Cover

1

About the Author

Paul Kitcatt was a bookseller and an English teacher before he was lured into the world of advertising.

He started as a copywriter, then became creative director and, in 2002, founded his own agency with three partners. It did well, with clients such as Waitrose, VSO, Lexus, the NSPCC, AXA, Virgin and the WWF.

Throughout his career, he continued to write – for clients, for the trade press and, when possible, for himself.

He left his agency in 2016 and wrote his first novel, We Care For You.

During his time in advertising, the digital revolution transformed his business and the entire industry, as it has everything, everywhere. Technology is changing the world, and us with it, and the journey has only just begun. Paul’s novel is about where it might take us next.

Paul is married with four children and lives in London.

2

To my mother, Audrey (1927–2015)

3

Dear Reader,

The book you are holding came about in a rather different way to most others. It was funded directly by readers through a new website: Unbound.

Unbound is the creation of three writers. We started the company because we believed there had to be a better deal for both writers and readers. On the Unbound website, authors share the ideas for the books they want to write directly with readers. If enough of you support the book by pledging for it in advance, we produce a beautifully bound special subscribers’ edition and distribute a regular edition and e-book wherever books are sold, in shops and online.

This new way of publishing is actually a very old idea (Samuel Johnson funded his dictionary this way). We’re just using the internet to build each writer a network of patrons. Here, at the back of this book, you’ll find the names of all the people who made it happen.

Publishing in this way means readers are no longer just passive consumers of the books they buy, and authors are free to write the books they really want. They get a much fairer return too – half the profits their books generate, rather than a tiny percentage of the cover price.

If you’re not yet a subscriber, we hope that you’ll want to join our publishing revolution and have your name listed in one of our books in the future. To get you started, here is a £5 discount on your first pledge. Just visit unbound.com, make your pledge and type WINIFRED17 in the promo code box when you check out.

Thank you for your support,

Dan, Justin and John
Founders, Unbound

4

Super Patrons

Vonnie Alexander
Caroline Beard
David Brown
Chris Cavell-Clarke
Chalice Croke
Nobby Davies
Lu Dixon
Kate Flather
Christie Jennings
Phil Keevill
Dan Kieran
Caroline Kitcatt
Mark Kitcatt
James Kitcatt
Ellie Kitcatt
Elizabeth Kitcatt
Cathy Kitcatt
Simon Kluge
Helen Ling
Richard Madden
Tania Mendes
John Mitchinson
Mo Morgan
Marc Nohr
Ben Parsons
Rob Pateman
Justin Pollard
Jill Richards
Simon Robinson
Margaux Sloan
Reannon Tapp
Tot Taylor
David Yates

5

With grateful thanks to Chalice Croke
and Kate Flather who helped to make this book happen

6

‘… he deserved no such return
From me, whom he created what I was
In that bright eminence…’

Milton, Paradise Lost

England, January 2022

John

At least the place doesn’t smell of piss. I’d expected it to. Instead it smells like the inside of an airing cupboard full of old blankets. The air feels denser than outside, but it must be my imagination. I don’t think that’s possible.

It’s hot. Like the reptile house at the zoo. Probably for the same reason. Old people need a lot of heat to get them moving. Then they move a leg forward, and stretch a tortoise neck out, look around, blink, then think better of it. Why bother? Stay put in the chair. Whatever they want will arrive eventually.

We sit in a silent and empty dining room, and I spoon food into my mother’s mouth. It’s mush, and if there was more gravy she could suck it through a straw. Baby food. She used to feed me like this once.

The walls are the beige of old people’s clothes. Covered with pictures everywhere – scenes of rural England, as it was in the imagined golden age. Fields without barbed wire or any rusting agricultural machinery in the corners. Happy rustic characters with rosy cheeks leading the good life. These pictures look like they came on a long roll, and were cut off to fit the space available.

And then there are abstract paintings, with big blocks of colour or paint scrubbed on hard with a manic brush. By local artists, I see, and donated to the home.

There are framed photo-montages, too, showing events from the younger days of the residents. Newspaper cuttings of children waiting to be evacuated, Chamberlain waving his piece of paper, RAF pilots sitting in the sunshine in armchairs, black airplanes arrowing though grey skies, crowds on seaside piers and promenades. The old queen, at various ages. All intended to keep memory alive, I suppose. Though you’d have to be, what – getting on for 100, to have any chance of remembering all that. But it’s our national memory, isn’t it? Not anyone’s in particular.

