Jessie
by Peter
Wakefield Kitcher
I’d met
Frank many years ago. I think it was at a
Remembrance Day service because we’d both
been wearing our medals. Anyway, we’d both
been in the Forces and had been in a lot of the
same places but not at the same time. We used to
meet fairly regularly after that although
sometimes I wished we didn’t. Our first
meetings were quite interesting as we reminisced
about places we’d been in during the war and
we had a lot of laughs. But then those sorts of
conversations faded away and we really had little
in common. One of the problems was that he had
few, if any, original ideas. He quoted others as
if their opinions about anything were always true
and I found out very quickly that there was no
point in arguing anyway since seldom did he have
any real facts.
Frank had never married but shared his house with
Jessie and his sister Margaret. Margaret was a
happy, bustling sort of person, very friendly,
and she always made me very welcome. I thought
that sometimes my visits gave her a little
respite from Frank. I often wondered how she put
up with him, and when he was in the middle of one
of his harangues, I’d see her shake her head
and cast her eyes up at the ceiling.
Jessie was really strange. She was quite old and
very shy. It was very difficult to make any
contact with her. I found it impossible and
finally had to give up. During the summer, for
example, she’d be sitting outside the house
when I arrived and she made no effort to greet me
or even to acknowledge my existence. Then I
remembered that fourteen years ago she’d had
that terrible experience when, with Frank’s
help, she’d managed to escape from the
dreadful fire that demolished the house where she
had been living. The old man in the house never
did get out and died and since Jessie seemed to
have nowhere to go, Frank and Margaret decided
that she could stay with them. This was one of
Frank’s better moments. I never knew her
before that but I always thought that the
experience had certainly affected her in some way.
As I said, I was getting a little annoyed with
Frank sometimes and was at the point of breaking
it all up when his life changed. My own life, as
well, for that matter. A couple of years ago
Margaret developed some rare disease that was not
treatable and she died quite quickly after a
short time in hospital.
This meant that I couldn’t just stop
visiting so I still went to see him and sometimes
we went for a drive when he didn’t talk so
much. I always felt very guilty when I didn’t
go because he didn’t go out very much on his
own. Jessie used to sit and look out of the
window and Frank used to ignore her. In my mind I
made up situations that would force Frank and
Jessie to make some contact but nothing ever
seemed feasible. I could never get closer to her
anyway.
Finally, something did happen but not anything I’d
ever considered in my wildest imagination. Frank
and Jessie had started out for a walk. They
shouldn’t have done, it was stupid, but once
Frank made up his mind about something there was
no stopping him. The snow was piled up and it was
slippery and then it happened.
I saw it all. I’d gone to visit them and had
just missed them as they were walking a short
distance up the road. Frank stepped into the road
when he shouldn’t have and slipped onto his
back. A car tried to miss him, skidded, hit
Jessie first and then just avoided running over
Frank but caught his leg.
I rushed over and dragged Frank from under the
car, and then he was gasping, “Where’s
Jessie? Where’s Jessie?” And he was
crying. Jessie wasn’t moving. She was
unconscious but at least she was alive. I ran
back to my car and, with Frank holding Jessie in
the back, I drove off to get some sort of medical
assistance. I suppose, thinking about it now, I
should probably have stayed there but I wasn’t
exactly thinking very much. In the back Frank was
talking away to Jessie but I could hardly hear
what he was saying through his tears. I thought
to myself, “What a way to make a contact
with somebody!”
A couple of days later I went round to see how
they were. I rang the bell and the door was
opened by a Mrs. Harrington who had done a lot of
cleaning for Frank after Margaret had died. She
was all smiles. “Have you come to see them?”
she said. “Be quiet, I’ve just looked
in and they’re both asleep. They’re
both together, downstairs.” I went into the
living room and there they were. Frank was in an
armchair with his leg in a cast propped up on
another chair. He was fast asleep. Jessie was
lying on the couch. Her eyes were shut. She’d
had a blanket over her but it had fallen to the
floor.
Mrs. Harrington said, “He looks so peaceful
lying there. He’s come through that accident
very well considering how old he is. And look at
Jessie, she had to have a little operation of
some sort and she can’t walk properly yet
but they say she’s going to be alright.
Frank never leaves her alone now and the way
Jessie looks at him you’d think she’d
fallen in love.”
Then I saw Jessie’s eyes half open and she
looked at me and then they opened a bit more and
it looked as though she really recognized me for
the first time. “Look!” said Mrs.
Harrington. “She knows you. Look at her tail.”
It gave a couple of thumps and then her eyes
really opened wide and the tail got really
excited.
I’ll never forget that moment when she
acknowledged that I was there and she knew me and
told me so. It’s lasted ever since.
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