdened.

They spent the rest of the day attending three more masses for the Feast of the Immaculate Conception in a dignified silence. When they returned home that evening Albert headed straight into the garage. It was shortly after dawn that Isabelle heard him heading to bed. He walked in on her at the breakfast table and broke his silence,

‘I’ll be back in an hour.’ Isabelle stared shocked as the back of his coat whipped around the door. She could not remember the last time she had been alone in the house.

Two hours later she heard the door open and Albert shuffle into the garage. She remained sitting at the table, her breakfast now cold and coagulated. At the whirr of a drill, something snapped in Isabelle and she stormed into the hallway. Her knuckles rapped on the garage door, she paused, rapped again and entered. She froze where she stood and her face filled with purple venom,

‘FISH,’ she choked out.

‘Fish.’ replied Albert without facing away from his newly populated fish-filled tank. Isabelle held onto the door for support, swallowed her rage, and gazed around the room. Albert turned from his fish and looked back at her. He stood up slowly and sighed, it was time.

‘The car,’ she continued

‘Sold. Well. Given away.’

Her eyes drifted up and she looked at him slowly for the first time in almost a week. She staggered back and struggled to take in the stranger that now stood in front of her. His hair was ruffled, his clothes were dirty, and his hands were coarse. He was unrecognisable.

In the days that followed Isabelle did not bring up any of that morning’s events. She fulfilled her parishioner duties with a grim determination that deterred any would-be do-gooder asking after her or Albert personally. When Albert told her one day that he would no longer be volunteering in the parish sacristan committee it barely registered with her.

‘I eh, have asked the church to organise a lift for you for the services however. I believe Angela will be picking you up tomorrow at 11am.’

Days bled into weeks, and there was not a room or sound shared between them except for the faint babble of water from the freshly populated fish tanks that were filling the garage. On the third week she heard him whistling a jaunty tune.

Following one afternoon of pious ceremony, Angela drove Isabelle home, but when they pulled up outside the house she switched off the engine. Angela nervously cleared her throat,

‘Isabelle, Lord forgive me for asking, but how is Albert? He hasn’t been seen in almost two months.I mean when I was asked to buddy-up I thought something must be…?’ Isabelle let the silence hang in the air like a venomous snake. She continued to look ahead,

‘He’s dead,’ she finally let out. ‘He died in his sleep. I didn’t want to say anything.’ Angela burst into tears and offered Isabelle a tissue. Isabelle pushed it away and continued, ‘He didn’t want me to say anything, he had been sick for a long time. It was a release, if I am honest. He’s in a better place.’

Isabelle heard Fiona begin to cough and stutter up another syllable but Isabelle had heard enough. She left the car, shut the door, and floated up the path to her home. Inside her front door she pulled the curtains and fell into the plastic clad couch with relief. The muffled sounds of bubbles gurgled from another room and a thin smile crept across her face.