What about the mannequins lurking in odd corners, dressed in mismatched outfits assembled from clothes of different eras? They look like someone’s idea of the guests at a bohemian nightclub. One’s wearing nothing but a sporran over his absent genitals. What memories these are supposed to rekindle is anybody’s guess. More likely to inspire nightmares in the unmoored minds of the demented.

When my mother seems to have had enough, I sit back. She stays bent over, but after a while she twists her head and looks at me. Sort of. I have no idea what she can see. Her eyes packed up years ago. She has peripheral vision, that’s all.

Her gaze is unsettling. It’s how she looked at me when I was a child, and in trouble. I feel like I’ve let her down, again. Haven’t I? She’s in this place, looked after by strangers, and I don’t visit often. It seems pointless. She barely knows I’m there.

Now she’s trying to speak, and point. She raises a shaky finger and waves it towards me.

‘You know it’s true!’ she croaks.

‘What’s true?’

‘I know she’s difficult, but you must stick with her.’

‘Who, Mum?’

‘With Fiona, of course. Who else?’

Fiona. My sister-in-law. She thinks I’m my brother, Ben. He seldom comes, as he lives in Australia, but last time he must have told her something about his marriage, or she’s decided something about it. I could go along with this and see what else comes out. Better not though.

‘Mum, I’m John. You’re thinking about Ben. He’s not here. I am. John.’

She looks at me sceptically. As if I’m making it up.

Then she subsides back down into herself, and shrinks into her chair. She moans, and then the sound turns into a sigh and she looks like she’s asleep.

I gaze out of the window. There’s a tidy garden and a summerhouse. The trees are bare and their branches are whipping in the wind. Endless grey cloud presses down. Beyond the garden is an estate of little houses. My mother’s house was grand, with a large and beautiful garden, and she knew how to plant it to look good all year round. She wanted to stay there. But it wasn’t practical. Twice she nearly burnt it down. She was stuck there all day on her own, unable to walk anywhere, waiting.

The afternoon inches past. She wakes from time to time and speaks, or mumbles. Nothing makes much sense. Some of it’s addressed to me, some to my siblings, some to my dead father. She speaks to me as if I were a child, or about things from before I was born. She relives conversations from 70 years ago, as far as I can tell. Sometimes it resolves into momentary coherence, like a remote radio station.

‘The garden.’

‘What about it, Mum?’

‘Go and play. Don’t kick the ball into the beds. Mummy will be cross.’

She would be, too. She always was. It didn’t stop us. I say nothing.

‘He fell into the roses once. Off his bike. I pulled out the thorns with tweezers.’

‘That was me, Mum. John. I remember it well.’

‘Better than when she broke her front tooth though. And her arm. You weren’t taking care. I made you pay. You heard her screams.’

Dad – she must be talking about him. Or to him, in her mind.

‘Never much interested. Didn’t know how to talk to them. You were hopeless at any chatting. At the tennis club. With our friends. I knew you wanted to talk to me. You didn’t know how. I wasn’t going to help you. Told Winnie later and she laughed. They’re all hopeless at it. You have to help them.’

I imagine my father, tongue-tied and struggling. Trying to get her attention. Which she knew perfectly well, but she led him a merry dance. He courted her for years. And he hated social occasions. Parties. Dinners. They never had them. My mother would have, but she gave up in the face of his reluctance. Perhaps if she’d encouraged him, back then, when he was forced to make small talk and find things to say to the young woman he wanted to kiss, he would have found it less painful later, and would’ve been prepared to try with friends or even strangers. But she didn’t. She made him work hard for her. She laughed at him behind his back, with her always-laughing sister.

‘Where are my children? Are any of them coming? Do they know I’m here? Where is this place? Somebody needs to do something with that garden.’

‘I’m here, Mum. John. I’m with you.’

The light fades, and she fades with it. She’s asleep when the door opens, and one of the staff comes in. A short, round woman, with thin, black hair plastered to her scalp, flabby arms and a stained uniform. She turns on the light.

‘How’s your mother?’

‘She’s fine. She’s been talking on and off, but it’s all a bit rambling. She ate well enough though.’

‘That’s what we like to hear. She’s got a lot to say for herself, hasn’t she? I can’t understand all of it, but everything’s in there,’ she says, tapping her forehead.

Is it? Is every memory intact? I imagine her mind as a vast library, with a card index system, but the drawers have been pulled out and the cards spilt all over the floor. Worse still, many of the books have fallen to bits, or been eaten by worms, or destroyed by mould. It’s a wreck, a shambles, a hopeless muddle. I’m gripped with fear for my own mind.

