SEPTEMBER 1941

It’s autumn. I’ve been here two years now. I’ve resigned myself to the fact that I won’t ever like it. But at least I don’t pretend. Len knows how I feel. He also knows how I feel about the war. I hate the ‘Wings for Victory’ and ‘Salute the Soldiers’ weeks. I’m just waiting for it all to end and then I’ll be off. Today I asked Len about his parents. He’s usually reluctant to talk about them, but for some reason he rested down his cup on the kitchen table and began to speak. But he didn’t look me in the eyes as he did so. He talked for a good while, in fact until I thought he might cry. But he didn’t. He was quiet for a while, and then he simply stood up and went out. I knew then that we’d never really been married. We didn’t know each other. We didn’t trust each other. Later on, he came in drunk and talking nonsense. He told me that he thought Hitler looked like a hysterical lavatory brush. And that because Russia was the only country to stand up to Hitler, maybe their system was right. I expect he heard this rubbish in the pub. He slumped against me as I helped him up the stairs to bed.