WHAT WAS THE SONG? Mary couldn’t quite remember. It was one of Mr Pepper’s classics, certainly. A ballad. Possibly You Are My Sunshine? What did it matter; the point was the voice. Not Mr Pepper’s – she knew what he sounded like well enough, being one of Easterlea Rest Home’s regular afternoon entertainers. No, this voice was new, and belonged to a man who had sat down in the chair next to her and started to sing along. She was so stunned – by the way his voice seemed to pour out of him, by its fierce clarity and defiance of age – that she turned to stare.
The man winked at her. Cheeky bugger, thought Mary.
It’s not entirely clear when this was. Two years ago, maybe three? Timings, the order of things, time in general, can be confusing. But there are some things we know for sure. Mary is Mary Turrell, nearly 80 years old. She had been living at Easterlea Rest Home in Denmead, near Ports-mouth, in England, for a little while, when the man with the voice arrived. And his name was Derek Brown.
It’s funny, what sticks in the memory. The crystalline moments, mostly from childhood. Like building a telescope with her older brother, Ian. Or hiding in a bombed-out crater in the woods. Or having whooping cough, and the feeling of the crusty sore that developed on her upper lip. Her mother told her not to pick it, but it was so tempting.
Aged five, at primary school in Norbury, south London, Mary started winning races against the boys. When she was seven, a woman turned up on the doorstep, summoned Mary’s mother and said, “ Your daughter’s a bully.” Mary had bashed the woman’s son in the head with a netball in a string bag. One of the string knots must have got him hard in the forehead, as a chunk had been gouged out. Well, the boy had been picking on Ian. She wasn’t going to let it lie.
Mary wanted to run faster. Her father told her to join an athletics club, and Mary wondered if she was brave enough to take the bus on her own. She was. They served hot Ribena at the club. It wasn’t long