The carer takes my mother’s hand and pats it.

‘Margaret? Margaret? Will you wake up for me? I need to get you ready for your supper.’

My mother groans, but doesn’t open her eyes.

‘OK,’ says the carer. ‘I’ll have to do it without your help.’

She turns to face me.

‘I’m going to need a hand. I can’t lift her on my own. Do you want to help? Or else I’ll go and get some of the others.’

I look at my mother. She’s tiny and frail, but lifting her would be hard on my back. And then what? Will the carer ask me to help while she cleans her? Involving some kind of adult nappy?

Feeding her like a baby is one thing. Changing her nappy is quite another. It’s at least 50 years since she changed mine. I’ve had enough of this role reversal.

‘I think I’d rather leave it to the experts, if you don’t mind.’

The carer stands for a moment, staring at me. I’m uncomfortable. I can feel a blush rising up my neck.

‘All right then,’ she says, and leaves the room in search of more useful people.

I take a last look at my mother. I could kiss her goodbye, but what’s the point? I turn away, and leave her for the carer to sort out. She knows what she’s doing.

All through the long drive home, I think about my mother’s life, and mine, and how I can avoid ending up like her.

Winifred

My name is Winifred.

Last week I started work at Evergreen Care Home, Dorking, Surrey.

We have been learning how to care for the elderly people who live there.

‘We’ means all of us who are new.

The people who used to work here have all left now, except for their manager. She is still here to reassure the relatives of the residents that everything will be done properly.

I’m not sure why they need to be reassured. Things are going to get much better for the residents now.

But it is true that all the relatives are middle-aged, and middle-aged people often find change unsettling.

This will also apply to our manager, though. She is called Janet Goodenough. She is an English woman aged 48. She has worked here for many years. I think the changes will be difficult for her.

She is 1m 58cm tall and weighs 80kg. This is too much for her height. I think she must have gained the weight recently because all her clothes are too small and squeeze her tight. She has not had time to buy new ones that fit, perhaps.

*

Today Stephen Jordan, the Chief Executive Officer of Eldercare, the company that now owns and runs Evergreen, is coming here with the Chief Scientific Officer, Angela Morton.

We have all met Dr Morton many times, of course. But we have only seen Mr Jordan from afar, and briefly. It will be interesting to meet him properly.

They are coming to address the relatives of the residents here. They have news for them.

They will be introducing us, the new team of carers. We are interested to see how they react.

We are different from the previous team of carers. We expect this will be welcomed by the relatives.

But we are not sure. They have placed their relatives – in almost all cases, their parents – here to be cared for, because they can’t do it themselves. They pay for this service. But they have contradictory feelings about it, we have been told.

They feel guilt, and relief, increased anxiety, reduced anxiety, satisfaction, dissatisfaction, happiness and unhappiness. Sometimes all at once. How is this possible? It is complicated, being human.

The problem perhaps is that care is something you are supposed to do for others out of a feeling of love. But if you pay someone else to do it, even though it may be logical, because they are better at it, you feel you have failed to do what you should.

*

I was stationed at the front door to greet relatives as they arrived. Mr Jordan had sent them a personal invitation to attend a reception at which wine and canapés would be served. Many had responded.

I detected some surprise at my appearance. I am 1m 70cm in height – a little above average but not abnormal for a UK woman of North European genetic origin. I have blue eyes and brown hair, and fair skin.

I think they looked surprised because of the contrast with the previous staff.

Many of them (the staff) suffered from obesity and skin conditions. They had low self-esteem and poor education, and many had chosen to colour their hair and tattoo their bodies.

The meaning and symbolism of their tattoos was obscure. A mixture of mythological and cultural sources seemed to have been involved.

The best word I have discovered to describe this is ‘hodge-podge’. Derived from Old French.

In addition, the staff spoke English with either a regional accent, or, if they had come from outside the UK, a foreign one. My accent is called RP.

I do not have tattoos, of course, and my hair is the colour it was made. My personality is as follows: enthusiastic, committed, competent, calm under pressure, friendly, curious, outgoing and empathetic.

All of which may account for the relatives’ reactions. I greeted them with a smile and showed them where to go for the reception with Mr Jordan and Dr Morton. They all thanked me but many seemed shy and awkward.

One of the last to arrive was John Woodruff, son of Margaret, who is to be one of my primary responsibilities, if he consents. He too seemed surprised to meet me, but he responded well and I judged him to be pleased with my appearance and demeanour.

