The Watchful Neighbour - Debbie Viggiano Page 0,21

didn’t understand. Instead she began laughing, nimbly hopping from one bare foot to the other, apparently dancing with delight.

Jade was starting to feel like she’d stepped into a weird movie and was halfway through a scene trying to work out the storyline. What the hell was going on? She didn’t have too much longer to find out.

Pounding footsteps distracted Jade’s attention from Mother. She turned to see Greg belting down the stairs. A bath towel was wrapped around his ample torso.

‘Oh no,’ he cried, eyes wide with horror. ‘Mother! Come back inside, dear!’

But Mother took no notice.

‘Please,’ he begged Jade. ‘She has dementia. She doesn’t understand. Get hold of her.’

But Jade wasn’t interested in Mother or doing Greg’s bidding. She stared at her neighbour, lips drawn back in a snarl that almost made her look feral.

‘Miss Ferguson, please,’ Greg implored. ‘Don’t let Mother go through the gate.’

Jade didn’t reply. She owed this man nothing. Why should she grab hold of his nutty mum? Let him go after her himself. She looked back at Mrs Good. Her wrinkled face was suffused with joy as she revelled in the sensation of rain pelting her face and body.

‘I’m asking you again, Miss Ferguson,’ said Greg urgently. ‘I’m not dressed.’ He indicated the bath towel. ‘I need help.’

‘Oh you need help all right,’ she spat.

Mrs Good was now walking towards the gate. A moment later and she’d slipped through, pausing briefly on the pavement as if to consider in which direction to go. Over the noise of the rain came another sound. That of an engine.

‘Oh no,’ said Greg, paling.

A car was now turning into Gresham Terrace, its windscreen wipers on full speed to aid visibility for the driver.

‘Mother, STOP!’

But Mrs Good was oblivious.

Greg finally realised that Jade wasn’t going to assist. Taking a deep breath, he barrelled past her, his bare feet momentarily slipping on the wet path. Righting himself, he clung on to his towel, reaching the gate just as Mother hovered on the edge of the kerb.

Jade froze, pinned to the spot by the sudden realisation that her obstinate refusal to respond to Greg’s pleas might result in an innocent driver mowing down a defenceless old lady. In the orange glow of overhead streetlight, Jade could now see the driver’s face. It was Dee Parker. Dee’s expression registered horror as Mrs Good stepped off the pavement directly in front of her vehicle.

The screech of brakes duetted with Greg’s yells as he hauled Mother back to the pavement in the nick of time.

For Jade, the ensuing commotion passed in a blur. She was aware of feeling shaky and nauseous as Dee assisted a distraught Greg and his doolally mother back to the safety of Number 2.

As the three of them passed a motionless Jade, she might as well have been invisible for all the notice they took of her. She stood there in the downpour, like a hovering spectre, while Mother’s perfume momentarily hung in the air like the rain-drenched roses on her pyjamas.

‘I was in the bath’ – Greg was explaining to Dee between sobs – ‘and Mother somehow opened the door. She can hardly feed herself, so how did she manage to do that? I’ll have to fit another lock. Higher up. Where she can’t reach. Thank goodness you’re a careful driver, Miss Parker, and have quick reflexes. The consequences could have been disastrous. It doesn’t bear thinking about.’

‘Don’t distress yourself, Mr Good,’ Dee was now saying, her tone soothing. ‘Would you like me to help you dry your mum and get her into some fresh nightclothes?’

‘Thank you,’ Greg sniffed.

He was now openly weeping, clearly shocked by the whole situation of what might have been.

‘You go and sort yourself out, Mr Good,’ said Dee as she guided Mother into the hallway. ‘I’ll see to your mum.’

‘You’re so kind.’

‘Do you need any other help,’ Jade heard Dee ask. ‘Are Social Services aware that you’re the sole carer for your mum?’

‘Yes,’ Greg replied. ‘But the alternative is a nursing home. I don’t have the funds for one of those and, even if I did, I wouldn’t want that. The staff…’ he trailed off. ‘Sometimes you read such horror stories.’

The door slammed shut and Jade was left standing alone on Greg’s footpath. A clap of thunder rolled through the sky. Seconds later Gresham Terrace was bathed in white light.

The brightness jolted Jade to her senses. Head down, she returned to Number 3. As she shook off her wet coat and dripped her way