"I Believe"

The rain had come and gone twice already that morning, leaving the pavements shining like tin lids. The clouds were moving fast; white and grey in long strips. The kind of April sky that made you keep your coat on even when the sun came out.

Helen stood outside the house on Eastern Road, the old Victorian villa now chopped into flats, its front steps worn smooth by decades of feet. She had her shopping bag hooked over one arm, waiting for her daughter to finish tying her shoelace. The girl was nine, thin as a reed, hair plaited tight, cardigan buttoned all the way up because: it’s not summer yet, no matter what you think.

“Come on, Nora,” Helen said. “I want to get to the market before the rush.”

“I am coming,” Nora said, though she wasn’t. She was humming again — that song everyone was humming — the one the wireless kept playing.

Helen closed her eyes briefly. “Not that tune again.”

“I wasn’t singing it.”

“You were humming it.”

“It’s not the same.”

“It is.”

They set off toward the station, the wind pushing at them from the side. A number 86 bus growled past the top of the road. A man in a flat cap shouted something at the driver, though the words were lost in the rising noise.

Nora skipped ahead and rounded the corner, landing in the shallow puddles left by the earlier shower. “Mum,” she called, “did you see the flags in the Co‑op window? They’ve got a big picture of the Queen.”

“I saw.”

“Are we getting anything for the Coronation?”

“We’ll see.”

“You always say that.”

“And it’s always true.”

They turned right at the top of South Street, dodging a pram and a woman carrying a bag of potatoes. The market was already busy: stallholders shouting prices, the smell of fish and damp cardboard, the clatter of crates being shifted. A wireless played faintly from inside the tea stall, the Light Programme drifting through the steam. Frankie Laine’s voice came through muffled, competing with the hiss of the tea urn.

I believe…

Nora stopped walking. “It’s on again.”

“So it is,” Helen said, not stopping.

“Do you like it?”

“It’s all right.”

“You don’t like it.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You said it like you don’t.”

Helen turned to her. “I said it’s all right. Now keep up.”

They moved through the crowd. A gust of wind lifted the corner of a tarpaulin, sending a spray of cold water across the path. Nora squealed and jumped back. Helen didn’t; she was already looking at the greengrocer’s stall, calculating prices in her head.

“Two pounds of carrots,” she said. “And a cabbage.”

The greengrocer nodded, weighing them out. “Weather can’t make its mind up,” he said. “Had hail in Hornchurch this morning.”

“Wouldn’t surprise me.”

Nora wandered to the edge of the stall, watching a boy her age trying to balance on the kerb. He wobbled, arms out, then hopped down when he saw her looking.

“You from them flats on Eastern Road?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“My aunt lives there. Says you can hear everything through the walls.”

“You can.”

“What floor you on?”

“Middle.”

He nodded like that meant something. “I’m Alan.”

“Nora.”

He kicked at a bit of gravel. “You going to Saturday morning pictures? They’ve got that Hopalong Cassidy one on. Tanner to get in.”

“I don’t know.”

“You should. It’s good.”

Helen called her name. Nora turned. “I have to go.”

Alan shrugged. “See you then.”

They walked back toward the station, the sky brightening again. A woman passed them clutching a box of Black Magic as if it were a prize from Have A Go. Another woman was talking loudly about Coronation bunting being sold out already.

As they turned the corner into their road, Nora tugged at her mother’s sleeve. “Mum?”

“Yes?”

“Do you believe things?”

“What sort of things?”

“Just… things.”

Helen looked down at her daughter; at the earnestness in her face, at the cardigan buttoned wrong at the top. “I believe,” she said slowly, “that we’ve got to get home before it rains again.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know.”

They reached the house. The wind had picked up again, rattling the iron railings. Someone upstairs was airing a blanket out of the sash window. A baby was crying somewhere behind a thin wall.

Nora started humming the tune again, quietly this time. Helen didn’t tell her to stop. Not because she liked it, but because the sky was darkening again, the air smelled of another shower coming and some things weren’t worth the breath.