All the relatives assembled in the central atrium of the home. We had arranged chairs in rows facing a lectern, and a screen onto which Mr Jordan could project images.

I stood with my fellow carers at the back of the room and we all watched.

First, the relatives did not immediately sit down. Instead they stood around in small groups conversing. They did not appear at ease.

Second, they were all given a drink. They could choose wine, water or orange juice. Almost all of them chose wine. We thought it was to make them feel at ease.

They all took one glass, apart from Mr Woodruff, who took two. He drank one quickly and then sipped the second. He did not join any of the groups, but stood apart. A waiter came into the room with a tray of small items of food, and Mr Woodruff moved towards it. The food seemed unexpected to him. I identified smoked salmon on rye bread, caviar on blinis and quails’ eggs.

At this moment Mr Jordan and Dr Morton came into the room. The guests turned to look at them, and all seemed once again surprised.

I have not met the previous owners of this care home. I think perhaps they did not look like Mr Jordan and Dr Morton. Mr Jordan models his appearance on certain film stars. His teeth are brilliant white and his skin light orange. His hair is swept back from his face but the effect is diminished by its thinness on the top of his head. He wore a light grey suit and tie. The suit was all wool and the tie silk. His clothes fitted as if made for him. His shoes too.

None of the guests was wearing a suit, though some wore ties. The fabric of their clothes included varying quantities of man-made fibres. None of their clothes fitted as well as his. The colours of Mr Jordan’s clothes were harmonious, but this could not be said for the guests.

However, it was not Mr Jordan who had the most powerful effect on the guests. It was Dr Morton. She is a brilliant scientist, and her work will make her famous throughout the world, we believe.

She is unlike Janet Goodenough, whom I have described already. Dr Morton is the same age, but taller, measuring 1m 80cm. Yet she weighs less, at 70kg. Her hair is blonde and her eyes are blue.

Her clothes were also of silk and wool, apart from her stockings, which were nylon. They fitted her, and her physique is good.

Compared to other women, Dr Morton is extremely beautiful. Mr Jordan is shorter than her, and though good looking he is not in the same category.

The guests spent some time looking at her. The male guests continued for longer than the female. They were paying particular attention to her secondary sexual characteristics.

It’s not clear why. Dr Morton is unlikely to be sexually available to any of them. We know people tend to find sexual partners with whom they correlate in terms of physical appearance, educational attainments, financial and social status. A deficiency in one or other measure can be compensated for by an excess in another. However, none of the male guests present in the room were going to meet Dr Morton’s sexual requirements.

Nevertheless, they all continued to gaze at her. Some of the males who were accompanied by their wives received discreet reprimands, verbal or physical.

Mr Jordan asked them to sit, which they did. None sat in the front row, apart from Mr Woodruff. They all sat quietly, clutching their glasses, staring at Mr Jordan and Dr Morton. They looked suspicious of them, we all agreed.

Mr Jordan must have noticed this, and he gave them a big smile. It made no difference. Then he started to speak.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, first of all, thank you. Thank you for coming, and thank you for placing your loved ones in our care. Of course, you put them in the care of our predecessors here. And you chose well. This was a good care home. One of the best.

‘But how good was that? The care of the elderly is a big issue. More of us are living longer lives. More go past one hundred than ever before. Once upon a time, people seldom made it past seventy. Their families could take care of them for the short period of their old age. Not anymore. Care homes like this one provide an essential service. You all know this.

‘But I bet each of you, at some time or another, has looked at life in this care home and thought, I hope I don’t end up here.’

Some of the audience shifted in their seats at this remark, and one or two made a noise, but not loudly.

‘Please don’t get angry. My own mother was in a care home. A pretty good one. But I had that thought. It’s natural. Because even the best care home isn’t good enough.

‘Our loved ones deserve better. And Eldercare was set up to provide it. I’ve been successful in business, and I want to use my success to do something to change the world. I’m in my fifties now. And I’m going to transform the care of old people here in this country, and all over the world. For selfish reasons, if you like. Because by the time I hit seventy, I want care homes to be like five-star hotels. And I want old people to have such a good time, they’re envied by the young. I want us all to look at our loved ones in their care homes, and think, I hope I do end up there.

‘A ridiculous dream? Maybe. Let me show you how we’re going to do it. It starts right here, in our first Eldercare home. If you agree. We’re going to bring in a new kind of carer, but they’ll only work with your loved ones if you consent. Because they’re a bit different. Let me introduce one of them. Winifred? Can you step up here?’

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